Changes

|If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him.

|If ye had known me, ye should have known my Father also: and from henceforth ye know him, and have seen him.

|If you have known me, you shall know my Father also. From now on you know Him, and you shall see Him.

|If you have known me, you shall know my Father also. From now on you know Him, and you shall see Him.

|The tense changes in this sentence can be dizzying. The first clause is perfect (past completed), which indicates something that happened in the past, and is an established thing now in the present. The second clause is future, indicating a promise that is not quite here yet. The third clause is present, showing what is going on right now, and the fourth clause goes back to future, indicating another promise for some day later. By using "had" in the first clause, the KJV makes that a statement of doubt (if you HAD known me - maybe you don't), where the perfect tense doesn't actually put that negative implication in the clause.

|The tense changes in this sentence can be dizzying. The first clause is perfect (past completed), which indicates something that happened in the past, and is an established thing now in the present. The second clause is future, indicating a guaranteed promise. The third clause is present, showing what is going on right now, and the fourth clause goes back to future, indicating another promise for some day later. By translating the first clause "if you had known me," the KJV almost makes this a contrafactual conditional (a conditional statement in which the first clause is ASSUMED to be false, therefore the second one did not happen). Since that is NOT this construction, that is not a particularly good translation.

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