The great similitude, or rather sameness, both of spirit and expression, which runs through St. John's Gospel and all his epistles, is a clear evidence of their being written by the same person. In this epistle he speaks not to any particular church, but to all the Christians of that age; and in them to the whole Christian church in all succeeding ages.
Some have apprehended that it is not easy to discern the scope and method of this epistle. But if we examine it with simplicity, these may readily be discovered. St. John in this letter, or rather tract, (for he was present with part of those to whom he wrote,) has this apparent aim, to confirm the happy and holy communion of the faithful with God and Christ, by describing the marks of that blessed state.
In the preface he shows the authority of his own preaching and writing, and expressly points out, 1 John 1:3, the design of his present writing. To the preface exactly answers the conclusion, more largely explaining the same design, and recapitulating those marks, by we know thrice repeated, 1 John 5:18-20.
2. Of communion with the Son, 1 John 2:1-12 With a distinct application to fathers, young men, and little children, 13-27 Whereto is annexed an exhortation to abide in him, 28-1 John 3:1-24 That the fruit of his manifestation in the flesh may extend to his manifestation in glory.
3. Of the confirmation and fruit of this abiding through the Spirit, 1 John 4:1-21
II. Conjointly, Of the testimony of the Father, and Son, and Spirit: on which faith in Christ, the being born of God, love to God and his children, the keeping his commandments and victory over the world, are founded, 1 John 5:1-12
The parts frequently begin and end alike. Sometimes there is an allusion in a preceding part, and a recapitulation in the subsequent. Each part treats of a benefit from God, and the duty of the faithful derived therefrom by the most natural inferences.
Adam Clarke
Preface to the First Epistle of John.
CLA_1JO.PDF, source PDF p. 3
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN.
AS the author of this epistle is the same who wrote the gospel, I need not detain the reader with any particulars of his life, having taken up the subject pretty much at large in my preface to his gospel, to which I must refer for that species of information.
Two questions have been urged relative to this epistle, which are very difficult to be solved: 1. When was it written? 2. To whom was it sent? The precise year it is impossible to determine; but it was probably written before the destruction of Jerusalem; and perhaps about the year 68 or 69, though some think not before 80. The second question Michaelis answers thus:—
“This question is still more difficult to decide than the preceding. In the Latin version it was formerly called The Epistle of St. John to the Parthians; and this title was adopted by some of the ancient fathers, and in modern times has been defended by Grotius. But if St. John had intended this epistle for the use of the Parthians, he would hardly have written it in Greek, but would have used either the language of the country, or, if he was unacquainted with it, would have written at least in Syriac, which was the language of the learned in the Parthian empire, and especially of the Christians. We know, from the history of Manes, that even the learned in that country were for the most part unacquainted with the Greek language; for to Manes, though he united literature with genius, his adversaries objected that he understood only the barbarous Syriac. That a Grecian book would not have been understood in the Parthian empire, appears from what Josephus says in the preface to his History of the Jewish War, where he declares that a work intended for Parthian Jews must be written, not in Greek, but Hebrew. However, it is worth while to examine whence the superscription ‘ad Parthos’ took its rise. Whiston conjectures that an ancient Greek superscription of this epistle was προς παρθενους, (to virgins,) because this epistle is chiefly addressed to uncorrupted Christians, and that this title was falsely copied προς παρθαυς, whence was derived the Latin superscription, ‘ad Parthos.’ But this conjecture is without foundation; for since the faithful are not called in a single instance throughout the whole epistle by the name of παρθενους, it is very improbable that the title προς παρθενους was ever affixed to it. I would rather suppose, therefore, that the frequent use in this epistle of the words ‘light’ and ‘darkness,’ which occur in the Persian philosophy, and on the same occasions as those on which St. John has used them, gave rise to the opinion that St. John wrote it with a view of correcting the abuses of the Persian philosophy; whence it was inferred that he designed it for the use of the Christians in the Parthian empire. That St. John really designed his epistle as a warning to those Christians who were in danger of being infected with Zoroastrian principles, is very probable, though the language of the epistle will not permit us to place St. John’s readers in a country to the east of the Euphrates.
“LAMPE, who appeals to Theodoret, contends that it, was not designed for any particular community, but that it was written for the use of Christians of every denomination; and this is really the most probable opinions since the epistle contains no reference to any individual Church. The only difficulty attending this opinion lies in the name ‘epistle,’ because the frequent use in an epistle of the terms ‘light and darkness,’ taken in the Persian sense of these words, seems to imply that it was written to persons of a particular description. But if we call it a treatise, this difficulty will cease; and in fact, the name ‘epistle’ is improperly applied to it, since it has nothing which entitles it to this appellation. It does not begin with the salutation which is used in Greek epistles, and with which St. John himself begins his two last epistles; nor does it contain any salutations, though they are found in almost all the epistles of the apostles. It is true that St. John addresses his readers in the second person; but this mode of writing is frequently adopted in books, and especially in prefaces: for instance, in Wolfe’s Elements of Mathematics, the reader is addressed throughout in the second person, I therefore consider that which is commonly called the First Epistle of St. John as a book or treatise, in which the apostle declared to the whole world his disapprobation of the doctrines maintained by Cerinthus and the Gnostics. However, as I do not think it worth while to dispute about words, I have retained the usual title, and have called it the First Epistle of St. John.
“That the design of this epistle was to combat the doctrine delivered by certain false teachers, appears from 1 John 2:18-26; 1 John 3:7; 4:1-3: and what this false doctrine was may be inferred from the counter doctrine delivered by St. John, 1 John 5:1-6. The apostle here asserts that Jesus is the Christ,’ and that he was the Christ, ‘not by water only, but by water and blood.’ Now these words, which are not in themselves very intelligible, become perfectly clear if we consider them as opposed to the doctrine of Cerinthus, who asserted that Jesus was by birth a mere man; but that the Æon, Christ, descended on him at his baptism, and left him before his death. But if what St. John says, 1 John 5:1-6, was opposed to Cerinthus, the Antichrists of whom he speaks, 1 John 2:18, 19, and who, according to 1 John 2:22, denied that Jesus was the Christ, as also the false prophets, mentioned 1 John 4:1, 3, must be Cerinthians, or at least Gnostics. That they were neither Jews nor heathens may be inferred from 1 John 2:19, where St. John says, ‘They went out from us.’ Farther, he describes them, 1 John 2:18, as persons who had lately appeared in the world. But this description suits neither Jews nor heathens, who, when this epistle was written, had not lately begun to deny that Jesus was the Christ. Lastly, in the same verse, he describes them as tokens of the last time, saying, ‘As ye have heard that Antichrist shall come, even now there are many Antichrists, whereby we know that it is the last time.’ But this inference could not be drawn from the refusal of the Jews to acknowledge that Jesus was the Messiah. Now, as soon as we perceive that the position, ‘Jesus is the Christ,’ is a counter position against Cerinthus, we may infer, as I have already observed, that the Antichrists who denied that Jesus was the Christ, or who denied that Christ had appeared in the flesh, were Cerinthians; or perhaps the latter were Docetes. It is, therefore, highly probable that the whole epistle, which in various places discovers an opposition to false teachers, was written against Cerinthians, or at least against Gnostics and Magi. A proposition can never be completely understood, unless we know the author’s design in delivering it. For instance, ‘God is light, and in him is no darkness,’ appears to contain a tautology, if we consider it as a detached dogma; and if it be considered as an admonitory proposition, it may be thought to contain a severe reproof; but if we regard it in a polemical view, it will present itself under a very different form. This epistle abounds with exhortations; but no man who wishes to understand it will be satisfied without asking the following questions: Why did St. John give these admonitions? Why has he so frequently repeated them? Why has he admonished, if he thought admonition necessary, merely in general terms, to holiness and brotherly love? And why has he not sometimes descended to particulars, as other apostles have done? An answer to these questions will throw great light on the epistle; and this light I will endeavour to procure for the reader, by pointing out the several propositions which, in my opinion, are laid down in opposition to Gnostic errors.
“1. In the first chapter the four first verses are opposed to the following assertion of the Gnostics: ‘That the apostles did not deliver the doctrine of Jesus as they had received it, but made additions to it, especially in the commandments which were termed legal; whereof they themselves (the Gnostics) retained the genuine and uncorrupted mystery.’ St. John therefore says: ‘That he declared that which was from the beginning, which he himself had seen and heard;’ that is, that he taught the doctrine of Christ as it was originally delivered, as he had heard it from Christ’s own mouth, whose person he had seen and felt; and that he made no additions of his own, but only reported as a faithful witness. In like manner he appeals, 1 John 2:13, 14, to the elder Christians, whom he calls fathers, ‘because they knew him who was from the beginning;’ that is, because they knew how Christ had taught from the beginning; and 1 John 2:24, he says: ‘Let that abide in you which ye have heard from the beginning.’ Farther he says, 1 John 2:7: ‘Brethren, I write no new commandment unto you, but an old commandment, which ye had from the beginning.’ In the next verse he adds: ‘Again a new commandment I write unto you, which thing is true in him and in you, because the darkness is past, and the light now shineth.’ Now Christ himself had given his disciples a commandment which he called a new commandment, and this was, ‘that they should love one another.’ The term ‘new commandment,’ therefore, St. John borrowed from Christ; but in the present instance he appears to have applied it to a different subject, because the special command which Christ gave to his disciples, that they should love one another, and which he called a new commandment, could not well be called an old commandment, being very different from the general commandment, that we should love our neighbour. St. John, therefore, very probably meant that the commandment of love and sanctification was no new commandment, as the Gnostics contended, but the old commandment which the Christians had heard from the beginning. It was, indeed, become a new commandment, in consequence of the false doctrines which then prevailed; or rather, it appeared to be so, because the Gnostics had endeavoured to banish it from their system of theology. But whether a new or an old commandment, St. John thought proper to enforce it. “2. The Gnostics, who contended that those commandments which were legal were not given by Christ, but were added by the apostles without his authority, counteracted, by so doing, the whole doctrine of sanctification. St. John, therefore, devotes the greatest part of his epistle to the confirmation and enforcement of this doctrine. In 1 John 1:5, 7, he asserts, as a principal part of the message which he had heard from Christ, that no one who does not walk in the light has fellowship with God. In the three following verses he limits this proposition in such a manner as was necessary in arguing with an adversary; and 1 John 2:1, 2, he removes the objection, that, according to his doctrine, a Christian who was guilty of wilful sins lost thereby all hopes of salvation. He then maintains, 1 John 2:3-5, and apparently in allusion to the word γνωσις, knowledge, the favourite term of the Gnostics, that he who boasted of profound knowledge, and at the same time rejected the commandments of Christ, had not a real but only a pretended knowledge; and that in him only the love of God is perfected, τετελειωται, who keeps God’s word. The expression τετελειωται is a term which was used in the schools of the philosophers, and applied to the scholars called esoterici, who had made a considerable progress in the inner school. Now the Gnostics were, in their own opinion, scholars of this description; but since they, whose imaginary system of theology annuls the commands of God, are so far from being perfect that they are not even beginners in the science, St. John very properly refuses to admit their pretensions, and opposes to them others who were perfect in a different way, and who were more justly entitled to the appellation. With respect to the expressions, ‘keeping the commandments of God,’ or ‘not keeping his commandments,’ it must be observed that, when used in a polemical work, they denote, not merely the observance or violation of God’s commands in our own practice, but the teaching of others that they are to be observed or rejected. What St. John says, 1 John 2:7, 8, has been already explained in the preceding paragraph.
“The whole of the third chapter, and part of the fourth, is devoted to the doctrine of sanctification, on which I have to make the following remarks. When St. John says, 1 John 3:7, ‘Let no man deceive you; he who doeth righteousness is righteous,’ he probably intends, not merely to deliver a precept, but to oppose the doctrine of those who asserted that a man, though he sinned, might be righteous in respect to his spiritual soul, because sin proceeded only from the material body. A similar observation may be applied to 1 John 3:4: ‘Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law;’ which, considered by itself, appears to be an identical proposition; but when considered as an assertion opposed to the Gnostics, it is far from being superfluous, because, evident as it appears to be, they virtually denied it. From the passage above quoted from the works of Irenæus, we have seen that they rejected the legal commandments as parts of the Christian religion which were not warranted by the authority of Christ; consequently, they denied that sin was a transgression of the law. Farther, it was consistent with their principles to regard sins as diseases; for they believed in a metempsychosis, and imagined that the souls of men were confined in their present bodies as in a prison, and as a punishment for having offended in the region above. According to this system, the violent and irregular passions of anger, hatred, &c., were tortures for the soul; they were diseases, but not punishable transgressions of the law. I will not assert that all who believed in a transmigration of souls argued in this manner, but some of them certainly did so; and against these it was not superfluous to write, ‘Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law, for sin is the transgression of the law.’
“The love of the brethren, which St. John enforced as a chief commandment, is generally understood of that special love which Christ commanded his disciples to have towards each other. But I rather think that St. John means the love of our neighbour in general, which Christ commanded, as comprehending the half of the law; for this general love St. John might very properly call the love of our brother, since God has created us all, and is our common Father. Besides, as St. John calls Cain, Abel’s brother, he could not intend to signify by this term a person of the same religious sentiments. Nor would it have been consistent with candour to have censured the Gnostics for not having Christian brotherly love towards St. John and other true believers, for in this particular sense they were not brethren; and St. John himself, in his second epistle, 2 John 1:10, forbids the exercise of Christian brotherly love towards those who teach false doctrines. I believe, therefore, that the brotherly love of which St. John speaks in the third chapter of this epistle, is not confined to that special love which we owe to those who are allied to us by religion, but denotes the love of our neighbour in general. Nor do I except even 1 John 3:16, where some think that St. John would require too much, if he meant brotherly love in general, or charity toward all men. But are there not certain cases in which it is our duty to hazard and even sacrifice our lives, in order to rescue our neighbour! Is not this duty performed by the soldier? And is it not performed by him who visits those who are infected with contagious diseases? It is true that this is not a duty which every man owes in all cases to his neighbour; but then, on the other hand, is it not a duty which every man owes to his spiritual brother? Nor was it St. John’s design so much to enforce this duty, and to recommend the exercise of it, as to argue from the acknowledgment of this duty in certain cases, to the necessity of performing the less painful duty of supporting our brethren in distress, by a participation of our temporal possessions. But though I believe that in the third chapter St. John speaks of the love of our neighbour in general, I do not mean to affirm that he nowhere understands that special love which Christians owe one to another, of which we meet with an instance in 1 John 5:1, 2.
“With respect to the moral conduct of the Gnostics, against whom St. John wrote, we may infer, therefore, that the apostle found more reason to censure them for their want of charity toward their neighbours, than for dissoluteness or debauchery. This want of charity they probably displayed by a hatred of the true believers.
“What St. John says, 1 John 5:3, that ‘God’s commandments are not grievous,’ appears in the clearest light when we consider it as opposed to the Gnostics, to whom the Divine commandments, as delivered by the apostles, appeared to be too legal.
“St. John declares, 1 John 1:5, as the message which he had heard from Christ, that ‘God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.’ Now if this proposition had been then as generally admitted as it is at present, there could have been no necessity for declaring it at the very beginning of the epistle, with so much energy, to be the grand message of Christ. We may reasonably infer, therefore, that it was opposed to certain persons who delivered a contrary doctrine. Farther, the words ‘light’ and ‘darkness,’ which are here applied to the Deity in a manner which is not usual in the Bible, remind us of the technical terms used by the Persian Magi, and afterwards by the Manicheans. It is true that in the Bible we meet with the expressions ‘works of the light,’ ‘children of the light,’ ‘to walk in the light,’ and others of the same kind; but in these instances the term ‘light’ is not synonymous with ‘holiness;’ works of the light denoting nothing more than works which no man need be ashamed to perform openly, and in the face of the whole world. This explanation of the word ‘light’ is inapplicable in the proposition ‘God is light;’ because there would be an impropriety in representing God either as fearing or not fearing to act in the face of the whole world. St. John, therefore, uses the term ‘light’ as equivalent to holiness.
“Now, the Gnostics admitted that the supreme Being was perfectly holy and pure light; but they denied that the supreme Being was the God whom the Jews and the Christians worshipped. For the Jews and the Christians worshipped the Creator of the world; and the Gnostics asserted that the Creator of the world was either a spirit of darkness, or, if he was a spirit of light, that he was not free from darkness.
“From 1 John 2:23, where St. John says, that ‘he who denies the Son, rejects also the Father,’ it appears that his adversaries did not deny the Father in positive terms, since the apostle argues only that they virtually did so by denying the Son. Now, the Gnostics did not positively deny the Father of Christ, whom they allowed to be the supreme Being, but then they did not allow that he was the Creator. The terms, therefore, ‘God’ and the ‘Father of Christ,’ though they denote in reality the same person, must not be considered as having precisely the same import; since the adversaries of St. John admitted that the Father of Christ was the supreme Being, and pure light; but denied that the Creator, who is in fact God, was light without darkness.
“4. In some places, especially 1 John 4:2, 3, St. John opposes false teachers of another description, namely, those who denied that Christ was come in the flesh. Now they who denied this were not Cerinthians, but another kind of Gnostics, called Docetes. For as, on the one hand, Cerinthus maintained that Jesus was a mere and therefore real man, the Docetes on the other hand contended that he was an incorporeal phantom, in which the Æon, Christ, or Divine nature, presented itself to mankind. 1 John 1:1: ‘Our hands have handled,’ appears likewise to be opposed to this error of the Docetes.
“The doctrines which St. John has delivered in this epistle he has not supported, either by arguments drawn from reason, or by quotations from the Old Testament; for neither of them are necessary, since the bare assertion of an apostle of Christ is sufficient authority. It is true that, in one respect, this epistle has less energy than St. John’s gospel, because in his gospel he warrants his doctrines by the speeches of Christ. But then, on the other hand, St. John declares in this epistle, 1 John 3:24; 4:4; 5:14, 16, that God sent his Spirit to the apostolic Church, and heard their prayers. And it is evident that St. John alludes to the extraordinary gifts of the Holy Ghost, and to the miraculous powers obtained by prayer. “The close of this epistle, ‘Keep yourselves from idols,’ has no immediate connection with the preceding discourse. I am therefore in doubt whether St; John meant to warn his readers against taking part in heathen sacrifices, which was allowed by these Gnostics, who are called Nicolaitans in the Apocalypse; or whether he meant to describe the system of the Gnostics in general as a system of idolatry, which in fact it was.”
Dr. Macknight has some judicious observations on the authenticity of this epistle, from the similarity of the style to that of the gospel of John. “The authenticity of any ancient writing is established, first, by the testimony of contemporary and succeeding authors, whose works have come down to us, and who speak of that writing as known to be the work of the person whose name it bears. Secondly, by the suitableness of the things contained in such writing to the character and circumstances of its supposed author, and by the similarity of its style to the style of the other acknowledged writings of that author. The former of these proofs is called the external evidence of the authenticity of a writing; The latter, its internal evidence. When these two kinds of evidence are found accompanying any writing, they render its genuineness indubitable. “The external evidence of the authenticity of John’s first epistle has been amply detailed by Dr. Lardner, who shows that the earliest and best Christian writers have all, with one consent, and without any hesitation, ascribed the first epistle to him. And their testimony is confirmed by this circumstance, that the Syriac translator, who omitted the Second Epistle of Peter, the Second and Third Epistles of John, and the Epistle of Jude, because some doubts were entertained concerning them in the first age, or perhaps because they had not come to his knowledge, has translated John’s first epistle, as an apostolical writing of which there never was any doubt in that or in any other Christian Church.
“In this preface, therefore, we shall state the internal evidence of the authenticity of John’s first epistle, by showing, first, that, in respect of its matter, and, secondly, in respect of its style, it is perfectly suitable to the character and circumstances of its supposed author. In respect of the matter or subject of the epistle under consideration, the writer of it has discovered himself to be John the apostle, by introducing a number of sentiments and expressions found in the gospel, which all Christians from the beginning have acknowledged to be the work of John the apostle. EPISTLE. GOSPEL
“From the above comparison of the first epistle of John with his gospel, there appears such an exact agreement of sentiment in the two writings, that no reader who is capable of discerning what is peculiar in an author’s turn of thinking, can entertain the least doubt of their being the productions of one and the same writer. Farther, since John has not mentioned his own name in his gospel, the want of his name in the epistle is no proof that it was not written by him; but rather a presumption that it is his; especially as he has sufficiently discovered himself to be an apostle, by affirming, in the beginning of the epistle, that he was an eye and an ear witness of the things he has written concerning the living word.
“The style of this epistle being the same with the style of the gospel of John, it is, by that internal mark likewise, denoted to be his writing. In his gospel, John does not content himself with simply affirming or denying a thing; but, to strengthen his affirmation, he denies the contrary. In like manner, to strengthen his denial of a thing, he affirms its contrary. See John 1:20; 3:36; 5:22. The same manner of expressing things strongly, is found in this epistle; for example, 1 John 2:4: ‘He who saith, I have known him, and doth not keep his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.’ 1 John 2:27: ‘The same unction teacheth you concerning all things, and is truth, and is no lie.’ 1 John 4:2: ‘Every spirit which confesseth that Jesus Christ hath come in the flesh, is from God.’ 1 John 4:3: ‘And every spirit which doth not confess that Jesus Christ hath come in the flesh, is not from God.’
“In his gospel likewise, John, to express things emphatically, frequently uses the demonstrative pronoun this. John 1:19; auth. ‘This is the testimony.’ John 3:19; auth. ‘This is the condemnation, that light,’ &c. John 6:29: touto. ‘This is the work of God.’ John 6:40: touto. ‘This is the will of him.’ John 6:50: outov. ‘This is the bread which cometh down from heaven.’ John 17:3: auth. ‘This is the eternal life.’ In the epistle the same emphatical manner of expression is found, 1 John 1:5; 2:25: ‘This is the promise.’ 1 John 3:23: auth. ‘This is the commandment.’ 1 John 5:3: auth. ‘This is the love of God.’ 1 John 5:4: ‘This is the victory.’ 1 John 5:6: outov. ‘This is he who came by water.’ 1 John 5:14: auth. ‘This is the boldness which we have with him.’
“Such is the internal evidence on which all Christians, from the beginning, have received the First Epistle of John as really written by him, and of Divine authority, although his name is not mentioned in the inscription, nor in any part of the epistle.”
On the term epistle, as applied to this work of St. John, it may be necessary to make a few remarks. There is properly nothing of the epistolary style in this work: it is addressed neither to any particular person, nor to any Church.
The writer does not mention himself either in the beginning or ending; and, although this can be no objection against its authenticity, yet it is some proof that the work was never intended to be considered in the light of an epistle.
1. Is it a tract or dissertation upon the more sublime parts of Christianity.
2. Is it a polemical discourse against heretics, particularly the Gnostics, or some of their teachers, who were disturbing the Churches where John dwelt. 3. Is it a sermon, the subject of which is God’s love to man in the mission of Jesus Christ; from which our obligations to love and serve him are particularly inferred. 4. Or is it a collection of Christian aphorisms, made by John himself; and put together as they occurred to his mind, without any intended order or method. Much might be said on all these heads of inquiry; and the issue would be, that the idea of its being an epistle of any kind must be relinquished; and yet epistle is its general denomination through all antiquity.
It is a matter, however, of little importance what its title may be, or to what species of literary composition it belongs; while we know that it is the genuine work of St. John; of the holiest man who ever breathed; of one who was most intimately acquainted with the doctrine and mind of his Lord; of one who was admitted to the closest fellowship with his Saviour; and who has treated of the deepest things that can be experienced or comprehended in the Christian life.
As to distinct heads of discourse, it does not appear to me that any were intended by the apostle; he wrote just as the subjects occurred to his mind, or rather as the Holy Spirit gave him utterance; and, although technical order is not here to be expected, yet nothing like disorder or confusion can be found in the whole work.
As Professor Michaelis has considered it in the light of a polemical treatise, written against the Gnostics, and other false teachers of that time, I have thought it right to give his view of the work considered in this light; but as I, in general, pursue another plan of interpretation in the notes, I have inserted his elucidations in the preceding pages of this preface. On the controverted text of the three heavenly Witnesses I have said what truth and a deep and thorough examination of the subject have obliged me to say. I am satisfied that it is not genuine, though the doctrine in behalf of which it has been originally introduced into the epistle is a doctrine of the highest importance, and most positively revealed in various parts both of the Old and New Testament. The stress which has been laid on the testimony of this text in behalf of the doctrine of the Trinity has done much evil; for when its own authenticity has come to be critically examined, and has been found to rest on no sure foundation, the adversaries of the doctrine itself have thought they had full cause for triumph, and have in effect said, “If this text be to the epistle, and to the doctrine in question, what the sun is in the world, what the heart is in man, and what the needle is in the mariner’s compass, then the doctrine is spurious, for the text is a most manifest forgery.” I would just observe, that incautious or feeble defences of any doctrine do not affect the doctrine itself but in the view of superficial minds. The proof that this text is an interpolation which, first existing as an illustrative marginal note, has afterwards been unfortunately introduced into the text, has “demolished no strong hold of the orthodox, has taken away no pillar from the Christian faith.” The grand defences of the doctrine of the Trinity, brought down to us from the highest Christian antiquity, stand still in all their force; not one of them was built upon this text, because the text, as a supposed part of St. John’s work, did not then exist; therefore neither evidence, prop, nor pillar of the grand doctrine is injured. We have what we ever had in this respect, and we may make the same illustrating use of the words in reference to this doctrine which many Latin writers, since the time of St. Cyprian, made; and which was proper enough in its own place, but became useless when incorporated with the sure sayings of God.
No man, it is hoped, will be so obstinate, perverse, or disingenuous, as to say or insinuate that the man who gives up this text is unsound in the faith; it would be as reasonable to assert, on the other hand, that he who understands the mass of evidence that is against the authenticity of this verse, and who nevertheless will contend for its continuance in the sacred canon, is a Deist in his heart, and endeavours to discredit the truth by mixing it with error and falsehood. Those whose doubts are not removed by the dissertation at the end of his epistle had better read the late Professor Porson’s Answer to Dean Travis, where it is presumed they will receive the fullest satisfaction.
THE FIRST GENERAL EPISTLE OF JOHN.
Chronological Notes relative to this Epistle.
-Year of the Constantinopolitan era of the world, or that used by the Byzantine historians, and other eastern Writers, 5577.
-Year of the Alexandrian era of the world, 5571.
-Year of the Antiochian era of the world, 5561.
-Year of the world, according to Archbishop Usher, 4073.
-Year of the world, according to Eusebius, in his Chronicon, 4297. -Year of the minor Jewish era of the world, or that in common use, 3829. -Year of the Greater Rabbinical era of the world, 4428.
-Year from the Flood, according to Archbishop Usher, and the English Bible, 2417.
-Year of the Cali yuga, or Indian era of the Deluge, 3171. -Year of the era of Iphitus, or since the first commencement of the Olympic games, 1009.
-Year of the era of Nabonassar, king of Babylon, 818.
-Year of the CCXIIth Olympiad, 1.
-Year from the building of Rome, according to Fabius Pictor, 816. -Year from the building of Rome, according to Frontinus, 820. -Year from the building of Rome, according to the Fasti Capitolini, 821. -Year from the building of Rome, according to Varro, which was that most generally used, 822.
-Year of the era of the Seleucidæ, 381.
-Year of the Cæsarean era of Antioch, 117.
-Year of the Julian era, 114.
-Year of the Spanish era, 107.
-Year from the birth of Jesus Christ, according to Archbishop Usher, 73. -Year of the vulgar era of Christ’s nativity, 69.
-Year of Vologesus, king of the Parthians, 20.
-Year of the Dionysian period, or Easter Cycle, 70.
-Year of the Grecian Cycle of nineteen years, or Common Golden Number, 13; or the fifth embolismic.
-Year of the Jewish Cycle of nineteen years, 10; or the year before the fourth embolismic.
-Year of the Solar Cycle, 22.
-Dominical Letter, it being the first year after the Bissextile, or Leap Year, A.
-Day of the Jewish Passover, the twenty-fourth of March, which happened in this year on the sixth day after the Jewish Sabbath.
-Easter Sunday, the twenty-sixth of March.
-Epact, or age of the moon on the 22d of March, (the day of the earliest Easter Sunday possible,) 12.
-Epact, according to the present mode of computation, or the moon’s age on New Year’s day, or the Calends of January, 20.
-Monthly Epacts, or age of the moon on the Calends of each month respectively, (beginning with January,) 20, 22, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 27, 28, 0, 0, 2, 2.
-Number of Direction, or the number of days from the twenty-first of March to the Jewish Passover, 3.
-In this year reigned four Roman emperors, viz., Galba, from Jan. 1 to Jan. 15, Otho ninety days, Vitellius eight months, and Vespasian for the remainder of the year.
-Roman Consuls, Servius Sulpicius Galba Augustus, the second time, and Titus Vinius Rufinus, from Jan. 1 to the death of Galba, Jan. 15; Salvius Otho Augustus, and L. Salvius Otho Titianus, from Jan. 15 to March 1; L. Virginius Rufus, and Vopiscus Pompeius Silvanus, from March 1 to May 1; Titus Arrius Antoninus and P. Marius Celsus, the second time, from May 1 to Sept. 1; C. Fabius Valens and Aulus Alienus Cœcina, from Sept. 1, the former holding the Consulship to Nov. 1, the latter being succeeded by Roscius Regulus, on Oct. 31; Cn. Cæcilius Simplex and C. Quintius Atticus, from Nov. 1, to the end of the year.
Joseph Benson
Preface
BEN_VOL8.PDF, source PDF p. 821
FIRST EPISTLE GENERAL OF
JOHN.
PREFACE
Concerning the apostle and evangelist John, to whom this epistle, (or treatise rather,) as well as the gospel which bears his name, has been justly ascribed by all the earliest and best Christian writers without hesitation, see the preface to his gospel. Indeed, that the same person was the author of both works, is evident from the similarity, or rather sameness, of the sentiments and expressions which runs through them both. A great many instances of this are enumerated by Dr. Macknight in his preface to this epistle, a few of which shall be here mentioned.
EPISTLE.
1 John 1:1, That which was from the beginning, — ο εθεασαμεθα, which we have looked upon concerning the word of life.
1 John 2:6, He who saith he abideth in him, ought himself to walk even as he walked.
1 John 2:8, A new commandment I write unto you. 1 John 3:11, This is the message, that we should love one another.
1 John 2:10, He that loveth, &c., abideth in the light, and there is none occasion of stumbling in him.
1 John 3:8, He who committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sinneth from the beginning.
1 John 4:9, In this was manifested the love of God, &c., that God sent his only-begotten Son, &c., that we might live through him.
1 John 4:12, No man hath seen God at any time. 1 John 5:13, These things have I written to you who believe, &c., that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe, &c.
GOSPEL.
John 1:1, In the beginning was the Word. — Verse 14, And, εθεασαμεθα, we beheld his glory. — Verse 4, In him was life. John 15:4, Abide in me and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, &c., no more can ye except ye abide in me. John 13:34, A new commandment I give unto you That ye love one another, as I have loved you.
John 11:10, If a man walk in the night, he stumbleth, because there is no light in him.
John 8:44, Ye are of your father the devil; he was a murderer from the beginning.
John 3:16, God so loved the world, that he gave his only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth, &c., might have everlasting life.
John 20:3, These things are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, &c., and that believing ye might have life through his name.
Various have been the opinions respecting the persons to whom this epistle was addressed. The most probable seems to be, that the apostle did not write to any particular church, but to all the Christians of that age, and in them, to the whole Christian Church in all succeeding ages. As to the time when the epistle was written there is the same uncertainty. Some indeed conclude, from 1 John 2:18; 4:1, compared with Matthew 24:24, that it was written a little before the destruction of Jerusalem; but several others fix the date at A.D. 90, 91, or 92. There are, however, many reasons for thinking that it was written before the Revelation. In the style of this apostle there is a remarkable peculiarity, and especially in this epistle. His sentiments, considered separately, are exceeding clear and intelligible; but when we search for their connection, we frequently meet with greater difficulties than we do in the epistles of Paul. The principal characteristic of his manner is an artless and amiable simplicity, and a singular modesty and candour, in conjunction with a wonderful sublimity of sentiment. His conceptions are apparently delivered to us in the order in which they arose in his own mind, and are not the product of artificial reasoning or laboured investigations.
His leading design is, “to demonstrate the vanity of faith separate from morality; to sooth and refine the warm and over-zealous tempers of the Christians to whom he writes, into that amiable charity and love, for which he himself was so eminent and illustrious; and to guard and arm them against the snares and efforts of antichrist, the grand apostate and seducer, and of all who were endued with his spirit.”
Joseph Sutcliffe
The First Epistle of John.
SUT_VOL5.PDF, source PDF p. 373
THE FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN.
ST. JOHN was the last of the writers of the new testament, and closed the canon of the christian scriptures. In his epistles and revelation, he unfolds the divine wisdom, and unveils with a beautiful simplicity the truth of God. He inscribes this epistle to his little children, who had heard him preach, that he might preserve them from sin, and fortify them against antichrist, who had already appeared, denying that Christ was come in the flesh. As heretical and jewish sects had thus sprung up among the churches, he developes the glory of the true catholic faith, that Jesus Christ is the Son of God; and by consequence, the glory of their adoption, as the children of God. He exhorts them to love the Lord with a pure and perfect love, to be bold in confessing Christ at the bar of princes, as he himself had given example, and to love their brethren with pure affection, and abound in all good works.
Of the authenticity of this epistle, the church has never had a doubt. The whole style and manner is John himself, still living and speaking to his little children.
Daniel Whedon
Introduction
WHD_CO14.PDF, source PDF p. 330
Editorial note: The supplied edition prints “2 Timothy 6:20” here (WHD_CO14.PDF, physical PDF page 335). The surrounding discussion of the warning about knowledge falsely so called corresponds to 1 Timothy 6:20 in the King James Version. The origin of the printed numbering is not established here; the historical wording is retained. WHD_CO14.PDF, PDF page 335.
1 JOHN
INTRODUCTION
ST. JOHN’S EPHESIAN RESIDENCE.
A BRIEF biography of John we have prefixed to our notes on the Gospel of John, but as we approach his three Epistles and his Apocalypse some fuller view of the latter part of his career seems to be suitable. After the crucifixion he seems to have remained in Jerusalem for several years, doubtless making the city his residence, yet performing constant missionary tours in different parts of Syria, like that of Peter in Acts 9:32. The last mention we find of his stay in Palestine is, in Paul’s account of his own visit to the Council of Jerusalem, (Galatians 2:1-10,) in which he found James, Peter, and John, apparent “pillars” of the Church. The order of names indicates the priority of James as official resident apostle at Jerusalem, and the inferiority of John as youngest, and as yet to attain his proper position. This was about the middle of the first century—some seventeen years after the crucifixion—at which point John had nearly fifty years, more or less, to live.
John may have gone to Ephesus immediately after the death of St. Paul, (A.D. 68,) to supply that metropolitan city with an apostolic superintendent; or he may have remained at Jerusalem until the approaching destruction of that city. There was a brief cessation of war, produced by the delay of Cestius Gallus’s attack on Jerusalem, in which the Christian population, warned by our Saviour’s memorable prediction, departed to Pella. Later than that John could scarce have remained. All Christian antiquity agrees in finding him at Ephesus through his later years; thence his writings are promulgated; and there he founded a school of apostolic Christian theology, marked by its peculiar traits, and distinguished by its eminent scholars and doctors. Of some of these we will give a brief account.
ST. IGNATIUS was St. John’s younger contemporary and hearer; was ordained by him, it is said by Eusebius, Bishop of Antioch, as early as A.D. 69; and was renowned for his ardent devotion to, and heroic defence of, the cause of Christ. Ignatius held the episcopate to be the strong bulwark of the Church against heresies and persecutions. The Emperor Trajan came to Antioch full of persecuting purpose, and Ignatius intrepidly sustained his responsible position by presenting himself as ready to be the chief martyr. The emperor ordered him to be conveyed by soldiers to Rome, there to be thrown to the wild beasts in the amphitheatre. The probable date of his martyrdom was A.D. 115.
ST. POLYCARP, Bishop of Smyrna, will be noticed in our notes on the Apocalypse. But it is quite proper here to speak of a celebrated pupil of Polycarp’s, and so, as we may call him, grand-pupil to St. John. ST. IRENAEUS was born about the same year that Ignatius was ordained bishop, and so previous to St. John’s death. In his boyhood he attended the ministry of Polycarp at Smyrna. Of Polycarp, and of his descriptions of St. John, the youthful Irenaeus was a profoundly interested hearer. We are able to give his own account of this period in a letter of his still extant, written to his friend Florinus, warning him against the doctrines of Valentinus, the heretic, to which he was inclined:—
These opinions, Florinus, that I may speak in mild terms, are not part of sound doctrine; these opinions are not consonant with the Church, and involve their votaries in the utmost impiety; these opinions even the heretics beyond the Church’s pale have never ventured to broach; these opinions those presbyters who preceded us, and who were conversant with the apostles, did not hand down to thee. For while I was yet a boy I saw thee in Lower Asia with Polycarp, distinguishing thyself in the royal court, and endeavoring to gain his approbation. For I have a more vivid recollection of what occurred at that time than of recent events, (inasmuch as the experiences of childhood, keeping pace with the growth of the soul, become incorporated with it,) so that I can even describe the place where the blessed Polycarp used to sit and discourse, his going out and his coming in, his general mode of life and personal
appearance, together with the discourses which he delivered to the people; also how he would speak of familiar intercourse with John and with the rest of those who had seen the Lord, and how he would call their words to remembrance.… What I heard from him that wrote I, not on paper, but in my heart, and, by the grace of God, I constantly bring it fresh to my mind.
Irenaeus became Bishop of Lyons, in Gaul, about A.D. 177. He is supposed to have been martyred A.D. 202. He was an eminent defender of apostolic doctrine, especially against the Gnostics. His extensive writings still remain, and are very valuable, both as exhibiting a view of the thought of his age, and as furnishing early evidence in regard to the authenticity of the books of the New Testament.
PAPIAS, Bishop of Hierapolis, was in earlier life, as Irenaeus informs us, a hearer of St. John. From his own account we should infer that, while he had opportunities of listening to the apostle’s public discourses, he had, perhaps by reason of extreme youth, little personal intimacy with him. He was deeply interested in obtaining from those who had heard the primitive “elders,” or fathers of the Church, what they were personally heard to say. And St. John was one of “the elders” about whose sayings he made diligent inquiry of other hearers than himself. He recorded these reminiscences, holding them to be more authentic than most written reports. These he published under the title of “Exegeses of our Lord’s Oracular Sayings,” a collection which Eusebius, who read them, pronounces to be eccentric in its character, and which the Church has not carefully preserved. Papias furnishes some of our earliest testimonies as to our canonical Gospels. He held a visionary expectation of Christ’s immediate return to establish a millennial kingdom. He is supposed to have suffered martyrdom about fifty years after the death of St. John.
Nothing in Christian antiquity is more beautiful than the closing years of St. John in the metropolis of Asia Minor. He maintained the vigour of youth and manhood almost to the end of his life. That vigour was expended in apostolic visitation through the villages and cities of that sunny clime— founding Churches, ordaining ministries, rebuking errors and heresies, propagating the true apostolic tradition with a sure authority as an original disciple of the living Jesus. At home he would gladly indoctrinate the young who might be future teachers and preachers after his ascension. And, above all, it was his mission to write and publish his GOSPEL as the basis of historic Christian verity; his EPISTLES to affirm the genuine doctrine against surrounding errors; and his APOCALYPSE as the doctrinal and historic chart of the future Church. And as we have no express historic record as to their precise dates or chronological order of publication, we may assume that the order of time accorded with this natural order of thought. We suppose that he published his Gospel before his banishment to Patmos, which took place in the fifteenth year of Domitian’s reign; that his exile lasted less than two years; and that he was restored to his Asian Churches at the death of Domitian and accession of Trajan. The learned commentator Lampe counts nineteen different opinions among scholars as to the years of John’s life, varying from eighty-nine to one hundred and twenty years. His death probably took place in the third year of Trajan’s reign, A.D. 101. It was thus his lot to complete the first Christian century, to be the last of the apostles, and to affix the last book to the New Testament canon.
INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN.
WE have elsewhere spoken of the pre-eminent position of Ephesus as a great centre in Christian history. (Note on Acts 19:1.) First founded as a Church by Paul in the meridian of his life, favoured with one of his most beautiful epistles, then ruled, at least for awhile, by the apostle’s vicar, Timothy, it was afterward honoured with the presence and presiding authority of St. John, and thence handed over to a line of Christian bishops. To an understanding of this epistle Paul’s address to the Ephesian elders at Miletus is an important starting-point. Acts 20:18-35. We must specially note his prophetic warning, that, after his departure, from the bosom of the Church itself grievous heretical wolves would arise, not sparing the flock. Next, written to this same Ephesus, his second letter to Timothy predicts more fully the same apostasies in the Church “in the last days.” 2 Timothy 3:1. This was penned just before Paul’s death, and was his dying prophecy of the peculiar heresies marking the close of the apostolic century. If now we open the epistles of John, we shall find that he is in at least the early scenes of that apostasy itself. The antinomians, (we shall style them indifferently Nicolaitans or Gnostics,) as foretold by Paul, are infesting the Church, impugning the original doctrines of Christ, and introducing demoralizations threatening to overthrow Christianity in its commencing life. The primal dogma, which centred all evil in matter, imported from Eastern Asia, was working its poisonous effects. (See notes on Acts 7:5 and 8:9.) Either men, through moral abhorrence of matter, became ascetics, and thence arose a superstitious vegetarianism, celibacy, and monkish asceticism, or, professing that purified in soul by a mental knowledge of God they could abandon the body to any work, a gross licentiousness resulted, consecrated by a false profession.* The moral atmosphere of Ephesus, as well as of Asia and Syria generally, at this period, was tainted by these demoralizing dogmas, and called imperatively for a public manifesto from an original apostle, stating the true Christian faith and ethic against this system of error and wickedness. As early as Simon Magus the germ of this antinomianism appears, (see our note Acts 8:9,) and our John, indeed, there personally encountered it in Simon himself, and so was prepared for his present work. The work was mainly done in this First Epistle. How the apostle prosecuted the war, both in his private letters and his apostolic circuits, we ascertain by his two lesser epistles. His last words are found in his seven apocalyptic letters to the seven Asiatic Churches; and, indeed, the whole Apocalypse is a sequel to the Epistles, being a grand unfolding of the antichrist of St. John’s day, (the elemental “many antichrists” of 1 John 2:18,) in its stupendous developments in future history down to the final consummation. [* Wordsworth translates the following passage of “some of the Gnostics of the sub-apostolic age” from Irenaeus, 2:6, 2-4: “Animal men (ψυχιχοι) are conversant only with animal things, (ψυχιχα,) and have not perfect gnosis; and they describe us who are of the Church as such; and they say that as we are only such, we must do good works in order to be saved; but they assert that they themselves will be saved, not by practice, but because they are spiritual (πνευματικα) by nature, and that as gold, though mingled with mire, does not lose its beauty, so they themselves, though wallowing in the mire of carnal works, do not lose their own spiritual essence. And, therefore, though they eat things offered to idols, and are the first to resort to the banquets which the heathen celebrate in honour of their false gods, and abstain from nothing that is foul in the eyes of God or man, they say that they cannot contract any defilement from these impure abominations; and they scoff at us who fear God as silly dotards, and hugely exalt themselves, calling themselves perfect, and the elect seed.”] In the midst of this atmosphere of doctrinal and ethical heresy, the purpose of our apostle in this epistle is to state the true doctrine and morale of Christ, both positively, in itself, and negatively, in its antagonism to surrounding error. And unless the antagonistic as well as positive phase be recognised, the reader will not take the full force, and sometimes not the true meaning, of the apostle’s words. It is now quite customary, we think absurdly so, for commentators to say that John had “no polemic purpose” in this epistle. But certainly in stating the positive truth he seldom forgets to defy the counter untruth, and even to fasten a trenchant epithet upon its utterer. The word lie or liar occurs, as verb or noun, eight times in five chapters. The bad sayings of opponents, as we enumerate them, are quoted and condemned nine times. Then he expressly tells us, “These things have I written concerning them that seduce you;” and he soon after adds, in regard to an important statement, “Let no man deceive you.” The opening paragraph is a bold assertion of his own original authority, and from beginning to end, we may say, there is a constant series of antithetic ideas, issues between the true view and the opposite error, very intensely stated, and, at first sight, apparently overstated. All this intensity arises not merely from his earnestness in behalf of doctrinal and narrative truth, but from the fact that he saw that the foundations of all true Christian purity were in the issue, and Christianity itself was at stake.
This great moral battle between Christianity and the heretical corruptions that not only threatened to ruin the Church, but showed themselves as the deepest degradations of our human nature, is presented in the later documents of the New Testament in two stages, namely: first, as foreseen and predicted, and, second, as fulfilment of these predictions. And this fact serves to fix the relative chronology of the two sets of documents. Earliest of the predictions (unless we include 2 Thessalonians 2:8-9) was Paul’s address to the Milesian elders, (Acts 20:29;) next, his Epistles to Timothy, (1 Timothy 4:1-3; 2 Timothy 3:1-5;) third, the second chapter of Peter’s Second Epistle. The fulfilments are found in these three Epistles of John, in Jude, and in Revelation 2:6, 14-16. A due reading of these passages in proper order will reveal a very powerful “polemic purpose” in the writers, the characters of the moral monsters against which young Christianity had to wage a war of extermination, and the chronological order of the documents which the war called out from the Church. In regard to these errorists, whether Gnostics or Nicolaitans, consult our notes on Acts 6:5; 8:9; 11:19; 1 Corinthians 8:1; 2 Thessalonians 2:7; 1 Timothy 4:1-3; 2 Timothy 6:20. The appalling quality of these heresies was their threatening the foundations of Christian morals, and of all morals, by maintaining that there could be a perfect purity of soul in the midst of the most abominable practices. The heretics had formed a system that reconciled the antithesis between sanctity and depravity of life and conduct. They taught that a man might be an outrageous violator of law, and yet a pure and holy saint. The epistle is, therefore, a defence of Christian purity from sin against Gnostic purity in sin. The epistle, then, is one great antithesis. The apostle grounds our real purification from natural sin by the Spirit of God, through Christ’s most real blood, producing a holiness the absolutely opposite of all sinful practice, the center of which holiness is LOVE—a divine love producing a unity between a perfectly pure God, a purified Church, and our purified soul; from which union with God results an eternal life here, to be perpetuated in eternity.
Plan of First Epistle of John.
WHD_CO14.PDF, source PDF p. 336
PLAN OF FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN.
INTRODUCTION—
Authority of the writer as an original witness of the living Word 1 John 1:1-4
Opening summary of the epistle—Purity through Christ 1 John 1:5-10
I. THE CHRISTIAN (WHO KNOWETH GOD, VERSE 4) IS ONE WHO CONDEMNS, AND PURIFIES HIMSELF from, SINNING AND SIN; BUT THE CLAIMANT TO KNOWING GOD in SIN IS A FALSE PRETENDER 1 John 2:1-29
1. For the Christian’s sin of infirmity Christ is a universal propitiation 1 John 2:1, 2
2. Yet for the claimant of divine fellowship the test is abstinence from all sin 1 John 2:3-14
3. So that we are not to love the godless and evanescent world 1 John 2:15-17
4. Nor accept the antichrists, whose coming marks a closing age 1 John 2:18-19
5. From which antichristic revolt you may be preserved by the purifying unction 1 John 2:20-29
(Two interludes—verses 7, 8 and 12-14—interposing statements of the writer’s purpose and feeling.)
II. OUR REGENERATE SONSHIP—ITS GLORY AND REQUISITE PURITY, IN CONTRAST WITH THE (GNOSTIC) FALSE REGENERATION IN IMPURITY 1 John 3:1-24
1. Present and future prospective glory of our sonship 1 John 3:1, 2
2. Purification from actual sin the test of our sonship 1 John 3:3-10
3. A purification manifested in love to our brother and actual benefaction 1 John 3:11-18
4. And evidenced to ourselves by assurance through faith in Christ and witness of the Spirit given unto us 1 John 3:19-24 III. THE TEST OF THE ANTICHRISTIC SPIRITS AND FALSE PROPHETS GONE ABROAD 1 John 4:1-21
1. The three condemnatory tests—non-confession of a human Jesus, worldliness, and the not hearing apostolic testimony 1 John 4:1-6
2. The one confirmatory test—love—the threefold love between God, the believer, and the brethren 1 John 4:7-21 IV. POWER OF THIS REGENERATION THROUGH FAITH IN CHRIST 1 John 5:1-21
1. Its effects—love, spontaneous obedience, victory 1 John 5:1-5
2. And Christ, divinely attested by the threefold witnesses, is supremely worthy of faith 1 John 5:6-10
3. The results of which faith are eternal life and answered prayer 1 John 5:11-17
4. Summarizing conclusion, with final admonition 1 John 5:18-21
John Wesley
Notes on the First Epistle of St. John.
WES_NTN2.PDF, source PDF p. 393
NOTES ON THE FIRST EPISTLE
OF ST. JOHN.
The great similitude, or rather sameness, both of spirit and expression, which runs through St. John's Gospel and all his epistles, is a clear evidence of their being written by the same person. In this epistle he speaks not to any particular church, but to all the Christians of that age; and in them to the whole Christian church in all succeeding ages.
Some have apprehended that it is not easy to discern the scope and method of this epistle. But if we examine it with simplicity, these may readily be discovered. St. John in this letter, or rather tract, (for he was present with part of those to whom he wrote,) has this apparent aim, to confirm the happy and holy communion of the faithful with God and Christ, by describing the marks of that blessed state.
THE PARTS OF IT ARE THREE:
I. The preface, 1 John 1:1-4
II. The tract itself, 5-v.-12
III. The conclusion, 13-21
In the preface he shows the authority of his own preaching and writing, and expressly points out, 1 John 1:3, the design of his present writing. To the preface exactly answers the conclusion, more largely explaining the same design, and recapitulating those marks, by we know thrice repeated, 1 John 5:18-20.
The tract itself has two parts, treating,
I. Severally,
1. Of communion with the Father, 1 John 1:5-10
2. Of communion with the Son, 1 John 2:1-12 With a distinct application to fathers, young men, and little children, 13-27 Whereto is annexed an exhortation to abide in him, 28-1 John 3:1-24 That the fruit of his manifestation in the flesh may extend to his manifestation in glory.
3. Of the confirmation and fruit of this abiding through the Spirit, 1 John 4:1-21
II. Conjointly, Of the testimony of the Father, and Son, and Spirit: on which faith in Christ, the being born of God, love to God and his children, the keeping his commandments and victory over the world, are founded, 1 John 5:1-12
The parts frequently begin and end alike. Sometimes there is an allusion in a preceding part, and a recapitulation in the subsequent. Each part treats of a benefit from God, and the duty of the faithful derived therefrom by the most natural inferences.
Adam Clarke
Preface to the First Epistle of John.
CLA_1JO.PDF, source PDF p. 3
PREFACE TO THE FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN.
AS the author of this epistle is the same who wrote the gospel, I need not detain the reader with any particulars of his life, having taken up the subject pretty much at large in my preface to his gospel, to which I must refer for that species of information.
Two questions have been urged relative to this epistle, which are very difficult to be solved: 1. When was it written? 2. To whom was it sent? The precise year it is impossible to determine; but it was probably written before the destruction of Jerusalem; and perhaps about the year 68 or 69, though some think not before 80. The second question Michaelis answers thus:—
“This question is still more difficult to decide than the preceding. In the Latin version it was formerly called The Epistle of St. John to the Parthians; and this title was adopted by some of the ancient fathers, and in modern times has been defended by Grotius. But if St. John had intended this epistle for the use of the Parthians, he would hardly have written it in Greek, but would have used either the language of the country, or, if he was unacquainted with it, would have written at least in Syriac, which was the language of the learned in the Parthian empire, and especially of the Christians. We know, from the history of Manes, that even the learned in that country were for the most part unacquainted with the Greek language; for to Manes, though he united literature with genius, his adversaries objected that he understood only the barbarous Syriac. That a Grecian book would not have been understood in the Parthian empire, appears from what Josephus says in the preface to his History of the Jewish War, where he declares that a work intended for Parthian Jews must be written, not in Greek, but Hebrew. However, it is worth while to examine whence the superscription ‘ad Parthos’ took its rise. Whiston conjectures that an ancient Greek superscription of this epistle was προς παρθενους, (to virgins,) because this epistle is chiefly addressed to uncorrupted Christians, and that this title was falsely copied προς παρθαυς, whence was derived the Latin superscription, ‘ad Parthos.’ But this conjecture is without foundation; for since the faithful are not called in a single instance throughout the whole epistle by the name of παρθενους, it is very improbable that the title προς παρθενους was ever affixed to it. I would rather suppose, therefore, that the frequent use in this epistle of the words ‘light’ and ‘darkness,’ which occur in the Persian philosophy, and on the same occasions as those on which St. John has used them, gave rise to the opinion that St. John wrote it with a view of correcting the abuses of the Persian philosophy; whence it was inferred that he designed it for the use of the Christians in the Parthian empire. That St. John really designed his epistle as a warning to those Christians who were in danger of being infected with Zoroastrian principles, is very probable, though the language of the epistle will not permit us to place St. John’s readers in a country to the east of the Euphrates.
“LAMPE, who appeals to Theodoret, contends that it, was not designed for any particular community, but that it was written for the use of Christians of every denomination; and this is really the most probable opinions since the epistle contains no reference to any individual Church. The only difficulty attending this opinion lies in the name ‘epistle,’ because the frequent use in an epistle of the terms ‘light and darkness,’ taken in the Persian sense of these words, seems to imply that it was written to persons of a particular description. But if we call it a treatise, this difficulty will cease; and in fact, the name ‘epistle’ is improperly applied to it, since it has nothing which entitles it to this appellation. It does not begin with the salutation which is used in Greek epistles, and with which St. John himself begins his two last epistles; nor does it contain any salutations, though they are found in almost all the epistles of the apostles. It is true that St. John addresses his readers in the second person; but this mode of writing is frequently adopted in books, and especially in prefaces: for instance, in Wolfe’s Elements of Mathematics, the reader is addressed throughout in the second person, I therefore consider that which is commonly called the First Epistle of St. John as a book or treatise, in which the apostle declared to the whole world his disapprobation of the doctrines maintained by Cerinthus and the Gnostics. However, as I do not think it worth while to dispute about words, I have retained the usual title, and have called it the First Epistle of St. John.
“That the design of this epistle was to combat the doctrine delivered by certain false teachers, appears from 1 John 2:18-26; 1 John 3:7; 4:1-3: and what this false doctrine was may be inferred from the counter doctrine delivered by St. John, 1 John 5:1-6. The apostle here asserts that Jesus is the Christ,’ and that he was the Christ, ‘not by water only, but by water and blood.’ Now these words, which are not in themselves very intelligible, become perfectly clear if we consider them as opposed to the doctrine of Cerinthus, who asserted that Jesus was by birth a mere man; but that the Æon, Christ, descended on him at his baptism, and left him before his death. But if what St. John says, 1 John 5:1-6, was opposed to Cerinthus, the Antichrists of whom he speaks, 1 John 2:18, 19, and who, according to 1 John 2:22, denied that Jesus was the Christ, as also the false prophets, mentioned 1 John 4:1, 3, must be Cerinthians, or at least Gnostics. That they were neither Jews nor heathens may be inferred from 1 John 2:19, where St. John says, ‘They went out from us.’ Farther, he describes them, 1 John 2:18, as persons who had lately appeared in the world. But this description suits neither Jews nor heathens, who, when this epistle was written, had not lately begun to deny that Jesus was the Christ. Lastly, in the same verse, he describes them as tokens of the last time, saying, ‘As ye have heard that Antichrist shall come, even now there are many Antichrists, whereby we know that it is the last time.’ But this inference could not be drawn from the refusal of the Jews to acknowledge that Jesus was the Messiah. Now, as soon as we perceive that the position, ‘Jesus is the Christ,’ is a counter position against Cerinthus, we may infer, as I have already observed, that the Antichrists who denied that Jesus was the Christ, or who denied that Christ had appeared in the flesh, were Cerinthians; or perhaps the latter were Docetes. It is, therefore, highly probable that the whole epistle, which in various places discovers an opposition to false teachers, was written against Cerinthians, or at least against Gnostics and Magi. A proposition can never be completely understood, unless we know the author’s design in delivering it. For instance, ‘God is light, and in him is no darkness,’ appears to contain a tautology, if we consider it as a detached dogma; and if it be considered as an admonitory proposition, it may be thought to contain a severe reproof; but if we regard it in a polemical view, it will present itself under a very different form. This epistle abounds with exhortations; but no man who wishes to understand it will be satisfied without asking the following questions: Why did St. John give these admonitions? Why has he so frequently repeated them? Why has he admonished, if he thought admonition necessary, merely in general terms, to holiness and brotherly love? And why has he not sometimes descended to particulars, as other apostles have done? An answer to these questions will throw great light on the epistle; and this light I will endeavour to procure for the reader, by pointing out the several propositions which, in my opinion, are laid down in opposition to Gnostic errors.
“1. In the first chapter the four first verses are opposed to the following assertion of the Gnostics: ‘That the apostles did not deliver the doctrine of Jesus as they had received it, but made additions to it, especially in the commandments which were termed legal; whereof they themselves (the Gnostics) retained the genuine and uncorrupted mystery.’ St. John therefore says: ‘That he declared that which was from the beginning, which he himself had seen and heard;’ that is, that he taught the doctrine of Christ as it was originally delivered, as he had heard it from Christ’s own mouth, whose person he had seen and felt; and that he made no additions of his own, but only reported as a faithful witness. In like manner he appeals, 1 John 2:13, 14, to the elder Christians, whom he calls fathers, ‘because they knew him who was from the beginning;’ that is, because they knew how Christ had taught from the beginning; and 1 John 2:24, he says: ‘Let that abide in you which ye have heard from the beginning.’ Farther he says, 1 John 2:7: ‘Brethren, I write no new commandment unto you, but an old commandment, which ye had from the beginning.’ In the next verse he adds: ‘Again a new commandment I write unto you, which thing is true in him and in you, because the darkness is past, and the light now shineth.’ Now Christ himself had given his disciples a commandment which he called a new commandment, and this was, ‘that they should love one another.’ The term ‘new commandment,’ therefore, St. John borrowed from Christ; but in the present instance he appears to have applied it to a different subject, because the special command which Christ gave to his disciples, that they should love one another, and which he called a new commandment, could not well be called an old commandment, being very different from the general commandment, that we should love our neighbour. St. John, therefore, very probably meant that the commandment of love and sanctification was no new commandment, as the Gnostics contended, but the old commandment which the Christians had heard from the beginning. It was, indeed, become a new commandment, in consequence of the false doctrines which then prevailed; or rather, it appeared to be so, because the Gnostics had endeavoured to banish it from their system of theology. But whether a new or an old commandment, St. John thought proper to enforce it. “2. The Gnostics, who contended that those commandments which were legal were not given by Christ, but were added by the apostles without his authority, counteracted, by so doing, the whole doctrine of sanctification. St. John, therefore, devotes the greatest part of his epistle to the confirmation and enforcement of this doctrine. In 1 John 1:5, 7, he asserts, as a principal part of the message which he had heard from Christ, that no one who does not walk in the light has fellowship with God. In the three following verses he limits this proposition in such a manner as was necessary in arguing with an adversary; and 1 John 2:1, 2, he removes the objection, that, according to his doctrine, a Christian who was guilty of wilful sins lost thereby all hopes of salvation. He then maintains, 1 John 2:3-5, and apparently in allusion to the word γνωσις, knowledge, the favourite term of the Gnostics, that he who boasted of profound knowledge, and at the same time rejected the commandments of Christ, had not a real but only a pretended knowledge; and that in him only the love of God is perfected, τετελειωται, who keeps God’s word. The expression τετελειωται is a term which was used in the schools of the philosophers, and applied to the scholars called esoterici, who had made a considerable progress in the inner school. Now the Gnostics were, in their own opinion, scholars of this description; but since they, whose imaginary system of theology annuls the commands of God, are so far from being perfect that they are not even beginners in the science, St. John very properly refuses to admit their pretensions, and opposes to them others who were perfect in a different way, and who were more justly entitled to the appellation. With respect to the expressions, ‘keeping the commandments of God,’ or ‘not keeping his commandments,’ it must be observed that, when used in a polemical work, they denote, not merely the observance or violation of God’s commands in our own practice, but the teaching of others that they are to be observed or rejected. What St. John says, 1 John 2:7, 8, has been already explained in the preceding paragraph.
“The whole of the third chapter, and part of the fourth, is devoted to the doctrine of sanctification, on which I have to make the following remarks. When St. John says, 1 John 3:7, ‘Let no man deceive you; he who doeth righteousness is righteous,’ he probably intends, not merely to deliver a precept, but to oppose the doctrine of those who asserted that a man, though he sinned, might be righteous in respect to his spiritual soul, because sin proceeded only from the material body. A similar observation may be applied to 1 John 3:4: ‘Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law;’ which, considered by itself, appears to be an identical proposition; but when considered as an assertion opposed to the Gnostics, it is far from being superfluous, because, evident as it appears to be, they virtually denied it. From the passage above quoted from the works of Irenæus, we have seen that they rejected the legal commandments as parts of the Christian religion which were not warranted by the authority of Christ; consequently, they denied that sin was a transgression of the law. Farther, it was consistent with their principles to regard sins as diseases; for they believed in a metempsychosis, and imagined that the souls of men were confined in their present bodies as in a prison, and as a punishment for having offended in the region above. According to this system, the violent and irregular passions of anger, hatred, &c., were tortures for the soul; they were diseases, but not punishable transgressions of the law. I will not assert that all who believed in a transmigration of souls argued in this manner, but some of them certainly did so; and against these it was not superfluous to write, ‘Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law, for sin is the transgression of the law.’
“The love of the brethren, which St. John enforced as a chief commandment, is generally understood of that special love which Christ commanded his disciples to have towards each other. But I rather think that St. John means the love of our neighbour in general, which Christ commanded, as comprehending the half of the law; for this general love St. John might very properly call the love of our brother, since God has created us all, and is our common Father. Besides, as St. John calls Cain, Abel’s brother, he could not intend to signify by this term a person of the same religious sentiments. Nor would it have been consistent with candour to have censured the Gnostics for not having Christian brotherly love towards St. John and other true believers, for in this particular sense they were not brethren; and St. John himself, in his second epistle, 2 John 1:10, forbids the exercise of Christian brotherly love towards those who teach false doctrines. I believe, therefore, that the brotherly love of which St. John speaks in the third chapter of this epistle, is not confined to that special love which we owe to those who are allied to us by religion, but denotes the love of our neighbour in general. Nor do I except even 1 John 3:16, where some think that St. John would require too much, if he meant brotherly love in general, or charity toward all men. But are there not certain cases in which it is our duty to hazard and even sacrifice our lives, in order to rescue our neighbour! Is not this duty performed by the soldier? And is it not performed by him who visits those who are infected with contagious diseases? It is true that this is not a duty which every man owes in all cases to his neighbour; but then, on the other hand, is it not a duty which every man owes to his spiritual brother? Nor was it St. John’s design so much to enforce this duty, and to recommend the exercise of it, as to argue from the acknowledgment of this duty in certain cases, to the necessity of performing the less painful duty of supporting our brethren in distress, by a participation of our temporal possessions. But though I believe that in the third chapter St. John speaks of the love of our neighbour in general, I do not mean to affirm that he nowhere understands that special love which Christians owe one to another, of which we meet with an instance in 1 John 5:1, 2.
“With respect to the moral conduct of the Gnostics, against whom St. John wrote, we may infer, therefore, that the apostle found more reason to censure them for their want of charity toward their neighbours, than for dissoluteness or debauchery. This want of charity they probably displayed by a hatred of the true believers.
“What St. John says, 1 John 5:3, that ‘God’s commandments are not grievous,’ appears in the clearest light when we consider it as opposed to the Gnostics, to whom the Divine commandments, as delivered by the apostles, appeared to be too legal.
“St. John declares, 1 John 1:5, as the message which he had heard from Christ, that ‘God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.’ Now if this proposition had been then as generally admitted as it is at present, there could have been no necessity for declaring it at the very beginning of the epistle, with so much energy, to be the grand message of Christ. We may reasonably infer, therefore, that it was opposed to certain persons who delivered a contrary doctrine. Farther, the words ‘light’ and ‘darkness,’ which are here applied to the Deity in a manner which is not usual in the Bible, remind us of the technical terms used by the Persian Magi, and afterwards by the Manicheans. It is true that in the Bible we meet with the expressions ‘works of the light,’ ‘children of the light,’ ‘to walk in the light,’ and others of the same kind; but in these instances the term ‘light’ is not synonymous with ‘holiness;’ works of the light denoting nothing more than works which no man need be ashamed to perform openly, and in the face of the whole world. This explanation of the word ‘light’ is inapplicable in the proposition ‘God is light;’ because there would be an impropriety in representing God either as fearing or not fearing to act in the face of the whole world. St. John, therefore, uses the term ‘light’ as equivalent to holiness.
“Now, the Gnostics admitted that the supreme Being was perfectly holy and pure light; but they denied that the supreme Being was the God whom the Jews and the Christians worshipped. For the Jews and the Christians worshipped the Creator of the world; and the Gnostics asserted that the Creator of the world was either a spirit of darkness, or, if he was a spirit of light, that he was not free from darkness.
“From 1 John 2:23, where St. John says, that ‘he who denies the Son, rejects also the Father,’ it appears that his adversaries did not deny the Father in positive terms, since the apostle argues only that they virtually did so by denying the Son. Now, the Gnostics did not positively deny the Father of Christ, whom they allowed to be the supreme Being, but then they did not allow that he was the Creator. The terms, therefore, ‘God’ and the ‘Father of Christ,’ though they denote in reality the same person, must not be considered as having precisely the same import; since the adversaries of St. John admitted that the Father of Christ was the supreme Being, and pure light; but denied that the Creator, who is in fact God, was light without darkness.
“4. In some places, especially 1 John 4:2, 3, St. John opposes false teachers of another description, namely, those who denied that Christ was come in the flesh. Now they who denied this were not Cerinthians, but another kind of Gnostics, called Docetes. For as, on the one hand, Cerinthus maintained that Jesus was a mere and therefore real man, the Docetes on the other hand contended that he was an incorporeal phantom, in which the Æon, Christ, or Divine nature, presented itself to mankind. 1 John 1:1: ‘Our hands have handled,’ appears likewise to be opposed to this error of the Docetes.
“The doctrines which St. John has delivered in this epistle he has not supported, either by arguments drawn from reason, or by quotations from the Old Testament; for neither of them are necessary, since the bare assertion of an apostle of Christ is sufficient authority. It is true that, in one respect, this epistle has less energy than St. John’s gospel, because in his gospel he warrants his doctrines by the speeches of Christ. But then, on the other hand, St. John declares in this epistle, 1 John 3:24; 4:4; 5:14, 16, that God sent his Spirit to the apostolic Church, and heard their prayers. And it is evident that St. John alludes to the extraordinary gifts of the Holy Ghost, and to the miraculous powers obtained by prayer. “The close of this epistle, ‘Keep yourselves from idols,’ has no immediate connection with the preceding discourse. I am therefore in doubt whether St; John meant to warn his readers against taking part in heathen sacrifices, which was allowed by these Gnostics, who are called Nicolaitans in the Apocalypse; or whether he meant to describe the system of the Gnostics in general as a system of idolatry, which in fact it was.”
Dr. Macknight has some judicious observations on the authenticity of this epistle, from the similarity of the style to that of the gospel of John. “The authenticity of any ancient writing is established, first, by the testimony of contemporary and succeeding authors, whose works have come down to us, and who speak of that writing as known to be the work of the person whose name it bears. Secondly, by the suitableness of the things contained in such writing to the character and circumstances of its supposed author, and by the similarity of its style to the style of the other acknowledged writings of that author. The former of these proofs is called the external evidence of the authenticity of a writing; The latter, its internal evidence. When these two kinds of evidence are found accompanying any writing, they render its genuineness indubitable. “The external evidence of the authenticity of John’s first epistle has been amply detailed by Dr. Lardner, who shows that the earliest and best Christian writers have all, with one consent, and without any hesitation, ascribed the first epistle to him. And their testimony is confirmed by this circumstance, that the Syriac translator, who omitted the Second Epistle of Peter, the Second and Third Epistles of John, and the Epistle of Jude, because some doubts were entertained concerning them in the first age, or perhaps because they had not come to his knowledge, has translated John’s first epistle, as an apostolical writing of which there never was any doubt in that or in any other Christian Church.
“In this preface, therefore, we shall state the internal evidence of the authenticity of John’s first epistle, by showing, first, that, in respect of its matter, and, secondly, in respect of its style, it is perfectly suitable to the character and circumstances of its supposed author. In respect of the matter or subject of the epistle under consideration, the writer of it has discovered himself to be John the apostle, by introducing a number of sentiments and expressions found in the gospel, which all Christians from the beginning have acknowledged to be the work of John the apostle. EPISTLE. GOSPEL
1 John 1:1. That which was
from the beginning o eqeasameqa,
which we have contemplated,
concerning the living Word.
John 1:1. In the beginning was
the Word: John 1:14; And
eqeasameqa, we beheld his glory:
John 1:4; In him was light:
John 1:14; The Word was made
flesh
1 John 2:5. Whosoever keepeth
his word truly, in that man the love
of God is perfected.
John 14:23. If a man love me he
will keep my words, and my Father
will love him.
1 John 2:6. He who saith he
abideth in him, ought himself also
so to walk, even as he walked. See
1 John 3:24; 4:13-16.
John 15:4. Abide in me, and I in
you. As the branch cannot bring forth
fruit of itself, except it abide in the
vine; no more can ye, except ye abide
in me.
1 John 2:8. I write to you a new
commandment.
John 13:34. A new
commandment I give unto you,
1 John 3:11. This is the
message which ye heard from the
beginning, that ye should love one
another.
That ye love one another, as I have
loved you.
1 John 2:8. The darkness
passeth away, and the light which is
true now shineth.
John 1:5. The light shineth in
darkness.
John 1:9. That was the true
light.
1 John 2:10. Abideth in the
light, and there is no stumbling
block to him.
John 11:10. If a man walk in the
night he stumbleth, because there is
no light in him.
1 John 2:13. Young children, I
write to you, because ye have known
the Father.
John 17:3. This is the eternal
life, that they might know thee, the
only true God,
1 John 2:14. Because ye have
known him from the beginning.
And Jesus Christ, whom thou hast
sent
1 John 3:7-9. Every one who
worketh righteousness is begotten of
God. See also 1 John 5:1.
John 3:3. Except a man be
begotten again, John 3:5; Except
a man be begotten of water and of the
Spirit.
1 John 3:1. Behold how great
love the Father hath bestowed on us,
that we should be called the sons of
God!
John 1:12. To them he gave
power to become the sons of God,
even to them who believe on his
name.
1 John 3:2. We shall be like
him, for we shall see him as he is.
John 17:24. Be with me where I
am, that they may behold my glory.
1 John 3:8. He who worketh
sin is of the devil; for the devil
sinneth from the beginning.
John 8:44. Ye are of your father
the devil; he was a murderer from the
beginning.
1 John 3:13. Do not wonder,
my brethren, that the world hateth
you.
John 15:20. If they have
persecuted me, they will also
persecute you.
1 John 4:9. By this the love of
God was manifested, that God sent
his Son, the only begotten, into the
world, that we might live through
him.
John 3:16. God so loved the
world that he gave his only begotten
Son, that whosoever believeth on him
might not perish, but have eternal
life.
1 John 4:12. No man hath seen
God at any time.
John 1:18. No man hath seen
God at any time.
1 John 5:13. These things I
have written to you, who believe on
the name of the Son of God, that ye
may know that ye have eternal life;
and that ye may believe in the name
of the Son of God.
John 20:31. These things are
written that ye might believe that
Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God,
and that believing ye might have life
through his name.
1 John 5:14. If we ask any
thing according to his will, he
heareth us.
John 14:14. If ye shall ask any
thing in my name, I will do it.
1 John 5:20. The Son of God is
come, and hath given us an
understanding, that we may know
him that is true, and we are in him
that is true, even in his Son Jesus
Christ. This is the true God, and
eternal life.
John 17:2. Thou hast given him
power over all flesh, that he might
give eternal life to as many as thou
hast given him. John 17:3: And
this is the eternal life, that they might
know thee, the only true God, and
Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent.
“From the above comparison of the first epistle of John with his gospel, there appears such an exact agreement of sentiment in the two writings, that no reader who is capable of discerning what is peculiar in an author’s turn of thinking, can entertain the least doubt of their being the productions of one and the same writer. Farther, since John has not mentioned his own name in his gospel, the want of his name in the epistle is no proof that it was not written by him; but rather a presumption that it is his; especially as he has sufficiently discovered himself to be an apostle, by affirming, in the beginning of the epistle, that he was an eye and an ear witness of the things he has written concerning the living word.
“The style of this epistle being the same with the style of the gospel of John, it is, by that internal mark likewise, denoted to be his writing. In his gospel, John does not content himself with simply affirming or denying a thing; but, to strengthen his affirmation, he denies the contrary. In like manner, to strengthen his denial of a thing, he affirms its contrary. See John 1:20; 3:36; 5:22. The same manner of expressing things strongly, is found in this epistle; for example, 1 John 2:4: ‘He who saith, I have known him, and doth not keep his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.’ 1 John 2:27: ‘The same unction teacheth you concerning all things, and is truth, and is no lie.’ 1 John 4:2: ‘Every spirit which confesseth that Jesus Christ hath come in the flesh, is from God.’ 1 John 4:3: ‘And every spirit which doth not confess that Jesus Christ hath come in the flesh, is not from God.’
“In his gospel likewise, John, to express things emphatically, frequently uses the demonstrative pronoun this. John 1:19; auth. ‘This is the testimony.’ John 3:19; auth. ‘This is the condemnation, that light,’ &c. John 6:29: touto. ‘This is the work of God.’ John 6:40: touto. ‘This is the will of him.’ John 6:50: outov. ‘This is the bread which cometh down from heaven.’ John 17:3: auth. ‘This is the eternal life.’ In the epistle the same emphatical manner of expression is found, 1 John 1:5; 2:25: ‘This is the promise.’ 1 John 3:23: auth. ‘This is the commandment.’ 1 John 5:3: auth. ‘This is the love of God.’ 1 John 5:4: ‘This is the victory.’ 1 John 5:6: outov. ‘This is he who came by water.’ 1 John 5:14: auth. ‘This is the boldness which we have with him.’
“Such is the internal evidence on which all Christians, from the beginning, have received the First Epistle of John as really written by him, and of Divine authority, although his name is not mentioned in the inscription, nor in any part of the epistle.”
On the term epistle, as applied to this work of St. John, it may be necessary to make a few remarks. There is properly nothing of the epistolary style in this work: it is addressed neither to any particular person, nor to any Church.
The writer does not mention himself either in the beginning or ending; and, although this can be no objection against its authenticity, yet it is some proof that the work was never intended to be considered in the light of an epistle.
1. Is it a tract or dissertation upon the more sublime parts of Christianity.
2. Is it a polemical discourse against heretics, particularly the Gnostics, or some of their teachers, who were disturbing the Churches where John dwelt. 3. Is it a sermon, the subject of which is God’s love to man in the mission of Jesus Christ; from which our obligations to love and serve him are particularly inferred. 4. Or is it a collection of Christian aphorisms, made by John himself; and put together as they occurred to his mind, without any intended order or method. Much might be said on all these heads of inquiry; and the issue would be, that the idea of its being an epistle of any kind must be relinquished; and yet epistle is its general denomination through all antiquity.
It is a matter, however, of little importance what its title may be, or to what species of literary composition it belongs; while we know that it is the genuine work of St. John; of the holiest man who ever breathed; of one who was most intimately acquainted with the doctrine and mind of his Lord; of one who was admitted to the closest fellowship with his Saviour; and who has treated of the deepest things that can be experienced or comprehended in the Christian life.
As to distinct heads of discourse, it does not appear to me that any were intended by the apostle; he wrote just as the subjects occurred to his mind, or rather as the Holy Spirit gave him utterance; and, although technical order is not here to be expected, yet nothing like disorder or confusion can be found in the whole work.
As Professor Michaelis has considered it in the light of a polemical treatise, written against the Gnostics, and other false teachers of that time, I have thought it right to give his view of the work considered in this light; but as I, in general, pursue another plan of interpretation in the notes, I have inserted his elucidations in the preceding pages of this preface. On the controverted text of the three heavenly Witnesses I have said what truth and a deep and thorough examination of the subject have obliged me to say. I am satisfied that it is not genuine, though the doctrine in behalf of which it has been originally introduced into the epistle is a doctrine of the highest importance, and most positively revealed in various parts both of the Old and New Testament. The stress which has been laid on the testimony of this text in behalf of the doctrine of the Trinity has done much evil; for when its own authenticity has come to be critically examined, and has been found to rest on no sure foundation, the adversaries of the doctrine itself have thought they had full cause for triumph, and have in effect said, “If this text be to the epistle, and to the doctrine in question, what the sun is in the world, what the heart is in man, and what the needle is in the mariner’s compass, then the doctrine is spurious, for the text is a most manifest forgery.” I would just observe, that incautious or feeble defences of any doctrine do not affect the doctrine itself but in the view of superficial minds. The proof that this text is an interpolation which, first existing as an illustrative marginal note, has afterwards been unfortunately introduced into the text, has “demolished no strong hold of the orthodox, has taken away no pillar from the Christian faith.” The grand defences of the doctrine of the Trinity, brought down to us from the highest Christian antiquity, stand still in all their force; not one of them was built upon this text, because the text, as a supposed part of St. John’s work, did not then exist; therefore neither evidence, prop, nor pillar of the grand doctrine is injured. We have what we ever had in this respect, and we may make the same illustrating use of the words in reference to this doctrine which many Latin writers, since the time of St. Cyprian, made; and which was proper enough in its own place, but became useless when incorporated with the sure sayings of God.
No man, it is hoped, will be so obstinate, perverse, or disingenuous, as to say or insinuate that the man who gives up this text is unsound in the faith; it would be as reasonable to assert, on the other hand, that he who understands the mass of evidence that is against the authenticity of this verse, and who nevertheless will contend for its continuance in the sacred canon, is a Deist in his heart, and endeavours to discredit the truth by mixing it with error and falsehood. Those whose doubts are not removed by the dissertation at the end of his epistle had better read the late Professor Porson’s Answer to Dean Travis, where it is presumed they will receive the fullest satisfaction.
THE FIRST GENERAL EPISTLE OF JOHN.
Chronological Notes relative to this Epistle.
-Year of the Constantinopolitan era of the world, or that used by the Byzantine historians, and other eastern Writers, 5577.
-Year of the Alexandrian era of the world, 5571.
-Year of the Antiochian era of the world, 5561.
-Year of the world, according to Archbishop Usher, 4073.
-Year of the world, according to Eusebius, in his Chronicon, 4297. -Year of the minor Jewish era of the world, or that in common use, 3829. -Year of the Greater Rabbinical era of the world, 4428.
-Year from the Flood, according to Archbishop Usher, and the English Bible, 2417.
-Year of the Cali yuga, or Indian era of the Deluge, 3171. -Year of the era of Iphitus, or since the first commencement of the Olympic games, 1009.
-Year of the era of Nabonassar, king of Babylon, 818.
-Year of the CCXIIth Olympiad, 1.
-Year from the building of Rome, according to Fabius Pictor, 816. -Year from the building of Rome, according to Frontinus, 820. -Year from the building of Rome, according to the Fasti Capitolini, 821. -Year from the building of Rome, according to Varro, which was that most generally used, 822.
-Year of the era of the Seleucidæ, 381.
-Year of the Cæsarean era of Antioch, 117.
-Year of the Julian era, 114.
-Year of the Spanish era, 107.
-Year from the birth of Jesus Christ, according to Archbishop Usher, 73. -Year of the vulgar era of Christ’s nativity, 69.
-Year of Vologesus, king of the Parthians, 20.
-Year of the Dionysian period, or Easter Cycle, 70.
-Year of the Grecian Cycle of nineteen years, or Common Golden Number, 13; or the fifth embolismic.
-Year of the Jewish Cycle of nineteen years, 10; or the year before the fourth embolismic.
-Year of the Solar Cycle, 22.
-Dominical Letter, it being the first year after the Bissextile, or Leap Year, A.
-Day of the Jewish Passover, the twenty-fourth of March, which happened in this year on the sixth day after the Jewish Sabbath.
-Easter Sunday, the twenty-sixth of March.
-Epact, or age of the moon on the 22d of March, (the day of the earliest Easter Sunday possible,) 12.
-Epact, according to the present mode of computation, or the moon’s age on New Year’s day, or the Calends of January, 20.
-Monthly Epacts, or age of the moon on the Calends of each month respectively, (beginning with January,) 20, 22, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 27, 28, 0, 0, 2, 2.
-Number of Direction, or the number of days from the twenty-first of March to the Jewish Passover, 3.
-In this year reigned four Roman emperors, viz., Galba, from Jan. 1 to Jan. 15, Otho ninety days, Vitellius eight months, and Vespasian for the remainder of the year.
-Roman Consuls, Servius Sulpicius Galba Augustus, the second time, and Titus Vinius Rufinus, from Jan. 1 to the death of Galba, Jan. 15; Salvius Otho Augustus, and L. Salvius Otho Titianus, from Jan. 15 to March 1; L. Virginius Rufus, and Vopiscus Pompeius Silvanus, from March 1 to May 1; Titus Arrius Antoninus and P. Marius Celsus, the second time, from May 1 to Sept. 1; C. Fabius Valens and Aulus Alienus Cœcina, from Sept. 1, the former holding the Consulship to Nov. 1, the latter being succeeded by Roscius Regulus, on Oct. 31; Cn. Cæcilius Simplex and C. Quintius Atticus, from Nov. 1, to the end of the year.
Joseph Benson
Preface
BEN_VOL8.PDF, source PDF p. 821
FIRST EPISTLE GENERAL OF
JOHN.
PREFACE
Concerning the apostle and evangelist John, to whom this epistle, (or treatise rather,) as well as the gospel which bears his name, has been justly ascribed by all the earliest and best Christian writers without hesitation, see the preface to his gospel. Indeed, that the same person was the author of both works, is evident from the similarity, or rather sameness, of the sentiments and expressions which runs through them both. A great many instances of this are enumerated by Dr. Macknight in his preface to this epistle, a few of which shall be here mentioned.
EPISTLE.
1 John 1:1, That which was from the beginning, — ο εθεασαμεθα, which we have looked upon concerning the word of life.
1 John 2:6, He who saith he abideth in him, ought himself to walk even as he walked.
1 John 2:8, A new commandment I write unto you. 1 John 3:11, This is the message, that we should love one another.
1 John 2:10, He that loveth, &c., abideth in the light, and there is none occasion of stumbling in him.
1 John 3:8, He who committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sinneth from the beginning.
1 John 4:9, In this was manifested the love of God, &c., that God sent his only-begotten Son, &c., that we might live through him.
1 John 4:12, No man hath seen God at any time. 1 John 5:13, These things have I written to you who believe, &c., that ye may know that ye have eternal life, and that ye may believe, &c.
GOSPEL.
John 1:1, In the beginning was the Word. — Verse 14, And, εθεασαμεθα, we beheld his glory. — Verse 4, In him was life. John 15:4, Abide in me and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, &c., no more can ye except ye abide in me. John 13:34, A new commandment I give unto you That ye love one another, as I have loved you.
John 11:10, If a man walk in the night, he stumbleth, because there is no light in him.
John 8:44, Ye are of your father the devil; he was a murderer from the beginning.
John 3:16, God so loved the world, that he gave his only-begotten Son, that whosoever believeth, &c., might have everlasting life.
John 1:18, No man hath seen God at any time.
John 20:3, These things are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, &c., and that believing ye might have life through his name.
Various have been the opinions respecting the persons to whom this epistle was addressed. The most probable seems to be, that the apostle did not write to any particular church, but to all the Christians of that age, and in them, to the whole Christian Church in all succeeding ages. As to the time when the epistle was written there is the same uncertainty. Some indeed conclude, from 1 John 2:18; 4:1, compared with Matthew 24:24, that it was written a little before the destruction of Jerusalem; but several others fix the date at A.D. 90, 91, or 92. There are, however, many reasons for thinking that it was written before the Revelation. In the style of this apostle there is a remarkable peculiarity, and especially in this epistle. His sentiments, considered separately, are exceeding clear and intelligible; but when we search for their connection, we frequently meet with greater difficulties than we do in the epistles of Paul. The principal characteristic of his manner is an artless and amiable simplicity, and a singular modesty and candour, in conjunction with a wonderful sublimity of sentiment. His conceptions are apparently delivered to us in the order in which they arose in his own mind, and are not the product of artificial reasoning or laboured investigations.
His leading design is, “to demonstrate the vanity of faith separate from morality; to sooth and refine the warm and over-zealous tempers of the Christians to whom he writes, into that amiable charity and love, for which he himself was so eminent and illustrious; and to guard and arm them against the snares and efforts of antichrist, the grand apostate and seducer, and of all who were endued with his spirit.”
Joseph Sutcliffe
The First Epistle of John.
SUT_VOL5.PDF, source PDF p. 373
THE FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN.
ST. JOHN was the last of the writers of the new testament, and closed the canon of the christian scriptures. In his epistles and revelation, he unfolds the divine wisdom, and unveils with a beautiful simplicity the truth of God. He inscribes this epistle to his little children, who had heard him preach, that he might preserve them from sin, and fortify them against antichrist, who had already appeared, denying that Christ was come in the flesh. As heretical and jewish sects had thus sprung up among the churches, he developes the glory of the true catholic faith, that Jesus Christ is the Son of God; and by consequence, the glory of their adoption, as the children of God. He exhorts them to love the Lord with a pure and perfect love, to be bold in confessing Christ at the bar of princes, as he himself had given example, and to love their brethren with pure affection, and abound in all good works.
Of the authenticity of this epistle, the church has never had a doubt. The whole style and manner is John himself, still living and speaking to his little children.
Daniel Whedon
Introduction
WHD_CO14.PDF, source PDF p. 330
Editorial note: The supplied edition prints “2 Timothy 6:20” here (WHD_CO14.PDF, physical PDF page 335). The surrounding discussion of the warning about knowledge falsely so called corresponds to 1 Timothy 6:20 in the King James Version. The origin of the printed numbering is not established here; the historical wording is retained. WHD_CO14.PDF, PDF page 335.
1 JOHN
INTRODUCTION
ST. JOHN’S EPHESIAN RESIDENCE.
A BRIEF biography of John we have prefixed to our notes on the Gospel of John, but as we approach his three Epistles and his Apocalypse some fuller view of the latter part of his career seems to be suitable. After the crucifixion he seems to have remained in Jerusalem for several years, doubtless making the city his residence, yet performing constant missionary tours in different parts of Syria, like that of Peter in Acts 9:32. The last mention we find of his stay in Palestine is, in Paul’s account of his own visit to the Council of Jerusalem, (Galatians 2:1-10,) in which he found James, Peter, and John, apparent “pillars” of the Church. The order of names indicates the priority of James as official resident apostle at Jerusalem, and the inferiority of John as youngest, and as yet to attain his proper position. This was about the middle of the first century—some seventeen years after the crucifixion—at which point John had nearly fifty years, more or less, to live.
John may have gone to Ephesus immediately after the death of St. Paul, (A.D. 68,) to supply that metropolitan city with an apostolic superintendent; or he may have remained at Jerusalem until the approaching destruction of that city. There was a brief cessation of war, produced by the delay of Cestius Gallus’s attack on Jerusalem, in which the Christian population, warned by our Saviour’s memorable prediction, departed to Pella. Later than that John could scarce have remained. All Christian antiquity agrees in finding him at Ephesus through his later years; thence his writings are promulgated; and there he founded a school of apostolic Christian theology, marked by its peculiar traits, and distinguished by its eminent scholars and doctors. Of some of these we will give a brief account.
ST. IGNATIUS was St. John’s younger contemporary and hearer; was ordained by him, it is said by Eusebius, Bishop of Antioch, as early as A.D. 69; and was renowned for his ardent devotion to, and heroic defence of, the cause of Christ. Ignatius held the episcopate to be the strong bulwark of the Church against heresies and persecutions. The Emperor Trajan came to Antioch full of persecuting purpose, and Ignatius intrepidly sustained his responsible position by presenting himself as ready to be the chief martyr. The emperor ordered him to be conveyed by soldiers to Rome, there to be thrown to the wild beasts in the amphitheatre. The probable date of his martyrdom was A.D. 115.
ST. POLYCARP, Bishop of Smyrna, will be noticed in our notes on the Apocalypse. But it is quite proper here to speak of a celebrated pupil of Polycarp’s, and so, as we may call him, grand-pupil to St. John. ST. IRENAEUS was born about the same year that Ignatius was ordained bishop, and so previous to St. John’s death. In his boyhood he attended the ministry of Polycarp at Smyrna. Of Polycarp, and of his descriptions of St. John, the youthful Irenaeus was a profoundly interested hearer. We are able to give his own account of this period in a letter of his still extant, written to his friend Florinus, warning him against the doctrines of Valentinus, the heretic, to which he was inclined:—
These opinions, Florinus, that I may speak in mild terms, are not part of sound doctrine; these opinions are not consonant with the Church, and involve their votaries in the utmost impiety; these opinions even the heretics beyond the Church’s pale have never ventured to broach; these opinions those presbyters who preceded us, and who were conversant with the apostles, did not hand down to thee. For while I was yet a boy I saw thee in Lower Asia with Polycarp, distinguishing thyself in the royal court, and endeavoring to gain his approbation. For I have a more vivid recollection of what occurred at that time than of recent events, (inasmuch as the experiences of childhood, keeping pace with the growth of the soul, become incorporated with it,) so that I can even describe the place where the blessed Polycarp used to sit and discourse, his going out and his coming in, his general mode of life and personal
appearance, together with the discourses which he delivered to the people; also how he would speak of familiar intercourse with John and with the rest of those who had seen the Lord, and how he would call their words to remembrance.… What I heard from him that wrote I, not on paper, but in my heart, and, by the grace of God, I constantly bring it fresh to my mind.
Irenaeus became Bishop of Lyons, in Gaul, about A.D. 177. He is supposed to have been martyred A.D. 202. He was an eminent defender of apostolic doctrine, especially against the Gnostics. His extensive writings still remain, and are very valuable, both as exhibiting a view of the thought of his age, and as furnishing early evidence in regard to the authenticity of the books of the New Testament.
PAPIAS, Bishop of Hierapolis, was in earlier life, as Irenaeus informs us, a hearer of St. John. From his own account we should infer that, while he had opportunities of listening to the apostle’s public discourses, he had, perhaps by reason of extreme youth, little personal intimacy with him. He was deeply interested in obtaining from those who had heard the primitive “elders,” or fathers of the Church, what they were personally heard to say. And St. John was one of “the elders” about whose sayings he made diligent inquiry of other hearers than himself. He recorded these reminiscences, holding them to be more authentic than most written reports. These he published under the title of “Exegeses of our Lord’s Oracular Sayings,” a collection which Eusebius, who read them, pronounces to be eccentric in its character, and which the Church has not carefully preserved. Papias furnishes some of our earliest testimonies as to our canonical Gospels. He held a visionary expectation of Christ’s immediate return to establish a millennial kingdom. He is supposed to have suffered martyrdom about fifty years after the death of St. John.
Nothing in Christian antiquity is more beautiful than the closing years of St. John in the metropolis of Asia Minor. He maintained the vigour of youth and manhood almost to the end of his life. That vigour was expended in apostolic visitation through the villages and cities of that sunny clime— founding Churches, ordaining ministries, rebuking errors and heresies, propagating the true apostolic tradition with a sure authority as an original disciple of the living Jesus. At home he would gladly indoctrinate the young who might be future teachers and preachers after his ascension. And, above all, it was his mission to write and publish his GOSPEL as the basis of historic Christian verity; his EPISTLES to affirm the genuine doctrine against surrounding errors; and his APOCALYPSE as the doctrinal and historic chart of the future Church. And as we have no express historic record as to their precise dates or chronological order of publication, we may assume that the order of time accorded with this natural order of thought. We suppose that he published his Gospel before his banishment to Patmos, which took place in the fifteenth year of Domitian’s reign; that his exile lasted less than two years; and that he was restored to his Asian Churches at the death of Domitian and accession of Trajan. The learned commentator Lampe counts nineteen different opinions among scholars as to the years of John’s life, varying from eighty-nine to one hundred and twenty years. His death probably took place in the third year of Trajan’s reign, A.D. 101. It was thus his lot to complete the first Christian century, to be the last of the apostles, and to affix the last book to the New Testament canon.
INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN.
WE have elsewhere spoken of the pre-eminent position of Ephesus as a great centre in Christian history. (Note on Acts 19:1.) First founded as a Church by Paul in the meridian of his life, favoured with one of his most beautiful epistles, then ruled, at least for awhile, by the apostle’s vicar, Timothy, it was afterward honoured with the presence and presiding authority of St. John, and thence handed over to a line of Christian bishops. To an understanding of this epistle Paul’s address to the Ephesian elders at Miletus is an important starting-point. Acts 20:18-35. We must specially note his prophetic warning, that, after his departure, from the bosom of the Church itself grievous heretical wolves would arise, not sparing the flock. Next, written to this same Ephesus, his second letter to Timothy predicts more fully the same apostasies in the Church “in the last days.” 2 Timothy 3:1. This was penned just before Paul’s death, and was his dying prophecy of the peculiar heresies marking the close of the apostolic century. If now we open the epistles of John, we shall find that he is in at least the early scenes of that apostasy itself. The antinomians, (we shall style them indifferently Nicolaitans or Gnostics,) as foretold by Paul, are infesting the Church, impugning the original doctrines of Christ, and introducing demoralizations threatening to overthrow Christianity in its commencing life. The primal dogma, which centred all evil in matter, imported from Eastern Asia, was working its poisonous effects. (See notes on Acts 7:5 and 8:9.) Either men, through moral abhorrence of matter, became ascetics, and thence arose a superstitious vegetarianism, celibacy, and monkish asceticism, or, professing that purified in soul by a mental knowledge of God they could abandon the body to any work, a gross licentiousness resulted, consecrated by a false profession.* The moral atmosphere of Ephesus, as well as of Asia and Syria generally, at this period, was tainted by these demoralizing dogmas, and called imperatively for a public manifesto from an original apostle, stating the true Christian faith and ethic against this system of error and wickedness. As early as Simon Magus the germ of this antinomianism appears, (see our note Acts 8:9,) and our John, indeed, there personally encountered it in Simon himself, and so was prepared for his present work. The work was mainly done in this First Epistle. How the apostle prosecuted the war, both in his private letters and his apostolic circuits, we ascertain by his two lesser epistles. His last words are found in his seven apocalyptic letters to the seven Asiatic Churches; and, indeed, the whole Apocalypse is a sequel to the Epistles, being a grand unfolding of the antichrist of St. John’s day, (the elemental “many antichrists” of 1 John 2:18,) in its stupendous developments in future history down to the final consummation. [* Wordsworth translates the following passage of “some of the Gnostics of the sub-apostolic age” from Irenaeus, 2:6, 2-4: “Animal men (ψυχιχοι) are conversant only with animal things, (ψυχιχα,) and have not perfect gnosis; and they describe us who are of the Church as such; and they say that as we are only such, we must do good works in order to be saved; but they assert that they themselves will be saved, not by practice, but because they are spiritual (πνευματικα) by nature, and that as gold, though mingled with mire, does not lose its beauty, so they themselves, though wallowing in the mire of carnal works, do not lose their own spiritual essence. And, therefore, though they eat things offered to idols, and are the first to resort to the banquets which the heathen celebrate in honour of their false gods, and abstain from nothing that is foul in the eyes of God or man, they say that they cannot contract any defilement from these impure abominations; and they scoff at us who fear God as silly dotards, and hugely exalt themselves, calling themselves perfect, and the elect seed.”] In the midst of this atmosphere of doctrinal and ethical heresy, the purpose of our apostle in this epistle is to state the true doctrine and morale of Christ, both positively, in itself, and negatively, in its antagonism to surrounding error. And unless the antagonistic as well as positive phase be recognised, the reader will not take the full force, and sometimes not the true meaning, of the apostle’s words. It is now quite customary, we think absurdly so, for commentators to say that John had “no polemic purpose” in this epistle. But certainly in stating the positive truth he seldom forgets to defy the counter untruth, and even to fasten a trenchant epithet upon its utterer. The word lie or liar occurs, as verb or noun, eight times in five chapters. The bad sayings of opponents, as we enumerate them, are quoted and condemned nine times. Then he expressly tells us, “These things have I written concerning them that seduce you;” and he soon after adds, in regard to an important statement, “Let no man deceive you.” The opening paragraph is a bold assertion of his own original authority, and from beginning to end, we may say, there is a constant series of antithetic ideas, issues between the true view and the opposite error, very intensely stated, and, at first sight, apparently overstated. All this intensity arises not merely from his earnestness in behalf of doctrinal and narrative truth, but from the fact that he saw that the foundations of all true Christian purity were in the issue, and Christianity itself was at stake.
This great moral battle between Christianity and the heretical corruptions that not only threatened to ruin the Church, but showed themselves as the deepest degradations of our human nature, is presented in the later documents of the New Testament in two stages, namely: first, as foreseen and predicted, and, second, as fulfilment of these predictions. And this fact serves to fix the relative chronology of the two sets of documents. Earliest of the predictions (unless we include 2 Thessalonians 2:8-9) was Paul’s address to the Milesian elders, (Acts 20:29;) next, his Epistles to Timothy, (1 Timothy 4:1-3; 2 Timothy 3:1-5;) third, the second chapter of Peter’s Second Epistle. The fulfilments are found in these three Epistles of John, in Jude, and in Revelation 2:6, 14-16. A due reading of these passages in proper order will reveal a very powerful “polemic purpose” in the writers, the characters of the moral monsters against which young Christianity had to wage a war of extermination, and the chronological order of the documents which the war called out from the Church. In regard to these errorists, whether Gnostics or Nicolaitans, consult our notes on Acts 6:5; 8:9; 11:19; 1 Corinthians 8:1; 2 Thessalonians 2:7; 1 Timothy 4:1-3; 2 Timothy 6:20. The appalling quality of these heresies was their threatening the foundations of Christian morals, and of all morals, by maintaining that there could be a perfect purity of soul in the midst of the most abominable practices. The heretics had formed a system that reconciled the antithesis between sanctity and depravity of life and conduct. They taught that a man might be an outrageous violator of law, and yet a pure and holy saint. The epistle is, therefore, a defence of Christian purity from sin against Gnostic purity in sin. The epistle, then, is one great antithesis. The apostle grounds our real purification from natural sin by the Spirit of God, through Christ’s most real blood, producing a holiness the absolutely opposite of all sinful practice, the center of which holiness is LOVE—a divine love producing a unity between a perfectly pure God, a purified Church, and our purified soul; from which union with God results an eternal life here, to be perpetuated in eternity.
Plan of First Epistle of John.
WHD_CO14.PDF, source PDF p. 336
PLAN OF FIRST EPISTLE OF JOHN.
INTRODUCTION—
Authority of the writer as an original witness of the living Word 1 John 1:1-4
Opening summary of the epistle—Purity through Christ 1 John 1:5-10
I. THE CHRISTIAN (WHO KNOWETH GOD, VERSE 4) IS ONE WHO CONDEMNS, AND PURIFIES HIMSELF from, SINNING AND SIN; BUT THE CLAIMANT TO KNOWING GOD in SIN IS A FALSE PRETENDER 1 John 2:1-29
1. For the Christian’s sin of infirmity Christ is a universal propitiation 1 John 2:1, 2
2. Yet for the claimant of divine fellowship the test is abstinence from all sin 1 John 2:3-14
3. So that we are not to love the godless and evanescent world 1 John 2:15-17
4. Nor accept the antichrists, whose coming marks a closing age 1 John 2:18-19
5. From which antichristic revolt you may be preserved by the purifying unction 1 John 2:20-29
(Two interludes—verses 7, 8 and 12-14—interposing statements of the writer’s purpose and feeling.)
II. OUR REGENERATE SONSHIP—ITS GLORY AND REQUISITE PURITY, IN CONTRAST WITH THE (GNOSTIC) FALSE REGENERATION IN IMPURITY 1 John 3:1-24
1. Present and future prospective glory of our sonship 1 John 3:1, 2
2. Purification from actual sin the test of our sonship 1 John 3:3-10
3. A purification manifested in love to our brother and actual benefaction 1 John 3:11-18
4. And evidenced to ourselves by assurance through faith in Christ and witness of the Spirit given unto us 1 John 3:19-24 III. THE TEST OF THE ANTICHRISTIC SPIRITS AND FALSE PROPHETS GONE ABROAD 1 John 4:1-21
1. The three condemnatory tests—non-confession of a human Jesus, worldliness, and the not hearing apostolic testimony 1 John 4:1-6
2. The one confirmatory test—love—the threefold love between God, the believer, and the brethren 1 John 4:7-21 IV. POWER OF THIS REGENERATION THROUGH FAITH IN CHRIST 1 John 5:1-21
1. Its effects—love, spontaneous obedience, victory 1 John 5:1-5
2. And Christ, divinely attested by the threefold witnesses, is supremely worthy of faith 1 John 5:6-10
3. The results of which faith are eternal life and answered prayer 1 John 5:11-17
4. Summarizing conclusion, with final admonition 1 John 5:18-21