{"commentary":{"id":"jamieson-fausset-brown","name":"Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary","website":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamieson-Fausset-Brown_Bible_Commentary","licenseUrl":"https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/","licenseNotes":null,"licenseNotice":null,"englishName":"Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary","language":"eng","textDirection":"rtl","sha256":"db3d4c8b3c1f32ef9d1430a57392e02bda3a17aac1f9bbe398461de021a3cb13","availableFormats":["json"],"listOfBooksApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/books.json","listOfProfilesApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/profiles.json","numberOfBooks":66,"totalNumberOfChapters":1187,"totalNumberOfVerses":17056,"totalNumberOfProfiles":0,"languageName":"English","languageEnglishName":"English"},"book":{"id":"1JN","commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","name":"1 John","commonName":"1 John","introduction":"AUTHORSHIP.--POLYCARP, the disciple of John [Epistle to the Philippians, 7], quotes Jo1 4:3. EUSEBIUS [Ecclesiastical History, 3.39] says of PAPIAS, a hearer of John, and a friend of POLYCARP, \"He used testimonies from the First Epistle of John.\" IRENÆUS, according to EUSEBIUS [Ecclesiastical History, 5.8], often quoted this Epistle. So in his work Against Heresies [3.15; 5, 8] he quotes from John by name, Jo1 2:18, &c.; and in [3.16,7], he quotes Jo1 4:1-3; Jo1 5:1, and Jo2 1:7-8. CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA [Miscellanies, 2.66, p. 464] refers to Jo1 5:16, as in John's larger Epistle. See other quotations [Miscellanies, 3.32,42; 4.102]. TERTULLIAN [Against Marcion, 5.16] refers to Jo1 4:1, &c.; [Against Praxeas, 15], to Jo1 1:1. See his other quotations [Against Praxeas, 28; Against the Gnostics, 12]. CYPRIAN [Epistles, 28 (24)], quotes as John's, Jo1 2:3-4; and [On the Lord's Prayer, 5] quotes Jo1 2:15-17; and [On Works and Alms, 3], Jo1 1:8; and [On the Advantage of Patience, 2] quotes Jo1 2:6. MURATORI'S Fragment on the Canon of Scripture states, \"There are two of John (the Gospel and Epistle?) esteemed Catholic,\" and quotes Jo1 1:3. The Peschito Syriac contains it. ORIGEN (in EUSEBIUS [Ecclesiastical History, 6.25]) speaks of the First Epistle as genuine, and \"probably the second and third, though all do not recognize the latter two\"; on the Gospel of John, [Commentary on John, 13.2], he quotes Jo1 1:5. DIONYSIUS OF ALEXANDRIA, ORIGEN'S scholar, cites the words of this Epistle as those of the Evangelist John. EUSEBIUS [Ecclesiastical History, 3.24], says, John's first Epistle and Gospel are acknowledged without question by those of the present day, as well as by the ancients. So also JEROME [On Illustrious Men]. The opposition of COSMAS INDICOPLEUSTES, in the sixth century, and that of MARCION because our Epistle was inconsistent with his views, are of no weight against such irrefragable testimony.\n\nThe internal evidence is equally strong. Neither the Gospel, nor this Epistle, can be pronounced an imitation; yet both, in style and modes of thought, are evidently of the same mind. The individual notices are not so numerous or obvious as in Paul's writings, as was to be expected in a Catholic Epistle; but such as there are accord with John's position. He implies his apostleship, and perhaps alludes to his Gospel, and the affectionate tie which bound him as an aged pastor to his spiritual \"children\"; and in Jo1 2:18-19; Jo1 4:1-3, he alludes to the false teachers as known to his readers; and in Jo1 5:21 he warns them against the idols of the surrounding world. It is no objection against its authenticity that the doctrine of the Word, or divine second Person, existing from everlasting, and in due time made flesh, appears in it, as also in the Gospel, as opposed to the heresy of the DocetÃ&brvbr in the second century, who denied that our Lord is come in the flesh, and maintained He came only in outward semblance; for the same doctrine appears in Col 1:15-18; Ti1 3:16; Heb 1:1-3; and the germs of Docetism, though not fully developed till the second century, were in existence in the first. The Spirit, presciently through John, puts the Church beforehand on its guard against the coming heresy.\n\nTO WHOM ADDRESSED.--AUGUSTINE [The Question of the Gospels, 2.39], says this Epistle was written to the Parthians. BEDE, in a prologue to the seven Catholic Epistles, says that ATHANASIUS attests the same. By the Parthians may be meant the Christians living beyond the Euphrates in the Parthian territory, outside the Roman empire, \"the Church at Babylon elected together with (you),\" the churches in the Ephesian region, the quarter to which Peter addressed his Epistles (Pe1 5:12). As Peter addressed the flock which John subsequently tended (and in which Paul had formerly ministered), so John, Peter's close companion after the ascension, addresses the flock among whom Peter had been when he wrote. Thus \"the elect lady\" (Jo2 1:1) answers \"to the Church elected together\" (Pe1 5:13). See further confirmation of this view in Introduction to Second John. It is not necessarily an objection to this view that John never is known to have personally ministered in the Parthian territory. For neither did Peter personally minister to the churches in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, Bithynia, though he wrote his Epistles to them. Moreover, in John's prolonged life, we cannot dogmatically assert that he did not visit the Parthian Christians, after Peter had ceased to minister to them, on the mere ground of absence of extant testimony to that effect. This is as probable a view as ALFORD'S, that in the passage of AUGUSTINE, \"to the Parthians,\" is to be altered by conjectural emendation; and that the Epistle is addressed to the churches at and around Ephesus, on the ground of the fatherly tone of affectionate address in it, implying his personal ministry among his readers. But his position, as probably the only surviving apostle, accords very well with his addressing, in a Catholic Epistle, a cycle of churches which he may not have specially ministered to in person, with affectionate fatherly counsel, by virtue of his general apostolic superintendence of all the churches.\n\nTIME AND PLACE OF WRITING.--This Epistle seems to have been written subsequently to his Gospel as it assumes the reader's acquaintance with the Gospel facts and Christ's speeches, and also with the special aspect of the incarnate Word, as God manifest in the flesh (Ti1 3:16), set forth more fully in his Gospel. The tone of address, as a father addressing his \"little children\" (the continually recurring term, Jo1 2:1, Jo1 2:12-13, Jo1 2:18, Jo1 2:28; Jo1 3:7, Jo1 3:18; Jo1 4:4; Jo1 5:21), accords with the view that this Epistle was written in John's old age, perhaps about A.D. 90. In Jo1 2:18, \"it is the last time,\" probably does not refer to any particular event (as the destruction of Jerusalem, which was now many years past) but refers to the nearness of the Lord's coming as proved by the rise of Antichristian teachers, the mark of the last time. It was the Spirit's purpose to keep the Church always expecting Christ as ready to come at any moment. The whole Christian age is the last time in the sense that no other dispensation is to arise till Christ comes. Compare \"these last days,\" Heb 1:2. Ephesus may be conjectured to be the place whence it was written. The controversial allusion to the germs of Gnostic heresy accord with Asia Minor being the place, and the last part of the apostolic age the time, of writing this Epistle.\n\nCONTENTS.--The leading subject of the whole is, fellowship with the Father and the Son (Jo1 1:3). Two principal divisions may be noted: (1) 1Jo. 1:5-2:28: the theme of this portion is stated at the outset, \"God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all\"; consequently, in order to have fellowship with Him, we must walk in light (Jo1 1:7); connected with which in the confession and subsequent forgiveness of our sins through Christ's propitiation and advocacy, without which forgiveness there could be no light or fellowship with God: a farther step in thus walking in the light is, positively keeping God's commandments, the sum of which is love, as opposed to hatred, the acme of disobedience to God's word: negatively, he exhorts them according to their several stages of spiritual growth, children, fathers, young men, in consonance with their privileges as forgiven, knowing the Father, and having overcome the wicked one, not to love the world, which is incompatible with the indwelling of the love of the Father, and to be on their guard against the Antichristian teachers already in the world, who were not of the Church, but of the world, against whom the true defense is, that his believing readers who have the anointing of God, should continue to abide in the Son and in the Father. (2) The second division (1Jo. 2:29-5:5) discusses the theme with which it opens, He is righteous; consequently (as in the first division), \"every one that doeth righteousness is born of Him.\" Sonship in us involves our purifying ourselves as He is pure, even as we hope to see, and therefore to be made like our Lord when He shall appear; in this second, as in the first division, both a positive and a negative side are presented of \"doing righteousness as He is righteous,\" involving a contrast between the children of God and the children of the devil. Hatred marks the latter; love, the former: this love gives assurance of acceptance with God for ourselves and our prayers, accompanied as they are (Jo1 3:23) with obedience to His great commandment, to \"believe on Jesus, and love one another\"; the seal (Jo1 3:24) of His dwelling in us and assuring our hearts, is the Spirit which He hath given us. In contrast to this (as in the first division), he warns against false spirits, the notes of which are, denial of Christ, and adherence to the world. Sonship, or birth of God, is then more fully described: its essential feature is unslavish, free love to God, because God first loved us, and gave His Son to die for us, and consequent love to the brethren, grounded on their being sons of God also like ourselves, and so victory over the world; this victory being gained only by the man who believes in Jesus as the Son of God. (3) The conclusion establishes this last central truth, on which rests our fellowship with God, Christ's having come by the water of baptism, the blood of atonement, and the witnessing Spirit, which is truth. As in the opening he rested this cardinal truth on the apostles' witness of the eye, the ear, and the touch, so now at the close he rests it on God's witness, which is accepted by the believer, in contrast with the unbeliever, who makes God a liar. Then follows his closing statement of his reason for writing (Jo1 5:13; compare the corresponding Jo1 1:4, at the beginning), namely, that believers in Christ the Son of God may know that they have (now already) eternal life (the source of \"joy,\" Jo1 1:4; compare similarly his object in writing the Gospel, Joh 20:31), and so have confidence as to their prayers being answered (corresponding to Jo1 3:22 in the second part); for instance, their intercessions for a sinning brother (unless his sin be a sin unto death). He closes with a brief summing up of the instruction of the Epistle, the high dignity, sanctity, and safety from evil of the children of God in contrast to the sinful world, and a warning against idolatry, literal and spiritual: \"Keep yourselves from idols.\"\n\nThough the Epistle is not directly polemical, the occasion which suggested his writing was probably the rise of Antichristian teachers; and, because he knew the spiritual character of the several classes whom he addresses, children, youths, fathers, he feels it necessary to write to confirm them in the faith and joyful fellowship of the Father and Son, and to assure them of the reality of the things they believe, that so they may have the full privileges of believing.\n\nSTYLE.--His peculiarity is fondness for aphorism and repetition. His tendency to repeat his own phrase, arises partly from the affectionate, hortatory character of the Epistle; partly, also, from its Hebraistic forms abounding in parallel clauses, as distinguished from the Grecian and more logical style of Paul; also, from his childlike simplicity of spirit, which, full of his one grand theme, repeats, and dwells on it with fond delight and enthusiasm. Moreover as ALFORD well says, the appearance of uniformity is often produced by want of deep enough exegesis to discover the real differences in passages which seem to express the same. Contemplative, rather than argumentative, he dwells more on the general, than on the particular, on the inner, than on the outer, Christian life. Certain fundamental truths he recurs to again and again, at one time enlarging on, and applying them, at another time repeating them in their condensed simplicity. The thoughts do not march onward by successive steps, as in the logical style of Paul, but rather in circle drawn round one central thought which he reiterates, ever reverting to it, and viewing it, now under its positive, now under its negative, aspect. Many terms which in the Gospel are given as Christ's, in the Epistle appear as the favorite expressions of John, naturally adopted from the Lord. Thus the contrasted terms, \"flesh\" and \"spirit,\" \"light\" and \"darkness,\" \"life\" and \"death,\" \"abide in Him\": fellowship with the Father and Son, and with one another,\" is a favorite phrase also, not found in the Gospel, but in Acts and Paul's Epistles. In him appears the harmonious union of opposites, adapting him for his high functions in the kingdom of God, contemplative repose of character, and at the same time ardent zeal, combined with burning, all-absorbing love: less adapted for active outward work, such as Paul's, than for spiritual service. He handles Christian verities not as abstract dogmas, but as living realities, personally enjoyed in fellowship with God in Christ, and with the brethren. Simple, and at the same time profound, his writing is in consonance with his spirit, unrhetorical and undialectic, gentle, consolatory, and loving: the reflection of the Spirit of Him on whose breast he lay at the last supper, and whose beloved disciple he was. EWALD in ALFORD, speaking of the \"unruffled and heavenly repose\" which characterizes this Epistle, says, \"It appears to be the tone, not so much of a father talking with his beloved children, as of a glorified saint addressing mankind from a higher world. Never in any writing has the doctrine of heavenly love--a love working in stillness, ever unwearied, never exhausted--so thoroughly approved itself as in this Epistle.\"\n\nJOHN'S PLACE IN THE BUILDING UP OF THE CHURCH.--As Peter founded and Paul propagated, so John completed the spiritual building. As the Old Testament puts prominently forward the fear of God, so John, the last writer of the New Testament, gives prominence to the love of God. Yet, as the Old Testament is not all limited to presenting the fear of God, but sets forth also His love, so John, as a representative of the New Testament, while breathing so continually the spirit of love, gives also the plainest and most awful warnings against sin, in accordance with his original character as Boanerges, \"son of thunder.\" His mother was Salome, mother of the sons of Zebedee, probably sister to Jesus' mother (compare Joh 19:25, \"His mother's sister,\" with Mat 27:56; Mar 15:40), so that he was cousin to our Lord; to his mother, under God, he may have owed his first serious impressions. Expecting as she did the Messianic kingdom in glory, as appears from her petition (Mat 20:20-23), she doubtless tried to fill his young and ardent mind with the same hope. NEANDER distinguishes three leading tendencies in the development of the Christian doctrine, the Pauline, the Jacobean (between which the Petrine forms an intermediate link), and the Johannean. John, in common with James, was less disposed to the intellectual and dialectic cast of thought which distinguishes Paul. He had not, like the apostle of the Gentiles, been brought to faith and peace through severe conflict; but, like James, had reached his Christian individuality through a quiet development: James, however, had passed through a moulding in Judaism previously, which, under the Spirit, caused him to present Christian truth in connection with the law, in so far as the latter in its spirit, though not letter, is permanent, and not abolished, but established under the Gospel. But John, from the first, had drawn his whole spiritual development from the personal view of Christ, the model man, and from intercourse with Him. Hence, in his writings, everything turns on one simple contrast: divine life in communion with Christ; death in separation from Him, as appears from his characteristic phrases, \"life, light, truth; death, darkness, lie.\" \"As James and Peter mark the gradual transition from spiritualized Judaism to the independent development of Christianity, and as Paul represents the independent development of Christianity in opposition to the Jewish standpoint, so the contemplative element of John reconciles the two, and forms the closing point in the training of the apostolic Church\" [NEANDER]. \n\n\n\nNext: 1 John Chapter 1\n\n","order":62,"numberOfChapters":5,"sha256":"1819ff9a13b86a0b99c6b3804bdbf97fa1c6e0e0a47e19960082f5017b0b7ce3","firstChapterNumber":1,"firstChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/1JN/1.json","firstChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"1JN","chapter":1},"lastChapterNumber":5,"lastChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/1JN/5.json","lastChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"1JN","chapter":5},"totalNumberOfVerses":100},"chapter":{"number":3,"content":[{"type":"verse","number":2,"content":["Beloved--by the Father, and therefore by me. \n\nnow--in contrast to \"not yet.\" We now already are really sons, though not recognized as such by the world, and (as the consequence) we look for the visible manifestation of our sonship, which not yet has taken place. \n\ndoth not yet appear--Greek, \"it hath not yet ('at any time,' Greek aorist) been visibly manifested what we shall be\"--what further glory we shall attain by virtue of this our sonship. The \"what\" suggests a something inconceivably glorious. \n\nbut--omitted in the oldest manuscripts. Its insertion in English Version gives a wrong antithesis. It is not, \"We do not yet know manifestly what . . . but we know,\" &c. Believers have some degree of the manifestation already, though the world has not. The connection is, The manifestation to the world of what we shall be, has not yet taken place; we know (in general; as a matter of well-assured knowledge; so the Greek) that when (literally, \"if\"; expressing no doubt as to the fact, but only as to the time; also implying the coming preliminary fact, on which the consequence follows, Mal 1:6; Joh 14:3) He (not \"it,\" namely, that which is not yet manifested [ALFORD]) shall be manifested (Jo1 3:5; Jo1 2:28), we shall be like Him (Christ; all sons have a substantial resemblance to their father, and Christ, whom we shall be like, is \"the express image of the Father's person,\" so that in resembling Christ, we shall resemble the Father). We wait for the manifestation (literally, the \"apocalypse\"; the same term as is applied to Christ's own manifestation) of the sons of God. After our natural birth, the new birth into the life of grace is needed, which is to be followed by the new birth into the life of glory; the two latter alike are termed \"the regeneration\" (Mat 19:28). The resurrection of our bodies is a kind of coming out of the womb of the earth, and being born into another life. Our first temptation was that we should be like God in knowledge, and by that we fell; but being raised by Christ, we become truly like Him, by knowing Him as we are known, and by seeing Him as He is [PEARSON, Exposition of the Creed]. As the first immortality which Adam lost was to be able not to die, so the last shall be not to be able to die. As man's first free choice or will was to be able not to sin, so our last shall be not to be able to sin [AUGUSTINE, The City of God, 22.30]. The devil fell by aspiring to God's power; man, by aspiring to his knowledge; but aspiring after God's goodness, we shall ever grow in His likeness. The transition from God the Father to \"He,\" \"Him,\" referring to Christ (who alone is ever said in Scripture to be manifested; not the Father, Joh 1:18), implies the entire unity of the Father and the Son. \n\nfor, &c.--Continual beholding generates likeness (Co2 3:18); as the face of the moon being always turned towards the sun, reflects its light and glory. \n\nsee him--not in His innermost Godhead, but as manifested in Christ. None but the pure can see the infinitely Pure One. In all these passages the Greek is the same verb opsomai; not denoting the action of seeing, but the state of him to whose eye or mind the object is presented; hence the Greek verb is always in the middle or reflexive voice, to perceive and inwardly appreciate [TITTMANN]. Our spiritual bodies will appreciate and recognize spiritual beings hereafter, as our natural bodies now do natural objects.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":3,"content":["this hope--of being hereafter \"like Him.\" Faith and love, as well as hope, occur in Jo1 3:11, Jo1 3:23. \n\nin--rather, \"(resting) upon Him\"; grounded on His promises. \n\npurifieth himself--by Christ's Spirit in him (Joh 15:5, end). \"Thou purifiest thyself, not of thyself, but of Him who comes that He may dwell in thee\" [AUGUSTINE]. One's justification through faith is presupposed. \n\nas he is pure--unsullied with any uncleanness. The Second Person, by whom both the Law and Gospel were given.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":4,"content":["Sin is incompatible with birth from God (Jo1 3:1-3). John often sets forth the same truth negatively, which he had before set forth positively. He had shown, birth from God involves self-purification; he now shows where sin, that is, the want of self-purification, is, there is no birth from God. \n\nWhosoever--Greek, \"Every one who.\" \n\ncommitteth sin--in contrast to Jo1 3:3, \"Every man that hath this hope in Him purifieth himself\"; and Jo1 3:7, \"He that doeth righteousness.\" \n\ntransgresseth . . . the law--Greek, \"committeth transgression of law.\" God's law of purity; and so shows he has no such hope of being hereafter pure as God is pure, and, therefore, that he is not born of God. \n\nfor--Greek, \"and.\" \n\nsin is . . . transgression of . . . law--definition of sin in general. The Greek having the article to both, implies that they are convertible terms. The Greek \"sin\" (hamartia) is literally, \"a missing of the mark.\" God's will being that mark to be ever aimed at. \"By the law is the knowledge of sin.\" The crookedness of a line is shown by being brought into juxtaposition with a straight ruler.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":5,"content":["Additional proof of the incompatibility of sin and sonship; the very object of Christ's manifestation in the flesh was to take away (by one act, and entirely, aorist) all sins, as the scapegoat did typically. \n\nand--another proof of the same. \n\nin him is no sin--not \"was,\" but \"is,\" as in Jo1 3:7, \"He is righteous,\" and Jo1 3:3, \"He is pure.\" Therefore we are to be so.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":6,"content":["He reasons from Christ's own entire separation from sin, that those in him must also be separate from it. \n\nabideth in him--as the branch in the vine, by vital union living by His life. \n\nsinneth not--In so far as he abides in Christ, so far is he free from all sin. The ideal of the Christian. The life of sin and the life of God mutually exclude one another, just as darkness and light. In matter of fact, believers do fall into sins (Jo1 1:8-10; Jo1 2:1-2); but all such sins are alien from the life of God, and need Christ's cleansing blood, without application to which the life of God could not be maintained. He sinneth not so long as he abideth in Christ. \n\nwhosoever sinneth hath not seen him--Greek perfect, \"has not seen, and does not see Him.\" Again the ideal of Christian intuition and knowledge is presented (Mat 7:23). All sin as such is at variance with the notion of one regenerated. Not that \"whosoever is betrayed into sins has never seen nor known God\"; but in so far as sin exists, in that degree the spiritual intuition and knowledge of God do not exist in him. \n\nneither--\"not even.\" To see spiritually is a further step than to know; for by knowing we come to seeing by vivid realization and experimentally.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":7,"content":["The same truth stated, with the addition that he who sins is, so far as he sins, \"of the devil.\" \n\nlet no man deceive you--as Antinomians try to mislead men. \n\nrighteousness--Greek, \"the righteousness,\" namely, of Christ or God. \n\nhe that doeth . . . is righteous--Not his doing makes him righteous, but his being righteous (justified by the righteousness of God in Christ, Rom 10:3-10) makes him to do righteousness: an inversion common in familiar language, logical in reality, though not in form, as in Luk 7:47; Joh 8:47. Works do not justify, but the justified man works. We infer from his doing righteousness that he is already righteous (that is, has the true and only principle of doing righteousness, namely, faith), and is therefore born of God (Jo1 3:9); just as we might say, The tree that bears good fruit is a good tree, and has a living root; not that the fruit makes the tree and its root to be good, but it shows that they are so. \n\nhe--Christ.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":8,"content":["He that committeth sin is of the devil--in contrast to \"He that doeth righteousness,\" Jo1 3:7. He is a son of the devil (Jo1 3:10; Joh 8:44). John does not, however, say, \"born of the devil.\" as he does \"born of God,\" for \"the devil begets none, nor does he create any; but whoever imitates the devil becomes a child of the devil by imitating him, not by proper birth\" [AUGUSTINE, Ten Homilies on the First Epistle of John, Homily 4.10]. From the devil there is not generation, but corruption [BENGEL]. \n\nsinneth from the beginning--from the time that any began to sin [ALFORD]: from the time that he became what he is, the devil. He seems to have kept his first estate only a very short time after his creation [BENGEL]. Since the fall of man [at the beginning of our world] the devil is (ever) sinning (this is the force of \"sinneth\"; he has sinned from the beginning, is the cause of all sins, and still goes on sinning; present). As the author of sin, and prince of this world, he has never ceased to seduce man to sin [LUECKE]. \n\ndestroy--break up and do away with; bruising and crushing the serpent's head. \n\nworks of the devil--sin, and all its awful consequences. John argues, Christians cannot do that which Christ came to destroy.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":9,"content":["Whosoever is born of God--literally, \"Everyone that is begotten of God.\" \n\ndoth not commit sin--His higher nature, as one born or begotten of God, doth not sin. To be begotten of God and to sin, are states mutually excluding one another. In so far as one sins, he makes it doubtful whether he be born of God. \n\nhis seed--the living word of God, made by the Holy Spirit the seed in us of a new life and the continual mean of sanctification. \n\nremaineth--abideth in him (compare Note, see on Jo1 3:6; Joh 5:38). This does not contradict Jo1 1:8-9; the regenerate show the utter incompatibility of sin with regeneration, by cleansing away every sin into which they may be betrayed by the old nature, at once in the blood of Christ. \n\ncannot sin, because he is born of God--\"because it is of God that he is born\" (so the Greek order, as compared with the order of the same words in the beginning of the verse); not \"because he was born of God\" (the Greek is perfect tense, which is present in meaning, not aorist); it is not said, Because a man was once for all born of God he never afterwards can sin; but, Because he is born of God, the seed abiding now in Him, he cannot sin; so long as it energetically abides, sin can have no place. Compare Gen 39:9, Joseph, \"How CAN I do this great wickedness and sin against God?\" The principle within me is at utter variance with it. The regenerate life is incompatible with sin, and gives the believer a hatred for sin in every shape, and an unceasing desire to resist it. \"The child of God in this conflict receives indeed wounds daily, but never throws away his arms or makes peace with his deadly foe\" [LUTHER]. The exceptional sins into which the regenerate are surprised, are owing to the new life principle being for a time suffered to lie dormant, and to the sword of the Spirit not being drawn instantly. Sin is ever active, but no longer reigns. The normal direction of the believer's energies is against sin; the law of God after the inward man is the ruling principle of his true self though the old nature, not yet fully deadened, rebels and sins. Contrast Jo1 5:18 with Joh 8:34; compare Psa 18:22-23; Psa 32:2-3; Psa 119:113, Psa 119:176. The magnetic needle, the nature of which is always to point to the pole, is easily turned aside, but always reseeks the pole.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":10,"content":["children of the devil--(See on Jo1 3:8; Act 13:10). There is no middle class between the children of God and the children of the devil. \n\ndoeth not righteousness--Contrast Jo1 2:29. \n\nhe that loveth not his brother-- (Jo1 4:8); a particular instance of that love which is the sum and fulfilment of all righteousness, and the token (not loud professions, or even seemingly good works) that distinguishes God's children from the devil's.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":11,"content":["the message--\"announcement,\" as of something good; not a mere command, as the law. The Gospel message of Him who loved us, announced by His servants, is, that we love the brethren; not here all mankind, but those who are our brethren in Christ, children of the same family of God, of whom we have been born anew.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":12,"content":["who--not in the Greek. \n\nof that wicked one--Translate, \"evil one,\" to accord with \"Because his own works were evil.\" Compare Jo1 3:8, \"of the devil,\" in contrast to \"of God,\" Jo1 3:10. \n\nslew he him? Because his own works were evil, and his brother's righteous--through envy and hatred of his brother's piety, owing to which God accepted Abel's, but rejected Cain's offering. Enmity from the first existed between the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":13,"content":["Marvel not--The marvel would be if the world loved you. \n\nthe world--of whom Cain is the representative (Jo1 3:12). \n\nhate you--as Cain hated even his own brother, and that to the extent of murdering him. The world feels its bad works tacitly reproved by your good works.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":14,"content":["We--emphatical; hated though we be by the world, we know what the world knows not. \n\nknow--as an assured fact. \n\npassed--changed our state. Col 1:13, \"from the power of darkness . . . translated into the kingdom of His dear Son.\" \n\nfrom death unto life--literally, \"out of the death (which enthrals the unregenerate) into the life (of the regenerate).\" A palpable coincidence of language and thought, the beloved disciple adopting his Lord's words. \n\nbecause we love the brethren--the ground, not of our passing over out of death into life, but of our knowing that we have so. Love, on our part, is the evidence of our justification and regeneration, not the cause of them. \"Let each go to his own heart; if he find there love to the brethren, let him feel assured that he has passed from death unto life. Let him not mind that his glory is only hidden; when the Lord shall come, then shall he appear in glory. For he has vital energy, but it is still wintertime; the root has vigor, but the branches are as it were dry; within there is marrow which is vigorous, within are leaves, within fruits, but they must wait for summer\" [AUGUSTINE]. \n\nHe that loveth not--Most of the oldest manuscripts omit \"his brother,\" which makes the statement more general. \n\nabideth--still. \n\nin death--\"in the (spiritual) death\" (ending in eternal death) which is the state of all by nature. His want of love evidences that no saving change has passed over him.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":15,"content":["hateth--equivalent to \"loveth not\" (Jo1 3:14); there is no medium between the two. \"Love and hatred, like light and darkness, life and death, necessarily replace, as well as necessarily exclude, one another\" [ALFORD]. \n\nis a murderer--because indulging in that passion, which, if followed out to its natural consequences, would make him one. \"Whereas, Jo1 3:16 desires us to lay down our lives for the brethren; duels require one (awful to say!) to risk his own life, rather than not deprive another of life\" [BENGEL]. God regards the inward disposition as tantamount to the outward act which would flow from it. Whomsoever one hates, one wishes to be dead. \n\nhath--Such a one still \"abideth in death.\" It is not his future state, but his present, which is referred to. He who hates (that is, loveth not) his brother (Jo1 3:14), cannot in this his present state have eternal life abiding in him.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":16,"content":["What true love to the brethren is, illustrated by the love of Christ to us. \n\nHereby--Greek, \"Herein.\" \n\nthe love of God--The words \"of God\" are not in the original. Translate, \"We arrive at the knowledge of love\"; we apprehend what true love is. \n\nhe--Christ. \n\nand we--on our part, if absolutely needed for the glory of God, the good of the Church, or the salvation of a brother. \n\nlives--Christ alone laid down His one life for us all; we ought to lay down our lives severally for the lives of the brethren; if not actually, at least virtually, by giving our time, care, labors, prayers, substance: Non nobis, sed omnibus. Our life ought not to be dearer to us than God's own Son was to Him. The apostles and martyrs acted on this principle.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":17,"content":["this world's good--literally, \"livelihood\" or substance. If we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren (Jo1 3:16), how much more ought we not to withhold our substance? \n\nseeth--not merely casually, but deliberately contemplates as a spectator; Greek, \"beholds.\" \n\nshutteth up his bowels of compassion--which had been momentarily opened by the spectacle of his brother's need. The \"bowels\" mean the heart, the seat of compassion. \n\nhow--How is it possible that \"the love of (that is, 'to') God dwelleth (Greek, 'abideth') in him?\" Our superfluities should yield to the necessities; our comforts, and even our necessaries in some measure, should yield to the extreme wants of our brethren. \"Faith gives Christ to me; love flowing from faith gives me to my neighbor.\"\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":18,"content":["When the venerable John could no longer walk to the meetings of the Church but was borne thither by his disciples, he always uttered the same address to the Church; he reminded them of that one commandment which he had received from Christ Himself, as comprising all the rest, and forming the distinction of the new covenant, \"My little children, love one another.\" When the brethren present, wearied of hearing the same thing so often, asked why he always repeated the same thing, he replied, \"Because it is the commandment of the Lord, and if this one thing be attained, it is enough\" [JEROME]. \n\nin word--Greek, \"with word . . . with tongue, but in deed and truth.\"\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":19,"content":["hereby--Greek, \"herein\"; in our loving in deed and in truth (Jo1 3:18). \n\nwe know--The oldest manuscripts have \"we shall know,\" namely, if we fulfil the command (Jo1 3:18). \n\nof the truth--that we are real disciples of, and belonging to, the truth, as it is in Jesus: begotten of God with the word of truth. Having herein the truth radically, we shall be sure not to love merely in word and tongue. (Jo1 3:18). \n\nassure--literally, \"persuade,\" namely, so as to cease to condemn us; satisfy the questionings and doubts of our consciences as to whether we be accepted before God or not (compare Mat 28:14; Act 12:20, \"having made Blastus their friend,\" literally, \"persuaded\"). The \"heart,\" as the seat of the feelings, is our inward judge; the conscience, as the witness, acts either as our justifying advocate, or our condemning accuser, before God even now. Joh 8:9, has \"conscience,\" but the passage is omitted in most old manuscripts. John nowhere else uses the term \"conscience.\" Peter and Paul alone use it. \n\nbefore him--as in the sight of Him, the omniscient Searcher of hearts. Assurance is designed to be the ordinary experience and privilege of the believer.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":20,"content":["LUTHER and BENGEL take this verse as consoling the believer whom his heart condemns; and who, therefore, like Peter, appeals from conscience to Him who is greater than conscience. \"Lord, Thou knowest all things: thou knowest that I love Thee.\" Peter's conscience, though condemning him of his sin in denying the Lord, assured him of his love; but fearing the possibility, owing to his past fall, of deceiving himself, he appeals to the all-knowing God: so Paul, Co1 4:3-4. So if we be believers, even if our heart condemns us of sin in general, yet having the one sign of sonship, love, we may still assure our hearts (some oldest manuscripts read heart, Jo1 3:19, as well as Jo1 3:20), as knowing that God is greater than our heart, and knoweth all things. But thus the same Greek is translated \"because\" in the beginning, and \"(we know) that\" in the middle of the verse, and if the verse were consolatory, it probably would have been, \"Because EVEN if our heart condemn us,\" &c. Therefore translate, \"Because (rendering the reason why it has been stated in Jo1 3:19 to be so important to 'assure our hearts before Him') if our heart condemn (Greek, 'know [aught] against us'; answering by contrast to 'we shall know that we are of the truth') us (it is) because God is greater than our heart and knoweth all things.\" If our heart judges us unfavorably, we may be sure that He, knowing more than our heart knows, judges us more unfavorably still [ALFORD]. A similar ellipsis (\"it is\") occurs in Co1 14:27; Co2 1:6; Co2 8:23. The condemning testimony of our conscience is not alone, but is the echo of the voice of Him who is greater and knoweth all things. Our hypocrisy in loving by word and tongue, not in deed and truth, does not escape even our conscience, though weak and knowing but little, how much less God who knows all things! Still the consolatory view may be the right one. For the Greek for \"we shall assure our hearts\" (see on Jo1 3:19), is gain over, persuade so as to be stilled, implying that there was a previous state of self-condemnation by the heart (Jo1 3:20), which, however, is got over by the consolatory thought, \"God is greater than my heart\" which condemns me, and \"knows all things\" (Greek \"ginoskei,\" \"knows,\" not \"kataginoskei,\" \"condemns\"), and therefore knows my love and desire to serve Him, and knows my frame so as to pity my weakness of faith. This gaining over the heart to peace is not so advanced a stage as the having CONFIDENCE towards God which flows from a heart condemning us not. The first \"because\" thus applies to the two alternate cases, Jo1 3:20-21 (giving the ground of saying, that having love we shall gain over, or assure our minds before Him, Jo1 3:19); the second \"because\" applies to the first alternate alone, namely, \"if our heart condemn us.\" When he reaches the second alternate, Jo1 3:21, he states it independently of the former \"because\" which had connected it with Jo1 3:19, inasmuch as CONFIDENCE toward God is a farther stage than persuading our hearts, though always preceded by it.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":21,"content":["Beloved--There is no \"But\" contrasting the two cases, Jo1 3:20-21, because \"Beloved\" sufficiently marks the transition to the case of the brethren walking in the full confidence of love (Jo1 3:18). The two results of our being able to \"assure our hearts before Him\" (Jo1 3:19), and of \"our heart condemning us not\" (of insincerity as to the truth in general, and as to LOVE in particular) are, (1) confidence toward God; (2) a sure answer to our prayers. John does not mean that all whose hearts do not condemn them, are therefore safe before God; for some have their conscience seared, others are ignorant of the truth, and it is not only sincerity, but sincerity in the truth which can save men. Christians are those meant here: knowing Christ's precepts and testing themselves by them.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":22,"content":["we receive--as a matter of fact, according to His promise. Believers, as such, ask only what is in accordance with God's will; or if they ask what God wills not, they bow their will to God's will, and so God grants them either their request, or something better than it. \n\nbecause we keep his commandments--Compare Psa 66:18; Psa 34:15; Psa 145:18-19. Not as though our merits earned a hearing for our prayers, but when we are believers in Christ, all our works of faith being the fruit of His Spirit in us, are \"pleasing in God's sight\"; and our prayers being the voice of the same Spirit of God in us, naturally and necessarily are answered by Him.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":23,"content":["Summing up of God's commandments under the Gospel dispensation in one commandment. \n\nthis is his commandment--singular: for faith and love are not separate commandments, but are indissolubly united. We cannot truly love one another without faith in Christ, nor can we truly believe in Him without love. \n\nbelieve--once for all; Greek aorist. \n\non the name of his Son--on all that is revealed in the Gospel concerning Him, and on Himself in respect to His person, offices, and atoning work. \n\nas he--as Jesus gave us commandment.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":24,"content":["dwelleth in him--The believer dwelleth in Christ. \n\nand he in him--Christ in the believer. Reciprocity. \"Thus he returns to the great keynote of the Epistle, abide in Him, with which the former part concluded\" (Jo1 2:28). \n\nhereby--herein we (believers) know that he abideth in us, namely, from (the presence in us of) the Spirit \"which He hath given us.\" Thus he prepares, by the mention of the true Spirit, for the transition to the false \"spirit,\" Jo1 4:1-6; after which he returns again to the subject of love.\n\n\n\n\nNext: 1 John Chapter 4\n\n"]}],"introduction":"DISTINGUISHING MARKS OF THE CHILDREN OF GOD AND THE CHILDREN OF THE DEVIL. BROTHERLY LOVE THE ESSENCE OF TRUE RIGHTEOUSNESS. (1Jo. 3:1-24)\n\nBehold--calling attention, as to some wonderful exhibition, little as the world sees to admire. This verse is connected with the previous Jo1 2:29, thus: All our doing of righteousness is a mere sign that God, of His matchless love, has adopted us as children; it does not save us, but is a proof that we are saved of His grace. \n\nwhat manner of--of what surpassing excellence, how gracious on His part, how precious to us. \n\nlove . . . bestowed--He does not say that God hath given us some gift, but love itself and the fountain of all honors, the heart itself, and that not for our works or efforts, but of His grace [LUTHER]. \n\nthat--\"what manner of love\"; resulting in, proved by, our being, &c. The immediate effect aimed at in the bestowal of this love is, \"that we should be called children of God.\" \n\nshould be called--should have received the privilege of such a glorious title (though seeming so imaginary to the world), along with the glorious reality. With God to call is to make really to be. Who so great as God? What nearer relationship than that of sons? The oldest manuscripts add, \"And we ARE SO\" really. \n\ntherefore--\"on this account,\" because \"we are (really) so.\" \n\nus--the children, like the Father. \n\nit knew him not--namely, the Father. \"If they who regard not God, hold thee in any account, feel alarmed about thy state\" [BENGEL]. Contrast Jo1 5:1. The world's whole course is one great act of non-recognition of God.\n\n"},"thisChapterLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/1JN/3.json","thisChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"1JN","chapter":3},"nextChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/1JN/4.json","nextChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"1JN","chapter":4},"previousChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/1JN/2.json","previousChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"1JN","chapter":2},"numberOfVerses":23}