{"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":5,"content":[{"type":"verse","number":2,"content":["By--Greek, \"In.\" As our love to the brethren is the sign and test of our love to God, so (John here says) our love to God (tested by our \"keeping his commandments\") is, conversely, the ground and only true basis of love to our brother. \n\nwe know--John means here, not the outward criteria of genuine brotherly love, but the inward spiritual criteria of it, consciousness of love to God manifested in a hearty keeping of His commandments. When we have this inwardly and outwardly confirmed love to God, we can know assuredly that we truly love the children of God. \"Love to one's brother is prior, according to the order of nature (see on Jo1 4:20); love to God is so, according to the order of grace (Jo1 5:2). At one time the former is more immediately known, at another time the latter, according as the mind is more engaged in human relations or in what concerns the divine honor\" [ESTIUS]. John shows what true love is, namely, that which is referred to God as its first object. As previously John urged the effect, so now he urges the cause. For he wishes mutual love to be so cultivated among us, as that God should always be placed first [CALVIN].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":3,"content":["this is--the love of God consists in this. \n\nnot grievous--as so many think them. It is \"the way of the transgressor\" that \"is hard.\" What makes them to the regenerate \"not grievous,\" is faith which \"overcometh the world\" (Jo1 5:4): in proportion as faith is strong, the grievousness of God's commandments to the rebellious flesh is overcome. The reason why believers feel any degree of irksomeness in God's commandments is, they do not realize fully by faith the privileges of their spiritual life.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":4,"content":["For--(See on Jo1 5:3). The reason why \"His commandments are not grievous.\" Though there is a conflict in keeping them, the sue for the whole body of the regenerate is victory over every opposing influence; meanwhile there is a present joy to each believer in keeping them which makes them \"not grievous.\" \n\nwhatsoever--Greek, \"all that is begotten of God.\" The neuter expresses the universal whole, or aggregate of the regenerate, regarded as one collective body Joh 3:6; Joh 6:37, Joh 6:39, \"where BENGEL remarks, that in Jesus' discourses, what the Father has given Him is called, in the singular number and neuter gender, all whatsoever; those who come to the Son are described in the masculine gender and plural number, they all, or singular, every one. The Father has given, as it were, the whole mass to the Son, that all whom He gave may be one whole: that universal whole the Son singly evolves, in the execution of the divine plan.\" \n\novercometh--habitually. \n\nthe world--all that is opposed to keeping the commandments of God, or draws us off from God, in this world, including our corrupt flesh, on which the world's blandishments or threats act, as also including Satan, the prince of this world (Joh 12:31; Joh 14:30; Joh 16:11). \n\nthis is the victory that overcometh--Greek aorist, \". . . that hath (already) overcome the world\": the victory (where faith is) hereby is implied as having been already obtained (Jo1 2:13; Jo1 4:4).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":5,"content":["Who--\"Who\" else \"but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God:\" \"the Christ\" (Jo1 5:1)? Confirming, by a triumphant question defying all contradiction, as an undeniable fact, Jo1 5:4, that the victory which overcomes the world is faith. For it is by believing: that we are made one with Jesus the Son of God, so that we partake of His victory over the world, and have dwelling in us One greater than he who is in the world (Jo1 4:4). \"Survey the whole world, and show me even one of whom it can be affirmed with truth that he overcomes the world, who is not a Christian, and endowed with this faith\" [EPISCOPIUS in ALFORD].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":6,"content":["This--the Person mentioned in Jo1 5:5. This Jesus. \n\nhe that came by water and blood--\"by water,\" when His ministry was inaugurated by baptism in the Jordan, and He received the Father's testimony to His Messiahship and divine Sonship. Compare Jo1 5:5, \"believeth that Jesus is the Son of God,\" with Joh 1:33-34, \"The Spirit . . . remaining on Him . . . I saw and bare record that this is the Son of God\"; and Jo1 5:8, below, \"there are three that bear witness in earth, the Spirit, and the water, and the blood.\" Corresponding to this is the baptism of water and the Spirit which He has instituted as a standing seal and mean of initiatory incorporation with Him. \n\nand blood--He came by \"the blood of His cross\" (so \"by\" is used, Heb 9:12 : \"by,\" that is, with, \"His own blood He entered in once into the holy place\"): a fact seen and so solemnly witnessed to by John. \"These two past facts in the Lord's life are this abiding testimony to us, by virtue of the permanent application to us of their cleansing and atoning power.\" \n\nJesus Christ--not a mere appellation, but a solemn assertion of the Lord's Person and Messiahship. \n\nnot by, &c.--Greek, \"not IN the water only, but IN the water and IN (so oldest manuscripts add) the blood.\" As \"by\" implies the mean through, or with, which He came: so \"in,\" the element in which He came. \"The\" implies that the water and the blood were sacred and well-known symbols. John Baptist came only baptizing with water, and therefore was not the Messiah. Jesus came first to undergo Himself the double baptism of water and blood, and then to baptize us with the Spirit-cleansing, of which water is the sacramental seal, and with His atoning blood, the efficacy of which, once for all shed, is perpetual in the Church; and therefore is the Messiah. It was His shed blood which first gave water baptism its spiritual significancy. We are baptized into His death: the grand point of union between us and Him, and, through Him, between us and God. \n\nit is the Spirit, &c.--The Holy Spirit is an additional witness (compare Jo1 5:7), besides the water and the blood, to Jesus' Sonship and Messiahship. The Spirit attested these truths at Jesus' baptism by descending on Him, and throughout His ministry by enabling Him to speak and do what man never before or since has spoken or, done; and \"it is the Spirit that beareth witness\" of Christ, now permanently in the Church: both in the inspired New Testament Scriptures, and in the hearts of believers, and in the spiritual reception of baptism and the Lord's Supper. \n\nbecause the Spirit is truth--It is His essential truth which gives His witness such infallible authority.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":7,"content":["three--Two or three witnesses were required by law to constitute adequate testimony. The only Greek manuscripts in any form which support the words, \"in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost, and these three are one; and there are three that bear witness in earth,\" are the Montfortianus of Dublin, copied evidently from the modern Latin Vulgate; the Ravianus, copied from the Complutensian Polyglot; a manuscript at Naples, with the words added in the Margin by a recent hand; Ottobonianus, 298, of the fifteenth century, the Greek of which is a mere translation of the accompanying Latin. All the old versions omit the words. The oldest manuscripts of the Vulgate omit them: the earliest Vulgate manuscript which has them being Wizanburgensis, 99, of the eighth century. A scholium quoted in MatthÃ&brvbri, shows that the words did not arise from fraud; for in the words, in all Greek manuscripts \"there are three that bear record,\" as the Scholiast notices, the word \"three\" is masculine, because the three things (the Spirit, the water, and the blood) are SYMBOLS OF THE TRINITY. To this CYPRIAN, 196, also refers, \"Of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, it is written, 'And these three are one' (a unity).\" There must be some mystical truth implied in using \"three\" (Greek) in the masculine, though the antecedents, \"Spirit, water, and blood,\" are neuter. That THE TRINITY was the truth meant is a natural inference: the triad specified pointing to a still Higher Trinity; as is plain also from Jo1 5:9, \"the witness of GOD,\" referring to the Trinity alluded to in the Spirit, water, and blood. It was therefore first written as a marginal comment to complete the sense of the text, and then, as early at least as the eighth century, was introduced into the text of the Latin Vulgate. The testimony, however, could only be borne on earth to men, not in heaven. The marginal comment, therefore, that inserted \"in heaven,\" was inappropriate. It is on earth that the context evidently requires the witness of the three, the Spirit, the water, and the blood, to be borne: mystically setting forth the divine triune witnesses, the Father, the Spirit, and the Son. LUECKE notices as internal evidence against the words, John never uses \"the Father\" and \"the Word\" as correlates, but, like other New Testament writers, associates \"the Son\" with \"the Father,\" and always refers \"the Word\" to \"God\" as its correlate, not \"the Father.\" Vigilius, at the end of the fifth century, is the first who quotes the disputed words as in the text; but no Greek manuscript earlier than the fifteenth is extant with them. The term \"Trinity\" occurs first in the third century in TERTULLIAN [Against Praxeas, 3].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":8,"content":["agree in one--\"tend unto one result\"; their agreeing testimony to Jesus' Sonship and Messiahship they give by the sacramental grace in the water of baptism, received by the penitent believer, by the atoning efficacy of His blood, and by the internal witness of His Spirit (Jo1 5:10): answering to the testimony given to Jesus' Sonship and Messiahship by His baptism, His crucifixion, and the Spirit's manifestations in Him (see on Jo1 5:6). It was by His coming by water (that is, His baptism in Jordan) that Jesus was solemnly inaugurated in office, and revealed Himself as Messiah; this must have been peculiarly important in John's estimation, who was first led to Christ by the testimony of the Baptist. By the baptism then received by Christ, and by His redeeming blood-shedding, and by that which the Spirit of God, whose witness is infallible, has effected, and still effects, by Him, the Spirit, the water, and the blood, unite, as the threefold witness, to verify His divine Messiahship [NEANDER].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":9,"content":["If, &c.--We do accept (and rightly so) the witness of veracious men, fallible though they be; much more ought we to accept the infallible witness of God (the Father). \"The testimony of the Father is, as it were, the basis of the testimony of the Word and of the Holy Spirit; just as the testimony of the Spirit is, as it were, the basis of the testimony of the water and the blood\" [BENGEL]. \n\nfor--This principle applies in the present case, FOR, &c. \n\nwhich--in the oldest manuscripts, \"because He hath given testimony concerning His Son.\" What that testimony is we find above in Jo1 5:1, Jo1 5:5, \"Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God\"; and below in Jo1 5:10-11.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":10,"content":["hath the witness--of God, by His Spirit (Jo1 5:8). \n\nin himself--God's Spirit dwelling in him and witnessing that \"Jesus is the Lord,\" \"the Christ,\" and \"the Son of God\" (Jo1 5:1, Jo1 5:5). The witness of the Spirit in the believer himself to his own sonship is not here expressed, but follows as a consequence of believing the witness of God to Jesus' divine Sonship. \n\nbelieveth not God--credits not His witness. \n\nmade him a liar--a consequence which many who virtually, or even avowedly, do not believe, may well startle back from as fearful blasphemy and presumption (Jo1 1:10). \n\nbelieveth not the record--Greek, \"believeth not IN the record, or witness.\" Refusal to credit God's testimony (\"believeth not God\") is involved in refusal to believe IN (to rest one's trust in) Jesus Christ, the object of God's record or testimony. \"Divine \"faith\" is an assent unto something as credible upon the testimony of God. This is the highest kind of faith; because the object hath the highest credibility, because grounded upon the testimony of God, which is infallible\" [PEARSON, Exposition of the Creed]. \"The authority on which we believe is divine; the doctrine which we follow is divine\" [LEO]. \n\ngave--Greek, \"hath testified, and now testifies.\" \n\nof--concerning.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":11,"content":["hath given--Greek, aorist: \"gave\" once for all. Not only \"promised\" it. \n\nlife is in his Son--essentially (Joh 1:4; Joh 11:25; Joh 14:6); bodily (Col 2:9); operatively (Ti2 1:10) [LANGE in ALFORD]. It is in the second Adam, the Son of God, that this life is secured to us, which, if left to depend on us, we should lose, like the first Adam.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":12,"content":["the Son . . . life--Greek, \"THE life.\" BENGEL remarks, The verse has two clauses: in the former the Son is mentioned without the addition \"of God,\" for believers know the Son: in the second clause the addition \"of God\" is made, that unbelievers may know thereby what a serious thing it is not to have Him. In the former clause \"has\" bears the emphasis; in the second, life. To have the Son is to be able to say as the bride, \"I am my Beloved's, and my Beloved is mine\" [Sol 6:3]. Faith is the mean whereby the regenerate HAVE Christ as a present possession, and in having Him have life in its germ and reality now, and shall have life in its fully developed manifestation hereafter. Eternal life here is: (1) initial, and is an earnest of that which is to follow; in the intermediate state (2) partial, belonging but to a part of a man, though that is his nobler part, the soul separated from the body; at and after the resurrection (3) perfectional. This life is not only natural, consisting of the union of the soul and the body (as that of the reprobate in eternal pain, which ought to be termed death eternal, not life), but also spiritual, the union of the soul to God, and supremely blessed for ever (for life is another term for happiness) [PEARSON, Exposition of the Creed].\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":13,"content":["The oldest manuscripts and versions read, \"These things have I written unto you [omitting 'that believe on the name of the Son of God'] that ye may know that ye have eternal life (compare Jo1 5:11), THOSE (of you I mean) WHO believe (not as English Version reads, 'and that ye may believe') on the name of the Son of God.\" English Version, in the latter clause, will mean, \"that ye may continue to believe,\" &c. (compare Jo1 5:12). \n\nThese things--This Epistle. He, towards the close of his Gospel (Joh 20:30-31), wrote similarly, stating his purpose in having written. In Jo1 1:4 he states the object of his writing this Epistle to be, \"that your joy may be full.\" To \"know that we have eternal life\" is the sure way to \"joy in God.\"\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":14,"content":["the confidence--boldness (Jo1 4:17) in prayer, which results from knowing that we have eternal life (Jo1 5:13; Jo1 3:19, Jo1 3:22). \n\naccording to his will--which is the believer's will, and which is therefore no restraint to his prayers. In so far as God's will is not our will, we are not abiding in faith, and our prayers are not accepted. ALFORD well says, If we knew God's will thoroughly, and submitted to it heartily, it would be impossible for us to ask anything for the spirit or for the body which He should not perform; it is this ideal state which the apostle has in view. It is the Spirit who teaches us inwardly, and Himself in us asks according to the will of God.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":15,"content":["hear--Greek, \"that He heareth us.\" \n\nwe have the petitions that we desired of him--We have, as present possessions, everything whatsoever we desired (asked) from Him. Not one of our past prayers offered in faith, according to His will, is lost. Like Hannah, we can rejoice over them as granted even before the event; and can recognize the event when it comes to pass, as not from chance, but obtained by our past prayers. Compare also Jehoshaphat's believing confidence in the issue of his prayers, so much so that he appointed singers to praise the Lord beforehand.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":16,"content":["If any . . . see--on any particular occasion; Greek aorist. \n\nhis brother--a fellow Christian. \n\nsin a sin--in the act of sinning, and continuing in the sin: present. \n\nnot unto death--provided that it is not unto death. \n\nhe shall give--The asker shall be the means, by his intercessory prayer, of God giving life to the sinning brother. Kindly reproof ought to accompany his intercessions. Life was in process of being forfeited by the sinning brother when the believer's intercession obtained its restoration. \n\nfor them--resuming the proviso put forth in the beginning of the verse. \"Provided that the sin is not unto death.\" \"Shall give life,\" I say, to, that is, obtain life \"for (in the case of) them that sin not unto death.\" \n\nI do not say that he shall pray for it--The Greek for \"pray\" means a REQUEST as of one on an equality, or at least on terms of familiarity, with him from whom the favor is sought. \"The Christian intercessor for his brethren, John declares, shall not assume the authority which would be implied in making request for a sinner who has sinned the sin unto death (Sa1 15:35; Sa1 16:1; Mar 3:29), that it might be forgiven him\" [TRENCH, Greek Synonyms of the New Testament]. Compare Deu 3:26. Greek \"ask\" implies the humble petition of an inferior; so that our Lord never uses it, but always uses (Greek) \"request.\" Martha, from ignorance, once uses \"ask\" in His case (Joh 11:22). \"Asking\" for a brother sinning not unto death, is a humble petition in consonance with God's will. To \"request\" for a sin unto death [intercede, as it were, authoritatively for it, as though we were more merciful than God] would savor of presumption; prescribing to God in a matter which lies out of the bounds of our brotherly yearning (because one sinning unto death would thereby be demonstrated not to be, nor ever to have been, truly a brother, Jo1 2:19), how He shall inflict and withhold His righteous judgments. Jesus Himself intercedes, not for the world which hardens itself in unbelief, but for those given to Him out of the world.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":17,"content":["\"Every unrighteousness (even that of believers, compare Jo1 1:9; Jo1 3:4. Every coming short of right) is sin\"; (but) not every sin is the sin unto death. \n\nand there is a sin not unto death--in the case of which, therefore, believers may intercede. Death and life stand in correlative opposition (Jo1 5:11-13). The sin unto death must be one tending \"towards\" (so the Greek), and so resulting in, death. ALFORD makes it to be an appreciable ACT of sin, namely, the denying Jesus to be the Christ, the Son of God (in contrast to confess this truth, Jo1 5:1, Jo1 5:5), Jo1 2:19, Jo1 2:22; Jo1 4:2-3; Jo1 5:10. Such wilful deniers of Christ are not to be received into one's house, or wished \"God speed.\" Still, I think with BENGEL, not merely the act, but also the state of apostasy accompanying the act, is included--a \"state of soul in which faith, love, and hope, in short, the new life, is extinguished. The chief commandment is faith and love. Therefore, the chief sin is that by which faith and love are destroyed. In the former case is life; in the latter, death. As long as it is not evident (see on Jo1 5:16, on 'see') that it is a sin unto death, it is lawful to pray. But when it is deliberate rejection of grace, and the man puts from him life thereby, how can others procure for him life?\" Contrast Jam 5:14-18. Compare Mat 12:31-32 as to the wilful rejection of Christ, and resistance to the Holy Ghost's plain testimony to Him as the divine Messiah. Jesus, on the cross, pleaded only for those who KNEW NOT what they were doing in crucifying Him, not for those wilfully resisting grace and knowledge. If we pray for the impenitent, it must be with humble reference of the matter to God's will, not with the intercessory request which we should offer for a brother when erring.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":18,"content":["(Jo1 3:9.) \n\nWe know--Thrice repeated emphatically, to enforce the three truths which the words preface, as matters of the brethren's joint experimental knowledge. This Jo1 5:18 warns against abusing Jo1 5:16-17, as warranting carnal security. \n\nwhosoever--Greek, \"every one who.\" Not only advanced believers, but every one who is born again, \"sinneth not.\" \n\nhe that is begotten--Greek aorist, \"has been (once for all in past time) begotten of God\"; in the beginning of the verse it is perfect. \"Is begotten,\" or \"born,\" as a continuing state. \n\nkeepeth himself--The Vulgate translates, \"The having been begotten of God keepeth HIM\" (so one of the oldest manuscripts reads): so ALFORD. Literally, \"He having been begotten of God (nominative pendent), it (the divine generation implied in the nominative) keepeth him.\" So Jo1 3:9, \"His seed remaineth in him.\" Still, in English Version reading, God's working by His Spirit inwardly, and man's working under the power of that Spirit as a responsible agent, is what often occurs elsewhere. That God must keep us, if we are to keep ourselves from evil, is certain. Compare Joh 17:15 especially with this verse. \n\nthat wicked one toucheth him not--so as to hurt him. In so far as he realizes his regeneration-life, the prince of this world hath nothing in him to fasten his deadly temptations on, as in Christ's own case. His divine regeneration has severed once for all his connection with the prince of this world.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":19,"content":["world lieth in wickedness--rather, \"lieth in the wicked one,\" as the Greek is translated in Jo1 5:18; Jo1 2:13-14; compare Jo1 4:4; Joh 17:14-15. The world lieth in the power of, and abiding in, the wicked one, as the resting-place and lord of his slaves; compare \"abideth in death,\" Jo1 3:14; contrast Jo1 5:20, \"we are in Him that is true.\" While the believer has been delivered out of his power, the whole world lieth helpless and motionless still in it, just as it was; including the wise, great, respectable, and all who are not by vital union in Christ.\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":20,"content":["Summary of our Christian privileges. \n\nis come--is present, having come. \"HE IS HERE--all is full of Him--His incarnation, work, and abiding presence, is to us a living fact\" [ALFORD]. \n\ngiven us an understanding--Christ's, office is to give the inner spiritual understanding to discern the things of God. \n\nthat we may know--Some oldest manuscripts read, \"(so) that we know.\" \n\nhim that is true--God, as opposed to every kind of idol or false god (Jo1 5:21). Jesus, by virtue of His oneness with God, is also \"He that is true\" (Rev 3:7). \n\neven--\"we are in the true\" God, by virtue of being \"in His Son Jesus Christ.\" \n\nThis is the true God--\"This Jesus Christ (the last-named Person) is the true God\" (identifying Him thus with the Father in His attribute, \"the only true God,\" Joh 17:3, primarily attributed to the Father). \n\nand eternal life--predicated of the Son of God; ALFORD wrongly says, He was the life, but not eternal life. The Father is indeed eternal life as its source, but the Son also is that eternal life manifested, as the very passage (Jo1 1:2) which ALFORD quotes, proves against him. Compare also Jo1 5:11, Jo1 5:13. Plainly it is as the Mediator of ETERNAL LIFE to us that Christ is here contemplated. The Greek is, \"The true God and eternal life is this\" Jesus Christ, that is, In believing in Him we believe in the true God, and have eternal life. The Son is called \"He that is TRUE,\" Rev 3:7, as here. This naturally prepares the way for warning against false gods (Jo1 5:21). Jesus Christ is the only \"express image of God's person\" which is sanctioned, the only true visible manifestation of God. All other representations of God are forbidden as idols. Thus the Epistle closes as it began (Jo1 1:1-2).\n\n"]},{"type":"verse","number":21,"content":["Affectionate parting caution. \n\nfrom idols--Christians were then everywhere surrounded by idolaters, with whom it was impossible to avoid intercourse. Hence the need of being on their guard against any even indirect compromise or act of communion with idolatry. Some at Pergamos, in the region whence John wrote, fell into the snare of eating things sacrificed to idols. The moment we cease to abide \"in Him that is true (by abiding) in Jesus Christ,\" we become part of \"the world that lieth in the wicked one,\" given up to spiritual, if not in all places literal, idolatry (Eph 5:5; Col 3:5).\n\n\n\n\n\nNext: 2 John Introduction\n\n"]}],"introduction":"WHO ARE THE BRETHREN ESPECIALLY TO BE LOVED (Jo1 4:21); OBEDIENCE, THE TEST OF LOVE, EASY THROUGH FAITH, WHICH OVERCOMES THE WORLD. LAST PORTION OF THE EPISTLE. THE SPIRIT'S WITNESS TO THE BELIEVER'S SPIRITUAL LIFE. TRUTHS REPEATED AT THE CLOSE: FAREWELL WARNING. (1Jo. 5:1-21)\n\nReason why our \"brother\" (Jo1 4:21) is entitled to such love, namely, because he is \"born (begotten) of God\": so that if we want to show our love to God, we must show it to God's visible representative. \n\nWhosoever--Greek, \"Everyone that.\" He could not be our \"Jesus\" (God-Saviour) unless He were \"the Christ\"; for He could not reveal the way of salvation, except He were a prophet: He could not work out that salvation, except He were a priest: He could not confer that salvation upon us, except He were a king: He could not be prophet, priest, and king, except He were the Christ [PEARSON, Exposition of the Creed]. \n\nborn--Translate, \"begotten,\" as in the latter part of the verse, the Greek being the same. Christ is the \"only-begotten Son\" by generation; we become begotten sons of God by regeneration and adoption. \n\nevery one that loveth him that begat--sincerely, not in mere profession (Jo1 4:20). \n\nloveth him also that is begotten of him--namely, \"his brethren\" (Jo1 4:21).\n\n"},"thisChapterLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/1JN/5.json","thisChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"1JN","chapter":5},"nextChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/2JN/1.json","nextChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"2JN","chapter":1},"previousChapterApiLink":"/api/c/jamieson-fausset-brown/1JN/4.json","previousChapterReference":{"commentaryId":"jamieson-fausset-brown","book":"1JN","chapter":4},"numberOfVerses":20}