1 John 5:18

Here we have,

I. A recapitulation of the privileges and advantages of sound Christian believers. 1. They are secured against sin, against the fulness of its dominion or the fulness of its guilt: We know that whosoever is born of God (and the believer in Christ is born of God, Jo1 5:1) sinneth not (Jo1 5:18), sinneth not with that fulness of heart and spirit that the unregenerate do (as was said Jo1 3:6, Jo1 3:9), and consequently not with that fulness of guilt that attends the sins of others; and so he is secured against that sin which is unavoidably unto death, or which infallibly binds the sinner over unto the wages of eternal death; the new nature, and the inhabitation of the divine Spirit thereby, prevent the admission of such unpardonable sin. 2. They are fortified against the devil's destructive attempts: He that is begotten of God keepeth himself, that is, is enabled to guard himself, and the wicked one toucheth him not (Jo1 5:18), that is, that the wicked one may not touch him, namely, to death. It seems not to be barely a narration of the duty or the practice of the regenerate; but an indication of their power by virtue of their regeneration. They are thereby prepared and principled against the fatal touches, the sting, of the wicked one; he touches not their souls, to infuse his venom there a he does in others, or to expel that regenerative principle which is an antidote to his poison, or to induce them to that sin which by the gospel constitution conveys an indissoluble obligation to eternal death. He may prevail too far with them, to draw them to some acts of sin; but it seems to be the design of the apostle to assert that their regeneration secures them from such assaults of the devil as will bring them into the same case and actual condemnation with the devil. 3. they are on God's side and interest, in opposition to the state of the world: And we know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness, Jo1 5:19. Mankind are divided into two great parties of dominions, that which belongs to God and that which belongs to wickedness or to the wicked one. The Christian believers belong to God. They are of God, and from him, and to him, and for him. They succeed into the right and room of the ancient Israel of God, of whom it is said, The Lord's people is his portion, his estate in this world; Jacob is the lot of his inheritance, the dividend that has fallen to him by the lot of his own determination (Deu 32:9); while, on the contrary, the whole world, the rest, being by far the major part, lieth in wickedness, in the jaws in the bowels of the wicked one. There are, indeed, were we to consider the individuals, many wicked ones, many wicked spirits, in the heavenly or the ethereal places; but they are united in wicked nature, policy, and principle, and they are united also in one head. there is the prince of the devils and of the diabolical kingdom. There is a head of the malignity and of the malignant world; and he has such sway here that he is called the god of this world. Strange that such a knowing spirit should be so implacably incensed against the Almighty and all his interests, when he cannot but know that it must end in his own overthrow and everlasting damnation! How tremendous is the judgment of God upon that wicked one! May the God of the Christian world continually demolish his dominion in this world, and translate souls into the kingdom of his dear Son! 4. They are enlightened in the knowledge of the true eternal God: "And we know that the Son of God has come, and has given as an understanding, that we may know him that is true, Jo1 5:20. The Son of God has come into our world, and we have seen him, and know him by all the evidence that has already been asserted; he has revealed unto us the true God (as Joh 1:18), and he has opened our minds too to understand that revelation, given us an internal light in our understandings, whereby we may discern the glories of the true God; and we are assured that it is the true God that he hath discovered to us. He is infinitely superior in purity, power, and perfection, to all the gods of the Gentiles. He has all the excellences, beauties, and riches, of the living and true God. It is the same God that, according to Moses's account, made the heavens and the earth, the same who took our fathers and patriarchs into peculiar covenant with himself, the same who brought our ancestors out of Egypt, who gave us the fiery law upon mount Sinai, who gave us his holy oracles, promised the call and conversion of the Gentiles. By his counsels and works, by his love and grace, by his terrors and judgments, we know that he, and he alone, in the fulness of his being, is the living and true God." It is a great happiness to know the true God, to know him in Christ; it is eternal lie, Joh 17:3. It is the glory of the Christian revelation that it gives the best account of the true God, and administers the best eye-salve for our discerning the living and true God. 5. They have a happy union with God and his Son: "And we are in him that is true, even (or and) in his Son Jesus Christ, Jo1 5:20. The Son leads us to the Father, and we are in both, in the love and favour of both, in covenant and federal alliance with both, in spiritual conjunction with both by the inhabitation and operation of their Spirit: and, that you may know how great a dignity and felicity this is, you must remember that this true one is the true God and eternal life" or rather (as it should seem a more natural construction), "This same Son of God is himself also the true God and eternal life" (Joh 1:1, and here, Jo1 1:2), "so that in union with either, much more with both, we are united to the true God and eternal life." Then we have,

II. The apostle's concluding monition: "Little children" (dear children, as it has been interpreted), "keep yourselves from idols, Jo1 5:21. Since you know the true God, and are in him, let your light and love guard you against all that is advanced in opposition to him, or competition with him. Flee from the false gods of the heathen world. They are not comparable to the God whose you are and whom you serve. Adore not your God by statues and images, which share in his worship. Your God is an incomprehensible Spirit, and is disgraced by such sordid representations. Hold no communion with your heathen neighbours in their idolatrous worship. Your God is jealous, and would have you come out, and be separated from among them; mortify the flesh, and be crucified to the world, that they may not usurp the throne of dominion in the heart, which is due only to God. The God whom you have known is he who made you, who redeemed you by his Son, who has sent his gospel to you, who has pardoned your sins, begotten you unto himself by his Spirit, and given you eternal life. Cleave to him in faith, and love, and constant obedience, in opposition to all things that would alienate your mind and heart from God. To this living and true God be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen."

Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

(Jo1 3:9.)

We 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.

whosoever--Greek, "every one who." Not only advanced believers, but every one who is born again, "sinneth not."

he 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.

keepeth 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.

that 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.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

(3) SOME PRACTICAL POINTS RECAPITULATED (1Jn_5:18-21).

(a) God’s sons do not sin (1Jn_5:18).

St. John refers back to “that ye may know” in 1Jn_5:13, and sums up three points from former portions of the Epistle, describing the true consciousness of the Christian. Each begins with “We know.”

(18) Sinneth not.—There is no reason to supply “unto death.” (Comp. the Note on 1Jn_3:9.) St. John means strongly to insist, in this the solemn close of his Letter, that the true ideal Christian frame is the absence of wilful sin. Stumbles there may be, even such as need the prayers of friends, but intentional lawlessness there cannot be.

But he that is begotten of God keepeth himself.—Rather, he that is begotten of God keepeth him: that is, the Son of God preserves him. (Comp. Joh_6:39; Joh_10:28; Joh_17:12; Joh_17:15.)

And that wicked one toucheth him not.—The last mention of the devil was in 1Jn_3:10. The devil and his angels attack, but cannot influence so long as the Christian abides in Christ. (Comp. 1Pe_5:8; Eph_6:11; Rev_3:10.)

(3 b.) Personal assurance that we are God’s sons (1Jn_5:19).

Next after the cardinal point that righteousness is the characteristic of the new birth comes the necessity that the Christian should make up his mind that he has been, or is being, born again, and is really different from the world. The proofs would be seen in 1Jn_1:6; 1Jn_2:3; 1Jn_2:5; 1Jn_2:29; 1Jn_3:9; 1Jn_3:14; 1Jn_3:19; 1Jn_3:24; 1Jn_4:7; 1Jn_4:13; 1Jn_4:15; 1Jn_5:1; 1Jn_5:10.

(19) The whole world lieth in wickedness.—Rather, the wicked one. There is a constant danger lest Christians should forget this. (Comp. Gal_1:4.)

(3 c.) Personal assurance of the Incarnation, of the gift of the spiritual sense, and of abiding in the God of Truth through His Son (1Jn_5:20).

The series ends with a climax: the Son is indeed come; He gave us the faculty of seeing the true God; and in that Almighty Being we actually are. through the Son. The greatest fact of all to St. John’s mind is that his Friend and Master of sixty years ago was the very Word made flesh. (Comp. 1Jn_1:1-2; 1Jn_2:13; 1Jn_2:22-23; 1Jn_3:5; 1Jn_3:8; 1Jn_3:16; 1Jn_3:23; 1Jn_4:2; 1Jn_4:9-10; 1Jn_5:1; 1Jn_5:5; 1Jn_5:9; 1Jn_5:11.)

(20) And hath given us an understanding.—Comp. Act_26:18; 1Co_2:12-15; Eph_1:18. This spiritual faculty of discernment was one of the gifts of that Spirit which Christ was to send. (Comp. 1Jn_2:20; 1Jn_2:27; Joh_14:26; Joh_16:13.)

Him that is true.—The personality of God. Amid all the deceptions and fluctuations of the world, St. John felt, with the most absolute and penetrating and thankful conviction, that the followers of Christ were rooted and grounded in perfect, unshakable, unassailable truth. This could not be unless they were resting on the living Son and holding fast to Him.

This is the true God, and eternal life.—A most solemn and emphatic crown to the whole Epistle. “This God, as seen in His Son, is the true God.” If the Word had not been God, God could not have been seen in Him. “And God, seen in His Son, is eternal life.” This is only another way of putting Joh_17:3. (Comp. 1Jn_5:11-13.) To make “this is the true God” refer only to the Son is equally admissible by grammar, but hardly suits the argument so well.

(4) LAST WARNING (1Jn_5:21).

(21) Little children, keep yourselves from idols.—This parting word is suggested by the thought of “the true God.” Every scheme of thought, every object of affection, which is not of Him, is a rival of His empire, a false god, a delusive appearance only, without solidity or truth. We cannot conclude better than in the words of Ebrard: “This idea is a general and very comprehensive one: it embraces all things and everything which may be opposed to the God revealed in Christ and to His worship in spirit and in truth. Pre-eminently, therefore, it embraces the delusive and vain idols of the Corinthian Gnosticism, whether ancient or modern; but it includes also the idols and false mediators of superstition, to whom the confidence is transferred which is due only to God in Christ—be their name Madonna, or saints, or Pope, or priesthood, or good works, or pictures, or office, or church, or sacraments. The One Being in whom we have ‘the life eternal’ is Christ. . . . And this Christ we possess through the Spirit of God, whose marks and tokens are not priestly vestments, but faith and love. In this meaning, the Apostle’s cry sounds forth through all the ages, in the ears of all Christians, ‘LITTLE CHILDREN, KEEP YOURSELVES FROM IDOLS!’ The holiest things may become a snare if their letter is regarded and not their spirit. Every Christian Church has a tendency to worship its own brazen serpents. Happy are they who have a Hezekiah to call them Nehushtan!”

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

18. We know] This confident expression of the certitude of Christian faith stands at the beginning of each of these three verses and is the link which binds them together. We have had it twice before (1Jn_3:2; 1Jn_3:14; comp. 1Jn_2:20-21, 1Jn_3:5; 1Jn_3:15): and perhaps in all cases it is meant to mark the contrast between the real knowledge of the believer, which is based upon Divine revelation in Christ, and the spurious knowledge of the Gnostic, which is based upon human intelligence.

The triple ‘we know’ at the close of the Epistle confirms the view that Joh_21:24 is by the Apostle’s own hand, and not added by the Ephesian elders.

whosoever is born of God] Better, as R.V., whosoever is begotten of God, It is the same verb, though not the same tense, as is used in the next clause: A.V. changes the verb and does not change the tense. The sentence is a return to the statement made in 1Jn_3:9, where see notes. Once more the Apostle is not afraid of an apparent contradiction (see on 1Jn_2:15). He has just been saying that if a Christian sins his brother will intercede for him; and now he says that the child of God does not sin. The one statement refers to possible but exceptional facts; the other to the habitual state. A child of God may sin; but his normal condition is one of resistance to sin.

but he that is begotten of God keepeth himself] Rather, but the Begotten of God keepeth him. The first change depends upon a question of interpretation, the second on one of reading; and neither can be determined with certainty. The latter is the easier question and it throws light on the former. ‘Him’ (αὐτόν), on the high authority of A1B and the Vulgate, seems to be rightly preferred by most editors to ‘himself’ (ἑαυτόν). This ‘him’ is the child of God spoken of in the first clause: who is it that ‘keepeth him’? Not the child of God himself, as A. V. leads us to suppose and many commentators explain, but the Son of God, the Only-Begotten. On any other interpretation S. John’s marked change of tense appears arbitrary and confusing. Recipients of the Divine birth are always spoken of by S. John both in his Gospel and in his Epistle in the perfect participle (ὁ γεγεννημένος or τὸ γεγεννημένον); 1Jn_3:9, 1Jn_5:1; 1Jn_5:4; Joh_3:6; Joh_3:8; also the first clause here. In the present clause he abruptly changes to the aorist participle (ὁ γεννηθείς), which he uses nowhere else (comp. Mat_1:20; Gal_4:29). The force of the two tenses here seems to be this: the perfect expresses a permanent relation begun in the past and continued in the present; the aorist expresses a timeless relation, a mere fact: the one signifies the child of God as opposed to those who have not become His children; the other signifies the Son of God as opposed to the evil one. It is some confirmation of this view that in the Constantinopolitan Creed, commonly called the Nicene Creed, ‘begotten of the Father’ (τὸν ἐκ τοῦ Πατρὸς γεννηθέντα) is the same form of expression as that used here for ‘begotten of God’ (ὁ γεννηθεὶς ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ). Moreover this interpretation produces another harmony between Gospel and Epistle. Christ both directly by His power and indirectly by His intercession ‘keepeth’ the children of God: ‘I kept them in Thy Name’ (Joh_17:12); ‘I pray not that Thou shouldest take them out of the world but that Thou shouldest keep them from the evil one’ (Joh_17:15).

that wicked one toucheth him not] Better, the evil one toucheth him not: see on 1Jn_1:2 and 1Jn_2:13. Strangely enough the Genevan Version has ‘that wycked man.’ The original is perhaps less strong than the English; ‘layeth not hold on him’ (ἅπτεται); see on Joh_20:17. The evil one does assault him, but he gets no hold. ‘No one shall snatch them out of My hand’ (Joh_10:28). ‘The ruler of the world cometh: and he hath nothing in Me’ (Joh_14:30). Therefore whoever is in Christ is safe.

18–20. The Sum of the Christian’s Knowledge

18–20. The Epistle now draws rapidly to a close. Having briefly, yet with much new material, retouched some of the leading ideas of the Epistle, eternal life, faith in Christ and boldness in prayer united with brotherly love (13–17), the Apostle now goes on to emphasize once more three great facts about which Christians have sure knowledge, facts respecting themselves, their relations to the evil one and his kingdom, and their relations to the Son of God. Each verse is a condensation of what has been said elsewhere. 1Jn_5:18 is a combination of 1Jn_3:9 with 1Jn_2:13; 1Jn_5:19 a combination of the substance of 1Jn_1:6, 1Jn_2:8; 1Jn_2:15 and 1Jn_3:10; 1Jn_3:13 : 1Jn_5:20 condenses the substance of 1Jn_4:9-14 and 1Jn_5:1-12. “Hence we have in these last verses a final emphasis laid on the fundamental principles on which the Epistle rests; that through the mission of the Lord Jesus Christ we have fellowship with God; that this fellowship protects us from sin; and that it establishes us in a relation of utter opposition to the world” (Haupt). Fellowship with one another is not mentioned again, but is included in the threefold ‘we know’.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

1Jn_5:18

We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not; but he that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and that wicked one toucheth him not

Three views of the truly regenerate man

1.

He sinneth not. As regenerate, he has a new nature. The power of sin is broken in his soul, and therefore its influence over his character and conduct is subdued.

2. He keepeth himself. The Holy Spirit, indeed, regulates his mind. But still, his own faculties and affections are in exercise; he voluntarily and earnestly endeavours to avoid sin and to practise righteousness; he steadily and energetically sets himself in opposition to the temptations by which he is beset, and, by the grace of God, he is successful.

3. The wicked one toucheth him not. The devil may stand up against him; he may even sometimes gain an advantage over him. But to overpower--to conquer--him, is beyond the utmost of Satans arts and efforts. (A. S. Patterson, D. D.)

Whosoever is born of God sinneth not

John closes his letter with a series of triumphant certainties, which he considers as certified to every Christian by his own experience. We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not … we know that we are of God … and we know that the Son of God is come.

I. Who is the apostle talking about here? We know that whosoever is born of God--or, as the Revised Version reads it, begotten of God--sinneth not. This new birth, and the new Divine life which is its result, co-exists along with the old nature in which it is planted, and which it has to coerce and subdue, sometimes to crucify, and always to govern. This apostle puts great emphasis upon that idea of advancement in the Divine life. So the new life has to grow--grow in its own strength, grow in its own sphere of influence, grow in the power with which it purges and hallows the old nature in the midst of which it is implanted. And growth is not the only word for its development. That new life has to fight for its life. There must be effort, in order that it may rule. Thus we have the necessary foundation laid for that which characterises the Christian life, from the beginning to the end, that it is a working out of that which is implanted, a working out, with ever-widening area of influence, and a working in with ever deeper and more thorough power of transforming the character. There may be indefinite approximation to the entire suppression and sanctification of the old man; and whatsoever is born of God manifests its Divine kindred in this, that sooner or later it overcomes the world. Now if all this is true, I come to a very plain answer to the first question that I raised: Who is it that John is speaking about? Whosoever is born of God is the Christian man, in so far as the Divine life which he has from God by fellowship with His Son, through his own personal faith, has attained the supremacy in him. The Divine nature that is in a man is that which is born of God. And that the apostle does not mean the man in whom that nature is implanted, whether he is true to the nature or no, is obvious from the fact that in another pal! of this same chapter he substitutes whatsoever for whosoever, as if he would have us mark that the thing which he declares to be victorious and sinless is not so much the person as the power that is lodged in the person. That is my answer to the first question.

II. What is asserted about this divine life? Whosoever is born of God sinneth not. That is by no means a unique expression in this letter. For, to say nothing about the general drift of it, we have precisely similar statements in a previous chapter, twice uttered. Whosoever abideth in Him sinneth not; whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin, for his seed remaineth in him, and he cannot sin, because he is born of God. Nothing can be stronger than that. Yes, and nothing can be more obvious. I think, then, that the apostle does not thereby mean to declare that unless a man is absolutely sinless in regard of his individual acts he has not that Divine life in him. For look at what precedes our text. Just before he has said, and it is the saying which leads him to my text, If any man seeth his brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall ask, and he shall give him life. And do you suppose that any man, in the very same breath in which he thus declared that brotherhood was to be manifested by the way in which we help a brother to get rid of his sins, would have stultified himself by a blank, staring contradiction such as has been extracted from the words of my text? I take the text to mean--not that a Christian is, or must be, in order to vindicate his right to be called a Christian, sinless, but that there is a power in him, a life principle in him which is sinless, and whatsoever in him is born of God, overcometh the world and sinneth not. Now, then, that seems to me to be the extent of the apostles affirmation here; and I desire to draw two plain, practical conclusions. One is, that this notion of a Divine life power, lodged in, and growing through, and fighting with the old nature, makes the hideousness and the criminality of a Christian mans transgressions more hideous and more criminal. The teaching of my text has sometimes been used in the very opposite direction. There have been people that have said, It is no more I, but sin, that dwelleth in me; I am not responsible. The opposite inference is what I urge now. In addition to all the other foulnesses which attach to any mans lust, or drunkenness, or ambition, or covetousness, this super-eminent brand and stigma is burned in upon yours and mine, Christian men and women, that it is dead against, absolutely inconsistent with, the principle of life that is bedded within us. To whomsoever much is given, of him shall much be required. Another consideration may fairly be urged, as drawn from this text, and that is that the one task of Christians ought to be to deepen and to strengthen the life of God, which is in their souls, by faith. There is no limit, except one of my own making, to the extent to which my whole being may be penetrated through and through and ruled absolutely by that new life which God has given. It is all very well to cultivate specific and sporadic virtues and graces. Get a firmer hold and a fuller possession of the life of Christ in your own souls, and all the graces and virtues will come.

III. What is the ground of Johns assertion about Him that is born of God? My text runs on, But he that is begotten of God keepeth himself. If any of you are using the Revised Version, you will see a change there, small in extent, but large in significance, It reads, He that is begotten of God keepeth him. Let me just say in a sentence that the original has considerable variation in expression in these two clauses, which variation makes it impossible, I think, to adopt the idea contained in the Authorised Version, that the same person is referred to in both clauses. The difference is this. In the first clause, He that is begotten of God is the Christian man; in the second, He that is begotten of God is Christ the Saviour. There is the guarantee that Whosoever is begotten of God sinneth not, because round his weakness is cast the strong defence of the Elder Brothers hand; and the Son of God keeps all the sons who, through Him, have derived into their natures the life of God. If, then, they are kept by the only-begotten Son of the Father, then the one thing for us to do, in order to strengthen our poor natures, is to take care that we do not run away from the keeping hand nor wander far from the only safety. When a little child is sent out for a walk by the parent with an elder brother, if it goes staring into shop windows and gaping at anything that it sees upon the road, and loses hold of the brothers hand, it is lost, and breaks into tears, and can only be consoled and secured by being brought back. Then the little fingers clasp round the larger hand, and there is a sense of relief and of safety. If we stray away from Christ we lose ourselves in muddy ways. (A. Maclaren, D. D.)

The keeping

A lady was leaving home, and was concerned for the safety of a jewel box too precious to be left in an empty house. Asking a friend to undertake the charge, responsible as it was, and receiving a promise that she would do so, she left it with her. But, reflecting that in her absence she might wish to wear some of her trinkets, the lady took three of them with her. On her return home, her first concern was with the box which contained so many precious things. It was safe. Yes, there it was; and one by one the jewels were examined and found all there. The friend had been faithful; she had kept them all in safety. But of the three which had been taken with her, one had been dropped somewhere on the journey and could not be found! Who was to blame? Was it the fault of the friend who took charge of the box? Nay, she could only keep that which had been committed to her. She would, no doubt, have kept this other also, had it been left in her care. That which you have not committed to Christ you cannot expect Him to keep. (J. B. Figgis.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

1Jn 5:18-19. We know, &c. — As if he had said, Yet this gives no encouragement to sin. On the contrary, it is an indisputable truth, that whosoever is born of God — That is, regenerated and made a new creature; see on 1Jn 2:29; sinneth not — Doth not commit any known sin, so long as he lives by faith in the Son of God, and by that faith has union with Christ; but he that is begotten of God — By the word of truth, (Jas 1:18; 1Pe 1:23,) accompanied by the influence of the Divine Spirit; keepeth himself — By the aid of divine grace watching unto prayer, denying himself and taking up his cross daily; and that wicked one — Namely, the devil; toucheth him not — So as to overcome and lead him into known, wilful sin. And we know — By the testimony of the Holy Spirit and our own consciences; that we — Who believe in Christ, (1Jn 5:13,) and are born of God, and made partakers of the divine nature; are of God — Belong to him, as his children and his heirs; and the whole world — All the rest of mankind, that are not such, all who have not his Spirit, are not only touched by him, but very generally are guilty of idolatry, fraud, violence, lasciviousness, impiety, and all manner of vice; lieth in wickedness — Rather, in the wicked one, as εν τω πονηρω signifies. They are under his dominion: just as it is said of believers in the next verse, that they are εν τω αληθινω, in the true one. “The power of Satan in this lower world, and over its inhabitants, is often spoken of in Scripture. Thus Eph 2:2, he is called the spirit which now worketh in the children of disobedience: 2Co 4:4, he is termed the god of this world, and is said to blind the minds of them that believe not: 1Pe 5:8, he is called our adversary, and is said to be going about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Further, 2Ti 2:26, wicked men are said to be held in the snare of the devil, who (Eph 6:11) is said to use wiles for the destruction of mankind, and (2Co 11:3) to have beguiled Eve by his subtlety.”

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

4. Summarizing conclusion, with final admonition, 1Jn_5:18-21.

18. Sinneth not—The continuous present again. For the very case presented above of a sin committed by a brother, which is not unto death, presupposes that the regenerate can and does commit a sin. He does not live in the practice of sin as an unregenerate does. See notes on 1Jn_3:8-9. He does not, like the Nicolaitan, live in unrighteousness, and say it is not sin. He does not, like the regular sinner, sin without repugnance or repentance, as if it were natural and congenial to him.

Keepeth himself— Watches and guards himself. Unless he does this he loses his regenerate character.—the character incompatible with free sinning.

Wicked one— The devil.

Toucheth him not—Rather, gets not possession of him; that is, so long as he keepeth himself. Keepeth and toucheth are instances of the continuous present tense.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

CRITICAL AND EXEGETICAL NOTES

1Jn_5:13-21 may be treated as a summary and conclusion. They divide into three parts:

1. Faith in the Son of God, eternal life, and love of the brethren showing itself in intercession, are recalled to mind.

2. Three great facts which believers know are restated.

3. A last practical warning is given. In the first part the new thought is, the association of boldness in prayer with the love of the brethren (1Jn_5:14-17).

1Jn_5:21. Idols.—Better, “the idols”; or “your idols.” “This parting word is suggested by the thought of the ‘true God.’ Every scheme of thought, every object of affection, which is not of Him, is a rival of His empire, a false god, a delusive appearance only, without solidity or truth.” “Every street through which St. John’s readers walked, and every heathen house they visited, swarmed with idols in the literal sense; and magnificent temples and groves, and seductive idolatrous rites, constituted some of the chief attractions at Ephesus.” “Of the strictness which was necessary in order to preserve Christians from the attractions of idolatry the history of the first four centuries is full.” St. John hints that Jesus is no idol. The Son of God, who was manifested in the flesh as the Son of man, was a Being not only altogether worthy to be worshipped and served, but a Being whose worship and service are supremely ennobling.

MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—1Jn_5:18-21

Things about which we ought to be sure.—The expression “we know,” as indicating something that is unquestionable, something that is settled and indisputable, something which has been so confirmed by evidence, observation, and experience, that it has become a persuasive power on our life, is applied to three things:

1. The actual fact that, the children of God do not sin wilfully.

2. The actual fact, that those who have not the new life in Christ do sin wilfully.

3. The spiritual fact, that the new life we have is a spiritual life communicated to us through faith in Jesus Christ the Son of God. St. John states these three things that we ought to know, as a kind of summary of his epistle. We ought then to know—

I. The actual fact that the children of God do not sin wilfully.—“We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not.” If we treat this expression with simple common sense, it will occasion no difficulty. No doctrine of human sinlessness is suggested. It can be said of every child who is in right relations in a Christian home that he “sinneth not.” Such a child has no sort of disposition to do any wrong thing, and, wilfully, never does any wrong thing. He must lose the sweet spirit of his sonship ere it can be possible for him to do anything to grieve his father or his mother. And he who is born of God, and stands fully in the sonship, never wants to do wrong, to grieve the heavenly Father. He wants to find fitting expression for his life, and he never can find it save in submissive and loving obediences, and kindly services, and righteous-doing. He cannot sin, for that would be to be unnatural. The Revised Version gives an alteration of the second clause of 1Jn_5:18 which seems to explain how it is that the man born of God does not commit sin. “But he that was begotten of God keepeth him [margin, himself], and the evil one toucheth him not.” This, however, introduces quite a new subject, and the watchfulness of a man over himself is much more in the line of St. John’s thought here, than any reference to the preserving power of Christ. “The child of God keeps himself in the estate of a child of God simply.” “The true ideal frame is the absence of wilful sin.”

II. The actual fact that those who have not the new life in Christ do sin wilfully.—1Jn_5:19 : “The whole world lieth in the evil one.” Lieth in his power, because, there being no new life, there is no steadfastly set will towards obedience and righteousness. It is just as natural for the man with only the earthly life to please himself, as it is for the man with the spiritual life to please God. Then St. John says, if it is thus natural for everybody to act wilfully, and to please themselves, then we may assure our hearts that we have experienced the great change, and are of God, if we never can think of acting wilfully or wickedly, if we cannot bear the idea of pleasing ourselves, when so doing can in any way be unpleasing to God. “We know that we are of God,” because our contrast with the world is so strongly marked.

III. The spiritual fact, that the new life we have is a spiritual life communicated to us through faith in Jesus Christ, the Son of God.—1Jn_5:20 : “And we are in Him that is true, even in His Son, Jesus Christ.” The idea of St. John may be made somewhat clearer by recalling what St. Paul could say he knew. “I live, yet not I, Christ liveth in me.” “I knew a man in Christ.” It is the Christian mystery that a Divine life was in Christ, and found its expression through all human activities and relations, guaranteeing a life in absolute conformity with the will of God. That Divine life is imparted to believers, and they become, within the creaturely limitations, what Christ was, men in whom is a spiritual and Divine life, which, finding expression in all the details, of life, enables them to live lives free from wilful sin. “We have in these last verses a final emphasis laid on the fundamental principles on which the epistle rests: that we through the mission of the Lord Jesus Christ have fellowship with God; that this fellowship protects us from sin, and establishes us in a relation of perfect opposition to the world.”

SUGGESTIVE NOTES AND SERMON SKETCHES

1Jn_5:18. Keeping Ourselves.—The Revised Version reads this verse thus, “But he that was begotten of God keepeth him, and the evil one toucheth him not,” with the marginal addition “himself,” instead of “him.” The idea may therefore be either “the Son of God preserves him,” or “he watchfully keepeth himself.” The latter seems more precisely in the line of St. John’s teaching here. He is speaking of the virtue that lies in the new Divine life of the soul. “Whosoever is born of God sinneth not”; for it is in the very nature of that life to be jealous of its own integrity and purity. This point may be opened out and illustrated on the following lines.

I. Every creature having life has life in trust.—It is the one thing which every animal and every man properly regards as his chief treasure. “Skin after skin, yea, all that a man hath will he give for his life.” How much more must the spiritual and Divine life be a trust.

II. Keeping here means guarding, but much more than guarding.—It is quite true that the Christian is “kept by the power of God,” but it is also true that God’s keeping is effective when it goes along with his keeping himself. How little a parent can do for his boy if the boy will do nothing for himself.

III. Guarding must be the man’s own work, but for it he may accept auxiliary aids.—He must “work out his own salvation,” but he may and should realise how fully the Divine help is at his command.

IV. He only knows his particular perils, and the self-weaknesses that bear such relation to his perils.—It is in the spiritual as in the physical world. A man gets to know his own body, and learns how to preserve health, by the wise management of himself. But the question may be asked, Is there usually such self-knowledge in the spiritual life as inspires a man to this “keeping himself.”

1Jn_5:20. The Gospel of the Incarnation.—St. John simply mentions the great things that lie inside this fact: “The Son of God is come.”

I. By His coming He has “given us an understanding that we may know Him that is true.”—This does not mean that Christ gives men any new intellectual power, that He adds to the faculties of the mind any more than to the senses of the body. “Understanding” here signifies rather the means of knowing, the power of understanding. The Son of God has given us the means of knowing God. By word and life He has given us ideas about Fatherhood, holiness, purity, kindness, and love, that we had not before. The horizon of language has been widened, and its heaven lifted higher than before.

II. For what purpose has Christ given us these new ideas and opened the eyes of our understanding?—That we may “know Him that is true,” even God. It is needful that we should know God. In Christ you will find the truth about God.

III. We know that the Son of God is come, and we are in Him that is true, in His Son Jesus Christ—i.e. in Christ we are in God.—Union with Christ by faith, obedience, and love is perfect union with God.

IV. The Son of God is come, and to be in Him is to have eternal life.—“This is the true God [the God in Christ], and eternal life.” Christ tells the truth: believe Him. Christ is the life: accept Him.—J. Morgan Gibbon.

1Jn_5:21. The Ever-recurring Temptation to Idolatry.—“As the epistle is addressed to Christians, this last exhortation to keep themselves from idols could not refer to gross idolatry; such a dehortation would most inharmoniously fit the tenor of the whole document. The εἴδωλα are rather the ideas of God entertained by the false prophets of whom the apostle has spoken, the antichrists, who, because they have not the Son, have not the Father also, without therefore being atheists in the common meaning of the word. All the heretics of that time would serve God. Against them is held up the proposition that οὗτος, that is, this God revealed in Christ, is alone the true God; all else is an εἴδωλον. But not only is God robbed of His honour, not only does man serve a false god when he seeks another god than the God revealed in Christ, but he also trifles away his own salvation, for this only is eternal life—he that hath Him hath thereby life” (Eric Haupt). But while it may be helpful thus to follow the precise meaning and allusion of St. John, it is permissible, for homiletic purposes, to follow the suggestions of his words, and we may therefore recognise the fact that the temptation to idol-service in some form has been the temptation of men in every age, and is their temptation still.

Striking Contrasts.—This is the last of the contrasts of which the epistle is so full. We have had light and darkness, truth and falsehood, love and hate, God and the world, Christ and antichrist, life and death, doing righteousness and doing sin, the children of God and the children of the devil, the spirit of truth and the spirit of error, the believer untouched by the evil one, and the world lying in the evil one; and now at the close we have what in that age was the ever-present and pressing contrast between the true God and the idols. There is no need to seek far-fetched, figurative explanations of “the idols” when the literal meaning lies close at hand, is suggested by the contrast, and is in harmony with the known circumstances of the time.—A. Plunmer, D.D.

Christian Idolatry.—The first commandment forbids us to have any god, but the one true God. The second forbids us to make any image or likeness of any created thing, for the purpose of bowing down to it and worshipping it. These two commandments may be regarded in a manner as parts of one and the same commandment. For there is hardly any way in which mankind have been drawn off from the worship of the one true God to the worship of false gods, so much as by the setting up of images, and the falling down to them, and worshipping them. (See book of Wis_14:12, “The devising of idols was the beginning of spiritual fornication, and the invention of them the corruption of life.”) In the time of our Lord every nation, except the Jews, was sunk in idol-worship. The yoke of idolatry lay heavy upon every people, and nation, and language. After our Saviour’s teaching, one might have thought things would have gone on better, at least in His own Church. But the same causes will ever produce the same effects. Instead of the images of heathen gods, which had been overthrown, the Churches after a time were again filled with the images of apostles, evangelists, martyrs, and other holy men. These were not introduced with any design of worshipping them. Yet they came to be worshipped. We may not be falling into this error, but we may have set up idols in our hearts, and this may prove to be a worse evil than bowing down before images. It is if, instead of keeping our souls pure, as befits temples of the Holy Ghost, we profane and pollute them to vain and perishable, or, as too many do, to abominable, things. The root and essence of idolatry is the worshipping and serving God’s creatures more than God Himself. Whoever then serves any one of God’s creatures more than he serves God—whoever loves any one of God’s creatures more than he loves God—whoever makes any of God’s creatures more an object of his thoughts, and allows it to fill a greater space in his mind than God fills—that man is guilty of idolatry, in the spiritual and Christian sense of the word. When it is said, God’s creatures, it is meant, not living creatures merely, but creatures of every kind—everything which God has made for us, or enabled us to make for ourselves—all the sweet and relishing things we can enjoy in this world—pleasures, honours, riches, comforts of every kind. Therefore, if any man is foolish and wicked enough to give up his heart to any one of these creatures, and suffers himself to be drawn away from serving God by it, he is an idolater in the sight of heaven. Then if the goods of this world may all become so many idols, luring our hearts away from God, then is the land full of idols of a thousand kinds—idols for all ages, for all classes, for all tempers, for all hearts. There are idols for the worldly-minded, and idols for the generous; idols for the intemperate, and idols for the prudent; there are idols for the affectionate; and again there are idols for the selfish. Young and old have their idols; married and unmarried have their idols; rich and poor have their idols. The covetous man is an idolater (Col_3:5). The insatiable and greedy man is an idolater. Mammon is not the only heathen god whose worship is carried on in the hearts of men to-day. What shall we say of Belial, the fleshliest spirit that ever seduced man to sin? He is the god of lust, of riot, of uncleanness, of unruliness. Or look at Moloch, the god of hatred and every fierce passion: has he no children, no worshippers, nowadays? Men who pay him the service he is best pleased with—the service of an envious, rancorous, malicious, and festered heart. But the commonest idol of all, which has the most constant, the devoutest worshippers, which reigns indeed in every heart, unless it has been cast out by the Spirit of God, is the idol of self. It is almost impossible to get rid of him, unless we starve him out. So long as we feed him and strengthen him by gratifying his wilfulness and whim, so long will he continue in possession. Nor will even starving him out be enough of itself, unless we add frequent prayer thereto. For this is the spirit of which our Lord said, that it goeth not out, except by prayer and fasting. Mortify yourselves therefore, brethren: strive to crush every feeling within you that would lift up its head against the will of God: strive to break the neck of your own will, and to make it bend meekly and patiently under the yoke of Christ.—A. W. Hare, A.M.

ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 5

1Jn_5:20. The Deity of Christ.—Two gentlemen were once disputing on the Divinity of Christ. One of them, who argued against it, said, “If it were true, it certainly could have been expressed in more clear and unequivocal terms.” “Well,” said the other, “admitting that you believed it, were you authorised to teach it, and allowed to use your own language, how would you express the doctrine to make it indubitable?” “I would say,” said he, “that Jesus is the true God.” “You are very happy, sir,” rejoined the other, “in the choice of your words; for you have happened to hit upon the very words of inspiration. The apostle John, speaking of the Son, says, ‘This is the true God, and eternal life.’ ” The Rev. Charles Buck says, “I was once arguing with a person on the same subject; and when I quoted the scripture, he was quite confounded, and said he was not previously aware that there was any such passage.”

1Jn_5:21. Christian Idols.—This idea is a general and very comprehensive one: it embraces all things and everything which may be opposed to the God revealed in Christ, and to His worship in spirit and in truth. Pre-eminently, therefore, it embraces the delusive and vain idols of the Cerinthian Gnosticism, whether ancient or modern; but it includes also the idols and false mediators of superstition, to whom the confidence is transferred which is due only to God in Christ—be their name Madonna, or saints, or Pope, or priesthood, or good works, or pictures, or office, or church, or sacraments. The one Being in whom we have the “life eternal “is Christ.… And this Christ we possess through the Spirit of God, whose marks and tokens are not priestly vestments, but faith and love. In this meaning the apostle’s cry sounds forth through all the ages in the ears of all Christians, “Little children, keep yourselves from idols.” The holiest things may become a snare, if their letter is regarded, and not their spirit. Every Christian Church has a tendency to worship its own brazen serpents. Happy are they who have a Hezekiah to call them Nehushtan (a piece of worthless brass).—Ebrard.

Modern Forms of Idolatry.—In the Russo-Greek Church solid images are not permitted, and the symbols of faith are generally worthless pictures, made to represent images as much as permissible, by having stuffs wrought in thin gold or silver stuck upon the painting. The celebrated gate in the wall of the Kremlin is famous because a picture of this sort. “The Redeemer of Smolensk,” as it is called, is suspended above the high archway of brick. With an opera-glass one can discern a representation of the typical face of Christ decked in golden garb and nimbus. Even in these degenerate days it is scarcely permitted that any one shall pass under this archway except uncovered. Jews and Mohammedans generally find some less sacred gate when they wish to enter the Kremlin—the Acropolis of Moscow. The Czar himself never passes by any other way, and never with his hat upon his head. But it is upon the outer side of the Voskreneski Gate, in the Kitai-Gorodi, or “Chinese town “of Moscow, that the most. remarkable exhibition of religious feeling may be witnessed. Before the stout wall of brickwork which separates the outgoing from the incoming way is the Iberian Chapel (Iverskaya Chasovnia), architecturally nothing but a large-sized hut of stone, on a platform raised by two steps above the roadway. From morning till night this platform is thronged, and the chapel overflows with a crowd, chiefly composed of men, pressing, all bareheaded, and all with money in their hands, toward the narrow doorway of the little sanctuary. We were some time getting into the chapel, which will hold about ten people abreast, and is lighted by the flickering glare of a score of candles. There is a step at the farther end, and the wall opposite the door is resplendent with shining metal, except where the object of this extravagant devotion looks grimy through its framework of gold. On the left side of “the Iberian Mother of God,” which is the name given to this commonplace daub, supposed to possess miraculous powers, stands a long-haired priest—now and then relieved by another long-haired priest—who, hour by hour, in the name of the tinselled and jewelled picture, and with blessings, consecrates the prayers and offerings of the faithful. Only the face of the Madonna is visible, and it is not easy to distinguish her features beneath the dust of years. But not a minute passes in which the rattle of money falling to the uses of the Russian Church is not heard, or in which lips are not pressed upon the framework, or upon the rudely wrought robes of beaten gold which conceal the picture to the neck. Surely no lower depth of superstitious degradation was ever reached in connection with Christian worship! One cannot be surprised that to a Turk a Russian seems to be an idolatrous worshipper of pictures. The refining explanation which the most enlightened fathers of the Greek Church offer concerning this exhibition is precisely of the sort, and differs only in degree, from that which might be offered for the idol-worshippers of more southern and eastern lands. The picture has no historic reputation. It was brought from Mount Athos, that pleasant wooded hill peopled with monkish drones. A sum of about £12,000 a year is collected, and from this the salary of the Metropolitan of Moscow is paid. Time was when in the ceremonies which precede Easter the Czar used to lead the donkey upon which the Patriarch of Moscow rode, carrying a sacred chalice, and a copy of the four gospels. Nowadays that ceremony is neglected, but we are given to understand that the Czar never enters Moscow without assisting the revenues of this high ecclesiastical officer by praying at the shrine of this “Iberian Mother of God.”—Fraser’s Magazine.

The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.

1 John

I.-TRIUMPHANT CERTAINTIES

1Jn 5:18

John closes his letter with a series of triumphant certainties, which he considers as certified to every Christian by his own experience. ‘We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not . . . we know that we are of God . . . and we know that the Son of God is come.’ Now, that knowledge which he thus follows out on these three lines is not merely an intellectual conviction, but it is the outcome of life, and the broad seal of experimental possession is stamped upon it. Yet the average Christian reads this text, and shrugs his shoulders and says, ‘Well! perhaps I do not understand it, but, so far as I do, it seems to me to say a thing which is contradicted by the whole experience of life.’ ‘We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not’; and some of us are driven by such words, and parallel ones which occur in other places, to a presumptuous over-confidence, and some of us to an equally unscriptural despondency; and a great many of us to laying John’s triumphant certainty up upon the shelf where the unintelligible things are getting covered over with dust.

So I wish, in this sermon, to try, if I can, to come to the understanding, that in some measure I may help you to come to the joyful possession, of the truth which lies here, and which the Apostle conceives to belong to the very elements of the Christian character.

I. First, then, I ask the question-of whom is the Apostle speaking here?

‘We know that whosoever is born of God’-or, as the Revised Version reads it, ‘begotten of God’- ‘sinneth not.’ Now we must go back a little-and sometimes to go a long way from a subject is the best way to get at it. Let me recall to you the Master’s words with which He all but began His public ministry, when He said to Nicodemus, ‘Except a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of God.’ There is the root of all that this epistle is so full of, the conception of a regeneration, a being born again, which makes men, by a new birth, sons of God, in a fashion and in a sphere of their nature in which they were not the sons of the Heavenly Father before that experience. Jesus Christ laid down, as the very first principle which He would insist upon, to a man who was groping in the midst of mere legal conceptions of righteousness as the work of his own hands, this principle,-there must be a radical change, and there must be the entrance into every human nature of a new life-principle before there is any vision, any possession of, or any entrance into, that region in which the will of God is supreme, and where He reigns and rules as King. John is only echoing his Master when he here, and in other places of this letter, lays all the stress, in regard to practical righteousness and to noble character, upon being born again, subjected to that change which is fairly paralleled with the physical fact of birth, and has, as its result, the possession by the man who passes through it of a new nature, sphered in and destined to dominate and cleanse his old self.

Then there is a further step to be taken, and that is that this sonship of God, which is the result of being born again, is mediated and received by us through our faith. Remember the prologue of John’s Gospel, where, as a great musician will hint all his subsequent themes in his overture, he gathers up in one all the main threads and points of his teaching. There he says, ‘To as many as received Him, to them gave He power to become the sons of God.’ Long years afterwards, when an old man in Ephesus, he writes down in this last chapter of his first epistle the same truth which he there set blazing in the forefront of his Gospel when he says, in the first verse of this chapter, ‘Whosoever believeth that Jesus is the Christ is born of God.’ On condition, then, of a man’s faith in Jesus Christ, there is communicated to him a new life direct from God, kindred with the Divine, and which dwells in him, and works in him precisely in the measure of his personal faith. That is the first point that I desire to establish.

You will remember, I suppose, that this same conception of the deepest result of the Christian faith being no mere external forgiveness of sins, nor alteration of a man’s position in reference to the Divine judgments, but the communication of a new life-power and principle to him, is not the property of the mystic John only, but it is the property likewise of the legal James, who says,’ Of His own will begat He us by the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first-fruits of His creatures’; and it is set forth with great emphasis and abundance in all the writings of the Apostle Paul, who insists that we are sons through the Son, who insists that the gift of God is a new nature, formed in righteousness ‘ after the image of Him that created Him,’ and who is ever dwelling upon the necessity that this new nature should be cultivated and increased by the faith and effort of its recipient.

Keeping these things in mind, I take the second step, and that is that this new birth, and the new Divine life which is its result, co-exist along with the old nature in which it is planted, and which it has to coerce and subdue, sometimes to crucify, and always to govern. For I need not remind you that if the analogy of birth is to be followed, we have to recognize that that Divine life, too, like the physical life, which is also God’s gift, has to pass through stages; and that just as the perfect man, God manifest in the flesh, ‘increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man,’ so the Divine life in a soul comes to it in germ, and has its period of infancy and growth up into youth and manhood. This Apostle puts great emphasis upon that idea of advancement in the Divine life. For you remember the long passage in which he twice reiterates the notion of the stages of children and young men and fathers. So the new life has to grow, grow in its own strength, grow in its sphere of influence, grow in the power with which it purges and hallows the old nature in the midst of which it is implanted. But growth is not the only word for its development. That new nature has to fight for its life. There must be effort, in order that it may rule; there must be strenuous and continuous diligence, directed not only to strengthen it, but to weaken its antagonist, in order that it may spread and permeate the whole nature. Thus we have the necessary foundation laid for that which characterizes the Christian life, from the beginning to the end, that it is a working out of that which is implanted, a working out, with ever widening area of influence, and a working in with ever deeper and more thorough power of transforming the character. There may be indefinite approximation to the entire suppression and sanctification of the old man; and whatsoever is born of God manifests its Divine kindred in this, that sooner or later it overcomes the world.

Now, if all that which I have been saying is true- and to me it is undeniably so-I come to a very plain answer to the first question that I raised: Who is it that John is speaking about? ‘Whosoever is born of God’ is the Christian man, in so far as the Divine life which he has from God by fellowship with His Son, through His own personal faith, has attained the supremacy in Him. The Divine nature that is in a man is that which is born of God. And that the Apostle does not mean the man in whom that nature is implanted, whether he is true to the nature or no, is obvious from the fact that, in another part of this same chapter, he substitutes ‘whatsoever’ for ‘whosoever,’ as if he would have us mark that the thing which he declares to be victorious and sinless is not so much the person as the power that is lodged in the person. That is ray answer to the first question.

II. What is asserted about this Divine life?

‘Whosoever is born of God sinneth not.’ That is by no means a unique expression in this letter. For, to say nothing about the general drift of it, we have a precisely similar statement in a previous chapter, twice uttered. ‘Whosoever abideth in Him sinneth not’; ‘whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin, for His seed remaineth in him, and he cannot sin, because he is born of God.’ Nothing can be stronger than that. Yes, and nothing can be more obvious. I think, then, that the Apostle does not thereby mean to declare that, unless a man is absolutely sinless in regard of his individual acts, he has not that Divine life in him. For look at what precedes our text. Just before he has said, and it is the saying which leads him to my text, ‘If any man seeth his brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall ask, and he shall give him life.’ So, then, he contemplated that within the circle of sons of God, who were each other’s brethren because they were all possessors of that Divine birth, there would exist ‘sin not unto death,’ which demanded a brother’s brotherly intercession and help. And do you suppose that any man, in the very same breath in which he thus declared that brotherhood was to be manifested by the way in which we help a brother to get rid of his sins, would have stultified himself by a blank, staring contradiction such as has been extracted from the words of my text? I say nothing about inspiration; I only say common-sense forbids it. The fact of the matter is that John, in his simple, childlike way, does not wait to concatenate his ideas, or to show how the one limits and explains the other, but he lays them down before us, and the fact of their juxtaposition limits, and he does not expect that his readers are quite fools. So he says in the one breath, ‘If any man see his brother sin a sin,’ and in the next breath, ‘Whosoever is born of God sinneth not.’ Surely there is a way to bring these two sayings into harmony. And it seems to me to be the way that I have been suggesting to you-viz., to take the text to mean-not that a Christian is, or must be, in order to vindicate his right to be called a Christian, sinless, but that there is a power in him, a life-principle in him which is sinless, and whatsoever in him is born of God overcometh the world and’ sinneth not.’

Now, then, that seems to me to be the extent of the Apostle’s affirmation here; and I desire to draw two plain, practical conclusions. One is, that this notion of a Divine life-power, lodged in, and growing through, and fighting with the old nature, makes the hideousness and the criminality of a Christian man’s transgressions more hideous and more criminal. The teaching of my text has sometimes been used in the very opposite direction. I do not need to say anything about that. There have been people that have said ‘It is no more I, but sin, that dwelleth in me; I am not responsible.’ There have been types of so-called Christianity which have used this loftiest and purest thought of my text as a minister of sin. I do not suppose that there are any representatives of that caricature and travesty here, so I need not say a word about it. The opposite inference is what I urge now. In addition to all the other foulnesses which attach to any man’s lust, or lechery, or drunkenness, or ambition, or covetousness, this super-eminent brand and stigma is burned in upon yours and mine, Christian men and women, that it is dead against, absolutely inconsistent with, the principle of life that is bedded within us. And whilst all men, by every transgression, flout God and degrade themselves, the Christian man who comes down to the level of living for flesh and sense and time and self, has laid the additional and heaviest of all weights of guilt upon his hack in that he has done despite to the Spirit of grace, and grieved and contradicted and thwarted the life of God that is within him. The deepest guilt and the darkest condemnation attach to the sins of the man who, with a Divine life in his spirit, obeys the flesh. ‘To whomsoever much is given, of him shall much be required.’

Another consideration may fairly be urged as drawn from this text and that is that the one task of Christians ought to be to deepen and to strengthen the life of God, which is in their souls, by faith. There is no limit, except one of my own making, to the extent to which my whole being may be penetrated through and through and ruled absolutely by that new life which God has given.

‘‘Tis life, whereof our nerves are scant,

Oh life, not death, for which we pant;

More life, and better, that I want’

It is all very well to cultivate specific and sporadic virtues and graces. Get a firmer hold and a fuller possession of the life of Christ in your own souls, and all graces and virtues will come.

III. Now, I have one last question-what is the ground of John’s assertion about him ‘that is born of God’?

My text runs on, ‘but he that is begotten of God keepeth himself.’ If any of you are using the Revised Version, you will see a change there, small in extent, but large in significance. It reads,’ He that is begotten of God keepeth him.’ And although at this stage of my sermon it would be absurd in me to enter upon exegetical considerations, let me just say in a sentence that the original has considerable variation in expression in these two clauses, which variation makes it impossible, I think, to adopt the idea contained in the Authorized Version, that the same person is referred to in both clauses. The difference is this. In the first clause, ‘He that is begotten of God’ is the Christian man; in the second, ‘He that is begotten of God’ is Christ the Saviour.

There is the guarantee that ‘ Whosoever is begotten of God sinneth not,’ because round his weakness is cast the strong defense of the Elder Brother’s hand; and the Son of God keeps all the sons who, through Him, have derived into their natures the life of God. If, then, they are kept by the only begotten Son of the Father, who, that ‘He might bring many sons unto glory,’ has Himself worn the likeness of our flesh apart from sin, then the one thing for us to do, in order to nourish and deepen and strengthen, and bring to sovereign power in our poor natures that previous and enduring principle of life, is to take care that we do not run away from the keeping hand nor wander far from the only safety. When a little child is sent out for a walk by the parent with an elder brother, if it goes staring into shop windows, and gaping at anything that it sees upon the road, and loses hold of the brother’s hand, it is lost, and breaks into tears, and can only be consoled and secured by being brought back. Then the little fingers clasp round the larger hand, and there is a sense of relief and of safety.

Dear brethren, if we stray away from Christ we lose ourselves in muddy ways. If we keep near Him, as merchantmen in time of war keep near the men-of-war convoy, or as pilgrims across a dangerous desert keep close to the heels of the horses of their escort, ‘that wicked one toucheth us not.’ And so we may be sure that ‘ that which is born of God’ will come to the sovereign power within us, and He that was born of the Spirit will cast out him that was born of the flesh.

Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Chapter 4

THE IMAGE OF ST. JOHNS SOUL IN HIS EPISTLE

1Jn_5:18-20

Much has been said in the last few years of a series of subtle and delicate experiments in sound. Means have been devised of doing for the ear something analogous to that which glasses do for another sense, and of making the results palpable by a system of notation. We are told that every tree, for instance, according to its foliage, its position, and the direction of the winds, has its own prevalent note or tone, which can be marked down, and its timbre made first visible by this notation, and then audible. So is it with the souls of the saints of God, and chiefly of the Apostles. Each has its own note, the prevalent key on which its peculiar music is set. Or we may employ another image which possibly has St. Johns own authority. Each of the Twelve has his own emblem among the twelve vast and precious foundation stones which underlie the whole wall of the Church. St. John may thus differ from St. Peter, as the sapphires azure differs from the jaspers strength and radiance. Each is beautiful, but with its own characteristic tint of beauty.

We propose to examine the peculiarities of St. Johns spiritual nature which may be traced in this Epistle. We try to form some conception of the key on which it is set, of the colour which it reflects in the light of heaven, of the image of a soul which it presents. In this attempt we cannot be deceived. St. John is so transparently honest; he takes such a deep, almost terribly severe view of truth. We find him using an expression about truth which is perhaps without a parallel in any other writer. "If we say that we have fellowship with Him and walk in darkness we lie, and are not doing the truth." The truth then for him is something co-extensive with our whole nature and whole life. Truth is not only to be spoken-that is but a fragmentary manifestation of it. It is to be done. It would have been for him the darkest of lies to have put forth a spiritual commentary on his Gospel which was not realised in himself. In the Epistle, no doubt, he uses the first person singular sparingly, modestly including himself in the simple "we" of Christian association. Yet we are as sure of the perfect accuracy of the picture of his soul, of the music in his heart which he makes visible and audible in his letter, as we are that he heard the voice of many waters, and saw the city coming down from God out of heaven; as sure, as if at the close of this fifth chapter he had added with the triumphant emphasis of truth, in his simple and stately way, "I John heard these things and saw them." He closes this letter with a threefold affirmation of certain primary postulates of the Christian life; of its purity, of its privilege, of its Presence, -" we know," "we know," "we know." In each case the plural might be exchanged for the singular. He says "we know," because he is sure "I know."

In studying the Epistles of St. John we may well ask what we see and hear therein of St. Johns character,

(1) as a sacred writer,

(2) as a saintly soul.

I We consider first the indications in the Epistle of the Apostles character as a sacred writer. For help in this direction we do not turn with much satisfaction to essays or annotations pervaded by the modern spirit. The textual criticism of minute scholarship is no doubt much, but it is not all. Aorists are made for man; not man for the aorist. He indeed who has not traced every fibre of the sacred text with grammar and lexicon cannot quite honestly claim, to be an expositor of it. But in the case of a book like Scripture this, after all, is but an important preliminary. The frigid subtlety of the commentator who always seems to have the questions for a divinity examination before his eyes, fails in the glow and elevation necessary to bring us into communion with the spirit of St. John. Led by such guides, the Apostle passes under our review as a third-rate writer of a magnificent language in decadence, not as the greatest of theologians and masters of the spiritual life-with whatever defects of literary style, at once the Plato of the Twelve in one region, and the Aristotle in the other; the first by his "lofty inspiration," the second by his "judicious utilitarianism." The deepest thought of the Church has been brooding for seventeen centuries over these pregnant and many-sided words, so many of which are the very words of Christ. To separate ourselves from this vast and beautiful commentary is to place ourselves out of the atmosphere in which we can best feel the influence of St. John.

Let us read Chrysostoms description of the style and thought of the author of the fourth Gospel. "The son of thunder, the loved of Christ, the pillar of the Churches, who leaned on Jesus bosom, makes his entrance. He plays no drama, he covers his head with no mask. Yet he wears array of inimitable beauty. For he comes having his feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of peace, and his loins girt, not with fleece dyed in purple, or be dropped with gold, but woven through and through with, and composed of, the truth itself. He will now appear before us, not dramatically, for with him there is no theatrical effect or fiction, but with his head bared he tells the bare truth. All these things he will speak with absolute accuracy, being the friend of the King Himself-aye, having the King speaking within him, and hearing all things from Him which He heareth from the Father; as He saith-you I have called friends, for all things that I have heard from My Father, I have made known unto you. Wherefore, as if we all at once saw one stooping down from yonder heaven, and promising to tell us truly of things there, we should all flock to listen to him, so let us now dispose ourselves. For it is from up there that this man speaks down to us. And the fisherman is not carried away by the whirling current of his own exuberant verbosity; but all that he utters is with the steadfast accuracy of truth, and as if he stood upon a rock he budges not. All time is his witness. Seest thou the boldness, and the great authority of his words! how he utters nothing by way of doubtful conjecture, but all demonstratively, as if passing sentence. Very lofty is this Apostle, and full of dogmas, and lingers over them more than over other things!" This admirable passage, with its fresh and noble enthusiasm, nowhere reminds us of the glacial subtleties of the schools. It is the utterance of an expositor who spoke the language in which his master wrote, and breathed the same spiritual atmosphere. It is scarcely less true of the Epistle than of the Gospel of St. John.

Here also "He is full of dogmas," here again he is the theologian of the Church. But we are not to estimate the amount of dogma merely by the number of words in which it is expressed. Dogma, indeed, is not really composed of isolated texts-as pollen showered from conifers and germs scattered from mosses, accidentally brought together and compacted, are found upon chemical analysis to make up certain lumps of coal. It is primary and structural. The Divinity and Incarnation of Jesus pervade the First Epistle. Its whole structure is Trinitarian. It contains two of the three great three-word dogmatic utterances of the New Testament about the nature of God (the first being in the fourth Gospel)-"God is Spirit," "God is light," "God is love." The chief dogmatic statements of the Atonement are found in these few chapters. "The blood of Jesus His Son cleanseth us from all sin." "We have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the Righteous." "He is the propitiation for the whole world." "God loved us, and sent His Son the propitiation for our sins." Where the Apostle passes on to deal with the spiritual life, he once more "is full of dogmas," i.e., of eternal, self-evidenced, oracular sentences, spoken as if "down from heaven," or by one "whose foot is upon a rock,"-apparently identical propositions, all-inclusive, the dogmas of moral and spiritual life, as those upon the Trinity, the Incarnation, the Atonement, are of strictly theological truth. A further characteristic of St. John as a sacred writer in his Epistle is, that he appears to indicate throughout the moral and spiritual conditions which were necessary for receiving the Gospel with which he endowed the Church as the life of their life. These conditions are three. The first is spirituality, submission to the teaching of the Spirit, that they may know by it the meaning of the words of Jesus-the "anointing" of the Holy Ghost, which is ever "teaching all things" that He said. The second condition is purity, at least the continuing effort after self-purification which is incumbent even upon those who have received the great pardon. This involves the following in lifes daily walk of the One perfect life walk, the imitation of that which is supremely good, "incarnated in an actual earthly career." All must be purity, or effort after purity, on the side of those who would read aright the Gospel of the immaculate Lamb of God. The third condition for such readers is love- charity. When he comes to deal fully with that great theme, the eagle of God wheels far out of sight. In the depths of His Eternal Being, "God is love." Then this truth comes closer to us as believers. It stands completely and forever manifested in its work in us, because "God hath sent" (a mission in the past, but with abiding consequences) "His Son, His only begotten Son into the world, that we may live through Him." Yet again, he rises higher from the manifestation of this love to the eternal and essential principle in which it stands present forever. "In this is the love, not that we loved God, but that God loved us, and once for all sent His Son a propitiation for our sins." Then follows the manifestation of our love. "If God so loved us, we also are bound to love one another." Do we think it strange that St. John does not first draw the lesson-"If God so loved us, we also are bound to love God"? It has been in his heart all along, but he utters it in his own way, in the solemn pathetic question-"He that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, God whom he hath not seen how can he love?" Yet once more he sums up the creed in a few short words. "We have believed the love that God hath in us." Truly and deeply has it been said that this creed of the heart, suffused with the softest tints and sweetest colours, goes to the root of all heresies upon the Incarnation, whether in St. Johns time or later. That God should give up His Son by sending Him forth in humanity; that the Word made flesh should humble Himself to the death upon the cross, the Sinless offer Himself for sinners, this is what heresy cannot bring itself to understand. It is the excess of such love which makes it incredible. "We have believed the love" is the whole faith of a Christian man. It is St. Johns creed in three words.

Such are the chief characteristics of St. John as a sacred writer, which may be traced in his Epistle. These characteristics of the author imply corresponding characteristics of the man. He who states with such inevitable precision, with such noble and self-contained enthusiasm, the great dogmas of the Christian faith, the great laws of the Christian life, must himself have entirely believed them. He who insists upon these conditions in the readers of his Gospel must himself have aimed at, and possessed, spirituality, purity, and love.

II We proceed to look at the First Epistle as a picture of the soul of its author.

(1) His was a life free from the dominion of wilful and habitual sin of any kind. "Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin, and he cannot continue sinning." "Whosoever abideth in Him sinneth not; whosoever sinneth hath not seen Him, neither known Him." A man so entirely true, if conscious to himself of any reigning sin, dare not have deliberately written these words.

(2) But if St. Johns was a life free from subjection to any form of the power of sin, he shows us that sanctity is not sinlessness, in language which it is alike unwise and unsafe to attempt to explain away. "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves." "If we say that we have not sinned and are not sinners, we make Him a liar." But so long as we do not fall back into darkness, the blood of Jesus is ever purifying us from all sin. This he has written that the fulness of the Christian life may be realised in believers; that each step of their walk may follow the blessed footprints of the most holy life; that each successive act of a consecrated existence may be free from sin. And yet, if any fail in some such single act, if he swerve, for a moment, from the "true tenour" of the course which he is shaping, there is no reason to despair. Beautiful humility of this pure and lofty soul! How tenderly, with what lowly graciousness he places himself among those who have and who need an Advocate. "Mark Johns humility," cries St. Augustine; "he says not ye have, nor ye have me, nor even ye have Christ. But he puts forward Christ, not himself; and he says we have, not ye have, thus placing himself in the rank of sinners." Nor does St. John cover himself under the subterfuges by which men at different times have tried to get rid of a truth so humiliating to spiritual pride-sometimes by asserting that they so stand accepted in Christ that no sin is accounted to them for such; sometimes by pleading personal exemption for themselves as believers.

This Epistle stands alone in the New Testament in being addressed to two generations-one of which after conversion had grown old in a Christian atmosphere, whilst the other had been educated from the cradle under the influences of the Christian Church. It is therefore natural that such a letter should give prominence to the constant need of pardon. It certainly does not speak so much of the great initial pardon, as of the continuing pardons needed by human frailty. In dwelling upon pardon once given, upon sanctification once begun, men are possibly apt to forget the pardon that is daily wanting, the purification that is never to cease. We are to walk daily from pardon to pardon, from purification to purification. Yesterdays surrender of self to Christ may grow ineffectual if it be not renewed today. This is sometimes said to be a humiliating view of the Christian life. Perhaps so-but it is the view of the Church, which places in its offices a daily confession of sin; of St. John in this Epistle; nay, of Him who teaches us, after our prayers for bread day by day, to pray for a daily forgiveness. This may be more humiliating, but it is safer teaching than that which proclaims a pardon to be appropriated in a moment for all sins past, present, and to come.

This humility may be traced incidentally in other regions of the Christian life. Thus he speaks of the possibility at least of his being among those who might "shrink with shame from Christ in His coming." He does not disdain to write as if, in hours of spiritual depression, there were tests by which he too might need to lull and "persuade his heart before God."

(3) St. John again has a boundless faith in prayer. It is the key put into the childs hand by which he may let himself into the house, and come into his Fathers presence when he will, at any hour of the night or day. And prayer made according to the conditions which God has laid down is never quite lost. The particular thing asked for may not indeed be given; but the substance of the request-the holier wish, the better purpose underlying its weakness and imperfection-never fails to be granted.

(4) All but superficial readers must perceive that in the writings and character of St. John there is from time to time a tonic and wholesome severity. Art and modern literature have agreed to bestow upon the Apostle of love the features of a languid and inert tenderness. It is forgotten that St. John was the son of thunder; that he could once wish to bring down fire from heaven; and that the natural character is transfigured, not inverted, by grace. The Apostle uses great plainness of speech. For him a lie is a lie, and darkness is never courteously called light. He abhors and shudders at those heresies which rob the soul first of Christ, and then of God. Those who undermine the Incarnation are for him not interesting and original speculators, but "lying prophets." He underlines his warnings against such men with his roughest and blackest pencil mark. "Whoso sayeth to him good speed hath fellowship with his works, those wicked works"-for such heresy is not simply one work, but a series of works. The schismatic prelate or pretender Diotrephes may "babble," but his babblings are wicked words for all that, and are in truth the "works which he is doing."

The influence of every great Christian teacher lasts long beyond the day of his death. It is felt in a general tone and spirit, in a special appropriation of certain parts of the creed, in a peculiar method of the Christian life. This influence is very discernible in the remains of two disciples of St. John, Ignatius and Polycarp. In writing to the Ephesians Ignatius does not indeed explicitly refer to St. Johns Epistle, as he does to that of St. Paul to the Ephesians. But he draws in a few bold lines a picture of the Christian life which is imbued with the very spirit of St. John. The character which the Apostle loved was quiet and real; we feel that his heart is not with "him that sayeth." So Ignatius writes-"it is better to keep silence, and yet to be, than to talk and not to be. It is good to teach if he that sayeth doeth. He who has gotten to himself the word of Jesus truly is able to hear the silence of Jesus also, so that he may act through that which he speaks, and be known through the things wherein he is silent. Let us therefore do all things as in His presence who dwelleth in us, that we may be His temple, and that He may be in us our God." This is the very spirit of St. John. We feel in it at once his severe common sense and his glorious mysticism.

We must add that the influence of St. John may be traced in matters which are often considered alien to his simple and spiritual piety. It seems that Episcopacy was consolidated and extended under his fostering care. The language of his disciple Ignatius, upon the necessity of union with the Episcopate is, after all conceivable deductions, of startling strength. A few decades could not possibly have remove Ignatius so far from the lines marked out to him by St. John as he must have advanced, this teaching upon Church government was a new departure. And with this conception of Church government we must associate other matters also. The immediate successors of St. John, who had learned from his lips, held deep sacramental views. The Eucharist is "the bread of God, the bread of heaven, the bread of life, the flesh of Christ." Again Ignatius cries-"Desire to use one Eucharist, for one is the flesh of our Lord Jesus Christ, and one cup unto oneness of His blood, one altar, as one Bishop, with the Presbytery and deacons." Hints are not wanting that sweetness and light in public worship derived inspiration from this same quarter. The language of Ignatius deeply tinged with his passion for music. The beautiful story, how he set down, immediately after a vision, the melody to which he had heard the angels chanting, and caused it to be use in his church at Antioch, attests the impression of enthusiasm and care for sacred song which was associated with the memory of Ignatius. Nor can we be surprised at these features of Ephesian Christianity, when we remember who was the founder of those Churches. He was the writer of three books. These books come to us with a continuous living interpretation more than seventeen centuries of historical Christianity. From the fourth Gospel in large measure has arisen the sacramental instinct, from the Apocalypse the esthetic instinct, which has been certainly exaggerated both in the East and West. The third and sixth chapters of St Johns Gospel permeate every baptismal and eucharistic office. Given an inspired book which represents the worship of the redeemed as one of perfect majesty and beauty, men may well in the presence of noble churches and stately liturgies, adopt the words of our great English Christian poet-

"Things which shed upon the outward frame

Of worship glory and grace-which who shall blame

That ever lookd to heaven for final rest?"

The third book in this group of writings supplies the sweet and quiet spirituality which is the foundation of every regenerate nature.

Such is the image of the soul which is presented to us by St. John himself. It is based upon a firm conviction of the nature of God, of the Divinity, the Incarnation, the Atonement of our Lord. It is spiritual. It is pure, or being purified. The highest theological truth-"God is Love"-supremely realised in the Holy Trinity, supremely manifested in the sending forth of Gods only Son, becomes the law of its common social life, made visible in gentle patience, in giving and forgiving. Such a life will be free from the degradation of habitual sin. Yet it is at best an imperfect representation of the one perfect life. It needs unceasing purification by the blood of Jesus, the continual advocacy of One who is sinless. Such a nature, however full of charity, will not be weakly indulgent to vital error or to ambitious schism; for it knows the value of truth and unity. It feels the sweetness of a calm conscience, and of a simple belief in the efficacy of prayer. Over every such life-over all the grief that may be, all the temptation that must be-is the purifying hope of a great Advent, the ennobling assurance of a perfect victory, the knowledge that if we continue true to the principle of our new birth we are safe. And our safety is, not that we keep ourselves, but that we are kept by arms which are as soft as love, and as strong as eternity.

These Epistles are full of instruction and of comfort for us, just because they are written in an atmosphere of the Church which, in one respect at least, resembles our own. There is in them no reference whatever to a continuance of miraculous powers, to raptures, or to extraordinary phenomena. All in them which is supernatural continues even to this day, in the possession of an inspired record, in sacramental grace, in the pardon and holiness, the peace and strength of believers. The apocryphal "Acts of John" contain some fragments of real beauty almost lost in questionable stories and prolix declamation. It is probably not literally true that when St. John in early life wished to make himself a home, his Lord said to him, "I have need of thee, John"; that that thrilling Voice once came to him, wafted over the still darkened sea-"John, hadst thou not been Mine, I would have suffered thee to marry." But the Epistle shows us much more effectually that he had a pure heart and virgin will. It is scarcely probable that the son of Zebedee ever drained a cup of hemlock with impunity; but he bore within him an effectual charm against the poison of sin. We of this nineteenth century may smile when we read that he possessed the power of turning leaves into gold, of transmuting pebbles into jewels, of fusing shattered gems into one; but he carried with him wherever he went that most excellent gift of charity, which makes the commonest things of earth radiant with beauty. He may not actually have praised his Master during his last hour in words which seem to us not quite unworthy even of such lips-"Thou art the only Lord, the root of immortality, the fountain of incorruption. Thou who madest our rough wild nature soft and quiet, who deliveredst me from the imagination of the moment, and didst keep me safe within the guard of that which abideth forever." But such thoughts in life or death were never far from him for whom Christ was the Word and the Life; who knew that while "the world passeth away and the lust thereof, he that doeth the will of God abideth forever."

May we so look upon this image of the Apostles soul in his Epistle that we may reflect something of its brightness! May we be able to think, as we turn to this threefold assertion of knowledge-"I know something of the security of this keeping. I know something of the sweetness of being in the Church, that isle of light surrounded by a darkened world. I know something of the beauty of the perfect human life recorded by St. John, something of the continued presence of the Son of God, something of the new sense which He gives, that we may know Him who is the Very God." Blessed exchange-not to be vaunted loudly, but spoken reverently in our own hearts-the exchange of we, for I. There is much divinity in these pronouns.

William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.

1Jn 5:18. Οἴδαμεν, we know) An instance of the figure Anaphora:[26] see the next verses.—ὅτι πᾶς, that every one) Now he takes care that no one abuse, verses 16, 17, to the purpose of (carnal) security.—γεγεννημένος) Shortly afterwards γεννηθείς. The Perfect has a loftier sound than the Aorist. An old lexicon says, ὠψωνηκότες, μέγα· ὀψωνήσαντες δὲ, μικρόν. Not only does he who has made great advancement in regeneration, but any one who has been born again, keep himself.—τηρεῖ ἑαυτὸν, keepeth himself) he is not wanting to himself from within.—οὐχ ἅπτεται, toucheth him not) The regenerate is not ruined from without. The wicked one approaches, as a fly does to the candle; but he does not injure him, he does not even touch him. The antithesis is lieth, 1Jn 5:19.

[26] See Append. on this figure.—E.

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

, it is true, is closely connected with the foregoing, but at the same time forms the commencement of the conclusion of the Epistle, which is indicated as such by the successive thrice-repeated οἴδαμεν (Ebrard), and in which the apostle describes the position of believers in brief vigorous strokes

1Jn_5:18, it is true, is closely connected with the foregoing, but at the same time forms the commencement of the conclusion of the Epistle, which is indicated as such by the successive thrice-repeated οἴδαμεν (Ebrard), and in which the apostle describes the position of believers in brief vigorous strokes.

As in 1Jn_5:16-17 it was admitted that even in Christians ἀδικία, and hence ἁμαρτία, still exist, the apostle finds himself compelled to repeat, confirmingly, what was said in chap. 1Jn_3:6-10, as a truth known to Christians (οἴδαμεν, in which there does not lie an appeal to the fact that he has already said it, Ebrard), in order that it may be thoroughly impressed on them that all sin is in the sharpest antagonism to their essential principle of life.

οἴδαμεν, ὅτι πᾶς γεγεννημένος ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ, οὐχ ἁμαρτάνει] This appears to be in contradiction with what is previously admitted; John does not solve the contradiction; many commentators seek to do so by supplying πρὸς θάνατον as a more particular definition of οὐχ ἁμαρτάνει, or by interpreting it of remaining in sin; both are, however, arbitrary; the solution lies rather in the fact that the apostle wants simply to emphasize the antagonism between being born of God and sinning. Though sin is still found in the life of the believer, who as such is γεγεννημένος ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ, yet it is nevertheless foreign to him, opposed to his nature, and in the strength of his faith he is ever becoming more and more free from it.[328]

ἈΛΛ ̓ Ὁ ΓΕΝΝΗΘΕῚς ἘΚ ΤΟῦ ΘΕΟῦ ΤΗΡΕῖ ἙΑΥΤΌΝ] This second clause is not dependent on ὍΤΙ, but is to be regarded as an independent sentence (Düsterdieck, Braune). Bengel erroneously states the difference between the form Ὁ ΓΕΝΝΗΘΕΊς and the preceding Ὁ ΓΕΓΕΝΝΗΜΈΝΟς thus: Praeteritum grandius quiddam sonat, quam aoristus: non modo qui magnum in regeneratione gradum assecutus, sed quilibet, qui regenitus est, servat se; it is rather the same distinction that occurs here as that by which these two verbal forms are generally distinguished; Ὁ ΓΕΝΝΗΘΕΊς is: he who was born, regarded as a historical fact.

In 1Ti_5:22, ἅγνον, and in Jam_1:27, ἌΣΠΙΛΟΝ, are put with ΤΗΡΕῖ ἙΑΥΤΌΝ as more particular definition. It is, however, unnecessary to supply such a predicate (de Wette); ΤΗΡΕῖ ἙΑΥΤΌΝ denotes the self-preservation of the believer in his proper character (so also Braune);[329] the more particular definition results from the following; καὶ ὁ πονηρὸς οὐχ ἅπτεται αὐτοῦ] is the result of the ΤΗΡΕῖ ἙΑΥΤΌΝ; Ebrard incorrectly: Satan dare not touch him; God does not permit it; the present simply expresses the fact, but this, according to the context, is the case, because the devil is prevented from ἅπτεσθαι by the ΤΗΡΕῖΝ ἙΑΥΤΌΝ of him who is born of God. With Ὁ ΠΟΝΗΡΌς, comp. chap. 1:13. By ἍΠΤΕΣΘΑΙ we are to understand touching in order to do harm; Psa_105:15, LXX. (see Raphelii Annot. ex Polybio). Compare Jam_4:7 : φεύξεται ἀφ ̓ ὑμῶν. It is true the believer is still tempted by the devil (comp. 1Pe_5:8, etc.), just as sinful desires still arise in him; but being in his most inner nature redeemed from the fellowship of sin, he suffers from these temptations no injury to the life that has come to him from God: in the ΠΑΝΟΠΛΊΑ ΤΟῦ ΘΕΟῦ he is protected against all the ΜΕΘΟΔΕῖΑΙ ΤΟῦ ΔΙΑΒΌΛΟΥ (Eph_6:11 ff.).[330]

[328] It needs no proof that the thought of the apostle is perverted by the explanation of de Wette: the apostle expresses his confidence that the occurrence of the sin unto death and of sin in general cannot often (!) take place in the Christian Church.

[329] It is less suitable to explain τηρεῖν ἑαυτόν here, with Ebrard = τηρεῖσθαι, to be on guard, to take care; for, in the first place, it is opposed to the usus loquendi of the N. T. to assign this meaning to the word; and secondly, it is not expressive enough for the context.

[330] Calvin: Utut malignus renatum ad peccatum solicitet, tela tamen illius irrita cadunt, quoniam renatus scuto fidei munitus ea repellit et diabolo per fidem resistit.

Meyer — Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament — English translation by Peter Christie, edited by Frederick Crombie (T&T Clark, 1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

1Jn 5:18-20 . The Certainties of Christian Faith. St. John has been speaking of a dark mystery, and now he turns from it: “Do not brood over it. Think rather of the splendid certainties and rejoice in them.”

1Jn 5:18 . Our Security through the Guardianship of Christ. οὐχ ἁμαρτάνει , see note on 1Jn 3:6 . The child of God may fall into sin, but he does not continue in it; he is not under its dominion. Why? Because, though he has a malignant foe, he has also a vigilant Guardian. ὁ γεννηθεὶς ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ , i.e. , Christ. Cf. Symb. Nic. : Κύριον Ἰησοῦν Χριστὸν , τὸν Υἱὸν τοῦ Θεοῦ , γεννηθέντα ἐκ τοῦ Πατρὸς . As distinguished from γεγεννημένος the aor. γεννήθεις refers to the “Eternal Generation”. The rendering “he that is begotten of God (the regenerate man) keepeth himself ( ἑαυτὸν ), qui genitus est ex Deo, servat seipsum (Calv.), is doubly objectionable: (1) It ignores the distinction between perf. and aor.; (2) there is no comfort in the thought that we are in our own keeping; our security is not our grip on Christ but His grip on us. Calvin feels this: “Quod Dei proprium est, ad nos transfert. Nam si quisque nostrum salutis suæ sit custos, miserum erit præsidium”. Vulg. has generatio Dei , perhaps representing a variant ἡ γέννησις τοῦ Θεοῦ . τηρεῖ , see note on 1Jn 2:3 . ἅπτεται , stronger than “toucheth,” rather “graspeth,” “layeth hold of”. A reference to Psa 105 (LXX 104):15: μὴ ἅψησθε τῶν χριστῶν μου , Nolite tangere christos meos (Vulg.).

The Expositor's Greek Testament, edited by W. Robertson Nicoll (1897–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

18–20. THE SUM OF THE CHRISTIAN’S KNOWLEDGE

18–20. The Epistle now draws rapidly to a close. Having briefly, yet with much new material, retouched some of the leading ideas of the Epistle, eternal life, faith in Christ, and boldness in prayer united with brotherly love (13–17), the Apostle now goes on to emphasize once more three great facts about which Christians have sure knowledge, facts respecting themselves, their relations to the evil one and his kingdom, and their relations to the Son of God. Each verse is a condensation of what has been said elsewhere. 1Jn 5:18 is a combination of 1Jn 3:9 with 1Jn 2:13; 1Jn 5:19 a combination of the substance of 1Jn 1:6; 1Jn 2:8; 1Jn 2:15 and 1Jn 3:10; 1Jn 3:13: 1Jn 5:20 condenses the substance of 1Jn 4:9-11 and 1Jn 5:1-12. “Hence we have in these last verses a final emphasis laid on the fundamental principles on which the Epistle rests; that through the mission of the Lord Jesus Christ we have fellowship with God; that this fellowship protects us from sin; and that it establishes us in a relation of utter opposition to the world” (Haupt). Fellowship with one another is not mentioned again, but it is included in the threefold ‘we know’.

18. For ἑαυτόν ([812][813]2[814][815][816]) read αὐτόν ([817]1[818], Vulgate).

[812] 4th century. Discovered by Tischendorf in 1859 at the monastery of S. Catherine on Mount Sinai, and now at Petersburg. All three Epistles.

[813] 5th century. Brought by Cyril Lucar, Patriarch of Constantinople, from Alexandria, and afterwards presented by him to Charles I. in 1628. In the British Museum. All three Epistles.

[814] 9th century. All three Epistles.

[815] 9th century. All three Epistles.

[816] 9th century. A palimpsest. All three Epistles excepting 1Jn 3:19 to 1Jn 5:1. There is a facsimile of a portion in Hammond’s Outlines of Textual Criticism showing the late leaning uncial letters of the 9th century (Act 4:10-15), with cursives of the 13th (Heb 7:17-25) written over them.

[817] 5th century. Brought by Cyril Lucar, Patriarch of Constantinople, from Alexandria, and afterwards presented by him to Charles I. in 1628. In the British Museum. All three Epistles.

[818] 4th century. Brought to Rome about 1460. It is entered in the earliest catalogue of the Vatican Library, 1475. All three Epistles.

18. οἴδαμεν. This confident expression of the certitude of Christian faith stands at the beginning of each of these three verses, and is the link which binds them together. We have had it twice before (1Jn 3:2; 1Jn 3:14; comp. 1Jn 2:20-21; 1Jn 3:5; 1Jn 3:15): and perhaps in all cases it is meant to mark the contrast between the real knowledge of the believer, which is based upon Divine revelation in Christ, and the spurious knowledge of the Gnostic, which is based upon human intelligence.

The triple οἴδαμεν at the close of the Epistle confirms the view that Joh 21:24 is by the Apostle’s own hand, and not added by the Ephesian elders.

πᾶς ὁ γεγενν. ἐκ τ. Θεοῦ. As R.V., whosoever is begotten of God. A.V. changes the verb (‘born’, ‘begotten’), which does not change in the Greek, and does not change the tense, which does change in a very remarkable way (γεγεννημένος. γεννηθείς).

οὐχ ἁμαρτάνει. To the non peccat of the Vulgate Bede adds peccatum videlicet ad mortem; which is clearly not S. John’s meaning. The condition of Divine sonship is incompatible, not merely with sin unto death, but with sin of any description. The sentence is a return to the statement made in 1Jn 3:9, where see notes. Once more the Apostle is not afraid of an apparent contradiction (see on 1Jn 2:15). He has just been saying that if a Christian sins his brother will intercede for him; and now he says that the child of God does not sin. The one statement refers to possible but exceptional facts; the other to the habitual state. A child of God may sin; but his normal condition is one of resistance to sin. “Two things a genuine Christian never does. He never makes light of any known sin, and he never admits it to be invincible” (Liddon).

ὁ γεννηθεὶς ἐκ τ. Θεοῦ τηρεῖ αὐτόν. The Begotten of God keepeth him. The interpretation of ὁ γεννηθεὶς and the reading as to the pronoun cannot either of them be determined with certainty. The latter is the easier question and it throws light on the former. ‘Him’ (αὐτόν), on the high authority of [852]1[853] and the Vulgate, seems to be rightly preferred by most editors to ‘himself’ (ἑαυτόν). This ‘him’ is the child of God spoken of in the first clause: who is it that ‘keepeth him’? Not the child of God himself, as A.V. leads us to suppose and many commentators explain, but the Son of God, the Only-Begotten. On any other interpretation S. John’s marked change of tense appears arbitrary and confusing. Recipients of the Divine birth are always spoken of by S. John both in his Gospel and in his Epistle in the perfect participle (ὁ γεγεννημένος or τὸ γεγεννημένον); 1Jn 3:9; 1Jn 5:1; 1Jn 5:4; Joh 3:6; Joh 3:8; also the first clause here. In the present clause he abruptly changes to the aorist participle (ὁ γεννηθείς), which he uses nowhere else (comp. Mat 1:20; Gal 4:29). The force of the two tenses here seems to be this: the perfect expresses a permanent relation begun in the past and continued in the present; the aorist expresses a timeless relation, a mere fact: the one signifies the child of God as opposed to those who have not become His children; the other signifies the Son of God as opposed to the evil one. It is some confirmation of this view that in the Constantinopolitan Creed, commonly called the Nicene Creed, ‘begotten of the Father’ (τὸν ἐκ τοῦ Πατρὸς γεννηθέντα, is the same form of expression as that used here for ‘begotten of God’ (ὁ γεννηθεὶς ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ). Moreover this interpretation produces another harmony between Gospel and Epistle. Christ both directly by His power and indirectly by His intercession ‘keepeth’ the children of God: ‘I kept them in Thy Name’ (Joh 17:12); ‘I pray not that Thou shouldest take them out of the world but that Thou shouldest keep them from the evil one’ (Joh 17:15).

[852] 5th century. Brought by Cyril Lucar, Patriarch of Constantinople, from Alexandria, and afterwards presented by him to Charles I. in 1628. In the British Museum. All three Epistles.

[853] 4th century. Brought to Rome about 1460. It is entered in the earliest catalogue of the Vatican Library, 1475. All three Epistles.

The Latin renderings are remarkable: non peccat; sed generatio Dei conservat eum, et malignus non tangit eum (Augustine, Jerome, Vulgate); and peccatum non facit; quia nativitas Dei custodit illum, et diabolus non tangit illum (Chromatius).

ὁ πονηρὸς οὐχ ἅπτεται αὐτοῦ. As R.V., The evil one toucheth him not. A.V. here as in 1Jn 1:2 (‘that eternal life’) exaggerates the article into a pronoun. For ὁ πονηρός see on 1Jn 2:13: strangely enough the Genevan here has ‘that wyeked man’. ‘Toucheth him not’ is somewhat too strong for οὐχ ἅπτεται αὐτοῦ. Ἅπτεσθαι, as distinct from θιγγάνειν (Heb 11:28; Heb 12:20), is ‘to lay hold of’; and one may sometimes touch where one cannot lay hold. See on Joh 20:17. The verb is very frequent in the Synoptists, elsewhere rare. In Col 2:21 the A.V. exactly reverses the climax by translating μὴ ἅψῃ ‘touch not’ and μηδὲ θίγῃς ‘handle not’. Here the meaning is that the evil one may assault, but he gets no hold. ‘No one shall snatch them out of My hand’ (Joh 10:28). ‘The ruler of the world cometh: and he hath nothing in Me’ (Joh 14:30). Therefore whoever is in Christ is safe.

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

We know [οιδαμεν] . John uses this appeal to knowledge in two forms : we know (iii. 2, 14; 1Jo 5:18, 19, 20); ye know (ii. 20; 1Jo 3:5, 15). He that is begotten of God [ο γεννηθεις εκ του θεου] . Lit., was begotten. This exact phrase does not occur elsewhere. Some refer it to the man who is born of God, making it parallel with oJ gegennhmenov ejk tou Qeou, he that is begotten of God. Others to Christ, the only - begotten of God. The later is preferable.

That wicked one [ο πονηρος] . See on 2 13. Rev., the evil one.

Toucheth [απτεται] . See on Joh 20:17, the only other passage in John's writings where the verb occurs. Both this verb and qigganw (Col 2:21; Heb 11:28; Heb 12:20) express a touch which exerts a modifying influence upon the object, though qigganw indicates rather a superficial touch. On yhlafaw (Act 27:27; Heb 12:18; 1Jo 1:1), see on Luk 24:39. Compare Col 2:21. The idea here is layeth not hold of him.

Marvin R. Vincent, Word Studies in the New Testament (1887–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

A reason why not all, nay rather why no sin is mortal to some: to wit, because they be born of God, that is to say, made the sons of God in Christ, and being endued with his Spirit, they do not serve sin, neither are deadly wounded of Satan.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

Verse 18. Whosoever is born of God sinneth not] This is spoken of adult Christians; they are cleansed from all unrighteousness, consequently from all sin, 1Jo 1:7-9.

Keepeth himself] That is, in the love of God, Jude 1:21, by building up himself on his most holy faith, and praying in the Holy Ghost; and that wicked one-the devil, toucheth him not-finds nothing of his own nature in him on which he can work, Christ dwelling in his heart by faith.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

18 We know that whosoever is born of God If you suppose that God’s children are wholly pure and free from all sin, as the fanatics contend, then the Apostle is inconsistent with himself; for he would thus take away the duty of mutual prayer among brethren. Then he says that those sin not who do not wholly fall away from the grace of God; and hence he inferred that prayer ought to be made for all the children of God, because they sin not unto death. A proof is added, that every one, born of God, keeps himself, that is, keeps himself in the fear of God; nor does he suffer himself to be so led away, as to lose all sense of religion, and to surrender himself wholly to the devil and the flesh.

For when he says, that he is not touched by that wicked one, reference is made to a deadly wound; for the children of God do not remain untouched by the assaults of Satan, but they ward off his strokes by the shield of faith, so that they do not penetrate into the heart. Hence spiritual life is never extinguished in them. This is not to sin. Though the faithful indeed fall through the infirmity of the flesh, yet they groan under the burden of sin, loathe themselves, and cease not to fear God.

Keepeth himself. What properly belongs to God he transfers to us; for were any one of us the keeper of his own salvation, it would be a miserable protection. Therefore Christ asks the Father to keep us, intimating that it is not done by our own strength. The advocates of freewill lay hold on this expression, that they may thence prove, that we are preserved from sin, partly by God’s grace, and partly by our own power. But they do not perceive that the faithful have not from themselves the power of preservation of which the Apostle speaks. Nor does he, indeed, speak of their power, as though they could keep themselves by their own strength; but he only shews that they ought to resist Satan, so that they may never be fatally wounded by his darts. And we know that we fight with no other weapons but those of God. Hence the faithful keep themselves from sin, as far as they are kept by God. (John 17:11.)

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

We know that whosoever is born of God,.... Who is regenerated by his Spirit and grace, and quickened by his power; who has Christ formed in him, and is made a partaker of the divine nature, and has every grace implanted in him:

sinneth not; the sin unto death; nor does he live in sin, or is under the power and dominion of it, though he does not live without it; See Gill on Jo1 3:9;

but he that is begotten of God; the Vulgate Latin version reads, "the generation of God keeps or preserves him"; that is, that which is born in him, the new man, the principle of grace, or seed of God in him, keeps him from notorious crimes, particularly from sinning the sin unto death, and from the governing power of all other sins; but all other versions, as well as copies, read as we do, and as follows:

keepeth himself; not that any man can keep himself by his own power and strength; otherwise what mean the petitions of the saints to God that he would keep them, and even of Christ himself to God for them on the same account? God only is the keeper of his people, and they are only kept in safety whom he keeps, and it is by his power they are kept; but the sense is, that a believer defends himself by taking to him the whole armour of God, and especially the shield of faith, against the corruptions of his own heart, the snares of the world, and particularly the temptations of Satan:

and that wicked one toucheth him not; he cannot come at him so as to wound him to the heart, or destroy that principle of life that is in him, or so as to overcome and devour him; he may tempt him, and sift him, and buffet him, and greatly afflict and grieve him, but he can not touch his life, or hurt him with the second death; nay, sometimes the believer is so enabled to wield the shield of faith, or to hold up Christ the shield by faith, and turn it every way in such a manner, that Satan, who is here meant by the wicked one, because he is notoriously so, cannot come near him, nor in with him; cannot work upon him at all with his temptations, nor in the least hurt his peace, joy, and comfort: the saints know their perseverance from the promises of God and declarations of Christ; Psa 125:1.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

18 We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not; but he that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and that wicked one toucheth him not.

Ver. 18. Sinneth not] sc. That sin to death, 1Jn 5:16, nor other sins, as other men do. {See Trapp on "1Jn 3:9"}

And that wicked one toucheth him not] viz. Tactu qualitativo, as Cajetan expoundeth it, with a deadly touch; he thrusts not in his sting so far as to infuse the venom of that sin that is properly his sin, Joh 8:44, and with which he toucheth their spirits that become the serpent’s seed. He toucheth them not so as the needle is touched by the loadstone; so as to partake of his devilish spirit, and to be wholly carried after him.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not - Is not habitually and characteristically a sinner; does not ultimately and finally sin and perish; cannot, therefore, commit the unpardonable sin. Though he may fall into sin, and grieve his brethren, yet we are never to cease to pray for a true Christian: we are never to feel that he has committed the sin which has never forgiveness, and that he has thrown himself beyond the reach of our prayers. This passage, in its connection, is a full proof that a true Christian “will” never commit the unpardonable sin, and, therefore, is a proof that he will never fall from grace. Compare the notes at Heb 6:4-8; Heb 10:26. On the meaning of the assertion here made, that “whosoever is born of God sinneth not,” see the notes at 1Jo 3:6-9.

Keepeth himself - It is not said that he does it by his own strength, but he will put forth his best efforts to keep himself from sin, and by divine assistance he will be able to accomplish it. Compare the 1Jo 3:3 note; Jud 1:21 note.

And that wicked one toucheth him not - The great enemy of all good is repelled in his assaults, and he is kept from falling into his snares. The word “toucheth” (ἅπτεται haptetai) is used here in the sense of harm or injure.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Sinneth not. See the annotation on chap. iii. 6. &c. (Challoner) --- The generation [5] of God preserveth him, (i.e. the grace of adoption, as long as it remains in the soul; see Chap. iii. 9.) and the wicked one (i.e. the devil) toucheth him not. (Witham)

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[BIBLIOGRAPHY]

Sed generatio Dei: Some manuscripts, Greek: genesis; others, Greek: o gennetheis ek tou Theou. qui genitus est ex Deo.

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

The great advantage is here signified of the regenerate, who, by the seed remaining in them, {as 1Jo 3:9} are furnished with a self-preserving principle, with the exercise whereof they may expect that co-operation of a gracious Divine influence by which they shall be kept, so as

that wicked one, the great destroyer of souls, shall not mortally touch them, to make them sin unto death.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Vers. 18-21. With three solemn asseverations and one equally solemn charge the Epistle is brought to a close. "Can we be certain of any principles in ethics? St. John declares that we can. He says that he has not been making probable guesses about the grounds of human actions, the relations of man to God, the nature of God himself. These are firings that he knows. Nay, he is not content with claiming this knowledge himself. He uses the plural pronoun; he declares that his disciples, his little children, know that which he knows" (Maurice).

We know; oidamen, as in 1Jn_3:2, 1Jn_3:14, andnov Joh_21:24, which should be compared with this passage. These expressions of Christian certitude explain the undialectical character of St. John"s Epistles as compared with those of St. Paul. What need to argue and prove when both he and his readers already knew and believed? We must have "begotten in both clauses, as in the Revised Version, not "born in one and "begotten in the other, as in the Authorized Version. In the Greek there is a change of tense oJ gegennhme and oJ gennhqeiv, but no change of verb. The whole should run, "We know that whosoever is begotten of God sinneth not, but the Begotten of God keepeth him." For the perfect participle, comp. 1Jn_3:9 1Jn_5:1, 1Jn_5:4; 1Jn_3:6, 8: it expresses him who has come to be, and still continues to be, a son of God. The aorist participle occurs nowhere else in St. John: it expresses him who, without relation to time past or present, is the Son of God. The reading aujto is preferable to eJauton. The Vulgate has conservat eum, not conserver seipsum, which Calvin adopts. The eternal Son of the Father preserves the frail children of the Father from the common foe, so that the evil one toucheth them not. The verb for "touch aptesqai is the same as in "Touch me not". (Joh_20:17) In both cases "touch" is somewhat too weak a rendering; the meaning is rather, "lay hold of," "hold fast." The Magdalene wished, not merely to touch, but to hold the Lord fast, so as to have his bodily presence continually. And here the meaning is that, though the evil one may attack the children of God, yet he cannot get them into his power.

Vers. 18, 19.

The strong foe and the stronger Friend.

Connecting link: It is not without reason that the apostle had just written of life from God as the needed gift to those who are sinning, whether their state be that of sin unto death or no; for the fact is that whosoever is born of God is not sinning. By the fact of the new birth he has been delivered out of that state in which the evil one would fain have held him, as that evil one still holds the world. But now the evil one is powerless, for his power is neutralized by the watchful care of the only begotten Son of God. Note: According to the Authorized Version this verse seems to teach that the believer has and exercises an instinct of self-preservation. The Revised Version and the Revisers" Greek text should be studied. Instead of eJauton, we now read aujton. And further, the oJ gennhqeiv plainly points to another than oJ gegennhmenov, even to him that was and is the Begotten One of God. He it is who so watches over the new-born child of God that the evil one has no power to touch him. TopicThe conquering and the conquered ones.

I THERE IS A GREAT FOE, OF MAN. "The evil one." The personality of the evil one is clearly implied in such passages as these: Mat_4:1 Mat_13:39 Mat_25:41; Joh_8:44 Joh_13:2; Eph_4:27; 1 Timothy Jam_4:7; 1Pe_5:8; 1Jn_3:8; Luk_22:31; Rom_16:20; 1Co_5:5; 2Co_4:4. It is not possible fairly to interpret all these passages as indicating only an all-pervasive, impersonal evil. If any demur, let them consider these two points.

1. It is not possible for moral evil to exist apart from some personal beingin whom it exists.

2. Whatever evil is in man is there whether there be a devil or no. If therebe no devil, and all man"s evil is self-originated, then man"s nature is a great deal worse than the Scriptures declare it to be.

II THOUGH MAN HAS A GREAT FOE, HE HAS A GREATER FRIEND. This Friend is the "Begotten One of God;" "the only begotten Son." He beheld this world usurped by the destroyer, and came to set it free. His work is fourfold.

1. He came and worsted the evil one in single combat.

2. He laid down his life for men, and claims the globe as his.

3. He has assumed the sovereignty over all, and dethroned the evil one. (Joh_12:31, Joh_12:32)

4. He is now engaged by his Word and Spirit in

(1) snatching men from the power of darkness, and transferring them to his own kingdom; (Col_1:13) and

(2) in guarding those thus rescued. (Luk_22:31, Luk_22:32) Note: The great mystery of evil has its origin elsewhere than here, and a vaster field than this globe, although it is only here that we can trace it.

III THROUGH THIS FRIEND (the only begotten Son of God) THERE ARE THOSE WHO ESCAPE THE EVIL.

1. Who are these? Those who are born again (verse 18). All of them.

2. How do they escape the evil? Through the watchful care of the Lord Jesus. He guards phrei them. The word "expresses a watchful regard from without, rather than safe custody" (so Westcott). This guardianship is exercised

(1) by gracious intercession; (Luk_22:31)

(2) by providential care; (Ps 121)

(3) by sustaining the inward life; (Joh 15)

(4) by bringing to naught the plans of the evil one. (Rom_16:20)

3. What is the effect? The wicked one does not touch them with a contaminating, poisoning hand. lie would, but he cannot. This must be the issue.

(1) The strong one is outwitted by the Stronger; (Luk_11:21, Luk_11:22)

(2) has been, as matter of history; (Rev_12:10, Rev_12:11)

(3) is, as matter of observation; (1Jn_4:4)

(4) we know it as matter of experience (verse 19).

The life which is guarded without and sustained within by the Son of God is a perpetual proof that there are some whom evil cannot touch. They move amid the evil, but it harms them not. Let the world get more and more corrupt, they do but become more and more like their Lord.

IV WE HAVE HERE THE SECRET OF VICTORY OR DEFEAT IN LIFE; i.e., of conquest over evil or conquest by it. All depends on whether we are ejk tou kosmou or ejk tou Qeou; (cf. 1Jn_4:4) i.e., whether we have a life that is inspired by God or a life upon the lower level of this world. If our being is still of the earth earthy, we are in that region which lieth wholly in the wicked one, "in all its parts and elements." It is in his domain, in his grasp. He is the "god of this world," blinding men"s minds. Its darkness is the realm in which he moves. And if we remain in this sphere, and are never extricated from it by a mightier power, with darkness and sin we must "lie down in sorrow." Who can consent to remain a prey to evil when the great Redeemer stands ready with a mighty hand to pluck us out of it, and to guard us so securely that no evil shall touch us?

V ALL THIS IS AMONG THE CONTENTS OF THE BELIEVER"S KNOWLEDGE. "We know.

1. Who know it? "We we who are born of God. Much is known by usthat is hidden from the world.

1. H ow do they know it?

1. Partly by testimony (a) of God, (b) of history.

2. Partly by observation.

3. Partly by experience. (But see next homily, division II)

Vers. 18-20.

The sublimest knowledge.

know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not," etc. There are certain things of which St. John writes without even the faintest tone of hesitation or doubt, with the calmest and firmest assurance, and with the accent of deep conviction. And the things of which he writes with so much certainty are of the greatest and most important. So in the paragraph before us he utters his triple "we know" concerning some of the most vital and weighty questions. Let us notice each of these in the order in which they here stand.

I THE KNOWLEDGE OF THE CHARACTER AND CONDITION OF THE CHILDREN OF GOD. "We know that whosoever is begotten of God sinneth not; but he that was begotten of God keepeth himself, and the wicked one toucheth him not." Here are three points for consideration concerning true Christians.

1. Their origination from God. They are "begotten of God?" They are "called children of God," and are such.

2. Their abstention from sin. "Whosoever is begotten of God sinneth not." He will not commit the "sin unto death;" and in proportion as he participates in the Divine life he will shun sin in any form. (cf. 1Jn_3:6-9; and see our remarks on 1Jn_3:6)

3. Their preservation from the evil one. "He that was begotten of God keepeth himself, and the wicked one toucheth him not." Danger is clearly implied here. "Be sober, be vigilant; your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour: whom resist steadfast in the faith." "Put on the whole armour of God, that ye may be able to stand against the wiles of the devil," etc. . (Eph_6:11-18) "Satan transformeth himself into an angel of light." Hence the danger. But notice:

(1) The means of preservation. "He that was begotten of God keepeth himself." He is sober and watchful and prayerful in order that he may not be surprised by temptation and seduced into sin. It has been well said by John Howe, "He that is begotten of God keepeth himself from those deadly mortal touches which would endanger his precious life; that is, he is his own underkeeper. We are every one to be our brother"s keeper, much more our own; but still in a subordinate sense, subservient to, and dependent upon, the Supreme One. Indeed, it were a kind of monstrous thing in the creation, that there should be so noble a life planted in us, but destitute of the self-preserving faculty or disposition; whereas every life, how mean soever, even that of a worm, a gnat, or a fly, hath a disposition to preserve itself." Christians are "kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation.

(2) The nature of the preservation. "The wicked one toucheth him not." This does not signify exemption from temptation, but victory over it. The great adversary shall not touch" the true-born child of God" so as to destroy his spiritual life or effect his overthrow.

II THE KNOWLEDGE OF PERSONAL FILIAL RELATIONSHIP TO GOD. "We know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in the wicked one." The assurance with which the apostle writes is remarkable. Not, "we are probably of God;" not," we hope we are of God," etc.; but "we know that we are of God," etc. We may know this:

1. By our consciousness of our Christian character. The genuine Christian can say of his spiritual condition, "One thing I know, that, whereas I was blind, now I see." He is conscious of his faith in Christ. "I know whom I have believed," etc. . (2Ti_1:12) He feels that the Saviour is precious unto him. (1Pe_2:7) He knows that he loves the Christian brotherhood; and "we know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brethren." He is conscious of his sincere desire and endeavour to follow Christ as his great Exemplar, and to obey him as his Divine Lord.

2. By our consciousness of our filial disposition toward God. We have "received the spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father." Our own hearts assure us that we trust and love and reverence our heavenly Father. Thus "we know that we are of God?

3. By the contrast between ourselves and the unchristian world. "The whole world lieth in the wicked one." We have already endeavoured to indicate the character of" the world" of which St. John writes. "Concerning the world, he says, not merely that it is of the wicked one, or has him for a father, and bears his nature, but also that it "lies in him," that is, lies in his bosom, like an infant on the bosom of a mother or a father, which is absolutely given up to its parent"s power" (Ebrard). The true Christian knows that he is not in such a condition, but in a decidedly opposite one that he "abides in the Son, and in the Father" (chapter 2:24).

III THE KNOWLEDGE OF A TRANSCENDENT FACT, AND OF GREAT PERSONAL BENEFITS DERIVED THROUGH THAT FACT. "And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we know him that is true," etc. Here are four points which require our attention.

1. That the Son of God came into our world. "We know that the Son of God is come." (This great fact has already engaged our attention in our homily on 1Jn_4:9-11, and the apostle"s assurance of it in that on 1Jn_4:14)

2. That the Son of God hath given to us spiritual discernment that we might know God. "And hath given us an understanding, that we know him that is true." This does not mean that he has given to us any new faculty, but that he has brought our spiritual faculties into a right condition for the apprehension of the Divine Being. "As Christ has come (in the sense of," 1Jn_4:9) says Ebrard, "and through this act of love has kindled love in us, (1Jn_4:10) thus communicating his nature to us, he has furnished us with the understanding necessary in order that we may know God. For God is, according to 1Jn_1:5 and 1Jn_4:8, Light and Love; and only he who is penetrated by his light, and kindled by his love, can know him." God was not the Unknowable to St. John. He knew him through the revelation of Jesus Christ, by the conscious realization of his presence with his Spirit, and by hallowed communion with him.

3. That we are in vital union with God and with his Son Jesus Christ. "We are in him that is true, even in his Son Jesus Christ." (We have already considered what it is to be in God, in our homily on 1Jn_2:6) The true Christian is in God the Father through being in Christ the Son. He is in the Father through the mediation of the Son.

4. That the Son of God is truly and properly Divine. "This is the true God, and eternal life" (cf. verses 11-13).

Let us seek to realize the exalted and blessed knowledge which we have been considering. And if it be already ours, let us endeavour to possess it in clearer light and fuller measure. "Then shall we know, if we follow on to know the Lord. W.J.

Vers. 18-21.

The three certainties of the Epistle.

I THE CERTAINTY OF THE POWER OF THE DIVINE BIRTH. "We know that whosoever is begotten of God sinneth not; but he that was begotten of God keepeth him, and the evil one toucheth him not." This is doctrine which has already been laid down. In, 1Jn_3:6 sinlessness is connected with human action; here it is connected with Divine action. There is sin, as in the context has been admitted, within the Christian circle; but it is according to the n orm of the Divine life not to sin. The language that is added here is unusual. Westcott would remove its unusual aspect by thinking of Christ, as the Begotten of God, opposed to the evil one. But it is God that is opposed to the evil one in the following verse; and the mere change of tense does not prepare for the introduction of Christ. In passing from the now begotten of God to the past begotten of God, we naturally think of the same person, only at a different moment, viz. that of the commencement of the Divine life. The new nature then received (ascribing all to God) it keepeth him; and the evil one, having nothing in the new nature to lay hold on, toucheth him not. He is indeed tempted; but he has a defense against temptation in his quickened sensibilities and activities.

II THE CERTAINTY OF OUR POSSESSING LIFE FROM GOD. "We know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in the evil one." There is here the strength of personal assurance. We know that we are of God; we know that we draw our life from the highest source. But there is also the certitude of Christian pessimism the worst view of the world. In the Christian judgment, the whole world lieth in the evil one. It is not only touched by the evil one (verse 18), but the evil one is, as it were, the circumambient element in which it passively lies, and by which it is completely moulded in all its systems and customs and institutions. This is not a cheering view to take of the world; but it would be less cheering to think that the world is only as God intended it to be that it has not suffered from a fall. The counterbalancing truth is that, bad as it is, it is loved by God, and is susceptible of redemption. And the Christian optimism, which we are warranted to entertain, is this that the world, in all its thinking and fashions, will yet be on the right side, not fraught with peril, but fraught with deliverance to souls.

III THE CERTAINTY OF THE REVEALING POWER OF THE INCARNATION. "And we know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we 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." This is the third "we know" which the apostle recalls. We know that the Incarnation is a fact. Through the Incarnation our understanding is Christianized, that we know him that is true, which is equivalent to being in him that is true, which again is equivalent to being in his Son Jesus Christ. This God whom Jesus Christ reveals, this is the true God, and eternal life. The proof of the Divinity of Christ here lies in this, that in his incarnation he absolutely reveals God as Father, as infinite Love, which is the highest truth about the nature of God, and also absolutely reveals eternal life, which is the highest happiness of God, he being, according to the thought of verse 11, the receptacle of it for us. From the center all things are made capable of ultimate explanation. The world, as it lies in the evil one, may seem to call up gloomy thoughts of God; but the Incarnation, the fact that Christ is come, and come into the midst of the world for its redemption, calls up bright, cheering thoughts of God. Parting word. "My little children, guard yourselves from idols." In parting, he naturally fixes on the word of special affection for his readers. In verse 18 he put forward Divine keeping that was begotten of God the Divine birth keepeth him." Here he puts forward self-keeping "keep," with added emphasis yourselves," i.e., in the use of means. The idols against which we are to be on our guard are the vain shadows that usurp the place of the true God. In connection with heathen idolatry, there are such false representations of God as these that he is to be apprehended by sense; that he is confined to temples made with hands; that he has a divided sovereignty; that he takes delight in impurities and in the blood of human victims. In connection with idolatry, in the wide sense here to be thought of, there are such false representations of God as these that he is pleased with our taking selfish gratification; that he does not extend his interest beyond our home, or some narrow circle with which we are connected; that he is indifferent to our happiness; that he does not notice our actions, and will not bring us into judgment for them. Let us oppose to these false representations of God the representation given in the Incarnation. Let us brood over this great fact till all vain shadows flee away, and God comes forth to us in all the splendour of his love. This is a word suitable for parting. We may think of John, now amid the realities of heaven, still beseeching us, and with greater intensity, to beware of the deceitful shadows that are here as often taken for God. R.F.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Yet this gives us no encouragement to sin: on the contrary, it is an indisputable truth, he that is born of God - That sees and loves God. Sinneth not - So long as that loving faith abides in him, he neither speaks nor does anything which God hath forbidden. He keepeth himself - Watching unto prayer. And, while he does this, the wicked one toucheth him not - So as to hurt him.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

That is, we are all well assured that sincere Christians, who are begotten and born of God, do not commit this sin unto death, namely, apostacy from Christianity to the Heathen idolatry: But he keepeth himself, and the wicked one toucheth him not: that is, he preserveth himself from the contagion of idolatry, into which the devil was so busy to seduce a great part of mankind.

It may be further added, that he that is born of God, so far as he is a partaker of the divine nature, sinneth not; that is, suffers not any sin to have dominion over him, but takes care to preserve himself, through the assistance of divine grace, from Satan’s deadly wound. He toucheth him not; that is, doth not touch him so as to leave an impression of his devilish spirit upon him. Non tangit tactu qualitativo, vel tactu lethali et martifero; "He shall not mortally touch them, to make them sin unto death."

William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

18–21. Whosoever is born of God sinneth not. Does not live a life of sin. He will not sin unto death, though he may be overtaken in a fault. See note at end of chapter. That wicked one toucheth him not. Cannot lay hands on him so as to hold him.

B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.

Connecting Statement:

John closes his letter, reviewing what he has said about the new nature of believers, which cannot sin, and he reminds them to keep themselves from idols.

the evil one cannot harm him

The phrase "the evil one" refers to Satan, the devil.

the whole world lies in the power of the evil one

Lying in someone's power represents being controlled or ruled by him. AT: "the whole world is controlled by the evil one" (See: Metaphor)

the whole world

Here "world" is a way in which some biblical writers refer to the people living in the world who are in rebellion against God and to the world system that is affected in every way by the corrupting power of sin. (See: Metonymy)

translationWords

born again

evil

world

Satan

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

18-20.] Three solemn maxims of the Epistle regarding sin, and the children of God and the world, and our eternal life in Christ, are repeated as a close of the teaching of the Apostle. Ver. 18 seems to be not without reference to what has just been said concerning sin. In actual life, even our brethren, even we ourselves, born of God, shall sin, not unto death, and require brotherly intercession: but in the depth and truth of the Christian life, sin is altogether absent. It is the world, not knowing God, which lies under the power of the wicked one: God’s new-begotten children he cannot touch: they are in and they know the True One, and in Him have eternal life. These maxims are introduced with a thrice-repeated οἴδαμεν, the expression of full persuasion and free confidence. They form a triumphant repetition of and anticipation of the attainment of the purpose expressed in ver. 13, ἵνα εἴδητε ὅτι ζωὴν ἔχετε αἰώνιον.

18.] We know that every one who is born of God, sinneth not (see on ch. 3:9, from which place our words are almost repeated. As explained there and in our summary of these verses there is no real inconsistency with what has been just said. And that there is none the second member of the verse shews): but he that hath been born of God (γεννηθείς, aor. this time. The perf. part. expresses more the enduring abidance of his heavenly birth, and fits better the habitual οὐχ ἁμαρτάνει: the aor. part., calling attention to the historical fact of his having been born of God, fits better the fact that the wicked one toucheth him not, that divine birth having severed his connexion with the prince of this world and of evil. So Düsterd. and Huther. See also the construction according to the true reading below. Sander, in apparent ignorance of the force of the tenses, has curiously taken them exactly vice versa: and Bengel has failed to hit the difference when he says, “Præteritum grandius quiddam sonat quam Aoristus: non modo qui magnum in regeneratione gradum assecutus, sed quilibet qui regenitus est, servat se.” The distinction is ingenious, but is not contained in the tenses) it keepeth him (“it,” viz. the divine birth, pointed at in the aor. part. γεννηθείς. So the vulg., but omitting the pendent nom., “sed generatio Dei conservat eum.” It is this, and not the fact of his own watchfulness, which preserves him from the touch of the wicked one: as in ch. 3:9, where the same is imported by ὅτι σπέρμα αὐτοῦ ἐν αὐτῷ μένει, κ. οὐ δύναται ἁμαρτάνειν, ὅτι ἐκ τοῦ θεοῦ γεγέννηται. The rationalistic Commentators insist on τηρεῖ ἑαυτόν, as shewing, as Socinus, “aliquid præstare eum atque efficere, qui per Christum regeneratus fuerit:” and the orthodox Commentators have but a lame apology to offer. Düsterd. compares ἁγνίζει ἑαυτόν ch. 3:3. But the reference there is wholly different—viz. to a gradual and earnest striving after an ideal model; whereas here the τηρεῖσθαι must be, by the very nature of the case, so far complete, that the wicked one cannot approach: and whose self-guarding can ensure this even for a day? Cf. Joh 17:15, ἵνα τηρήσῃς αὐτοὺς ἐκ τοῦ πονηροῦ, which is decisive. There is a possible construction of the clause which I do not remember to have seen suggested, but which should hardly be left out of account. ὁ γεννηθεὶς ἐκ τοῦ θεοῦ might be taken as meaning the Son of God: “He that was begotten of God keepeth him.” But this would hardly suit the analogy of the Epistle: see e. g. ver. 1 and note), and the wicked one (Satan: see reff. and notes) doth not touch him (Düsterd. approves of Calvin’s paraphrase, which is self-condemnatory—“continet se in Dei timore, nec se ita abripi patitur, ut exstincto pietatis sensu diabolo et carni totum se permittat”—as the meaning of ὁ πον. οὐχ ἅπτεται αὐτοῦ. Of course the words must not be understood as saying that he is not tried with temptation by the evil one: but imply that as the Prince of this world had nothing in our blessed Lord, even so on His faithful ones who live by His life, the Tempter has no point d’appui, by virtue of that their γέννησις by which they are as He is. “Malignus appropinquat,” says Bengel, “ut musca lychnum, sed non nocet, ne tangit quidem”).

Henry Alford, The Greek Testament (1849–1861) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

18. οἴδαμεν] Cf. 3:2, 14. The knowledge is intuitive. That which is stated follows immediately from the very nature of God, and of the life which He has given to men.

πᾶς ὁ γεγεννημένος κ.τ.λ.] Cf. 3:9. The perfect expresses the abiding results of the “begetting.” In so far as they are realized they exclude the possibility of sin. Following his usual custom, the writer states the truth absolutely, without stating the modifications which become necessary as it is applied to individual cases in actual experience. The preceding section as well as the early part of the Epistle sufficiently shows that he recognized the actual fact of sin in Christians.

ὁ γεννηθεὶς ἐκ τοῦ θεοῦ] If the reading ἑαυτόν be adopted, the meaning must be that he who has once for all experienced the new birth keeps himself from the evil in virtue of the power which the new birth places within his reach. In the first clause of the verse the permanent consequences of the initial act are emphasized; here the stress is laid on the act itself. The fact of the new birth enables him to keep himself free from the attacks of the evil one. This sense is not badly expressed in the paraphrase of the Vulgate, “sed generatio Dei conseruat eum,” a rendering which may have been influenced by the similar passage in 3:9, πᾶς ὁ γεγεννημένος ἐκ τοῦ θεοῦ ἁμαρτίαν οὐ ποιεῖ, ὅτι σπέρμα αὐτοῦ ἐν αὐτῷ μένει. It is found in Greek (ἡ γἑννησις) in two cursives.The reading, however, of B and the original hand of A (αὐτόν) has strong claims to be regarded as original. It is difficult to see why ἑαυτόν should ever have been altered into αὐτόν, which is apparently far more difficult, unless, indeed, the change was due to accidental carelessness at a very early stage in the transmission of the text. And the evidence of the Latin, supported as it now is by two Greek cursives, is of considerable importance in favour of this reading (generatio Dei conseruat eum vg., cf. natiuitas Dei custodit illum Chromatius).

If αὐτόν is original, it can hardly be explained, as Weiss suggests, by referring the phrase ὁ γεννηθεὶς ἐκ τοῦ θεοῦ “directly to the fact of the begetting from God, which keeps him who has experienced it.” This would be a very strained expedient. It is still more unnatural to refer αὐτόν to God, as Karl does (Der aus Gott gezeugte hält ihn (seine Gebote). Τηρεῖ αὐτόν cannot mean “observes His commandments.” With an accusative of the person τηρεῖν always has the sense in the N.T. of watching or guarding, in a friendly or hostile spirit. It would be far better to read αὑτόν (cf. Joh 2:24, οὐκ ἐπίστευεν αὑτόν).

But no explanation of the change from the perfect to the aorist participle is altogether satisfactory, if both are referred to the same person, i.e. the man who has experienced the new birth. The interpretation, therefore, which refers ὁ γεννηθεὶς ἐκ τοῦ θεοῦ to Christ deserves serious consideration. It is true that the expression γεννηθῆναι ἐκ τοῦ θεοῦ is not used elsewhere in the Johannine writings of Christ, unless the Western variant in Joh 1:13, ὃς … ἐκ θεοῦ ἐγεννήθη, for which there is interesting Patristic evidence in the second century, is to be regarded as original. We may also compare Joh 18:37, ἐγὼ εἰς τοῦτο γεγέννημαι καὶ εἰς τοῦτο ἐλήλυθα εἰς τὸν κόσμον, and the language of the Messianic Psalm, ἐγὼ σήμερον γεγέννηκά σε, which has some claim to represent the true text in Luk 3:22. Thus interpreted the passage has a fairly close parallel in Joh 17:15, ἵνα τηρήσῃς αὐτοὺς ἐκ τοῦ πονηροῦ, and ver. 12, ἐγὼ ἐτήρουν αὐτοὺς ἐν τῷ ὀνόματί σου ᾧ δέδωκάς μοι καὶ ἐφύλαξα καὶ οὐδεὶς ἐξ αὐτῶν ἀπώλετο. Cf. Rev 3:10, κἀγῶ σε τηρήσω ἐκ τῆς ὥρας τοῦ πειρασμοῦ.

It may be noticed that τηρεῖν is never used in the Johannine writings with the accusative of the reflex pronoun, or in the N.T. with such an accusative absolutely. Cf. 2Co 11:9, ἀβαρῆ ἐμαυτὸν ἐτήρησα: 1Ti 5:22, σεαυτὸν ἁγνὸν τήρει: Jas 1:27, ἄσπιλον ἑαυτὸν τηρεῖν: Jud 1:21, ἑαυτοὺς ἐν ἀγάπῃ θεοῦ τηρήσατε. An interesting article in support of the reference to Christ was contributed by Wohlenberg to the Neue Kirchliche Zeitung in 1902 (p. 233 ff.).ἅπτεται] The word probably suggests the idea of laying hold of in order to harm. Cf. Gen 26:11; Jos 9:25 (19); Jer 4:10; Jer_4 Mac. 10:4; Psa 104. (105.):15. Schlatter quotes from Siphre to Num 6:26, אֵין הַשָּׂטָן נוֹגֵעַ בָּהֶם.

οιδαμεν] οιδα Ia 397 (96):+ δε Ib 370 (353) | γεγενημενος99 jscr | ο γεννηθεις εκ] η γεννησις Ic 114, 116 (335): generatio vg. | γεννηθεις] γεγενημενος Ia 7f. Ic 174 (252) | τηρει] μαρτυρει | Ib δ602 (522) | αυτον A * B 105 vg.] εαυτον א A con K L P al. pler. cat. Or. Eph. Thphyl. Oec.

International Critical Commentary — older volumes (1896–1929), various authors — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.