. Especially is the distinction made between those who belong to God and those who belong to the devil, by Love and Hate: and therefore must we ever love in deed and in truth (ii. 29-iii. 18). The Apostle adds a promise of confidence towards God and answer to prayer, and exhorts them to add to love, faith in the Son of God (iii. 19–24): which leads him to a second express warning against the false teachers (iv. 1-6). c) In this third Exhortation, the Apostle sets out with the simple principle of Love, which, constituting the essence of God Himself, and being revealed in the mission of Christ, is the condition of all adoption into God's family and all confidence towards God (iv. 7—21). But a co-ordinate condition is faith in the Son of God, as including in itself Love, and the keeping of God's commandments, and the strength requisite thereto. And the voucher for this faith is found in the historical facts and testimonies of baptism, of the death of Christ, and of the Holy Spirit, and in eternal life which He gives (v. 1-13). At the conclusion of the exhortation, we have the repeated promise of confidence towards God and the hearing of prayer, in this case intercessory prayer for a sinning brother, yet with a limitation, and a reminding that strictly speaking, Christians may not sin: ending with a warning against idolatry (v. 14—21). 7. To this division Düsterdieck objects, that the terms exhortation, reminding, &c., are of too superficial a kind to suffice for designating the various portions of the Epistle, and that De Wette is in error in supposing a new train of thought to be begun in ch. iv. 7-21: rather does the leading axiom of ch. ii. 29 proceed through that portion, and in fact even further than that. 8. His own division, which has been in the main followed in my Commentary, is as follows. Regarding, as the others, ch. i. 1-4 as the Introduction, in which the writer lays down the great object of apostolic preaching, asserts of himself full apostolicity, and announces the purpose of his writing, he makes two great divisions of the Epistle: the first, i. 5-ii. 28, the second, ii. 29-v. 5: on which follows the conclusion, v. 6-21. 9. Each of these great divisions is ruled and pervaded by one master thought, announced clearly in its outset; which we may call its theme. These themes are impressed on the readers both by positive and negative unfolding, and by polemical defence against erroneous teachers: and, this being done, each principal portion is concluded with a corresponding promise. And both principal portions tend throughout to throw light on the great subject of the whole, viz. FELLOWSHIP WITH GOD THE FATHER AND THE LORD JESUS CHRIST. 10. The theme of the first portion is given ch. i. 5, "God is Light, and in Him is no darkness." Consequently, fellowship with Him, on which depends our joy in Christ (i. 3, 4), belongs only to him who walks in light (i. 6). To walk thus in light as God is light (i. 6 ff., ii. 8 ff.), and to flee from darkness, in which there can be no fellowship with God (ii. 11 ff.), forms the first subject of the Apostle's Exhortation. To this end, after shewing the relation which this proposition, "God is light," has to us in regard of our fellowship with God and with one another through Jesus Christ (i. 6, 7), he unfolds first positively (i. 8-ii. 11) wherein our walking in light consists: viz. in free recognition and humble confession of our own sinfulness: the knowledge and confession of our own darkness being in fact the first breaking in on us of the light, in which we must walk: viz. fellowship with God through Christ, whose blood is to cleanse us from all our sin. 11. This our walking in light, whose first steps are the recognition, confession, and cleansing of sin, further consists in keeping the commandments of God, which are all summed up in one great commandment of Love (ii. 3-11). Hence only we know that we know God (ii. 3), that we love Him (ii. 5), that we are and abide in Him (ii. 6), in a word that we have fellowship with Him (cf. i. 3, 5 ff.), when we keep His commandments, when we walk (ii. 6, cf. i. 6) as "He,” i. e. Christ, walked. : 12. This summing up of all God's commands in love by the example of Christ as perfect love (John xiii. 34) brings in the negative side of the illustration of the proposition "God is light." Hate is darkness: is separation from God is fellowship with the world. So begins then a polemical designation of and warning against the love of and fellowship with the world (ii. 15-17), and against those false teachers (ii. 18-26), who would bring them into this condition: and an exhortation to abide in Christ (ii. 24-28). All this is grounded on the present state and progress of the various classes among them in fellowship with God in Christ (ii. 12—14, 27). See each of these subdivisions more fully specified in the Commentary. 13. The second great portion of the Epistle (ii. 29-v. 5) opens, as the other, with the announcement of its theme: "God is righteous (ii. 29), and “he who doeth righteousness, is born of Him." And as before, "God is Light" made the condition of fellowship with God to be, walking in light as "He" walked in light, so now, "God is righte ous makes the condition of " sonship" on our part to be that we be righteous, as 'He," Christ, was holy. And as before also, so now: it must be shewn wherein this righteousness of God's children consists, in contrast to the righteousness of the children of the world and of the devil. And so we have in this second part also a twofold exhortation, a positive and a negative: the middle point of which is the fundamental axiom "God is righteous, and therefore we His children must be righteous:" and thus it also serves the purpose of the Epistle announced in 66 i. 3 f. to confirm the readers in fellowship with the Father and the Son, and so to complete their joy: for this fellowship is the state of God's 14. This, however, as on the one side it brings in all blessed hope and our glorious inheritance (iii. 2, 3), so on the other it induces the moral necessity of that righteousness on which our fellowship with the Father and the Son, our abiding in Him, rests, grounded on His Love (iii. 8, 9, 10 ff. iv. 7 ff. &c.). Both sides of the birth from God, that which looks forward and that which looks backward, are treated together by the Apostle. Because we are born of God, not of the world, because we are God's children, not the devil's (because we know Him,-because we are of the truth,-because His Spirit is in us,-which are merely parallel enunciations of the same moral fact), therefore we sin not, therefore we practise righteousness, as God our Father is just and holy : and thus sanctifying ourselves, thus doing righteousness, thus abiding in Him and in His love, as His children, even thus we may comfort our- selves in the blessed hope of God's children to which we are called, even 15. It will be well to examine more in detail the order in which the exhortation proceeds in this second portion of the Epistle. 16. First, after the enunciation of the theme in ii. 29, the Apostle takes up the forward side of the state of God's children, that hope which is full of promise (iii. 1, 2); then proceeds to the condition of this hope, purifying ourselves even as "He" is pure (iii. 3). This purifying consists in fleeing from sin, which is against God's command (iii. 4), and presupposes abiding in Him who has taken away our sins (iii. 5, 6) the Apostle thus grounding sanctification in its condition, justifica- 17. Having laid down (iii. 7) the positive axiom, "He that doeth righteousness is righteous even as 'He' is righteous," he turns to the. other and negative side (iii. 8 ff.), contrasting the children of God and the children of the devil. And this leads us to an explanation how the abiding in the love of God necessarily puts itself forth in the love of the brethren (iii. 11-18). Hate is the sure sign of not being from God (iii. 10): love to the brethren a token of being from Him (iii. 18, 19), and being of the truth (ib.): and is a ground of confidence towards God (iii. 20, 21), and of the certainty of an answer to our prayers 18. This confidence towards Him is summed up in one central and decisive pledge-the Spirit which He has given us (iii. 24): and thus This he characteristic the denial of Christ having come in the flesh. concludes with a formula parallel to that in the first part, iii. 10: "Hereby know we the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error." : 19. After this (iv. 7 ff.) follows a fuller positive description of that which is born of God. Its very essence is love: for God is Love: Love to God grounded on His previous love to us (iv. 7-21) in sending His Son love to one another, resting on the same motive, and moreover (v. 1-5) because our brethren, like ourselves, are born of Him. And seeing that our love to God and to one another is grounded on God having given us His Son, we come to this, that faith in the Son of God is the deepest ground and spring of our love in both its aspects: and is the true test of being born of God as distinguished from being of the world (iv. 1-6), the true condition of life (iv. 9: cf. v. 13, i. 3, 4), of blessed confidence (iv. 14 ff.), of victory over the world (iv. 4, v. 4 f.). And thus the Apostle's exhortation converges gradually to the one point against which the lie of antichrist is directed, viz. true faith in the Lord Jesus Christ manifested in the flesh (v. 5). On this faith rests the righteousness of those who are born of God, as on the other hand the antichristian character of the children of the world consists in the denial of Christ having come in the flesh. For this faith works by righteousness and sanctification, as God the Father, and as the Lord Jesus Christ, is righteous and holy: seeing that we, who are born of and abide in the love with which God in Christ hath first loved us, keep His commandments, viz. to practise love towards God and towards the brethren. 20. So that we see on the one side the simple parallelism of both parts, suggested by the nature of the subject: and on the other, how both parts serve the general purpose of the whole work. The righteousness of those that are born of God, who is righteous, is simply the walking in light as God is light: the keeping God's commandments which all converge into one, the commandment of love. And this love has its ground and its source in a right faith in the Son of God manifested in the flesh. On our fellowship therefore with this our Lord, depends our fellowship with the Father and with one another (i. 3, 7, ii. 23, iii. 23, iv. 7 ff.), and consequently our joy (i. 4), our confidence (ii. 28), our hope (iii. 3), our life (iii. 15, v. 13: cf. i. 2), our victory over the world (ii. 15 ff., iii. 7 ff., v. 5). rest. 21. The CONCLUSION of the Epistle begins with v. 6. It is in two portions, v. 6-12 and v. 13-21. Both of these serve to bring the subject of the whole to its full completion, and, so to speak, to set it at "Jesus is the Son of God." This is the sum and substance of the apostolic testimony and exhortation. In the opening of the Epistle it was rested on the testimony of eye and ear witnesses: now, it is rested on witness no less secure, viz. on the religious life and experience of the readers themselves. Between these two testimonies comes in the Epistle itself with all its teaching, exhortation, and warning. This last testimony that Jesus is the Son of God is threefold: the water of baptism, the blood of reconciliation, the Spirit of sanctification (v. 6—8). These, in threefold unity, form God's own witness for His Son (v. 9). Only in faith on the Son of God (v. 10) do we receive and possess this witness of God, the true substance of which is eternal life, bestowed on us in Christ through water, blood, and the Spirit. So that he that hath the Son hath life. 22. And thus we have reached the true goal of all the Apostle's exhortation: the words, "these things have I written" (v. 13), answering to the "these things write we" of i. 4. And it is this-that our fellowship with the Father, and with one another, rests on our fellowship with the Lord Jesus Christ the Son of God; on which also depends our confidence, our hope, our joy, seeing that we have eternal life in faith in the Son of God. As in ch. iii. 22, so here again he illustrates this confidence by its exercise with regard to the answer of our prayers. And of this he takes occasion to adduce one particular example, viz. intercession for a sinning brother; and to place it in its true moral light, viz., as then availing when the sin in question has not excluded him totally from the family of life and from holy fellowship with God. Then follow a few solemn sentences, gathering up the whole instruction of the Epistle: the living contrast between the sinner and the child of God: between the family of God and the world: the consciousness on the part of God's children of their standing and dignity in Christ, the true God and life eternal. And he ends by summing up in one word all his warnings against falsehood in doctrine and practice, "Little children, keep yourselves from idols." 23. Such is a free rendering of the account given by Düsterdieck of his division of the Epistle: which, for the reason stated above, I have inserted here almost at length. The points wherein I have differed from it will be easily recognized in the Commentary. 24. It has this decided advantage over the others, that it not only arranges, but accounts for the arrangement given: and without any straining of the material of the Epistle to suit a preconceived view, brings to light its inner structure and parallelisms in a way which leaves on the mind a view of it as an intelligently constructed and interdependent whole. SECTION VI. LANGUAGE AND STYLE. 1. The questions of language and style, which in other sections of the |