38 - 1Jn 3:4
Πᾶς ὁ ποιῶν τὴν ἁμαρτίαν, καὶ τὴν ἀνομίαν ποιεῖ· καὶ ἡ ἁμαρτία ἐστὶν ἡ ἀνομία. The exhortation to the ποιεῖντὴνδικαιοσύνην [“to practice righteousness”] takes a form habitual to our apostle: first of all, he presents sharply to view the ἁμαρτία [“sin”], its opposite, in order that thereby he may illustrate the meaning of the positive idea concerning which he has to speak. Here it is above all needful that we should regard anything that opposes the δικαιοσύνην [“righteousness”] as also a contradiction and absolute opposite to the divine nature, as contrary to God in its very essence; and that we should be careful not arbitrarily to restrict in any way the idea of sin. This definition and delimitation of the idea of ἁμαρτία [“sin”] is the subject of the fourth verse. This word is not supposed, in the apostle’s teaching, to convey a more comprehensive idea than ἀνομία [“lawlessnes”], but to be strictly co-extensive with it: wherever, therefore, we are constrained to find ἁμαρτία [“sin”]. Nothing evil can to the Christian man be merely imperfection, or sin, so to speak, of the second degree: all is to him transgression of the law. Such is the strict meaning of the word ἀνομία [“lawlessnes”] even in classical Greek: it signifies not the conduct which proceeds from a state in which the law is either absent or unknown, it does not imply the exclusion of a νόμος [“law”], but rather expresses a guilt which casts aside the law already existing by actual neglect of its requirements, just as in the German Ungesetzlichkeit is interchangeable with Widersetzlichkeit. And thus ἀνομία [“lawlessnes”], when the word really occurs in its full meaning, is the very strongest definition or description of sin: the νόμος [“law”], indeed, according to St. Paul, makes sin generally exceeding sinful, and his emphatic word ἐπικατάρατος πᾶς ὃς οὐκ ἐμμένει ἐν πᾶσι τοῖς γεγραμμένοις ἐν τῷ βιβλίῳ τοῦ νόμου [“cursed is everyone who does not continue in all the things written in the book of the law”] (Gal 2:20), refers, precisely as St. James does, Jas 2:10, ὅστις γὰρ ὅλον τὸν νόμον τηρήσει, πταίσει δὲ ἐν ἑνὶ, γέγονε πάντων ἔνοχος [“For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles in one point, he has become guilty of all.”], to sin as definitely and strictly ἀνομία [“lawlessnes”]. This sunders man unfailingly, according to the very idea of man, from God. And the force of the apostle’s declaration is, that ἀνομία [“lawlessnes”] is not a subordinate kind or a specifically aggravated degree of the ἁμαρτία [“sin”], but that every ἁμαρτία [“sin”] is at the same time ἀνομία [“lawlessnes”]: in short, that the two ideas cannot be separated from each other. The solemn earnestness of this proposition will appear more fully when we inquire what the νόμος [“law”] is, and what is in St. John’s estimation that νόμος [“law”], the violation or not following of which he speaks of in the ἀνομία [“lawlessnes”]. Most certainly it is not the universal law of conscience; for the New Testament never calls that νόμος [“law”]; nor yet is it, however, the law of Moses or the old covenant as such. It is not this, first, because in the Old Testament the strict congruence or coincidence here declared between ἁμαρτία [“sin”] and ἀνομία [“lawlessnes”] did not yet exist: there were actually multitudes of ἁμαρτίαι [“sins”], or moral delinquencies, for instance, in the connubial relations which were not forbidden by the letter of the Mosaic law, and were not therefore ἀνομία [“lawlessnes”]. Secondly, not the old law, because St. John furnishes no instance of the word νόμος [“law”], standing absolutely, being applied to the Mosaic law. It is true that in two passages (Joh 7:49, John 12:34) it stands absolutely and as the definition of the Old Testament canon; but it must be observed that this is put into the mouth of the Pharisees only; and elsewhere there is the invariable addition ὁ νόμος ἡμῶν [“our law”], ὁ νόμος Μωϋσέως [“the law of Moses”], or the like. The reason of this is to be found in the fact that St. John starts originally (Joh 1:18) from the great principle of a sharp antithesis between the revelation of the law and the revelation through Christ. The Mosaic law was to him absolutely and only the law of the Jews: although this did no violence to the truth that Christ was born οὐκαταλῦσαιτὸννόμονἀλλὰπληρῶσαι [“not to abolish the law, but to fulfill it” cf. Mat 5:18].
Thus we are constrained to understand the νόμος [“law”], opposition to which is here expressed by the word ἀνομία [“lawlessnes”] of the divine law generally and universally, as it is revealed through Christ: the expression refers as well to the as it were new commandments given by the Saviour, as to the spirit of the Old Testament which our lawgiver has only released from the γράμμα [“written code” cf. Rom 2:27] enveloping it and thrust forward into the foreground. The uttered or revealed will of God is the νόμος [“law”], therefore ἀνομία [“lawlessnes”] is the opposition or rebellion of the lawless will against this will. Every ἁμαρτία [“sin”], consequently, bears on its front the impress of ἀνομία [“lawlessnes”] as thus explained: every transgression or shortcoming in the widest sense of the word. But this view of the matter was not obvious to the churches here addressed, any more than it is obvious to us who have received this fundamental declaration in its true meaning: it is only too common in the very nature of men to establish distinctions and gradations among individual sins. As to the countless little failures and defects in common life, no man indeed who is filled with the Spirit of Christ will justify these, or even hold them as indifferent: but have we in relation to them a pressing consciousness of actual transgression of law? Do we look at the manifold discords of our life, and its deviations from the line of the Christian ideal as positive sins, every one of which immediately and certainly separates us from God, and can be expiated or abolished only by deep repentance and a distinct act of forgiveness? Most assuredly in multitudes of cases it is not so: such things are thought of as imperfections, but do not press on the consciousness as ἀνομία [“lawlessnes”].
Now, St. John declares here that this current view of the matter as entertained by us is not of the truth; he lays this down as an axiom without any further demonstration: the demonstration of it is plain enough throughout the whole teaching of the apostle. If, in fact, the Spirit of Christ guides us into all truth, and therefore in every particular case shows us what is right, every sin must be an act of resistance to the drawing of the Spirit, and consequently of disobedience to the will of God as shown by the Spirit, and consequently against the νόμοςΘεοῦ [“law of God”]. I may not in the specific case have been conscious of the drawing of the Spirit; but then that was my fault, and does not alter the position of things. As in the well-known passage in the Sermon on the Mount concerning the oath, the centre and pith of the explanation—too often unobserved—is that the mere utterance of yea must itself contain equally inviolable truth as the oath with its strong emphasis, the simple affirmation being lifted up to the height of the oath; so here in like manner it is the design of St. John to elevate every sin in its whole and wide domain to the degree of ἀνομία [“lawlessnes”]. There lies in every sin, of whatever kind for the rest it may be, the highest grade of guiltiness. But this definition of the nature of sin, as it is contained in the words ἡ ἁμαρτία ἐστὶν ἡ ἀνομία [“sin is lawlessnes”], does not itself constitute the motive of the verse, but serves only for the illustration of the first member of it: he who committeth sin committeth also a breach of the law. The article before ἁμαρτίαν [“sin”] is not intended to distinguish a specific kind of sin from other kinds; for nothing whatever had been said about various kinds of sin in the present Epistle. It simply comprehends the diversified acts of human sin which may take place into the unity of one idea. He who ἁμαρτίαντιναποιεῖ [“he who practices sin”], by that very fact also committeth τήνἁμαρτίαν [“sin”]; in every individual transgression the nature of the sin is manifested. The emphasis lies in the first hemistich plainly upon the ποιεῖν [“to practice”]; for generally the apostle is here occupied with the doing of men. That the ποιεῖντήνἁμαρτίαν [“to practice sin”] is identical with the ποιεῖντήνἀνομίαν [“to practice lawlessness”], the apostle proves by the simple declaration that ἁμαρτία [“sin”] and ἀνομία [“lawlessnes”] are or ought to be for Christians interchangeable ideas. Similarity of nature implies or produces similarity of outward manifestation. Substantially, therefore, the second universal proposition of the verse is the demonstration or proof of the first particular proposition; but, inasmuch as they are bound together by the general καί [“and”], we see that the apostle reflects not precisely on the causal connection of the two propositions, but simply regards the second as the illustration of the first. Now, if every sin is, as well in its internal nature (1Jn 3:4