55 - 1Jn 4:2
Ἐν τούτῳ γινώσκετε τὸ πνεῦμα τοῦ Θεοῦ· πᾶν πνεῦμα ὃ ὁμολογεῖ Ἰησοῦν Χριστὸν ἐν σαρκὶ ἐληλυθότα ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἐστι.
St. John mentions and commends the standard of judgment in 1Jn 4:2: we must take γινώσκετε [“you know”] in the imperative sense; that elsewhere the indicative γινώσκομεν [“we know”] so often occurs, cannot affect the application of the second person These few words must be all the more carefully studied, because their meaning is so important: the decision concerning others, yea, the decision concerning my own relation to God. An ὁμολογεῖν [“confession”] is demanded: the question is not here of πίστις[“faith”], for that is an act of my inmost and most secret life; visible to no other, often un known to myself while often I am conscious of it, it cannot be a standard or mark for judgment upon others. It is something that must show itself, and be confirmed, and that in act (chapter 3); but the act must be judged by its motive and spring, and this judgment is measured by the confession that I make concerning my motive. But thus it is not the confession of itself which is laid down as a standard, as if it were opposed to the fear of confession; the emphasis rests upon the matter of the confession or its object. In general, it is made plain by a comparison of 1Jn 4:3, where the right readingtn comprehends the full contents of the confession in the one word Ἰησοῦν [“Jesus”], that the question here is of the historical person of Jesus of Nazareth. But in what sense, we must again more closely ask, is this to be the matter of my confession? What concerning it am I to confess? Here, first of all, the words must be grammatically arranged in their due order. Much depends on the grammatical place of the word Χριστὸν [“Christ”]. Is it to be immediately combined with Ἰησοῦν [“Jesus”], so that Jesus Christ is the definition of the person concerning whom something—that is, the ἐληλυθέναιταἐνσαρκὶ [“has come in the flesh”]—is to be confessed? or is it to stand as an attributive, so that I am to confess Jesus as the Christ, and that He appeared as such in the flesh? In the former case, the apostle presupposes that Jesus is the Christ; and his requirement is only this, that I avow this Jesus Christ to have become incarnate; in the other case, the presupposition is that there must be a confession concerning Jesus, and the requirement is that I avow concerning Him Messiahship and incarnation. The question is not an irrelevant one, nor one of mere logomachy. If we take the former view, we suppose that the confession demanded was in opposition to Docetism, which acknowledged Jesus as the Christ, as sent of God, as the ἄνωθενέρχόμενον [“the one who came from above”], but not as real man, who had become flesh; if we take the latter view, we suppose it demanded in opposition to Ebionism, which would not acknowledge Jesus as the incarnate Christ, but denied His higher nature. For it is quite certain that Χριστός [“Christ”] here does not define Jesus as the promised Messiah of the Jews, but expresses His higher and divine nature. It is true that the former is the meaning in all those passages of the Gospels where by Jews, or in opposition to Jews, Jesus is described as the Christ. But wherever ἸησοῦςΧριστός [“Jesus Christ”] is used as a proper name, the former word expresses His human nature, the latter His divine; and in a series of places Χριστός [“Christ”] simply is interchangeable with υἱὸς τοῦ θεοῦ [“Son of God”]. Thus it is in Joh 1:18,[N] where the words ὁμονογενὴςθεὸςκ.τ.λ. [“the only-begotten God”] define the meaning of the Χριστός [“Christ”]; thus it is in Joh 3:28, for the subsequent words in Joh 3:31, ὁ ἐκ τοῦ οὐρανοῦ ἐρχόμενος [“the one who comes from heaven”], define the substance of the name. In our Epistle we must hold fast this significance in every passage where Χριστός [“Christ”] occurs: in 1Jn 1:5 it is clear from the added clause that Jesus Christ is introduced as the Son of God; in 1Jn 2:22 the denial of Jesus as the Christ is more closely defined by the words of 1Jn 2:23, ὁ ἀρνούμενος τὸν υἱὸν [“the one who denies the Son”]; the close of the ninth verse of the second Epistle confirms this meaning of the name. And finally, as it concerns our present passage, it may be most absolutely proved that Christ is interchange able with Son of God. First, the sum of Christian doctrine which the apostle here lays down is identical with that which he utters in Joh 1:14, ὁ λόγος σὰρξ ἐγένετο [“the word became flesh”], and therefore the Χριστός [“Christ”] here corresponds to the idea of λόγος [“word”] there. Secondly, in the resumé of our section in 1Jn 4:14 the apostle sums up what he here says thus, that God sent His Son as Saviour into the world: thus the Χριστός [“Christ”] here is equivalent to υἱὸς τοῦ θεοῦ [“Son of God”] there; just as similarly in 1Jn 4:15 he demands the confession that Jesus is the Son of God.
After having established the full significance of the word Christ, let us turn back to the original question: does the apostle demand the confession that the Son of God, who is acknowledged Jesus by the supposition, became flesh and a true man; or does he demand that the man Jesus be acknowledged as the Son of God? In other words: Is the divinity of Jesus the thing acknowledged, the humanity in its full meaning the thing doubted,—that is to say, the thing denied; or is it precisely the converse of this? Finally, in the grammatical terminis, does Χριστός [“Christ”] belong to the subject or to the predicate? In favour of the former, it may be urged that the combination ἸησοῦςΧριστός [“Jesus Christ”] is so common, that if the apostle had meant to divide them, he must have shown his intention by his specific arrangement; and this he might easily have done by simply putting the Ἰησοῦν [“Jesus”] before the ὁμολογεῖν [“confession”]. Not the less on that account must we decide for the separation of the Χριστόν [“Christ”] from the Ἰησοῦν [“Jesus”]. For the recapitulation in 1Jn 4:14, and especially that of 1Jn 4:15, shows that the matter of primary importance to the apostle here was the recognition of Jesus as the Son of God: he sums up the confession introduced before to this effect, that Ἰησοῦςἐστινὁυἱὸς τοῦ θεοῦ [“Jesus is the Son of God”]. Now if, as we have seen, Χριστός [“Christ”] here is equivalent with υἱὸς τοῦ θεοῦ [“Son of God”] there, it cannot belong to the subject, but must be separated as the predicate of the confession demanded. Thus the question which should serve for the δοκιμασίαπνευμάτων [“testing of spirits”] was the old one: What think ye of Jesus? The right answer to the question was the common confession of the church concerning His divine human person as the God-man; but this introduced in such a way that the emphasis rests upon the divinity, while the humanity is here, as everywhere else in the New Testament, simply taken for granted or not open to any suspicion. In making the divinity prominent, the apostle does not say that Christ became flesh, but that He came into the flesh. Concerning His birth as the physical entrance into the world, St. John neither here nor anywhere else uses ἔρχεσθαιεἰςτὸνκόσμον [“to come into the world”] and the like; it is always rather with him the coming as the result of a higher divine causality. All the three Johannaean documents agree in representing the coming of Jesus as essentially a coming from heaven. Ἦν τὸ φῶς τὸ ἀληθινόν [“the true light was coming” cf. Joh 1:9] is the announcement of the gospel, coming, that is, from the Father into the world; the Saviour promises to His disciples His own coming from the Father, to whom He returns as the Paraclete; the entire Apocalypse revolves around the ναὶἔρχουκύριεἸησοῦ [“yes, come Lord Jesus” cf. Rev 22:20], His final coming from heaven. Accordingly, it is not the intention of the apostle to aver here primarily that the Son of God became truly man,—that follows only from the words used,—but by the ἔρχεσθαι [“to come”] to indicate plainly that the man Jesus was nevertheless the Son of God, that He came into this humanity from heaven, and therefore entered it as the eternal Logos.
We are then to regard Christ in our thoughts as ἐνσαρκὶἐληλυθότα [“the one who has come in the flesh”]. The phrase expresses something different from εἰςσάρκα [“in the flesh”], and something more than εἰςτὸνκόσμον [“into the world”]. Something different from εἰςσάρκα [“in the flesh”], for this would mean only that He descended into the sphere of the σάρξ [“flesh”], of humanity as infected by sin and guilt, without expressing in what sense He personally became σάρξ [“flesh”]. Something higher than εἰςτὸνκόσμον [“into the world”]; for we have already seen on 1Jn 2:16 that κόσμος [“world”] is a much more comprehensive idea than σάρξ [“flesh”]: all potencies opposed to God which are found in the κόσμος [“world”] are condensed in the σάρξ [“flesh”], in human nature sold under sin, as in a focus. Σάρξ [“flesh”] means human nature not in itself, nor as exclusively in its corporeal relation, but that human nature as having sin lodged in it. Sin does not originate indeed in the σῶμα [“flesh”] of man; but all that man is and does makes for itself an organ in the body, makes indeed the body its organ. Not only does the body of man participate in the dissolution of the human constitution which entered as the effect of sin, sickness, suffering, and death itself included, but every sinful psychical impulse conditions or determines man’s bodily nature, inasmuch as, in consequence of sinful impulses, the body is adapted to the service of sin, and unfitted for the service of righteousness. Thus, while we cannot indeed say that the flesh, that is, the body infected with sin, is itself sin, for sin can be predicated only of that which is psychical or spiritual, it is nevertheless pervaded through and through by the results of sin. As nature cannot be evil, though no longer by any means responding to the original design of the Creator, not being any longer the representative and organ of pure, divine thoughts, so also is it with the body of man. And this corporeity thus perverted is the σάρξ [“flesh”] in which Christ must appear if He would and should approve Himself the σωτῆρα τοῦ κόσμου [“Saviour of the world”] (1Jn 4:14). He must thus be manifested in it as the Reconciler or Atonement, thus also as the Redeemer. As the former, for in taking upon Himself the σάρξ [“flesh”], He bore all the consequences of sin; not even His body was the adequate and homogeneous organ of His spirit, as St. Paul declares in the averment of His ἀσθένεια [“weakness”] (2Co 13:3); He tasted thoroughly the sorrow which sin has poured out upon the whole human estate and life. But by this very fact He has redeemed us from the σάρξ [“flesh”]; for in that He, by virtue of the power of the Spirit indwelling in Him, gradually overcame, blessed and glorified the σάρξ [“flesh”], that is, the corporeity deteriorated and bound by sin, it has become a σῶματῆςδόξης [“glorious body”], or σῶμαπνευματικόν [“spiritual body”], that is to say, a body which is the absolutely perfect organ of the spirit; and thereby He has opened the way for us also on our part to undergo this process of glorification with our σάρξ [“flesh”].
Now he who confesses to this Son of God, who was manifested in the flesh, gives witness that he has the πνεῦματῆςἀληθείας [“Spirit of truth”], for no man can call Jesus Lord but by His Holy Spirit; thus also, in his case, the ποιεῖν τὴνδικαιοσύνην [“to practice righteousness”] is the glorifying process upon the flesh wrought through Christ’s Spirit, and after His pattern. His works are therefore the full pledge of His divine sonship, which fact the apostle aims here to corroborate with force this section concurs with the former to make one whole. And the confession here demanded is not alone an unconditional token of my estate of grace; for, while it does indeed prove that the Holy Spirit is operating within me, it does not prove that my whole personal life is brought under His power; again, the testimony of works demanded in 1Jn 3:1-24 is then only efficient when it is certain that these works have the right principle as their source, that is, the Holy Ghost. Both these elements taken together, however, establish an unassailable security.
Textual note tnτὸν Ἰησοῦν A B Ψ 33 81 206 322 323 429 436 630 945 1067 1241 1409 1505 1611 1739 2138 2200 2298 2344 2495 itq,z vg copbo (eth) Ir1739mg Cl1739mg NA‖ Ἰησοῦν Χριστὸν K 056 0142 5 6 18 82 175 181 221 330c 424 442 450 454 457 459 469 623 627 629c 920 1127 1243 1292 1735 1852 1862 1891 2080 2127 2492 2805 2818 HF RP ‖ τὸν Ἰησοῦν Χριστὸν L 049 1 61 88 104 326 451 456 468 1175 1845 1875 Lect TR ‖ τὸν Χριστὸν Ἰησοῦν 93 307 614 1678 1837 2147 2412 ‖ τον Χριστον 1846 ‖ Ἰησοῦν Κύριον א ‖ τὸν υἱόν 2541