The IVP New Testament Commentary Series
1–3 John
Marianne Meye Thompson
Grant R. Osborne
series editor
D. Stuart Briscoe
Haddon Robinson
consulting editors
InterVarsity Press
P.O. Box 1400, Downers Grove, Illinois 60515, U.S.A.
38 De Montfort Street, Leicester LE1 7GP, England
Copyright 1992 by Marianne Meye Thompson
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Inter-Varsity Press, England, is the book-publishing division of the Universities and Colleges Christian Fellowship (formerly the Inter-Varsity Fellowship), a student movement linking Christian Unions in universities and colleges throughout the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland, and a member movement of the International Fellowship of Evangelical Students. For information about local and national activities write to UCCF, 38 De Montfort Street, Leicester LE1 7GP.
All Scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the HOLY BIBLE, NEW INTERNATIONAL VERSION. Copyright 1973, 1978, 1984 International Bible Society. Used by permission of Zondervan Publishing House and Hodder and Stoughton Ltd. All rights reserved.
USA ISBN 0–8308-1819–7
UK ISBN 0–85111-671–X
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Thompson, Marianne Meye.
1-3 John/Marianne Meye Thompson.
p. cm.—(The IVP New Testament commentary series)
Includes bibligraphical references
ISBN 0–8308-1819–7
1.Bible. N.T. Epistles of John—Commentaries. I. Title
II. Series.
BS2805.3.T45 1992
227’.9407—dc20 91–45910
CIP
For Allison and Annelise
“No greater joy can I have than this,
to hear that my children follow the truth.”
(3 John 4)
General Preface
In an age of proliferating commentary series, one might easily ask why add yet another to the seeming glut. The simplest answer is that no other series has yet achieved what we had in mind—a series to and from the church, that seeks to move from the text to its contemporary relevance and application.
No other series offers the unique combination of solid, biblical exposition and helpful explanatory notes in the same user-friendly format. No other series has tapped the unique blend of scholars and pastors who share both a passion for faithful exegesis and a deep concern for the church. Based on the New International Version of the Bible, one of the most widely used modern translations, the IVP New Testament Commentary Series builds on the NIV’s reputation for clarity and accuracy. Individual commentators indicate clearly whenever they depart from the standard translation as required by their understanding of the original Greek text.
The series contributors represent a wide range of theological traditions, united by a common commitment to the authority of Scripture for Christian faith and practice. Their efforts here are directed toward applying the unchanging message of the New Testament to the ever-changing world in which we live.
Readers will find in each volume, not only traditional discussions of authorship and backgrounds, but useful summaries of principal themes and approaches to contemporary application. To bridge the gap between commentaries that stress the flow of an author’s argument but skip over exegetical nettles and those that simply jump from one difficulty to another, we have developed our unique format that expounds the text in uninterrupted form on the upper portion of each page while dealing with other issues underneath in verse-keyed notes. To avoid clutter we have also adopted a social studies note system that keys references to the bibliography.
We offer the series in hope that pastors, students, Bible teachers and small group leaders of all sorts will find it a valuable aid—one that stretches the mind and moves the heart to ever-growing faithfulness and obedience to our Lord Jesus Christ.
Author’s Preface
There are many to thank for their support, encouragement and assistance over the years that I worked on this commentary. I extend my thanks to Bethany Community Church of Seattle, to the women of Highland Park Presbyterian Church of Dallas and to various groups of La Crescenta Presbyterian Church for allowing me to try out some of my material in various forms. To my students who studied the epistles with me, and especially to those who read the commentary in draft and gave me helpful responses and feedback, I am grateful. I am indebted to the Board of Trustees of Fuller Theological Seminary for the granting of sabbatical leave that enabled the completion of this volume. Thanks are also due to the staff at InterVarsity Press and to the editors who read this book in draft. Their many suggestions have, I hope, improved the volume, and in any case no blame is to be assigned to them for any deficiencies that remain.
I should also like to thank my colleagues at Fuller Seminary who make our service together a joy and inspire me to faith, hope and love. As I think of these friends, there is both joy and sadness. It is a special pleasure to be able to name my husband, John, among my colleagues here, and to thank him for his encouragement and support in this and in all our life together. But it was during the final stages of finishing this work that we received the news of the untimely death of our colleague Bob Guelich. His warm friendship, collegial spirit and deep faith will be sorely missed by us all. I hope that in some way this commentary can help to further these same qualities in the church of Christ, for which Bob cared so passionately.
The writing of this commentary spanned a period of several years, marked on either end by the birth of our daughters, to whom this work is dedicated. No dedication could be more fitting. For they have helped bring to life every word in the epistles about the joy, love and confidence we have as God’s children. It is our prayer that what they have taught us in their infancy, we may also teach them to know in maturity, that together we may be found to walk as companions of the One who is true.
Introduction
When a number of reformers, including Luther and Zwingli, met at the Colloquy of Marburg in 1529 to discuss theological differences, one of the main topics of discussion was the significance of the Lord’s Supper. Luther voiced his disagreement with Zwingli and those of the Reformed confession in the statement “We have a different spirit” (see Luther 1971:70). Years later, when the Swiss theologian, Karl Barth, was teaching in Germany in the 1930s, all professors were required to open every lecture with the so-called Hitler salute and to sign a loyalty oath to Hitler and the government. Barth expressed his reservations to those Christian professors who signed the oath with the statement “We have different beliefs, different spirits and a different God” (Busch 1976:242).
We can go back in time nearly two millennia, to a community known to us from the pages of the three short epistles of the New Testament commonly called 1, 2 and 3 John. It was a community torn by conflict and marred by schism. The two sides of the dispute were represented by those loyal to the “Elder,” the author of these epistles, and those who had left the community (1 Jn 2:19). The Elder could well have said of those who departed, “We have different beliefs, different spirits and a different God” (compare 1 Jn 4:1–6).
Looking back over history, we would probably say that Luther overstated the case when he argued that the Lutheran and Reformed confessions “had a different spirit.” But the events of history proved Barth’s statement to be prophetic: the German Christians, loyal to the Third Reich, surely had a different spirit than those who resisted Hitler’s policies. And what about the Elder and his opponents? Have his judgments that those who left his congregation manifested the spirit of antichrist been sustained by history? What was at stake that elicited such a blanket condemnation of his opponents? Did they differ, like Luther and Zwingli, on an important but not essential tenet of the faith? Or were the disagreements between the Elder and the secessionists so great and so central to the faith that no compromise was possible?
In order to answer this question, we must seek to reconstruct the situation and issues behind the epistles. By doing this we can discern what was at stake for the Elder in these disputes, and so sharpen our minds and hearts to be aware of similar issues facing our churches today. The better we can ascertain what problems faced these early Christians, the better we can understand how to cope with similar problems still facing the church today.
I. The Occasion and Purpose of the Epistles
Each of the epistles testifies to an underlying conflict. However, while the situations of the readers addressed in 1 and 2 John are closely related, and perhaps identical, it is not so clear that 3 John was written to help its readers face the same crisis. Accordingly, we shall discuss 1 and 2 John together, and then ask how 3 John fits into the picture.
A. The Occasion and Purpose of 1 and 2 John
The Situation of the Readers To understand the Johannine community we should envision a network of smaller congregations or house churches, sharing a theological heritage and historical roots. Within one (or perhaps several) of these smaller churches there are theological conflicts (1 Jn 4:1–6; 5:5–8; 2 Jn 7–10) and social rifts (1 Jn 2:18–26; 4:1; 2 Jn 7). The Elder (2 Jn 1; 3 Jn 1), who has pastoral responsibility for the larger community and is probably a member of the smaller congregation in which the division has occurred, is now writing both to interpret the split that has torn his church and to warn other congregations about the problem.
The Nature of the Problem But what exactly is the problem? Broadly speaking, we may describe the conflict as focused on the nature and implications of salvation. Those who left the community—the “secessionists”—apparently held the view that those who were the “children of God” (1 Jn 3:1–2) attained a spiritual status by being “born of God” (3:9–10) that not only delivered them from the guilt and power of sin but actually rendered them sinless. They claimed to be without sin and to have attained a state of perfect righteousness (1 Jn 1:8, 10). In this regard they were like Jesus (2:1–2; 3:2) and like God, whose children they were (3:1–3).
A consequence of the secessionists’ belief in their full and present righteousness was what amounts to a denial of the significance of the atonement of Christ. They agreed that once they had needed God’s forgiveness through Christ. But having been purified of their sin and born of God, they had been granted a status in which they no longer needed atonement, for they were no longer guilty of or subject to sin. And where there is no sin, there is no need of confession or atonement. Moreover, since righteousness was a status already attained, there was no call to grow in righteousness or purity or knowledge of God. These were the present possession of the children of God. While the Elder agrees that the children of God have received the gift of God’s salvation, he disagrees with the secessionists that they have attained this fully in the present life (3:1–3); that being “children of God” makes no demands on the way they live (2:6); and that they have ceased to need forgiveness (1:8–2:2).
Thus the letters of 1 and 2 John are as much about Christian spirituality and conduct as they are about doctrine and belief. However, they have long been viewed as dealing primarily with a doctrinal dispute about the person of Jesus (Christology), a dispute that ultimately led to the fracturing of the church. Efforts to find historical parallels to the teaching addressed in 1 and 2 John have focused on the problems of Christology. A brief review will show how the parallels might shed light on the situation that occasioned the Johannine epistles.
Historical Parallels to the Teaching of the Secessionists Three dominant theories about the nature of the heresy in 1 and 2 John have arisen:
1. The opponents are Cerinthians. One of the oldest understandings of the epistles is that they are directed against the teachings of Cerinthus (see Stott 1988:48–55). According to tradition, Cerinthus was the archenemy of the apostle John in Ephesus, but we know little about Cerinthus. As summarized by Irenaeus (in Against All Heresies 1.26.1), Cerinthus’ Christology distinguished between Jesus and Christ. Jesus was merely a human being like all others, although noteworthy for his righteousness, prudence and wisdom. Christ (the Messiah) was a heavenly and spiritual being who descended upon the merely human Jesus at his baptism and departed at the crucifixion. Thus the human Jesus, not the heavenly, divine Christ, suffered and died.
If the secessionists’ teaching is understood against this background, then the statement that Jesus came “not … by water only, but by water and blood” (1 Jn 5:6) might be taken as an affirmation of the union of “Jesus” and “Christ” throughout his entire life, from his baptism (water) to his death (blood). There was no temporary merger of two distinct beings, and it was indeed the Messiah who died on the cross. The affirmation that “Jesus Christ has come in the flesh” (1 Jn 4:2; 2 Jn 7) would then be understood to emphasize the permanent union of Jesus and the Christ.
But there are other ways of reading these verses. Moreover, the records that we have of Cerinthus’ teaching lack certain features (such as claims to be without sin) that figure prominently in 1 John, while other ideas attributed to Cerinthus by Irenaeus are never mentioned or refuted in 1 John. And some of Cerinthus’ views, such as his belief that Jesus exceeded all his contemporaries in righteousness, actually seem closer to those of the author of 1 John, who holds up Jesus’ righteousness as an example to imitate (2:6; 3:7), than to the views of the dissidents themselves.
2. The opponents are Docetists. One tendency in early Christian thought was what has come to be known as “docetism” (from the Greek word dokein meaning “to seem”), which denied the reality of the Incarnation by claiming that Jesus only “seemed” to be human. Such teaching is documented quite early in the history of the church, for Ignatius of Antioch (early second century) wrote several epistles to churches in Asia Minor warning his readers against docetizing tendencies. Ignatius reminds his readers that Jesus did not merely seem to be human, or merely appear to suffer and to die. He really suffered, and he really died. Some scholars have read 1 John 4:2 (“Jesus Christ has come in the flesh”) as an insistence that Jesus was indeed a human being of flesh and blood, and so have taken this verse as part of the epistle’s attack on a docetic Christology.
But it is not obvious that in the statement “Jesus Christ has come in the flesh” (1 Jn 4:2) the accent falls on the word flesh. Even if it does, it is not clear that it counters the view that Jesus only seemed to have a body of flesh. It could, for example, be directed against a group which argued that there had never been an Incarnation at all or who, like Cerinthus, held that the Incarnation was merely temporary. While “Jesus Christ has come in the flesh” does affirm the reality of Jesus’ humanity, it is much more difficult to deduce the views against which such a statement is directed.
3. The opponents are Gnostics. The early church was confronted by various forms of the teaching that we label “Gnosticism.” Cerinthus’ views were of Gnostic orientation, and some Gnostics were also Docetists. Among the features of Gnosticism that have parallels in the Johannine epistles are the dualism of light and darkness and of truth and falsehood; claims to special union with or special knowledge of God; the view that the Christian is begotten of God, and that certain human beings have a “spiritual seed” implanted within them (1 Jn 3:9); and claims to sinlessness (1 Jn 1:8, 10). Some Gnostic Christologies held that in Jesus two natures (spiritual and physical) existed, but were not perfectly united. In some Gnostic treatises, it is not the divine Savior who dies on the cross, but another who dies in his place. In still other treatises, the heavenly man merely came upon an earthly body, but left that body prior to the crucifixion (Second Treatise of Seth VII 51:20–52:3 NHL 330; VII 56:8–11 NHL 332).
While the secessionists may have held beliefs that lent themselves to Gnostic interpretation, it is doubtful that they ought to be called Gnostic. The beliefs of the secessionists, as reconstructed from the epistles of John, seem neither as fully developed as nor entirely congruent with Gnostic systems developed in later writings. But it is probable that the kinds of beliefs they held fed into the stream of thought known as Gnosticism.
In summary, while striking parallels can be adduced between early known heresies and the epistles of John, none of these heresies perfectly mirrors the false teaching of 1 and 2 John. Yet the options outlined above do show that already in the early days of the church there were varying theories about the human nature of Jesus, about the union of divine and human in him and about his suffering and death. We also see a tendency to deny or minimize the humanity of Jesus. Whatever the heresy may have been which these dissidents advocated, they would not have labeled it by any of these names or agreed that it was heresy. Surely they would have regarded themselves as “Christians” insofar as that name means followers of Jesus Christ! The problem facing the Elder and his congregations is thus complicated by the subtlety of the heresy and the avowed sincerity of its proponents.
The Purpose and Genre of 1 and 2 John The main purpose of these two epistles is to combat a tangle of erroneous teaching and practice. Second John is a real letter, written to a specific congregation, to warn it that false teachers might come their way, to remind the faithful of the teaching that they had been given and to urge them to cherish the bonds of love that bind them together as a Christian fellowship. By contrast, 1 John lacks the features that characterize genuine correspondence, and has been variously called a treatise, sermon, tract or pastoral manual. Yet, like Paul’s letters, 1 John is intended for a specific audience and directed to a particular situation. It is possible that 1 John was sent to more than one congregation; some have suggested it was originally written (and read aloud) in smaller segments to a congregation in the author’s vicinity or to which he belonged.
First John is also permeated by a gentle pastoral tone. The author desires to encourage his readers and to assure them of their standing as God’s children. The turmoil within their congregation undoubtedly caused many to question their own faith and practice, and to wonder whether they were also guilty of or prone to the failings of the departed dissidents. First John regularly reassures its readers of those things in which they can have confidence. But at the same time it urges them to continue in faithfulness to the God who has given them so much.
B. The Occasion and Purpose of 3 John
Third John fits broadly into the same setting and milieu as 1 and 2 John, but it does not seem to deal with the identical issues. It is a personal letter, addressed to Gaius, and has three main purposes: first, to commend Gaius and his practice of welcoming traveling missionaries into his home; second, to express disapproval of the conduct of Diotrephes, who refuses to welcome these same missionaries; third, to commend one of these itinerant ministers, Demetrius, to Gaius and to urge that he be received with hospitality. In fact, 3 John may be a letter of commendation that Demetrius carried. The apostle Paul refers to such letters in passing (2 Cor 3:1–3).
Beyond this, it is difficult to pinpoint the nature of the problem in 3 John. The letter does not address the problems of heresy and schism evident in 1 and 2 John. Although some commentators have suggested that Diotrephes may well be one of the dissident former church members—for this would explain his refusal to receive any itinerant prophets from the Elder—others point out that the Elder does not allude to any doctrinal deviation on Diotrephes’ part, nor to his defection from the community. If either of these had been known to the Elder, he surely would have referred to them. It is, therefore, more likely that the dispute between Diotrephes and the Elder rests on other grounds.
We might call the dispute a power struggle. Some commentators have noted that the Elder cannot peremptorily dismiss Diotrephes. The Elder would like to visit the church so that he can “call attention to what [Diotrephes] is doing” (3 Jn 10). This kind of language suggests that the Elder has legitimate authority in the congregation, but perhaps his authority comes not by virtue of an appointed office, but through familiarity with and seniority in the church. At any rate, Diotrephes has challenged his position, for what reasons we can only guess. The Elder merely states that Diotrephes “loves to be first.” Yet other issues may have been at stake. Even if Diotrephes felt that he was exercising legitimate authority, he may still have appeared to others simply to be seeking after power.
II. Authorship, Date and Order of the Epistles
Authorship The name of these short letters, “1, 2 and 3 John,” comes from the tradition that they were written by the apostle John, the son of Zebedee. The letters themselves are anonymous, although 2 and 3 John state that they are from “the Elder.” The similarities in tone, language, thought and situation are such that we may safely conjecture that all three letters come from the same pen. But was that author, the “Elder,” the apostle John?
There are two kinds of evidence for assigning the epistles to the apostle John. First, evidence is taken from the epistles themselves. Some statements within the epistles suggest that they were written by an eyewitness of Jesus’ ministry (1 Jn 1:1–4). However, while firsthand testimony fits with a theory of apostolic authorship, it does not necessarily demand it. After all, there were other eyewitnesses to Jesus’ ministry; and Paul speaks of five hundred who were witnesses to the resurrection.
Other evidence derives from early church tradition, according to which the epistles were written by John, the son of Zebedee, one of the twelve disciples of Jesus (see Brown 1984:9–13). Apparently the apostles were called “presbyters” or “Elders” (compare Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 3.39.4.), but other leaders in the early church were granted this honorific designation as well. Eusebius quotes Papias (ca. 60–130), who refers to an “Elder John,” but it is debated whether he is the same person as an earlier named John, who was one of the Twelve (see Stott 1988:39–44; Marshall 1978:42–48).
Of course the lack of unambiguous evidence for the apostolic authorship of the epistles does not disprove their apostolic origins, but neither does it settle the question. The possibility of apostolic authorship should not be discounted, but in view of the ambiguous evidence, exegetical decisions and interpretation should not be based on an a priori assumption of such authorship. With this disclaimer in mind, there is no reason not to designate the author of the epistles by his traditional name, “John.”
Date Typically the epistles are assigned to the end of the first century, perhaps somewhere between the years a.d. 90 to 100. One of the chief reasons for dating the letters late in the first century is their relationship to the Gospel of John, which is usually dated between the years a.d. 70 to 100. If the epistles were written after the Gospel, as most scholars assume, then they must fall in the last decade or so of the first century.
Order Questions of authorship and date raise two other related questions—those of the relationship between the Gospels and epistles, and of the order in which the epistles themselves were written. Clearly there is a relationship between the Gospel of John and the epistles of John, for the language, theology and situations are closely related. But the epistles are written after the Gospel, within the same general milieu, to deal with a new set of problems that has arisen within the church.
The order in which the epistles were written is more difficult to discern. We may hypothesize that 1 John was written to deal pastorally and theologically with the crisis confronting the Johannine community. It was both read, in part or in whole, in the congregation of “the Elder,” and sent to other congregations that formed the greater “Johannine community.” Second John may well have been sent with 1 John as a cover letter to one congregation (or even to several). Third John could have been sent as a cover letter or on its own. Demetrius, who is commended in the letter, may also have carried the letter to a sister church. Perhaps he had a copy of 1 John as well.
The Importance of Discernment Discernment is a theme that runs throughout 1 John, even though it is directly addressed in one section only (4:1–6). Discernment is the ability to distinguish truth from error, whether that truth be manifested in doctrine or practice. While the gift of discernment comes from the Holy Spirit, it is not confined to the individual or to inner experience. Discernment is the task of the community. The church as a corporate entity is to guard, preserve and nurture truth. Indeed, in a church that so stresses the need for love and unity, it would be strange if at the point of discerning the truth the author would suddenly appeal to the private individual, without casting an eye on the community at large. This community has two primary manifestations: the community that has gone before us, and the community in which we now fellowship. The church is to test the spirits to see whether they conform with that which has been carefully taught and safeguarded by the church in the past, in order to preserve the continuity and life of the church today.
Assurance and Confidence One theme that permeates 1 John in particular is the theme of assurance. Again and again the author assures his readers that they can be confident of their standing with God. Believers are the children of God (3:1–3), born of God, with new life. Believers have assurance of salvation because they trust in the God who gives salvation, new birth and new life. God keeps them in eternal life; it is not earned by one’s own efforts or superior moral achievements. Those who make it their aim to “walk in the light” and recognize their need for the forgiveness of God when they fail do not need to be anxious about God’s graciousness to them. God is “faithful and just to forgive us our sins,” for “God is love.” Assurance rests on what God does and has done for those who trust in God.
IV. Learning to Read and Apply the Epistles of John
The Importance of Historical Context In interpreting any book of Scripture, the more we know about the historical setting of the material, the better we can interpret it. One of the things that we can glean from the epistle is that the church to which the elder has written has been torn apart by schism. In order to interpret 1 John, it is important always to keep this setting in mind. We can illustrate how important this historical setting is with a brief illustration.
Take, for example, the statements in 1 John 2:3–4, “We can be sure we know him if we obey his commands. The [one] who says, ‘I know [God],’ but does not do what he commands is a liar, and the truth is not in him.” If we interpret these statements without any attention to historical context, then the verses seem to mean that anyone who claims to know God—which would include most Christians—but who breaks one of God’s commands is a liar, and does not know God or have God’s indwelling truth. This would exclude most, if not all, Christians from “knowing God”!
However, it is instructive to remember that there has been a split in the church, and that the dissident faction has broken the commands to believe in Jesus and to love the children of God (see 1 Jn 3:23). When John speaks of “the [one] who says, ‘I know him’ ” but fails to keep God’s commands, John is referring to one of these secessionists. That is, he is applying a principle accepted by himself and the community to a specific situation. The general principle is that those who know God also do what God commands. When someone consistently disobeys the commands of God, then that person’s claim to know and serve God is also called into question. John has not formulated a test to apply to individual or isolated acts of faithful believers, but to the lifestyle of a group of people that has left the church. He is not looking so much at specific acts or individual persons as he is at a conception of the Christian life with which he disagrees.
In short, whenever the author speaks of people who are not doing something they ought to be doing—like loving, believing or keeping the commands—he is directing his remarks not so much to Christians in his churches who are doing these things imperfectly, but to the secessionists who are not doing them at all. These letters were not intended primarily to whip believers into shape or to serve as warnings to the faithful, so much as they were to encourage them that the path in which they were walking was indeed the path of God’s will. When John speaks of those who are not doing what God requires, his mind is on the secessionists. Most, if not all, of the warnings are directed to those who have left the community and abandoned the apostolic teaching.
To apply these epistles today, a pastor or teacher must discern when a congregation or individual needs encouragement and when they need exhortation. Passages that were originally intended to be applied to the secessionists cannot simply be applied to those who have been and continue to be faithful to the apostolic message. But just because John encourages his congregation and believes that they are walking as God would have them to walk does not mean that exhortations to love, obedience and confession are not appropriate for the church today. Today the epistles sound the same call as they did in the first century—to bring all of one’s life under the scrutiny of God’s light, and to live in conformity with God’s character and will.
The Importance of Literary Context It is also important to interpret individual passages by setting them within the context of the epistles as a whole. One example may suffice here. The statement “everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God” (1 Jn 4:7), when interpreted without reference to context, could be construed to mean that love is the evidence that one stands in relationship to God. But elsewhere in the epistle, belief in Jesus is advanced as the test of one’s relationship to God (5:1). And, similarly, keeping the commandments is likewise taken as evidence that one “lives in [God]” (3:24).
In context, each of these verses is making a specific point. Here, for example, the point is that love for others must characterize those who love God. But love is not the only characteristic of those who love God. Indeed, the epistle might well be read as a series of short sermons, in which various aspects of the Christian life—belief, love, conduct, obedience, discernment or confession—are examined. In interpreting the epistles one should press beyond the surface statements to ask how they cohere with each other, as well as what the fundamental and basic understanding of God and the Christian life is that they manifest. The letter’s simplicity lends itself to simplistic interpretation; to the attuned ear, however, its commands are calls to understand and live in light of the nature and character of God.
Dualism Perhaps one of the most puzzling features of Johannine thought is its adamant dualism. “Dualism” is, as its name implies, the view that the world is divided into two opposing and conflicting realities, such as matter and spirit. Johannine dualism sets life and death, love and hate, truth and error, light and darkness, in absolute opposition to each other. Between these opposing realities there is no middle ground. Good is not tinged with evil; truth cannot embrace error; love does not allow room for even a little bit of hate. And yet none of us is perfectly good, loving or truthful. What then are we to make of this dualism?
First, in Johannine dualism the only absolute light, goodness and truth is God (1 Jn 1:5). Divine reality is absolutely unambiguous. Second, believers are in the light because they align themselves with the God who is light, not because they themselves are perfect light. Believers commit themselves to God, to walking in the light, to living according to the standards that flow from the character of God. But they are not absolutely good as God is good. There is no ambiguity in God, but there is ambiguity in every Christian. Third, just as Christians are not unambiguously good, neither is the world absolutely evil or devoid of any truth or goodness. But the “world” consists of those who have not made a commitment to God, who have not given their complete allegiance to the One who is light and life.
In short, Johannine dualism depicts ultimate reality (God) and calls all people to commit themselves to the reality that is truth and light. To make any other choice is not to remain neutral but to elect the only other option, namely, darkness. One need not be completely evil to be on the side of darkness; neither must one be perfectly good to serve the cause of light. But one must make a choice for light. And to choose for light is to choose against darkness.
Two warnings may be issued here with respect to interpreting the dualism of the Johannine world. Although dualism describes the world in clear-cut opposites, such a description should not be taken to mean that we actually see the world in such neat categories. Dualism points to the underlying belief that truth and error, goodness and evil, do not overlap. But in a sinful world, truth and error are not so easy to distinguish, and good and righteousness are not always easy to see or to live out. Moreover, the Elder urges his readers to “test the spirits”: such discernment is necessary because the options sometimes come to us in shades of gray. Dualism is a graphic description of the fundamental and ultimate issues of life: that truth, love, life, light and salvation belong to and come from God, while all that is opposed to these realities is also opposed to God. Human beings are faced with the choice to align themselves with one or the other.
This leads us to a second point about applying the dualistic world view. We are exhorted to discern truth from error. We must say, as clearly as possible, of what the truth consists. But it is one thing to pass judgment on ideas, concepts or practices in the abstract; it is quite another to pass judgment on the individuals or people who cherish certain ideas or practices. While we might wish to say quite emphatically that a certain behavior comes from and belongs to the darkness, we should feel a certain reticence and humility about making the judgment that a certain person belongs to the darkness. Our judgments are always imperfect and incomplete. God, the only perfect judge, alone judges the hearts of people. The church’s responsibility is to sound the call to decision, but even more to model that life of righteousness and love to which God calls us. And while the Christian lives constantly with the vision of the absolute dichotomy of truth and falsehood, with the necessity for righteousness and love, putting these things into action is scarcely ever simple. While we can see the general contours of the path of life, that does not mean that each jog in the road or each turn comes clearly marked. There are still difficult personal and moral decisions to be made, and the choices are not always clear.
Special Problems in Translating the Epistles One recurrent problem in translating and interpreting 1 John especially is the author’s use of the pronoun “he” or “him” for God or Jesus. It is sometimes difficult to tell to whom John is referring, and commentators differ on various verses. Based on my interpretation of such passages, I have regularly put [God] or [Jesus] in brackets in order to show to whom I think the author is referring when the reference is ambiguous.
A somewhat related but different problem has to do with the NIV’s use of masculine pronouns (“he”) and nouns (“brothers”) to refer to Christians. It is clear that the epistles do not refer only to men when speaking of those who know God, live in Christ and are to obey the commands, but to all Christians. Moreover, the Greek term translated as “brethren” included “brothers and sisters.” Thus, I have rendered these words either in the plural (“they”), with a multiple reference (“brothers and sisters”), or by alternating examples with “she” and “he.” I hope that this will help to communicate that the epistles call all believers to “walk in the light, as God is in the light” and to live together as brothers and sisters, the children of God.
Outline of 1 John
1:1–4 Witness to the Word of Life
1:5–2:27 Walking in the Light: The Fundamental Pattern
1:6–2:2 The Atonement of Christ
2:3–6 Obedience to God’s Commands
2:7–11 The Fundamental Command: Love One Another
2:12–14 Encouragement to the Faithful
2:15–17 Warnings Against Unfaithfulness
2:18–27 Warnings Against Antichrists
2:28–3:24 Remembering Who We Are: The Children of God
2:28–3:3 The Privileges of the Children of God
3:4–10 Family Likeness
3:11–17 A Rift in the Family
3:18–24 The Confidence of the Children of God
4:1–5:12 Walking in the Light: Belief and Love
4:1–6 Discerning the Spirits
4:7–12 Let Us Love One Another
4:13–5:5 Abiding in Faith and Love
5:6–12 Testimony to the Son
5:13–21 Closing Exhortations
5:13–17 The Children of God Have Confidence in Prayer
5:18–21 Concluding Assurances and Admonitions
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