Reference: John, The Epistles of
Fausets
FIRST EPISTLE. Genuineness. Polycarp, John's disciple (ad Philippians 7), quotes 1Jo 4:3. Eusebius (H. E., iii. 39) says of Papias, John's hearer, "he used testimonies from the first epistle of John." Irenaeus (Eusebius, H. E., v. 8) often quoted it; he quotes (Haeres. iii. 15, sections 5,8) from John by name 1Jo 2:18; and in 1Jo 3:16, section 7 he quotes 1Jo 4:1-3; 5:1; 2Jo 1:7-8. Clement Alex. (Strom. ii. 66, p. 664) refers to 1Jo 5:16 as in John's larger epistle; compare Strom. iii. 32,42; iv. 102. Tertullian adv. Marcion, vi. 16, refers to 1Jo 4:1; adv. Praxean xv to 1Jo 1:1; also 1Jo 1:10, and contra Gnost. 12. Cyprian (Ep. 28:24) quotes 1Jo 2:3-4 as John's; and, de Orat. Domini, 5, quotes 1Jo 2:15-17; De opere et Eleemos. quotes 1Jo 1:8; De bono Patientiae quotes 1Jo 2:6.
Muratori's Fragment on the Canon states "there are two (the Gospel and epistle) of John esteemed universal," quoting 1Jo 1:3. The Peshito Syriac has it. Origen (Eusebius vi. 25) designates the first epistle genuine, and "probably second and third epistles, though all do not recognize the latter two"; he quotes 1Jo 1:5 (tom. 13 vol. 2). Dionysius of Alexandria, Origen's scholar, cites this epistle's words as the evangelist John's. Eusebius (H. E., iii. 24) says John's first epistle and Gospel are "acknowledged without question by those of the present day, as well as by the ancients." So Jerome (Catalog. Ecclesiastes Script.). Marcion opposed it only because it was opposed to his heresies. The Gospel and the first epistle are alike in style, yet evidently not mere copies either of the other. The individual notices, it being a universal epistle, are fewer than in Paul's epistles; but what there are accord with John's position.
He implies his apostleship (1Jo 2:7,26), alludes to his Gospel (Joh 1:1, compare Joh 1:14; 20:27), and the affectionate He uniting him as an aged pastor to his spiritual "children" (1Jo 2:18-19). In 1Jo 4:1-3 he alludes to the false teachers as known to his readers; in 1Jo 5:21 he warns them against the idols of the world around. Docetism existed in germ already, though the Docete by name appear first in the second century (Col 1:15-18; 1Ti 3:16; Heb 1:1-3). Hence 1Jo 4:1-3 denounces as "not of God every spirit that confesseth not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh" (compare Joh 2:22-23). Presciently the Spirit through John forearms the church against the coming heresy.
TO WHOM THE EPISTLES WERE ADDRESSED. Augustine (Quaest. Evang. 2:39) says it was addressed to the Parthians, i.e. the Christians beyond the Euphrates, outside the Roman empire, "the church at Babylon elected together with" (1Pe 5:13) the churches in the Ephesian region, where Peter sent his epistles (1Pe 1:1; Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, Bithynia). As Peter addressed the Asiatic flock tended first by Paul, then by John, so John, Peter's close companion, addresses the flock among whom Peter was when he wrote. Thus "the elect lady" (2Jo 1:1) answers to "the church elected together."
TIME AND PLACE. This epistle is subsequent to the Gospel, for it assumes the reader's acquaintance with the Gospel facts and Christ's speeches, and His aspect as the incarnate Word God manifest in the flesh, set forth in John's Gospel. His fatherly tone addressing his "little children" implies it was written in old age, perhaps A.D. 90. The rise of antichristian teachers he marks as a sign of "the last time" (1Jo 2:18), no other "age" or dispensation will be until Christ comes; for His coming the church is to be ever waiting; Heb 1:2, "these last days." The region of Ephesus, where Gnostic heresy sprang up, was probably the place, and the latter part of the apostolic age the time, of writing. Contents. Fellowship with the Father and the Son is the subject and object (1Jo 1:3). Two divisions occur:
(1) 1 John 1:5 - 2:28, God is light without darkness; consequently, to have fellowship with Him necessitates walking in the light. Confession and consequent forgiveness of sins, through Christ's propitiation for the world and advocacy for believers, are a necessary preliminary; a further step is positive keeping God's commandments, the sum of which is love as contrasted with hatred, the sum of disobedience. According to their several stages of spiritual growth, children, fathers, young men, as respectively forgiven, knowing the Father, and having overcome the wicked one, John exhorts them not to love the world, which is incompatible with the indwelling of the Father's love. This anointing love dwelling in us, and our continuing to abide in the Son and in the Father, is the antidote against the antichristian teachers in the world, who are of the world, not of the church, and therefore have gone out from it.
(2) 1 John 2:29 - 5:5 handles the opening thesis: "He is righteous," therefore "every one that doeth righteousness is born of Him." Sonship involves present self purification, first because we desire now to be like Him, "even as He is pure," secondly because we hope hereafter to be perfectly like Him, our sonship now hidden shall be manifested, and we shall be made like Him when He shall be manifested (answering to Paul's Colossians 3), for our then "seeing him as He is" involves transfiguration into His likeness (compare 2Co 3:18; Php 3:21). In contrast, the children of the devil hate; the children of God love. Love assures of acceptance with God for ourselves and our prayers, accompanied as they are with obedience to His commandment to "believe on Jesus Christ, and love one another"; the seal is "the Spirit given us" (1Jo 3:24). In contrast (as in the first division), denial of Christ and adherence to the world characterize the false spirits (1Jo 4:1-6). The essential feature of sonship or birth of God is unslavish love to God, because God first loved us and gave His Son to die for us (1Jo 4:18-19), and consequent love to the brethren as being God's sons like ourselves, and so victory over the world through belief in Jesus as the Son of God (1Jo 5:4-5).
(3) 1Jo 5:6-21. Finally, the truth on which our fellowship with God rests is, Christ came by water in His baptism, the blood of atonement, and the witnessing Spirit which is truth, which correspond to our baptism with water and the Spirit, and our receiving the atonement by His blood and the witness of His Spirit. In the opening he rested this truth on his apostolic witness of the eye, the ear, and the touch; so at the close on God's witness, which the believer accepts, and by rejecting which the unbeliever makes God a liar. He adds his reason for writing (1Jo 5:13), corresponding to 1Jo 1:4 at the beginning, namely, that "believers may know they have (already) eternal life," the spring of "joy" (compare Joh 20:31), and so may have "confidence" in their prayers being answered (1Jo 5:14-15; compare 1Jo 3:22 in the second part), e.g. their intercessions for a brother sinning, provided his sin be not unto death (1Jo 5:16). He sums up with stating our knowledge of Him that is true, through His gift, our being in Him by virtue of being in His Son Jesus Christ; being "born of God" we keep ourselves so that the wicked one toucheth us not, in contrast to the world lying in the wicked one; therefore still, "little children, keep yourselves from idols" literal and spiritual.
STYLE. Aphorism and repetition of his own phrases abound. The affectionate hortatory tone, and the Hebraistic form which delights in parallelism of clauses (as contrasted with Paul's logical Grecian style), and his own simplicity of spirit dwelling fondly on the one grand theme, produce this repetition of fundamental truths again and again, enlarged, applied, and condensed by turns. Contemplative rather than argumentative, he dwells on the inner rather than the outer Christian life. The thoughts do not move forward by progressive steps, as in Paul, but in circles round one central thought, viewed now under the positive now under the negative aspect. His Lord's contrasted phrases in the Gospel John adopts in his epistles, "flesh," "spirit," "light," "darkness," "life," "death," "abide in Him"; "fellowship with the Father and Son, and with one another" is a phrase not in the Gospel, but in Acts and Paul's e
See Verses Found in Dictionary
IN the beginning was the WORD, and the WORD. was with God, and the WORD was God.
And the "WORD became flesh, and tabernacled among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and of truth.
"When, therefore, he was raised from the dead, his disciples remembered that he had said this. And they believed the scripture, and the word that Jesus had spoken. And while he was in Jerusalem, during the feast of passover, many believed on his name, because they saw the signs that he did.
Then he said to Thomas: Reach hither your finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither your hand, and put it into my side; and be not faithless, but believing.
but these are written, that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that by believing you may have life through his name.
Gains, my host, and the host of the whole church, salutes you. Erastus the treasurer of the city, and Quartus, my brother, salute you.
And we all, with unvailed face, reflecting the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image, from glory to glory, even as by the Lord the Spirit.
who will transform our humbled body, and make it like his glorious body, according to that power by which he is able to subdue all things to himself.
in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins; who is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of every creature; read more. for by him were all things created, things in heaven and things in earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones, or lordships, or principalities, or authorities; all things were created by him, and for him: and he is before all things, and by him all things consist: and he is the head of the body, the church: and he is the beginning, the first-born from the dead, that in all things he might be preeminent;
GOD, who in many parts and in many ways spoke in ancient times to the fathers by the prophets, has in these last days spoken to us by his Son, whom he has appointed heir of all things, by whom, also, he made the ages;
whom he has appointed heir of all things, by whom, also, he made the ages; who, being the effulgence of his glory and the exact representation of his essence, and upholding all things by his own powerful word, when he had by himself made expiation for our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,
Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the sojourners that are dispersed through Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia,
Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the sojourners that are dispersed through Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father, by the sanctification of the Spirit, in order to obedience, and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ: grace be to you, and peace be multiplied.
The elders that are among you I exhort, who am a fellow-elder, and a witness of the sufferings of the Christ, and a sharer in the glory that is to be revealed.
The church in Babylon, elected together with you, salutes you, and so does Marcus my son.
The church in Babylon, elected together with you, salutes you, and so does Marcus my son.
THAT which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled concerning the Word of life;
that which we have seen and heard, we declare it to you, that you also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ.
that which we have seen and heard, we declare it to you, that you also may have fellowship with us: and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ. And these things we write to you, that your joy may be full. read more. And this is the message that we heard from him, and do declare to you: that God is light, and in him is no darkness at all.
If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.
If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.
And by this we know that we do know him, if we keep his commandments. He that says, I know him, and keeps not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.
He that says, he abides in him, ought himself also so to walk, even as he walked. Beloved, I write no new commandment to you, but an old commandment, which you have had from the beginning; the old commandment is the word, which you have heard from the beginning.
Love not the world, nor the things that are in the world. If any man loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the desire of the flesh, and the desire of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. read more. And the world and its desire passes away: but he that does the will of God, abides forever. Little children, it is the last time; and, as you have heard that the antichrist is coming, even now there are many antichrists; by which we know that it is the last time.
Little children, it is the last time; and, as you have heard that the antichrist is coming, even now there are many antichrists; by which we know that it is the last time.
Little children, it is the last time; and, as you have heard that the antichrist is coming, even now there are many antichrists; by which we know that it is the last time. They went out from us, but they were not of us: for, if they had been of us, they would have remained with us; but they went out, that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us.
I have written these things to you concerning those who deceive you.
By this we know the love of Christ, because he laid down his life for us: and we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.
and whatever we ask, we receive from him, because we keep his commandments, and do the things that are pleasing in his sight.
And he that keeps his commandments abides in him, and he in him. And by this we know that he abides in us, by the Spirit which he has given us.
Beloved, believe not every spirit; but prove the spirits, whether they are from God: for many false prophets have gone out into the world.
Beloved, believe not every spirit; but prove the spirits, whether they are from God: for many false prophets have gone out into the world.
Beloved, believe not every spirit; but prove the spirits, whether they are from God: for many false prophets have gone out into the world.
Beloved, believe not every spirit; but prove the spirits, whether they are from God: for many false prophets have gone out into the world.
Beloved, believe not every spirit; but prove the spirits, whether they are from God: for many false prophets have gone out into the world. By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ came in the flesh, is from God:
By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ came in the flesh, is from God:
By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ came in the flesh, is from God:
By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ came in the flesh, is from God: and whatever spirit confesses not that Jesus Christ came in the flesh, is not from God: and this is the spirit of antichrist, of which you have heard that it comes, and is now already in the world.
and whatever spirit confesses not that Jesus Christ came in the flesh, is not from God: and this is the spirit of antichrist, of which you have heard that it comes, and is now already in the world.
and whatever spirit confesses not that Jesus Christ came in the flesh, is not from God: and this is the spirit of antichrist, of which you have heard that it comes, and is now already in the world.
and whatever spirit confesses not that Jesus Christ came in the flesh, is not from God: and this is the spirit of antichrist, of which you have heard that it comes, and is now already in the world.
and whatever spirit confesses not that Jesus Christ came in the flesh, is not from God: and this is the spirit of antichrist, of which you have heard that it comes, and is now already in the world. You are of God, little children, and have overcome them; because he that is in you, is greater than he that is in the world. read more. They are of the world: there fore, they speak of the world, and the world hears them. We are of God: he that knows God, hears us: he that is not of God, does not hear us: by this we know the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error.
There is no fear in love; but perfect love casts out fear, because fear has torment: he that fears is not made perfect in love. We love him, because he first loved us.
Whoever believes that Jesus is the Christ, has been be gotten of God: and every one that loves him that begot, loves him also that is begotten of him.
For whatever is begotten of God, overcomes the world; and this is the victorious principle that overcomes the world, even our faith. Who is he that overcomes the world, but he that believes that Jesus is the Son of God? read more. This is he that came by water and by blood, Jesus the Christ; not by water only, but by water and by blood: and it is the Spirit that testifies, because the Spirit is truth. For there are three that testify, the Spirit, and the water, and the blood; and the three agree in one. If we receive the testimony of men, the testimony of God is greater: for this is the testimony of God, which he has borne concerning his Son. He that believes on the Son of God has the testimony in him self: he that believes not God, has made him a liar, because he has not believed the testimony which God has borne concerning his Son. And this is the testimony, that God has given us eternal life: and this life is in his Son. He that has the Son, has life: he that has not the Son of God, has not life. I have written these things to you that believe on the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life, and that you may believe on the name of the Son of God.
I have written these things to you that believe on the name of the Son of God, that you may know that you have eternal life, and that you may believe on the name of the Son of God. And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask any thing according to his will, he hears us.
And this is the confidence that we have toward him, that if we ask any thing according to his will, he hears us. And if we know that he hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions which we have asked of him.
And if we know that he hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions which we have asked of him. If any one see his brother sinning a sin not to death, he shall ask, and he will give him life for those who sin not to death. There is a sin to death: I do not say concerning this, that he should ask.
If any one see his brother sinning a sin not to death, he shall ask, and he will give him life for those who sin not to death. There is a sin to death: I do not say concerning this, that he should ask.
If any one see his brother sinning a sin not to death, he shall ask, and he will give him life for those who sin not to death. There is a sin to death: I do not say concerning this, that he should ask. All unrighteousness is sin; and there is a sin not to death. read more. We know that whoever has been begotten of God, does not sin: but he that is begotten of God, keeps himself, and the wicked one touches him not. We know that we are of God, and the whole world lies under the wicked one. And we know that the Son of God has come, and has given us understanding, that we may know him that is true: and we are in him that is true, in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and life eternal. Little children, keep yourselves from idols. #VALUE!
#VALUE!
THE elder to the elect lady, and to her children, whom I love in the truth: and not I only, but also all who know the truth;
For many deceivers have entered into the world, who con fess not that Jesus Christ came in the flesh: this is the deceiver and the antichrist.
If any one comes to you, and brings not this teaching, receive him not into your house, and do not wish him well:
If any one comes to you, and brings not this teaching, receive him not into your house, and do not wish him well:
If any one comes to you, and brings not this teaching, receive him not into your house, and do not wish him well: for he that wishes him well, is partaker of his evil deeds.
for he that wishes him well, is partaker of his evil deeds. Though I have many things to write to you, I determined not to communicate them by means of paper and ink: for I hope to come to you, and to speak mouth to mouth, that our joy may be full.
elder to the beloved Gains, whom I love in the truth.
I have no greater joy than to hear that my children walk in the truth. Beloved, you do faithfully whatever you do to the brethren, and to strangers,