Expositor's Bible: The Epistles of St. John. William Alexander

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СКАЧАТЬ thou hearest from my mouth, write upon the sheets.' And having opened his mouth as he was standing praying, and looking up to heaven, he began to say—'in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.' And so following on, he spake in order, standing as he was, and I wrote sitting."[68]

      True instinct which tells us that the Gospel of St. John was the fruit of prayer as well as of memory; that it was thought out in some valley of rest, some hush among the hills; that it came from a solemn joy which it breathed forth upon others! "These things write I unto you, that your joy may be fulfilled." Generation after generation it has been so. In the numbers numberless of the Redeemed, there can be very few who have not been brightened by the joy of that book. Still, at one funeral after another, hearts are soothed by the word in it which says—"I am the Resurrection and the Life." Still the sorrowful and the dying ask to hear again and again—"let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid." A brave young officer sent to the war in Africa, from a regiment at home, where he had caused grief by his extravagance, penitent, and dying in his tent, during the fatal day of Isandula, scrawled in pencil—"dying, dear father and mother—happy—for Jesus says, 'He that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out.'" Our English Communion Office, with its divine beauty, is a texture shot through and through with golden threads from the discourse at Capernaum. Still are the disciples glad when they see the Lord in that record. It is the book of the Church's smiles; it is the gladness of the saints; it is the purest fountain of joy in all the literature of earth.

Note A.

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      The thorough connection of the Epistle with the Gospel may be made more clear by the following tabulated analysis:—

      The (A) beginning and (B) the close of the Epistle contain two abstracts, longer and shorter, of the contents and bearing of the Gospel.

      A.

      i.—1 John i. 1.

      1. "That which was from the beginning—concerning the Word of Life" = John i. 1–15.

      2. (a) "Which we have heard" = John i. 38, 39, 42, 47, 50, 51, ii. 4, 7, 8, 16, 19, iii. 3, 22, iv. 7, 39, 48, 50, v. 6, 47, vi. 5, 70, vii. 6, 39, viii. 7, 58, ix. 3, 41, x. 1, 39, xi. 4, 45, xii. 7, 50, xiii. 6, 38, xiv., xvii., xviii. 14, 37, xix. 11, 26, 27, 28, 30, xx. 15, 16, 17, 19, 21, 23, 27, 29, xxi. 5, 6, 10, 12, 22.

      (b) "Which we have seen with our eyes" = John i. 29, 36, 39, ii. 11, vi. 2, 14, 19, ix., xi. 44, xiii. 4, 5, xvii. 1, xviii. 6, xix. 5, 17, 18, 34, 38, xx. 5, 14, 20, 25, 29, xxi. 1, 14.

      (c) "Which we gazed upon" = ibid.

      (d) "Which we have handled" = John xx. 27 (refers also to a synoptical Gospel, Luke xxiv. 39, 40).

      ii.—1 John i. 2.

      1. "The Life was manifested" = John i. 29—xxi. 25.

      2. (a) "We have seen" = (A. i. 2 (b)).

      (b) "And bear witness" = John i. 7, 19, 37, iii. 2, 27, 33, iv. 39, vi. 69, xx. 28, 30, 31, xxi. 24.

      (c) "And declare unto you" = John passim.

      "The Life, the Eternal Life, which"

      א "Was with the Father" = John i. 1–4.

      ב "And was manifested unto us" = John passim.

      B.

      i.—1 John v. 6–10.

      Summary of the Gospel as a Gospel of witness.

      1. "The Spirit beareth witness" = John i. 32, xiv., xv., xx. 22.

      2. "The water beareth witness" = John i. 28, ii. 9, iii. 5, iv. 13, 14, v. 1, 9, vi. 19, vii. 37, ix. 7, xiii. 5, xix. 34, xxi. 1.

      3. "The blood beareth witness" = John vi. 53, 54, 55, 56, xix. 34.

      4. "The witness of men" = (A. ii. 1 (b)) Also John i. 45, 49, iii. 2, iv. 39, vii. 46, xii. 12, 13, 17, 19, 20, 21, xviii. 38, xix. 35, xx. 28.

      5. "The witness of God" =

      (a) Scripture = John i. 45, v. 39, 46, xix. 36, 37.

      (b) Christ's own = John viii. 17, 18, 46, xv. 30, xviii. 37.

      (c) His Father's = John v. 37, viii. 18, xii. 28.

      (d) His works = John v. 36, x. 25, xv. 24.

      ii.—1 John v. 20.

      We know (i.e., by the Gospel) that—

      1. "The Son of God is come" (ἡκεν), "has come and is here."

      Note.—בָאחִי = ἡκω, LXX. Psalm xl. 7. "Venio symbolum quasi Domini Jesu fuit." (Bengel on Heb. x. 7), the Ich Dien of the Son of the Father—εγω γαρ εκ του θεου εξηλθον και ἡκω. "I came forth from God, and am here" (John viii. 4) = John i. 29—xxi. 23 (John xiv. 18, 21, 23, xvi. 16, 22, form part of the thought "is here").

      2. "And hath given us an understanding" = gift of the Spirit, John xiv., xv., xvi. (especially 13, 16).

      3. "This is the very God and eternal Life" = John i. 1, 4.

      The whole Gospel of St. John brings out these primary principles of the Faith—

      That the Son of God has come. That He is now and ever present with His people. That the Holy Spirit gives them a new faculty of spiritual discernment. That Christ is the very God and the Life of men.

DISCOURSE III.

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THE POLEMICAL ELEMENT IN THE FIRST EPISTLE OF ST. JOHN.

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      "Dum Magistri super pectus

       Fontem haurit intellectûs

       Et doctrinæ flumina,

       Fiunt, ipso situ loci,

       Verbo fides, auris voci,

       Mens Deo contermina.

      "Unde mentis per excessus,

       Carnis, sensûs super gressus,

       Errorumque nubila, Contra veri solis lumen Visum cordis et acumen Figit velut aquila." Adam of St. Victor, Seq. xxxii.

      "Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is СКАЧАТЬ