000 - Preface

Preface THE Exposition here presented was first delivered sixteen years ago to the Headingley students of that time, and is published partly at their request. Chapters of it have appeared, occasionally, in the pages of the Expositor, the Wesleyan, Methodist Magazine, and Experience; these have been carefully revised and re-written. The features of the work and the method of treatment will be apparent from the full Table of Contents that is furnished. I have had primarily in view the needs of theological students and preachers; but professional language has been avoided and matters of technical scholarship kept in the background, and I venture to hope that the interpretation may be of service to other readers who are interested in questions of New Testament doctrine and Christian experience. To no age since his own has St John had more to say than to ours; the opening of the twentieth century is, in some ways, wonderfully near to the close of the first.

Amongst previous interpreters of the Epistles of John, my debts—at least, my more immediate debtsare greatest to Lucke, Erich Haupt, Rothe, and Westcott. Lucke excelled in grammatical and logical acumen; Haupt in analytic power and theological reflection; Rothe was supreme in spiritual insight and fineness of touch; in Westcott there was a unique combination of all these gifts, though he may have been surpassed in any single one of them. Neither Lucke’s nor Rothe’s commentaries, unfortunately, have been translated from the German.

GEORGE G. FINDLAY.        

HEADINGLEY.