05 - 1Jn 1:5
Καὶ αὕτη ἐστὶν ἡ ἐπαγγελία ἣν ἀκηκόαμεν ἀπ᾽ αὐτοῦ, καὶ ἀναγγέλλομεν ὑμῖν, ὅτι ὁ Θεὸς φῶς ἐστι, καὶ σκοτία ἐν αὐτῷ οὐκ ἔστιν οὐδεμία. In one most impressive sentence St. John sums up the whole matter of his annunciation. This message—we must read ἀγγελία [“message”], not ἐπαγγελία [“announcement”], which, according to New Testament usage (2Ti 1:1 being no exception), could only have meant promise; here, as in 1Jn 3:11, the copyists inserted the familiar ἐπαγγελία [“announcement”] instead of the ἀγγελία [“message”], which is found nowhere else—was communicated to the apostles ἀπ᾽αὐτοῦ [“from him”], that is, by Christ, who is the last most immediate antecedent (compare 1Jn 5:3); and they communicate this fundamental declaration, thus unique, in their turn. Quod Filius annunciavit, renuneiat apostolus. The substance of the record which had been given to him St. John condenses into one clause: Θεὸςφῶς [“God is light”]. At the first glance this seems to have no discernible connection with the constituent ideas of the introduction. The ζωή [“life”] was to have been the subject, and that as manifested by One who had come within the range of personal and sensible observation and experience. But both the idea of life and that of sensible experience here fall into the background and disappear. The key to the connection in this case also is found in the prologue of the Gospel. There, too, we find the three ideas which have hitherto entered as constituent elements; and we find them in the same order, λόγος [“word”], ζωή [“life”], φῶς [“light”]; there also as here, and here as there, the antithesis being supplied to φῶς [“light”] by the σκοτία. Now it is manifest, that in the Gospel φῶς [“light”] is a closer definition of the ζωή [“life”], and that in its highest stage. As ζωή [“life”] the Logos created all things which generally were created; as φῶς [“light”] He is described only in relation to man: ἐν αὐτῷζωὴ ἦν καὶ ἡζωὴ ἦν τὸφῶς τῶνἀνθρώπων [“in him was life, and the life was the light of men” cf. Joh 1:4]. This definition of the λόγος [“word”] as φῶς [“light”] is that on which the whole Gospel rests; for the following words, to τὸφῶςἐν τῇσκοτίᾳφαίνει καὶ ἡσκοτία οὐκατέλαβεναὐτὸ [“the light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not mastered it” cf. Joh 1:5], might serve as the programme, particularly of the first great division of the Gospel down to John 12:1-50. They declare, as the present tense itself indicates, something altogether universal, running through the entire course of history, which reached in the work and influence of the manifested incarnate Logos its highest stage of expression and development.
Inasmuch as the life is described as the light of men, it is declared that He manifested Himself for them in a manner in which it was not possible that He would manifest Himself in regard to the rest of the creation. It is self-understood that the designation light is not to be understood in the physical sense, but in its reference to the spiritual domain. It is the property of light that it communicates itself to those objects which are capable of receiving it, and makes them light. We may compare that other word of Scripture: “The light of the body is the eye; if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.” There our thought is expressly declared: the eye receives the light, and thereby becomes itself enlightened and enlightening. So also in the prologue of the Gospel: the whole creation manifests the Logos as the life; but only man is capable of light, that is, can so receive the nature of the Logos pouring forth toward him, that he himself shall be consciously transformed into it. Inasmuch as man has not only a passive relation to his life, that is, instinctively fulfils his destiny, but an active one also, his life being at all points and throughout ethically ordered, therefore he has the capacity not only to receive life from the Logos, but also to have this life as a light, that is, to be able to discern or know Him in His nature, in order to reflect His image in himself. Now, wherever this destination is forgotten by man, and he closes against it the eye which was given him in order to be able to receive the Logos into himself as light, there is the dominion of darkness as the σκοτία [“darkness”]. According to St. John’s view, what constitutes the ground or characteristic of belonging to the σκοτία [“darkness”], is not the fact of not coming under the influence of the light, but only the fact of that not submitting to it which ought or was destined to be subject to it. Only in the domain of the rational world does the Logos manifest Himself as φῶς [“light”]; hence only in regard to that is there any question of φῶς [“light”] or σκοτία [“darkness”]; all else lies outside of the sphere of these counterparts, and the two ideas have no longer any application. Accordingly, what we have learned from Joh 1:4 is, that the revelation of the Logos as light is the highest stage of His revelation, that it is specifically a higher potency of His manifestation as life, and that therefore it takes place only in relation to men, because these alone have the organ for receiving Him as φῶς [“light”]. To the same relation between ζωή [“life”] and φῶς [“light”] we are led by Joh 8:12, ἕξειν τὸφῶς τῆς ζωῆς [“he will have the light of life”]: the Lord promises His believing disciples the life, not, however, life in general, but in its development as φῶς [“light”],—such life, namely, of His as becomes at the same time light for them. Where the φῶς [“light”] is, there is also ζωή [“life”]; but the converse does not hold good. When a man is said to be a partaker of eternal life, ζωὴαἰώνιος [“eternal life”], that takes place through his becoming a τέκνονφωτός [“child of light”]. Thus it is clear in what certain connection the message here announced, Θεὸςφῶς [“God is light”], stands with the introduction of the Epistle: to wit, inasmuch as here, precisely as in the Gospel, there is an ascent from the idea of the ζωή [“life”] to that of the light, men having the possibility in the ordination of God for sharing in the life. But there is another point of view from which, however little obvious it may be, the connection between the fifth verse and what precedes may be traced. Hitherto the stress had been laid on the φανέρωσις [“announcement”] of the λόγος τῆς ζωῆς [“the word of life”], on His entering into the sphere of experience. And this element is noteworthy for the interpretation of 1Jn 1:5. In order to discern this clearly, let us start from another difficulty. We know that the declaration Θεὸςφῶς [“God is light”], which St. John lays down as the compendium of the message of Christ, does not occur in the Gospels in this particular form, Christ indeed is called φῶς [“light”], Joh 1:4; John 3:19, John 8:12, but not the Father. It may be said, of course, that in the Johannaean view, according to which Christ and the Father are one, so that he who sees the one sees also the other, there is direct propriety in assigning whatever Christ predicates of Himself to the Father also. But we do not need this extrication; nor need we seek for individual passages in which the ἀγγελία [“message”] with which we now have to do is literally contained. For, as the whole substance of the Gospel may be epitomized in the expression θεὸςἀγάπη [“God is love”], even though in no one passage this phrase is found, because the real essential meaning of every saving word and every saving act is no other than this, that God is love; so also the real essential meaning, patent to every unprejudiced eye, of all that Christ ever said and did, is no other than that which is summarized and announced in the words: Θεὸς φῶς [“God is light”]. Θεὸςφῶς [“God is light”]: for to this end was Christ born, and came into the world, that He might reveal the Father whom no man hath seen; and Θεὸςφῶς [“God is light”]: for if, according to John 1:4, this is the peculiar vocation of mankind, that in relation to it God reveals Himself as φῶς [“light”], then all revelation of the Father through Christ becomes a manifestation as light. And if Christ in His whole life, in word and deed, reveals the Father, and yet this revelation of God as proceeding towards men is a revelation of God as φῶς [“light”], then the whole life of Christ, His person and His work, must have for its one meaning the proclamation Θεὸςφῶς [“God is light”]; it is indeed the representation to the senses, in a sense the incarnation, of the truth: Θεὸςφῶς [“God is light”]. Thus it is made clear that the φανέρωσις [“announcement”], made prominent in the introduction, of the λόγος τῆς ζωῆς [“the word of life”], His entering into personal, sensible perceptibility and observation, is the necessary basis for our affirmation that God is light; for all that the apostles had learnt concerning the Logos by hearing and seeing, beholding and handling, may be condensed into this one sentence. But with all this investigation we have not in the slightest degree explained the meaning of this sentence. We do not yet know what it signifies that God is light, nor what thought was to be expressed by this designation. There is a difference between this passage and the others in which the fact that Christ is light appears. In these latter we have not so much to consider the immanent nature of Christ, or the definition of His essence, as an assertion or vindication of His being. Thus in Joh 1:4-5, ἦν φῶς τῶνἀνθρώπων, τὸφῶς φαίνει τῷκόσμῳ [“was the light of men, the light shines in the world”], where it is obvious that the question is, not what the Logos is in Himself, but what He is and wills to be for men; in Joh 3:19, where the light as a judicial power is treated of; in Joh 8:12, where, apart from the expression φῶς τοῦκόσμου [“light of the world”], the light is represented as a power passing over or reaching to man. We may compare also Joh 9:10-11. Similarly, in our passage it is certainly affirmed that the nature of God, which is light, will have its effect upon us, so that we also may ἐν φωτὶπεριπατῶμεν [“let is walk in the light”], or, to adopt St. Paul’s parallel word, may be τέκναφωτός [Eph 5:8]. But, on the other hand, it is clear of itself that the practical vindication of Christ or of God as light presupposes a quality in Him corresponding, as in general every transitive energy implies an immanent characteristic. And it is this latter which in our passage, otherwise than in those before mentioned, is placed in the foreground. Not only does the general proposition Θεὸςφῶς [“God is light”] produce the impression that it gives us a general definition of the divine essence, without any reference as yet to influence ad extra, but also the subsequent teaching that we should walk in the light, ὡς αὐτόςἐστινἐν τῷφωτί [“he is in the light”], shows that the apostle is thinking of His being light as of an absolute, immanent characterization of God. As God is life, apart from any particular life-giving energy, so also He is light, apart from any enlightening act. Consequently we see how impossible it is to accept φῶς [“light”] as simply equivalent to σωτηρία [“salvation”], salvation; for salvation is a relative idea, absolutely requiring the added thought of someone who is the object of the salvation, while God must be light, according to all that has been said, not only in a relative, but in an absolute sense also.
It is usual to illustrate the idea of the φῶς [“light”] by making it a figure, in this case to be applied in the intellectual or moral direction; for example, as the figurative designation of the divine wisdom or holiness. But this way of looking at it does not meet all the requirements of the apostolical view. When we reflect that, in the most strikingly abundant and persistent way, the scriptures of both Testaments place God in peculiar and immediate relation to light,—calling it His garment. His dwelling-place, φῶς οἰκῶνἀπρόσιτον [“dwelling in unapproachable light”], 1Ti 6:16[N],—we shall be disposed to seek in these expressions for more than a mere figure of some particular attribute of God, and shall be constrained, giving up the purely figurative application altogether, to assign to them the meaning of reality. Moreover, to this we shall be forced by another passage of Scripture. In Jas 1:17, God is directly called πατὴρτῶν φώτων [“Father of lights”]. This phrase cannot be intended to designate God as only the Creator of the stars; it is nowhere, and in no connection, the manner of the New Testament to identify the creative activity of God with His fatherly relation: the latter always presupposes a fellowship of nature between Creator and creature, and therefore stands in a higher sphere than the former. Where there is a father, the question is not of production, but of generation. Accordingly God, in the passage quoted, must be called πατὴρτῶν φώτων [“Father of lights”], only because the creatures or natures of light, which are intended here, are in some sense of the same nature with Him,—that is, because He is Himself light. Thus, when we have learned from Scripture that the definition of God as light or φῶς [“light”] is a characterization of essence, there remains only the possibility that we have here a metaphorical description of His divine nature, and that the φῶτα [“lights”], whose Father He is, are so called in a figurative sense. But that will not avail; for St. James, when he says φῶτα [“lights”], is certainly thinking of light-natures in the ordinary sense: even if the expression φῶτα [“lights”] were not to be referred to the stars, but to any spiritual light-natures, yet even then the description would be used not on account of any ethical quality in them, but on account of the bodies of light with which Scripture customarily invests them. We must therefore hold to it as a scriptural view, that God is in the proper and unfigurative sense light. Of course we do not mean to assign to Him material light, nor, indeed, that supernatural yet still material light which shed its beams around the Lord, or surrounded the angel forms; but we mean a light purely unmaterial. The matter stands simply thus: The earthly light is not the proper and real, and the description of God as light therefore figurative; but the divine light-nature is the true light, the earthly being only the divine light translated into the creating domain and the earthly reflection of it. Everywhere it is not the bodily and the material which is the reality, but the spiritual and the immaterial, which makes for itself a body in matter, and thus comes to manifestation. As the tabernacle was the copy of heavenly realities, not merely a symbol, therefore, but a type, so in the end everything material is only the copy of heavenly realities. If, therefore, God is called light, we are taught to think that He possesses, in the fullest intensity and in the most real because spiritual manner, that which for us upon earth is the light. Consequently more is asserted than any particular attribute of God. All united attributes are far from furnishing the essence of God itself; they are only particular modalities, outbeamings, or forms of His nature: at the basis of them all lies the divine essence, as the source whence they flow; and this. His essence, the θείαφύσις [“divine nature”], the primal ground of His being, it is which St. John defines as φῶς [“light”]. The necessity of such a view will be evident at once, if we cease to think of spirit as mere force. All force presupposes something in which it inheres; and it is this something, this ground-essence in God, which is meant by the φῶς [“light”].
Thus our word φῶς [“light”] is not intended to be a figure for any particular divine attribute, but it is the altogether real, though not materially understood, designation of the divine essence. We are carried now a step farther by the circumstance that we read, as following hard one on the other: Θεὸςφῶς [“God is light”] and Θεὸςἐν τῷφωτί [“God is in the light”]. These are by no means one and the same thing. It is only in the case of this word φῶς [“light”] that such a variation of the phraseology is possible. We cannot, in the same way, say Θεὸςἐντῇζωῇ [“God is in the life”], but only Θεὸςζωή [“God is life”]; or ζωὴ ἐντῷΘεῷ [“life is in God”]. The expression Θεὸςἐν τῷφωτί [“God is in the light”] corresponds pretty nearly to the applications “light is His garment,” or φῶς οἰκῶν [“dwelling of light”]. In all three the light is not thought of as in God, but, conversely, as surrounding God. Thus they lead us to consider a similar representation, in which St. Paul describes it by μορφῇΘεοῦ [“form of God”], Php 2:6.[N] In this last-mentioned word we may most easily trace the idea which all these descriptions would set before us. To the μορφῇΘεοῦ [“form of God”]corresponds, in Phil, ii., the μορφῇδούλου [“form of a servant”]. Now, as the nature of the μορφῇδούλου [“form of a servant”] is further depicted by obedience, this leads us to conclude, and the connection of the passages confirms it, that the μορφῇΘεοῦ [“form of God”] is dominion. This is the figure which God has given Himself, the form under which we see and know Him, which Jesus Christ laid aside, and, instead of it, assumed the μορφῇδούλου [“form of a servant”], when He became obedient. The lordship of God is thus a transitive idea; if we seek the corresponding immanent quality within the divine nature, in virtue of which God can exercise the dominion, we are led at once to the biblical idea of the δόξα [“glory”]. The Scripture, to wit, understands by δόξα [“glory”] the perfect unfolding of the divine essence in its altogether infinite riches,—the revelation of Himself before Himself, as distinguished from His revelation only in the creature and to the creature. Now this, His essence, which He reveals before Himself, is called φῶς [“light”] and inasmuch as this self-manifestation of God before Himself, His δόξα [“glory”], is yet to be distinguished from His nature as pure potency, it is called His garment, or it is said of Him here: Θεὸςἐν τῷφωτί [“God is in the light”]. As the clothing of the lily is inseparably bound up with its nature, and yet is the first φανέρωσις [“reveal”] of its nature as unfolded in the germ, so the light-nature of God has become a δόξα [“glory”] surrounding Him, so that it may be said with equal propriety Θεὸςφῶς [“God is light”], and also Θεὸςἐν τῷφωτί [“God is in the light”]. As we have thus to keep steadily before our eyes the fact that by the word φῶς [“light”], the heavenly pattern of our light, something purely super-creaturely—the essence of God—is intended to be expressed, it becomes evident that we cannot think out and make clear, in human ideas, this divine nature. But, on the other hand, it is assuredly true that the apostles tell us nothing which should have no practical bearing, and therefore no conceivable meaning. Especially here, where St. John aims to deduce from the light-nature of God conclusions affecting us, he evidently must intend that with the expression Θεὸςφῶς [“God is light”] should be connected an altogether definite meaning. All utterances concerning divine things transcend, it is true, all human understanding. Not, however, that they are therefore empty of meaning; it is only that we cannot seize their full import. Hitherto we have placed in the foreground that side of the apostolical utterance which points to depths which go beyond all fathoming of human thought; but now, on the other hand, we must needs consider what it contains for us of practical and accessible bearing. The way is indicated for us by those passages of the Gospel, again and again referred to, in which Christ describes Himself as the light of the world, and the light of men. The enlightening energy of Christ has relation pre-eminently to the understanding of men: He shows them the right and the truth. He who would give clearness to others must have it himself; he who would enlighten must be light. Now, absolute clearness in human thought is to be found only when I know a thing altogether, and look through it on all sides, and in its connections. If God is to give this intelligence. He must of course have it Himself: that means. He must possess all truth. But the enlightening activity of God refers not merely to the impartation of certain abstract truths, but to the communication of the good generally, which, on its theoretical and intelligible side, we call the truth, and goodness on its practical side. If, then, God is the light of men, it means that in Him all goodness an d all perfection dwell; there is no good which is not in Him; He is the πλήρωμα [“fullness”], out of the fullness of which we all receive. And this is the concrete and practical import of the word Θεὸςφῶς [“God is light”], that in Him is all perfection, all truth, blessedness, and holiness; and in such a sense in Him, that as the light everywhere diffuses around its own nature, so all that is good radiates from God.
What is beyond, that this metaphysical essence of God is to be conceived, not as the sum of individual perfections, but as the substance and archetype of the light, passes, indeed, human power of comprehension. But it is a gain even to know that such an original ground, such a primal substance, is in God, out of which all His perfections flow; to know, further, that it is such as may be most fitly described by the word φῶς [“light”], even though we cannot also know how this is to be conceived. Is it no enrichment of science, that chemical researches have detected to us the existence of ultra-violet colours, though we cannot discover them with the eye, and have no suspicion of their appearance? Or was it no enrichment of theology, that the union of the two natures in Christ was defined by the terms, ἀσυγχύτως [“without confusion”], ἀμερίστος [“unchangeable”], ἀχωρίστως [“indivisible”], ἀδιαιρέτως [“inseparable”], although, being pure negations, they say nothing positive as to the manner of that union? There are two kinds of ignorance—one concerning the being of an object, and the other concerning its character as being. The latter marks an advanced stage in relation to the former. So it is a great thing to know that in God there is an essential nature which is to be called light, though we do not know how we are to conceive of it. That in this expression we have in general a definition of the divine essence, which is not to be limited one-sidedly to the region of His willing or of His thinking activity, is confirmed by the progress of the apostolical discussion. That is to say, when it speaks of a περιπατυεῖνἐν τῷφωτί [“walk in the light”], that points rather to the exhibition of the nature by act, and therefore to the will; when it speaks of the ὁμολογίατῶνἁμαρτιῶν [“confess our sins”] as required, that points rather to the domain of the thinking. To make it more plain, however, the negative is added to the positive declaration, καὶσκοτίαἐναὐτῷοὐκἔστινοὐδεμία [“and there is no darkness in him at all”]. First, it must be observed that this sentence is, as to its form, distinguished as well from Θεὸςφῶς [“God is light”] as from Θεὸςἐν τῷφωτὶἐστιν [“God being in light”]. To the former would have corresponded accurately οὐκἔστινσκοτία [“not being darkness”], He is light and not darkness; it is clear, however, that this would have been far less pregnant than the expression selected by St. John. To the latter would have corresponded οὐκἔστινἐντῇσκοτίᾳ [“not being in darkness”]. But this idea would be a harsh one, since it is obvious that the self-revelation of God before Himself, His garment—for this is meant by εἶναιἐν [“being in”]—must correspond with His inmost essence; and it was necessary therefore to deny, not that in it, but that in God, there is any darkness. The form οὐκἔστινἐντῇσκοτίᾳ [“not being in darkness”] would not have been parallel with Θεὸςφῶς [“God is light”], which, however, it would be supposed to be. Generally speaking, to God as φῶς [“light”] there is no counterpart nature which in a similar way would be the sum of all σκοτία [“darkness”]: not Satan; for though he is indeed ἐντῇσκοτίᾳ [“in darkness”], and ἄρχων of the kingdom of darkness, he is not the epitome of darkness, so that there is no darkness outside of him; while all light dwells and has its source in God, and is derived from Him, and wrapped up in Him, the σκοτία [“darkness”] comes to realization only in the community of collective persons who are ἐντῇσκοτίᾳ [“in darkness”]; darkness, as a whole, is only an ideal, and not a concrete unity. For the rest, that the positive expression Θεὸςφῶς [“God is light”] is followed by the negative one, has its reason—apart from the tendency of St. John to move by preference in antitheses—in the consideration that follows: because, to wit, the purport of the teaching is to make it emphatic that the slightest fellowship with darkness excludes fellowship with God, as God has no darkness in Himself, but is light, and only light.