09 - Jn 1:9
Ἐὰν ὁμολογῶμεν τὰς ἁμαρτίας ἡμῶν, πιστός ἐστιν καὶ δίκαιος, ἵνα ἀφῇ ἡμῖν τὰς ἁμαρτίας καὶ καθαρίσῃ ἡμᾶς ἀπὸ πάσης ἀδικίας. In the same manner as 1Jn 1:7 forms an antithesis to 1Jn 1:6, 1Jn 1:9 does to 1Jn 1:8; but here, however, also we have no mere logical contrast, but at the same time the introduction of a new element which exhibits, like 1Jn 1:7, the blessing of the right condition of the heart, of the περιπατεῖνἐντῷφωτί [“walk in the light”]. It is true that the antithesis to 1Jn 1:8 is not introduced, like 1Jn 1:7, by a δὲtn [“but”]. On the one hand, that antithesis appears of itself sufficiently marked by its matter, and St. John does not prefer the accumulation of particles; on the other hand, the intention is that in this manner the thought introduced should be brought forward in its own absolute significance, being presented by an asyndeton, and therefore to be considered not alone in its relation to what precedes. As, in the seventh verse, the mere assertion of a fellowship with God has not only placed against it in antithesis the actual fact of fellowship, as stated in εἶναιἐντῷφωτί [“being in the light”], but also this fact is, as it were, strengthened by the περιπατεῖν [“walk”], and placed in its full intensity and active force; so in our verse the εἴπεῖνὅτιἁμαρτίαν οὐκἔχομεν [“to say we do not have sin”] is not only paralleled by a mere εἴπεῖνὅτιἁμαρτίανἔχομεν [“to say we have sin”], but the whole energy of the consciousness of sin opens itself out in the ὁμολογεῖν [“to confess”]. As to the emphatic significance of this word, we may compare Joh 1:20, καὶὡμολόγησενκαὶοὐκἠρνήσατο,καὶὡμολόγησεν, [“he confessed and did not deny, but he confessed”], where the element of earnest emphasizing and prominence which lies in the of ὁμολογεῖν [“confess”] is made still more prominent through the negative expression οὐκἀρνεῖσθαι [“did not deny”]. It is not unimportant that, instead of the singular in 1Jn 1:8, οὐκἔχομενἁμαρτίαν [“we do not sin”], here the articulated plural comes in: the recognition and confession has not reference to sinfulness in general, but to the individual sinful actions of which I am conscious to myself. Against sin I cannot contend, and the consciousness of sinfulness in general will not conduce to an effectual repentance; I control sin only by fixing my eye keenly upon its particular outbursts and war against individual transgressions. This kind of acknowledgment of sins cannot fail of its benefit; as a response to it, God, for the sake of His justice and righteousness, forgives them all. But what, then, is that? In the majority of passages—of the New Testament especially—where the faithfulness of God is spoken of. His fidelity to His promise is meant: that He performs what He has promised. At the first glance this seems unsuitable here; for where in the whole context has there been any reference to promise? The idea of promise must needs in that case be enlarged. Not alone by words, but also through deeds, a promise may be given, and it is of such practical promises that it is said πιστὸςὁΘεός [“God is faithful”]; comp. 1Th 5:24,[N]πιστὸςὁκαλῶνὃς καὶποιήσει [“The one who calls you is faithful and he will do it”], and, so far as the thing goes, though the word is not used, Php 1:6,[N]πέποιθαὅτιὁ ἐναρξάμενοςἐνὑμῖνἔργονἀγαθὸνἐπιτελέσει [“that he who began a good work in you will perfect it”]. This particular application of the πιστίς [“faithful”] would be more appropriate here; the ἐνφωτὶπεριπατεῖν [“walk in light”], which is manifested in the ὁμολογεῖν τὰςἁμαρτίας [“to confess of sin”], is such a real beginning of the divine energy of which the final and good result must be, in the faithfulness of God, the effectual cleansing from all sin. But even this explanation has its difficulty. It is true, indeed, that the περιπατεῖνἐντῷφωτί [“walk in the light”] and ὁμολογεῖν τὰςἁμαρτίας [“to confess of sin”] take place as the result of the divine action on the soul; but this view of the matter is not made prominent in our passage, and both are brought into consideration as human acts. Moreover, we are wont to speak of fidelity in yet another sense. One is true to himself when he does that which he must do according to the constitution of his whole nature. Now, here God’s nature is described as φῶς [“light”] only; and therefore the fidelity of God refers to His ever manifesting Himself truly as the light. Man, in the apostle’s supposition, has already entered into connection with God, inasmuch as he has passed into the kingdom of light; and it belongs to the very nature of God—that is, it comports with His fidelity—that He should appear Himself as light in him who has come near to Him, and that by destroying and taking away his sin.
Again, He shows Himself, in the forgiveness of sins, δίκαιος [“righteous”], righteous. This idea occurs in St. John with the same two meanings which we attach to our word “right;” one, that is, signifying the rectitude of the judge who judges according to the evidence, the other signifying the rectitude of the judged who answers to the standard applied to him, who therefore in this case is holy and sinless. The former is the meaning in almost all the passages of the Apocalypse, not only Rev 16:5, Rev 16:7; Rev 19:2, but also Rev 15:3, where the connection leads directly to the same signification; with which compare also Joh 5:30; John 7:24, both confirming this. In the second meaning, that of holiness, it occurs in 1Jn 2:29; 1Jn 3:12 of our Epistle, as also in Rev 22:11 and Joh 17:25, where the sense is not that the Father must, in His judicial capacity, hear the Son’s request,—for in that case the address to the Father must belong to the preceding verse,—but that He as the Holy One, withdrawn from all sin, cannot be effectually known by the world, save only by the Son. These two interpretations, however, do not lie wide apart; because God is in possession of immanent, objective righteousness, therefore He can exercise the transitive and subjective righteousness of the judge; this latter is only the outgoing of the former. This reconciliation or synthesis of the two meanings must be maintained if we would understand the δίκαιος [“just”] of our passage. On the one hand, that is, the transitive righteousness of God is exhibited in its true character when sin is forgiven, this being certainly an act of the judge: He could forgive no sin if His righteousness, and not His grace only, did not require it. But, on the other hand, the immanent righteousness comes also to its rights; God as the light cannot be otherwise than such towards those who stand in a true relation to the light; He cannot regard them as ἐνσκοτίᾳπεριπατοῦντες [“those walking in darkness”]. In other words, he who knows and acknowledges his sin has in fact separated himself inwardly from it: hence the transitive or subjective righteousness of God requires, that is, His judicial function demands, that He should in fact, by His pronounced sentence, acknowledge this internal separation. Further, as He is in Himself in an immanent sense righteous, God approves Himself holy towards the sinner, inasmuch as He, by virtue of His own holiness, effectually takes away the sin that is still present in him, imparting instead a portion of His own perfection. With all this correspond the two following predicatives, the ἀφεῖναιτὰςἁμαρτίας [“forgiveness of sin”] and the καθαρίζεινἀπὸπάσηςἁμαρτίας [“cleansing from all sin”]: the former refers to the actus forensis [“legal action”], the latter to the renewal of the nature in virtue of the δικαιοσύνη [“righteousness”] indwelling in him.
Thus the meaning of the supplementary clause is this: by πιστός [“faithful”] it is said primarily and generally that God, in the forgiveness of sins, approves Himself faithful to His own nature, which is light; then by δίκαιος [“just”] it is more specifically said under what aspect this fidelity shows itself. But in the previous discussion we have evidently laid ourselves open to the charge of inexactness, inasmuch as we have treated the passage as if it had been δίκαιοςἐστιτὰςἁμαρτίας καὶκαθαρίζω, κ.τ.λ. [“he is righteous and just to cleanse, etc.”]. But the apostle’s phrase, instead of that, moves in a telic clause, or “in order that.” It has been attempted to rob the sentence of its strange peculiarity by interpreting the ἵνα [“in order that”] as ecbatic, as if it were ὥστε [“so that”]. It is undoubtedly true that with the decline of a language there is frequently a marked enfeebling of its conjunctions; and as to ἵνα [“in order that”] in particular, looked at philologically, a multitude of examples have been adduced from later Greek, especially from Plutarch. But, in the first place, these examples from classical Greek require a very careful sifting, for there are not a few among them which show that by the exhibition of the consequence as if it were a design, a certain effect is attained and a precision intentionally introduced into the thought (as, for example, in Plutarch, Moral, p. 333a); and, secondly, there is need of doubly careful sifting in the Scripture, where from the very beginning much is viewed as design which to our apprehension is primarily only consequence or result. We have only to think of the hardening of Pharaoh, which is referred to as the purpose of God; and yet more appropriately, Mat 13:15. The thought is, as in all such cases, only weakened if we do not hold fast the reference to design or purpose. Assuredly the righteousness and fidelity is grounded in His inmost nature, and both attributes belong to Him apart from every possible demonstration of them in act, and every purpose outside of Himself to which they refer. But as all that He has, and not only; so, but also all that He is. He gives to the Son, so that He places all, so to speak, at His Son’s service, so all is, absolutely and entirely devoted to the service of man. The whole fulness of His unfathomable essence is turned to nothing else but the salvation of His creatures, so that it is to Him only the means, yea, His very self is only the means, to effect His creatures’ happiness and good. As a friend has lived for his friend when his whole life has had his friend’s wellbeing for its aim, so God makes the whole πλήρωμααὐτοῦ [“his fullness”] into the means for bringing us to our salvation. It is a deduction from the sentence Θεὸςἀγάπῃ [“God is love”]that He refers His whole nature only to others, whether to His own Son or to the creature. His fidelity, His righteousness, and in like manner all His other perfections, are for Him existent, only to be applied to His creatures’ benefit, to our salvation. Here is the impressive thought which lies in the ἵνα [“in order that”]. In this one particle lies the most comprehensive and the highest witness of the power of His love that it is possible to conceive. For the rest, whether we are to read at the close of the verse καθαρίσῃ[V-AAS-3S]tn [“he may cleanse”] or καθαρίζει [V-PAI-3S] [“he cleanses”], is irrelevant to the sense; even in the latter case the καθαρίζει [“cleanse”] must be in fact parallel with ἀφῇ [“forgiveness”], and the form is only after the Hebrew manner released from strict grammatical symmetry. footnote Plutarch, Moralia, 333a
καὶ ἀποδράσεις τῶνἐπιτιθεμένων; καὶταυτίγεκἀκεῖνοι λέγοντεςἀποκναίουσιν,ἐν ταῖς εἰσαγωγαῖςἑκάστοτε τὴν “πρόθεσιν”ὁριζόμενοι “σημείωσινἐπιτελειώσεως,” τὴνδ᾿“ἐπιβολὴν” “ὁρμὴν πρὸ ὁρμῆς,” “παρασκευὴν”δὲ“πρᾶξιν πρὸπράξεως,” “μνήμην”δὲ“κατάληψινἀξιώματος παρεληλυθότος, οὗτὸπαρὸνἐξ αἰσθήσεως κατελήφθη.” And yet those very authors rasp our ears by repeatedly defining in theirIntroductions“purpose” as “an indication of intent to complete,” “design”as"an impulse before an impulse," “preparation”as“an act before an act,”and“memory”as“an apprehension of a proposition in the past tense of which the present tense has been apprehended by perception.” tnNestle-Aland 28th edition omits δὲ in 1Jn 1:7, even though the manuscript evidence seems to strongly support it. All previous editions of NA1-27 retain δὲ. The reason for omitting δὲ from the text of Nestle-Aland 28th edition is unclear (and seems unjustified).
δὲ is supported by א, A, B, C, K, L, P, 5, 18, 33, 69c, 81, 218, 307, 398, 424*, 436, 442, 453, 614, 621, 623, 630, 642, 720, 808, 1067, 1409, 1448, 1505, 1523, 1524, 1611, 1735, 1844, 1852, 2138, 2298, 2344, 2492, 2541, 2805, Vulgate, Syriacph Copticsa Clement, Ps-Oecumenius. || δὲ does not appear in Ψ, 6, 322, 323, 424c, 945, 1241, 1243, 1739, 1881, ith,l,r,w,z* Copticbo mss Cyril, and Jerome.
tnThe print edition reads καθαρίζῃ[V-PAS-2S] [“you may cleanse”]. However, this seems to be a typo, since there is no known manuscript with this form of the word at 1Jn 1:9.