We can turn this around and say that anyone who despises the Begotten also despises the One who begat him.

This describes everyone who is born of God and does what God wants him to do.

John immediately joined love to faith, because without love faith is useless. According to charity, faith belongs to Christians, but without love it belongs to the demons. Moreover, those who do not believe are even worse than the demons.

By practicing virtue, those who are born of God have become his children, his friends, just as Abraham was. Once again John touches on the doctrine of truth, revealing the depths of the unbelief of the heretics.

Who is it who believes that Jesus is the Christ? It is the person who lives according to Christ’s commandments. Let no heretic or schismatic say that he believes that Jesus is the Christ, for even the devils believe and tremble, because they too know that much. But those who do not have his love or the works of truth are not of God.

To love the children of God is to love the Son of God; to love the Son of God is to love the Father. Nobody can love the Father without loving the Son, and anyone who loves the Son will love the other children as well.

Only someone who is on fire with the love of his Maker can be said to love his fellow humans in the right way. For if a person’s love for his Creator starts to flag, his words of love for his fellows lose all their power.

If we love God, then we must also love those whom God has brought to birth and who have become our brothers and sisters. Loving one another is a sign of how much we love God.

The substance and ground of the love we ought to have for God is obedience to his commandments.

The commandments of which John speaks are the two given by Jesus: Love God and love one another. Hold fast to this love and set your minds at rest. You need not be afraid of doing harm to anyone, for how can you harm the person you love? Love, and you cannot but do well.

Keeping the commandments is both the form and substance of our love for God. Those who obey them are brought close to God by them. If someone looks at them in the wrong way and says that they are heavy to bear, he is merely revealing his own weakness.

The proof of love is found in the works that we do. We truly love God if we bend our wills to his commandments, for whoever runs after his own illicit desires does not love God, because he contradicts that love in his own will. God’s commands are not onerous, for Christ himself said: My yoke is easy and my burden is light.^[1]

Neither a Jew nor a pagan nor a heretic can do anything in the face of this victory which is ours through faith.

This means that such a person has overcome all evil and ungodliness. For our faith has destroyed all ignorance and driven out all darkness.

The commandments of God are not burdensome. All those who are bound to keep them with true devotion, despite the adversities of this world, regard its temptations with equanimity, even to the point of looking forward to death, because it is the gateway to the heavenly country. And lest anyone should think that we can somehow achieve all this by our own efforts, John adds that the substance of our victory is our faith, not our works.

Once you have become brothers and sisters in love, you must go on to the next stage, which is to overcome the world. For those who have been born again in God must expel every kind of unbelief from their midst.

The person who believes that Jesus is the Son of God overcomes the world by adding works worthy of that faith to it. If you think that faith in his divinity and a profession of that faith are enough by themselves, read on!

It is not faith in the abstract that overcomes the world. It must be faith in Jesus Christ, as John makes plain.

What flowed from his side was also the blood which cleanses us from sin and sanctifies the people of God. . . . It was not a mere man who appeared at the Jordan^[1] but the incarnate Word of God, to whom the Father also bore witness: This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.^[2] Similarly, when he was hanging on the cross, what sounded to the people like thunder was the voice of God speaking at the moment that his blood fell to the ground.

The Son of God came not by water only, in order to cleanse us from our sins, but also with the blood of his passion, by which he consecrates the sacrament of our baptism, giving his blood for us, redeeming us by his suffering and nourishing us with his sacraments so that we might be made fit for salvation.

Why did Jesus come? To give us new birth and to make us children of God. How are we born? Through water and blood. The Jesus who came gives us new birth by water and by blood. The water stands for his baptism, when Jesus was revealed as the Son of God. The blood, of course, stands for his crucifixion, when he prayed that the Father would glorify him and a voice answered from heaven: I have glorified and I will glorify.^{[1] [2]} BY BAPTISM, PASSION AND THE SPIRIT. ISHO‘DAD OF MERV: John calls Christ’s baptism water and his passion blood. He fulfilled all the dispensations for our sake, by means of his baptism, his passion and by the Holy Spirit. COMMENTARIES.^[1]

The spirit is life, the water is regeneration and faith, the blood is knowledge, and these three are one. In the Savior these are the saving powers, and life itself is found in the Son.

When the Lord was baptized in the Jordan, the Spirit descended on him in the form of a dove, bearing witness that he is the truth, that he is the true Son of God, that he is the true Mediator between God and humanity, that he is the true Redeemer and Reconciler of the human race, that he is truly free from any contamination of sin, that he is truly able to take away the sins of the world.

What was it that flowed from Jesus’ side if not the sacrament which believers receive? The Spirit, the blood and the water—the Spirit which he gave up, the blood and water which flowed from his side. The church is signified as being born from this blood and water.

This means the Spirit of sanctification, the blood of redemption and the water of baptism, which three are one and remain distinct, and none of them is separated from union with the others. This is the faith by which the church lives and moves.

The Spirit bore witness that Jesus is the truth when he descended on him at his baptism. If Jesus were not the truth, the Spirit would not have done that. The water and the blood bore witness that Jesus is the truth when they both flowed from his side at the time he was crucified. That would not have been possible if he had not had a genuine human nature. All three are independent of each other, but their testimony is one and the same, because Christ’s divinity is not to be believed in apart from his humanity, nor is his humanity to be accepted apart from his divinity. And all three are present also in us, not in their natural form but by the mystical union of our souls with him. The Spirit makes us children of God by adoption, the water of the sacred font cleanses us, and the blood of the Lord redeems us. They are invisible in themselves, but in the sacraments they are made visible for our benefit. ^[1] ALL ACCOMPLISHED IN UNITY. ISHO‘DAD OF MERV: The three things are one because everything was accomplished by the one Christ. COMMENTARIES.^[1]

The testimony of men refers to the testimony of people like Moses and the prophets, who were all men of God.

There are many great testimonies to the Son of God, for example: The Lord said to my Lord, Sit at my right hand,^[1] and The Lord said to me, You are my Son.^[2] This testimony is great and true and worthy to be received by everyone, but the testimony of God to his beloved Son is much greater still. For the Father himself spoke from heaven, saying: You are my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.^[3]

God can never turn himself into a liar, because he is the essence of truth. But an unbelieving man is a liar, because he does not believe in the truth of God.

After giving us one testimony about his Son, God gave us another, which is eternal life.

This means that whoever believes in the Son in such a way as to do what the Son commands has the witness of God in him and may be counted among the children of God. Jews and heretics are wasting their time when they claim to believe in God,^[1] because they reject Christ and refuse to believe in him. For whoever refuses to honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him.

John says that God has given us eternal life, and remember that he was saying this at a time when he was still in the flesh and subject to physical death. But God gave us eternal life in exactly the same way as he has given us the power to become his children. Right now we live on earth in the hope of his promise, which we shall receive in its fullness after we die and go to be with him.

God has promised to give us eternal life because we have been adopted into him through his Son, of whom Scripture says: In him was life.^[1] Therefore whoever has the Son by holy baptism also has life.

Here John testifies that no one has life unless he has Christ.

John does not simply say that there is life in the Son; he says that the Son is life itself. The Son in his turn glorified the Father by saying: Just as the Father has life in himself, so he has given the Son also life in himself.^[1] He goes on to show how this life is common to both Father and Son, when he says: And this is eternal life, that they know you the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent.^[2]

John writes these things so that those who believe in Christ will be reassured about their future blessedness. They will not be led astray by the deception of those who say that Jesus was not the Son of God and therefore has nothing to offer to those who have believed in him.

John says that he has written to those who are inheritors of eternal life, for such things would never be written to people who are not. After all, it is not right to give holy things to dogs or to scatter pearls before swine.^[1]

Those who possess technical skills and know how to repair things are fully confident that when the need arises they will be able to do so. Similarly these holy men, John and the other apostles, knew from their own experience that if they asked God for what was pleasing and acceptable to him, they would obtain it. For God is most generous to those who have this knowledge and will grant the requests of those who ask according to his will.

John holds out to us the great assurance that we can expect to receive heavenly blessings from the Lord and that whatever we ask for here on earth will be given to us as long as we ask for it in the right way. This is in full agreement with what Jesus said in the Gospels: I say to you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you receive it and you will.^[1]

John repeats what he has already said many times over, in order to stir us up to more vibrant prayer. But the condition which he imposed at the beginning remains valid, which is that we must ask according to our Maker’s will. There are two sides to this, because on the one hand we are expected to ask for the things which he wants us to ask for, and at the same time we are expected to come to understand what those things are. This is what it means to have the kind of faith which works through love.

What this means is that if we ask according to his will, he hears us, and if he hears us in everything that we ask of him, we know that we are praying according to his will. Therefore we already have inside us the things which we have asked for. For these are the kingdom and righteousness of God, which he has asked us to pray for.

Since there are sins unto death, it follows that anyone who commits one of them will die as a result.

Even though the Lord commands us to pray for our very persecutors, this passage clearly shows that there are some brothers for whom we are not commanded to pray. We therefore must acknowledge that there are some sins among the brothers which are worse than persecution by enemies. I think that the sin of a brother is unto death when anyone who has attained a knowledge of God through the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ opposes the brotherhood and is aroused by the fires of envy against that very grace by which he was reconciled to God.

In another place I defined the sin of a brother unto death [see above], but I should have added: if he ends this life in a perversity of mind as wicked as this. For surely we must not despair of anyone, no matter how wicked he is, while he lives, and we should pray with confidence for him of whom we should not despair.

It is the sin of heresy, or of blasphemy against the Holy Spirit, which leads to death. If one man sins against another, pray for him. But if he sins against God, who is there who can pray on his behalf?

Just as Christ washes us from our sins by interceding with the Father on our behalf, so also should we, if we know that our brother is committing a sin which is not unto death.

These are things which are asked for according to God’s will, because they are part of what it means to love our brothers. John is talking here about trivial, everyday sins which are hard to avoid but which are easy to put right. The question of what constitutes a mortal sin is very difficult, and it is hard to accept that there are people whom John tells us not to pray for, when our Lord tells us that we should pray for those who persecute us. The only answer to this is that there must be sins committed within the fellowship of the brothers which are even more serious than persecution from outside enemies. Mortal sin therefore occurs when a brother opposes the fellowship after he has come to acknowledge God by the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ given to him and when he starts to fight against that grace, by which he has been reconciled to God, with the weapons of hatred. A nonmortal sin is one which does not infringe on brotherly love but merely fails to show it adequately because of some weakness of the mind.

The variety of sins is such that everything which fails to agree with the law of fairness is a sin, although minor infractions of the kind which are almost impossible to avoid in this life can be forgiven the righteous without too much difficulty. But there are other sins which are so contrary to any kind of righteousness that they will lead the one who does them into eternal punishment without any doubt whatsoever, unless he happens to put them right.

Only those sins which are not repented of lead to death. Judas, for example, although he showed remorse, did not repent and was led off to his death. But whoever has given himself over to Christ cannot commit mortal sin, even though his nature^[1] remains unchanged and he still sins.

If it is true that when someone does what is righteous his power to do so comes from God, and if it is also true that righteousness and evil cannot live together, then it is perfectly clear that as long as a person does such things he is righteous and does not sin. But because this ability is given by grace and is not natural, John adds that the righteous person must watch out, so that evil will not touch him.

It may be true that the righteous person does not sin, but no one is a child of God by nature. This is why we avoid sin, not by the way in which we were made, which would make sin impossible for us,^[1] but by watching out that we do not fall into it.

Anyone born of God does not commit mortal sin, which we have defined earlier on. But mortal sin can also be understood to mean sin which retains its force right up to the moment of death, and those who are born of God do not commit that kind of error. David, for, example, confessed to having committed mortal sin, for how else can we regard such things as adultery and murder? But David was also born of God and because he belonged to that fellowship he did not sin up to his death, because when he repented he was regarded as worthy to receive forgiveness.

World does not mean creation as a whole but rather worldly people and those who live according to their lusts.

The world, that is, those who love the world, are subjected to evil. This includes everybody, because we are all born under sin, which traces its origin to the disobedience of Adam. Many heretics claim that there is a creator god who made the world evil to begin with, but this is not so. The word refers to people, not to the material substance of creation.

We know that we are of God because we have been born again by grace and baptism through faith, and we know too that we shall persevere in that faith to the very end. But those who love the world are subjected to the enemy, and there is no water of regeneration which can deliver them from that subjection, especially if they sin again after their baptism. Nor is it just the lovers of the world who are in this state, because it applies also to those who are newly born and who have inherited the guilt of original sin, although they cannot yet tell the difference between good and evil. Such people are in the power of the enemy, unless by the power of a loving Creator they are taken out of the power of darkness and placed in the kingdom of the Son of his love. ^[1] PERVERSION GENERATES SIN. ISHO‘DAD OF MERV: The world is subjected to the perversion which gives birth to sin, and because of that it is prone to the cultivation of evil things. COMMENTARIES.^[1]

The understanding which God gave, by which it is known that the true Son of God is coming, is the same as the mind of Christ.

Even at the end of his letter, John never stops insisting on the need for right doctrine. We have been given understanding to the extent that we have known the Son of God, who really has come into the world. This is what it means to say that we have the mind of Christ.^[1] The person who has this mind and understanding knows what is really true and is united with him because he shares the same mind.

What could be clearer than these words? What could be sweeter to the ear? What could be a more powerful weapon to use against the heretics? Christ is the true Son of God. The Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is the true God. The eternal Son of God has come into the world of time, and he came only in order to save us, so that we might come to know the true God. For no one can come to eternal life without a knowledge of the true God. All these things John just keeps repeating over and over again.

John did not tell us to keep away from worship, but from idols, that is, from their very likeness. For it is wrong for you, who are created in the image of the living God, to become the image of an idol and a dead man.

Why is it that after everything else which he has said to his hearers during the course of his letter, John should keep this warning about idols to the very end? In my opinion it is because here he is addressing the church in general. There must have been many in that assembly who were former idolaters, and he adds this caution for their benefit.

The letter ends as it began, with an admonition to worship the one true God alone. Everything else that John says is contained in this one golden rule.

You who know the true God, in whom you have eternal life, must keep yourselves away from the teachings of the heretics which lead only to eternal death. In the manner of those who made idols in the place of God, the heretics have corrupted the glory of the incorruptible God by their wicked doctrines which bear the stamp of corruptible things.

See, in short you have it that the Father is one, the Son another, and the Holy Spirit another; in Person, each is other, but in nature they are the same. In this regard Jesus says: “The Father and I, we are one” [Jn 10:30]. He teaches us that one refers to their nature, and we are to their Persons. In like manner it is said: “There are three who bear witness in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Spirit; and these three are one” [1 Jn 5:7]. Let Sabellius hear we are , let him hear three ; and let him believe that there are three Persons. Let him not blaspheme in his sacrilegious heart by saying that the Father is the same in himself as the Son is the same in himself and as the Holy Sprit is the same in himself, as if in some way he could beget himself, or proceed from himself. Even in created natures nothing is able to beget itself. Let also Arius hear one ; and let him not say that the Son is of a different nature, if one cannot be said of that, the nature of which is different.

Therefore read that the three witnesses in baptism, the water, the blood, and the Spirit [1 Jn 5:7], are one, for if you take away one of these, the sacrament of baptism does not exist. For what is water without the cross of Christ? A common element, without any sacramental effect. Nor, again, is there the sacrament of regeneration without water: “For except a man be born again of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God” [Jn 3:5]. Now, even the catechumen believes in the cross of the Lord Jesus, with which he is signed; but unless he be baptized in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, he cannot receive remission of sins or the gift of spiritual grace.

And as many of them . . . as have repented, shall have their dwelling in the tower [i.e., the Church]. And those of them who have been slower in repenting shall dwell within the walls. And as many as do not repent at all, but abide in their deeds, shall utterly perish. . . . But if anyone relapse into strife, he will be cast out of the tower, and will lose his life. Life is the possession of all who keep the commandments of the Lord.

And pray without ceasing on behalf of other men. For there is in them hope of repentance that they may attain to God. For cannot he that falls arise again, and he that goes astray return?

[E]ternal fire was prepared for him who voluntarily departed from God and for all who, without repentance, persevere in apostasy.

Yet most men either shun this work, as a public exposure of themselves, or else defer it from day to day. I presume (they are) more mindful of modesty than salvation; just like men who, having contracted some malady in the more private parts of the body, avoid the probing of physicians, and so perish of their own bashfulness. It is intolerable for modesty to make satisfaction to the offended Lord! To be restored to its forfeited salvation! Truly you are honorable in your modesty; bearing an open forehead for sinning, but an abashed one for deprecating! I give no place to bashfulness when I am a gainer by its loss; when it exhorts the man, “Respect not me; it is better that I perish through you than you through me”.

Discipline governs a man, power sets a seal upon him, apart from the fact that power is the Spirit, but the Spirit is God. What did the Spirit teach? That there must be no communicating with the works of darkness. Observe what he says. Who, moreover, was able to forgive sins? This is his prerogative alone: for “who remits sins but God alone?” And, of course, (who but he can remit) mortal sins, such as those committed against himself, and against his temple?

The clergyman who is deposed for mortal sin shall not be excommunicated.

Stinginess is redeemed by generosity, insult by apology, perversity by honesty, and for whatever else, amends can be made by practice of the opposite. But what can he do who is contemptuous of God? What shall the murderer do? What remedy shall the fornicator find? . . . These are capital sins, brethren, these are mortal. Someone may say: “Are we then about to perish? . . . Are we to die in our sins?” . . . I appeal first to you brethren who refuse penance for your acknowledged crimes; you, I say, who are timid after your impudence, who are bashful after your sins, who are not ashamed to sin but now are ashamed to confess.

Some offenses are light, some heavy. It is one thing to owe ten thousand talents, another to owe a farthing. We shall have to give account of the idle word no less than of adultery; but it is not the same thing to be put to the blush and to be put upon the rack, to grow red in the face and to ensure lasting torment. . . . You observe that if we entreat for smaller offenses, we obtain pardon: if for greater ones, it is difficult to obtain our request: and that there is a great difference between sins.

[ N]othing could have been devised more likely to instruct and benefit the pious reader of sacred Scripture than that, besides describing praiseworthy characters as examples, and blameworthy characters as warnings, it should also narrate cases where good men have gone back and fallen into evil, whether they are restored to the right path or continue irreclaimable; and also where bad men have changed, and have attained to goodness, whether they persevere in it or relapse into evil; in order that the righteous may not be lifted up in the pride of security, nor the wicked hardened in despair of a cure.

[A]lthough they were living well, [they] have not persevered therein; because they have of their own will been changed from a good to an evil life, and on that account are worthy of rebuke; and if rebuke should be of no avail, and they persevere in their ruined life until death, they are worthy of divine condemnation forever. Neither shall they excuse themselves, saying—as now they say, “Why are we rebuked?”—so then, “Why are we condemned? Since we returned from good to evil, we did not receive the perseverance by which we would abide in good?” They shall by no means deliver themselves by this excuse from righteous condemnation . . . since it may be said, “O man, in what you have heard and kept, in that you might persevere if you want”.

Whoever, then, are made to differ from that original condemnation by such bounty of divine grace, there is no doubt but that it is provided that they should hear the gospel, and when they hear they believe, and in the faith that works by love they persevere unto the end; and if, perchance, they deviate from the way, when they are rebuked they are amended and some of them, although they may not be rebuked by men, return into the path they had left; and some who have received grace in any age are withdrawn from the perils of this life by swiftness of death. For he works all these things in them who made them vessels of mercy, who also elected them in his Son before the foundation of the world by the election of grace: “And if by grace, then is it no more of works, otherwise grace is no more grace” [Rom 11:6]. For they were not so called as not to be elected, in respect of which it is said, “For many are called but few are elected” [Mt 20:16]; but because they were called according to the purpose, they are surely also elected by the election of grace, not of any precedent merits of theirs, because to them grace is all merit.

[O]f two pious men, why to the one should perseverance be given unto the end, and to the other it should not, God’s judgments are even more unsearchable. . . . Had not both been called and followed him that called them? And had not both become, from wicked men, justified men, and both been renewed by the washing of regeneration?

We have a second font (itself one with the former) of blood, about which the Lord said, “I have to be baptized with a baptism,” when he had been baptized already. For he had come “by means of water and blood” [1 Jn 5:6], just as John has written; that he might be baptized by the water, glorified by the blood—to make us, in like manner, called by water, chosen by blood. These two baptisms he sent out from the wound in his pierced side, in order that they who believed in his blood might be bathed with the water; they who had been bathed in the water might drink the blood. This baptism stands in lieu of being bathed in the font when that has not been received, and restores it when lost.