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cannot receive that life, that therefore deliverance from death must go alongside of participation in life.

(b) John has by no means formed any new theory of redemption, as Frommann, pp. 450-454, and Köstlin, p. 182, ascribe to him, but he here directly connects himself, out and out, with the current apostolic type of doctrine. The assertion, that the evangelist sets forth with peculiar emphasis Jesus as the true passover Lamb, falls of itself no doubt, if the day fixed by him for the death of Jesus is historically correct, and if xix. 36, as is most likely by far, is to be referred to the passage Ps. xxxiv. 20. But the word of the Baptist about the Lamb of God (i. 29), a word safely handed down in its fundamental principle, does not refer to the Passover lamb (yet comp. Scholten, p. 134; Schenkel, p. 384), but to the mute, patient lamb of Isa. liii. 7 (comp. Ritschl, ii. p. 68); yet the evangelist already explained the idea, borrowed certainly originally from Isa. liii. 11, in this way, that the servant of God, by His suffering (of death), takes away the sin of the world (comp. I. iii. 5). The way in which this takes place he explains substantially in this way, that he designates Christ as the author of atonement for our sins (iλaoμòs Teρì Tŵv áμactiŵv ýμŵv: I. ii. 2, iv. 10), by which His death is evidently conceived of under the aspect of a sin-offering (Lev. vi. 23, v. 16, 18; comp. píos тoû iλaoμoû: Num. v. 8); His blood has atoning power, and purifies from all stain of guilt (I. i. 7, 9; comp. 123, a; 134, a).3 In particular,

2 We find the figure of the lamb of Isaiah in Peter and in Revelation (§ 38, d; 49, a; 134, a). But apuv, according to I. iii. 5, and the ordinary Johannean usus loquendi, can be understood only in the sense of taking away, and not in that of "taking on Himself to take away" (Gess, p. 522). But it refers not to the deliverance from an immoral nature (Baur, p. 396; Schenkel, p. 387), but to the taking away of the guilt of sin, as even the plural in I. iii. 5 shows, because it refers to past sins, which load us with guilt. Only ver. 6 speaks of the way in which the revelation of Christ as the sinless One works also actual holiness in us.

3 To refer xalapis to deliverance from sin itself (comp. Schenkel, p. 386, who, however, speaks of a sacrifice of purification !), or to that along with other purposes (Gess, p. 522), is contrary to the text, inasmuch as it deals with the past sins (ver. 10) of those who have sin (I. i. 8; comp. ix. 41, xv. 22, 24, xix. 11) generally, past sins which are acknowledged as such (ver. 9), and which stain men with guilt. For the idea of ¡xacμós, comp. Ritschl, ii. p. 208, and Gess, p. 516, who, however, in an incomprehensible way, denies that by this covering for sin Christ is thought of as a sin-offering; while Reuss, ii. p. 495

quite as in the Epistle to the Hebrews, the sin-offering of the great day of atonement is thought of (Lev. xxiii. 27, 28, xxv. 9: μépa éğıλaoμoû), since here, as there, the Son of God, as the sinless (I. iii. 5, ii. 1; comp. § 119, b) high priest, takes away sin, while He consecrates Himself as an offering, in order to put men in truth into the position of unstained holiness (xvii. 19; comp. § 121, a; 123, b); and as the intercessor with the Father (Tapáяλптоs: I. ii. 1), He makes good before the Father the forgiveness obtained (ver. 2) by His atonement (§ 121, c).* Believers have forgiveness of sins for His name's sake, who designates Him as the inaoμós and πаρáκλητos (I. ii. 12; comp. i. 9).

(c) Inasmuch as Jesus atones for sin by His blood poured out in death, and thereby delivers the world from the destruction which death brings on the sinner, He dies for the good of (ép) men (xi. 51, 52);5 and the apostle interprets the word of Caiaphas as a prophecy by which one has to die, so that the whole nation may not perish (xi. 50; comp. xviii. 14). As, according to § 22, c, Jesus gives His life to be a λÚTρov, so does He present Himself as the Good Shepherd, x. 11, 14, who gives His life for the good of the sheep, and that they may not become the prey of the wolf, may not fall into condemnation (ver. 12), i.e. that they may not lose their soul in death (xii. 25). In this sense Jesus gives His flesh (in death) for the life of the world (vi. 51). As meat and drink sustain life, so His flesh and blood, which seem to be so separated by a violent death (§ 27, b), become the means by which the world, which has fallen under abiding death, is maintained

[E. T. ii. 443], and Schenkel, p. 386, footnote 11, combat any reference of aaopós to atonement and reconciliation.

The peculiar connection in which I. i. 7, cleansing by the blood of the Son of God, is introduced with the xovavía, reminds one of the way of looking on it as the blood of the covenant (§ 22, c; 49, c; 121, d), only that this way of looking at it is not followed out. Only in Christian fellowship (xovaríar ixoμer μετ ̓ ἀλλήλων καὶ κ. τ. λ.) has any one a share in the Messianic saving blessing of purification from sin by the blood of Christ, and the connection with ver. 6 teaches that we can have fellowship with God only thus, with whom indeed no one stained with sin can enter into full covenant fellowship.

5 In the second half of xi. 52 the gathering together the children of God from among the Gentiles is not an effect of the death of Jesus, but the intended result of it, inasmuch as it is conditioned by the exaltation of Jesus from the bonds of the earthly life (comp. xii. 24).

in life (vi. 55). In both images there is nothing said of any bearing of punishment, but of a service of love, which Jesus discharges to the world by giving His life, while He thereby delivers it from death and keeps it in life. But it is natural not to think here of life in the specifically Johannean sense (§ 146, as Köstlin, p. 183, does), but of eternal life in the current sense (v. 39; comp. § 34, 6), which begins after the resurrection (ver. 29), and confers blessing for ever (iv. 14, 36, vi. 27). To be sure, he who even here possesses eternal life has, as is self-evident, eternal life in this sense; but he could not have it, unless to the salvation given him in Christ, a salvation which gives him the former (§ 146), there was also connected deliverance from death through His death, who took away from us our guilt (note b), and therefore made the communication of life in the former sense possible (note a).

(d) One can only be struck by the way in which, at times. in passages in which Christ's death is spoken of along with life in the other world, a life which seems especially to be the fruit of that death, eternal life in this life is also spoken of, the reception of which, to be sure, is also made possible by that death, but it is brought about apparently in quite a different way. Thus is it between vi. 51 and ver. 55, according to which Christ's death works life in the eternal sense, irrespective of the true life in this world preceding the resurrection, a true life which is obtained directly by the appropriation of Jesus' bloody death (vv. 53, 54); thus the eternal life which, according to iii. 14, 16, is produced by Jesus' death, is evidently regarded, ver. 15, as a life possessed immediately by faith. But this is explained in this way,

It is clear, vi. 58, that the eternal life which the eating the bread of life in the sense of vv. 51, 55 gives, forms the contrast to the dying of the patriarchs. In this sense life follows, xii. 25, on the resurrection, and stands, I. v. 16, in contrast to death, as eternal life, x. 28, stands in contrast to destruction (comp. ver. 10), in which God's wrath abides on men (iii. 36). In this sense the raising on the cross, typically foreshadowed by the brazen serpent (Num. xxi. 8, 9), brings about the obtaining eternal life (iii. 14, 15), which, ver. 16, forms the express contrast to destruction (comp. xii. 25). Only by a very forced exegesis can we bring these passages to the specifically Johannean idea of eternal life, as the attempt of Reuss, ii. p. 551 [E. T. ii. 494], sufficiently shows.

7 In I. v. 16, life, in contrast with death as the punishment of sin, is spoken of, although plainly (vv. 11-13) he had been speaking of life in the specifically Johannean sense. But this is easily explained there, because the knowledge,

that the death of Christ is but the climax of the revelation of the love of God (in the sense of § 147, c), whether one now regard it as the necessary consequence of the gift of the onlybegotten Son for the salvation of the world, as that deliverance could be achieved only in that way, or as the fulfilment of the divine loving will (x. 17, 18), which gave Him this cup (xviii. 11). Just so is it the climax of this revelation of love, in so far as it is seen in the love of the Son, which shows itself in the sacrificial death in the most striking way (xv. 13; I. iii. 16). In this sense the death of Christ is connected with His self-manifestation, which brings about the new revelation of God, as without it full salvation (eternal life) would not be objectively procured, and therefore the love of God would not be perfectly revealed; so thus without its subjective appropriation the revelation of God cannot be perfectly known, and therefore eternal life cannot in this life be perfectly obtained. From this point of view His death

is the highest glorifying of God (xii. 28; comp. xvii. 4, xiii. 31, 32), as it is the highest glorifying of Christ Himself.

which is the true life, strictly excludes sins (§ 146, c); where these nevertheless enter, life can be restored only through the victory over them. Similarly,

iii. 36, to continue under the wrath of God is regarded as the contrast to eternal life, because unbelief, which excludes life, is there regarded as disobedience to the divine demand of faith (I. iii. 23). It creates no difficulty, finally, if, according to x. 9, 10, he who has been delivered by Jesus from destruction finds pastures which afford him true nourishment in the positive sense. Thus the reason of this double sense of wń lies in this, that John has taken the one from the current apostolic doctrinal of speech, but has coined the other independently (comp. § 141, a); so little reason can there be in this, accordingly, to speak of "unclear thinking" or of "uttering himself," since it is throughout clearly intelligible of what life he speaks.

8 Only one must not, with Baur, pp. 379-381, find the latter indicated in a twofold signification of you (iii. 14, viii. 28, xii. 32), or in the sense of doğágiobas (xii. 23, xiii. 31), since the former points to His exaltation to heaven, which was brought about by His death; but the latter to His acknowledgment on the earth (comp. xi. 4, xvii. 10, and therewith § 145, a),—an acknowledgment, to be sure, which, if it is to be general, presupposes His death (comp. footnote 5), but is not occasioned by it.

CHAPTER III.

THE APPROPRIATION OF SALVATION.

§ 149. Faith and Fellowship with Christ.

. Faith, which forms the condition for the appropriation of salvation, because it alone perfects knowledge, is the confident conviction that Jesus is the Son of God (a). To reach faith there is needed a testimony of the object of faith, and this testimony must be willingly accepted, and therefore assumes a longing receptiveness (b). While the believer by the knowledge of God through Christ receives a life rooted in Christ alone, he becomes conscious of being in Christ, and the important thing now is to continue in Christ (c). Then Christ abides in him, and becomes in him ever anew the spring of the blissful knowledge of God and of the new moral life (d).

(a) The subjective condition on which the obtainment of eternal life (iii. 15, vi. 47, xx. 31), as also deliverance from death depend (viii. 24), is most commonly designated as faith simply. The idea occurs much more frequently in Jesus' mouth than in the synoptical speeches; but as there, it is used almost entirely (comp. Mark xi. 31, xiii. 21) of the confidence with which the word of another is accepted as true.1 He is believed, as Moses was (v. 46; comp. vi. 30, 1 Thus God is believed (v. 24) when we accept the testimony as true which He gives (I. v. 10); the Scriptures are believed (ii. 22), or the message (xii. 38, according to Isa. liii. 1), or the spirit of a prophet (I. iv. 1). Comp. § 40, c; 139, b, footnote 2. It seldom stands for trust in God generally (xi. 40, xiv. 1), as it does so often in the earlier evangelists (§ 29, c); and even, xiv. 1, the parallel Túris ipi is at once changed in what follows into trust in the infallibility of His word, inasmuch as, according to ver. 2, Jesus would not have said what He had just said had it not been true. Nor, xiv. 29, is it trustful confidence in Christ that is spoken of, as it there refers to faith in Him in the ordinary sense, in whom they might have been mistaken by His going away, had He not told them beforehand. Moreover, Tu stands, iii. 14, 15, in the sense of trust in reference to the parallel, Num. xxi. 9, since the tert. compar., as John gives it, and expressly emphasizes it by the anteposition of wo, lies simply in the salvation - bringing inva (against Huther, p. 25 f.). The assertion that the moment of trust in the love of God is the ruling idea in the Johannean faith (Frommann, p. 557), wants any sort of

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