1Jo 2:14-16 | JFB | STEP | 13-14. All three classes are first addressed in the present. "I write"; then in the past (aorist) tense, "I wrote" (not "I have written"; moreover, in the oldest manuscripts and versions, in the end of , it is past, "I wrote," not as English Version, "I write"). Two classes, "fathers" and "young men," are addressed with the same words each time (except that the address to the young men has an addition expressing the source and means of their victory); but the "little sons" and "little children" are differently addressed. have known-- and do know: so the Greek perfect means. The "I wrote" refers not to a former Epistle, but to this Epistle. It was an idiom to put the past tense, regarding the time from the reader's point of view; when he should receive the Epistle the writing would be past. When he uses "I write," he speaks from his own point of view. him that is from the beginning-- Christ: "that which was from the beginning." overcome-- The fathers, appropriately to their age, are characterized by knowledge. The young men, appropriately to theirs, by activity in conflict. The fathers, too, have conquered; but now their active service is past, and they and the children alike are characterized by knowing (the fathers know Christ, "Him that was from the beginning"; the children know the Father). The first thing that the little children realize is that God is their Father; answering in the parallel clause to "little sons ... your sins are forgiven you for His name's sake," the universal first privilege of all those really-dear sons of God. Thus this latter clause includes all, whereas the former clause refers to those more especially who are in the first stage of spiritual life, "little children." Of course, these can only know the Father as theirs through the Son ( ). It is beautiful to see how the fathers are characterized as reverting back to the first great truths of spiritual childhood, and the sum and ripest fruit of advanced experience, the knowledge of Him that was from the beginning (twice repeated, , ). Many of them had probably known Jesus in person, as well as by faith.

‏ 1 John 2:14-16

13-14. All three classes are first addressed in the present. "I write"; then in the past (aorist) tense, "I wrote" (not "I have written"; moreover, in the oldest manuscripts and versions, in the end of 1Jo 2:13, it is past, "I wrote," not as English Version, "I write"). Two classes, "fathers" and "young men," are addressed with the same words each time (except that the address to the young men has an addition expressing the source and means of their victory); but the "little sons" and "little children" are differently addressed.

have known--and do know: so the Greek perfect means. The "I wrote" refers not to a former Epistle, but to this Epistle. It was an idiom to put the past tense, regarding the time from the reader's point of view; when he should receive the Epistle the writing would be past. When he uses "I write," he speaks from his own point of view.

him that is from the beginning--Christ: "that which was from the beginning."

overcome--The fathers, appropriately to their age, are characterized by knowledge. The young men, appropriately to theirs, by activity in conflict. The fathers, too, have conquered; but now their active service is past, and they and the children alike are characterized by knowing (the fathers know Christ, "Him that was from the beginning"; the children know the Father). The first thing that the little children realize is that God is their Father; answering in the parallel clause to "little sons ... your sins are forgiven you for His name's sake," the universal first privilege of all those really-dear sons of God. Thus this latter clause includes all, whereas the former clause refers to those more especially who are in the first stage of spiritual life, "little children." Of course, these can only know the Father as theirs through the Son (Mt 11:27). It is beautiful to see how the fathers are characterized as reverting back to the first great truths of spiritual childhood, and the sum and ripest fruit of advanced experience, the knowledge of Him that was from the beginning (twice repeated, 1Jo 2:13, 14). Many of them had probably known Jesus in person, as well as by faith.

15. Love not the world--that lieth in the wicked one (1Jo 5:19), whom ye young men have overcome. Having once for all, through faith, overcome the world (1Jo 4:4; 5:4), carry forward the conquest by not loving it. "The world" here means "man, and man's world" [Alford], in his and its state as fallen from God. "God loved [with the love of compassion] the world," and we should feel the same kind of love for the fallen world; but we are not to love the world with congeniality and sympathy in its alienation from God; we cannot have this latter kind of love for the God-estranged world, and yet have also "the love of the Father in" us.

neither--Greek, "nor yet." A man might deny in general that he loved the world, while keenly following some one of THE THINGS IN IT: its riches, honors, or pleasures; this clause prevents him escaping from conviction.

any man--therefore the warning, though primarily addressed to the young, applies to all.

love of--that is, towards "the Father." The two, God and the (sinful) world, are so opposed, that both cannot be congenially loved at once.

16. all that is in the world--can be classed under one or other of the three; the world contains these and no more.

lust of the flesh--that is, the lust which has its seat and source in our lower animal nature. Satan tried this temptation the first on Christ: Lu 4:3, "Command this stone that it be made bread." Youth is especially liable to fleshly lusts.

lust of the eyes--the avenue through which outward things of the world, riches, pomp, and beauty, inflame us. Satan tried this temptation on Christ when he showed Him the kingdoms of the world in a moment. By the lust of the eyes David (2Sa 11:2) and Achan fell (Jos 7:21). Compare David's prayer, Psa 119:37; Job's resolve, Psa 31:1; Mt 5:28. The only good of worldly riches to the possessor is the beholding them with the eyes. Compare Lu 14:18, "I must go and SEE it."

pride of life--literally, "arrogant assumption": vainglorious display. Pride was Satan's sin whereby he fell and forms the link between the two foes of man, the world (answering to "the lust of the eyes") and the devil (as "the lust of the flesh" is the third foe). Satan tried this temptation on Christ in setting Him on the temple pinnacle that, in spiritual pride and presumption, on the ground of His Father's care, He should cast Himself down. The same three foes appear in the three classes of soil on which the divine seed falls: the wayside hearers, the devil; the thorns, the world; the rocky undersoil, the flesh (Mt 13:18-23; Mr 4:3-8). The world's awful antitrinity, the "lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life," similarly is presented in Satan's temptation of Eve: "When she saw that the tree was good for food, pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise," Ge 3:6 (one manifestation of "the pride of life," the desire to know above what God has revealed, Col 2:8, the pride of unsanctified knowledge).

of--does not spring from "the Father" (used in relation to the preceding "little children," 1Jo 2:12, or "little sons"). He who is born of God alone turns to God; he who is of the world turns to the world; the sources of love to God and love to the world, are irreconcilably distinct.