We are profoundly indebted to our chaplain Fr John Hemer MHM for the biblical learning he offered us this day, at a recollection in the Chapter Room in Golden Square. For those who do not yet know him, Father Hemer is scripture professor at Allen Hall seminary, and regularly offers us insightful food for meditation. He celebrated the midday Mass in the church of the Assumption, which was followed by lunch in the Priory, and a second talk, Vespers and Benediction. The second talk, on the Good Samaritan, will be published later.
The first Epistle of John.
Here in the year 2020 we all have a sense that we are ‘up against’ the world, as well as being at its service. We understand that there are forces fiercely inimical to religion in general, Christianity in particular and Catholicism most of all. The discipline of apologetics, neglected, even disparaged in the catechetical euphoria that was the 1970’s and 80’s is now on every priest and seminarians ‘to do’ list.
As well as that challenge, for which there are increasingly ample resources, there is also the challenge of division, or at least disagreement within the Church. And that is often the thing which saps us of our energy, and we have, by now, probably all found ourselves alongside people whose understanding of Catholicism is at least somewhat different to our own, and sometimes seems to be a largely different religion. If we study St. Paul, especially 1 Corinthians we see this this already in the Early Church. But the Corinthian divisions seems to be of the cruder, grosser kind, setting up one leader against another, class divisions manifesting themselves during Mass etc. As far as St Paul tells us anyway, the Corinthians don’t seem to be arguing about theological niceties. But this is precisely the problem the letters of John deal with, and also, by the way, the way they behave towards each other. So there are the theological issues:
5 Who is it that overcomes the world but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God? 6 This is he who came by water and blood, Jesus Christ, not with the water only but with the water and the blood. 7 And the Spirit is the witness, because the Spirit is the truth. 8 There are three witnesses, the Spirit, the water, and the blood; and these three agree. 9 If we receive the testimony of men, the testimony of God is greater; for this is the testimony of God that he has borne witness to his Son. 10 He who believes in the Son of God has the testimony in himself. He who does not believe God has made him a liar, because he has not believed in the testimony that God has borne to his Son. (1John 5:5-10)
And there are the moral issues:
9 He who says he is in the light and hates his brother is in the darkness still. 10 He who loves his brother abides in the light, and in it there is no cause for stumbling. 11 But he who hates his brother is in the darkness and walks in the darkness, and does not know where he is going, because the darkness has blinded his eyes. (1John 2:9-11)
The First Letter of John was written to confront a dangerous situation: a breakaway group of false teachers (John calls them Antichrists, liars, and deceivers) were leading the Christian believers into error. John was probably writing to members of the community in Ephesus, and he was probably acquainted personally with the recipients of the letter. Unlike the second and third letters of John, the First Letter of John is more like an address than a letter.
False teachers have broken away from the community
They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us; but they went out, that it might be plain that they all are not of us. (2:19)and denied that Jesus was “the Christ” and “the Son of God”Who is the liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, he who denies the Father and the Son. No one who denies the Son has the Father. He who confesses the Son has the Father also. (2:22-23)
Although the exact identity of the heretics is difficult to determine. Perhaps they were Cerinthians, who claimed that the divine Christ had descended on the ordinary man Jesus but then left him just before the Passion. Or perhaps they were Docetists, who believed that Jesus only seemed to suffer and die on the Cross. Or maybe they were Gnostics, who believed that the true knowledge of Christ was hidden from all but the chosen few. The false teachers believed themselves to be free from sin, so they were free from the obligations of keeping the Ten Commandments, including the commandment to love other Christians. We are living in very different times, but there are still plenty of false teachers and false doctrines and false practices around, and some of them are being propagated by people who hold high office in the Church – just think of the German Synodal Path.
The First Letter of John refutes these false doctrines with several key points. No one loves God who does not keep his commandments.
And by this we may be sure that we know him, if we keep his commandments. He who says "I know him" but disobeys his commandments is a liar, and the truth is not in him; (2:3-4)All who keep his commandments abide in him, and he in them. And by this we know that he abides in us, by the Spirit which he has given us. (3:24)
No one is able to declare himself free of sin
If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us. (1:10)The only way to overcome sin is to admit it and seek forgiveness through Christ.7 but if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. 8 If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just, and will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
We presume that the letters are later than the Gospel. In the gospel there is no suggestion that there is a problem about the New Commandment which Jesus gives. The gospel gives us a picture of a community that is harmonious and mutually loving. Clearly in the epistles this seems to falling part. In the Apocalypse John commends the Ephesians for their orthodoxy and resistance to false teaching.
I know your works, your toil and your patient endurance, and how you cannot bear evil men but have tested those who call themselves apostles but are not, and found them to be false; 3 I know you are enduring patiently and bearing up for my name's sake, and you have not grown weary. (Apocalypse 2:2-3)
In Acts 20:29-30 Paul warns them about the possibility of false teachers:
I know quite well that when I have gone fierce wolves will invade you and have no mercy on your flock. Even from your own ranks there will be men coming forward with a travesty of truth on their lips to induce the disciples to follow them.
By the time John writes the Apocalypse this has come true and the sect called the Nicolaitans have been troubling them. The Ephesians have resisted this. Ignatius of Antioch writing a few years later say that the Ephesians has a reputation for being immune to false teaching. All well and good. This church is a model of orthodoxy.
But I have this against you: you have lost the love you had at first. (2:4)
The history of the Church is full of instances of where, in the name of orthodoxy, charity has been thrown out of the window. In our own time we are aware of how Christians who pride themselves on being utterly loyal to the Pope and the church can be most uncharitable. Without strong love for Christ and for each other, these things can become a scandal to the world rather than an invitation to faith.
It may well be that the Gospel and first letter of John were intended for the Church in Ephesus. 1 John gives us a picture of a Church which had been united and harmonious but was now rife with argument and division. So the author has to remind his Christians of basic facts about Christianity, that there can be true love of God without love of neighbour.
Chapter 1
1 John 1:1 That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and touched with our hands, concerning the word of life -- 2 the life was made manifest, and we saw it, and testify to it, and proclaim to you the eternal life which was with the Father and was made manifest to us -- 3 that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you, so that you may have fellowship with us; and our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ. 4 And we are writing this that our joy may be complete.
The connections between this and the prologue of John’s gospel must be obvious. As in the gospel the Logos is something which has deep scriptural echoes for Jews and deep philosophical echoes for Greeks. For Jews God’s word is powerful and active. It gives life:
Take all these words to heart… for the Law is your life and by its means you will live long..(Deut 32:46-47.)
It can heal people
He sent out his word and it cured them. (Ps. 107:20.)
According to Psalm 119
Your Word is my hope (81)Your word is planted firm in heaven (89)Your word is a lamp for my feet and a light for my path (105)As your word unfolds it gives light and even the simple understand (130)
If we equate God’s word with his Law or commandments, which the OT does. It is the most treasured thing there is (Feast of Shimchat Torah) In Genesis it is the agent of creation: And God said: “Let there be light” and there was light. John says: Through him all things came into being, a deeper reflection on what we are told in Genesis.
All this is thoroughly Jewish, but how to express it for Greek converts who have never read OT? In Greek Philosophy the Word, Logos is the eternal principle of order in the universe. For some it was the mind of God, guiding, controlling & directing everything. Later it was considered to be the by which God created and ordered the world. Some have translated the word Logos as ‘creative energy’. It’s important to see that there is logos rather than chaos. The modern view that the universe is a purely random set of events with no intelligence behind it is flatly contradicted by the statement that in the beginning there was Logos – reason.
A good way to understand this is: “In the beginning God expressed himself. Today people talk about ‘the force’, New agers about ‘cosmic energy’ or ‘the Life principle’ John tells his gentile readers that this force or power that they have always known about is not just something vague and abstract, but actually became visible in a real man. New agers tend to like their god rather vague and woolly, floating around in the atmosphere and you can get in touch with him (or her) by chanting or hugging a tree. God can be anything you want it to be. John agrees with them that there is such a force, but challenges them by saying that this force entered history in the form of a man. So ‘Word’, Logos, means much more to John’s readers than to us.
In verse 1 it seems that we are dealing with eyewitness testimony and John wants us to get that. The four verbs used:
which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and touched with our hands,
make it increasingly clear that he is not talking about some theoretical idea, or about a purely spiritual even. People actually touched Jesus. It’s the same verb which Jesus uses himself in Luke’s Resurrection account:
See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself; handle me, and see; for a spirit has not flesh and bones as you see that I have." (Luke 24:39)
The verb in Question here is to touch or to feel. This is no doubt a shot across the bows of those who deny the physical reality of Christ’s coming – proto-Gnostics. Note that one of the main uses of this letter in the Liturgy is in the days after Christmas and epiphany: December 27th – 31st and then January 2nd – 12 excluding Epiphany itself. The Church sees them as a sustained reflection on the incarnation. In the letter he seems to be arguing against the idea that Christ is an idea! The world in which he lived was full of religious ideas, often competing with one another. The gospel isn’t an idea or an ideology or a belief system. It’s an event, a historical event. And just as we can see that certain events have changed the course of history, so John’s contention is that the coming of Jesus in the flesh has not so much changed the course of history, but changed the nature of history. Until now there have been political, social and spiritual forces acting on the human race both for good and for evil. But with the coming of Jesus in the flesh, a force has arrived which has trumped all others.
It seems a little surprising that he says:
We are writing this that our joy may be complete.
The “our” here is inclusive, he’s saying that because of the doctrinal divisions among us our joy is muted, but if we can all accept the true original teaching about Christ then we will be full of joy. Think how divisions in the Church today can make life a misery, and think how encouraging a united parish and community can be.
5 This is the message we have heard from him and proclaim to you, that God is light and in him is no darkness at all. 6 If we say we have fellowship with him while we walk in darkness, we lie and do not live according to the truth; 7 but if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus his Son cleanses us from all sin. 8 If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. 9 If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just, and will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.
This does not mean that we have to get our act completely together before we can enjoy communion with God, but that we consciously turn towards the light. You may say that you don’t hear too many Catholics denying the reality of sin – after all we all say the Confiteor at Mass – but the numbers of people at confession would indicate to us that maybe the majority of our practising parishioners do not think of sin as something so serious that they need to do anything about it. So while there may be relatively few people who would come out straight and say: we have no sin, probably most people, for all practical purposes, walk around with that attitude.
It’s hard to know the exact issues which cause John to write these things, but one is reminded for instance of Paul’s long argument in 1 Cor 10-11 where he puts forward the case of those people in Exodus who were all baptised into Moses, were in theory at least all on board with the thing he was doing, but nevertheless were displeasing to God. So here in John there seem to be people who claim to be in communion – fellowship with God but at the same time not walking in his light. That could be either dissenting from orthodoxy or behaving in a way incompatible with being a Christian, but whatever it is there is a lie, one might say a cognitive dissonance involved. We see this constantly in the lives of our Catholic people. People who, tacitly even subconsciously, do not consider themselves to be struggling sinners, but more or less perfect, or at least happy to live with imperfection and do nothing about it since: “God loves me just as I am.” Clearly without any consciousness or willingness to admit that their lives demand something as drastic as the Sacrament of Reconciliation. Oh, and by the way, the thing that cleanses us of sin is the blood of Jesus, that constant NT affirmation that it is his death that brings about our salvation, and so often expressed in cultic terms.
V. 9 talks about confessing our sins. As modern Catholics we hear that in connection with Confession, and one could legitimately object that the practise of private confession to a priest was not yet known in John’s Church. Fine, but the scriptures continue to yield meaning, so if we read this in today’s context it’s not beyond the bounds of legitimate interpretation to read that as an exhortation to go to confession.
Chapter 4
Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are of God; for many false prophets have gone out into the world. 2 By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit which confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is of God,
3 and every spirit which does not confess Jesus is not of God. This is the spirit of antichrist, of which you heard that it was coming, and now it is in the world already. (4:1-3)
Remember the initial problem, Gnosticism. Their teaching might seem very spiritual, indeed it appeared to defend and uphold God’s transcendence. It appealed to spiritual people, in the same way that Buddhism and various new age doctrines appeal to people in a post-Christian society who think the Church is far too materialist, or who disdain organized religion as something for the masses but not for sensitive discerning souls like themselves. (I’m spiritual but not religious)
Unfortunately the people who taught these things claimed to be acting under the direct inspiration of the Holy Spirit; they claimed to be able to by-pass the authority structures of the Church.
Have you ever met anyone like that? I have. There’s no arguing with them and your only refuge is the teaching of the Church.
In the Catholic Church this deception sometimes takes the form of claiming that Our Lady is speaking to them. There’s no arguing with them and your only refuge is the teaching of the Church. If the Blessed Virgin is saying something which contradicts Catholic doctrine, then it isn’t her! That’s why John says:
It’s not every spirit you can trust, test them to see if they come from God.
Not every spiritual idea or utterance comes from God automatically. A Plymouth priest who gave a recollection day at Allen Hall described how in his town which already has a Catholic Church and three different Protestant denominations, some Evangelicals arrived and addressed the various clergy of the town. They wanted to start another Church and claimed that they came to this place under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Fr. Jonathan said that his claim for being there was that he came under the obedience to his bishop. But the clergy of the other denominations, who certainly weren’t happy about this had no way to counter the claim of the evangelicals. In the end you cling to the Church, nothing else works.
So what is Antichrist? It’s only mentioned by name in the letters of John
Who is the liar but he who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This is the antichrist, he who denies the Father and the Son. (2:22)
2 John 1:7 For many deceivers have gone out into the world, men who will not acknowledge the coming of Jesus Christ in the flesh; such a one is the deceiver and the antichrist.
and as you have heard that antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come;(2:18)
It seems to be a principle, something that sets itself up as an alternative to Christ, something that is (for some at least) an even more attractive alternative.
But that principle is always incarnate in people – individuals or groups.
And John says you can always recognize them – with a bit of discernment. He says:
They are of the world and they speak the language of the world and the world listens to them.
They are of the world, therefore what they say is of the world, and the world listens to them.
And presumably he implies that the world is less inclined to listen to true believers.
In our western world, whose humanitarian values have been largely been generated by the Gospel, the enemies of Catholicism always try to appear to be more caring, more compassionate, more sensitive than we are.
Catholics are called callous, uncaring because we won’t abort babies whose birth would be inconvenient or ruin our holiday plans and we won’t bump off old people whose quality of life has deteriorated so badly that anyone can see that the compassionate thing to do is to gently put them out of their misery.
Because Jesus and his truth has entered our world permanently people get deceived into thinking that doing even truly wicked things – killing the most vulnerable well that’s what Jesus would have wanted?
I would suggest that this is one example of the presence of the antichrist in our world, and many people, even good Christians, are taken in by him. Surely if it sounds like compassion it must be of Christ? No, sometimes it’s of the antichrist. Which is why in the end at least for some, adhering doggedly to the teachings of the Church is the only defense against this insanity.
Another manifestation of this spirit of antichrist is the desire to over-spiritualize the Christian faith, to try to make it about ideas and not about concrete realities. One of the characteristics of the so-called Gnostic Gospels is that they are compendiums of the teaching of Jesus (sometimes very esoteric and frankly weird teaching. For instance:
22. Jesus saw some babies nursing. He said to his disciples, "These nursing babies are like those who enter the (Father's) kingdom." They said to him, "Then shall we enter the (Father's) kingdom as babies?"Jesus said to them, "When you make the two into one, and when you make the inner like the outer and the outer like the inner, and the upper like the lower, and when you make male and female into a single one, so that the male will not be male nor the female be female, when you make eyes in place of an eye, a hand in place of a hand, a foot in place of a foot, an image in place of an image, then you will enter [the kingdom]."
And this, the ending of Thomas:
114. Simon Peter said to them, "Make Mary leave us, for females don't deserve life." Jesus said, "Look, I will guide her to make her male, so that she too may become a living spirit resembling you males. For every female who makes herself male will enter the kingdom of Heaven."
There is precious little in these gospels about what Jesus did, only what he says. So he becomes a heavenly teacher, rather like the Buddha or Confucius. It’s always been essential to Christianity that Jesus is not just about ideas, but concrete historical facts. And of course if these deeds and actions are ignored, then people will find it very easy to say that their behaviour doesn’t really matter either. (In moral theology, the idea of the ‘fundamental option’ can easily lead to that. “My fundamental option is to be an honest person. Now and then the circumstances and demands of life require that I tell a little lie, and now and then that I help myself to things that don’t strictly belong to me, but my fundamental option is to be honest.” Or: “My fundamental option is to be a chaste celibate, but of course I am a red-blooded man and I have needs and yes I have close friendships with women and sometimes I end up in bed with them, but it’s all mutually consenting, and I am acting fundamentally out of love to my basic option remains intact.” John would say to such people: “you are thieves, liars and fornicators.”
Now in both of those examples we must factor in the possibility of moral failure which does not destroy or negate the fundamental option. That’s why we have confession. But at a certain point the option becomes largely meaningless in the light of behaviour which conflicts with that option. That’s why John puts the issue rather starkly
In this way we know that we love God's children, when we love God and keep his commandments. This is what the love of God is: keeping his commandments. Nor are his commandments burdensome, (5:2-3)
Whoever says, 'I know him' without keeping his commandments, is a liar, and truth has no place in him. (2:4)
When Jesus came among us, He was not content merely to speak of ideas. He did not simply advance ethical theories or set forth merely philosophical notions. He also spoke to actual human behaviours, not merely speaking of them, but actually living them, and modelling them in the flesh. He demands for his followers not mere intellectual affirmations, but an actual walking in his truth, using our very bodies, and living his teaching. We are to renounce unnecessary possessions, actually feed the poor, confess him with our lips, reverence human sexuality through chaste living, accept suffering, even embraced it, for the sake of the kingdom, and so forth.
Faith is about real things, about actual concrete behaviours that involve not only what we think, but actually how we physically move our body through the created order, how we interact with the physical order, and with one another.
For there are, and have been, many Gnostic and neo-gnostic tendencies down through the centuries which seek to reduce faith merely to intellectualism, to ideas or opinions, and to remove things from the world of reality. Thus St. John and the Church have had to insist over and over that Jesus is real, that faith is real, and is about real, tangible, even material things.
Yet despite this radical physicality seen in the Gospel and the work of God, there remains a persistent tendency on the part of many to reduce the faith by removing it from the physical and temporal order rendering it a merely ethical notion, an intellectualism, or a set of ideas, and even mere opinion. Faith rooted in daily reality, and with measurable parameters, is set aside, and sophistry takes place. Never mind what a person does, all that seems to matter to many is what they think about it, or what their intentions are.
The reduction of reality and truth to “what I perceive it to be” or what I think it is” is bearing bitter and dangerous fruit in modern gender theory. So someone can claim that despite the fact that they have a body which is clearly biologically male, they are in fact a woman and vice-versa, and anyone who challenges that can be accused of hate crime. And It’s very telling that such a person will not say “I am a woman” but rather: “I identify as female.” And that little linguistic dance move belies the truth. The person cannot say in truth: “I am a woman” since the plain truth indicates that he is a man. But once people start to deny the importance of physical reality all this can happen and we have here yet another manifestation of Gnosticism.
The doctrinal denial that Jesus has come in the flesh may seem a long way from our problems but it appears in all sorts of ways today. It’s a little surprising that although in the last fifty years the practice of Christianity has declined in the west, in same period more books have been written about Jesus than in previous nineteen hundred years. Some of it is ‘airport fiction’ like Dan Brown’s “The Da Vinci Code”. Some of it is more serious scholarly work and all manner of popular books now purport to tell us the ‘real truth’ about Jesus, the truth that’s been hidden in undiscovered documents, or the truth that the Catholic Church has been covering up for centuries. The intriguing thing is none of these books seem to attack Jesus himself. The assumption always seems to be that he was a basically decent bloke. That says something about the effect he has had on our world. Even the Monty Python team when they were making “The Life of Brian” felt there was nothing in Jesus himself they could make fun of. At some level there is a recognition of Jesus being central to world history. All the efforts are to show that his followers and interpreters have got him wrong, misinterpreted or deliberately misrepresented him. There’s somehow a sense of his importance, and if people can only disprove the inflated crazy claims that have been made about him, then they can sleep secure. Because Jesus is Jesus and if he really is the son of God then that makes huge demands of everyone. So it becomes all the more important to try to prove that he isn’t.
So there’s still no shortage of opinions about Jesus. The question Jesus asks the apostles at Caesarea Philippi:
"Who do men say that the Son of man is?" (Mt. 16:13)
is every bit as real today as when Jesus first asked it. The apostles offered him three alternatives; we could probably offer him three dozen. There are all sorts of opinions about Jesus flying around, some mistaken, some deliberately at odds with the scriptures and the creeds, some just plain wacky. And although many indeed most of these ideas come from outside the Church many of them enjoy an active life within her. In his book “The Historical Jesus: The Life of a Mediterranean Jewish Peasant”, (1991) the scholar and ex-priest, John Dominic Crossan argues that the body of Jesus was probably eaten by dogs. I remember several priests devouring the book back in the 90’s. And how many authors within the fold, scripture scholars and others effectively deny the full truth about Christ, his miracles his resurrection, his birth etc. So even the Bible itself is no sure defence against these aberrations. People can make it say more or less what they want. The only defence against this is the Church’s tradition, the depositum fidei. John’s way of saying this is:
Let what you heard from the beginning abide in you. If what you heard from the beginning abides in you, then you will abide in the Son and in the Father. (2:24)
Chapter 5
Who is it that overcomes the world but he who believes that Jesus is the Son of God? 6 This is he who came by water and blood, Jesus Christ, not with the water only but with the water and the blood. 7 And the Spirit is the witness, because the Spirit is the truth. 8 There are three witnesses, the Spirit, the water, and the blood; and these three agree. (5:5-8)
This is a direct argument against the heretic Cerinthus, who held that the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity came to dwell in the man Jesus at his baptism and departed just before Jesus’ passion. John refutes this, insisting that just as at His baptism Jesus’ divine nature was affirmed
This is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased
so also was it affirmed during the shedding of His blood on Calvary (the inspired word of God records the centurion, on seeing the manner of Jesus’ death, saying,
Surely this was the Son of God (Mat 27:54).
So to say that Jesus “came” in this context means he manifested his divinity. Remember how the Epiphany liturgy conflates the visit of the Magi with Jesus’ baptism and the manifestation of his glory at Cana.
Tribus miraculis ornatum, diem sanctum colimus: Hodie stella Magos duxit ad praesepium: Hodie vinum ex aqua factum est ad nuptias: Hodie in Jordane a Joanne Christus baptizari voluit, ut salvaret nos, Alleluia.
We observe this holy day, ornamented with three miracles: Today a star led the Magi to the manger; Today wine was made from water at the wedding; Today in the Jordan Christ desired to be baptised by John, so that He might save us, Alleluia.
Given that this is John writing we can’t help thinking of what happens after his death in the gospel.
34 But one of the soldiers pierced his side with a spear, and at once there came out blood and water. 35 He who saw it has borne witness -- his testimony is true, and he knows that he tells the truth -- that you also may believe. 36 For these things took place that the scripture might be fulfilled, "Not a bone of him shall be broken." 37 And again another scripture says, "They shall look on him whom they have pierced." (John 19:35-37)
Jewish Sacrificial law required that the blood of the victim should not be congealed but should flow so that it can be sprinkled, so the priest had to cut open the heart of the victim, so maybe this is one more way of emphasising that Jesus dies as a sacrificial victim. John insists that he tells the truth in order that the reader may believe, so he must see a deeper significance here. He’s also telling us here that the sacraments of Baptism and Eucharist have their origin here.
To a first century Jew familiar with the topography of Jerusalem this scene may well have held yet another meaning. Josephus in The Jewish War tells us that there were 256,500 lambs sacrificed at the Passover. Now that figure sounds exaggerated, how would they achieve all that in one day? But we are talking of at least tens of thousands of animals. Where does all the blood go from these sacrifices? According to an ancient Jewish tradition this blood was directed into a drain that flowed from the altar of sacrifice and merged with a spring of water that flowed from the side of Temple Mount. It flowed into the Kedron brook. So at Passover time, if you approached the Temple from the Kedron valley to enter by the golden gate you would have seen a stream of blood and water flowing from the side of the Temple. It’s John once again telling us that Jesus is the true Temple, the true dwelling place of God on Earth. And he continues to come to us through water and blood, that is, through Baptism and Eucharist. Through these sacraments, we are filled with the Spirit who is Truth.
18 We know that any one born of God does not sin, but He who was born of God keeps him, and the evil one does not touch him. 19 We know that we are of God, and the whole world is in the power of the evil one. 20 And we know that the Son of God has come and has given us understanding, to know him who is true; and we are in him who is true, in his Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God and eternal life. 21 Little children, keep yourselves from idols. (5:18-21)
These last four verses are a climax and summary of the whole letter. They could sound a bit like the classic Protestant “assurance of salvation, except the last line recognises that possibility that we can all still do the wrong thing. Earlier John says:
Little children, let us not love in word or speech but in deed and in truth. By this we shall know that we are of the truth, and reassure our hearts before him. (3:18)
That last line seems a complete non-sequitur, especially as it is addressed to people who have been living the Christian life for many years, and many of them are Jewish converts for whom idolatry is probably not an option. But in fact it sums up the whole letter, and perhaps about a half of the Christian life. It’s something like “avoid the sham and keep to the genuine.” It could well be that in the context of the Eastern Roman empire the temptations to material idolatry were many. At Ephesus there was a huge temple to the goddess Artemis (Diana) and the non-Jewish Christians may well have come from a background where such worship was common and they needed encouragement not to fall back into that. Paul addresses these issues very clearly in 1 Corinthians:
18 Consider the people of Israel; are not those who eat the sacrifices partners in the altar? 19 What do I imply then? That food offered to idols is anything, or that an idol is anything? 20 No, I imply that what pagans sacrifice they offer to demons and not to God. I do not want you to be partners with demons. 21 You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons. You cannot partake of the table of the Lord and the table of demons. (1Cor 10:18-21)
But there doesn’t seem to be the slightest mention of this problem in the rest of this letter. But all along the issue has been about false versions of Christianity. If we look for the wider meaning of ‘idol’ it refers to anything that takes or usurps the place due to God. We find this metaphorical meaning of idolatry elsewhere.
Be sure of this, that no fornicator or impure man, or one who is covetous (that is, an idolater), has any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God. (Ephesians 5:5)
5 Put to death therefore what is earthly in you: fornication, impurity, passion, evil desire, and covetousness, which is idolatry. (Colossians 3:5)
So John seems to be saying: “Keep away from sinful God-substitutes.” He has in mind those half-baked heretical images of Jesus which have been causing such trouble within his community. He feels so strongly about these false ideas that he equates them with
the sin which leads to death (v. 16)
and with pagan idols. There is a sense in which this last verse is ‘the big reveal.’ What John has been talking about all along, the liars, deceivers, antichrists, the source of the problems, he now gives a final diagnosis. The thing the that OT most detests, the thing that Jews have avoided most assiduously, idolatry, that’s the thing which has been at work in his own community, so let’s call it what it is. As an analogy we might consider how various types of exploitation in our modern world have been labelled ‘slavery’. So human trafficking and bonded labour and the use of child labour have all been practised with impunity and people have justified these things. But once you label something ‘slavery’ you deny it all legitimacy. Or let’s say an adult in psychotherapy talks about his childhood in a dysfunctional family and at a certain point the therapist says: “you were the victim of child abuse”. Whatever that dysfunctional behaviour was, it probably seemed normal to the client when it was going on. But once it is labelled ‘abuse’ it takes on a gravity, it has a name which means it should never have been tolerated and the client no longer has to make the slightest effort to justify or explain his parents’ behaviour. John does something similar here. Whatever the Gnostics (or whoever) call their teaching and opinions, he nails it and says it’s idolatry, that most despised practise. Raymond Brown argues the idols are the heretics themselves. (He calls them secessionists.) Although this doesn’t seem to appear in any English translations, it’s clear from the Greek that John isn’t just thinking of idols or idolatry in general. He uses the definite article; the idols
He has definite things (or people) in mind.
(The afternoon talk on the Good Samaritan will be published in a separate post)
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