realities of his life and love have been disclosed to men in their proper meaning and power, and through him men may know the truth and be made free by it (viii. 32). Their life may be illumined, enriched, and ennobled by a knowledge of God as he truly is, through living contact and renewing fellowship with him. Hence the truthlife as seen in the light of God- becomes something intensely real and practical. The truth is something to be done (iii. 21; i. 6). It is, as it were, an atmosphere in which one must live. To walk in the truth (II. 4; III. 3) is to live the life of fellowship with God and of likeness to him. It is synonymous with "walking in the light" (I. i. 7) or “abiding in the light” (I. ii. 10) which, in turn, is explained as obedience to the commandment, at once old and new, that men should love one another (I. ii. 10; iii. 11; II. 5).

God's perfect knowledge of what is in the human heart is asserted in the passage: "Hereby shall we know that we are of the truth, and shall assure our heart before him, whereinsoever our heart condemn us; because God is greater than our heart and knoweth all things" (I. iii. 19, 20). Interpreters are divided in opinion respecting the sense in which God is said to be "greater than our heart" whether greater in severity or greater in leniency. On the former view the meaning would be that since God's knowledge of our sinfulness is greater than ours, he must condemn us much more severely than we condemn ourselves. On the latter view the thought is Those who truly live the life of love have this comforting assurance, that God will freely forgive the sins which still beset them, because he is greater in compassion than their own accusing consciences are. I confidently adopt this view of the meaning.1 God knows and takes full account of the sincere intention, the right central purpose and main direction of life, the weakness of human nature and the strength of men's temptations, and where the man is really "of the truth," that is, sincerely desiring and striving to conform to the demands of the life 1 Cf. The Johannine Theology, pp. 68-70.

of holy love, God judges his faults more mercifully than he himself does. There is, however, no failure in the Johannine writings to recognize the holy displeasure of God against sin and the severity of his condemnation of it. Although the word "righteousness" is not employed in a judicial or penal sense (see I. i. 9; ii. 29), the law and penalty side of the divine nature is frequently emphasized. We have already seen how this is done in connection with the teaching, that although the direct object of Jesus' coming into the world was to save and not to judge the world, yet a process of judgment was inevitably involved in his work, and that God's condemnation stands against those who love darkness rather than light (iii. 19). The necessary reaction of God's holy nature against sin is amply brought out in connection with the doctrine of love. Since love, in the sense in which John uses the word, and sin are incompatible (I. iii. 9), it is evident that God, whose nature is love, must repudiate and condemn sin. Love is thus seen to be essentially righteous. It is no mere benevolence or good nature. Only he who loves can abide in the light of God (I. ii. 10). The sinful world has no understanding or appreciation of the life of those who live in the fellowship of the divine love (I. iii. 1), because evil is as contrary to love as darkness is to light. Love of the world, the supreme choice of the pleasures and possessions of this temporary order, is inconsistent with love to the Father, that is, with moral likeness to God (I. ii. 15). Every one who has been born into the life of love sets his hope on attaining a purity like that of Christ. "Every one that hath this hope set on him, purifieth himself, even as he is pure" (I. iii. 3). To "do righteousness" and to love one's brother are inseparable elements of the life which is begotten of God (I. ii. 29; iii. 10). Sin is lovelessness, and "he that loveth not abideth in death" (I. iii. 14). The possession of love is eternal life. How evident it is, then, that love, in the thought of the apostle, includes not only the self-imparting impulse in God but also his self-assertion as against sinthe energy of his holy nature in repudiating its opposite.

Love includes both benevolence and righteousness. The exercise of the divine love is regulated by the demands and standards of absolute holiness. Thus love is seen to be the most adequate definition of the moral nature and the best compendium of the Christian idea of God.

These considerations show us how God is to be known. "Every one that loveth knoweth God, for God is love" (I. iv. 7, 8). How obvious it is that we have to do here with something more than an intellectual knowing. It is the knowledge which is possible only in living fellowship and through kinship of spirit. It is the knowledge which comes from welcoming the divine light which shines down into this sinful world (i. 5) and from walking therein. Such a knowledge Christ has opened to men. He has shown them the way to fellowship with God. "The Son of God hath given us an understanding, that we know him that is true" (I. v. 20), and such knowledge of God is the indispensable condition of realizing the eternal life (ib.; ef. xvii. 20). It is a knowledge which involves the whole nature. It is man's entire grasp of God. John's doctrine is something more than mysticism. It involves the will as well as the intellect and feeling. The knowledge of God is attained only by love, and love requires the doing of God's commandments. Such knowledge is attained only on the path of obedience. The doctrine is practical. He knows God who lives a Godlike life. He knows Christ who walks with him and keeps his commandments. The apostle's mysticism never loses itself in mere devout ecstasies or subjective phantasies. It deals with men's every-day cares and labors, not to degrade the knowledge of God to the level of other knowledge, but to exalt all religious duty by showing how it leads to the heights of Godlikeness and to the consequent realization of the eternal life.

CHAPTER III

THE LOGOS

THE Logos-idea has its roots in the Old Testament and in post-canonical Jewish literature. The word of Jehovah is the fiat of his almighty will:

"By the word of the Lord were the heavens made;

And all the host of them by the breath of his mouth."
(Ps. xxxiii. 6.)

This word is often poetically personified, as when it is said that God's word shall accomplish that which he pleases (Is. lv. 10). By a natural extension of the meaning of the term the word of God easily becomes a name for the revelation or message of Jehovah to men. In this sense the prophets are said to see the word of the Lord (Is. ii. 1). More distinctly still is the word of God personified in passages where divine attributes, such as rectitude (Ps. xxxiii. 4) and power (Jer. xxiii. 29), are ascribed to it.

In the wisdom-books this personification proceeds a step further. There wisdom becomes an agent of God in the accomplishment of his gracious will and purpose. In Job wisdom is the secret of life, securely hidden from the common observation of men. It is "that path which no bird of prey knoweth, and which the falcon's eye hath not (xxviii. 7). But God knows where it dwells and he has searched it out and declared it unto men:

seen

"Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom;

And to depart from evil is understanding" (v. 28).

In Proverbs wisdom is God's messenger who lifts up her voice in the street and at the city gates and bids men walk in her pure and pleasant ways:

"Unto you, O men, I call;

And my voice is unto the sons of men" (viii. 4).

Before the world was made Jehovah formed her and established her from everlasting (vv. 22, 23). Wisdom was his companion when he settled the mountains, established the heavens, and gave the sea its bound:

"Then I was by him as a master-workman:

And I was daily his delight,

Rejoicing always before him;

Rejoicing in his habitable earth;

And my delight was with the sons of men" (vv. 30, 31). These are poetic forms of thought in which the idea of God's active energy, his self-revealing nature is set forth. They are ways of describing the living God who does not remain shut up within himself, but expresses his nature in acts of power and in works of benevolence and grace.

In the apocryphal wisdom-literature we may trace the development of the Logos-idea a step further. In Ecclesiasticus the personification of wisdom found in Proverbs is more fully elaborated. She is the first creation of God, and becomes the friend of all who fear and love him. (i. 4, 10). She issues from the mouth of God and inhabits the remote places of earth and heaven. But in a special manner she dwells in Israel and has established her throne in Zion (xxiv. 3-12). She makes her instruction to shine as the morning, and sends forth her light afar off; she pours out her doctrine for the benefit of the most distant generations (xxiv. 32, 33). In the Book of Wisdom the origin and nature of wisdom are most vividly described. She is one to be loved above health and beauty and to be chosen instead of light (vii. 10). She is "the artificer of all things," a holy and subtle spirit, "more mobile than any motion," and penetrating all things "by reason of her pureness" (vii. 22, 24). The description continues:

"For she is a breath of the power of God, and a pure effluence from the glory of the Almighty; therefore no defiling thing falls into her; for she is a reflection of the everlasting light, and an unspotted mirror of the efficiency