[ 2Jn 1:1-3]. The Address. “The Elder to elect Kyria and her children, whom I love in Truth, and not I alone but also all that have got to know the Truth, because of the Truth that abideth in us; and with us it shall be for ever. Yea, there shall be with us grace, mercy, peace from God the Father and from Jesus Christ the Son of the Father in Truth and love.”
[ 2Jn 1:2]. μένουσαν ἐν ἡμῖν, not merely apprehended by the intellect but welcomed by the heart. μεθʼ ἡμῶν, nobiscum, bei uns, as our guest and companion.
[ 2Jn 1:3]. ἔσται μεθʼ ἡμῶν, not a wish ([ 1Pe 1:2]; [ 2Pe 1:2]) but a confident assurance. χάρις the well-spring in the heart of God; ἔλεος, its outpourings; εἰρήνη, its blessed effect. They are evangelical blessings: (1) not merely “from God” but “from God the Father and from Jesus Christ the Son of the Father” who has interpreted Him and brought Him near, made Him accessible; (2) not merely “in Truth,” enlightening the intellect, but “in love,” engaging the heart.
Observe the high tribute which the Elder pays to Kyria: (1) He testifies to the esteem in which she is held; (2) he recognises her as a fellow-worker as though she were a fellow-apostle—the three-fold “us,” not “you”; (3) he is about to speak of the danger from heretical teaching, but he has no fear of her being led astray: “You and I are secure from the deceiver. The Truth abideth in us; with us it shall be for ever; yea, there shall be with us grace, mercy, peace.”
[ 2Jn 1:4]. The Occasion of the Epistle. “I was exceedingly glad because I have found some of thy children walking in Truth, even as we received commandment from the Father.”
ἐχάρην, of a glad surprise (cf. [ Mar 14:11]). He had been too often disappointed in lads like these (see Introd., p. 155). They had profited by the nurture of their godly home, the best equipment for the battle of life. “No man should ever leave money to his children. It is a curse to them. What we should do for our children, if we would do them the best service we can, is to give them the best training we can procure for them, and then turn them loose in the world without a sixpence to fend for themselves” (Cecil John Rhodes). εὕρηκα, “I have found”. He sits down at once and writes to Kyria. How glad she would be that her lads, far away in the great city were true to their early faith! ἐκ τῶν τέκνων, “some of thy children” (a tenderer word than “sons,” υἱῶν), “members of thy family,” not implying that others had done ill; the lads who had come to Ephesus. περιπατοῦντας, κ.τ.λ., ambulantes in veritate, die in der Wahrheit wandeln, “ordering their lives according to the precepts of the Gospel”. See note on [ 1Jn 1:6].
[ 2Jn 1:5-6]. The Comprehensive Commandment. “And now I ask thee, Kyria, not as writing a new commandment to thee but the one which we had from the beginning, that we love one another. And this is love—that we walk according to His commandments; this is the commandment, even as ye heard from the beginning—that we should walk in love,”
These counsels are just a summary of the doctrines expounded at large in the first Epistle. There is here a sort of reasoning in a circle: The commandment is Love; Love is walking according to His commandments; His commandments are summed up in one—Love.
[ 2Jn 1:6]. ἡ ἀγάπη, “the love just referred to”. περιπ. κατὰ τὰς ἐντ. αὐτ., regulating our lives by their requirements; περιπ. ἐν ἀληθείᾳ ([ 2Jn 1:4]), keeping within the limits of the Christian revelation and not straying beyond them—not προάγοντες ([ 2Jn 1:9]). αὐτῇ, i.e., “love,” not “the commandment” (Vulg.: Hoc est mandatum, ut … in eo ambuletis). περιπατεῖν ἐν ἀγάπῃ is synonymous with περιπατεῖν ἐν ἀληθείᾳ, since Love is Truth in practice. Cf. the story of R. Hillel: A mocking Gentile promised to become a proselyte if he would teach him the whole Law while he stood on one foot—a gibe at the multitudinous precepts, reckoned at 613. “What is hateful to thyself,” said the Rabbi, “do not to thy neighbour. This is the whole Law; the rest is commentary.” Yalk. Chad., lix. 2; “qui justum cibat frusto, perinde est acsi totum Pentateuchum servasset”.
[ 2Jn 1:7-8]. A Warning against Heretical Teaching. “Because many deceivers went forth into the world—even they that confess not Jesus as Christ coming in flesh. This is the deceiver and the Antichrist. Look to yourselves, that ye may not lose what we wrought, but receive a full wage.”
[ 2Jn 1:8]. μισθόν, cf. [ Mat 20:8]; [ Jas 5:4]. St. John here addresses not only Kyria but her family and “the Church in her house”. He views them as his fellow-labourers in the Lord’s vineyard: “We have worked together (ἠργασάμεθα): see that you do not forfeit the reward of your labour. Get a full wage. Be not like workmen who toward the close of the day fall off, doing their work hadly or losing time, and get less than a full day’s pay.” ἀπολέσητε … ἠργασάμεθα … ἀπολάβητε: “We have been fellow-workers thus far, and I mean to be faithful to the last; see that you also be so”. Their danger lay in taking up with false teaching and losing the comfort of the Gospel in its simplicity and fulness.
[ 2Jn 1:9]. Progress in Theological Thought. “Every one that ‘progresseth’ and abideth not in the eaching of the Christ hath not God; he that abideth in the teaching—this man hath both the Father and the Son.”
ὁ προάγων: the Corinthians (see Introd. pp. 156 f.) boasted of their enlightenment. They were “progressives,” “advanced thinkers”. τῇ διδαχῇ τοῦ Χριστοῦ, the teaching which recognises Jesus as the Christ (see note on [ 1Jn 4:1-2]), i.e. the Messiah, the Saviour. Θεὸν οὐκ ἔχει, i.e. according to His true nature as the Father manitested in the Son (καὶ τὸν Πατέρα καὶ τὸν Υἱόν). It is necessary not merely to believe in God but to believe in Him “through Christ” ([ 1Pe 1:21]).
St. John does not here condemn theological progress, which is a necessity of living and growing faith. A doctrine is a statement of Christian experience, and since there is always more in Christ than we have ever experienced, our doctrines can never be adequate or final. Theology is to God’s revelation in Grace as Science is to His revelation in Nature; and just as Science is always discovering more of the wonders of the First Creation, so Theology is always entering more deeply into the glory of the New Creation and appropriating more of the treasures which are hidden in Christ. Even the inspired Apostles did not comprehend all His fulness. Each saw only so much as was revealed to him, and declared only so much as he saw. Each approached the infinite wonder along the lines of his temperament and experience. St. John saw in it a revelation of Eternal Life; St. Paul the Reconciliation of sinners to God, the satisfaction of humanity’s long desire and the completion of its long discipline under the Law; the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews the rending of the Veil and the opening of free Access to God. St. John does not condemn theological progress; he defines its limits: “abide in the teaching of the Christ”. (1) We must never break with the past; the new truth is always an outgrowth of the old. A theology which is simply old is dead; a theology which is simply new is false (Cf. [ Mat 13:52]). (2) We must maintain “the teaching of the Christ”. Jesus is the Saviour, and no interpretation of Christianity is true which eliminates Redemption or obscures the glory of the Cross.
[ 2Jn 1:10-11]. Treatment of Heretical Teachers. “If any one cometh unto you and bringeth not this teaching, receive him not into your house, and bid him not farewell. For he that biddeth him farewell hath fellowship with his works, his evil works.”
[ 2Jn 1:11]. κοινωνεῖ, cf. [ 1Jn 1:3]. An unholy κοινωνία. τοῖς ἔργ. αὐτ. τοῖς πον., cf. [ 1Jn 1:2]: τὴν ζωὴν τὴν αἰώνιον. The adjective is an emphatic afterthought.
This counsel recalls the story of St. John’s behaviour to Cerinthus (see Introd. p. 157), and it was cited by Irenæus (i. ix. 3) as inculcating intolerance of heretics. If so, it is certainly an unChristian counsel, contrary to the spirit and teaching of our Lord (cf. [ Mar 9:38-39]; [ Luk 9:51-56]; [ Mat 13:28-29]). Heretics are our fellow-creatures; Jesus died for them also, and our office is to win them. If we close our doors and our hearts against them, we lose our opportunity of winning them and harden them in their opposition. There are two thoughts which may well teach us forbearance and humility: (1) The patience of the Lord. A Jewish fable tells how Abraham thrust an aged wayfarer from his tent because he asked no blessing on his food and avowed himself a fire-worshipper. And the Lord said: “I have suffered him these hundred years, although he dishonoured Me; and couldst not thou endure him for one night?” (2) The mystery of the things of God and the blindness of our intellects. “Illi,” says St. Augustine (Contra Epistolam Manichcæi, 2), “in vos sæviant, qui neseiunt cum quo labore verum inveniatur, et quam difficile caveantur errores”. This counsel of the Apostle must be read in the light of local circumstances. There was need of caution and discrimination in receiving the itinerant “apostles and prophets” who went from church to church, lest they should prove “false apostles” (ψευδαπόστολοι) and “false prophets” (ψευδοπροφῆται). See Didache, xi.–xii., where the test is given: οὐ πᾶς ὁ λαλῶν ἐν πνεύματι προφήτης ἐστίν, ἀλλʼ ἐὰν ἔχῃ τοὺς τπρόπους Κυρίου. It is not until the second century that there is any appearance of buildings set apart for worship. The primitive ἐκκλησίαι met in private houses (cf. [ Rom 16:5]; [ 1Co 16:19]; [ Col 4:15]; [ Phm 1:2]); and when St. John warns Kyria against “receiving into her house” a heretical teacher, it is not showing him hospitality that he forbids, but affording him an opportunity to unsettle the faith of the brethren. She must neither let him pervert “the church in her house” nor send him on his way to a neighbouring church with the recommendation of her confidence and goodwill. This is expressed, though somewhat vaguely, by Clem. Alex.: “Hoc in hujusmodi non est inhumanum, sed nec conquirere vel condisputare cum talibus admonet qui non valent intelligibiliter divina tractare, ne per eos traducantur a doctrina veritatis, verisimilibus inducti rationibus. Arbitror autem, quia et orare cum talibus non oportet, quoniam in oratione quæ fit in domo, postquam ab orando surgitur, salutatio gaudii est et pacis indicium.”
[ 2Jn 1:12-13]. The Conclusion. “Though I have many things to write to you, I would not by paper and ink; but I hope to get to you, and talk face to face, that our joy may be fulfilled. The children of thine elect sister salute thee.”
[ 2Jn 1:13]. See Introd. pp. 162 f.