act, he does not. It is the one whose sin is “not unto death” who is termed a brother; he whose sin is “unto death” is neither named nor de scribed. Nevertheless, supposing John thinks of each as a brother, we must still assert that neither can be regarded as a child of God. The rea sons for denying that he who sins “unto death” is a Christian have al ready been given; what can be said about him whose sin is “not unto death?” An important point, to which commenators surprisingly give no attention, is that he is given life in answer to prayer. This means that, although his sin is “not unto death,” he is in fact dead and needs to be given life. How can you give life to one who is already alive ? This man is not a Christian, for Chris tians do not fall into death when they fall into sin. True, “life” to John means communion with God, and the sinning Christian cannot enjoy fel lowship with God (1:5, 6), but John would certainly not have said that when the Christian sins, he dies and needs to receive eternal life again. The Christian has “passed out of death into life” (3:14, RSV; cf. John 5:24). Death and judgment are be hind him; he “has life” (12) as a present and ab id ing possession. When he stumbles into sin, which he may (2:1), he has a heavenly advocate (2:2). He needs to be for given and cleansed (1:10), but John never says he needs to be “quick ened,” “made alive,” or “given life” all over again. If this is so, neither he whose sin is “unto death” nor he whose sin is “not unto death” is a Christian, pos sessing eternal life. Both are “dead in trespasses and sins” (Eph. 2:1). Each “abideth in death” (3:14). The difference between them is that one may receive life through a Chris tian’s intercession, while the other will die the second death. Spiritually dead already, he will die eternally. Only such a serious state as this 32
would lead John to say that he will not advise his readers to pray for such a person. The question remains: How can someone who (if the above inter pretation be correct) is not a Chris tian, be termed a brother? The only answer is that John must here be using the word in the broader sense of a “neighbor” or of a nominal Christian, a church member who pro fesses to be a “brother.” Certainly in 2:9, 11 the word “brother” is not used strictly, for he who hates him is not a Christian at all but “in the darkness.” In 3:16, 17 also the word seems to have this wider connotation, where we are bidden to lay down our lives “for the brethren” and to sup ply the material necessities of a “brother in need.” Since Christ died for the ungodly and for His enemies, we can scarcely suppose that we are to limit our self-sacrifice and service exclusively to our Christian breth ren, and to have compassion only upon them. Such a wider connota tion of the word brother, implied also in the teaching of Jesus (Matt. 5 :22- 24, 7:3-5), “arises not so much out of the character and standing of him whom you call your brother, as out of the nature of the affection with which you regard him” (Candlish). This suggestion is supported by the somewhat similar passage in the Epistle of James (5:19, 20). We have a further confirmation of the interpretation argued above if under the description of the “sin unto death” John is alluding, as many commentators believe, to the false teachers. In John’s view they were not apostates; they were coun terfeits. They were not true “broth ers” who had received eternal life and subsequently forfeited it. They were “antichrists.” Denying the Son, they did not possess the Father (2:22, 23; II John 9). They were children of the devil, not children of God (3:10). True, they had once been members of the visible congre-
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