1 John 4:2

Hereby know ye Or, Herein ye know: the verb may be either indicative or imperative (comp. 1 John 2:27; 1 John 2:29). The indicative is preferable, in spite of the imperatives in 1 John 4:1: comp. 1 John 3:16; 1Jn 3:19; 1 John 3:24, which are very closely parallel to this. -Ye know" is literally -ye come to know, perceive, recognise": -herein" refers to what follows: see on 1 John 3:19.

every spirit that confesseth This idea of -confessing" one's belief is specially frequent in S. John: John 2:23; John 4:15; 2 John 1:7; John 9:22; John 12:42; comp. Romans 10:9.

that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh See on 2 John 1:7. This is the crucial test, and one which would at once expose -the spirits" of Cerinthian and Docetic teachers. We are not to suppose that all other articles of faith are unimportant; or that to deny this truth is the worst of all denials (see on 1 John 2:22); or that such denial involves every kind of doctrinal error. But against the errors prevalent in that age this was the great safeguard. The confession must of course be not with the tongue only but in truth, and in deed as well as in word (1 John 3:18): non lingua sed factis, non sonando sed amando(Bede).

The sentence may be taken in more ways than one: (1) as both A. V. and R. V.; (2) more accurately, and with some difference of meaning; confesseth Jesus Christ as come in the flesh; (3) confesseth that Jesus is the Christ come in the flesh. Remark that S. John does not say -come intothe flesh", but - inthe flesh": Christ did not descend (as Cerinthus said) into an already existing man, but He came in human nature; He - becameflesh". Moreover he does not say that the confession is to be of a Christ who came(ἐλθόντα), but of a Christ who is come(ἐληλυθότα). This -coming" is not an exhausted fact: He is come and abides in the flesh.

S. Paul gives almost exactly the same test: -I give you to understand that no man speaking in the Spirit of God saith, Jesus is anathema; and no man can say, Jesus is Lord, but in the Holy Spirit" (1 Corinthians 12:3).

is of God Proceeds from Him as its source: comp. 1 John 3:10. "To confess that Jesus the anointed is come in the flesh, is to confess that there is a medium of spiritual communications between the visible and the invisible world, between earth and heaven. It is to confess that there is one Mediator for all men" (Maurice).