John 1:14

καὶ ὁ λόγος σὰρξ ἐγένετο, “and the Word became flesh”. This is not a mere repetition. John has told us that the Logos came into the world, but now he emphasises the actual mode of His coming and the character of the revelation thus made, καί “simply carrying forward the discourse” (Meyer) and now introducing the chief statement (Luthardt). It is this great statement to which the whole prologue has been directed; and accordingly he names again the great Being to whom he at first introduced us but whom he has not named since the first verse. As forcibly as possible does he put the contrast between the prior and the subsequent conditions, ὁ λόγος σὰρξ ἐγένετο; he does not even say ἄνθρωπος but σάρξ. He wishes both to emphasise the interval crossed, λόγος, σάρξ; and to direct attention to the visibility of the manifestation. Cf. 1 Timothy 3:16, ἐφανερώθη ἐν σαρκί; 1 John 4:2, ἐν σαρκὶ ἐληλυθώς; also Hebrews 2:14. “Flesh expresses here human nature as a whole regarded under the aspect of its present corporal embodiment, including of necessity the ‘soul' (John 12:27) and the ‘spirit' (John 11:33; John 13:21) as belonging to the totality of man” (Westcott). The copula is ἐγένετο, and what precisely this word covers has been the problem of theology ever since the Gospel was written. The Logos did not become flesh in the sense that He was turned into flesh or ceased to be what He was before; as a boy who becomes a man ceases to be a boy. By his use of the word ἐκένωσεν in connection with the incarnation Paul intimates that something was left behind when human nature was assumed; but in any case this was not the Divine essence nor the personality. The virtue of the incarnation clearly consists in this, that the very Logos became man. The Logos, retaining His personal identity, “became” man so as to live as man. καὶ ἐσκήνωσεν ἐν ἡμῖν, “and tabernacled among us”; not only appeared in the flesh for a brief space, manifesting Himself as a Being apart from men and superior to human conditions, but dwelt among us (“non tantum momento uno apparuisse, sed versatum esse inter homines,” Calvin). The “tent,” σκηνή, suggests no doubt temporary occupation, but not more temporary than human life. Cf. 2 Corinthians 5:1; 2 Peter 1:13. And both in classical and N.T. Greek σκηνοῦν had taken the meaning “dwell,” whether for a long or a short time. Cf. Revelation 7:15; Revelation 12:12, and Raphel, Annot. in loc. From the use of the word in Xenophon to denote living together and eating together Brentius would interpret in a fuller sense: “Filius ille Dei came indutus, inter nos homines vixit, nobiscum locutus est, nobiscum convivatus est”. But the association in John's mind was of course not military, but was rather with the Divine tabernacle in the wilderness, when Jehovah pitched His tent among the shifting tents of His people, and shared even in their thirty-eight years of punishment. Whether there is an allusion to the שְׁבִינָה has been doubted, but it is probable. The Shekinah meant the token of God's presence and glory, and among the later Jews at all events it was supposed to be present not only in the temple but with individuals. See Schoettgen in loc. and Weber, Die Lehren des Talmud, § 39. What the tabernacle had been, the dwelling of God in the midst of the people, the humanity of the Logos now was. καὶ ἐθεασάμεθα τὴν δόξαν αὐτοῦ, we, among whom He lived, beheld by our own personal observation the glory of the incarnate Logos. “Beheld,” neither, on the one hand, only by spiritual contemplation (Baur), nor, on the other, merely with the bodilyeye, by which the glory could not be seen. This “beholding” John treasured as the wealth and joy of his life. The “glory” they saw was not like the cloud or dazzling light in which God had manifested His glory in the ancient tabernacle. It was now a true ethical glory, a glory of personality and character, manifesting itself in human conditions. It is described as something unique, δόξαν ὡς μονογενοῦς παρὰ πατρός, “a glory as of an only begotten from a father”. ὡς introduces an illustrative comparison, as is indicated by the anarthrous μονογενοῦς. Holtzmann expands thus: “The impression which the glory made was of so specific a character that it could be taken for nothing less than such a glory as an only son has from a father, that is, as the only one of its kind: for besides the μονογενής a father has no other sons”. But the expression is no doubt suggested by the immediately preceding statement that as many as received Christ were born of God. The glory of the Incarnate Logos, however, is unique, that of an only begotten. In the connection, therefore, the application of the relation of Father and Son to God and Christ is close at hand and obvious, although not explicitly made. “The thought centres in the abstract relation of Father and Son, though in the actual connection this abstract relation passes necessarily into the relation of the Son to the Father.” Westcott. παρὰ πατρός more naturally follows δόξαν than μονογενοῦς. The glory proceeds from the Father and dwells in the only begotten wholly, as if there were no other children required to reflect some rays of the Divine glory. Accordingly He is πλήρης. With what is πλήρης to be construed? Erasmus thinks with Ἰωάννης following. Codex Bezae reads πλήρη and joins it to δόξαν. Many interpreters consider it to be one of those slight irregularities such as occur in Mark 12:40 and Philippians 3:19 and in the Apoc., and would unite it either with αὐτοῦ or μονογενοῦς. But (pace Weiss) there is no good reason why we should not accept it as it stands and construe it in agreement with the nominative to ἐσκήνωσε. χάριτος καὶ ἀληθείας. His glory consisted in the moral qualities that appeared in Him. What these qualities were will appear more readily from John 1:17.