John 1:16

[See also the "General Considerations on the Prologue" in the comments of John 1:18.]

Ver. 16. “ And of his fullness we have all received, and grace for grace. ”

By that first feature of the divine character, grace, the Church recognized in Jesus the Word made flesh. The two words, χάρις (grace), and πλήρωμα (fullness), closely connect this sentence with the last words of John 1:14. The experience which the Church has had, has come to set the seal upon the testimony of those who surrounded Jesus when on earth. Since Heracleon and Origen, many (Luther, Melanchthon, etc.), have made John 1:16 the continuation of John the Baptist's discourse (John 1:15). And it is possible that from this explanation the reading ὅτι (because), arose, which the Alexandrian authorities, Origen, and some other documents substitute for καί (and) read by T. R. at the beginning of the verse. The we all of John 1:16, which implies the existence of the Church, in any case excludes the supposition that John the Baptist is still speaking in John 1:16.

As to ὅτι (because), if it were the true reading, it would be necessary to make it relate either to the testimony of the apostles in John 1:14, or to that of the Baptist in John 1:15. The first reference is not possible, since it would force us to make John 1:15 a simple parenthesis, which is inadmissible; the second is no more possible; since it would be necessary in that case to refer this because, as Weiss attempts to do, not to the contents of John's testimony (John 1:15), but to the very act of the testimony, and thus to the verb he testifies: “John testifies thus of Jesus, because indeed we have all received...” A connection which is, grammatically and logically speaking, more unnatural cannot be imagined. Nothing is more natural, on the contrary, than the connection through καί (and) in the T. R.; this and expresses very simply the addition of the third testimony, that of the Church, to the two others. This reading, therefore, is certainly the true one; it is found already in the oldest Syriac version, the Curetonian Syriac. The other is due to Heracleon's false interpretation, which was followed by Origen.

The word πλήρωμα which properly denotes that which serves to fill an empty space, refers to the inexhaustible fullness of grace and truth by which the person of the Logos is filled and with which it overflows. This word πλήρωμα is used here in the most simple and natural way, in the same sense as in Romans 15:29 (πλήρωμα εὐλογίας, fullness of blessing), and without the least analogy to the mythological sense, which the Gnostics of the second century gave to it in their systems. In the words we all are included all the believers mentioned in John 1:12, the Church already extended through every country of the East and the West at the time when John wrote this Prologue. The verb: we have received is left without an object. The question at first is not of such or such a gift received, but only of the act of receiving. “We have all drawn, richly drawn from this invisible source.” The witnesses had beheld (John 1:14); the Church has received. In the following words, John states precisely what it has received.

First, grace that first sign by which it had recognized in Him the divine Logos; then, truth; this second sign will be noticed in John 1:17-18. The καί, and, signifies here: “and this is the way.” The words “grace for grace” are ordinarily translated “grace upon grace.” That would simply mean, grace added to previous grace. But, with this sense, would not John rather have used the preposition ἐπί (Php 2:27)? In the following verse, grace is opposed to the law. It must, therefore, be supposed that John has this antithesis already present to his mind, and that this is the reason why he seeks to bring out with emphasis in John 1:16 the peculiar character of the grace. Under the rule of the law each new grace must be obtained at the cost of a new work. In the economy of grace which faith in the Word made flesh opens, the gift already received is the one title to the obtaining of a new gift: “To him who hath, more is given.”

There is enthusiasm in this paradoxical formula which exalts the system of grace by setting it in such complete opposition to that of the law. No one defends any longer, at the present day, the explanation of the ancient Greek interpreters, who thought they saw here the supplying the place of the gift of the Old Covenant by the superior gift of the New Covenant. The following verse, where grace, as such, is opposed to the law, would be sufficient to exclude such an interpretation. That of Calov, who imagined he could see here the grace of salvation replacing the happy state which man possessed before the fall, is still more unfortunate.

Vv. 16 describes grace; John 1:18 will describe truth; John 1:17 which connects them, unites grace and truth: