John 1:3

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

Vv. 3. “ All things were made through Him, and not one of the things which exist was made without Him. ”

The work of creation was the first act of the divine revelation ad extra. The preposition διά, through, does not lower the Logos to the rank of a mere instrument. For this preposition is often applied to God Himself (Romans 11:36; Galatians 1:1; Hebrews 2:10). Nevertheless it has as its object to reserve the place of God beside and above the Logos. This same relation is explained and more completely developed by Paul, 1 Corinthians 8:6: “We have but one God, the Father from whom (ἐκ) are all things, and we are for him (εἰς); and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through (διά) whom are all things, and we are through him.” So, then, no being has come into existence without having passed through the intelligence and will of the Logos. But, also, the Logos derives everything from the Father, and refers everything to the Father. This is what is at once indicated by διά, through, which leaves room for ἐκ with relation to the Father.

The word πάντα, all things, differs from τὰ πάντα all the things, in that the second phrase can designate a particular totality which must be determined according to the context (comp. 2 Corinthians 5:18), while the first indicates the most unlimited universality. The term γίνεσθαι, to become, forms a contrast with εἰναι, to be, in John 1:1-2; it indicates the passage from nothing to existence, as opposed to eternal existence; comp. the same contrast, John 8:58: Before Abraham became, I am.

The second proposition repeats in a negative form the idea which is affirmatively stated in the first. This mode of expression is frequently found in John, especially in the first Epistle; it is intended to exclude any exception. The reading οὐδέν, nothing, instead of οὐδὲ ἕν, not even one thing, is not sufficiently supported. It is, undoubtedly, connected with the explanation which places a period immediately after this word ἕν (see on John 1:4).

Some modern writers, Lucke, Olshausen, de Wette, Baumlein, suppose that by this expression: Not even one thing, John meant to set aside the Platonic idea of eternal matter (ὕλη). But eternal matter would not be a ἕν, one thing; it would be the foundation of everything. It is no less arbitrary to claim, as has been claimed, that in this passage the apostle aims to make the world proceed from an eternally pre-existing matter. Where in the text is the slightest trace of such an idea to be found? Far from holding that a blind principle, such as matter, co-operated in the existence of the universe, John means to say, on the contrary, that every existence comes from that intelligent and free being whom he has for this reason designated by the name Word. There is not an insect, not a blade of grass, which does not bear the trace of this divine intervention, the seal of this wisdom. “The foundation of the universe,” as Lange says, “is luminous.” It is the Word!

We have, in the translation, joined the last words of the Greek phrase: ὅ γέγονεν (which exists) to John 1:3, and not, as many interpreters, to John 1:4 (see on that verse). These words seem, it is true, to mak a useless repetition in connection with the verb ἐγένετο (became). This apparent repetition has been explained by a redundancy peculiar to the style of John. But it must not be forgotten that the Greek perfect is, in reality, a present, and that the sense of ο ' γέγονεν is consequently, not: nothing of what has come to be, has come to be without Him; but nothing of what subsists, of what now is (γέγονε), came to be (ἐγένετο) without Him. There is here, therefore, neither redundance nor tautology. The apostle here has nothing to do with theological speculation; his aim is practical. He has in view the redemptive work (John 1:14); he wishes to make it understood that He who is become our Saviour is nothing less than the divine and personal being who was associated with God in the work of creation. But the Word has not been the organ of God simply for bringing all beings from nothing into existence; it is He, also, who, when the world is once created, remains the principle of its conservation, and of its ulterior development, both physical and moral.