John 15:18-4

2. 15:18-16:4.

Opposite to this spiritual body whose inward life and outward activity He has just described, Jesus sees a hostile society arise, which has also its principle of unity, hatred of Christ and of God: the world, natural humanity, which will declare war against the Church, and which is represented at this moment by the Jewish people. Jesus draws a first picture of its hatred to believers, John 15:18-25. Then, after having pointed out in passing, as if to reassure the disciples, the succor which will be given them, He reproduces with still more living colors the description of the hostility of the world, John 15:26 to John 16:4.

ADDITIONAL NOTES BY THE AMERICAN EDITOR.

Vv. 18-16:4.

1. The word γινώσκετε, which Godet prefers to take as an indicative, is better taken as an imperative. Jesus is giving them comfort and strength in view of the hatred of the world, and bids them bear in mind the fact that they would only be meeting what He had met before. He then reminds them, as a second thought, that it was the fact that He had chosen them, and that thus they did not belong to the world, which was the reason of the hatred. The hatred would therefore be an evidence that they were really His followers. ᾿Εξελεξάμην evidently means here a choice, not to the apostleship, but to discipleship as contrasted with the world.

2. Meyer regards the conditional clauses of John 15:20 as abstract cases supposed, the minds of the apostles being left to decide which would be realized. Godet, on the other hand, thinks both suppositions are intended to represent real cases. The mass of the people will not receive their message, but some will. The fact that the entire context refers to the opposition of the world seems to make the view of Meyer the more correct one.

3. The statement that they would not have had sin, John 15:22; John 15:24, is to be explained in connection with the accompanying statement: “But now they have no excuse for their sin.” It is sin with no possible ground of excuse for it of which Jesus is speaking.

4. We see in John 15:22; John 15:24 the two evidences, which are presented throughout this Gospel, brought forward once more the words and the works and the parallelism and partial repetition in these two verses are to be accounted for as connected with the desire to set them forth.

5. In John 15:26-27 Jesus makes a new reference to the Spirit, by way of encouragement and support in view of the opposition of the world. As this was His purpose, it was natural that He should set forth here the testimony which the Spirit should give, and which should help the disciples in their conflict with the world. In John 14:16 Jesus says that He will ask the Father, and the Father will give the Spirit; here, He says that He will send the Spirit from the Father; in John 16:7 He says that He will Himself send the Spirit. The same indication of close union between Himself and the Father is given here, which we find in many places in this Gospel. Godet presses the distinction of the prepositions ἐκ and παρά, and the difference in the tense of πέμψω and ἐκπορεύεται, as showing that in the latter verb there is a reference to an emanating (essentially and eternally) from the Father. That this may be the correct view may be allowed, but as the verb ἐκπορεύεται is itself used with the preposition παρά, and as it does not, in itself, necessarily mean come forth out of the being or nature of God, it must be regarded as doubtful whether this interpretation can be insisted upon.

6. The present tense in μαρτυρεῖτε is doubtless used because the testimony of the disciples had already begun. The allusion to the disciples is secondary to the allusion to the Spirit, but it calls to mind the fact that they were, and were to be, a power in the world for the truth.