Hate and Love Understood through Murder and Sacrifice

Introduction:

John has made a simple claim: believers can know that we know God and are of the truth.

That assuring knowledge comes from a set of realities about us that distinguish us from the world.

We believe Jesus Christ is come in the flesh.

We walk in the light as God is in the light (we live in a manner reflective of God’s own holy nature).

We recognize God’s authority through submitting to His commandments.

We love the brothers.

We listen to the teachings of Christ through the teachings of the Apostles (we value and obey the Word of God).

We anticipate the coming of Jesus through purity.

We always have to exercise caution in our thinking and in our study of the Bible. To that end, we must appreciate how the world of the New Testament (in this case) differed greatly from our own. We benefit from living in a world shaped by Christian assumptions, even by those who reject Christianity (Tom Holland, in Dominion, has at great length pointed this out). Because we can make the mistake of assuming their world was like ours, we can miss the scale or degree to which the message of Jesus and the apostles radically departed from the assumptions of their times.

One area we’ve already explored along this line is Romans 5:8 where Paul explains “God is demonstrating his love for us because while still existing as sinners, Christ died on our behalf.”

The only way the death of Christ can represent a new understanding of love is found in the earlier statements about how difficult it is to get someone to die for a righteous man. No one would take the place of a criminal (Dickensian endings in the Greco-Roman world?).

The Connection between Death and Hate and Love and Life Established

Echoing Jesus in John 5:24 “Ἀμὴν ἀμὴν λέγω ὑμῖν ὅτι ὁ τὸν λόγον μου ἀκούων καὶ πιστεύων τῷ πέμψαντί με ἔχει ζωὴν αἰώνιον καὶ εἰς κρίσιν οὐκ ἔρχεται, ἀλλὰ μεταβέβηκεν ἐκ τοῦ θανάτου εἰς τὴν ζωήν,” John places death and life as opposites.

Our knowledge, he says, that we have experienced the transition from death into life is assured “because we are loving the brothers” (1 John 3:14).

The Apostle follows this with another contrast: “the one not loving is remaining in death.”

If those transferred into life love the brothers, then those who have not been so transferred will not practice love, thus demonstrating that they are remaining (continuing to abide, a static state) in “the death.”

Although he does not use inferential terminology such as therefore, John presents this as a logical reality that follows the previous premise.

The Connection between Death and Hate and Love and Life Expanded

In 1 John 3:15, John expands upon this statement with a universal claim.

It is universal because of the word “all/every.”

He equates the practice of hating ones brother with being a murderer.

This combines the non-physical real (hating) with the physical realm (being a murder).

John 8:44 “ὑμεῖς ἐκ τοῦ πατρὸς τοῦ διαβόλου ἐστὲ καὶ τὰς ἐπιθυμίας τοῦ πατρὸς ὑμῶν θέλετε ποιεῖν. ἐκεῖνος ἀνθρωποκτόνος ἦν ἀπʼ ἀρχῆς καὶ ἐν τῇ ἀληθείᾳ οὐκ ἔστηκεν, ὅτι οὐκ ἔστιν ἀλήθεια ἐν αὐτῷ. ὅταν λαλῇ τὸ ψεῦδος, ἐκ τῶν ἰδίων λαλεῖ, ὅτι ψεύστης ἐστὶν καὶ ὁ πατὴρ αὐτοῦ.”

John also relies on Jesus’ teaching in the Sermon on the Mount, Mt. 5:21-23

“Ἠκούσατε ὅτι ἐρρέθη τοῖς ἀρχαίοις· οὐ φονεύσεις· ὃς δʼ ἂν φονεύσῃ, ἔνοχος ἔσται τῇ κρίσει. ἐγὼ δὲ λέγω ὑμῖν ὅτι πᾶς ὁ ὀργιζόμενος τῷ ἀδελφῷ αὐτοῦ ἔνοχος ἔσται τῇ κρίσει· ὃς δʼ ἂν εἴπῃ τῷ ἀδελφῷ αὐτοῦ· ῥακά, ἔνοχος ἔσται τῷ συνεδρίῳ· ὃς δʼ ἂν εἴπῃ · μωρέ, ἔνοχος ἔσται εἰς τὴν γέενναν τοῦ πυρός. Ἐὰν οὖν προσφέρῃς τὸ δῶρόν σου ἐπὶ τὸ θυσιαστήριον κἀκεῖ μνησθῇς ὅτι ὁ ἀδελφός σου ἔχει τι κατὰ σοῦ,”

Jesus captured the true spirit of the law by explaining that murder is rooted in something else, namely, hatred/anger.

John’s point seems to be that murder is the physical manifestation of a pre-existing hatred. Murder doesn’t just happen. It comes from somewhere.

Those “in the death” hate and murder.

With malice and aforethought, a murderer intentionally deprives someone else of life.

To hate is to have that same contempt for the value of someone else.

A murderer does not have eternal life dwelling in him.

The Connection between Death and Hate and Love and Life Explained through Christ

The contrast between love and hate could not be any more stark.

The one who hates is a murderer.

The one who loves voluntarily lays down his life.

This is what “eternal life” in the person of Jesus did.

He willingly dies for someone else.

That is the extreme example of love.

We have a responsibility to imitate it.

It can have smaller manifestations that reveal just as much.

John’s smaller scale is the use of one’s wealth “the life of this world” for the aid of someone living in total poverty.

There is a direct parallel between this section and James 2.

John concludes by calling upon his listeners to practice love not just in word (note the hendiadys), but in actual fact and act.

Conclusion: living in a world filled with hatred and persecution is no excuse not to practice love.