{"author":null,"canonical_references":[],"database_sha256":"8cfbe7284c6936871d57c02dc6aa63ebbdfd4722422d539dd9f716e46e91112e","date_end":null,"date_start":null,"edition_year":null,"id":"sermonindex-ecf-474","native_reference":{"book_number":690,"chapter_from":2,"chapter_to":2,"system":"MyBible module coordinates (mapping unverified)","verse_from":3,"verse_to":3},"public_import_allowed":false,"record_kind":"verse-keyed-module-record","review_required":["English edition and exact text","author/work attribution","dating","verse mapping and citation kind","reuse and attribution","split author quotations and deduplicate"],"review_status":"unreviewed","source_html":"<p><b>Andreas of Caesarea</b>: John shows here that true knowledge means demonstrating that one is faithful to Christ by obeying his commandments.<br/><i>— CATENA</i></p><p><b>Augustine of Hippo</b>: \"And in this we do know Him, if we keep His commandments.\" What commandments? \"He that saith, I know Him, and keepeth not His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.\" But still thou askest, What commandments? \"But whoso,\" saith he, \"keepeth His word, in him verily is the love of God perfected.\" Let us see whether this same commandment be not called love. For we were asking, what commandments, and he saith, \"But whoso keepeth His word, in him verily is the love of God perfected.\" Mark the Gospel, whether this be not the commandment: \"A new commandment,\" saith the Lord, \"give I unto you, that ye love one another.\"<br/><i>— Ten Homilies on 1 John 1</i></p><p><b>Bede</b>: And by this we know that we have come to know Him, if we keep His commandments. Which commandments he means, he explains subsequently, that is, love.<br/><i>— Commentary on the Catholic Epistles</i></p><p><b>Clement of Alexandria ((as quoted by Cassiodorus))</b>: \"And by this we know that we know Him, if we keep His commandments.\" For the Gnostic also does the Works which pertain to the province of virtue. But he who performs the works is not necessarily also a Gnostic. For a man may be a doer of right works, and yet not a knower of the mysteries of science. Finally, knowing that some works are performed from fear of punishment, and some on account of the promise of reward, he shows the perfection of the man gifted with knowledge, who fulfils his works by love.<br/><i>— From the Latin Translation of Cassiodorus</i></p><p><b>Cyprian</b>: To these glorious beginnings of confession and the omens of a victorious warfare, has been added the maintenance of discipline, which I observed from the vigour of your letter that you lately sent to your colleagues joined with you to the Lord in confession, with anxious admonition, that the sacred precepts of the Gospel and the commandments of life once delivered to us should be kept with firm and rigid observance. Behold another lofty degree of your glory; behold, with confession, a double title to deserving well of God,-to stand with a firm step, and to drive away in this struggle, by the strength of your faith, those who endeavour to make a breach in the Gospel, and bring impious hands to the work of undermining the Lord's precepts:-to have before afforded the indications of courage, and now to afford lessons of life. The Lord, when, after His resurrection, He sent forth His apostles, charges them, saying, \"All power is given unto me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you.\" And the Apostle John, remembering this charge, subsequently lays it down in his epistle: \"Hereby,\" says he, \"we do know that we know Him, if we keep His commandments. He that saith he knoweth Him, and keepeth not His commandments, is a liar, and the truth is not in him.\" You prompt the keeping of these precepts; you observe the divine and heavenly commands. This is to be a confessor of the Lord; this is to be a martyr of Christ,-to keep the firmness of one's profession inviolate among all evils, and secure. For to wish to become a martyr for the Lord, and to try to overthrow the Lord's precepts; to use against Him the condescension that He has granted you;-to become, as it were, a rebel with arms that you have received from Him;-this is to wish to confess Christ, and to deny Christ's Gospel. I rejoice, therefore, on your behalf, most brave and faithful brethren; and as much as I congratulate the martyrs there honoured for the glory of their strength, so much do I also equally congratulate you for the crown of the Lord's discipline. The Lord has shed forth His condescension in manifold kinds of liberality. He has distributed the praises of good soldiers and their spiritual glories in plentiful variety. We also are sharers in your honour; we count your glory our glory, whose times have been brightened by such a felicity, that it should be the fortune of our day to see the proved servants of God and Christ's soldiers crowned. I bid you, most brave and blessed brethren, ever heartily farewell; and remember me.<br/><i>— Epistle XXIV</i></p><p><b>Didymus the Blind</b>: Often in the Scriptures the word know means not just being aware of something but having personal experience of it. Jesus did not know sin, not because he was unaware of what it is but because he never committed it himself. For although he is like us in every other way, he never sinned. Given this meaning of the word know, it is clear that anyone who says that he knows God must also keep his commandments, for the two things go together.<br/><i>— COMMENTARY ON 1 JOHN</i></p><p><b>Oecumenius</b>: \"And by this we know that we have come to know him, if we keep his commandments.\"<br/>\"And by this we know.\" When John had said above that those who believed in the Lord have fellowship with him (1 Jn. 1:6), he now presents what confirms that fellowship towards him, and he says: \"And by this we know that we have come to know him.\" This divine man often uses similar expressions in the same way: as when he says: \"He was in the world, and the world was made through him, and the world did not know him.\" (Jn. 1:10)<br/>Thus, therefore, John now uses the word \"to know.\" That we know him, that is, that we are mixed with him, from this we know if we observe his commandments. The word γινώσκειν, that is, \"to know\", signifies two things, especially in sacred Scripture, namely to know something: as when it is said: \"I have known that the Lord will execute judgment on the poor.\" (Ps. 139:1) Moreover, it signifies an all-encompassing connection and confirmation towards someone, which is called knowledge: as when it is said, \"The Lord knows the ways of the innocent,\" (Ps. 37:18) and as Paul says, \"That we may know God just as we are also known by Him.\" (1 Cor. 13:12) Similarly, it must be said about ignorance that it is understood in two ways. For just as it seems to external writers that there is one knowledge of opposites. According to this, therefore, to know is taken in two ways in this context. Indeed, when it says, \"By this we know,\" it is taken for knowing; but when it is said, \"That we know him,\" this means that we are firmly joined with him. For he who has a partnership with someone is also joined and connected to him in what he shares.<br/>Therefore, John also adds, \"we keep His commandments.\" From this, that is also resolved: \"The Lord knows who are His,\" (2 Tim. 2:19) and that: \"He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us:\" (2 Cor. 5:21) and anything else that is discussed in Sacred Scripture regarding knowledge or ignorance.<br/><i>— Commentary on 1 John</i></p>","source_html_sha256":"96dea298252ceb8c77fe48f1f63f5233dbcbdd5e1111db6f1ed6cf0038c6084d","source_module":"ECF","source_row_id":474,"source_url":"https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/ecf/","text_sha256":"0b26b3646f7737fb21368b0e51d3334130431cd84caa882f73f0e58ee1dd8364","translator":null,"work":null}