From: 1 John 5:1-6 (NAB)
1 John 5:1-7 (RSVCE)
Everyone Who Believes in Jesus Overcomes the World
Testimony Borne to Christ
*********************************************************************************************
Commentary:
1-5. The fifth chapter is a summary of the entire letter, focusing on faith in Jesus
Christ (vv. 6-12) and the confidence that faith gives (vv. 13-21).
In the opening verses (vv. 1-5) St John points to some consequences of faith: he
who believes in Christ is a child of God (v. 1); he loves God and men, his brothers
(v. 2); he keeps the commandments (v. 3) and shares in Christ’s victory over the
world (vv. 4-5).
1. “He who loves the parent...”: it is axiomatic that one who loves his father also
loves his brothers and sisters, because they share the same parent. The New
Vulgate clarifies the scope of this maxim in this letter by adding the word “Deum”:
“He who loves God his father...” loves him who is born of God; Christian fraternity
is a consequence of divine filiation.
4. “This is our victory that overcomes the world, our faith”: faith in Jesus Christ
is of crucial importance because through it every baptized person is given a share
in Christ’s victory. Jesus has overcome the world (cf. Jn 16:33) by his death and
resurrection, and the Christian (who through faith becomes a member of Christ)
has access to all the graces necessary for coping with temptations and sharing
in Christ’s own glory. In this passage the word “world” has the pejorative meaning
of everything opposed to the redemptive work of Christ and the salvation of man
that flows from it.
6. The “water” and the “blood” have been interpreted in different ways, depending
on whether they apply (following the more literal meaning) to events in the life of
Christ, or are regarded as symbols of particular sacraments. The water, if referred
to the life of Christ, would be an allusion to our Lord’s baptism (cf. Mt 3:13-17 and
par.), where the Father and the Holy Spirit bore witness to Christ’s divinity; the
blood would refer to the Cross, where Christ, God and true man, shed his blood
to bring Redemption. According to this interpretation, St John is answering the
Gnostics, who said that Jesus of Nazareth became the Son of God through bap-
tism and ceased to be the Son of God prior to his passion: therefore, only the
man Jesus, devoid of divinity, died on the Cross; which would be a denial of the
redemptive value of Christ’s death.
Understood as symbols of the sacraments, the water would refer to Baptism (cf.
In 3:5), where we receive the Holy Spirit and the life of grace (cf. Jn 7:37-39); the
blood would apply to the Eucharist, where we partake of the blood of Christ in
order to have life in us (cf. Jn 6:53, 55, 56). Jesus came on earth to give his life
for men (cf. Jn 10:10); we obtain that life in the first instance by means of the
living water of Baptism (cf. Jn 4:14; 7:37ff); and also by the application of the
blood of Christ, which cleanses us from all sin (cf. 1 Jn 1:7; 2:2; 4:10).
The two interpretations are compatible with one another, given that sacraments
are sensible signs of the supernatural effects of Christ’s redemptive death. Re-
ferring to Baptism, Tertullian wrote: “We have also a second laving, and it too
is unique—the baptism with blood. The Lord spoke of this when he said, ‘I have
a baptism to be baptized with’ (Lk 12:50), having had already been baptized
once. So, he did come ‘by water and blood’ (1 In 5:6), as John writes, in order
to be bathed by the water and glorified by the blood, in order to make us (who
are called by water) chosen ones through blood. These two baptisms spring
from the wound in his pierced side; so it is that those who believed in his blood
would be washed by the water; those who were washed in the water would also
drink of the blood” (”De Baptismo”, XVI).
7-8. The Sistine-Clementine edition of the Vulgate included an addition which
left the text reading as follows: “There are three who give witness [in heaven:
the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit; and these three are one. And there
are three who give witness on earth]: the Spirit, the water, and the blood; and
these three agree.” The words shown in bracketed italics (known as the Johan-
nine “comma” or addition) were the subject of heated debate (around the end
of the nineteenth century) as to their authenticity. The Holy Office (as was)
left theologians free to research the matter (cf. “Declaration”, 2 June 1927) and
in fact it has been shown that the “comma” was introduced in Spain around the
fourth century AD in a text attributed to Priscillian, and therefore does not be-
long to the original inspired text. The “comma”makes express mention of the
Blessed Trinity; however, even without it the text proclaims that mystery of faith
fairly clearly: it makes mention of Jesus Christ, the Son of God (vv. 5-6), and of
the Holy Spirit (v. 7) and of the Father, both of whom bear witness to the Son
(v. 9).
According to the legal prescriptions of the Old Testament, the testimony of one
witness was insufficient at trials (Deut 17:6; cf. Jn 8:17). St John points to three
witnesses (the Holy Spirit, water and blood), thereby refuting the Gnostic tea-
ching; he is saying that the water and the blood, that is, Christ’s baptism and
his death on the Cross, are a manifestation of his divinity. Clearly the word “wit-
ness” is used here in a broad sense: namely, in the sense that at those two
important moments in his life, Christ makes known to us that he is true God.
The Fathers who interpreted these words as referring to the sacraments usually
comment on the fact that in the sacraments the grace of God is communicated
internally and is signaled externally. St Bede writes along those lines: “The
Holy Spirit makes us adoptive sons of God; the water of the sacred fount clean-
ses us; the blood of the Lord redeems us: the spiritual sacrament gives us a
dual witness, one visible, one invisible” (”In I Epist. S. Ioannis, ad loc.”).
*********************************************************************************************
Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.
Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.
From: John 20:19-31
Jesus Appears to the Disciples
[24] Now Thomas, one of the Twelve, called the Twin, was not with them when
Jesus came. [25] So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord.” But
he said to them, “Unless I see in His hands the print of the nails, and place my
finger in the mark of the nails, and place my hand in His side, I will not believe.”
[26] Eight days later, His disciples were again in the house, and Thomas was
with them. The doors were shut, but Jesus came and stood among them, and
said, “Peace be with you.” [27] Then He said to Thomas, “Put your finger here,
and see My hands; and put out your hand, and place it in My side; do not be
faithless, but believing.” [28] Thomas answered Him, “My Lord and my God!”
[29] Jesus said to him, “Have you believed because you have seen Me? Bles-
sed are those who have not seen and yet believe.”
[30] Now Jesus did many other signs in the presence of the disciples, which
are not written in this book; [31] but these are written that you may believe that
Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His
name.
*********************************************************************************************
Commentary:
19-20. Jesus appears to the Apostles on the evening of the day of which He rose.
He presents Himself in their midst without any need for the doors to be opened,
by using the qualities of His glorified body; but in order to dispel any impression
that He is only a spirit He shows them His hands and His side: there is no lon-
ger any doubt about its being Jesus Himself, about His being truly risen from the
dead. He greets them twice using the words of greeting customary among the
Jews, with the same tenderness as He previously used put into this salutation.
These friendly words dispel the fear and shame the Apostles must have been
feeling at behaving so disloyally during His passion: He has created the normal
atmosphere of intimacy, and now He will endow them with transcendental po-
wers.
21. Pope Leo XIII explained how Christ transferred His own mission to the Apos-
tles: “What did He wish in regard to the Church founded, or about to be founded?
This: to transmit to it the same mission and the same mandate which He had
received from the Father, that they should be perpetuated. This He clearly re-
solved to do: this He actually did. ‘As the Father hath sent Me, even so I send
you’ (John 20:21). ‘As Thou didst send Me into the world, so I have sent them
into the world’ (John 17:18). [...] When about to ascend into Heaven, He sends
His Apostles in virtue of the same power by which He had been sent from the
Father; and He charges them to spread abroad and propagate His teachings (cf.
Matthew 28:18), so that those obeying the Apostles might be saved, and those
disobeying should perish (cf. Mark 16:16). [...] Hence He commands that the
teaching of the Apostles should be religiously accepted and piously kept as if
it were His own: ‘He who hears you hears Me, and he who rejects you rejects
Me’ (Luke 10:16). Wherefore the Apostles are ambassadors of Christ as He is
the ambassador of the Father” (Leo XIII, “Satis Cognitum”). In this mission the
bishops are the successors of the Apostles: “Christ sent the Apostles as He
Himself had been sent by the Father, and then through the Apostles made their
successors, the bishops, sharers in His consecration and mission. The func-
tion of the bishops’ ministry was handed over in a subordinate degree to priests
so that they might be appointed in the order of the priesthood and be co-workers
of the episcopal order for the proper fulfillment of the apostolic mission that had
been entrusted to it by Christ” (Vatican II, “Presbyterorum Ordinis”, 2).
22-23. The Church has always understood—and has in fact defined—that Jesus
Christ here conferred on the Apostles authority to forgive sins, a power which is
exercised in the Sacrament of Penance. “The Lord then especially instituted the
Sacrament of Penance when, after being risen from the dead, He breathed upon
His disciples and said: “Receive the Holy Spirit...’ The consensus of all the Fa-
thers has always acknowledged that by this action so sublime and words so
clear the power of forgiving and retaining sins was given to the Apostles and
their lawful successors for reconciling the faithful who have fallen after Baptism”
(Council of Trent, “De Paenitentia”, Chapter 1).
The Sacrament of Penance is the most sublime expression of God’s love and
mercy towards men, described so vividly in Jesus’ parable of the prodigal son
(cf. Luke 15:11-32). The Lord always awaits us, with His arms wide open, wai-
ting for us to repent—and then He will forgive us and restore us to the dignity of
being His sons.
The Popes have consistently recommended Christians to have regular recourse
to this Sacrament: “For a constant and speedy advancement in the path of virtue
we highly recommend the pious practice of frequent Confession, introduced by
the Church under the guidance of the Holy Spirit; for by this means we grow in
a true knowledge of ourselves and in Christian humility, bad habits are uprooted,
spiritual negligence and apathy are prevented, the conscience is purified and the
will strengthened, salutary spiritual direction is obtained, and grace is increased
by the efficacy of the Sacrament itself” (Pius XII, “Mystici Corporis”).
24-28. Thomas’ doubting moves our Lord to give him special proof that His risen
body is quite real. By so doing He bolsters the faith of those who would later on
find faith in Him. “Surely you do not think”, [Pope] St. Gregory the Great com-
ments, “that is was a pure accident that the chosen disciple was missing; who
on his return was told about the appearance and on hearing about it doubted;
doubting, so that he might touch and believe by touching? It was not an acci-
dent; God arranged that it should happen. His clemency acted in this wonderful
way so that through the doubting disciple touching the wounds in His Master’s
body, our own wounds of incredulity might be healed. [...] And so the disciple,
doubting and touching, was changed into a witness of the truth of the Resurrec-
tion” (”In Evangelia Homiliae”, 26, 7).
Thomas’ reply is not simply an exclamation: it is an assertion, an admirable act
of faith in the divinity of Christ: “My Lord and my God!” These words are an eja-
culatory prayer often used by Christians, especially as an act of faith in the real
presence of Christ in the Blessed Eucharist.
29. [Pope] St. Gregory the Great explains these words of our Lord as follows:
“By St. Paul saying ‘faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of
things unseen’ (Hebrews 11:1), it becomes clear that faith has to do with things
which are not seen, for those which are seen are no longer the object of faith, but
rather of experience. Well then, why is Thomas told, when he saw and touched,
‘Because you have seen, you have believed?’ Because he saw one thing, and be-
lieved another. It is certain that mortal man cannot see divinity; therefore, he saw
the man and recognized Him as God, saying, ‘My Lord and my God.’ In conclu-
sion: seeing, he believed, because contemplating that real man he exclaimed
that He was God, whom he could not see” (”In Evangelia Homiliae”, 27, 8).
Like everyone else Thomas needed the grace of God to believe, but in addition to
this grace he was given an exceptional proof; his faith would have had more merit
had he accepted the testimony of the other Apostles. Revealed truths are normal-
ly transmitted by word, by the testimony of other people who, sent by Christ and
aided by the Holy Spirit, preach the deposit of faith (cf. Mark 16:15-16). “So faith
comes from what is heard, and what is heard comes from the preaching of Christ”
(Romans 10:17). The preaching of the Gospel, therefore, carries with it sufficient
guarantees of credibility, and by accepting that preaching man “offers the full
submission of his intellect and will to God who reveals, willingly assenting to the
revelation given” (Vatican II, “Dei Verbum”, 5).
“What follows pleases us greatly: ‘Blessed are those who have not seen and yet
believe.’ For undoubtedly it is we who are meant, who confess with our soul Him
whom we have not seen in the flesh. It refers to us, provided we live in accor-
dance with the faith, for only he truly believes who practices what the believes”
(”In Evangelia Homiliae”, 26, 9).
30-31. This is a kind of first epilogue or conclusion to the Gospel of St. John.
The more common opinion is that he added Chapter 21 later, which covers such
important events as the triple confession of St. Peter, confirmation of his prima-
cy and our Lord’s prophecy about the death of the beloved disciple. These verses
sum up the inspired writer’s whole purpose in writing his Gospel — to have men
believe that Jesus was the Messiah, the Christ announced by the prophets in
the Old Testament, the Son of God, so that by believing this saving truth, which
is the core of Revelation, they might already begin to partake of eternal life (cf.
John 1:12, 2:23; 3:18; 14:13; 15:16; 16:23-26).
*********************************************************************************************
Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.
Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.