1 John 1: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

The writer opens by saying that he and others heard, saw, and touched the Word of life, and that they are reporting this so their readers can share that life with them, and with the Father and his Son Jesus Christ. He then passes on the message he heard: God is light, and there is no darkness in him at all. From that he draws a set of contrasts about claiming to share life with God while living in the dark, and about admitting sin instead of denying it. The chapter says that anyone who claims to have no sin is fooling himself, and that God forgives and cleans up those who admit their sins.

Claim by Claim

1. 1:1
   • Something existed from the beginning.
   • The writers have heard it.
   • The writers have seen it with their own eyes.
   • The writers have gazed upon it.
   • The writers' hands have handled it.
   • What is spoken of concerns the Word of life.
2. 1:2
   • The life was made manifest.
   • The writers have seen the life.
   • The writers bear witness to the life.
   • The writers announce the eternal life to those addressed.
   • That eternal life was with the Father.
   • That life was made manifest to the writers.
3. 1:3
   • The writers declare to those addressed what they have seen and heard.
   • The purpose of the declaring is that those addressed may also have fellowship with the writers.
   • The writers' fellowship is with the Father.
   • The writers' fellowship is with his Son Jesus Christ.
4. 1:4
   • The writers write these things to those addressed.
   • The purpose of the writing is that the joy of those addressed may be full.
5. 1:5
   • There is a message the writers have heard from him.
   • The writers declare that message to those addressed.
   • The message is that God is light.
   • In God there is no darkness at all.
6. 1:6
   • If we say we have fellowship with him while walking in darkness, we lie.
   • If we say we have fellowship with him while walking in darkness, we do not do the truth.
7. 1:7
   • He is in the light.
   • If we walk in the light as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another.
   • The blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanses us from all sin.
8. 1:8
   • If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves.
   • If we say we have no sin, the truth is not in us.
9. 1:9
   • If we confess our sins, he is faithful.
   • If we confess our sins, he is just.
   • He forgives us our sins.
   • He cleanses us from all unrighteousness.
10. 1:10
    • If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar.
    • If we say we have not sinned, his word is not in us.

Words Worth Explaining

Every language note in this chapter, gathered. These explain what a word meant, never what it means for the reader.

1:1

The King James sentence piles up four relative clauses before it ever names what they are about, and the subject arrives only at the end: "of the Word of life." In Greek "that which" is neuter, so it can point to a thing (the message, the life that was seen) rather than to a person, and the writer does not resolve which he means; the ambiguity is in the original. "Handled" in 1611 English means touched or felt with the hands, not managed or dealt with. "Word" translates the Greek logos, which covers a spoken word, a message, an account, or the reasoning behind something; here it stands as a title, as it does in the opening of John's Gospel.

1:2

"Manifested" means made visible, brought out where people could see it, not "obvious" in the modern sense. "Shew" is simply the older spelling of show. "Bear witness" is courtroom language: to testify to what you personally saw, the way a witness gives evidence. "Eternal life" translates a phrase meaning the life belonging to the coming age, a quality of life as much as a length of it.

1:3

"Fellowship" translates koinonia, which means having something in common, a shared stake or partnership, the word used of business partners sharing a venture or of people holding property in common. It does not mean a friendly gathering or a church social, which is what the English word suggests today.

1:4

The ancient copies differ here: some read "your joy," as the King James does, and others read "our joy," which is why modern translations often print the other word. The two differ by a single letter in Greek.

1:5

Light and darkness are word pictures here. In the Bible, light often stands for what is good, true, and out in the open. Darkness stands for what is wrong and hidden.

1:6

"Walk" in verses 6 and 7 is not about physical walking. It is the standard biblical way of describing how a person lives day to day.

1:7

Blood stands for a life given up. In Israel, animals were offered to God to put wrong things right again. John is saying that Jesus gave his life, and that is what makes people clean. "Sin" means doing what is wrong and going against God's ways.

1:9

The King James word is "confess." It means saying out loud that you did wrong and agreeing that it was wrong, instead of hiding it or making excuses.

1:10

"His word" means the message God has given, not one single word.