An Atheist Explores the Bible Part 239: God is Love, Love is God, We Are the Egg Man and the Bird is the Word (1 John 1-5)

1 John 1-5
God is Love, Love is God, We Are the Egg Man and the Bird is the Word.

Welcome to another instalment of An Atheist Explores Sacred Texts (Bible version).

In this series I work my way chapter-by-chapter through the King James Bible, commenting on it from the point of view of the text as literature and mythology.

For more detail, see the introductory post http://bit.ly/2F8f9JT

For the online KJV I use, see here http://bit.ly/2m0zVUP

And now:

1 John 1

“That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life”

I assume this is the same John as the gospel writer, the one who claimed at the end of his gospel to be the “disciple that Jesus loved most”. And here he is, being as poetic as before. This is a short chapter of only ten verses, in which John proclaims that the revelations he has got (from Jesus, it’s implied), are that “God is light, and in him is no darkness at all”. It’s impossible, therefore, to “walk in darkness” and still be with God. Does this mean the reverse as well? Is it impossible for one who is “with God” to “walk in darkness”? (By which we assume that John means live a sinful life of some vague kind.

John also states that it is not possible to claim to be “without sin” as this would be a lie and would also make God a liar (or Jesus, it isn’t clear, perhaps it isn’t meant to be). Therefore the better course is to confess your sins and let God forgive you.

1 John 2

“My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous:”

John continues with this logic – if God/Jesus is light and good etc., then anything that you do to make you sin or take towards “darkness” means that you are not a true follower. It’s a bit of a circular argument, to be honest, which reminds me of an old Beavis and Butthead sequence (possibly from the movie) where an interviewer asks them what they like, to which they reply “Things that are cool.” “What things are cool?” asks the interviewer. “Stuff we like,” they reply.

There’s quite a nice rhetorical device used by John here where he speaks to “little children”, “young men” and “elders” with a different selling point or argument for each based around the same concept, e.g. Verse 13 –“I write unto you, fathers, because ye have known him that is from the beginning. I write unto you, young men, because ye have overcome the wicked one. I write unto you, little children, because ye have known the Father”.

John is quite explicit that in return for shunning worldly things and for being kind to each other, the reward is eternal life –“this is the promise that he hath promised us, even eternal life”. Elsewhere he’s a bit vague about the original blessings. He on the one hand claims to “write no new commandment unto you, but an old commandment which ye had from the beginning”. This “commandment” is “the word which ye have heard from the beginning”. Which is .. er…

However, the next verse he then claims that “a new commandment I write unto you”, which again is not very clear – “which thing is true in him and in you: because the darkness is past, and the true light now shineth”.

Notably, however, John talks of an end time – “it is the last time: and as ye have heard that antichrist shall come”. That all sounds apocalyptic, but wait. John also says that there are many antichrists and “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us”. So in other words, the terrible antichrist(s) are mere apostates and possibly those who were not convinced by the arguments. That’s all terribly mundane.

1 John 3

“Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God: therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew him not.”

After a shaky start with another circular argument – “Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law.”. Well… yes. That’s just reversing the terms of a sentence – John returns to safer ground concerning the mystical link between Christ and worshippers. He continues with his theme that it is impossible for as true convert to commit sin because they have a bit of God inside them stopping this, so if they do sin they evidently never had that bit of God inside them. Sounds like a No True Scotsman fallacy to me.

And then he really gets into logical trouble. “He that committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil.” John accidentally raises up the Problem of Evil – why does the devil exist and sin from the beginning if God is all-powerful and all-loving and all-knowing? He has to not be at least one of those for evil to exist in the world. Or a bit of a doofus. Ultimately John brushes it aside. It doesn’t matter, he implies. “And this is his commandment, That we should believe on the name of his Son Jesus Christ, and love one another, as he gave us commandment.” Just believe, and be nice to each other. Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

1 John 4

“Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesseth that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh is of God”

Beware of false prophets and non-believers says John (conveniently cutting off access to dissenting opinions). Most of what he says in this chapter, however, is along the lines that I discerned from Paul – that through becoming the “Christ”, Jesus became a conduit for His worshippers to gain special powers. And for John, these special powers are … love.

For John, God is love, and therefore “If we love one another, God dwelleth in us, and his love is perfected in us”. In other words, anyone experiencing love for one another is partaking of the essence of God (what John refers to as the Holy Spirit). This kind of makes God the Platonic ideal of love (although we’re hindered here a little by having just the one English word rather than the six different Greek versions of love).

However, it’s not just that. “Whosoever shall confess that Jesus is the Son of God, God dwelleth in him, and he in God.” So, possibly, one needs to make this confessional statement which opens up the mystical conduit to God, before one can access the Spirit of Love that is part of God. Or something. So to me, a non-believer, what does that mean under John’s theology if I am kind and charitable to someone? Is that the spirit of God/Love working through me anyway, even if I’m one of those who are “of the world: therefore speak they of the world, and the world heareth them.”

I’d assume John would say that I wasn’t *truly* capable of whatever version of “love” he’s talking about. Which is nonsense.

1 John 5

“This is he that came by water and blood, even Jesus Christ; not by water only, but by water and blood. And it is the Spirit that beareth witness, because the Spirit is truth.”

John gives a poetic but strange description of the “witnesses” for Christ – “For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one.” The first hints, I think, of the Holy Trinity. And also “And there are three that bear witness in earth, the Spirit, and the water, and the blood: and these three agree in one.”. I mean, it’s hardly conclusive proof of anything much, let alone a man becoming divine. But the rhetoric is nice and it’s probably meant to be more poetic than literal so I’ll give him a pass.

The rest of the chapter is mainly going over the same ground as before – if you worship God then He gives you love toward one another, and if you love one another then you are partaking of God, that kind of thing. John does make a strange argument at the start, however. “and every one that loveth him that begat loveth him also that is begotten of him”. He’s talking here about Jesus and God, but then turns it to mean that if you love God then you must also love all humanity, “they” being God’s creation. Fair enough, just don’t pick too much at the logic of that. I’d say that it wasn’t a given that you automatically like other people’s children simply because you like the people. If you’re a reasonable human being you’ll most likely find them endearing in some sense and not actively wish them harm, but you might also find them obnoxious and brattish without that making you a bad person. So I don’t think the logic follows as well as John would like.

And that’s it for 1 John. I rather liked that one, it was a more personal and poetic version of the kind of theology that Paul was trying to get across. I don’t have to agree with it all to appreciate it, and in summary all it really boils down to is a long-winded way of saying “be nice to each other”.