1 John 4:2Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

What, then, is their sign? It is the following: every spirit, that is, everyone bearing the title of prophet or apostle, who confesses the Lord Jesus as come in the flesh, is of God. But whoever does not confess this is not of God. Rather, his dignity is from antichrist, as you have heard. A little earlier (1 Jn 2:18), the Apostle said that many antichrists had appeared in the world, that is, forerunners of antichrist. The confession of Christ’s coming in the flesh must be made not only with the tongue, but also in deeds. As the Apostle Paul says: “Always carrying about in the body the dying of Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body” (2 Cor 4:10).

The Manichaean denies that Christ came in the flesh. There is no need to labor further to persuade you that this error is not from God.

The Apostle says that confession of the Lord’s manifestation in the flesh is made not by the tongue, but by deeds. How so? As blessed Paul says, “We always carry about in the body the death of Jesus, that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our body” (2 Cor 4:10). Therefore, he who has Jesus acting within himself, who has died to the world and no longer lives for it but for Christ, is from God. He not only represents Him in His body, but also bears Him in his own.

Light and darkness, truth and error, good and evil are opposed to one another in their essence and in their properties. As light disperses darkness, so the teaching of truth exposes error. All the Gospel teaching of faith and morality serves to expose errors. But the Apostle, having in mind the false teachers who rejected the truth of the Incarnation of the Son of God, indicates a special mark of true teachers who proclaim divine teaching. This mark is the teaching on the Incarnation, or becoming man, of the Son of God. “By this know the Spirit of God,” and the spirit of error: “every spirit that confesses Jesus Christ, come in the flesh, is of God.” Recognize the teacher moved by the Spirit of God and proclaiming divine teaching, and the false teacher, in this way.

Compare verse 15. This cannot be applied to the Stundists, nor can one say that they too are of God because they confess Jesus Christ as having come in the flesh. The Apostle is not speaking here about teachings and heresies, such as Stundism, but only about cases of inspiration that occurred in the primitive Church. At that time, one or another Christian in the assembly would rise to preach, moved by the Spirit, proclaiming what the Spirit placed in his mouth. The Apostle gives instruction that faith should not be given to every such preacher, but only to the one who first confesses the Incarnation of Christ. He gives this instruction because at that time there were many heretics who had crept into the Church.

Verses 2-3. “The Spirit of God,” and so forth. Between the Spirit of God and the deceitful spirit there is nothing in common, just as there is nothing in common between light and darkness, Christ and Belial (2 Cor 6:14-15), good and evil, truth and error. Everything between them is different and opposed. Yet the Apostle presents only one mark of difference between truth and falsehood, and between teacher and false teacher. It is one article of the confession of faith, in which the whole subject of Christian faith and knowledge is concentrated. This is the teaching concerning the person of Jesus Christ.

How are the true prophets of God to be known and distinguished from the many false prophets who have multiplied (1 Jn 4:1-3)? For this, the holy Apostle John declares the fundamental dogma of Christianity, the Incarnation of God the Word, to be the touchstone. “Every spirit,” that is, teacher, “that confesses Jesus Christ, come in the flesh, is of God” (1 Jn 4:2). Strengthening his discourse, the Apostle repeats this in negative form: “And every spirit that does not confess Jesus Christ, come in the flesh, is not of God. This is the spirit,” the teacher and forerunner, “of antichrist” (1 Jn 4:3). According to the testimony of St Irenaeus of Lyons (Against Heresies III, 16, 18), both of these verses were directed by the Apostle against the Docetists.

By calling the spirit of the false teachers the spirit of antichrist, the Apostle more clearly expresses their dependence on the spirit of malice, and through this their connection with the final antichrist. Earlier the Apostle spoke of the false teachers as denying the messianic dignity of Jesus Christ. Here he mentions another error of theirs, which consisted in denying His human nature and the reality of His accomplishment of our salvation. This Docetic teaching seemed less dangerous. In fact, it overthrew the whole work by which salvation is appropriated to Christians. For if Jesus Christ was not truly man, then His most intimate participation in men, in order to take their sins upon Himself, was impossible. Together with this, the participation of men in Him was also impossible. Therefore this false teaching is rightly ascribed to the spirit of antichrist. When antichrist appears, he himself will be unable to proclaim anything about Christ more blasphemous and harmful.

The characteristic mark of the children of God, in distinction from the children of the devil, is not only personal righteousness, but also love for neighbors and faith in Jesus Christ as the Son of God. He truly, and not seemingly, came to earth in the flesh and suffered for the sins of the world. Therefore the Apostle exhorts Christians not to believe every spirit, but to test the spirits, whether they are of God, because many false prophets have appeared in the world (ch. 4). Just as true prophets, the teachers of truth, teach by illumination from the Holy Spirit, so false prophets are far from the truth. They are under the influence of the devil, the spirit of malice and flattery or deception.

Among the false teachers contemporary with the Apostle John were some who did not confess Jesus Christ as having come in the flesh. They did not acknowledge Christ as the God-man, denied the Incarnation of the Son of God, and asserted various things. Some said that Christ was a mere man. Others said that He was only the appearance of a man, just as angels, when they appeared to men, were clothed not in a real material body, but only in a seeming one. By such teaching about the person of Christ, the Christian faith was overthrown. Its essence consists in the teaching on the Incarnation of the Son of God, and on the hypostatic union of the divine and human natures in the person of Christ. Now it is clear how believers had to act when they needed to distinguish true teachers from false ones.

Every spirit, he says, that confesses the Word of the Lord, Him Who, although He was God by nature, came in the flesh, taking the form of a servant. Latin authors and translators, following early translations of the Bible, use for Christ the expression in forma Dei, according to the form of God, Greek en morphe Theou in Phil 2:6-7. For man they use ad imaginem Dei, according to the image of God, Gen 1:27. The Synodal translation uses the word “image” to render such different words as eikon, meaning image, depiction, or reflection, as in Gen 1:27, and morphe, meaning form, appearance, or image, as in Mk 16:12 and Phil 2:7. At the same time, Paul calls Christ the image of God, using the expression eikon tou Theou (2 Cor 4:4).