2 John 1:7Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

He continually speaks of one and the same thing. By the commandment of love he persuades them to unity, so that they will not pass over to the deceivers. These already walk through the world and deny the coming of the Lord in the flesh.

By speaking of walking according to the commandment given from the beginning, he shows that the opinion of the erring heretics is new. He persuades the faithful to hold fast to this original commandment and not be carried away by the deception of the heretics.

For Christ also commanded His disciples concerning deceivers: "Many will come in My name, saying, 'I am He'; do not go after them" (Lk 21:8). Therefore he commands all who keep the commandments not to be deceived, but to regard as antichrist anyone who says this.

Without this phrase the text would be incoherent, for it is a transition from the plural to the singular. Such a man, says the Apostle, is an antichrist and a deceiver.

When the Apostle says, "those who do not confess Jesus Christ coming in the flesh," and not "having come," he has in mind the Lord's second coming. For the Lord Himself, when He says that "many will come in My name" (Mt 24:5), has in mind not the first coming, but the second.

Yet, according to the true word, those who deny the second coming also reject the first. For if the One who came in the flesh also proclaimed the second coming, then whoever rejects the second certainly rejects the first. If he believes in His coming, he will also regard the words of Him who came as trustworthy.

"For many deceivers": see the note on 1 Jn 2:18-19, 26; 1 Jn 4:1-3.

"Have gone out into the world." Although the Church of Christ is not of this world, it is in this world. If deceivers have come into the world, they have also come into the Church of Christ, and within it they act as deceivers and false teachers.

"Coming in the flesh." This is expressed in the parallel passage of the First Epistle as "having come" (1 Jn 4:2-3). Here, in the Greek text, it says not "having come," but "coming," or "about to come" (cf. Mt 11:3). The expression, however, does not show that the Apostle has in mind other deceivers or false teachers than those in the First Epistle. The false teachers and the false teaching are the same. The Apostle only expresses his thought differently.

The Apostle defines the essential character of the heretics here in the same way as in the First Epistle. These are the Ebionite heretics, who denied the Godhead of Jesus Christ, and the Docetists, who did not acknowledge the reality of the human nature in Jesus Christ. By this they destroyed the whole work of redemption and its appropriation by Christians. In the same sense as in the First Epistle, these heretics as a whole, and each individually, are called antichrists (see 1 Jn 2:18-28).