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truth he taught waa gained direct from the Master, and its form largely so. But in describing the teaclilng we shall use the name of the disciple.

2. The doctrine o£ God which underUes these books is as sublime in its lofty monotheism as it is distinctively 'Christian' in its manifestation and unfolding. No writer of Scripture insists more strongly upon the unity and absoluteness of the only God (Jn S"), ' the only true God' (17'), whom 'no man hath seen at any time' (1'"); yet none more completely recognizes the eternal Sonship of the Son, the fulness of the Godhead seen in Christ, the personality and Divine ofBces of the Holy Spirit. It is to St. John that we owe the three great utterances, 'God is Spirit' (Jn 42*), 'God is Light' (1 Jn 1'), 'God is Love' (1 Jn i'- 's).

The deductions drawn from the doctrine of the spirituality of God show the importance of its practical aspects. God as Spirit is not remote from men, but this conception of His essence brings Him, though invisible, nearer to men than ever. God as Light exMbits Himself to us as truth, holiness, and righteousness. Some interpreters understand the phrase as designating the metaphysical being of God, others His self -revelation and self-impartation. The context, however, points rather to the ineffable purity of His nature and the need of holiness in those who profess to hold fellowship with Him. That God is loving unto every man, or at least to Israel, was no new doctrine when John taught: but up to that time none had ever pronoxmced the words in their profound simplicity — 'God is Love.' John himself could never have conceived the thought; he learned it from his Master. But if the form in which he expressed it is accurate — and what Christian can question it? — , it 'makes one thing of all theology.* Love is not so much an attribute of God as a name for Himself in the intimate and changeless essence of His b^ng. That there is the slightest inconsistency between the Divine love and the Divine righteousness is incredible; but if God is love, no manifestation of God's justice can ever contradict this quintessential principle of His inmost nature. Again, the words that f oUowthe statement show tnat in the Apostle's mind the practical aspects of the doctrine were prominent. Contemplation with him does not mean speculation. Ab-stract a priori deductions from a theologoumenon are not in St. .John's thought: his conclusions are, ' He that loveth not knoweth not God ' (IJn 4"), ' We also ought to love one another' (v.n). Nor does this high teaching exclude careful discrimination. The love of the Father to the Son, His love to the world as the basis of all salvation, the closer sympathy and fellowship which He grants to beheveis as His own children, are not confused with one another. But the statement that God is love goes behind all these for the moment, and teaches that the principle of self-impartation is ""essential, energetic, and ever operating in the Divine nature, and that it is in itself the source of all life, all purifying energy, and all that love which constitutes at the same time the oinding and the motive power of the whole universe.

3. The Logos. — The object for which the Gospel was written, we are told, was that men might believe that Jesus was not only the Christ, but also the Son of God. The former beUef would not necessarily change their views of the Godhead; the latter, if inteUigently held and interpreted in the light of Thomas' confession (for instance), would undoubtedly affect in some direction the intense monotheism of one who was born and bred a Jew. Was it possible to believe that in Jesus God Himself was incarnate, and at the same time to believe completely and ardently in the unity of God? The answer of the writeris givensubstantially in the Prologue, in the doctrine of the Eternal Word. It is unnecessary to discuss in detail whence John derived the word Logos: the doctrine was practically his own. There can be little question that the Memra of the Targums, based on the usage of such passages as Ps 33' 147", and Is 55", formed the foundation of the idea, and it is tolerably certain that the connotation attaching to the word had been modified by Philo's use of it. It does not follow, however, that St. John uses the word either as the Psalmist did, or as the paraphrast or the Alex-andrian philosopher employed it. Taking a word which his hearers and readers understood, he put his

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own stamp upon it. Philo and St. John both drew from Hebrew sources. Philo employed an expression which suited his philosophy because of its meaning 'reason,' and it was employed by him mainly in a metaphysical sense. St. John, however, availed him-self of another meaning of the Greek word Logos, and he emphasizes the Divine 'utterance,' which reveals the mind and will of God Himself, giving a personal and historical interpretation to the phrase. The Word, according to the teaching of the Prologue, is Eternal, Divine, the Mediator of creation, the Light of mankind throughout history: and in the latter days the Word made flesh, tabernacUng amongst men, is the Only-begotten from the Father full of grace and truth. This cardinal doctrine once laid down, there is no further reference to it in the Gospel, and in the only other places in NT where a similar expression is used (1 Jn 1' and Rev 19'') it is employed with a differ-ence. Even in the Prologue the conception of the Word is not abstract and philosophical, but when the introduction to the Gospel is finished, the idea never appears again; the narrative of the only Son, revealing for the first time the Father in all His fulness, proceeds as if no account of the Logos had been given. When the basis of the Gospel story has been laid in a deep doctrine of the Eternal Godhead, the idea has done its work, and in the actual narrative it is discarded accord-ingly. The Christology of St. John would be quite incomplete without his doctrine of the Logos, but it is not dependent on this. Christ's unique Personality as Son of God may be fully known from His life on earth, but the Prologue gives to the narrative of His ministry in the flesh a background of history and of eternity. In all ages the Logos was the medium of Divine revela-tion, as He had been of creation itself, and of the Godhead before the world was. Pre-temporaJ exist-ence and pre-incarnate operation having been described with sublime brevity, the Evangelist proceeds calmly with the story to which this forms an august intro-duction. See also art. Logos.

4. The Fatherhood of God, and the doctrine of the Holy Spirit. — It is unnecessary to point out how influential the Prologue has been in the history of Christian thought, but it is well to remember also that to St. John more than to any other writer we owe the development of the Christian doctrine of the God-head, as modified by the above cardinal conceptions. The doctrines of the Fatherhood of God and of the Holy Spirit as a Divine Person do not indeed depend upon the witness of St. John. The Synoptists and St. Paul, not to speak of other NT writers, would furnish a per-fectly adequate basis for these vital truths of Christian faith. But neither would have influenced Christian thought so profoundly, and neither would have been so clearly understood, without St. John's teaching and Christ's words as reported by him. The meaning of the term ' Son of God ' as applied to Jesus is brought to light by the Fourth Gospel. Without it we might well have failed to gain an adequate conception of Father-hood and Sonship as eternal elements in the Divine nature, and the unique relationship between the Father and the Son Incarnate is brought out in the fifth and other chapters of the Gospel as nowhere else. So with the Christian doctrine of the Holy Spirit. The whole of Scripture bears its testimony. Even in the OT more is said of the Spirit of God than is often recognized, and the teaching of St. Paul and St. Luke Is full of instruction. But without the farewell discourses of Christ to His Apostles as recorded in Jn 14-16, our ideas of His Person and office would be comparatively meagre. The very term 'Paraclete,' not found outside the Gospel and 1 Ep., is itself a revelation. The person-ality of the Spirit and His distinctness from the Father and the Son, whilst Himself one with them, are elucidated with great clearness in these chapters. On the other hand, in his Epistle, St. John has much less to say