2 John 1:1

Introductory Address and Benediction, 2 John 1:1-3.

1. The elder According to his modest custom, St. John utters not his own name, nor gives his highest title, apostle. He was not, like St. Paul, compelled by gainsayers to such brave self-assertion. Every body knew he was the sole survivor of the twelve, and ready to call him apostle; or, as he was later styled, the theologos, theologian. As every apostle was by rank an elder, so St. John, like St. Peter, (1 Peter 5:1,) styles himself by that lesser title. But while St. Peter is a co-presbyter, St. John is the presbyter; the elder whom all Asia Minor knew. Elders there were in plenty, but there was but one the elder in Asia. He does not call himself episcopos, though that term designated the same rank; because, probably, 1, that term was just beginning to be appropriated to a superpresbyterial grade of men; and, 2, the term elder pointed to his venerable age, and was a proper antithesis to his frequent address to his hearers, little children. Some scholars have drawn an argument from this title to attribute the authorship of this epistle to a certain so-called Presbyter John, who, as they suppose, resided in Ephesus at the same time with the apostle. But, 1, the existence of such a John is too doubtful to permit any reasonable critic from attributing to him any writing, or anything else; and, 2, this shadow of a John did not bear the title of Presbyter. That title is a mistaken later addition to his name, arising from the fact that he seems to be mentioned as one in a number of presbyters; but presbyters in the sense of early or ancient fathers of the Church.

Elect lady The epithet elect is here used, as in 2 John 1:13, as an honorary term. Chosen of God through a blessed faith in Christ, and so a choice one among women. Also adorning that faith with Christian graces, and so a choice one, a very elect lady, among Christians. But it is probable that the Greek word for lady here, Kyria, (or Cyria, like its masculine form Cyrus,) is a proper name. Examples of such a use are found. We would only have to print the word lady with a capital to preserve the double sense which, perhaps, St. John intended.

Many commentators, including Huther and Wordsworth, maintain that the word lady is symbolically used of a Christian Church to which this epistle was addressed. Others, that it was addressed to the universal Church under this title. It certainly can be read plausibly under either supposition. But the former of these suppositions is, we think, entirely improbable. 1. The allegorical is not to be adopted where the literal will, as in this case, suit as well or better. A Church is often signified under symbol of a woman, especially in St. John’s Apocalypse: but that a letter should be addressed to a Church through its officials under the symbol of a lady, ingeniously carried through, is eminently unnatural. 2. The analogy of the third epistle is against the allegory. It is a simple letter addressed to a leading man in a certain Church. We may safely infer, accordingly, that this is addressed to a certain Christian woman. In one case the address is, The elder unto the well beloved Gaius; in the other, The elder unto the elect lady.

Children, whom The whom is, in the Greek, masculine, implying that some of the children were males; but it would also include with them females, just as our word mankind includes both sexes. The whom includes both lady and children.

In the truth With that pure and holy love embraced in the sphere of Christian truth. But especially is meant, the truth of a real personal bodily Christ, in opposition to the phantasm of the Docetae.

All All Christians love all Christians. And so all who have known the truth loved the elect lady.