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1Jn_3:12. The converse of Christian brotherly love is the hatred of the world, which has its example in Cain.
οὐ καθὼς Κάϊν κ . τ . λ .] Contrary to the opinion of Grotius, with which Lücke agrees, that before καθώς we must supply “ οὐκ ᾦμεν ἐκ τοῦ πονηροῦ ” dependent on ἵνα , de Wette has shown the clumsiness of speech that would result with this construction; it is unjustifiable, however, on the side of the thought also, for it is impossible that John would say that to Christians the commandment has been given from the beginning, not to be ἐκ τοῦ πονηροῖ . Most commentators supply after οὐ the thought “we should be disposed,” and after Κάϊν the relative ὅς . Thus there certainly results a good sense; but if the apostle had thought thus, he would also have expressed himself thus; at least he would not have left out the ὅς . De Wette rightly finds here “an inexact comparison of contrast, as Joh_6:58, only still more difficult to supply, and just on that account not to be supplied,” i.e. by a definitely formulated sentence (so also Braune). Christians are (and therefore should also show themselves as) the opposite of Cain; they are ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ , Cain was ἐκ τοῦ πονηροῦ ; τοῦ πονηροῦ is not neuter, but masculine; ὁ πονηρός = ὁ διάβολος ; comp. especially Mat_13:38.[220]
ΚΑῚ ἜΣΦΑΞΕΝ ΤῸΝ ἈΔΕΛΦῸΝ ΑὐΤΟῖ ] This murder of his brother is the evidence that Cain was ἘΚ ΤΟῦ ΠΟΝΗΡΟῦ . The verb ΣΦΆΖΕΙΝ (besides here, only in the Apocalypse), strictly used of slaughter, indicates the violence of the action;[221] the diabolical character of it is brought out by the following: καὶ χάριν τίνος κ . τ . λ .; the form of the sentence in question and answer serves to bring out emphatically the thought contained in it, that the hatred of Cain towards his brother was founded in his hatred towards the good, i.e. that which is of God, for it is just in this that the hatred of the world towards believing Christians is also founded.[222] The correspondence between ἐκ τοῦ πονηροῦ and τὰ ἔργα αὐτοῦ πονηρά , which J. Lange and Düsterdieck have already noticed, is to be observed.
[220] The strange Rabbinical view of the devilish nature of Cain in Zohar on Gen_4:1 : Rabbi Eleazar dixit: Cum projecisset serpens ille immunditiem suam in Evam eaque illam suscepisset, remque cum Adam habuisset, peperit duos filios, unum ex latere illo immundo et unum ex latere Adami; fuitque Cain similis imagine superiorum h. e. Angelorum et Abel imagine inferiorum h. e. hominum, ac propterea diverse fuerunt viae istius ab illius viis. Equidem Cain fuit filius spiritus innnundi, qui est serpens malus; Abel vero fuit Alius Adami; et propterea quod Cain venit de parte Angeli mortis, ideo interfecit fratrem suum.
[221] From the fact that σφάζειν is used in the Revelation of “slaying in a holy service, as the martyrs are slain, even though by the godless” (which is never quite appropriate, comp. Rev_6:4), it cannot be concluded that John here used the expresssion in order “to mark the death of Abel as a martyrdom by the hand of a godless man, or as a sacrifice which Cain offered to his god, the devil.”
[222] That Cain slew his brother because his own works were evil and his brother’s righteous, does not seem to correspond to the Mosaic narrative, for τὰ ἔργα are not the offering, but the works in general (Spener: “the whole manner of life”); but there is no real contradiction, for the narrative in Genesis does not exclude the idea that the piety of Abel had already excited in Cain hatred towards his brother, and that, when God despised his offering, but had respect unto his brother’s, this hatred went so far that he became guilty of murder. Cain with this hatred, and Abel in his suffering on account of his δικαιοσύνη , serve the apostle as prototypes of the world and of the children of God. On the similar view in Philo and in the Clementine Homilies, see Lücke on this passage.