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1Jn_3:8. ὁ ποιῶν τὴν ἁμαρτίαν ] forms the diametrical opposite of ὁ ποιῶν τὴν δικαιοσύνην , inasmuch as it signifies the man whose life is a service of sin, “who lives in sin as his element” (Sander). While the former belongs to Christ, and is a τέκνον Θεοῦ , the latter is ἐκ τοῦ διαβόλου ; ἐκ does not signify here either merely connection (de Wette), or similarity (Paulus), or imitation (Semler), but, as the expression τέκνον τοῦ διαβόλου (1Jn_3:10) shows, origin (so also Ebrard): the life that animates the sinner emanates from the devil; “not as if the devil created him, but that he introduced the evil into him” (Russmeyer). The apostle confirms the truth of this statement by the following words: ὅτι ἀπ ̓ ἀρχῆς ὁ διάβολος ἁμαρτάνει . The words ἀπ ̓ ἀρχῆς are put first, because the chief emphasis rests on them, inasmuch as those who commit sin are ἐκ τοῦ διαβόλου , not because he sins, but because it is he who sinneth ἀπʼ ἀρχῆς . From this expression it must not, with Frommann and Hilgenfeld, be inferred that John was considering the devil as an originally evil being,—in dualistic fashion (comp. Köstlin, p. 127, and Weiss, p. 132 ff.),—for John is not here speaking of the being, but of the action of the devil. In order not to accuse John of the Manichaean dualism, the attempt has been made to define ἀπʼ ἀρχῆς more particularly, either by referring it to the creation of the world (Calvin, S. G. Lange; also Hofmann, Schriftbew. 2d ed. I. 429: “since the beginning of the world,” or: “from the beginning of history, in the course of which the sin of men has begun”), or to res humanae (Semler), or to the time of the devil’s fall (Bengel: ex quo diabolus est diabolus); but all these supplements are purely arbitrary. Many modern commentators take the expression in reference to the sin of man, and find this idea expressed in it, that “the devil is related to all the sins of men as the first and seductive originator” (Nitzsch, Syst. der christlichen Lchre, 6th ed. p. 244 f.); thus Lücke, Düsterdieck, Ebrard, Weiss, Braune, and previously in this commentary; but this thought, while it no doubt lies in the preceding ἐκ τοῦ διαβόλου and in the following τέκνον τοῦ διαβόλου , and hence in the thesis to be established, does not lie in this confirmatory clause, apart from the fact that in ἀπʼ ἀρχῆς ἁμαρτάνει no reference is indicated to the sin of man. It is otherwise in Joh_8:44, where the more particular definition of the relation of the devil to men is supplied with ἀπʼ ἀρχῆς from the context (“since he has put himself in connection with men”); here, on the contrary, John does not say: “what the devil is to men, but what is his relationship to God” (Hofmann as above); but as he describes his relationship by ἀπʼ ἀρχῆς ἁμαρτάνει , as a sinning which has continued from the beginning, this can only mean that the devil’s first action was sin, and that he has remained and remains in that action. Likewise in the interpretation which Brückner gives of ἀπʼ ἀρχῆς : “i.e. so long as there is sin,” ἀπʼ ἀρχῆς does not receive its full force.[211]
The present ἉΜΑΡΤΆΝΕΙ describes the sinning of the devil as uninterruptedly continuous.
ΕἸς ΤΟῦΤΟ ἘΦΑΝΕΡΏΘΗ Κ . Τ . Λ .] As 1Jn_3:6-7 refer to the second part of 1Jn_3:5, these words refer to the first part of that verse; they not only express the antithesis between Christ and the devil, but they bring out the fact that the appearance of Christ has for its object the destruction of the ἜΡΓΑ ΤΟῦ ΔΙΑΒΌΛΟΥ , i.e. of the ἁμαρτίαι which are wrought by him (not “the reward of sin,” Calov, Spener; nor “the agency that seduces to sin,” de Wette). ΛΎΕΙΝ is used here as in Joh_2:19 (similarly 2Pe_3:10-12), in the meaning of “to destroy;” less naturally some commentators (a Lapide, Lorinus, Spener, Besser, etc.) maintain the meaning “to undo,” sins being regarded as the snares of the devil.
[211] The idea that the devil, before he sinned, was for a time without sin, is nowhere expressed in Scripture; neither in Joh_8:44 nor in the deuterocanonical passages Jud_1:6 and 2Pe_2:4 (see my comm. on these passages).—The view of Frommann, that John’s statements do not justify the representation of a personal existence of the devil, that “he is nothing further than the world-spirit that tempts man, considered in concrete personality,” is to be rejected as arbitrary.