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2. καὶ αὐτὸς ἱλασμός ἐστιν. And He Himself is a propitiation. Ἔχομεν … ἐστιν, present tense of what is continual. In His glorified Body the Son is ever acting thus. Contrast the aorist (ἔθηκεν) of what took place once for all (1Jn 3:16), His death. Beware of the unsatisfactory explanation that ‘propitiation’ is the abstract for the concrete, ‘propitiation’ (ἱλασμός) for ‘propitiator’ (ἱλαστήρ). Had S. John written ‘propitiator’ we should have lost half the truth; viz. that our Advocate propitiates by offering Himself. He is both High Priest and Victim, both Propitiator and Propitiation. It is quite obvious that He is the former; the office of Advocate includes it. It is not at all obvious that He is the latter: very rarely does an advocate offer himself as a propitiation. Ἱλασμός occurs nowhere in N.T. but here and in 1Jn 4:10; in both places without the article and followed by περὶ τῶν ἁμ. ἡμῶν. It is one of the few great words in this Epistle which are not found in the Gospel. It signifies any action which has expiation as its object, whether prayer, compensation, or sacrifice. Thus ‘the ram of the atonement’ (Num 5:8) is ὁ κριὸς τοῦ ἱλασμοῦ. Comp. Eze 44:27; Num 29:11; Lev 25:9. ‘There is forgiveness with Thee’ (Psa 130:4) is in LXX. παρὰ σοὶ ὁ ἱλασμός ἐστιν, ‘Before Thee is the propitiation,’ Apud Te propitiatio est. The full meaning of this is given here: Jesus Christ, as being righteous, is ever present before the Lord as the propitiation. Comp. the use of ἱλάσκεσθαι (Heb 2:17) and of ἱλαστήριον (Rom 3:25; Heb 9:5). These passages shew that in N.T. the word is closely connected with that form of expiation which takes place by means of sacrifice or offering, although this idea is not of necessity included in the radical signification of the word itself. See notes in all three places. Latin writers use deprecatio, exoratio, and placatio as translations, as well as propitiatio. Thus Tertullian (De Pud. XIX.): et ipse placatio est pro delictis nostris; and again Horum ergo erit venia per exoratorem patris Christum. Augustine uses both propitiatio and exoratio, and also propitiator. See Appendix G. Comp. S. Paul’s words καταλλαγή (Rom 5:11; Rom 11:15; 2Co 5:18-19) and καταλλάσσειν (Rom 5:10; 1Co 7:11; 2Co 5:18-20). By the advocacy of Christ (παράκλητος) God is propitiated (ἱλασμός) and we are reconciled to Him (καταλλαγή).
περὶ τῶν ἁμαρτ. ἡμ. Literally, concerning our sins: our sins are matter respecting which propitiation goes on. So commonly in LXX. χίμαρον ἐξ αἰγῶν ἕνα περὶ ἁμαρτίας, ἐξιλάσασθαι περὶ ὑμῶν (Num 29:5; Num 29:11; comp. Exo 30:15-16; Exo 32:30; Lev 4:20; Lev 4:26; Lev 4:31; Lev 4:35, &c.). Comp. also Joh 8:46; Joh 10:33; Joh 16:8. Note the plural: not merely the sinfulness of human nature, but the sins which we are daily committing, is the subject of the propitiation.
οὐ περὶ τῶν ἡμετέρων δὲ μόνον, ἀλλὰ καὶ π. ὅλου τ. κ. “The particle δέ marks the clause as guarding against error, not merely adding a new thought” (Westcott). Once more we have a parallel with the Gospel, and especially with chap. 17. ‘Neither for these only do I pray, but for them also that shall believe on Me through their word … that the world may believe that Thou didst send Me … that the world may know that Thou didst send Me, and lovedst them, even as Thou lovedst Me’ (Joh 17:20-23): ‘Behold, the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world’ (Joh 1:29): ‘We know that this is indeed the Saviour of the world’ (Joh 4:24). Comp. 1Jn 4:14. S. John’s writings are so full of the fundamental opposition between Christ or believers and the world, that there was danger lest he should seem to give his sanction to a Christian exclusiveness as fatal as the Jewish exclusiveness out of which he and other converts from Judaism had been delivered. Therefore by this (note especially ‘the whole world’) and other plain statements both in Gospel (see Joh 11:51 in particular) and Epistle he insists that believers have no exclusive right to the merits of Christ. The expiatory offering was made for the whole world without limitation. All who will may profit by it: quam late peccatum, tam late propitiatio (Bengel). The disabilities under which the whole human race had laboured were removed. It remained to be seen who would avail themselves of the restored privileges. It is from the Latin, pro totius mundi (understanding peccatis, which Beza inserts) that the A.V. rendering, ‘but also for the sins of the whole world,’ comes. So Luther: ‘sondern auch für der ganzen Welt.’ The supposed ellipse is neither necessary nor very probable: rather, as R.V., but also for the whole world. Comp. Joh 5:36; Heb 9:7. The latter passage shews that the ellipse is not necessary; and if it be said that ἱλασμός implies τῶν ἁμαρτιῶν (which may be doubted), then let ‘propitiation’ imply ‘sins’ in the English. We are not justified in inserting the word.
Ὁ κόσμος is another of S. John’s characteristic expressions. In his writings it generally means those who are alienated from God, outside the pale of the Church. “The world is a living tradition of disloyalty and dislike to God and His kingdom, just as the Church is or was meant to be a living tradition of faith, hope, and charity” (Liddon’s Easter Sermons XXII, perhaps the best existing commentary on S. John’s use of ‘the world’). But we should fall into grievous error if we assigned this meaning to the word indiscriminately. Thus, in ‘the world was made by Him’ (Joh 1:10) it means ‘the universe’; in ‘This is of a truth the Prophet that cometh into the world’ (Joh 6:14) it means ‘the earth’; in ‘God so loved the world’ (Joh 3:16) it means, as here, ‘the inhabitants of the earth, the human race.’ But still the prevalent meaning in both Gospel and Epistle is a bad one; ‘those who have not accepted the Christ, unbelievers, especially the great heathen organization of Rome.’ The natural order has become an unnatural disorder. S. Paul uses the word in the same sense (1Co 2:12; 1Co 7:33; 2Co 7:10; Col 2:8; Gal 4:3; Gal 6:14). In the Apocalypse it occurs only thrice, once in the usual sense, ‘The kingdom of the world is become the kingdom of our Lord’ (Rev 11:15), and twice in the sense of ‘the universe’ (Rev 13:8; Rev 17:8).