1 Yohanes 4:21

4:21 And the commandment we have from him is this: that ¹  the one who loves God should love his fellow Christian ²  too.

1 Yohanes 5:3

5:3 For ³  this is the love of God: ⁴  that we keep his commandments. ⁵  And his commandments do not weigh us down,

1 Yohanes 5:14

5:14 And this is the confidence that we have before him: that ⁶  whenever ⁷  we ask anything according to his will, he hears us.

[4:21]  ¹ tn The ἵνα (Jina) clause in 4:21 could be giving (1) the purpose or (2) the result of the commandment mentioned in the first half of the verse, but if it does, the author nowhere specifies what the commandment consists of. It makes better sense to understand this ἵνα clause as (3) epexegetical to the pronoun ταύτην (tauthn) at the beginning of 4:21 and thus explaining what the commandment consists of: “that the one who loves God should love his brother also.”

[4:21]  ² tn See note on the phrase “fellow Christian” in 2:9.

[5:3]  ³ tn The force of the γάρ (gar) at the beginning of 5:3 is similar to another introductory formula used by the author of 1 John, καὶ αὕτη ἐστίν (kai Jauth estin; used in 1:5; 5:4, 11, and 14). The γάρ draws an inference based on the preceding statements, particularly the one in 5:2b, regarding the love of God. If in 5:2 loving God and keeping his commandments is the key to knowing that we love God’s children, it is important to define what the love of God involves, and this is what the author is doing in 5:3. In fact, as the following ἵνα (Jina) clause makes clear, loving God consists in keeping his commandments.

[5:3]  ⁴ tn Once again the genitive could be understood as (1) objective, (2) subjective, or (3) both. Here an objective sense is more likely (believers’ love for God) because in the previous verse it is clear that God is the object of believers’ love.

[5:3]  ⁵ tn Contrary to the punctuation of NA²⁷ and UBS⁴, it is best to place a full stop (period) following τηρῶμεν (thrwmen) in 5:3. The subordinate clause introduced by ὅτι (Joti) at the beginning of 5:4 is related to the second half of 5:3 which begins with καί (kai). Καί is commonly used by the author to begin a new sentence, probably by analogy with the Hebrew vav consecutive.

[5:14]  ⁶ tn For the third time in 5:9-14 the author uses the construction αὕτη ἐστίν ({auth estin; 5:9, 11, 14). As in the previous instance (5:11) the ὅτι (Joti) clause which follows is epexegetical (explanatory) to the pronoun αὕτη and explains what the “confidence” (παρρησία, parrhsia) consists of (technically the subject is ἡ παρρησία, the predicate nominative is the pronoun αὕτη, and the ὅτι clause explains the predicate nominative): “And the confidence which we have before him is this, namely, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us.”

[5:14]  ⁷ tn A third-class condition is introduced by ἐάν (ean) + present subjunctive. Because the apodosis also contains a present tense verb (ἀκούει, akouei) this belongs in a subcategory of third-class conditional sentences known as present general. In the Koine period ἐάν can mean “when” or “whenever” and is virtually the equivalent of ὅταν (Jotan; see BDAG 268 s.v. ἐάν 2). Thus the meaning here is, “whenever (i.e., if) we ask anything according to his will, then he hears us.”