Yohanes 15:18-21

The World’s Hatred

15:18 “If the world hates you, be aware ¹  that it hated me first. ²  15:19 If you belonged to the world, ³  the world would love you as its own. ⁴  However, because you do not belong to the world, ⁵  but I chose you out of the world, for this reason ⁶  the world hates you. ⁷  15:20 Remember what ⁸  I told you, ‘A slave ⁹  is not greater than his master.’ ¹⁰  If they persecuted me, they will also persecute you. If they obeyed ¹¹  my word, they will obey ¹²  yours too. 15:21 But they will do all these things to you on account of ¹³  my name, because they do not know the one who sent me. ¹⁴ 

Yohanes 16:1-2

16:1 “I have told you all these things so that you will not fall away. ¹⁵  16:2 They will put you out of ¹⁶  the synagogue, ¹⁷  yet a time ¹⁸  is coming when the one who kills you will think he is offering service to God. ¹⁹ 

Yohanes 17:14

17:14 I have given them your word, ²⁰  and the world has hated them, because they do not belong to the world, ²¹  just as I do not belong to the world. ²² 

[15:18]  ¹ tn Grk “know.”

[15:18]  ² tn Grk “it hated me before you.”

[15:19]  ³ tn Grk “if you were of the world.”

[15:19]  ⁴ tn The words “you as” are not in the original but are supplied for clarity.

[15:19]  ⁵ tn Grk “because you are not of the world.”

[15:19]  ⁶ tn Or “world, therefore.”

[15:19]  ⁷ sn I chose you out of the world…the world hates you. Two themes are brought together here. In 8:23 Jesus had distinguished himself from the world in addressing his Jewish opponents: “You are from below, I am from above; you are of this world, I am not of this world.” In 15:16 Jesus told the disciples “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you.” Now Jesus has united these two ideas as he informs the disciples that he has chosen them out of the world. While the disciples will still be “in” the world after Jesus has departed, they will not belong to it, and Jesus prays later in John 17:15-16 to the Father, “I do not ask you to take them out of the world, but to keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world.” The same theme also occurs in 1 John 4:5-6: “They are from the world; therefore they speak as from the world, and the world listens to them. We are from God; he who knows God listens to us; he who is not from God does not listen to us.” Thus the basic reason why the world hates the disciples (as it hated Jesus before them) is because they are not of the world. They are born from above, and are not of the world. For this reason the world hates them.

[15:20]  ⁸ tn Grk “Remember the word that I said to you.”

[15:20]  ⁹ tn See the note on the word “slaves” in 4:51.

[15:20]  ¹⁰ sn A slave is not greater than his master. Jesus now recalled a statement he had made to the disciples before, in John 13:16. As the master has been treated, so will the slaves be treated also. If the world had persecuted Jesus, then it would also persecute the disciples. If the world had kept Jesus’ word, it would likewise keep the word of the disciples. In this statement there is the implication that the disciples would carry on the ministry of Jesus after his departure; they would in their preaching and teaching continue to spread the message which Jesus himself had taught while he was with them. And they would meet with the same response, by and large, that he encountered.

[15:20]  ¹¹ tn Or “if they kept.”

[15:20]  ¹² tn Or “they will keep.”

[15:21]  ¹³ tn Or “because of.”

[15:21]  ¹⁴ tn Jesus is referring to God as “the one who sent me.”

[16:1]  ¹⁵ tn Grk “so that you will not be caused to stumble.”

[16:1]  sn In Johannine thought the verb σκανδαλίζω (skandalizw) means to trip up disciples and cause them to fall away from Jesus’ company (John 6:61, 1 John 2:10). Similar usage is found in Didache 16:5, an early Christian writing from around the beginning of the 2nd century a.d. An example of a disciple who falls away is Judas Iscariot. Here and again in 16:4 Jesus gives the purpose for his telling the disciples about coming persecution: He informs them so that when it happens, the disciples will not fall away, which in this context would refer to the confusion and doubt which they would certainly experience when such persecution began. There may have been a tendency for the disciples to expect immediately after Jesus’ victory over death the institution of the messianic kingdom, particularly in light of the turn of events recorded in the early chapters of Acts. Jesus here forestalls such disillusionment for the disciples by letting them know in advance that they will face persecution and even martyrdom as they seek to carry on his mission in the world after his departure. This material has parallels in the Olivet Discourse (Matt 24-25) and the synoptic parallels.

[16:2]  ¹⁶ tn Or “expel you from.”

[16:2]  ¹⁷ sn See the note on synagogue in 6:59.

[16:2]  ¹⁸ tn Grk “an hour.”

[16:2]  ¹⁹ sn Jesus now refers not to the time of his return to the Father, as he has frequently done up to this point, but to the disciples’ time of persecution. They will be excommunicated from Jewish synagogues. There will even be a time when those who kill Jesus’ disciples will think that they are offering service to God by putting the disciples to death. Because of the reference to service offered to God, it is almost certain that Jewish opposition is intended here in both cases rather than Jewish opposition in the first instance (putting the disciples out of synagogues) and Roman opposition in the second (putting the disciples to death). Such opposition materializes later and is recorded in Acts: The stoning of Stephen in 7:58-60 and the slaying of James the brother of John by Herod Agrippa I in Acts 12:2-3 are notable examples.

[17:14]  ²⁰ tn Or “your message.”

[17:14]  ²¹ tn Grk “because they are not of the world.”

[17:14]  ²² tn Grk “just as I am not of the world.”