It may be added thiit the sin of unbelief in .Tesus a.s the Christ the Son of God holds in the Nl' much the .'ian'.e position which idolatry holds in the ()T. In each ca.se the sin is the worst sin that can be coiniiiitted, because it cuts off the soul from God, and so from the source of its life and peace. It is
an evil heart of unbelief falling away from the living God (He 3'-).
2. The second important point in the Fourth Gospel is its emphasis on sin as boiuUKjc. The direct teaching is brief, contained in six ver.ses iu Jn S""'-, but the development afterwards given it by St. Paul in Ko 0 places it in the front of NT teaching on sin. It is perhaps anticipated in Mt 6^ ' ye cannot serve God and mammon.'
3. There are also les.ser points worthy of notice. The old iiuestion of tln! connexion of sin and suffer- ing is raised in Jn 9, and its universality is there denied ; while, on the other hand, it is clear that it holds good in some cases, as appears in o''' ' sin no more, lest a worse thing befall thee.' The pas- sage in Lk If) as to the slaughter of the Galila,>ans is not precisely to the poiiit, as what is there taught is the general .guilt of the nation of which only these few had as yet paid the penalty. Another class of passages bearing on the subject is that dis- tinctive one in which this Gospel gives us, far more fully than the others — the Lord's dealings with individual souls. What is remarkable is His gentleness towards their sins, as, for instance, Jn 4''- 1» and 8".
Lastly, we must observe that the principal teach- ing as to sin in the Gospels, taken as a whole, is that which result.s from the revelation of a perfect standard of life as shown in Christ. As Kitschl says (vol. iii. Eng. tr. p. 329), ' The only way in which the idea of sin can be formed at all is by comparison with the good.' It is true that RitschI presses this too far, and seems to imjily that no competent standard of morality had existed before the preaching of the Kingdom of tiod. ' But to aOirm the absolute standard is not to deny the relative standard. God was in the preparation for the Kingdom of God as in the realization of that Kingdom in Christ' (Garvie, liitscltlian 7'he- oloijii, p. uO.'S). We must, nevertheless, allow that the coming of Christ and the preaching of the gospel did give a new character to sin. Sin was thus placed in a new relation, that of opposition to the Kingdom of God, and yet, further, it was shown, as in the parable of the I'rodigal, to be not only sin against power and wisdom, but also against goodness ami love.
iii. ElMSTl.Ks. — 1. St. James. — Three passages de- serve special consideration. («) The genesis of sin in the individual (Ja I''- '■'•). It comes from the will consenting to a desire for something not lawful. The desire in itself may be innocent (see art. LfsT), but, in the case supposed, it can only be gratified at tlie expense of transgression of moral law. The will surrenders, and the desire is fulfilled in an act of sin (cf. 4'-). Desire {iiriOviila) here corre- sponds nearly to ' the fie.sh' of St. Paul's theology. To understand the bearing of the passage, see Sir IS'"" , which perhaps .suggestetl il. There the source of evil lies in the freedom of the will. The fact that tills freedom is God's gift does not make Him the author of evil, for it is freedom, {h) Sin iu relation to law. The Law, rather than Christ, is the central thought of the Epistle, but it is the Law as revealetl and interpreted by Christ in the Sermon on the Mount and in His life. It is a lierfecl law (l-'-) ; a law of freeiloni, j.e. not enforced from without, hut freely accepted as the aim and desire of the subject of it (1^ 2'-) ; a royal law (2"). There is also the thought of the solidarity of the Law, with its consequences on the doctrine of sin. (Jonscious, wilful transgression of any one jioint is tantamount to transgression of the whole, for, all being God's will, any transgression is defiance of God's will (2'"). This, so far from being a pedantic conc<'])lion, is founded on a truesiiiritual view of tlio relation of man to God. It is applietl to an appa- rently small matter— respect of persons withiu the
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Church, and pri'ference jiiven to the rich over the poor. It must be added that the passage does not justify >is in inferring the equality of all sins. It is rather a warning against regarding lesser sins as of no consequence, (c) Forgiveness of siu (y'''--*). Two points deserve notice. (1) The uiediiitiou of the Christian connuunity, not of the elders only, in the forgiveiie.ss of sins (fi/xeo-tfe inrep dWr/Xwi', V."'). This mediation is elfeeted by mutual confession anil prayer. It may extend even to the case of a Christian who has actually forsaken the truth (v.'-*), and every member of the Church is bidden to consider the blessing which may attend his efforts. The sins covered are certainly those of the sinner who is converted (see Toy on I'r 10'-). (2) The close connexion in the writer's mind be- tween forgiveness of sin and healing. The i>assage begins simply with the idea of a ciise of sickness (v.H), and goes on to assume that it may perhaps be occasioned by sin (cf. the forgiveness of the paralytic, .Mt 9'^). The removal of the chastise- ment and the forgiveness of the sin which occa- sioned it go together ; cf. Ps 103^, which was interpreted in this sense.