He (éxefvos). Strongly emphatic, and pointing to the eternal Son. This pronoun is used by John more frequently than by any other writer. It occurs seventy-two times, and not only as denoting the more distant subject, but as denoting and laying special stress on the person or thing immediately at hand, or possessing pre-eminently the quality which is immediately in question. Thus Jesus applies it to Himself as the person for whom the healed blind man is inquiring: “It is He (éxetvos) that talketh with thee” (John ix. 37). So here, “the only-be- gotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father—He hath de- clared Him.”
Hath declared (éényjcaro). Or, rendering the aorist strictly, He declared. From ék, forth, and yéopas, to lead the way. Orig., to lead or govern. Hence, like the Lat. praeire verbis, to go before with words, to prescribe or dictate a form of words. To draw out in narrative, to recount or rehearse (see Acts xv. 14, and on Luke xxiv. 35). To relate in full ; to imterpret, or translate. Therefore é&/ynous, exegesis, is interpretation or ea- planation. The word éEnyntis was used by the Greeks of an expounder of oracles, dreams, omens, or sacred rites. Thus Croesus, finding the suburbs of Sardis alive with serpents, sent to the soothsayers (¢Enyntas) of Telmessus (Herodotus, i., 78). The word thus comes to mean a spiritual director. Plato calls Apollo the tutelary director (matp@os éEnyntns) of religion (“‘ Republic,” 427), and says, “ Let the priests be interpreters for life” (“ Laws,” 759). In the Septuagint the word is used of the magicians of Pharaoh’s court (Gen. xli. 8, 24), and the kindred verb of teaching or interpreting concerning leprosy (Levit. xiv. 57). John’s meaning is that the Word revealed or manifested and interpreted the Father to men. The word occurs only here in John’s writings. Wyc. renders, He hath told out. These words conclude the Prologue.
Tar Historica, Narrative now begins, and falls into two general divisions.