receiving Christ (i. 12; v. 43; xiii. 20). The phrase receive the witness is peculiar to John (ver. 11; v. 84; 1 John vy. 9).
33. Hath set to his seal (e€odpdyicev). To set to, is to affix. To set to a seal is therefore to attest a document. The expres- sion is retained from Coverdale’s version (1535). So, “ They must set ¢o their hands, and shall se¢ to their hands.” Compare
, also the old legal formula: “In wittenesse qwherof I haue set to my seele.” Rev., better, hath set his seal to this. The meaning here is, has solemnly attested and confirmed the state- ment ‘God is true.” Only here in this sense. Elsewhere of closing up for security; hiding; marking a person or thing. See on Apoc. xxii. 10. The aorist tense here denotes an accom- plished act.
34. The words (ra pyywata). Not words, nor individual words, but ¢he words—the complete message of God. See on Iuke i. 37.
God giveth. The best texts omit God. Rev., He giveth. Rev. also, rightly, omits the italicized to Him. The personal object of the verb giveth is indefinite. Render, He giveth not the Spirit by measure.
In order to convey the full force of the terms giveth and by measure, it will be necessary to attempt an explanation of the general scope and meaning of this very difficult and much dis- puted passage. The starting-point of the exposition must be ver. 30, the Baptist’s noble resignation of his own position and claims to Jesus: He must increase, but I must decrease. At this point the Evangelist, as we have seen, takes up the dis- course. The Baptist’s declaration that Jesus “must increase” —that He is a messenger of a transcendently higher character, and with a far larger and more significant message than his own—furnishes the Evangelist with a text. He will show why Jesus “must increase.” He must increase because Le comes Srom above, and is therefore supreme over all (ver. 81). This statement he repeats; defining from above (dvw9ev) by out of heaven (é« Tod ovpavod), and emphasizing it by contrast with a