Hansjörg Schmidt, «How to Read the First Epistle of John Non-Polemically», Vol. 85 (2004) 24-41
When reading 1 John most contemporary interpretors stress its polemical character and use the opponents as a key for the whole text. In contrast to them, this article proposes a non-polemical reading which treats the opponents only as a minor feature of 1 John and denies the possibility of mirror-reading the epistle. The article shows the merits, but also the inconsistencies of already existing non-polemical readings of 1 John. It describes the relationship between 1 John and John as an intertextual reading-process and views the opponents as literary contrasting figures. They form a part of an apocalyptic scenario and are related to the main ethical theme of 1 John. The pragmatic function of the excursus-like opponent texts(1 John 2,18-27; 4,1-6) is to strengthen and reassure the reader by demonstrating that he or she is immune to the opponent’s denial of the christological confession. On this basis, the ethical parenesis takes place, the urgency of which is stressed by the apocalyptic motifs. As a result, the reader tries to avoid an ethical transgression by which he or she would become like the christological opponents, who thus function as a counter-concept to the community.
40 Hansjörg Schmid
follow that a transgression in ethics is equivalent to a transgression in
christology, which has been illustrated with the help of the opponents.
For the reader, the motif of the opponents is thus a “reminder of the
perennial possibility of failureâ€(60).
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Is a non-polemical reading of 1 John convincing and what are its
implications? The position with regard to the four points mentioned as
characteristic for the polemical approach at the beginning is different.
1 John is not a polemical text in its whole, but only in minor parts. A
non-polemical reading demonstrates how the opponents’ motif is
related to the main ethical theme of 1 John. This motif, which may be
understood as polemical in a rhetorical sense, is thereby interpreted
non-polemically as a special type of self-description. Furthermore, I
see the following advantages of the non-polemical model:
1 John is often regarded as secondary to John. A non-polemical
reading is also a kind of rehabilitation of 1 John, which is no longer
described as a “situative†intervention into a past conflict, but as a
general text of equal weight to John. The intertextual perspective is also
a new model for the relationship of John and 1 John, taking into account
both their similarities and their different genre. In addition to this, it
bursts open the limits of a historistic model (the presuppositions of
which have seldom been explained in the exegesis of 1 John). Questions
that cannot be answered recede and more emphasis is put on the text
itself and a close-reading of it. Hence, contradictions within the text,
which were traditionally explained by means of the opponents, can now
be described as steps within a complex reading-process. The question of
the semantic of the christological confessions remains relevant, but is
embedded into a pragmatic perspective on the function of denial and
confession and thus is no more the key issue in reading 1 John.
Moreover, a non-polemical reading of 1 John is more open for rel-
evance to the present so that today’s reader can participate in the read-
ing and 1 John is no longer simply a story about a community more
than 1900 years ago, but a story about oneself (61). A further gain is that
(60) F.J. MOLONEY, Signs and Shadows. Reading John 5–12 (Minneapolis
1996) 204.
(61) R.A. CULPEPPER, The Gospel and the Letters of John (Interpreting Biblical
Texts; Nashville 1998) 287 asks: “Can the Gospel of John continue to function for
Christians as a document of faith in the increasing pluralism of American
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