Yohanes 13:34

13:34 “I give you a new commandment – to love ¹  one another. Just as I have loved you, you also are to love one another. ² 

Yohanes 15:19

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 

[13:34]  ¹ tn The ἵνα (Jina) clause gives the content of the commandment. This is indicated by a dash in the translation.

[13:34]  ² sn The idea that love is a commandment is interesting. In the OT the ten commandments have a setting in the covenant between God and Israel at Sinai; they were the stipulations that Israel had to observe if the nation were to be God’s chosen people. In speaking of love as the new commandment for those whom Jesus had chosen as his own (John 13:1, 15:16) and as a mark by which they could be distinguished from others (13:35), John shows that he is thinking of this scene in covenant terminology. But note that the disciples are to love “Just as I have loved you” (13:34). The love Jesus has for his followers cannot be duplicated by them in one sense, because it effects their salvation, since he lays down his life for them: It is an act of love that gives life to people. But in another sense, they can follow his example (recall to the end, 13:1; also 1 John 3:16, 4:16 and the interpretation of Jesus’ washing of the disciples’ feet). In this way Jesus’ disciples are to love one another: They are to follow his example of sacrificial service to one another, to death if necessary.

[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.