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Book of John | Alexander Scourby | KJV

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The ancient Greek word translated life is ‘zoe,’ which means “the life principle,” … He, Christ Jesus, is life and light [the principle] … Therefore, without Jesus, we are dead and in darkness. We are lost … The light cannot lose against the darkness; the darkness will never overcome it ... So the new creation involves the banishing of spiritual darkness by the light which shines in the Word.

David Guzik

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The Light was always nigh at hand, even in the Old Testament, ready to apply a remedy to darkness and sin … Men wrapt in darkness.—[comprehended it not] did not attain to it) Men, it seems, were too much averse from the Light, as well as too deeply sunk in darkness … they did not comprehend the, ‘The Word unclothed in flesh’, “He, Christ Jesus, was made flesh,” John 1:14.

Johann Bengel

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The World's Condition

Darkness, was the expression naturally used by secular Greek writers to describe the world’s condition. Thus Lucian:

“Qualibus in tenebris vitae, quantisque periclis, Degitur hoc aevi quodcunque est” “In what darkness of life, and in what dangers, This age is lived, whatever it may be”

The Expositor's Greek Testament

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3-m

“(3) And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness {m} comprehended it not:”

(3) The light of men is turned into darkness, but yet there is enough clearness so that they are without excuse.

(m) They could not perceive nor reach it to receive any light from it, no, they did not so much as acknowledge him.

~ Geneva Study Bible

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Darkness

Here the abstract term “darkness,” as the element in which the light shines, denotes not the individual subject of darkness, but, as the context requires, that same totality … consequently mankind in general, in so far as in and for themselves they have since the fall been destitute of divine truth, and have become corrupt in understanding and will … [Mankind thus] … apprehended it not, took not possession of it; it was not appropriated by the darkness, so that thereby the latter might have become light, but remained aloof and alien to it. ~ Heinrich A.W. Meyer

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Book of John | (NASB)

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But in the moral chaos, too, God said, “Let there be light; and there was light.”

The first struggle of light into and through darkness until the darkness received it, rolled back before it, passed away into it—the repeated comprehension of light by darkness, as in the dawn of every morning the night passes into day, and the earth now shrouded in blackness is now bathed in the clear white light of an Eastern sun—this has its counterpart in the moral world.

There, too, the Sun of Righteousness has shone, is ever shining; but as the Apostle looks back on the history of the pre-Christian world, or, it may be, looks back on the earthly ministry of Christ Himself, he seeks in vain for the victory of truth, for the hearts of nations, or of men, penetrated through and through with heaven’s light, and he sums up the whole in one sad negation, “The darkness comprehended it not.”

Yet in this very sadness there is firm and HOPEFUL FAITH. The emphatic present declares that the light still, always, “shineth in darkness.”

True are those words of patriarch, lawgiver, prophet, as they followed the voice which called, or received God’s law for men, or told forth the word which came to them from Him; true are they of every poet, thinker, statesman, who has grasped some higher truth, or chased some lurking doubt, or taught a nation noble deeds; true are they of every evangelist, martyr, philanthropist, who has carried the light of the gospel to the heart of men, who has in life or death witnessed to its truth, who has shown its power in deeds of mercy and of love; true are they of the humblest Christian who seeks to walk in the light, and from the sick-chamber of the lowliest home may be letting a light shine before men which leads them to glorify the Father which is in heaven.

The Light is ever shining, ofttimes, indeed, colored as it passes through the differing minds of different men, and meeting us across the space that separates continents, and the time that separates ages, in widely varying hues; but these shades pass into each other, and in the harmony of all is the pure light of truth.

John Ellicott

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Whatever truly lives, does so because sin has never found place in it, or, having found place for a time, has since been overcome and expelled.

[Ref. 2 Corinthians 5:21: “God made him who had no sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.”

~ Trench

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The primary distinction is that ζωὴ means existence as contrasted with death, and βίος, the period, means, or manner of existence. Hence βίος is originally the higher word, being used of men, while ζωὴ is used of animals (ζῶα). We speak therefore of the discussion of the life and habits of animals as zoology; and of accounts of men's lives as biography. Animals have the vital principle in common with men, but men lead lives controlled by intellect and will, and directed to moral and intellectual ends. In the New Testament, βίος means either living, i.e., means of subsistence (Mk 12:44; Lk 8:43), or course of life, life regarded as an economy (Lk 8:14; 1 Ti 2:2; 2 Ti 2:4). Ζωὴ occurs in the lower sense of life, considered principally or wholly as existence (1 Pt 3:10; Acts 8:33; 17:25; Heb 7:3). There seems to be a significance in the use of the word in Luke 16:25: "Thou in thy lifetime (ἐν τῇ ζωῇ σου) receivedst thy good things;" the intimation being that the rich man's life had been little better than mere existence, and not life at all in the true sense. But throughout the New Testament ζωὴ is the nobler word, seeming to have changed places with βίος. It expresses the sum of mortal and eternal blessedness (Mt 25:46; Lk 18:30; Jn 11:25; Acts 2:28; Rm 5:17; 6:4), and that not only in respect of men, but also of God and Christ. So here. Compare John 5:26; John 14:6; 1 John 1:2. This change is due to the gospel revelation of the essential connection of sin with death, and consequently, of life with holiness. ~ Marvin R. Vincent

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The Persic version reads in the plural number, "lives".

DIVINE LIFE: There was life in the word with respect to himself; a divine life, the same with the life of the Father and of the Spirit; and is in him, not by gift, nor by derivation or communication; but originally, and independently, and from all eternity: indeed he lived before his incarnation as Mediator, and Redeemer. Job knew him in his time, as his living Redeemer; but this regards him as the word and living God, and distinguishes him from the written word, and shows that he is not a mere idea in the divine mind, but a truly divine person:

NATURAL LIFE: And there was life in Christ the word, with respect to others; the fountain of natural life is in him, he is the efficient cause, and preserver of it; whether vegetative, animal, or rational; and proves him to be truly God, and that he existed before his incarnation; since creatures, who have received such a life from him, did: and spiritual life was also in him; all his elect are dead in trespasses and sins, and cannot quicken themselves. Christ has procured life for them, and gives it to them, and implants it in them; a life of sanctification is from him; and a life of justification is upon him, and of faith is by him; all the comforts of a spiritual life, and all things appertaining to it, are from him, and he maintains, and preserves it.

ETERNAL LIFE: Eternal life is in him, and with him; not the purpose of it only, nor the promise of it barely, but the gift of it itself; which was granted in consequence of his asking it, and which he had by way of stipulation; and hence has a right and power to bestow it: now, this being in him proves him to be the true God, and shows us where life is to be had, and the safety and security of it.

~ John Gill

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John’s thoughts overlap and run into one another. Creation leads on to life, and life leads on to light. Without life creation would be unintelligible; without light all but the lowest forms of life would be impossible. Psalm 36:9 reads, “For the fountain of life is with You; In Your light we see light.”

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

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