CHAPTER 2
The Prologue in Outline (1:1-18)
In reading the fourth Gospel, most of us find that it is the prologue
that contains the more difficult expressions, while in the body of the
Gospel itself we feel on more familiar ground. It is probable, however,
that those who were primarily in the apostle's mind when he wrote this
record, would find the reverse to be true. As they began to read about
the Logos, at the beginning of the Gospel, they would be on familiar
ground, but they would feel that they were entering quite new territory
as they followed the earthly footsteps of Him Who was the Logos
`made flesh'. We have thought so frequently of the Hebrew people as
the channel of Divine revelation and as the supreme example of the
failure of the creature to attain unto righteousness that we have tended
to forget the Greek nation, as the example of the failure of human
reason to attain unto wisdom. We are expressly told that the Jew
sought after righteousness but did not attain it, because he sought it by
law and not by faith (Rom. 9:31,32; 10:3), and in 1 Corinthians we
read:
`The Jews require a sign, and the Greeks seek after wisdom' (1:22).
Just as `Christ' was the true Righteousness of the Jew, so He was
equally the true Wisdom of the Greek.
`But of Him are ye in Christ Jesus, Who of God is made unto us
wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption'
(1 Cor. 1:30).
In the first three Gospels the Jew is distinctly prominent, and there
are abundant references to the Old Covenant Scriptures. Both are
conspicuous, too, in the body of the Gospel of John - for it is a faithful
record of the Lord's deeds and words in Jerusalem, Jud -a and Samaria
- but in the prologue the Greek point of view is prominent, and the
problem of the Greeks is shown to be solved in the person and work of
the Son of God.
It is interesting to notice that this Gospel is the only one that uses
the word Hellen, `Greeks'. With the coming of the `Greeks' and their
request: `Sir, we would see Jesus' (12:20,21), the Saviour says for the
first time: `The hour is come, that the Son of Man should be glorified'
(12:23). To his mother at the marriage feast He had said: `Mine hour