1Jo 2:15, 5:19 | JFB | e4.org | 15. Love not the world —that lieth in the wicked one ( ), whom ye young men have overcome. Having once for all, through faith, overcome the world ( ), carry forward the conquest by not loving it. "The world" here means "man, and man's world" [ALFORD ], in his and its state as fallen from God. "God loved [with the love of compassion ] the world," and we should feel the same kind of love for the fallen world; but we are not to love the world with congeniality and sympathy in its alienation from God; we cannot have this latter kind of love for the God-estranged world, and yet have also "the love of the Father in" us. neither — Greek, "nor yet." A man might deny in general that he loved the world, while keenly following some one of THE THINGS IN IT : its riches, honors, or pleasures; this clause prevents him escaping from conviction. any man —therefore the warning, though primarily addressed to the young, applies to all. love of —that is, towards "the Father." The two, God and the (sinful) world, are so opposed, that both cannot be congenially loved at once.

‏ 1 John 2:15

15. Love not the world—that lieth in the wicked one (1Jo 5:19), whom ye young men have overcome. Having once for all, through faith, overcome the world (1Jo 4:4; 5:4), carry forward the conquest by not loving it. "The world" here means "man, and man's world" [ALFORD], in his and its state as fallen from God. "God loved [with the love of compassion] the world," and we should feel the same kind of love for the fallen world; but we are not to love the world with congeniality and sympathy in its alienation from God; we cannot have this latter kind of love for the God-estranged world, and yet have also "the love of the Father in" us.

neither—Greek, "nor yet." A man might deny in general that he loved the world, while keenly following some one of THE THINGS IN IT: its riches, honors, or pleasures; this clause prevents him escaping from conviction.

any man—therefore the warning, though primarily addressed to the young, applies to all.

love of—that is, towards "the Father." The two, God and the (sinful) world, are so opposed, that both cannot be congenially loved at once.

‏ 1 John 5:19

19. world lieth in wickedness—rather, "lieth in the wicked one," as the Greek is translated in 1Jo 5:18; 1Jo 2:13, 14; compare 1Jo 4:4; Joh 17:14, 15. The world lieth in the power of, and abiding in, the wicked one, as the resting-place and lord of his slaves; compare "abideth in death," 1Jo 3:14; contrast 1Jo 5:20, "we are in Him that is true." While the believer has been delivered out of his power, the whole world lieth helpless and motionless still in it, just as it was; including the wise, great, respectable, and all who are not by vital union in Christ.