John 1:16

ὅτι with אBC1DLX for καί of T. R. with Acts 3, perhaps to avoid ὅτι thrice in three lines.

16. The Baptist’s witness to the incarnate Logos confirmed by the experience of all believers. The Evangelist is the speaker.

πληρώματος. “A recognised technical term in theology, denoting the totality of the Divine powers and attributes.” See Lightfoot on Colossians 1:19; Colossians 2:9, where this meaning is very marked. This fulness of the Divine attributes belonged to Christ (John 1:14), and by Him was imparted to the Church, which is His Body (Ephesians 1:23); and through the Church each individual believer in his degree receives a portion.

ἡμεῖς πάντες. Shews that the Evangelist and not the Baptist is speaking. This appeal to his own experience and that of his fellows is natural as coming from the Apostle; it would not be natural in a writer of a later age. Another indication that S. John is the writer.

καί. Epexegetic, = ‘namely’ or ‘even,’ explaining what we all received. Comp. 1 Corinthians 3:5; 1 Corinthians 15:38; Ephesians 6:18. Winer, p. 545.

χάριν�. Literally, Grace in the place of grace, one grace succeeding another and as it were taking its place. (On χάρις see John 1:14.) There is no reference to the New Testament displacing the Old: that would have been χάριν�; see next verse. Possibly the ἀντί may imply that one grace leads on to another, so that the second is, as it were, a reward for the first. Winer, p. 456.