John 3:31

that cometh from above i.e. Christ. Comp. John 3:13; John 8:23, He -is above all," John included. No one, however exalted a Prophet, can rival Him.

is earthly There is loss instead of gain in obliterating the emphatic repetition of the words -of the earth" as they appear in the Greek. He that is of the earth, of the earth he is, and of the earth he speaketh. This was John's case: he spoke of -earthly things" (see on John 3:12), Divine Truth as manifested in the world, and as revealed to him. He could not, like Christ, speak from immediate knowledge of -heavenly things." Note that -speaking of the earth" is a very different thing from -speaking of the world" (1 John 4:5). The one is to speak of God's work on earth; the other of what opposes, or at least is other than, God's work.

he that cometh from heaven A repetition with further development, very characteristic of S. John's style.