5-15 Your Father The Devil
John 8:44: “Ye are of your father the Devil, and the lusts of your father
ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not
in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh
a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father
of it”.
Popular Interpretation
The Devil is a person who has children, who are the sinful people.
They obey what he tells them to do. “From the beginning” is taken as a
reference to the serpent in Eden.
Comments
1. The use of the pronoun “he” does not indicate that the Devil
is a person. “Wisdom” is personified as a woman house-builder (Prov.
9:1) and sin as a paymaster paying wages (Rom. 6:23). Human lust
is personified as a man who drags us away to enticement. If it is
accepted that sin and sinful tendencies are personified, there should
be no problem in imagining that persona being given a name- “Satan”,
the adversary.
2. There is no specific reference here to the serpent in Eden.
3. We sin because of the lusts that begin inside us (Mk. 7: 21-23; James 1:14;
Jer. 17:9). Our evil heart - the real Devil - is the father of our
lusts and sins. “The lusts of your father” the Devil, are thus the
same as the lusts of our evil heart - the Devil.
4. The Devil is a murderer. But “no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him”
(1 Jn. 3:15). The Devil must, therefore, die - but as angels cannot
die (Lk. 20:35-36) they are therefore immortal, and have eternal
life abiding in them.
5. In our exposition of Mark 4:15, we have identified the children
of the Devil as those who obey their evil desires - the real Devil.
6. “Ye do that which ye have seen with your father” (the Devil) v. 38. The
Jews had not literally seen a person called the Devil, which indicates
that when Jesus spoke about the Jews being of their father the Devil,
He was again using parabolic language.
7. They were of the Devil in the sense that, “ye do the
deeds of your father” (v. 41), i.e. they continued the family likeness.
8. If the Devil is a murderer then he isn’t immortal, for in
commentary on this verse John later explained [as if there had already
arisen misunderstandings in the time between John’s Gospel and
epistles]: “No murderer hath eternal life abiding in him” (1 Jn. 3:15).
Angels are immortal (Lk. 20:36), so therefore this “murderer” wasn’t a
‘fallen Angel’.
Suggested Explanations
1. Scripture often uses the characteristics of something mentioned at an earlier
point in the Bible to describe what a group of people are like.
Thus “the sting of death is sin” (1 Cor. 15: 56) alludes back to
the sting of the serpent in Eden, but it doesn’t mean that death
is a literal serpent - it has the characteristics of the serpent.
Thus the dragon in Revelation 12: 9 is called “that old serpent”.
A dragon cannot be a snake at the same time; but it had the characteristics
of the serpent in Genesis.
2. Similarly, the Devil, the desires which are in our heart forming
and stimulating an evil inclination, has the characteristics of
the serpent, but it does not mean that the serpent was the Devil
itself. The serpent was “subtil” (Gen. 3:1; 2 Cor.11: 3); this may
well be behind the description of the Jews consulting “that they
might take Jesus by subtilty, and kill him” (Matt. 26: 4). The serpent
in Eden was the prototype of the Jewish system; their killing of
Jesus was the fulfillment of the prophecy that the seed of the serpent
(sin manifested in the Jews, Mt. 12: 34; Lk. 3: 7, in it’s primary
meaning) would wound the seed of the woman, Christ, in the heel
(Gen. 3:15).
3. John 8: 44 is also a reference to Cain, the first murderer -
“he was a murderer from the beginning” (Gen. 4: 8-9). He “abode
not in the truth” as he was the father of the seed of the serpent
who corrupted the true way of worshipping God (see exposition of
Gen. 6: 2 for more on this: “Suggested Explanations” , No. 4).The
letter of John often alludes to the Gospel of John, and 1 John 3:12
& 15, is an example; it confirms this interpretation: “Not as
Cain, who was of that wicked one (i.e. the Devil - Mt. 13:19 cp.
Mk. 4:15) and slew his brother...Whosoever hateth his brother (as
Cain did) is a murderer”. However, it is also true that John 8:
44 alludes to the serpent as well. The serpent told the first lie,
“Ye shall not surely die” (Gen. 3: 4); he did not abide in the truth;
he was a murderer in the sense that he brought about the death of
Adam and Eve. “He is a liar, and the father of it”. But in the same
way as Cain was not a super-human person called the Devil, but an
ordinary man, having the characteristics of the serpent and manifesting
the Devil - our evil desires - so, too, the Devil - our evil desires
- has characteristics of the serpent (see exposition of Genesis
3, earlier) - not a being called the Devil. The way in which the
fire consumed Abel’s offering but not Cain’s is paralleled by the
fire burning up Elijah’s offering but leaving those of the apostate
Jewish Baal worshippers (1 Kgs.18: 19-40). This would associate
Cain with apostate Jews, i.e. the Jewish Devil.
4. Note: “...he is a liar , and the father of it”. Jesus does not
say “he was a liar”. If we tell a lie, it is a result of the Devil, in
the sense of our evil desires prompting us - not due to any force
outside of us. Lying is one of those things that Jesus lists in Mk.
7:15,21-23 as not entering a man from outside him, but originating from
within him. The Devil is the ‘father’ of lies in the sense that they
originate from within us- which is where the Biblical Devil is located.
5. “When he speaketh a lie” - when someone lies, it is not a
super-human person called the Devil standing in front of him, it is the
Devil, in the sense of the man’s evil desires speaking to him. “Deceit”
- i.e. lies - proceed “from within, out of the heart of men” (Mk.
7:21-22).
6. The context of John 8 is Jesus stressing that if only the Jews
would truly follow the Word of God, then they would not be seeking to
murder Him. There is a pointed contrast between those who are born of
the Word of God and those conceived by the Devil, our evil heart. Man’s
heart is evil continually (Gen. 6: 5), and it is only by the Word of
God being there that we can stop the evil desires there - the Devil -
leading us into sin (Ps.119: 11; James 1: 13-15):-
- Thus Jesus said that the Jews were murderers (i.e. of the Devil
- v. 44) because the word “hath no place in you’ (Jn. 8: 37);
- “Because ye cannot hear my word. Ye are of your father the Devil” (v. 43-44);
- Because Jesus kept the saying (Greek : logos - word) of God, He
was not a liar like the Jews (v. 55) - and they were liars because they
were of the Devil (v. 44);
- “There is no truth in him” (the Devil - v. 44) because “Thy Word
is truth (Jn.17:17). The Devil is therefore the opposite to the Word of
God. Jesus said, “If ye continue in my Word...ye shall know the Truth”
(Jn. 8: 31-32);
- “He that is (born) of God heareth God’s Words: ye therefore hear
them not, because ye are not of God” (v. 47), i.e. they were of the
Devil, (v. 44);
- “I tell you the Truth (the Word - Jn. 17:17), ye believe me not”
(v. 45) - because,( v. 44), “ye are of the Devil”, which is not
sensitive to the Word of Truth”;
- The seed of the Devil is therefore our lusts, which result in the
conception of sin (James 1:13-15; Matt.13: 39). Believers are born “not
of (this) corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the Word of God”
(1 Pet.1: 23; James 1:18), the seed of the Word preached by Christ (Lk.
8:11).
Thus, because it is through the Word that our evil desires are
overcome, they who, like the Jews, reject that Word, will be living
lives and making judgments governed solely by their evil desires
- they will be truly “of the Devil”.
