Albert Barnes Commentary 1 John 3:9

"Whosoever is begotten of God doeth no sin, because his seed abideth in him: and he cannot sin, because he is begotten of God." — 1 John 3:9 (ASV)

Whoever is born of God does not commit sin. This passage must mean either that those who are born of God—that is, who are true Christians—do not sin habitually and characteristically, or that everyone who is a true Christian is absolutely perfect and never commits any sin.

If it can be used as referring to the doctrine of absolute perfection at all, it proves not that Christians may be perfect, or that a portion of them are, but that all are. But who can maintain this? Who can believe that John meant to affirm this? Nothing can be clearer than that the passage does not have this meaning, and that John did not teach a doctrine so contrary to the current teaching of the Scriptures and to fact. If he did not teach this, then in this whole passage he refers to those who are habitually and characteristically righteous.

For his seed remains in him. There is much obscurity in this expression, though the general sense is clear: there is something abiding in the heart of the true Christian, which the apostle here calls seed, that will prevent his sinning. The word "his" in this phrase, "his seed," may refer either to the individual himself—in the sense that this can now be properly called his, since it is a part of himself or a principle abiding in him—or it may refer to God, in the sense that what is here called "seed" is his; that is, he has implanted it, or it is a germ of Divine origin.

Robinson (Lexicon) understands it in the latter sense, and so also do Macknight, Doddridge, Lucke, and others; this is probably the true interpretation. The word seed (Greek: sperma) properly means seed sown, as of grain, plants, or trees, then anything that resembles it—anything that germinates, springs up, or is produced. It is applied in the New Testament to the word of God, or the gospel, as that which produces effects in the heart and life similar to what sown seed does. (Compare Matthew 13:26, 37-38).

Augustine, Clement (of Alexandria), Grotius, Rosenmuller, Benson, and Bloomfield suppose that this is the meaning of the word here. The proper idea, according to this view, is that the seed referred to is truth, which God has implanted or sown in the heart, from which it may be expected that the fruits of righteousness will grow.

But that which abides in the heart of a Christian is not the naked word of God—not the mere gospel or mere truth. It is, rather, that word made vital and efficacious by the influences of his Spirit: the germ of the Divine life, the principles of true piety in the soul. Compare the words of Virgil: "Igneus est illi vigor et caelestis origo semini."

The exact idea here, as it seems to me, is not that the "seed" refers to the word of God (as Augustine and others suppose) or to the Spirit of God, but to the germ of piety produced in the heart by the word and Spirit of God. This germ may be regarded as having been implanted there by God himself and may be expected to produce holiness in life.

There is probably, as Lucke supposes, an allusion in the word to the fact that we are begotten (Greek: ho gegenēmenos) of God. The word remaineth (Greek: menei) is a favorite expression of John (compare 1 John 3:6).

The expression John uses here, thus explained, would seem to imply two things:

1. that the germ or seed of religion implanted in the soul abides there as a constant, vital principle, so that he who is born of God cannot become habitually a sinner; and
2. that it will so continue to live there that he will not fall away and perish.

The idea is clearly that the germ or principle of piety so permanently abides in the soul that he who is renewed can never again become characteristically a sinner.

And he cannot sin. This means not merely that he will not, but that he cannot sin, in the sense referred to. This cannot mean that one who is renewed lacks the physical ability to do wrong, for every moral agent possesses that. Nor can it mean that a true Christian never, in fact, does anything wrong in thought, word, or deed, for no one could seriously maintain that. Rather, it must mean that there is somehow a certainty—as absolute as if it were physically impossible—that those who are born of God will not be characteristically and habitually sinners; that they will not sin in such a way as to lose all true religion and be numbered with transgressors; and that they will not fall away and perish.

Unless this passage teaches that no one who is renewed can ever sin in any sense, or that everyone who becomes a Christian is and must be absolutely and always perfect, no words could more clearly prove that true Christians will never fall from grace and perish. How can what the apostle says here be true if a real Christian can fall away and again become a sinner?

Because he is born of God. Or begotten of God. God has given him, by the new birth, real spiritual life, and that life can never become extinct.