1 John 5:17

All unrighteousness is sin: and there is a sin not unto death.

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Word by word — the Greek

Word	Greek	Strong’s	Meaning
All	πᾶσα pasa	G3956	all · adjective — nominative singular feminine
unrighteousness	ἀδικία adikia	G93	(legal) injustice (properly · noun — nominative singular feminine
is	ἐστί estí	G2076	he (she or it) is
sin	ἁμαρτία hamartia	G266	a sin (properly abstract) · noun — nominative singular feminine
and	καὶ kai	G2532	and · conjunction
is	ἐστί estí	G2076	he (she or it) is
sin	ἁμαρτία hamartia	G266	a sin (properly abstract) · noun — nominative singular feminine
not	οὐ ou	G3756	the absolute negative (compare G3361 (μή)) adverb · particle — negative
unto	πρὸς pros	G4314	a preposition of direction · preposition
death	θάνατον. thanaton	G2288	(properly · noun — accusative singular masculine

Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).

Cross-references

1 John 3:4 Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for sin is the transgression of the law.
James 1:15 Then when lust hath conceived, it bringeth forth sin: and sin, when it is finished, bringeth forth death.
Ezekiel 18:26-32 When a righteous man turneth away from his righteousness, and committeth iniquity, and dieth in them; for his iniquity that he hath done sha…
1 John 5:16 If any man see his brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall ask, and he shall give him life for them that sin not unto death. The…
James 4:7-10 Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
Deuteronomy 12:32 What thing soever I command you, observe to do it: thou shalt not add thereto, nor diminish from it.
Isaiah 1:18 Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red lik…
1 John 2:1 My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ th…

Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).

Commentary

Matthew Henry on 1 John 5:14-17

Here we have, I. A privilege belonging to faith in Christ, namely, audience in prayer: This is the confidence that we have in him, that, if we ask any thing according to his will, he heareth us, Jo1 5:14. The Lord Christ emboldens us to come to God in all circumstances, with all our supplications and requests. Through him our petitions are admitted and accepted of God. The matter of our prayer must be agreeable to the declared will of God. It is not fit that we should ask what is contrary either to his majesty and glory or to our own good, who are his and dependent on him. And then we may have confidence that the prayer of faith shall be heard in heaven. II. The advantage accruing to us by s…

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Jamieson-Fausset-Brown on 1 John 5:17

"Every unrighteousness (even that of believers, compare Jo1 1:9; Jo1 3:4. Every coming short of right) is sin"; (but) not every sin is the sin unto death. and there is a sin not unto death--in the case of which, therefore, believers may intercede. Death and life stand in correlative opposition (Jo1 5:11-13). The sin unto death must be one tending "towards" (so the Greek), and so resulting in, death. ALFORD makes it to be an appreciable ACT of sin, namely, the denying Jesus to be the Christ, the Son of God (in contrast to confess this truth, Jo1 5:1, Jo1 5:5), Jo1 2:19, Jo1 2:22; Jo1 4:2-3; Jo1 5:10. Such wilful deniers of Christ are not to be received into one's house, or wished "God speed…

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Adam Clarke on 1 John 5:17

All unrighteousness is sin - Πασα αδικια, Every act contrary to justice is sin - is a transgression of the law which condemns all injustice.

John Gill on 1 John 5:17

All unrighteousness is sin,.... All unrighteousness against God or man is a sin against the law of God, and the wrath of God is revealed against it, and it is deserving of death; yet all unrighteousness is not unto death, as the sins of David, which were unrighteousness both to God and man, and yet they were put away, and he died not; Peter sinned very foully, and did great injustice to his dear Lord, and yet his sin was not unto death; he had repentance unto life given him, and a fresh application of pardoning grace: and there is a sin not unto death; this is added for the relief of weak believers, who hearing of a sin unto death, not to be prayed for, might fear that theirs were of that k…

The Church Fathers

All iniquity is sin, etc. Such is the diversity of sins, he says, that everything which deviates from the rule of equity is counted among the sins, although small sins cannot in any way take away or diminish the merit of righteousness from the just, as long as they are those without which this life cannot be lived, and likewise there are certain sins so discordant with all justice, committed with such iniquity, that without any contradiction, unless they are corrected, they lead their perpetrator to eternal punishment. Concerning which it is written: The soul that sins shall die (Ezekiel 18). Blessed John's statement clearly repudiates the inept argument of the Stoics, who dared to say against all human sense and to affirm that all sins are equal, saying it makes no difference whether a man steals a human being, an ox, or a chicken, because it is not the animal but the intention that constitutes the crime. Jovinian the heretic followed them, asserting that there is no distinction between marriage and virginity, claiming that those who abstain in no way should be preferred in any privilege of recompense over those who simply partake in feasting. Therefore, everything that is unjustly committed or thought is to be referred to as sin. But there are some sins unto death, about which the Apostle says: For those who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God (Galatians 5).
— Bede, Commentary on the Catholic Epistles

The Church Fathers: public-domain translations (Ante-Nicene and Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers), verse-indexed by SermonIndex (CC BY 4.0).

Dictionary and topics

Sin · All unrighteousness is — All unrighteousness is

Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).

1 John 5:17

Word by word — the Greek

Cross-references

Commentary

Matthew Henry on 1 John 5:14-17

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown on 1 John 5:17

Adam Clarke on 1 John 5:17

John Gill on 1 John 5:17

The Church Fathers

Dictionary and topics

1 John 5:17

Word by word — the Greek

Cross-references

Commentary

Matthew Henry on 1 John 5:14-17

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown on 1 John 5:17

Adam Clarke on 1 John 5:17

John Gill on 1 John 5:17

The Church Fathers

Dictionary and topics

John Calvin on 1 John 5:16-18

Tyndale Open Study Notes on 1 John 5:17