are often referred to in the Commentary as “the Revisionists,” those who brought a new version of Christianity. I have refrained from calling them Gnostics because there is no trace of the later Gnostic mythologies in First John (with the possible exception of the reference to Cain, in 3:12). It is conceivable that the false teachers could be called Proto-Gnostics, but in the present state of our knowledge, the term Revisionists seems more appropriate. I admit to being influenced here by Brown’s
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