As I've mentioned before, I'm working my way through Martin Culy's I, II, III John: A Handbook on the Greek Text.
One thing that has been brought out in Culy's text that I'd never really noticed is the dearth of imperatives (ten) in 1 John and the wealth of subjunctives (54). I thought: “Gee, what a groovy thing to run a verb river on!” So I did:
Here we see a picture of the use of moods in 1 John. A few imperatives toward the middle/end of chapter 2, and a few more sprinkled throughout chapter three. The predominant mood (of course) is the indicative, and subjunctives are used throughout the book as well.
What was interesting to me was to see how some (e.g. Longacre, according to Culy) see the imperative occurrences as showing high-points in the text.* The first imperative occurs in 1Jn 2.15** which states “Do not love the world ... ”. Longacre (as I recall, from Culy's text) sees this as the start of the second section (of four) sections that make up 1 John. The sections coincide with use of the imperative.
Many of the subjunctives in 1 John, then, are “hortatory” subjunctives. These are (in 1Jn, from what I gather — I'm still picking this stuff up as I go) almost back-handed commands. 1Jn 1.8-10 is a good example (I think). Subjunctives are in bold.
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8 ἐὰν εἴπωμεν ὅτι ἁμαρτίαν οὐκ ἔχομεν, ἑαυτοὺς πλανῶμεν καὶ ἡ ἀλήθεια οὐκ ἔστιν ἐν ἡμῖν. |
8If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. |
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9 ἐὰν ὁμολογῶμεν τὰς ἁμαρτίας ἡμῶν, πιστός ἐστιν καὶ δίκαιος, ἵνα ἀφῇ ἡμῖν τὰς ἁμαρτίας καὶ καθαρίσῃ ἡμᾶς ἀπὸ πάσης ἀδικίας. |
9If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins an to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. |
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10 ἐὰν εἴπωμεν ὅτι οὐχ ἡμαρτήκαμεν, ψεύστην ποιοῦμεν αὐτὸν καὶ ὁ λόγος αὐτοῦ οὐκ ἔστιν ἐν ἡμῖν. |
10If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us. |
(Greek text is UBS4, English text is ESV)
I'd never really noticed this stuff before, but what is going on is that instead of using an outright command like “You must confess your sin”, John goes about it from the other direction. “If you say you don't have any sin, you're lying and you're making Jesus Christ into a liar. But if you confess your sins, you'll be forgiven”. Same effect — the reader knows he must confess — but the instruction is more gentle and more effective.
Fun stuff. Makes me want to read Longacre's work on 1 John to see what else he sees going on in there at the discourse level. I'm a very long way from being able to notice things like this in my own reading/study.
* Also interesting are the vocative nouns.
** I think — my LDLS search results are busted with the current code base on the machine I'm working on here at the office.