1 John 5:19

And we know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

MacLaren's Expositions

1 John



II.-TRIUMPHANT CERTAINTIES

1 John 5:19.

This is the second of the triumphant certainties which John supposes to be the property of every Christian. I spoke about the first of them in my last sermon. It reads,’ We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not.’ Now, there is a distinct connection and advance, as between these two statements. The former of them is entirely general. It is particularized in my text; the ‘whosoever’ there is pointed into ‘ we’ here. The individuals who have the right to claim these prerogatives are none other than the body of Christian people.

Then there is another connection and advance. ‘Born of God’ refers to an act; ‘of God’ to a state. The point is produced into a line. There is still another connection and advance. ‘Whosoever is born of God sinneth not, ‘and that wicked one toucheth him not.’ That glance at a dark surrounding, from which he that is born of God is protected, is deepened in my text into a vision of the whole world as ‘lying in the wicked one.’

Now, I know that sayings like this of my text, which put into the forefront the Christian prerogative, and which regard mankind, apart from the members of Christ’s body, as in a dark condition of subjection under an alien power, have often been spoken of as if they were presumptuous, on the one hand, and narrow, uncharitable, and gloomy on the other. I am not concerned to deny that, on the lips of some professing Christian, they have had a very ugly sound, and have ministered to distinctly un-Christlike sentiments. But, on the other hand, I do believe that there are few things which the average Christianity of to-day wants more than a participation in that joyous confidence and buoyant energy which throb in the Apostle’s words; and that for lack of this triumphant certitude many a soul has been lamed, its joy clouded, its power trammeled, and its work in the world thwarted. So I wish to try to catch some of that solemn and joyous confidence which the Apostle peals forth in these triumphant words.

I. I ask you, then, to look first at the Christian certainty of belonging to God.

‘We know that we are of God.’ Where did John get that form of expression, which crops up over and over again in his letter P He got it where he got most of his terminology, from the lips of the Master. For, if you remember, our Lord Himself speaks more than once of men being ‘of God.’ As, for instance, when He says, ‘He that is of God heareth God’s words. Ye therefore hear them not because ye are not of God.’ And then He goes on to give the primary idea that is conveyed in the phrase when He says, in strong contrast to that expression, ‘Ye are of your father, and the lusts of your father ye will do.’ So, then, plainly, as I said, what was a point in the previous certitude, is here prolonged into a line, and expresses a permanent state.

The first conception in the phrase is that of life derived, communicated from God Himself. Fathers of the flesh communicate life, and it is thenceforth independent. But the life of the Spirit, which we draw from God, is only sustained by the continual repetition of the same gift by which it was originated. So the second idea that lies in the expression is that of a life dependent upon Him from whom it originally comes. The better life in the Christian soul is as certain to fade and die if the supply from Heaven is cut off or dammed back, as is the bed of a stream to become parched and glistering in the fierce sunshine, if the head-waters flow into it no more. You can no more have the life of the Spirit in the spirit of a man without continual communication from Him than a sunbeam can subsist if it be cut off from the central source. Therefore, the second of the ideas in this expression is the continual dependence of that derived life upon God. Christian people are ‘ of God,’ in so far as they partake of that new life, in an altogether special sense, which has a feeble analogy in the dependence of all creation upon the continual effluence of the Divine power. Preservation is a continual creation, and unless God operated in all physical phenomena and change there would neither be phenomena, nor change, nor substance, which could show them forth. But high above all that is the dependence of the renewed soul upon Him for the continual communication of His gifts and life.

If that life is thus derived and dependent, there follows the last idea in our pregnant phrase, viz., that it is correspondent with its source. ‘Ye are of God,’ kindred with Him and developing a life which, in its measure, being derived and dependent, is cognate with, and assimilated to, His own. This is the prerogative of every Christian soul.

Then there is another step to be taken. The man that has that life knows it. ‘We know,’ says the Apostle, ‘that we are of God.’ That word ‘know’ has been usurped, or at all events illegitimately monopolized by certain forms of knowledge. But surely the inward facts of my own consciousness are as much facts, and are certified to me as validly and reliably as are facts in other regions which are attested by the senses, or arrived at by reasoning. Christian people have the same right to lay hold of that great word, ‘we know,’ and to apply it to the facts of their spiritual experience, as any scientist in the world has to apply it to the facts of his science. I do not for a moment forget the differences between the two kinds of knowledge, but I do feel that in regard of certitude the advantage is at least shared, and some of us would say that we are surer of ourselves than we are of anything besides. How do you know that you are at all? The only answer is,’ I feel that I am.’ And precisely the same evidence applies in regard to these lofty thoughts of a Divine kindred and a spiritual life. I know that I am of God. I have passed through experiences, and I am aware of consciousness which certify that to me.

But that is not all. For, as I tried to show in my last sermon, the condition of being ‘born of God’ is laid plainly down in this very chapter by the Apostle, as being the simple act of faith in Jesus Christ. So, then, if any man is sure that he believes, he knows that he is born of God, and is of God.

But you say, ‘Do you not know that men deceive themselves by a profession of being Christians, and that many of us estimate their professions at a very different rate of genuineness from what they estimate them at?’ Yes, I know that. And this whole letter of John goes to guard us against the presumption of entertaining inflated thoughts about ourselves as being kindred with God, unless we verify the consciousness by certain plain facts. You remember how continually in this epistle there crops up by the side of the most thorough-going mysticism, as people call it, the plainest, home-spun practical morality, and how all these lofty, towering thoughts are brought down to this sharp test, ‘Let no man deceive you; he that doeth not righteousness is not of God; neither he that loveth not his brother.’ That is a test which, applied to many a fanatical dream, shrivels it up.

There is another test which the Master laid down in the words that I have quoted already for another purpose, when He said, ‘He that is of God heareth God’s words. Te, therefore, hear them not because ye are not of God.’ Christian people, take these two plain tests-first, righteousness of life, common practical morality, the doing and the loving to do, the things that all the world recognizes to be right and true; and, second, an ear attuned and attend to catch God’s voice-and control your consciousness of being God’s son by these, and you will not go far wrong.

And now, before I go further, one word. It is a shame, and a laming and a weakening of any Christian life, that this triumphant confidence should not be clear in it. ‘We know that we are of God.’ Can you and I echo that with calm confidence? ‘I sometimes half hope that I am.’ ‘I am almost afraid to say it.’ ‘I do not know whether I am or not.’ ‘I trust I may be.’ That is the kind of creeping attitude in which hosts of Christian people are contented to live; and they stare at a man as if he was presumptuous, and soaring up into a region that they do not know anything about, when he humbly echoes the Apostle, and says, ‘We know that we are God’s.’ Why should our skies be as grey and sunless as those of a northern winter’s day when all the while, away down on the sunny seas, to which we may voyage if we will, there are unbroken sunshine, ethereal blue, and a perpetual blaze of light? Christian men and women it concerns the power of your lives, their progress in holiness, and their possession of peace, that you should be far more able than, alas! Many of us are, to say, and that without presumption, ‘ We know that we are of God.’

II. We have here the Christian view of the surrounding world.

I need not, I suppose, remind you that John learned from Jesus to use that phrase ‘the world,’ not as meaning the aggregate of material things, but as meaning the aggregate of godless men. If you want a modern translation of the word, it comes very near a familiar one with us nowadays, and that is ‘Society’; the mass of people that are not of God.

Now, the more a man is conscious that he himself, by faith in Jesus Christ, has passed into the family of God, and possesses the life that comes from Him, the more keen will be his sense of the evil that lies round him, and of the contrast between the maxims and prevalent practices and institutions and ways of the world, and those which belong to Christ and Christ’s people. Just as a native of Central Africa, brought to England for a while, when he gets back to his kraal, will see its foulnesses and its sordidnesses as he did not before, or as, according to old stories, those that were carried away into fairyland for a little while came back to the work-a-day life of the world, and felt themselves alien from it, and had visions of what they had seen ever floating before them; so the measure of our conscious belonging to God is the measure of our perception of the contrast between us and the ways of the men about us.

I am not concerned for a moment to deny, rather, I most thankfully recognize the truth, that a great deal of ‘the world’ has been ransomed by the Cross, by which its prince has been cast out, and that much of Christian morality, and of the Christian way of looking at things, has passed into the general atmosphere in which we live, so as that, between the true Christian community and the surrounding world in which it is plunged, there is less antagonism than there was when John in Ephesus wrote these words beneath the shadow of Diana’s temple. But the world is a world still, and the antagonism is there; and if a man will live true to the life of God that is in him, he will find out soon enough that the gulf is not bridged over. It never will be bridged. The only way by which the antagonism can be ended is for the kingdoms of this world to become the kingdoms of our God and of His Christ. Society is not of God, and the institutions of every nation upon earth have still in them much of the evil one. Christian people are set down in the midst of these, and the antagonism is perennial.



III. Lastly, consider the consequent Christian duty.

Let me put two or three plain exhortations. I beseech you, Christian people; cultivate the sense of belonging to a higher order than that in which you dwell. A man in a heathen land loses his sense of home, and of its ways; and it needs a perpetual effort in order that we should not forget our true affinities. ‘We are of God’ may be so said as to be the parent of all manner of un-Christlike sentiments, as I have already remarked. It may be the mother of contempt and self-righteousness, and a hundred other vices; but, rightly said, it has no such tendency. But unless we are ever and anon seeking to renew that consciousness, it will fade and become dim, and we shall forget the imperial palace whence we came, and be content to live in the barren fields of the citizens of that country, and even to feed upon the husks that are in the swine’s trough. So I say, cultivate the sense of belonging to God.

Again, I say, be careful to avoid infection. Go as men do in a plague-stricken city. Go as our soldiers in that Ashanti expedition had to go, on your guard against malaria, the ‘pestilence that walketh in darkness,’ and smites ere we are aware, bringing down our notions, our views of life, our thoughts of duty, to the low level of the people around us. Go as these same soldiers did, on the watch for ambuscades and lurking enemies behind the trees. And remember that the only safety is keeping hold of Christ’s hand.

Look on the world as Christ looked on it. There must be no contempt; there must be no self-righteousness; there must be no pluming ourselves on our own prerogatives. There must no sorrow caught from Him, and tenderness of pity, like that which forced itself to His eyes as He gazed across the valley at the city sparkling in the sunshine, or such as wrung His heart when He looked upon the multitude as sheep without a shepherd.

Work for the deliverance of your brethren from the alien tyrant. Notice the difference between the two clauses in the text. ‘We are of God’; that is a permanent relation. ‘The world lieth in the wicked one’; that is not necessarily a permanent relation. The world is not of the wicked one; it is ‘in’ him, and that may be altered. It is in the sphere of that dark influence. As in the old stories, knights hung their dishonored arms upon trees, and laid their heads in the lap of an enchantress, so men have departed from God, and surrendered themselves to the fascinations and the control of an alien power. But the world may be taken out of the sphere of influence in which it lies. And that is what you are here for. ‘For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the devil’; and for that purpose He has called us to be His servants. So the more we feel the sharp contrast between the blessedness of the Divine life which we believe ourselves to possess, and the darkness and evils of the world that lies around us, the more should sorrow, and the more should sympathy, and the more should succour be ours. Brethren, for ourselves let us remember that we cannot better help the world to get away from the alien tyrant that rules it than by walking in the midst of men, with the aureola of this joyful confidence and certitude around us. The solemn alternative opens before every one of us-Either I am ‘of God,’ or I am ‘ in the wicked one.’ Dear friends, let us lay our hearts and hands in Christ’s care, and then that will be true of us which this Apostle declares for the whole body of believers: ‘Ye are of God, little children, and have overcome, because greater is He that is in you than he that is in the world.’

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

5:18-21 All mankind are divided into two parties or dominions; that which belongs to God, and that which belongs to the wicked one. True believers belong to God: they are of God, and from him, and to him, and for him; while the rest, by far the greater number, are in the power of the wicked one; they do his works, and support his cause. This general declaration includes all unbelievers, whatever their profession, station, or situation, or by whatever name they may be called. The Son leads believers to the Father, and they are in the love and favour of both; in union with both, by the indwelling and working of the Holy Spirit. Happy are those to whom it is given to know that the Son of God is come, and to have a heart to trust in and rely on him that is true! May this be our privilege; we shall thus be kept from all idols and false doctrines, and from the idolatrous love of worldly objects, and be kept by the power of God, through faith, unto eternal salvation. To this living and true God, be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

And we know that we are of God - We who are Christians. The apostle supposed that true Christians might have so clear evidence on that subject as to leave no doubt on their own minds that they were the children of God. Compare 1 John 3:14; 2 Timothy 1:12.

And the whole world - The term "world" here evidently means not the material world, but the people who dwell on the earth, including all idolaters, and all sinners of every grade and kind.

Lieth in wickedness - "In the wicked one," or under the power of the wicked one - ἐν τῷ πονηρῷ en tō ponērō. It is true that the word πονηρῷ ponērō may be used here in the neuter gender, as our translators have rendered it, meaning "in that which is evil," or in "wickedness;" but it may be in the masculine gender, meaning "the wicked one;" and then the sense would be that the whole world is under his control or dominion. That this is the meaning of the apostle seems to be clear, because:

(1) the corresponding phrase, 1 John 5:20, ἐν τῷ ἀληθινῷ en tō alēthinō, "in him that is true," is evidently to be construed in the masculine, referring to God the Saviour, and meaning "him that is true," and not that we are "in truth."

(2) it makes better sense to say that the world lies under the control of the wicked one, than to say that it lies "in wickedness."

(3) this accords better with the other representations in the Bible, and the usuage of the word elsewhere. Compare 1 John 2:13, "Ye have overcome the "wicked" one;" 1 John 5:14, "ye have overcome the "wicked" one;" 1 John 3:12, "who was of that "wicked" one." See also the notes at 2 Corinthians 4:4, on the expression "the god of this world;" John 12:31, where he is called "the prince of this world;" and Ephesians 2:2, where he is called "the prince of the power of the air." In all these passages it is supposed that Satan has control over the world, especially the pagan world. Compare Ephesians 6:12; 1 Corinthians 10:20. In regard to the fact that the pagan world was pervaded by wickedness, see the notes at Romans 1:21-32.

(4) it may be added, that this interpretation is adopted by the most eminent critics and commentators. It is that of Calvin, Beza, Benson, Macknight, Bloomfield, Piscator, Lucke, etc. The word "lieth" here (κεῖται keitai) means, properly, to lie; to be laid; to recline; to be situated, etc. It seems here to refer to the "passive" and "torpid" state of a wicked world under the dominion of the prince of evil, as acquiescing in his reign; making no resistance; not even struggling to be free. It lies thus as a beast that is subdued, a body that is dead, or anything that is wholly passive, quiet, and inert. There is no energy; no effort to throw off the reign; no resistance; no struggling. The dominion is complete, and body and soul, individuals and nations, are entirely subject to his will. This striking expression will not unaptly now describe the condition of the pagan world, or of sinners in general. There would seem to be no government under which people are so little restive, and against which they have so little disposition to rebel, as that of Satan. Compare 2 Timothy 2:26.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

19. world lieth in wickedness—rather, "lieth in the wicked one," as the Greek is translated in 1Jo 5:18; 1Jo 2:13, 14; compare 1Jo 4:4; Joh 17:14, 15. The world lieth in the power of, and abiding in, the wicked one, as the resting-place and lord of his slaves; compare "abideth in death," 1Jo 3:14; contrast 1Jo 5:20, "we are in Him that is true." While the believer has been delivered out of his power, the whole world lieth helpless and motionless still in it, just as it was; including the wise, great, respectable, and all who are not by vital union in Christ.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

And this he doth not exclusively assume to himself, but expresses his charitable confidence of them to whom he writes, that it was their privilege, in common with him, to be thus of God, or born of him; notwithstanding the generality of men were under the power of that before-mentioned wicked one, (as that phrase may be read), or in the midst of all impurity and malignity.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

And we know that we are of God,.... The sons of God, and regenerated by him; this is known by the Spirit of God, which witnesses to the spirits of the saints that they are the children of God; and by the fruits and effects of regenerating grace, as love to the brethren, and the like:

and the whole world lies in wickedness; that is, the men of the world, the greater part of the inhabitants of it, who are as they were when they came into it, not being born of God; these are addicted to sin and, wickedness; the bias of their minds is to it, they are set upon it, and give themselves up to it, are immersed in it, and are under the power of it: or "in the wicked one"; Satan, the god of this world; they are under his influence, and led according to his will, and they are governed by him, and are at his beck and command; and this is known, by sad experience, it is easy of observation;

"And cannot comprehend the things that are promised to the righteous in time to come: for this world is full of unrighteousness and infirmities.'' (2 Esdras 4:27)

Geneva Study Bible

{18} And we know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness.

(18) Every man must particularly apply to himself the general promises, that we may certainly persuade ourselves, that whereas all the world is by nature lost, we are freely made the sons of God, by the sending of Jesus Christ his son to us, of whom we are enlightened with the knowledge of the true God and everlasting life.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Meyer's NT Commentary

marks the antithesis between believers as being born of God, and the κόσμος, as belonging in its whole extent (ὅλος) to the πονηρός; and this is done by the apostle vindicating for himself and his readers—who are united with him in faith—the εἶναι ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ

1 John 5:19 marks the antithesis between believers as being born of God, and the κόσμος, as belonging in its whole extent (ὅλος) to the πονηρός; and this is done by the apostle vindicating for himself and his readers—who are united with him in faith—the εἶναι ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ.

ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἐσμεν finds its explanation in the preceding: ὁ γεννηθεὶς ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ. Socinus incorrectly: a Deo pendemus.

καὶ ὁ κόσμος ὅλος κ.τ.λ.] probably as an independent sentence, not depending on ὅτι (Düsterdieck); καί is not = δέ; it is just the connecting καί that brings out the antithesis which exists between the two parts of the verse, still more clearly than if this had been done by an adversative particle. ὁ κόσμος is here used in the ethical meaning of the word, which is peculiar to John.

ἐν τῷ πονηρῷ κεῖται] τῷ πονηρῷ is not neuter (Socinus, Episcopius, Rickli, Erdmann), but masculine, as is clear both from ὁ πονηρός in 1 John 5:18, as also from the antithesis to ὁ Θεός.

By the preceding ἐκ τ. Θεοῦ and Luther’s translation of Isaiah 46:3, some commentators have been led erroneously to refer the expression ἐν … κεῖται to the relation of the child to its mother (Spener: “as a child in its mother’s womb”); by ἐν it is expressed that the κόσμος is as it were surrounded by the devil, i.e. is quite in his power; κεῖται, stronger than ἐστί, indicates, if not, as Lücke thinks, the permanent, yet certainly the passive state (so also Braune), and hence the complete domination of the devil, which is in the most pronounced contrast with the preceding: καὶ ὁ πονηρὸς οὐχ ἅπτεται αὐτοῦ.

Expositor's Greek Testament

1 John 5:19. Our Security in God’s Embrace. ὁ κόσμος: “Non creatura sed seculares nomines et secundum concupiscentias viventes” (Clem. Alex.). See note on 1 John 2:15. τῷ πονηρῷ, masc. as in previous verse κεῖται, in antithesis to οὐχ ἅπτεται. On the child of God the Evil One does not so much as lay his hand, the world lies in his arms. On the other hand, the child of God lies in God’s arms. Cf. Deut. 23:27. Penn, Fruits of Solitude: “If our Hairs fall not to the Ground, less do we or our Substance without God’s Providence. Nor can we fall below the arms of God, how low soever it be we fall.”

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

19. And we know] The conjunction must be omitted on abundant authority. This introduces the second great fact of which the believer has sure knowledge. And, as so often, S. John’s divisions are not sharp, but the parts intermingle. The second fact is partly anticipated in the first; the first is partly repeated in the second. Christians know that as children of God they are preserved by His Son from the devil. Then what do they know about the world, and their relation to the world? They know that they are of God and the whole world lieth in the evil one. It remains in his power. It has not passed over, as they have done, out of death into life; but it abides in the evil one, who is its ruler (John 12:31; John 14:30; John 16:11), as the Christian abides in Christ. It is clear therefore that the severance between the Church and the world ought to be, and tends to be, as total as that between God and the evil one. The preceding verse and the antithesis to God, to say nothing of 1 John 2:13-14, 1 John 4:4, make it quite clear that ‘the evil’ (τῷ πονηρῷ) is here masculine and not neuter. The Vulgate has in maligno, not in malo. Tyndale and Cranmer have ‘is altogether set on wickedness,’ which is doubly or trebly wrong. Note once more that the opposition is not exact, but goes beyond what precedes. The evil one doth not obtain hold of the child of God: he not only obtains hold over the world, but has it wholly within his embrace. No similar use of ‘to lie in’ occurs in N. T. Comp. Sophocles Oed. Col. 248.

Bengel's Gnomen

1 John 5:19. Ἐκ, from) An abbreviated form of expression: We are from God, and we abide in God; but the world is from the wicked one, and lies wholly in the wicked one.—ἐν τῷ πονηρῷ κεῖται, lies in the wicked one) [Therefore the world can no more touch the sons of God, than the wicked one, in whom it lieth.—V. g.] The wicked one, comp. 1 John 5:18, is opposed to Him that is true, 1 John 5:20. The whole world [and this universally, comprehending the learned, the respectable, and all others, excepting those alone who have claimed themselves for God and for Christ.—V. g.] is not only touched by the wicked one, but altogether lies (Germ. bleibt liegen, lies motionless), by means of idolatry, blindness, deceit, violence, lasciviousness, impiety, and all wickedness, in the evil one, destitute both of life from God and of διανοίας, understanding: see 1 Corinthians 5:10; 1 Corinthians 11:32. The dreadful condition of the world is most vividly portrayed in this brief summary. No other commentary is needed than the world itself, and the actions, discourses, contracts, strifes, brotherhoods, etc., of worldly men. [That men of the world do not perpetrate worse things than the worst, is rather to be wondered at, than that they act in the worst way. They esteem themselves happy in their own wretchedness, and the sons of God as destitute of what is for their welfare.—V. g.] There is an antithesis in abides, as applied to God and the saints. Ye that are regenerate have what ye pray for: ch. 1 John 2:2. [Ye have reason to desire to fly forth from the world to God.—V. g.]

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 19. - Omit the "and" before "we know." There is no καί or δέ in the true text; and the asyndeton is impressive. The whole world lieth in the evil one. This is the second great fact of which Christians have certainty. They, as children of God, and preserved from the evil one by his Son, have nothing to do with the world, which still lies in the power of the evil one. That "the evil" τῷ πονηρῷ is here not neuter but masculine is evident from the context, as well as from 1 John 2:13, 14; 1 John 4:4. "By saying that it lieth in the evil one (in maligno) he represents it as being under the dominion of Satan. There is, therefore, no reason why we should hesitate to shun the world, which contemns God and delivers up itself into the bondage of Satan; nor is there any reason why we should fear its enmity, because it is alienated from God" (Calvin). 1 John 5:19

Vincent's Word Studies

We are of God (ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ ἐσμέν)

For the phrase εἷναι ἐκ to be from, see on John 1:46. For ἐσμέν we are, see on 1 John 3:1. John expresses the relation of believers to God by the following phrases: To be born or begotten of God, γεννηθῆναι ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ (1 John 5:1; 1 John 2:29; 1 John 4:7): denoting the initial communication of the new life. To be of God, εἷναι ἐκ τοῦ Θεοῦ (John 8:47; 1 John 3:10; 1 John 4:6): denoting the essential connection in virtue of the new life. Child of God, τέκνον Θεοῦ (John 1:12; 1 John 3:1, 1 John 3:10): denoting the relation established by the new life.

World (κόσμος)

See on John 1:9.

Lieth (κεῖται)

The word is stronger than ἐστι is, indicating the passive, unprogressive state in the sphere of Satan's influence. "While we are from God, implying a birth and a proceeding forth, and a change of state, the κόσμος the world, all the rest of mankind, remains in the hand of the evil one" (Alford).

In wickedness (ἐν τῷ πονηρῷ)

Rev., better, in the evil one. The expression to lie in has a parallel in Sophocles' "Antigone:"

ἐν ὑμῖν γὰρ ὡς Θεῷ

κείμεθα τλάμονες

"Wretched we lie in you as in a god" (247).