=43, 44. Why do ye not understand my speech?= He has thus far spoken parabolically, as though reluctant to characterize them openly as children of the devil. He now abandons the dark saying, and speaks plainly.--=Even because ye cannot hear my word.= _Word_ is the doctrine taught, _speech_ is the form in which it is clothed; to _hear_ is to receive with the heart, as in Matt. 13:16, 20; John 5:24; 8:47, etc.; to _understand_ is to comprehend intellectually. The implication then is that he who is unwilling to receive and act upon the doctrine of Christ in his heart and life cannot comprehend the forms in which it is couched. The declaration is thus the converse of ch. 7:17.--=Ye are from your father the devil.= God is the Father of Christ, and of all those who through faith in Christ are born again; they become by adoption his children (Rom. 8:15-17), are sent into the world by their Father (ch. 17:18), and manifest their Father unto the world (Phil. 2:15). In like manner they that resist the truth are children, by their own choice, of the devil, commissioned by him, serving him, and manifesting his spirit, in their selfishness, cupidity, malice, and all uncharitableness. In each case the soul derives its spirit from its own chosen father. The whole contrast would be almost meaningless if by the devil Christ understood only a poetic personification of evil in human nature. There are two households, one of God, the other of Satan; two churches, one of truth and love, the other of falsehood and malignity. “This verse is one of the most decisive testimonies for the objective personality of the devil. It is quite impossible to suppose an accommodation to Jewish views, or a metaphorical form of speech, in so solemn and direct an assertion as this.”--(_Alford._)-- =The will= (lusts is too narrow a word; the original signifies earnest desire, but generally of a bad sort) =of your father ye are determined to do=. Literally, _will to do_. Resolute determination to evil is clearly indicated by the form of the sentence (θέλετε ποιεῖν). The language of Christ here, therefore, does not apply to sins of ignorance and inattention. He is speaking to wilful opposers of the truth.--=He was a murderer from the beginning.= Not because he inspired Cain’s murder of his brother Abel, but because, from the very outset, he endeavored to seduce into disobedience, and so to destroy, the human race. His declaration “Ye shall not surely die” (Gen. 3:4) was not merely a lie, but a lie having for its object the death of mankind.--=Stood not in the truth.= It seems to me that there is here a reference to the fall of the devil. So Augustine and the Roman Catholic commentators generally; _contra_, Meyer, Alford, and the moderns. Satan was in a high position, but he did not _stand_, because truth was not his foundation, and--=Because truth is not in him=. No definite article is appended to _truth_ here. Satan did not _stand_ on