James 2:1-13. Respect of Persons 1. _have not the faith_ Better, DO NOT HOLD. The Greek for "respect of persons" (better, perhaps, ACCEPTANCE OF PERSONS) is in the plural, as including all the varied forms in which the evil tendency might shew itself, and stands emphatically immediately after the ne... [ Continue Reading ]
_if there come unto your assembly_ Literally, INTO YOUR SYNAGOGUE, the old familiar name as yet, in that early stage of the Church's life, being used for the Christian as for the Jewish place of worship. What is noted presented the most glaring and offensive form which the acceptance of persons had... [ Continue Reading ]
_And ye have respect to_ Better, LOOK WITH RESPECT UPON. The same word is used in Luke 1:48; Luke 9:38. The English version weakens the dramatic vividness of the Greek. _the gay clothing_ The English presents a needless variation from the Greek, which has the same words as in the preceding verse. T... [ Continue Reading ]
_are ye not then partial in yourselves_?] The verb is the same as that translated "waver" in chap. James 1:6 and elsewhere, as in Matthew 21:21; Mark 11:23; Acts 10:20; Romans 14:23 by "doubt." Nor is any other meaning, such as that of "making distinctions," necessary, or admissible, here. "When you... [ Continue Reading ]
_Hath not God chosen_ Better, perhaps, DID NOT GOD CHOOSE? as referring to the special election of the poor by Christ as the heirs of blessings and the messengers of His Kingdom (Matthew 5:3; Luke 6:20; comp. also 1 Corinthians 1:27). _the poor of this world_ Literally, IN THIS WORLD, i. e. "as far... [ Continue Reading ]
_But ye have despised the poor_ Better, YE HAVE DISHONOURED, or DONE DISHONOUR TO, the word implying the outward act that expressed contempt. The Greek tense may point to the special instance just given as a supposed fact, "Ye dishonoured.…" The pronoun is emphatic, "God chose the poor, _ye_put them... [ Continue Reading ]
_Do not they blaspheme that worthy name_ Better, DO NOT THEY REVILE THAT NOBLE NAME? The pronoun is again emphatic, IS IT NOT THEY THAT REVILE? The two senses of the Greek verb, the reviling which has man for its object, and the blasphemy, in its modern sense, which is directed against God, are in t... [ Continue Reading ]
_If ye fulfil the royal law according to the scripture_ The Greek gives a particle which is not expressed in the English, "If, however, ye fulfil …" Nothing that the writer has said in disparagement of wealth and the wealthy is to lead men to anything at variance with the great law of love; that law... [ Continue Reading ]
_but if ye have respect to persons_ The Greek gives a compound verb which is not found elsewhere, IF YE BE PERSON-ACCEPTING. _ye commit sin_ The Greek is more emphatic, " IT IS SIN that ye are working, being convicted by the Law." However generally decorous their lives might be, yet through this on... [ Continue Reading ]
_in one point_ The noun, as the italics shew, is not in the Greek, but the English is a satisfactory rendering. Guided by what follows we might perhaps say "in one _commandment_." _he is guilty of all_ Better, HE HAS BECOME GUILTY, i. e. liable to condemnation under an indictment which includes all... [ Continue Reading ]
_For he that said, Do not commit adultery_ The two commandments are chosen as standing first in the Second Table, the fifth being classed by most Jewish writers as belonging to the First, just as in Greek and Roman ethics, duty to parents came under the head of Ε ὐ σεβεία and _Pietas_, rather than u... [ Continue Reading ]
_So speak ye, and so do_ The thoughts of the teacher dwell, as before (chap. James 1:26) and afterwards (chap. James 3:1-12), on sins of speech as no less tests of character than sins of act. In so doing he was echoing the words of a yet greater Teacher (Matthew 12:37). _the law of liberty_ See note... [ Continue Reading ]
_For he shall have judgment_ There is something more emphatic in the actual structure of the sentence. FOR THE JUDGMENT SHALL BE MERCILESS TO HIM THAT WROUGHT NOT MERCY. The axiom presents one aspect of the great law of divine retribution, and, like so much of St James's teaching, is an obvious repr... [ Continue Reading ]
Justification by Faith and Works 14. _though a man say he hath faith_ The section on which we now enter has been the battle-field of almost endless controversies. It led Luther in the boldness of a zeal not according to knowledge to speak of the whole Epistle with contempt. (_Preface to German New T... [ Continue Reading ]
_If a brother or sister_ The words are not necessarily used in the sense in which they imply the profession of faith in Christ as they are, e. g., in Acts 10:23; Acts 11:1; 1 Corinthians 5:11. Every Israelite was to see a brother in every child of Abraham (Matthew 5:23; Acts 2:29; Acts 3:17). All th... [ Continue Reading ]
_Depart in peace_ The phrase was one of familiar benediction, and had been used by our Lord to those who came to Him seeking bodily or spiritual healing (Luke 7:50; Luke 8:48; Acts 16:36). It would naturally only be used where such wants, if they existed, had been, or were going to be, relieved. _be... [ Continue Reading ]
_Even so faith, if it hath not works_ This then is St James's objection to the faith of which he speaks. It is, while alone (literally, BY ITSELF), with no promise or potency of life, and it is, therefore, dead, and being so, as we scarcely call a corpse a man, is unworthy of the name of faith. The... [ Continue Reading ]
_Yea, a man may say_ The objector thus introduced, after the same manner as by St Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:35, is here the representative neither of an opponent to be refuted, nor yet of the writer's own thoughts, but rather, as we should say, of an outsider, the man of common sense and practical pi... [ Continue Reading ]
_Thou believest that there is one God_ The instance of the faith in which men were trusting is important as shewing the class of Solifidians (to use a term which controversy has made memorable) which St James had in view. They were not those who were believing in the Son of God, trusting in the love... [ Continue Reading ]
_wilt thou know, O vain man_ The term, as applied to men, is not found elsewhere in the New Testament, but is used with something of the same significance in the LXX. of Judges 9:4. The idea is primarily that of "emptiness," and the Greek adjective is almost literally the equivalent of our EMPTY-HEA... [ Continue Reading ]
_Was not Abraham our father justified by works_ The close correspondence of phraseology with Romans 4:2 at first seems to favour the view that St James is correcting or modifying St Paul's statement It is obvious, however, that the agreement equally admits of the explanation that St Paul is correcti... [ Continue Reading ]
_Seest thou how faith wrought with his works …?_ Better, perhaps, not as a question, THOU SEEST THAT … Attention is called, not as the English "how" suggests, to the manner of co-operation, but only to the fact. The tense of the verb emphasises the continued co-operation of Abraham's faith with his... [ Continue Reading ]
_And the scripture was fulfilled_ The use of the words commonly applied to the fulfilment of prophetic utterances implies that St James saw in the statement of Genesis 15:6 that which, though true at the time, was yet also an anticipation of what was afterwards to be realised more fully. Of that pro... [ Continue Reading ]
_Ye see then_ The better MSS. omit the _then_. The Greek verb may be indicative, imperative, or interrogative. The English Version is probably right in giving the preference to the first. _not by faith only_ There is, it is obvious, a verbal contradiction between this and St Paul's statement in Roma... [ Continue Reading ]
_was not Rahab the harlot_ The question meets us, What led St James to select this example? St Paul does not refer to it, as he probably would have done, had he been writing with St James's teaching present to his thoughts, in any of the Epistles in which his name appears as the writer. In the Epist... [ Continue Reading ]
_For as the body without the spirit is dead_ Some MSS. omit the conjunction, but the evidence for retaining it preponderates. The reasoning seems to refer Rahab's justification by works to the wider law that faith without works is dead (as in James 2:17) and therefore cannot justify. Our usual mode... [ Continue Reading ]