PUBLIC-DOMAIN CHRISTIAN BOOK
The Expositor's Bible: The General Epistles of St. James and St. Jude
Plummer, Alfred · 146,075 words · 198 reading sections
Chapter Xii.
It has been already pointed out that a letter addressed by a Jewish Christian to Jewish Christians would not be very likely to take account of St. Paul's doctrine, whether rightly or wrongly understood. It has also been shown that St. James, as is natural in such a letter, makes frequent appeals to the Old Testament, a…
703 wordsSECTION 62Chapter Xii.
St. Paul and St. James are thus found to be agreed. It remains to be shown that in spite of his own statements to the contrary, Luther was as fully agreed with the latter as with the former. When he writes about St. James, Luther's prejudices lead him to disparage a form of teaching which he has not been at the pains t…
509 wordsSECTION 63Chapter Xiii.
_THE FAITH OF THE DEMONS; THE FAITH OF ABRAHAM; AND THE FAITH OF RAHAB THE HARLOT._ "Thou believest that God is One; thou doest well: the devils also believe, and shudder." "Was not Abraham our father justified by works, in that he offered up Isaac his son upon the altar?" "And in like manner was not also Rahab t…
755 wordsSECTION 64Chapter Xiii.
St. James has just been pointing out the advantage which the Christian who has works to show has over one who has only faith. The one can prove that he possesses both; the other cannot prove that he possesses either. The works of the one are evidence that the faith is there also, just as leaves and fruit are evidence t…
680 wordsSECTION 65Chapter Xiii.
But a suggestion which Bede makes, and which several modern commentators have followed, is well worth considering. St. James may be thinking of the demons which possessed human beings, rather than those which received or promoted idolatrous worship. Bede reminds us of the many demons who went out at Christ's command, c…
847 wordsSECTION 66Chapter Xiii.
In contrast with this barren faith, which makes a man's spiritual condition no better than that of the demons, St. James places two conspicuous instances of living and fruitful faith--Abraham and Rahab. The case of "Abraham our father" would be the first that would occur to every Jew. As the passages in the Apocrypha (…
757 wordsSECTION 67Chapter Xiii.
With the expression "was justified _as a result of_ works" (ἐξ ἔργων ἐδικαιώθη), which is used both of Abraham and of Rahab, should be compared our Lord's saying, "By thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned" (Matt. xii. 37), which are of exactly the same form; literally, "_As a resul…
855 wordsSECTION 68Chapter Xiii.
"_In like manner_ was not also Rahab the harlot justified by works?" It is because of the similarity of her case to Abraham's, both of them being a contrast to the formal Christian and the demons, that Rahab is introduced. In her case also faith led to action, and the action had its result in the salvation of the agent…
669 wordsSECTION 69Chapter Xiii.
[65] Döllinger, _The Gentile and the Jew_, II., pp. 384, 386, Eng. Tr., _Heidenthum und Judenthum_, pp. 825, 827. [66] The following story is given by Mahometan commentators on the passage, "God took Abraham for His friend," which occurs in the fourth chapter of the Koran, entitled _Nessa_, or "Women:" Abraham was the…
323 wordsSECTION 70Chapter Xiv.
_THE HEAVY RESPONSIBILITIES OF TEACHERS. THE POWERS AND PROPENSITIES OF THE TONGUE. THE SELF-DEFILEMENT OF THE RECKLESS TALKER._ "Be not many teachers, my brethren, knowing that we shall receive heavier judgment. For in many things we all stumble. If any stumble not in word, the same is a perfect man, able to brid…
1,263 wordsSECTION 71Chapter Xiv.
But this is to miss the point of the passage. St. James says that "in many things we stumble--_every one of us_." He uses the strong form of the adjective (ἅπαντες for πάντες), and places it last with great emphasis. Every one of us sins, and therefore there is condemnation in store for every one of us. But those of us…
805 wordsSECTION 72Chapter Xiv.
The argument is _à fortiori_ from the horse to the man, and still more from the ship to the man, so that the whole forms a climax, the point throughout being the same, viz. the smallness of the part to be controlled in order to have control over the whole. And in order to bring out the fact that the ships are a stronge…
702 wordsSECTION 73Chapter Xiv.
This second point, like the first, is enforced by two illustrations taken from the world of nature. The first was illustrated by the power of bits and rudders; the second is illustrated by the capacity for mischief in fire and in venomous beasts. "Behold, what a fire kindles what a wood!" is the literal rendering of th…
727 wordsSECTION 74Chapter Xiv.
It "setteth on fire the wheel of nature, and is set on fire by hell." We must be content to leave the precise meaning of the words rendered "the wheel of nature" (τὸν τροχὸν τῆς γενέσεως) undetermined. The general meaning is evident enough, but we cannot be sure what image St. James had in his mind when he wrote the wo…
783 wordsSECTION 75_The Moral Contradictions In The Reckless Talker._
[67] There is a story that Amasis, King of Egypt, sent a sacrifice to Bias the sage, asking him to send back the best part and the worst; and Bias sent back the tongue. "Therewith bless we the Lord and Father; and therewith curse we men, which are made after the likeness of God: out of the same mouth cometh forth bl…
969 wordsSECTION 76_The Moral Contradictions In The Reckless Talker._
The illustrations of the fountain and the fig-tree are among the touches which, if they do not indicate one who is familiar with Palestine, at any rate agree well with the fact that the writer of this Epistle was such. Springs tainted with salt or with sulphur are not rare, and it is stated that most of those on the ea…
1,128 wordsSECTION 77_The Moral Contradictions In The Reckless Talker._
Nor is this the only contradiction in which such a one is involved. How strange that the being who is lord and master of all the animal creation should be unable to govern himself! How strange that man's chief mark of superiority over the brutes should be the power of speech, and that he should use this power in such a…
687 wordsSECTION 78_The Moral Contradictions In The Reckless Talker._
There is one kind of sinful language to which the severe sayings of St. James specially apply, although the context seems to show that it was not specially in his mind--impure language. The foul tongue is indeed a "world of iniquity, which defileth the whole body, and setteth on fire the wheel of nature, and is set on …
705 wordsSECTION 79_The Wisdom That Is From Below._
[68] _Sermons preached in Rugby School Chapel_, by the Rev. Frederick Temple, D.D. (Macmillan, 1867), pp. 324, 325. "Who is wise and understanding among you? let him show by his good life his works in meekness of wisdom. But if ye have bitter jealousy and faction in your heart, glory not, and lie not against the tru…
696 wordsSECTION 80_The Wisdom That Is From Below._
Whether we are to understand any very marked difference between the two adjectives ("wise" and "understanding") used in the opening question, is a matter of little moment. The question taken as a whole amounts to this: Who among you professes to have superior knowledge, spiritual or practical? The main thing is not the…
1,045 wordsSECTION 81_The Wisdom That Is From Below._
"In _meekness_ of wisdom." On this St. James lays great stress. He has already told his readers to "receive with meekness the implanted word" (i. 21), and what implies the same thing, although the word is not used, to "be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath" (i. 19). And in the passage before us he insists with…
729 wordsSECTION 82_The Wisdom That Is From Below._
"Glory not, and lie not against the truth." To glory with their tongues of their superior wisdom, while they cherished jealousy and faction in their hearts, was a manifest lie, a contradiction of what they must know to be the truth. In their fanatical zeal for the truth they were really lying against the truth, and rui…
662 wordsSECTION 83_The Wisdom That Is From Below._
Does this seem to be an exaggeration? St. James is ready to justify his strong language. "For where jealousy and faction are, there is confusion and every vile deed." And who are the authors of confusion and vile deeds? Are they to be found in heaven, or in hell? Is confusion, or order, the mark of God's work? If one w…
607 wordsSECTION 84_The Wisdom That Is From Above._
"But the wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, easy to be entreated, full of mercy and good fruits, without variance, without hypocrisy. And the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace for them that make peace."--ST. JAMES iii. 17, 18. At the beginning of his Epistle St. James exhorts tho…
757 wordsSECTION 85_The Wisdom That Is From Above._
This interpretation contradicts the context, and makes St. James teach the opposite of what he says very plainly in the sentences which precede, and in those which follow, the words which we are considering. It tries to enlist him on the side of partisanship and persecution, at the very moment when he is pleading most …
696 wordsSECTION 86_The Wisdom That Is From Above._
"Let those rage against you who know not with what toil truth is found, and how difficult it is to avoid errors.... Let those rage against you who know not with how great difficulty the eye of the inner man is made whole, so that it can behold its Sun.... Let those rage against you who know not with what sighs and groa…
1,047 wordsSECTION 87_The Wisdom That Is From Above._
"Full of mercy and good fruits." The wisdom from above is not only peaceable, reasonable, and conciliatory, when under provocation or criticism, it is also eager to take the initiative in doing all the good in its power to those whom it can reach or influence. Thus it goes hand in hand with that pure and undefiled reli…
658 wordsSECTION 88Chapter Xviii.
It is evident that the heavenly wisdom is pre-eminently a _practical_ wisdom. It is not purely or mainly intellectual; it is not speculative; it is not lost in contemplation. Its object is to increase holiness rather than knowledge, and happiness rather than information. Its atmosphere is not controversy and debate, bu…
951 wordsSECTION 89Chapter Xviii.
"Whence wars, and whence fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your pleasures which war in your members?" By a common transposition, St. James, in answering his own question, puts the pleasures which excite and gratify the lusts instead of the lusts themselves, in much the same way as we use "drink" for int…
675 wordsSECTION 90Chapter Xviii.
Plato and St. James are entirely agreed in holding that wars and fightings are caused by the lusts that have their seat in the body, and that this condition of fightings without, and lusts within, is quite incompatible with the possession of heavenly wisdom. But there the agreement between them ceases. The conclusion w…
867 wordsSECTION 91Chapter Xviii.
In either of these ways, therefore, the literal interpretation of a "kill" makes good sense; and we are not justified in saying, with Calvin, that "kill in no way suits the context." Calvin, with Erasmus, Beza, Hornejus, and others, adopts the violent expedient of correcting the Greek from "kill" (φονεύετε) to "envy" (…
901 wordsSECTION 92Chapter Xviii.
St. James is not blaming his readers for asking God to give them worldly prosperity. About the lawfulness of praying for temporal blessings, whether for ourselves or for others, there is no question. St. John prays that Gaius "in all things may prosper and be in health, even as his soul prospereth" (3 John 2), and St. …
286 wordsSECTION 93Chapter Xix.
_THE SEDUCTIONS OF THE WORLD, AND THE JEALOUSY OF THE DIVINE LOVE._ "Ye adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? Whosoever, therefore, would be a friend of the world maketh himself an enemy of God. Or think ye that the Scripture speaketh in vain? Doth the Spirit which He made …
844 wordsSECTION 94Chapter Xix.
St. John tells us (and the words are probably not his, but Christ's) that "God loved the world" (John iii. 16). He also charges us _not_ to love the world (1 John ii. 15). And here St. James tells us that to be friends with the world is to be the enemy of God. It is obvious that "the world" which God loves is not ident…
745 wordsSECTION 95Chapter Xix.
Still less is there any sin in "the enthusiasm of humanity," in a passionate zeal for the amelioration of the whole human race. A consuming love for one's fellow-men is so far from involving enmity to God that it is impossible to have any genuine love of God without it. "He that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen…
725 wordsSECTION 96Chapter Xix.
"Ye unfaithful spouses of Jehovah! know ye not that to be friendly with the world is to be at enmity with Him? Or do ye think that what the Scripture says about faithlessness to God is idly spoken?" But as regards this first question we must be content to remain in great uncertainty. 2. Who is it that "longeth" or "lu…
662 wordsSECTION 97Chapter Xix.
Just such is the claim which God, by the working of His Spirit, makes upon ourselves. He cannot share us with the world, however much we may offer to Him, and however little to His rival. If a rival is admitted at all, our relation to Him is violated and we have become unfaithful. His government _must have the whole_. …
677 wordsSECTION 98Chapter Xx.
[76] Liddon, _Easter Sermons_, vol. ii., pp. 56, 57 (Rivingtons, 1885). [77] Comp. 1 Cor. ii. 9; ix. 10; Eph. v. 14, in all which places we have quotations the source of which cannot be determined. Similar phenomena are frequent in patristic literature. See A. Resch's _Agrapha; Aussercanonische Evangelienfragmente_ in…
723 wordsSECTION 99Chapter Xx.
St. James enters an earnest and simple protest against the weak plea that temptations are irresistible. To maintain _that_ is to assert that the evil one has more will and power to destroy mankind than God has to save them. The truth is exactly the other way. God not only allows to Satan no power to coerce a man into s…
799 wordsSECTION 100Chapter Xx.
In the volume in this series which treats of the Pastoral Epistles is a passage on this subject respecting which a very friendly critic has said that he cannot quite see the force of it.[78] As the argument is of value, it may be worth while to state it here more clearly. The statement criticized is the concluding sent…
762 wordsSECTION 101Chapter Xx.
St. James is not addressing two classes of people when he says, "Cleanse your hands, ye _sinners_; and purify your hearts, ye _double-minded_." Every one whose hands have wrought unrighteousness is a sinner who needs this cleansing; and every one who attempts to draw nigh to God, without at the same time surrendering a…
678 wordsSECTION 102Chapter Xx.
"Humble _yourselves_;" "He that humbleth _himself_." Everything depends on that. It must be _self_-abasement. There is nothing meritorious in chancing to be in a humble position, still less in being _forced_ to descend to one. It is the voluntary acceptance, or the choice, of a lowly place that is pleasing to God. We m…
660 wordsSECTION 103Chapter Xxi.
_SELF-ASSURANCE AND INVASION OF DIVINE PREROGATIVES INVOLVED IN THE LOVE OF CENSURING OTHERS._ "Speak not one against another, brethren. He that speaketh against a brother, or judgeth his brother, speaketh against the law, and judgeth the law: but if thou judgest the law, thou art not a doer of the law, but a judg…
1,097 wordsSECTION 104Chapter Xxi.
This proneness to judge and condemn others is further proof of that want of humility about which so much was said in the previous section. Pride, the most subtle of sins, has very many forms, and one of them is the love of finding fault; that is, the love of assuming an attitude of superiority, not only towards other p…
755 wordsSECTION 105Chapter Xxi.
Is not the sin of a censorious temper in a very real sense diabolical? It is Satan's special delight to be "the accuser of the brethren" (Rev. xii. 10). His names, Satan ("adversary") and devil (διάβολος = malicious accuser"), bear witness to this characteristic, which is brought prominently forward in the opening chap…
727 wordsSECTION 106Chapter Xxi.
* * * * * But are not St. James and St. Paul requiring of us what is impossible? Is it not beyond our power to avoid forming judgments about our brethren? Certainly this is beyond our power, and we are not required to do anything so unreasonable as to attempt to avoid such inevitable judgments. Whenever the conduct of…
722 wordsSECTION 107Chapter Xxii.
[80] Dr. Hatch thinks that in both the Septuagint and the New Testament διάβολος, when used as a proper name, has "the general connotation of enmity, and without implying accusation, whether true or false." As an adjective it has its usual meaning of "slanderous" (1 Tim. iii. 11; 2 Tim. iii. 3; Titus ii. 3) (_Biblical …
829 wordsSECTION 108Chapter Xxii.
It was long ago remarked that "All men are mortal" is a proposition which each man believes to be true of every one excepting himself. Not that any one seriously believes that he himself will be exempt from death; but each one of us habitually thinks and acts as if in his case death were such an indefinite distance off…
783 wordsSECTION 109Chapter Xxii.
"Quid sit futurum cras, fuge quærere; et Quem Fors dierum cunque dabit, lucro Appone, nec dulces amores Sperne puer neque tu choreas;" and-- "Lead, kindly Light, amid th' encircling gloom, Lead Thou me on: The night is dark, and I am far from home; Lead Thou me on. Keep Thou my feet; I do not ask to see The d…
684 wordsSECTION 110Chapter Xxii.
"For that ye ought to say, If the Lord will, we shall both live, and do this or that." We must beware of understanding these words in such a way as to lose the spirit of them. It is one of many passages of Scripture which are often taken according to the letter, when the letter is of little or no importance. As in so m…
802 wordsSECTION 111Chapter Xxii.
In concluding this section of his letter, St. James brings the conduct which he has been condemning within the sweep of a very comprehensive principle: "To him, therefore, that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin." No Jew, whether Christian or not, could plead ignorance as an excuse for his transgres…
694 wordsSECTION 112Chapter Xxii.
This principle cuts at the root of that unwholesome growth which in moral theology is known as the doctrine of _Probabilism_, and which has worked untold mischief, especially in the Roman Church, in which its chief supporters are to be found. This doctrine teaches that in all cases in which there is doubt as to whether…
391 wordsSECTION 113Chapter Xxiii.
_THE FOLLIES AND INIQUITIES OF THE RICH; THEIR MISERABLE END._ "Go to now, ye rich, weep and howl for your miseries that are coming upon you. Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are moth-eaten. Your gold and your silver are rusted; and their rust shall be for a testimony against you, and shall eat your fl…
724 wordsSECTION 114Chapter Xxiii.
"Go to now, ye rich, weep and howl for your miseries that are coming upon you." We have the same combination of words in Isaiah: "In their streets they gird themselves with sackcloth: on their housetops, and in their broad places, every one _howleth, weeping_ abundantly" (xv. 3). And in an earlier chapter we have a sti…
686 wordsSECTION 115Chapter Xxiii.
That the "last days" mean the days immediately preceding the Second Advent can scarcely be doubted. The context renders this very probable, and the exhortation in the next section renders it practically certain. "Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts: for _the coming of the Lord is at hand_. Murmur not, brethren, on…
984 wordsSECTION 116Chapter Xxiii.
But none of these passages determine for us a point of some interest in the construction used by St. James. The words translated "_of_ you," in "of you kept back by fraud," literally mean "_from_ you" (ἀφ' ὑμῶν, not ὑφ' ὑμῶν). Two explanations are suggested: 1. The fraudulent action proceeds _from_ them, and hence "fro…
746 wordsSECTION 117Chapter Xxiii.
The meaning of "in a day of slaughter" is not easily determined. The "as"--"_as_ in a day of slaughter"--must certainly be omitted. It was inserted to make more evident one of the possible interpretations of "day of slaughter." "Ye fattened your heart with perpetual banqueting, as if life were made up of killing and ea…
865 wordsSECTION 118Chapter Xxiii.
But nevertheless, this attractive and tenable interpretation is probably not the right one; the context is against it. It is the evil that is inherent in class tyrannizing over _class_ that is condemned, the rich oppressing the poor, and the godless persecuting the godly. "The righteous one" is here not an individual, …
432 wordsSECTION 119Chapter Xxiv.
_PATIENCE IN WAITING. THE ENDURANCE OF JOB. THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE MENTION OF JOB BY ST. JAMES._ "Be patient therefore, brethren, until the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient over it, until it receive the early and latter rain. Be ye also patient;…
765 wordsSECTION 120Chapter Xxiv.
The key-note of the whole passage is _patience_, which in one form or another occurs six times in five verses In the original two different words are used--one (μακροθμεῖν and μακροθμία) four times in the first four verses; and the other (ὑπομένειν and ὑπομενή) twice in the last verse, where we certainly need "the _end…
689 wordsSource & rights
Public domain in the USA; original historical text digitized by Project Gutenberg.
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Historical Christian writing; not Scripture.