It is not so easy to determine the time at which tne epistle was written. ]\lany place the date about the year 60 — close on the martyrdom of James the Just, or not long before the destruction of Jerusalem — as Michae- lis, Pearson, Mill, Guericke, Burton, Macknight, Eleek (Einlcit. p. 547, 18G2), and the older commentators gen- erally. Hug and De Wette place it after the Epistle to the Hebrews, to which they imagine it contains some allusions — Hug holding that it was written (i'lberlcgt) on set purpose against Paul and his doctrine of justifica- tion by faith. So also Baiir (Paulus, p. fi77). But these reasons are by no means conclusive. The great argu- ment that the Epistle of James was written to oppose either the doctrine or counteract the abuses of the doc- trine of justification by faith has, as we shall see, no foundation. The notion that this epistle is in some sense corrective in its tone and purpose appears plausi- ble to lis, as Paul is so usually read by us before James that we gain an earlier acquaintance with him, while James occupies also a later place in the ordinary ar- rangement of the books of the New Testament.
But it is claimed bj^ many that the state of the Ju- dffio-Christians addressed in the epistle is not that which we know to have existed at and before the year GO. There is no allusion to the fierce disputations as to the value and permanence of circumcision, the authority and meaning of the ceremonial law, or the conditions on which Gentile converts should be admitted into the Church — the questions discussed at the Council of Jeru- salem. Controversies on these points, it is asserted, sat- urated the Church during many years before the fall of Jerusalem, and no one could address Jewish converts at any length without some allusion to them. The myri- ads who believed, as James said, Avere " all zealous of the law" (Acts xxi, 20) ; and that zeal assumed so many false shapes, threw up so nianj- barriers in the way of ecclesiastical relationship, nay, occasionally' so infringed on the unconditioned freeness of the Gospel as to rob it of its simplicity and power, that no Jew addressing Jcav- ish believers with the authority and from the position of James could fail to dwell on those disturbing and en- grossing peciUiarities. The inference, therefore, on the part of many critics, is, that the epistle was written prior to those keen and universal discussions, and to that state of the Church which gave them origin and continu- ance; prior, therefore, also to the time when the labors of the apostle Paul among the Gentiles called such at- tention to their success that " certain from James came down" to Antioch to examine for themselves and carry back a report to the mother Church in Jerusalem (Acts XV ; Gal. ii). The epistle, on this view, might be writ- ten shortly before the Council of Jerusalem — ]irobably about the year 45. Such is the opinion of Noandcr, Schncckenburger, Theile, Thiersch, Huther, Da\itlson, and Alford.
On the other hand, Wiesinger and Bleek justly olijcct that the interval supposed is too limited for such a growth of Christianity as this epistle implies. More- over, although the argument in favor of an early date, drawn from the supposed design of counteracting the misinterpretation of some of Paul's doctrines (comp. 2 Pet. iii, 16), is scarcely tenable, yet the epistle manifest- ly presupposes such a general intelligence of (Jospel terms and truth as could hardly have obtained, especial- ly abroad, so early as )irior to the first council at Jerusa- lem (Acts xv). Indeed, many of the above arguments in favor of this very early date are self-contradictory ; for it was precisely at this i)eriod that the disputes and con- troversies in question raged most fiercely, not having yet been authoritatively (ktermined l>y any ecclesiastical consultation (comp. Paul's strong contention with Peter and Barnabas) ; whereas the official edict of that coun- cil i)recluded any further public discussion. In this re- spect the Epistle of James will fairly compare with that to the Hebrews, written about the same time. The reasoning, however, may be allowed to hold goo<l against so late a date as immediately preceding Jerusalem's
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fall (so Mackiiight infers from v, 1); for at that time the old controversj' appears to liave been somewhat re- vived. De Wette adduces the allusion to the name " Christians" in ii, 7, as an evidence in favor of the late date ; but this would only require a date later tlian that of Acts xi, 26. On the whole, the evidence decidedly preponderates in favor of the interval between Paul's two imprisonments at Konie, or about A.D. G2.
V. Ohject of Writinr/. — The main design of the epis- tle is not to teach doctrine, but to improve morality. James is the moral teacher of the N. Test. ; not in such sense a moral teacher as not to be at the same time a maintainer and teacher of Christian doctrine, but yet mainly in this epistle a moral teacher. There are two ways of explaining this characteristic of the epistle. Some commentators and writers see in James a man who had not realized the essential principles and pecid- iarities of Christianitj', but was in a transition state, half Jew and half Christian, Schneckenburger thinks that Christianity had not penetrated his spiritual life. Neander is of much the same opinion {Pjlanznng und Leitum/, p. 579). The same notion may j)crhaps be traced in Prof. Stanley and dean Alford. But there is another and much more natural way of accounting for the fact. James was writing for a special class of per- sons, and knew what that class especially needed ; and therefore, under the guidance of God's Spirit, he adapt- ed his instructions to their capacities and wants. Those for wliom he wrote were, as we have said, the Jewish Christians, whether in Jerusalem or abroad. James, living in the centre of Judaism, saw what were the chief sins and vices of his countrymen , and, fearing that his tiock might share in them, he lifted up his voice to warn them against the contagion from which they not only might, but did in part suffer. This was his main object ; but there is another closely connected with it. As Christians, his readers were exposed to trials which they did not bear with the patience and faith that would have become them. Here, then, are the two objects of the epistle : 1. To warn agauist the sins to which, as .Jews, they were most liable. 2. To console and exhort them under the sufferings to which, as Christians, they were most exposed. The warnings and consolations are mixed together, for the writer does not seem to have set himself down to compose an essay or a letter of which he had previously arranged the heads ; but, like one of the old prophets, to have poured out what was uppermost in his thoughts, or closest to his heart, without waiting to connect his matter, or to throw bridges across from subject to subject, ^\'hile, in the purity of his Greek and the vigor of his thoughts, we mark a man of education, in the abruptness of his transitions and the unpolished roughness of his style we may trace one of the family of the Davideans, \vho disarmed Doraitian by the simplicity of their minds, and by exhibiting tlieir hands hard with toil (Hegesip- pus apud Euieb. iii, 20.