jl,nd perfection of the old; the Christian's highest hononr i11, not that he is 11,member of the nniversal Church, but that he is the genuine type of the ancient Israelite; it instils no new principles of spiritual life, such as those which were to 'turn the world upside down,' in the teaching of Paul or of John, but only that pure and perfect morality which was the trne fulfil- ment of the Law ; it dwells, not on the human Teacher or Friend whose outward acts and words are recorded minutely in St. Mark, or on the human Sufferer whose sorrows and whose tenderness are brought out in St. Luke, nor yet on the inward and essential Divinity impressed upon us by St. John; but as we might again expect from the position of its author, it is the practical comment on that gospel which internal evidence as well as general tradition ascribes to the Church of Palestine, and in which our Lord appears emphatically as the Judge, the Lawgiver, and the King'' ('Ser- mons on the Apostolic Age,' p. 305).1 The p"lace from which the Epistle was written was undoubtedly Jerusalem. Every notice of St. James, scriptural, historical, and legendary, connects him with this city, and no other place has ever been seriously suggested. Tnternal evidence points to the same locality, e.g. the allusions to the natural phenomena of Palestine, the " early and the latter rain," the ,cavuwv, the bitter springs, etc.
V. AUTHENTICITY 01!' THE EPISTLE. So far this has been ta.ken for granted. It will, however, be well to say a few words on this head before concluding the Introduction. The testimony of Eusebius in the fourth century is given in 'Rist. Eccl.,' Bk. II. xxiii.: "These accounts are given respecting James, who is said to have written the first of the Catholic Epistles; but it is to be observed that it is considered spurious (vo0rueTai). Not many, indeed, of the ancients have mentioned it, nor yet that called the Epistle of Jude, which is also one of the seven called Catholic Epistles. Nevertheless, we know that these with the rest are publicly used in most of the Churches." From this passage we gather- 1. That the Epistle was ascribed to James. 2. That doubts were current as to its genuineness. 3. That not much use was made of it by early writers. 4. That nevertheless it was generally read in the Churches. In Bk. III. xxv. Eusebius ranks it among the dvni\ryoµwa, 11 which are t1evertheless well known and recognized by most ( yvwptµwv Toi's 'l!'oUo,s)."
1 The frequent references to the recorded discourses of our Lord in this Epistle can- not fail to strike the most careless reader. They are all pointed out in the notes on the text. But it is worth noticing in this connexion that we " find a statement in the works of Athanasius (tom. ii. p. 102) that the Hebrew Gospel of St. Matthew was translated into Greek by James the Bishop of Jerusalem" (Stanley, ubi supra). :xii INTRODUCTION TO
But his own opinion with regard to it may be shown from the fact that he makes free use of it in his other writings, and ascribes it to " the apostle " (see Westcott on the' Canon,' p. 392). At a le.tar date than that of Eusebius it was apparently rejected by TheocJm:e of :ft!opsuestia, but there is no need to discuss his witness. Turning to earher wnters, we find that St. Cyprian has no reference to it, and that there is nothing in the writings of TertuUian to show that he was acquainted with it. Further, Dr. Westcott says that "there is no external evidence to show that the Epistle of St. James or the Second Epistle of St. Peter was included in the Vetus Latina. The earliest Latin testimonies to both of them •.• are those of Hilary, Jerome, and Rufinus in his Latin version of Origen" (' Canon of the New Testament,' p. 234). Considerations of style and language are also said to lead to the conclusion that it did not form part of the original African Version of the Scriptures. It is found, however in what appears to be an early Italian recension in Codex Cor- beiensis (ff). Thus the Epistle would seem to have been unknown to the African Church of the first three centuries. Elsewhere the case is different. .Against the absence of allusions in the remains of Novatus (Westcott on the' Canon,' p. 345), and the silence of the 'Muratorian Fragment,' we may set the fact that Hippolytus (A.D. 220) has one (unacknowledged) quotation from it : 'H -yap KpLCTL<; avLAEW<; ECTTL 'T'e PY/ '71"0l~CTQ,l/'Tl l>..Eo<; ( edit. Lagarde, P· 122; cf. Jas. ii. 13), and that Irenreus (A.D. 180) has one fairly clear allusion to it: "Ipse Abraham . . . credidit Deo et reputatum est illi ad justitiam et amicus Dei vocatus est'' (' Adv. Hrer.,' IV. xvi. 2; cf. Jas. ii. 23); while at a still earlier date there are two important witnesses to the knowledge of this Epistle in the West, viz. Hermas, the author of ' The Shepherd,' and Clement of Rome. With regard to the former of these, Dr. Westcott writes that"' The Shepherd' bears the same relation to the Epistle of St. James as the Epistle of Barnabas does to that of the Hebrews. The idea of a. Christian law lies at the bottom of them both; but, according to St. James, it is a law of liberty, centering in man's deliverance from corruption within and ceremonial without ; while Hermas rather looks for its essence in the rites of the outward Church." Again," whole sections of 'The Shepherd' are framed with evident recollection of St. James" (' Canon of the New Testa- ment,' p. 180). The passages in question are too numerous for quotation, but may be seen in full in Professor Chuteris' admirable volume on • Canonicity,' p. 293. [The date of' The Shepherd' is somewhat difficult to fix precisely. Zahn puts it as early as A.D. 97; others as late as A.D. 140. (See 'Dictionary of Christian Biography,' ii. p. 918.)J Clement of Rome (A.D, 96) was undoubtedly familiar with our Epistle, although he never names the author and makes no formal quotation from it. He speaks of Abraham as called "the friend" (li cJ,{>..o,; '1T'pouayoprn0£{,;, eh. x.; cf. Jas. ii. 23), and instances Rahab as saved by faith and hospitality (eh. xii.), an instanco "doubtless suggested by Heb. xi. 31 and Jae. ii. 25" (Lightfoot, in loc.). Hi11 THE GENERAL EPISTLE OF JAMES. xiii