Epistle of James

A copy of James, c. 250 CE.

The Epistle of James, often titled simply, James, is a letter canonized into pretty much all Christian bibles. The author identifies himself as "James," writing to the 12 Jewish tribes, though, the identity of the physical recipient is unknown.

The letter directs new Jewish Christians to continue to follow religious tenants, refrain from anything evil, avoid everything that is worldly, to have faith in God, to patiently await the coming of the Lord, and to be good to each other. It also stresses that faith must be proved by doing good works.

As far as the New Testament canon is concerned, the Epistle of James has little to do with Jesus. Although the letter mentions theos (God) and kýrios (Lord) dozens of times, it only makes two references to Jesus (1:1 and 2:1), and neither implies that he is the son of God. There is also no mention of Jesus being crucified, resurrected, or performing miracles.

Authorship and Dating

The author identifies himself simply as "James," but there are at least six people in the New Testament with that name, two of which are described as "apostles of Jesus," as well as any number of people named James not mentioned in the bible. Christians can't agree on which, but the most common belief comes from Catholic tradition which maintains that the author is James, son of Alphaeus who they also believe is the same person as James the Just. The document is dated by scholars anywhere between 60 CE and 125 CE. Those who believe the Catholic tradition have no choice but to believe an early date when James would still be alive. No historical documents acknowledge the letter's existence until around 180 CE. The majority of Christians didn't agree the epistle should be part of the Christian canon until around 350 CE.

Status

I have several translations of this book from various bibles, and have read the KJV and NIV translations.

Review

Good

• Some good advice is scattered throughout the letter like (1:19), "Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry." Nothing is very profound, but there are some generally good ideas.
• The author warns against giving undue respect to rich people (2:2-9).
• There is an interesting description of sin being when you know you should do something good, but don't (4:17).

Bad

• The letter is lacking in structure. Aside from the single-sentence introduction, the letter is a jumble of thoughts which ends abruptly.
• The letter isn't very impressive. It's mostly a bunch of generic "don't do bad things, instead do good things." Pretty dull, really.
• The author says that God doesn't tempt men (1:13), but there are multiple instances of God temping men throughout the bible like Genesis 22:1, or the Lord's Prayer which ends with, "lead us not into temptation." Why would Jesus tell people to pray for God to not do something he would never do in the first place?
• 2:14-18, 24 explains how faith without deeds is useless, which contradicts contradicts Romans 4:5, and says that faith by itself won't feed or clothe you, which is the opposite of what Jesus says in Matthew 6:25-26.
• The author makes everything out to be black and white. If you're humble, you're of God, but if you're selfish, you're of the devil (3:13). While I can understand this as a general rule, the author doesn't leave room for any nuance. Is it selfish to keep food for the future in order to prevent starvation, or should you always humbly give it away to the hungry and run the risk of your own starvation? Likewise, why is it that anyone who is a "friend of the world", must therefore hate God (4:4)?

Ugly

• The author suggests that, no matter how well you follow the majority of the laws, if you ever break a single one, you're guilty of breaking them all (2:10). In the Gospels, Jesus makes similar ridiculous statements which go against any semblance of justice. If someone steals a candy bar, we don't charge them rape, nor should we.
• The author suggests the Binding of Isaac is a great example of good works through faith (2:21) and the Torture of Job as an example of God's mercy (5:11).
• The author suggests that the most important thing for a Christian to do, even above not bragging, not oppressing, not playing favorites, and even more important than submitting yourself to God, is to not swear oaths! (5:12). This hugely contradicts the majority of the bible.

Links

• en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Epistle_of_James - Wikipedia.