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The Four: A Survey of the Gospels
Defending Constantine: The Twilight of an Empire and the Dawn of Christendom
From Behind the Veil: The Epistles of John
Deep Exegesis:The Mystery of Reading Scripture
1 & 2 Kings
Brazos Theological Commentary
The Promise Of His Appearing: An Exposition Of Second Peter
A Great Mystery: Fourteen Wedding Sermons
Deep Comedy: Trinity, Tragedy, And Hope In Western Literature
Miniatures & Morals: The Christian Novels of Jane Austen
The Priesthood of the Plebs: A Theology of Baptism
A Son To Me: An Exposition of 1 & 2 Samuel
From Silence to Song: The Davidic Liturgical Revolution
Ascent to Love: A Guide to Dante's Divine Comedy
Blessed Are the Hungry: Meditations on the Lord's Supper
A House For My Name: A Survey of the Old Testament
Heroes of the City of Man: A Christian Guide to Select Ancient Literature
Brightest Heaven of Invention: A Christian Guide To Six Shakespeare Plays
Wise Words: Family Stories That Bring the Proverbs to Life
The Kingdom and the Power: Rediscovering the Centrality of the Church
James says that true religion consists in “visiting widows and orphans in their distress” (James 1:27). We don’t get the point if we think of “visit” in our first sense of “pay a call.”
In Christ, God has “visited and redeemed His people” (Luke 1:68), and the dayspring from on high visited us (1:78; cf. 7:16). Moses “visited” his brothers when he killed the Egyptian (Acts 7:23). To “visit” widows and orphans means to act, and to act zealously, in their defense.
No accident that the Greek word for “visit” is epispektomai, and has an etymological sense of “look around” or “examine with the eyes.” To visit is to “see” in the full biblical sense, that is, to judge.
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Sunday, May 3, 2009 at 5:39 am
Do we murder the poor when we abuse them? James thinks so. At the beginning of chapter 5, he sharply rebukes the rich, reminding them that they have not paid the laborers who mowed their fields (v. 3). Like Abel’s blood, the laborers “cry out against you, and the outcry of those who did the harvesting has reached the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth” (v. 4), that is, the “Lord of Armies.”
Untimely pay seems a minor oversight. Not for James: It’s a sin of Cain.
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Friday, January 30, 2009 at 5:56 am
James says that the law is a mirror. We think he means that we read the law, it shows us flaws and blemishes, and we are convicted of sin.
That’s not the way the image works in James. The man who looks in a mirror and turns away is not the one who hears the law and ignores his sin. He’s the man who hears the law and doesn’t do it (1:23-24). Hearing and not obeying is like glancing and turning away without remembering the image in the mirror. Looking intently at the law means doing it (v. 25).
The structure of verses 23-25 brings this out:
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Friday, January 30, 2009 at 5:52 am
Cristina Conti of th Salvation Army Seminary in Buenos Aires offers an interesting chiasm of James (Global Bible Commentary, Abingdon Press). Here is an abbreviated form of the chiasm:
A. Joy in trial, 1:2-8
B. Rich fade, 1:9-11
C. Lustfulness, 1:12-15
D. Perfect Gift, 1:16-25
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Monday, April 28, 2008 at 4:29 pm
When Elijah prayed, James tells us, the Lord shut up the sky for three years and six months. Elijah prayed again, and the heavens poured rain and the land was restored.
Elijah clearly prayed according to God’s will. But how did he know? Did Elijah decide to pray for drought after God said, “I’m going to send a drought”? Was it just dumb luck?
More relevantly, is this something we should be able to do? Or is it only for great Old Testament prophets?
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Sunday, August 13, 2006 at 7:30 am
It’s common to reconcile James and Paul on justification by saying something like “Paul’s faith is not the faith that James is talking about, and James’ justification is not the justification Paul is talking about.” That is, James is talking about some kind of demonstration of being in a justified state rather than the forensic act by which God places us in that justified state. At times, it is said that James uses “justify” to refer to public vindication before men rather than to refer to entry into a status before God.
That doesn’t work in James 2:22-24, however. There, Abraham is said to be justified by works and not by faith alone, his sacrifice of Isaac fulfilling the declaration of Gen 15:6 that “Abraham believed God and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.” And nestled in this discussion is James’ claim that Abe was “called the friend of God” (v 23). Being justified and being called a friend of God are two ways of describing the same reality for James: To be reckoned righteous is to be reckoned a friend of the righteous God. James, in short, is talking about Abe’s legal standing, and he says that Abe came into this standing by a faith that works.
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Wednesday, July 26, 2006 at 3:27 pm
James condemns those who use tongues for blessing and cursing ?Eblessing God, and cursing men made in the image of God. Among the images he uses to express this is the image of the tree and fruit. Fig trees cannot product olives, nor vines produce figs (3:12). In many passages, the vine and fig tree are associated with Israel, especially Israel during her Solomonic splendor (1 Ki 4; Mic 4:4; Zech 3:10); when the prophets talk about the withering of the vine and the fig tree, they are saying specifically that Israel has fallen short of the glories of Solomon (Is 34:4; Jer 5:17; 8:13). When the Assyrians promise Jerusalem “every man his vine and every man his fig tree,” they are saying that they can provide the peace, security, and plenty that Judah enjoyed long ago (Is 36:16): Sennacherib is the new SHLOMOH, the king who brings SHALOM.
With this background, it seems plausible that James has Israel’s double-tonguedness specifically in mind in James 3:12. The chapter begins with a warning about the stricter standard that is applied to teachers (v 1), a role that Israel played in relation to the Gentiles (cf. Rom 2:17-24). Perhaps James is even thinking of the “cursing” or “blaspheming” that comes to God because of Israel’s unfaithfulness (as in Rom 2).
One oddity: the image in 3:12 is not an image of a vine producing useless thorns or chaff, but vine that produces oil; dittos with the fig tree – it produces grapes. A grape-producing fig tree would be surprising, but how does this image connect to the blessing/cursing of v 10, which presumably it’s supposed to illustrate?
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Thursday, September 2, 2004 at 9:50 am
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