Criswell Theological
Review 1.1 (1986) 3-29.
Copyright © 1986 by The
THE CHRISTOLOGY OF JAMES
ROBERT B.
SLOAN
To
do research on the book of James is to weary of reading Luther's
dictum about its being a "right strawy epistle." That remark not only
tells us more about Luther than it does the book of
James, but it has
influenced the interpretation of this epistle since
the time of the
Reformation. The book has become
better known for its omissions
than its affirmations. Indeed, the latter are
tacitly feared as anti-Pauline
and thus more often defended than declared. To be sure,
what is not
(apparently) in the book of James may be at first striking.
There is no
mention of the cross, Christ's triumph over the
powers of evil, the
resurrection, the gift of the
Spirit, or baptism and the Lord's Supper.
Most
noticeable perhaps among the omissions in this NT book are
frequent references to Jesus and His
Christological titles.
But James must be appreciated in its
own right. It does not show
its best colors against the background of a
Lutheran-style Paulinism.
The
so-called problems of the theology and/or Christology of the book
of James are, it seems to me, more matters of the
paradigms and
methods with which it is examined than its
supposed sub-Christian
qualities. Seen, for example, in connection with other
NT books such as
Matthew
and Hebrews (to say nothing of Paul under a better light) the
book of James acquires a better field from which its
own hues may be
perceived.
Though given the form of an epistle
the book of James is frequently
referred to as Christian wisdom literature.
However that may be in
terms of genre questions, it is certainly clear that
James has a very
practical orientation. That is, James is concerned
not so much with
evangelistic questions as with
issues related to the practice of the faith.
Because
of its orientation, therefore, the theological implications of the
book are often more implicit than explicit. Though
implicit, however,
4
CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL
REVIEW
the traditional theological views of the book are
nonetheless very real.
One
does not have to look very long or very hard at the sometimes
casually expressed theological categories and/or
allusions in James to
realize that this book is certainly worthy of a
rightful place within the
canon of sacred books which comprise and reflect the
earliest (and
normative) Christian and apostolic theology.
I. James and Early Christian Theological Traditions
Though often assumed and not clearly
expressed, it is clear that
the practical exhortations in James are undergirded by the earliest
categories and theological traditions of the
apostolic church. Though
by no means exhaustive, the following observations
should suffice to
suggest the underlying theological structures
that are operative for the
author of this epistle.
The Use of Traditional
Texts, Illustrations and Phrases
James shares with a number of other
NT writers the use of the
Abraham stories as a model of faith/obedience
(2:21-23).
Paul of
course makes extensive use of the covenant promises to
Abraham (and
Abraham's subsequent trust) in Romans 4 and
Galatians 3.
The author
of Hebrews likewise finds in Abraham a very
congenial model of faith,
obedience and hope (6:13-20; 7:1-10; 11:8-12,
17-19). Of course,
Abraham
as a model of faith was not unknown in Judaism, and that
alone, it could be argued, is sufficient to account
for James' use of it.
But,
as we shall see later, James' use of the Abraham stories seems to
represent a dialogue with an already existent
Christian use of Abraham
as a model of faith. In this connection it is
interesting to note that both
Jas
2:23 and Rom 4:3, in their quotation of Gen 15:6 ( ]Epi<steusen de<
]Abraa>m t&? qe&?, kai>
e]logi<sqh au]t&? ei]j dikaiosu<nhn),
agree in reading
(against the LXX) }Epi<steusen de< for kai> e]p. While Philo also has
the
same reading, what we may in any case be
encountering here is the
traditional Christian variant of the text.
As a further example of the
Christian use of OT texts in James, it
may be noted that the use of Lev 19:12-18
throughout James1--though
having no doubt its own unique nuances--is in a common
vein with the
use of that same passage in Matt 5:43-48, and
especially 22:39 (par.
Mark
12:31). With regard to the latter passage (Matt 22:39, par. Mark
12:31),
it should be noted that the commandment to "love your
neighbor as yourself" (Lev 19:18) is
referred to as second only to the
l
See L. T. Johnson, "The Use of Leviticus 19 in the Letter of
James," JBL 103
(1982)
391-401.
Sloan: THE CHRISTOLOGY
OF JAMES 5
commandment of the Shema (Deut 6:4, 5). The
exegetical tradition
whereby Lev 19:18 and Deut 6:4, 5 were combined
may no doubt be
attributed to Jesus himself. Not only, however, was the connection not
lost in either the Matthean
or Markan traditions, but neither apparently
was it lost in James who likewise affirms, though
in separate (but not
unrelated) passages, the theological implications
for the Christian of
both the Shema (2:19) and the second commandment (2:8).
Another example of traditional
Christian exegesis in James is
found in the joint use of the Rahab
and Abraham stories. Though it is
difficult to tell whether there is any literary
dependence between James
and Hebrews, the clear fact is that both made use
of Josh 2:1-16 by
way of alluding to Rahab
as an OT model of faith.2 Though issues
related to literary dependence, dating, origin
and the definition of
faith/hope are very complex, what seems
nevertheless to be clear is
that the use of both Abraham and Rahab
as models of faith is to be
attested only in Christian traditions, i.e., Heb
11:8-12, 17-19, 31; Jas
2:20-26.
James also shows a number of early
Christian exegetical affinities
with 1 Peter. In quoting rather literally the Septuagintal reading of Prov
3:34,
Jas 4:6 agrees with 1 Pet 5:5 in substituting qeo<j for the LXX's
ku<rioj. This particular minor
agreement (followed apparently by the
author of I Clem 1:30), though theologically
insignificant in terms of
the meaning of the text, again illustrates the
affinity of James with other
early Christian materials. Similarly, Jas 5:20 and 1
Pet 4:8 reflect a
common early Christian interpretive/sermonic use of Prov 10:12, where
we read, "Hatred stirs up strife, but love
covers all transgressions." The
common interpretive and exegetical traditions
reflected in James and
1
Peter are evidenced again in 1:10, 11 and 1 Pet 1:24 where the former
clearly alludes to, and the latter explicitly
quotes Isa 40:6, 7. Finally, we
may note merely in passing that the use of Amos
9:12 in Acts 15:17
seems to have found further Christian use in Jas 2:7.
While not
exhaustive, the above instances of OT use by James
in common with
other traditional uses of those same passages in
primitive Christianity
reflect at a deep level the thoroughgoingly
Christian frame of reference
within which OT Scripture was appropriated by James.
Not only in the use of Scripture
does James show itself to be of a
piece with other early Christian theological
communities, but it is also
heir to (and perhaps also the ancestor of) a number
of phrases and
2 Discussion of dating
and literary dependence with respect to James and Hebrews
maybe found in B. W. Bacon, "The Doctrine of
Faith in Hebrews, James and Clement of
James,"
JBL 67(1948) 339-45; and D. A. Hagner, The Use of the Old and
New
Testaments in Clement of
6
CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL
REVIEW
expressions that seem to have been part of the
common theological
stock of early Christianity. Though the similarities
of James with other
NT
books are too numerous to delineate exhaustively,3
the following
parallels of thought and expression between James
and the Pauline and
Petrine traditions of the NT will demonstrate
the congenial nature of
the theology of James within the framework of early
Christianity.
First, taking the two traditions
together, we may note that (as
P.
Davids in his recent commentary has shown4)
there is a rather
impressive similarity of thought and language that
exists between Jas
1:2-4
and Rom 5:2b-5, on the one hand, and 1 Pet 1:6-7 on the other.
Rom 5:2b-5 Jas 1:2-4 1
Pet 1:6-7
3. knowing
that 3. knowing that 7.
so that the
tribulation the testing of testing
of
produces per- your faith your faith,
severance produces more precious
perseverance than gold which
4. and persever- perishes
ance a tested 4. and
let per-
character, and severance have through
testing
tested character a mature
result by fire,
hope.
5. and hope
does
not disappoint may be found
so that you may to result in
because the love be mature
and praise and
of God has been complete
lack- glory
and honor
poured out within ing in nothing. at the revela-
our hearts through tion of Jesus
the Holy Spirit Christ.
who was given to us.
Also,
James shares with Pauline and Petrine traditions the
common
early Christian expression often found in baptismal
and/or ethical
contexts regarding the "putting off" of
sin and/or the old way of living
(1:21;
Rom 13:12; Eph 4:22;
3 The dated but still
masterly work of J. B. Mayor, The Epistle at St.
James: The
Greek Text with
Introduction Notes and Comments and Further Studies in the Epistle at
St. James, 3rd. ed. (London: MacMillan, 1913), may profitably be consulted regarding
the literary relationship of James to other parts
of the NT and, indeed, to earlier (both
biblical and non-biblical) materials. See
especially LXXXV-CXXVII.
4 P. Davids,
The Epistle at James: A Commentary on the Greek
Text (NIGTC;
even the English translations suggest an impressive
similarity of thought and language.
Sloan: THE CHRISTOLOGY
OF JAMES 7
three traditions speak of a glorious crown to be
received (1:12; 1 Cor
9:25;
1 Pet 5:4; see also Rev 2:10, 3:11).
Considering the Pauline traditions
alone, the following (randomly
chosen) parallels of thought and expression may be
noted. First, both
Paul
and James are convinced that it is the poor and lowly who have
received the mercies of God (1 Cor 1:27; Jas 2:5). Second, though the
cross and resurrection are not explicitly mentioned
in James, they are
surely implicit in the reference in 1:18 to the gospel
as "the word of
truth" (lo<g& a]lhqei<aj), which reference
moreover is quite common in
the traditional Pauline literature and may be noted
in 2 Cor 6:7
(without the article, as in James), Coll:5; Eph 1:13; and 2
Tim 2:15.
Third,
it may be noted that Jas 1:18 refers to the people of God as "first
fruits" (a]parxh<) and thus is of a piece with similar expressions in the
Pauline
literature whereby the people of God are either said to possess
"the first fruits of the Spirit" (Rom 8:23; cf. 2 Cor 1:22, 5:5; Eph 1:14) or
are themselves as missionary products called
"first fruits" (Rom 16:5;
1
Cor 16:15; cf. Rev 14:4). Fourth, both James (2:10)
and Paul (Gal 5:3)
speak of the holistic demand that is related to the
keeping of the law.
Regarding the parallels of thought
and language between James
and 1 Peter the greetings of both works refer to
the scattered people of
God
(1:1; 1 Pet 1:1). Second, both traditions think of the Christian as
both free and a slave (1:1, 1:25, 2:12; 1 Pet 2:16).
Finally, while we
observed above the common use of Prov 3:34 in both Jas 4:6 and 1 Pet
5:5,
what also deserves to be noted is the immediate exhortation in both
subsequent contexts for the believers to submit to
God while at the
same time resisting the devil (4:7; 1 Pet 5:6, 8).
Further parallels of
thought and language between James and other NT
materials could be
adduced, but these are enough to demonstrate
that James moves
comfortably in the world of expression that was
broadly characteristic
of primitive Christianity.
The Use of an Epistolary
Greeting
The form of an epistle was the most
popular form of early
Christian literary communication. Though on every other
ground the
book of James would seem not to be an epistle, the
very fact that what
in other regards appears to be something akin to
wisdom literature
and/ or an early Christian sermon is put within the
form of a letter
reflects the consciousness on the part of the
writer that he himself is
within an established literary tradition. Other
literary forms were
available to our author. He chose, however, to
address his readers via
the form of an epistle and thus placed himself within
a common
(indeed, the most popular) genre tradition of early
Christianity.
8
CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL
REVIEW
Faith as an
"Entry" Term
Recent works by E. P. Sanders5
and H. Raisanen6 have popularized
questions of "getting in" (or
"entry") and "staying in" ("maintenance").
That
is, Sanders and Raisanen have pointed to, especially
with regard
to the "righteousness" word group in the
NT, the differences between
Judaism
and Christianity with regard to what it takes to enter into the
people of God and what is required to remain a member
of God's
chosen ones. If it is true, as Raisanen
has suggested, that "faith" was
likely not used in Judaism to refer to the experience
of "entry,"7 then
the use of "faith" in Christian
literature as a word closely related to the
beginning of and/or entry into Christian
experience is a uniquely
Christian term. In this respect it must
be noted that "faith" in James is
often used as a "maintenance" term (1:3;
2:1, 5). However, not only do
these so-called "maintenance" references
presuppose faith as an entry
experience, but there are some passages which use
"faith" in exclusively
that way (i.e., as an "entry" term). The
discussions of "hearing" and
"doing" (1:1-29) and the relationship of
"faith" and "works" (2:14-26)
are central in this regard. The "hearing"
that is but temporary--like a
man who "looks at his natural face in a
mirror," but quickly forgets
what he looked like upon turning away from the
mirror--is "self-
deluding" and "worthless," being
the opposite of the "humble receiving"
of the word of truth which alone can
"save" (1:21-26). Thus, it is
exactly like the "faith" of 2:14-26
that is merely professed, but "has no
works," and thus cannot "save" (2:14).
The faith that saves is the faith
that humbly receives "the word of truth"
(1:18, 21) and proves itself by
works to be that of a "doer of the word";
which is why our author can
argue in the intervening passage of 2:1-13 that
"your faith in our Lord
Jesus
Christ, the glorious One," cannot be expressed with elitism.
Instead,
the readers must show themselves to be "fulfillers" of the
"royal law" (2:8) just as the genuine "doer"
is the one who looks intently
at the "perfect law" (1:25); as we will
see below, both expressions, the
"perfect law" and the "royal law ," are tied
together in synonymity by
the mutually qualifying expression, "the law
of liberty" (1:25, 2:12).
The
basic point to be made here, however, is that for James the faith
5 Sanders' thought can be
best traced out in four of his works: "Patterns of Religion
and Rabbinic Judaism: A Holistic Method of Comparision," HTR
66 (1973) 455-78; Paul
and Palestinian Judaism (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1977); "Paul's
Attitude toward the
Jewish
People," Union Seminary Quarterly
Review 33 (1978) 175-87; and Paul,
the Law,
and the Jewish People (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1983).
6 H. Raisanen,
"Galatians 2.16 and Paul's Break with Judaism," NTS 31 (1985)
543-53.
7 Ibid.
546.
Sloan: THE CHRISTOLOGY
OF JAMES 9
that "saves" is a "humble
receiving" (of the "word") which is defined in
terms of "doing" and "works."
Such a faith is, to use Sanders' termi-
nology (about which I actually
have some misgivings) the experience
of both entry and maintenance.
Early Christian
Eschatology
The eschatology of James is not
unlike other expressions of early
Christian
eschatology (which have both present and future elements)
in that the blessings of heaven are already being
experienced--"blessed
is a man who perseveres under trial"--and yet
await a final con-
summation--"he will receive the
crown of life"--no doubt at the
"coming (parousi<a) of the Lord"
(1:12; 5:7). In this regard, the same
imminent expectation of the Lord's return that is
to be found throughout
the NT (Mark 13:33-37; Rom 13:11,12; 1 Pet 4:7)
maybe attested also
in James (5:8). Nor is the early Christian
connection between ethics and
eschatology (Matt 25:31-46; 1 Cor
15:58; 1 Thes 4:18; Phil 3:17-21;
3:4ff.)
missing in James, for the references in 5:7, 8 to the imminent
return of the Lord are precisely for the purpose of
exhorting moral
perseverance on the part of the
readers. In addition, the early Christian
belief that final judgment will be based on works8
(cf. Matt. 25:31-46;
Acts
17:30, 31; Rom 2:5-16, 14:10-12; 1 Cor 3:13-15; 2 Cor 5:10, 9:6,
11:15;
Gal 6:7;
3:8-13;
Rev 20:11-15) is also strongly implied in James (4:11, 12;
5:1-5,
9).
The Use of Dominical
Sayings
The authoritative status of the
sayings of Jesus was a common
perception in primitive Christianity. The very
existence of the gospels
and the communities out of which and for which they
were produced
is rather straight-forward evidence of the fact
that the words of the
Master
assumed an authoritative role and function within the earliest
Christian fellowships. The gospel of Matthew,
especially, reflects (and
no doubt also encouraged) the extensive use of the
sayings of Jesus
within the earliest periods of Christian confession.
The fact that
Matthew
is regarded as--if not the first--then at least the most wide-
spread and extensively used of the four gospels in
early Christian
worship reinforces this point.
Though it was a commonplace in NT
studies of several decades
ago to remark the paucity of references to the
ministry and teachings of
8 See the recent and
excellent work of K. Snodgrass, "Justification by Grace--To the
Doers:
An Analysis of the Place of Romans 2 in the Theology of Paul," NTS 32 (1986)
72-93, on this very interesting dimension of NT soteriology/eschatology.
10
CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL
REVIEW
Jesus
in the epistles of the NT, it is now thought entirely possible that
the sayings of Jesus were so integral a part of
early Christian catechism
and instruction (perhaps even a part of
evangelistic instruction) that
they may have been presumed as familiar to many in
the various
churches.9 How far that assumption
may be pressed, however, is not
certain. What is clear, at any rate, is that the
epistles of the NT are not
entirely without reference to the sayings of
Jesus and their presumed
authoritative status. For example,
the use of the sayings of Jesus in the
literature of the Pauline churches has been
frequently observed (see 1
Cor 7:10, 9:14, 10:33 [par. Mark 10:44], 11:24, 25;
1 Thes 4:15; cf. also
traditions contained in the Sermon on the Mount
upon Rom 12:1-15:7
has been often noted.10 Outside the
Pauline traditions we may note that
Mark
13 and the apocalyptic sayings of Jesus reflected therein have
certainly influenced the Revelation,11
and Acts 20:35 (reporting words
of Paul) explicitly cites an otherwise unknown
saying of the Lord.
Finally,
covering a wide range of NT traditions, we may observe, as
suggested by many,12 that the
"stone" passage of Rom 9:32, 33; Eph
2:19-22,
and 1 Pet 2:4-10 are based upon the exegetical uses of Isa
8:14,
28:16 and Ps 118:22 as established already by Jesus and reflected
in the synoptic traditions (Matt 21:33-46; par.
Mark 12:1-12; Luke
20:9-19).
James is by no means an exception to
this common early Christian
practice of employing the sayings of Jesus. It is
to be noted, of course,
that James nowhere explicitly cites a saying of
Jesus as such, but the
words of Jesus are so very clearly woven into the
very structure of
J
status of the dominical sayings for the author of
James and his readers
was an unquestioned assumption. James' use of what
we call the
Sermon
on the Mount (Matt 5-7) is so well known as scarcely to need
9 G. B.
Caird, The
Apostolic Age (London: Duckworth, 1965) 73-82; also, C. F. D.
Moule, The
Birth of the New Testament, 3rd rev. and rewritten ed. (San Fransicso:
Harper and Row, 1982) 177-99.
10 So F. F. Bruce, The Epistle of Paul to the Romans (Tyn NT.;
Eerdmans, 1963) 228; Paul: The Apostle of the Heart Set Free (Paternoster, 1977) 96;
cf.
W. D. Davies, The Setting of the Sermon on the Mount (
1977) 398f.
11 G. R. Beasley-Murray, The Book of Revelation (NCB;
1974) 129ff.
12 R. N. Longenecker, Biblical
Exegesis in the Apostolic Period (
Eerdmans,
1975) 202-4.
The "stone" passages have also received excellent treatment in
K.
Snodgrass, "1 Peter 1l.1-10: Its Formation and Literary Affinities," NTS 24 (1977)
97-106;
The Parable of the Wicked Tenants [WUNT 27;
Tiibingen: J. C. B. Mohr
(Paul Siebeck), 1983].
Sloan: THE CHRISTOLOGY
OF JAMES 11
demonstration.13 Leaving aside the less
certain instances of James'
employment of the Jesus traditions found within the
Great Sermon, the
following represent rather clear-cut instances
wherein those sayings of
Jesus
have found expression in the teaching material of
James. Though
the allusions are clearer when looked at in Greek,
the following side-
by-side comparison of even the English texts of
the relevant passages
from the Sermon on the Mount and James makes clear
the similarities.
Sermon on the Mount James
(Matt 5-7)
5:3:
Blessed are the poor in spirit, 2:5:
. . . did not God choose the poor
for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. of this
world to be rich in faith and
heirs of the kingdom. . . ?
5:7:
Blessed are the merciful, for they 2:13:
for judgment will be merciless
shall receive mercy. to one who has shown no mercy;
mercy
triumphs over judgment.
5:11,12: Blessed are you when men 1:2; 5:9, 10: Consider it all joy, my
revile you, and persecute you, and say brethren, when you encounter various
all kinds of evil against you falsely, on trials. . ./Do not complain, brethren,
account of Me./Rejoice, and be glad, against one another, that you your-
for your reward in heaven is great, for selves be not judged; behold, the
so they persecuted the prophets who Judge is standing right at the door./
As -
were before you. an example,
brethren, of suffering and
patience, take the prophets who spoke
in the name of the Lord.
5:34-37:
But I say to you, make no 5:12:
But above all, my brethren, do
oath at all; Neither by heaven. . ./or not swear either by heaven or by
earth
by the earth. ..or by
Nor
. . . by your head. . . /But let your yes be yes, and your no, no; so that
statement be, "Yes, yes" or "No,
no" you may not fall under
judgment.
and anything beyond these is of evil.
6:19:
Do not lay up for yourselves 5:2, 3: Your
riches have rotted and
treasures upon earth, where moth and your garments have become moth-
rust destroy, and where thieves break eaten./Your gold and your silver have
in and steal. rusted; and their rust will be a witness
against you and will consume your
flesh like fire. It is in the Last Days
that you have stored up your treasure!
6:24:
No one can serve two masters; 4:4,
8: You adulteresses, do you not
for either he will hate the one and know that friendship with the
world
13 Mayor,
James LXXXV-LXXXVII.
12
CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL
REVIEW
love the other, or he will hold to one is hostility towards God? Therefore
and despise the other. You cannot whoever wishes to be a friend of
the
serve God and Mammon. world makes
himself an enemy of
God./Draw near to God and He will
draw near to you. Cleanse your hands,
you sinners; and purify your hearts,
you double-minded.
6:34:
Therefore do not be anxious 4:13,
14: Come now, you who say,
for tomorrow; for tomorrow will care "Today or tomorrow, we shall go to
for itself. Each day has enough trouble such and such a city, and spend a year
of its own. there and engage in business and make
a profit."/Yet you do not know what
your life will be like tomorrow. You
are just a vapor that appears for a
little while and then vanishes away.
7:1:
Do not judge lest you be judged 4:11,
12; 5:9: Do not speak against
yourselves. one another, brethren. He who speaks
against a brother, or judges his brother,
speaks against the law, and judges the
law; but if you judge the law, you are
not a doer of the law but a judge of
it./There is only one Lawgiver and
Judge,
the One who is able to save
and destroy; but who are you to judge
your neighbor?/Do not complain,
brethren, against one another, that you
yourselves may not be judged; behold,
the Judge is standing right at the door.
7:7,
8: Ask, and it shall be given to 1:5;
4:3: But if any of you lacks
you; seek, and you shall find; knock, dom, let him
ask of God, who gives to
and it shall be opened to you./For all men generously and without
re-
everyone who asks receives; and he proach, and
it will be given to him./
who seeks finds; and to him who You ask and do not receive,
because
knocks it shall be opened. you ask with
wrong motives, so that
you may spend it on your pleasures.
7:16,17: You will know them by their 3:10-13,18: From the same mouth
fruits. Grapes are not gathered from come both blessing and cursing. My
thombushes, nor figs from
thistles, are brethren, these things
ought not to be
they? /Even so every good tree bears this way./Does
a fountain send out
good fruit; but the rotten tree bears from the same opening both fresh and
bad fruit. bitter water? /Can a fig tree, my breth-
ren, produce olives, or a vine
produce
figs? Neither can salt water produce
fresh./Who among you is wise and
understanding? Let him show by his
Sloan: THE CHRISTOLOGY
OF JAMES 13
good behavior his deeds in the gentle-
ness of wisdom./ And the seed whose
fruit is righteousness is sown in peace
by those who make peace.
7:24,
26: Therefore everyone who 1:22-25: But
prove yourselves doers
hears these words of Mine, and acts of the word, not merely hearers who
upon them, may be compared to a delude themselves./For if anyone
is a
wise man, who built his house upon a hearer of the word and not a doer, he
rock. . . / And everyone who hears is like a man who looks at his natural
these words of Mine, and does not act face in a mirror;/for once he has
upon them, will be like a foolish man, looked at himself and gone away, he
who built his house upon the sand. has immediately
forgotten what kind
of person he was./But one who looks
intently at the perfect law, the law of
liberty and abides by it, not having
become a forgetful hearer but an effec-
tual doer, this man shall be
blessed in
what he does.
While numerous other allusions could
be suggested, the above are
sufficient to show that the sayings of Jesus are a
rich part of the
theology and experience of our author, a fact
which places him
squarely within the traditions and practices of
early Christianity.
The Knowledge of Pauline
Traditions
J. B. Mayor14 has argued
that Paul, in writing Romans, knew the
book of James--a fact which, according to Mayor,
accounts for certain
similarities of expression,
especially regarding "justification by faith"
and the similar use of Abraham as a model of saving
faith (2:14-26).
Most
scholars, of course, would no longer agree that Paul had access to
James,
but there seems to be little doubt that Jas 2:14-26 represents a
dialogue involving Pauline traditions. It is
certainly not necessary,
however, to argue that James is consciously
contradicting the great
apostle. In fact, there is nothing in the
implied theology of those whom
J
apparent similarity of the opponents' views to
certain Pauline expres-
sions makes it probable that
James is in fact responding to a kind of
perverted Paulinism.
There can be little doubt that Pauline theology
exerted an enormous influence throughout the
various centers of early
Christianity
in the formative years of the major church traditions.15
14
Ibid. XCI-CII.
15 M. Hengel,
Between Jesus and Paul: Studies in the
Earliest History of Christianity,
tr. J. Bowden (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1983); S.
Kim, The Origin of Paul's Gospel (Grand
Rapids: Eerdmans,
1982) especially, 100-36.
14
CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL
REVIEW
Therefore,
it should not surprise us that, just as Paul himself had to
combat various antinomian perceptions of his theology
(cf. Rom 6:1;
Gal
2:15-21) so there may be standing behind the polemic of Jas 2:14-
26 a kind of misrepresented Paulinism. At any rate, the point
that is to
be made here is that, while James does not correct
misrepresentations
of Paul in the way that Paul himself would have
(and did), his own
language and thought were nonetheless certainly
congenial with certain
similar expressions in Paul whereby we read that
faith has its expression
in lifestyle (cf. collectively Gal 5:6; 6:15; 1 Cor 7:19).16
* * *
The point to all that has been
presented thus far is relatively
simple: the theology of James is not alien to the
theological currents of
primitive Christianity as reflected in the
canonical literature. Though
some scholars have treated the book of James as if
it were merely a
Jewish
document to which a couple of traditional Christian references
to the "Lord Jesus Christ'" (1:1; 2:1)
were added so as to give it
Christian
acceptability, such handling, we are convinced, does no
justice to the almost unconscious use of
traditional Christian materials,
phrases and texts at virtually every literary
stratum of the book.
Moreover,
the theology of James, while often more implicit than
explicit, given its extremely practical bent, is
nonetheless real and is
evidenced in the deep structures of our author's
thinking and belief. As
we continue by considering the Christology of
James, the implicit but
nonetheless real pattern of Christian confession
continues to be evident.
II. An Implicit Christology
What James has to say about Christ
lies for the most part beneath
the surface of the practical exhortations in the
book. In attempting to
uncover the Christology of James, therefore, we
must look not only at
what James says about Christ, but at what James
seems to assume
about Christ in the course of his ethical
instructions. The following
represents a brief summary of the Christological
statements that can be
made as a reflection of the implicit Christological
assumptions under-
lying the explicit paraenesis
of the book.
Christ the Teacher and
Prophet
We've noted already the impact of
the traditions contained in what
we call the Sermon on the Mount (Matt 5- 7) upon
the thinking of our
16 Snodgrass,
"Justification" 85-87.
Sloan: THE CHRISTOLOGY
OF JAMES 15
to author. There is little doubt that the
teachings of Jesus had a very great
impact upon James. There is more to be said in this
regard but it will be
deferred until we consider the explicit
Christological title of "Lawgiver"
as discussed below. What may be remarked here,
however, is that the
central (and serious) function of teaching for
James (3:1) was no doubt
enhanced by the teaching role our author saw
modeled in the life of his
Lord,
a fact which, again, is reflected in the extensive use of Jesus'
sayings to be found in this short work. But it
was not only the content of
Jesus'
teaching that seems to have touched our author, since, for the
author of James, teaching was no mere academic
enterprise, but a task
of morally compelling urgency fraught with
eschatological significance
(3:1). In addition to the
re-interpreted legal content to which James fell
heir as a Christian teacher, there was the
authority, the prophetic
passion of Jesus that was likewise conveyed with
the teachings them-
selves. Literary analysis easily suggests the
teachings of Jesus as a
primary source for the exhortations of James.
If, however, we inquire
further, as to the source of James' prophetic
passion and tone, we are
once again thrown back upon the similar and very
reasonable explana-
tion of the historical Jesus
as the originator, in this case, of the rather
innovative conflation of rabbinic and prophetic
roles in early Christi-
anity17
(see Acts 13:1; 1 Cor 12:28, 29; 14:26-33; Eph 4:11;
cf. Acts 11:21;
Eph
2:20, 3:5) and especially James (see below). For Jesus to have been
regarded as both "rabbi" and
"prophet" is historically unusual, to say
the least, and provides the most plausible
explanation for the--again,
unusual--conflation in James of what appears to
be wisdom literature
delivered with prophetic tone. The blunt, often
harsh remarks of the
historical Jesus directed to either his religious
enemies (Matt 12:34;
15:7,
14; 16:4; 21:31; 22:18; 23:1-36; Luke 16:15; 20:41), or, in some
cases, even bitingly delivered to his own disciples
(Matt 8:26; 15:16;
16:8-11,
23; 17:17,20; Luke 9:31) is, in turn, likely reflected
in the often
searing tone evidenced by the author of James.
Just as the Master
himself could call his disciples "friends"
(Luke 12:4) or "little flock"
(Luke
12:32) on the one hand and "unbelieving and perverted" (Luke
9:41),
on the other, or could even so sternly rebuke his disciples for
17 See D. E. Aune, Prophecy in
Early Christianity and the Ancient
World (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1983) 103-6, where the simplistic notion--which
asserts that the prophetic movement ceased and
was followed by the rabbinic--is
certainly qualified, though the notion is itself,
as Aune concedes, representive
of the
opinion of classical rabbinic tradition. Aune does admit that there is a relative re-
emergence of the prophetic movement in and through
early Christianity. Indeed, Aune
argues that the rabbinic claim that the prophetic
movement had ceased and was
superseded by them (the rabbis) is itself an
attestation of the relative resurgence of the
prophetic movement in Christian circles (and
perhaps elsewhere).
16
CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL
REVIEW
their moral and/or intellectual stubbornness that
they were afraid to
question him (Luke 9:41-45), so James seems
unaware of any psycho-
logical or spiritual contradiction in his own
references to his readers as
both
"beloved brethren" (1:16, 19; 2:5; see also 1:2, 9; 2:1, 14; 3:1;
4:11;
5:7,
9, 10, 12) and "double-minded" (4:8, cf. 1:8),
"adulteresses" (4:4)
who are proud (4:6), quarrelsome (4:1) and
"judges with evil motives"
(2:4).
Some of the problematic passages
frequently encountered in the
study of James with regard to the identity of those
whom he so
severely rebukes--i.e., are they Christians or
non-Christians18--may
perhaps be fruitfuily
advanced by taking note of this prophetic phe-
nomenon. The seemingly
incongruous nature of the various epithets is
as easily explained as a derivative of the tone of
Jesus (without omitting
due regard for the author's own personality) as our
author's hortatory
instructions are of the content of
Jesus' sayings.
The Lord Who Heals and
Forgives
The healing ministry of Jesus seems,
for our author, to have
continued into the life of the early church,
assuming that the anointing
of the sick with oil "in the name of
Lord" (5:14; cf. 2:7 which is
discussed below) is a reference to the name of the
Lord Jesus. If that is
so, and the probability seems to lie in that
direction, it would then be a
work of the risen Lord in healing that is referred
to in 5:15 with the
expression "the Lord will raise him up."
If these two references to "the
Lord"
(5:14, 15) are indeed references to Christ, then the promise of
forgiveness for the physically stricken one who has
also committed sins
(5:15)
would likewise seem to represent the work of the risen Lord.
The
Lord who heals also forgives. The healing of the afflicted sinner
seems thus reminiscent of the story of the healing of
the paralytic
(Mark
2:1-12 and par.) wherein a similar connection between
forgive-
ness and healing is evidenced, as is also the Lord's
work of "raising"
him up (5:15; Mark 2:11, 12) in response to the
effective value of the
faith of others (5:14, 15; Mark 2:5). It seems clear
that for James the
historical Jesus continues to work in the community
of faith and that,
conversely, the heavenly Lord who works in the
worship and experi-
ence of the Christian
community is not discontinuous with the historical
Jesus,
the memory of whom has not faded and whose words were still
highly regarded.
The Friend of Sinners
The explicit reference in 2:1 to
"our glorious Lord Jesus Christ"
stands in the service of an exhortation against
"personal favoritism,"
18 Davids,
James 76-78.
Sloan: THE CHRISTOLOGY
OF JAMES 17
Here
the injunction not to make "distinctions among yourselves, and
become fudges with evil motives" by showing
favoritism to the wealthy
and despising the poor seems to assume the
historically based gospel
traditions regarding the fellowship of Christ with
sinners. Though the
basic theological appeal in 2:5 to the fact that God
has chosen the "poor
of this world to be rich in faith" is not
apparently a Christological
reference, when seen in the light of the explicit
title that in 2:1
introduces this injunction against elitism, it
suggests unmistakably that
it is in fact the ministry of Jesus and His
identity with the poor and
outcast that is being referred to by the
reference in 2:5 to God's
"choosing of the poor of this world." Put another way, God's
"choosing
of the poor of this world to be rich in faith and
heirs of the Kingdom" is
a theocentric
description for our author of the ministry of Jesus. Seen in
this way our Lord's identity with, and announcement
of good news to,
the poor constitutes the implicit historical and/or
Christological basis
of our author's ethical instruction here. Not
unknown to James therefore
is the Jesus who ate with sinners (e.g., Luke
5:29-32; 7:36-50) and
announced the good news of the kingdom to the poor
(e.g., Luke 4:18;
6:20-26;
7:22).
A Wisdom Pneumatology/Christology
In this matter the Christological
implications may well seem to be
very remote, but considering the fact that both the
categories of
wisdom and Spirit/spirit are Christological in
virtually every other
corner of NT theological tradition, it may at least be
noted here that the
category of wisdom is certainly not absent from
James and--while it
does not seem to imply directly a Christology--it
certainly suggests a
pneumatology, which itself may have
had Christological undertones
for our author.19 The notion of wisdom
is suggested in at least three
contexts (1:5-8; 16-18; 3:13-18). While the term
"wisdom" does not
appear in the 1:16-18 passage the verbal and
theological clues (where
wisdom is "of God," "from above,"
"unwavering," and "good") pro-
vided by the other two contexts in which the term is
explicitly used
make it clear that here too our author is referring
to wisdom.
The connection between Spirit/spirit
and wisdom in the OT and
other Jewish materials (Gen 41:38-39; Exod 31:3; Isa 11:2; Wisdom of
Solomon
1:6; 7:7,22) is well established. Moreover, that
connection is
certainly not lost in the NT. Indeed, in the
Pauline writings we see that
wisdom, which in the OT involves the ability to live
life under the will
of God, is not only used in passages which draw
out the implications of
the divine Spirit for Christian experience (1 Cor 2:1-16; 12:8; cf. Eph
1:17;
3:5, 10, 16), but is also frequently referred to in the absence of
19 Ibid. 51-54.
18
CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL
REVIEW
other more explicit references to the Spirit, but in
ways that are parallel
to what is elsewhere the work of the Spirit in
producing a life that is
pleasing to God (
reflect the connection between wisdom and
Spirit. In Luke 11:13 we
read of the heavenly Father who, even more than an
earthly father,
gives good gifts--in this case the Holy Spirit--to
His children who ask
Him. It is interesting to note that the Matthean parallel (7:11) does not
refer to the Holy Spirit but simply to “what is good”
as that which is
given to those who ask the generous Father. Neither
synoptic passage
uses the term “wisdom,” but certainly the obedient
life of wisdom is in
view. Furthermore, when read in tandem with the
wisdom passages in
J
wisdom, these synoptic traditions (Matt 7:11; Luke
11:13) seem much
less dissimilar: i.e., the reference to the Spirit
being apt in Luke, and
likely implied in the more J ewishly
conceived Matthew. Thus, in
Matthew
and James the reference to the Spirit seems implied, in Luke
(like Paul) it is more explicit. In all cases, the life that
is pleasing to God
is in view. Whereas Paul (cf. also John) has what
is often described as a
wisdom Christology, James has, it would seem,
analogous to the
synoptic traditions reflected in Matt 7:11 and
Luke 11:13, a wisdom
pneumatology.
To what extent James' wisdom pneumatology reflects also a
wisdom Christology is difficult to demonstrate, but it
does not seem a
far remove, given what we have seen already in
terms of James'
theocentric understanding and
ethical use of the ministry of Jesus as
“God's
choosing of the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of
the kingdom" (2:5). If Paul's Spirit theology
in Gal 5:22, 23 is in some
way a reminiscence of the historical Jesus, then it
is not too far-fetched
to ask whether James' wisdom paraenesis
may not likewise reflect a
certain understanding of the historical Jesus and/or
his life of wisdom
and obedience to God.20 In this
connection it is interesting to note that
the implicit Christology thus far uncovered in
James is largely depen-
dent on historical traditions regarding the life of
Jesus. It has been
assumed by some that the primary residue of the
historical Jesus is
found indirectly in the deposit (to be recovered by
the variously
applied criteria of form criticism) of his life
left in the communities in
the form of his teachings. While none may doubt
that the teachings of
Jesus
exerted an enormous influence upon the theology and self-
20 See Davies, Sermon 346-49 and F. F. Bruce, The Epistle to the Galatians
(NIGTC;
Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1982) 252-61, who suggest the
connection for Paul
between the life in the Spirit of Gal 5: 22, 23
and the historical Jesus; note well that Paul's
"fruit of the Spirit" (Gal 5:22, 23) and James'
"wisdom from above" (Jas 3:17, 18) are not
at all dissimilar.
Sloan: THE CHRISTOLOGY
OF JAMES 19
understanding of early Christianity--James
being a primary witness to
that fact--it is nonetheless clear that the life of
Jesus as event was not
unimportant,21 especially (see the
discussion above of 2:1ff) for James.
Stated
in terms of some current discussions, James is not to be thought
of as a way station along the trajectory of a non-kerygmatic Christology
(Jesus
the teacher cum holy man) which
presumably co-existed with
equal force of tradition alongside the (ultimately
triumphant) canonical
and/ or apostolic traditions (of the crucified
Jesus who is now the
exalted Lord of the cosmos) and finally emerged
literarily in the
Gnostic
Jesus of Nag Hammadi.22 For James, as we
have seen above
and shall also see in what follows, the exalted
Lord is none other than
the crucified Jesus whose life, as well as his
teachings, constituted a
normative basis upon which further theological
insight (especially
certain legal/paraenetic
traditions) could be developed (see the discus-
sion above of 2:1ff).
III. Explicit Christology
At this point we must observe that
whatever else may be said
about the paucity of Christological references in
James, they are not
entirely lacking. Furthermore, whatever else one
may say about the
composition history of the book of James in terms of
its use of Jewish
sources and/ or its character as a piece of
first century wisdom literature,
the fact is that the text of James as we have it is
explicitly Christian.
Even
without the traditional Christological titles, e.g., 1:1 and 2:1 (there
are others: cf. 4:12, 5:9), we have seen enough
from this book to know
that it lies within the mainstream of early
Christian confession theo-
logically and that it has enough of an implicit
Christology to suggest
that, under different literary circumstances, our
author could have told
us much more about Christ than he did on this
occasion. But the fact
still remains that James is not lacking in an explicit
Christology.
Christ and Lord
The two references to the “Lord
Jesus Christ” (kuri<ou
[h[mw?n]--
]Ihsou? Xristou?: 1:1, 2:1) make use of
the most characteristic and
frequently occurring titles for Jesus in early
Christianity. The title
“Christ”--while
apparently used here as something more akin to a
21 See the recent study
by E. P. Sanders, Jesus and Judaism (
1985),
in which the author begins his study of Jesus not with the teachings, but with
the
facts of his life, his career, and their
consequences.
22 As in, for example, J.
M. Robinson, "Jesus: From Easter to Valentinus
(or to the
Apostles'
Creed)," JBL 101 (1982) 5-37;
"The Sayings of Jesus: Q," The
Drew Gateway
54
(1983) 26-38.
20
CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL
REVIEW
name than a title--has not completely lost contact
with its Jewish roots
(however good or "Hellenistic" the Greek of this
document may be) as
a reference to "Messiah." Though seldom
used publicly by Jesus during
the days of his ministry,23 the title
"Christ" and/or "Messiah" was one
of the most popular early Christian confessions
about Jesus, finding its
functional roots in the ministry of Jesus, its
decisive shaping vis-a-vis
the cross of Jesus, and its supreme vindication in
the fact of his
resurrection from the dead. In this
latter connection it was connected
with the title "Lord" (cf. Acts 2:33-36;
Rom 1:4; 1 Cor 1:2f.; 2 Cor
4:5;
Phil
2:6-11; 3:8;
Christological confessions about Jesus. The background of the
term
"Christ"
in Jewish messianism as an expression of the
predominantly
royal (as opposed to prophetic and priestly) hopes of
prophetic/
apocalyptic Judaism quite naturally brought this
term into the orbit of
its often closely-associated fellow term
"Lord" (and both with "Son,"
cf.
Rom 1:4; 1 Cor 15:20-28, 57;
The term "Lord" has been
suggested by some to have arisen in the
Hellenistic
communities of early Christianity, but its Jewish antecedents
are not to be dismissed lightly. The presence of
the term in the several
hymnic fragments incorporated
within the NT materials suggests that
the term was part of the very earliest confessions
of the Christian faith
and thus may well have its rise and setting within
the framework of
Jewish
Christianity.24 Whatever its provenance it seems clear that the
term as such is a reference to the kingly status of
the resurrected Jesus,
given the early Christian belief that he had acceded
to a celestial throne
and was seated (as a ruling and interceding agent)25
at the right hand of
the Most High God. The precipitating cause for the
Christian ascription
of Lordship to Jesus seems to have been the belief
in His resurrection
and ascension to the right hand of God.26
The use of both of these early
Christian
designations with reference to Jesus in the book of James
confirms its rightly perceived status within the
mainstream of early
Christianity .
The Glory and the Name
We place both of these explicit
Christological designations together
here because each reflects the early Christian
tendency to use traditional
23 R. N. Longenecker, The Christology of
Early Jewish Christianity (
1970)
63-82.
24 O. Cullmann, The
Christology of the New Testament, revised ed., tr. S. G.
Guthrie
and C. A. M. Hall (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1959) 195-237; Longenecker,
Christology 120-36.
25 Acts 2:30-36; 5:31;
7:55, 56; Rom 1:4; 8:34; 2 Cor 5:10; Eph 1:20-23;
2:6; 4:8-10;
Phil
2:9; CoI3:1; Heb 1:3; 2:5-9; 5:9,10; 7:24-26; 8:1; 10:12; 12:2; Rev 1:5;
5:5-14.
26 Longenecker,
Christology 128-31.
Sloan: THE CHRISTOLOGY
OF JAMES 21
names of God with reference to Christ. The term
"glory" has a long
pre-history in Jewish history and theology as a
euphemism for Yahweh.
As
a word that refers, e.g., to the light that could be seen when God
was present in the tabernacle in the wilderness (Exod 40:34), the
throne (1:28), the
term "glory" itself came to mean the presence of God
and thus was widely used in NT traditions as a
reference to the
presence of God in Christ,27 and, as
such, was also closely associated
with both wisdom and image of God Christology in the
NT.28 In Jas
2:1,
where th?j
do<chj is commonly translated as an attributive adjec-
tive,29 and thus rendered as "our glorious
Lord Jesus Christ," the
reference to "the glory" may more
properly be seen as a kind of
substantive in its own right. That is, given the use
of "glory" as a
euphemism for God, and the Christian tendency to
transfer traditional
names of God to Christ, the passage in question could
well be translated
"our Lord Jesus Christ, the glory."30 As to
the precise import that is to
be given to "the glory," if thus
rendered in this reference to "our Lord
Jesus
Christ," there can be some debate. It could be argued that
"glory"
here is a straightforward reference to Jesus as the
very presence of God
and thus, in light of the presence of God revealed
in the ministry of the
Lord
who had fellowship with sinners (cf. 2:5), the readers must be
certain not to violate God's Christocentrically-revealed
nature and/or
continued presence in their fellowship by
expressing attitudes of
personal favoritism and snobbery. In this sense a
presumption of
familiarity with, if not an intended allusion to,
the historical Jesus may
be justifiably deduced from our author's use of
"the glory." At the very
least the reference to Jesus as "the glory"
would seem to be a reference
to His exalted status at the right hand of God.
We must note, however, that, even in
this latter sense, to confess
His
glory is still, for our author, to refrain from a disdain for the poor.
How
one gets theologically from the confession of glory to the stated
necessity of solidarity with the poor seems at
first psychologically
implausible, but, given the common early Christian
association of glory
with suffering (John 12:23-28; 13:31; 1 Pet 4:12-16;
1 Cor 2:8; 2 Cor
27 Cf. Matt 16:27; 19:28;
Luke 24:26; John 1:14; 2:11; 11:40; 12:23-41; 13:21-32; 17:5,
22,24; Acts 7:55; 22:11; Rom 6:4; 1 Cor
2:8; 2 Cor 3:18; 4:4-6; Eph 1:12, 14, 17; 3:16; Phil
4:19;
14;
5:10; 2 Pet 1:3, 17; Rev 5:12f.; 21:23.
28 Kim, Origin 230f.
29 So NIV, NASB, and Goodspeed. The KJV, RSV,
seem to have opted for a compromise translation,
"the Lord of glory," though even thus
the adjectival sense of th?j
do<chj appears to have predominated.
30 P. J. Townsend,
"Christ, Community and Salvation in the Epistle of James," EvQ
53 (1981) 116.
22
CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL
REVIEW
4:4-18; Heb 2:5-10), certainly not impossible. Thus, the ease of transi-
tion in James from glory to
humility may reflect not only James'
familiarity with the profound theological
juxtaposition of the cross and
resurrection in early Christianity,
but especially the paraenetic import
of that relationship. In this way we see but
another instance of what has
been the pattern throughout this early Christian
document, viz., explicit
exhortation based upon, and itself in turn implying,
a rather traditional,
primitive Christian theology / Christology.
Jewish emphasis upon "the
name" of God is well attested in
ancient sources.31 In the NT it is especially the Jewish
Christian
materials which reflect very great interest in
"the name" as a Christo-
logical designation.32 Just as
references to "the name" had earlier
become a way to refer to God for Jewish piety, so also
the same phrase
became, it seems, a reference in early Jewish
Christianity to Christ
himself. In 2:1, our author exhorts his readers
not to pay special
attention to the wealthy, for they are the ones
who "blaspheme the fair
name" which was invoked “over” the early
Christians. This latter
reference to "the name" which was
pronounced "over" believers may
well be a reference to baptism. Whether it was in
fact the act of
baptism whereupon "the name" was
pronounced over the readers of
James'
epistle, it is nonetheless clear that we are confronted here with a
Christological
reference, for it was no doubt the name of Jesus which
constituted the distinctive identity--the
"call"--of early Christians and
was, in the instances suggested by our author,
"blasphemed" by their
wealthy oppressors. Just as in the OT the Lord
had "called" out for
Himself
a people to be his own chosen people (Deut 28:10), so also
early Christians understood their own self identity
in terms of the
"Lord
Jesus" by whom and through whom they had been called and to
whom they were to give their allegiance. The
reference in 5:14 to a
prayerful anointing "in the name of the
Lord" has been discussed
above, but may be mentioned again here as another
instance of James'
use of "the name" as an unmistakable
Christological reference to Jesus
as the distinctive "Lord" whose "name"
may be invoked over the
members of the fellowship.
Judge and Lawgiver
The titles "Judge" and
"Lawgiver" represent perhaps the most
significant, explicit Christological titles in the
book of James, if signifi-
cance is to be measured in
terms of relatedness to the distinctive
message of a given book. All would agree that
the major themes of this
31 Longenecker,
Christology 41-46.
32
Ibid.
Sloan: THE CHRISTOLOGY OF JAMES 23
epistle are tied up with a series of related
exhortations that enjoin a
certain legitimating response to the divine
oracles. For example, those
who would be "wise" (1:5; 3:13) must be
"doers of the word," who look
“intently
at the perfect law. . . of liberty" (1:22-25) and
thus demon-
strate the saving faith that
"works" and is thereby completed or
"perfected" (2:14-26); or, negatively stated and applied
to a more
specific situation, one who is guilty of
transgressing the "royal law" by
showing "partiality" (2:8-13) and/or
"speaking against a brother" (4:11,
cf.
5:9)--thereby arrogantly assuming a posture that stands "against the
law" (4:11)--will thus, as a
"transgressor" of it (2:11), come under the
judgment of the one true Lawgiver and Judge
(4:11, 12; 5:9). In a work
that for so many scholars apparently defies
structure or outline,33 the
seemingly disparate themes of wealth and social
preference, evil
speech, wisdom, being a doer of the word and having a
faith that works
are all related at a deeper level to an
authoritative entity, or entities,
something variously called "the word of
truth" (1:18), "the word
implanted" (1:21), "the word"
(1:22,23), "the perfect law" (1:25), "the
law of liberty" (1:25; 2:12), "the royal
law" (2:8), "the law" (2:9, 10, 11;
4:11
[three times]) and "the truth" (3:14; 5:19), and to a certain
authoritative person, or persons,
Someone called "Lawgiver" (4:12;
cf.
2:11), "Judge" (4:12; 5:9), "the Lord of Sabaoth"
(5:4) and "the
Lord"
(5:7, 8; cf. also 5:10, 11).
We will seek to identify the
"something" and "Someone" mentioned
above by beginning with the latter issue at the point
in the text (5:7-11)
where identification seems easiest and then
proceeding backwards to
the next obviously related (but more difficult to
identify) "Someone"
and "something" of 4:11, 12 and then to
the also closely related
"something" of 2:8-13 and 1:18-25.
The context of 5:1-6 is clearly
eschatological. The wicked rich will
answer to the Lord Sabaoth,
a divine name implying wrath,34 in the
Last
Days (5:3f.). The oppressed "brethren" are then exhorted (5:7-11)
to "be patient. . . until the coming of the
lord. . . , for the coming of
the Lord is at hand. . . behold, the Judge is
standing right at the door."
The
references to the parousi<a of the Lord in 5:7, 8
are difficult to
understand except in the common and virtually
technical sense given
the phrase in Christian tradition as a reference to
the coming of Christ,
though it must be remembered that the Christophanic language and
expectations of the NT, are, in a
certain sense, only a special case of the
33 So M. Dibelius and Ho Greeven, James (Hermeneia;
1976), cited by Davids,
James 23.
34 Cf. Isa 5:9; sabaw<q is used 61 times in
Isaiah compared to 9 other instances in the
rest of the LXX (Davids, James 178).
24 CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL REVIEW
theophanic hopes of OT religion.
By the same token, however, the
largely theocentric
language of James cannot be divorced from the
author's (at least implicit) Christology, in
which case every theocentric
expression may be Christological. However that may
be, the rather
obviously Christological references in 5:7, 8 to
the imminent coming of
the Lord mandate a similarly Christological
exegesis of the parallel
phrase in 5:9 regarding "the Judge" who is
standing right at the door"
(see Matt 24:33; cf. Rev 3:20). It is the Lord Christ who
comes (soon) to
judge.
Though most would regard the
reference to "Lawgiver and Judge"
in 4:12 as strictly a reference to God--given in
addition the likely
allusion in 5:12b to the saying of Jesus (Matt
10:28) about fearing Him
who can destroy both body and soul in Gehenna--it is certainly possible
that the reference in 4:12 to "Judge" must
be read in the light of 5:9 as
Christological. Certainly Christ the
Judge is a common early Christian
motif and it should not surprise us if theocentric language is used to
express it here, as is commonly the case
elsewhere in NT tradition
(cf.
Rev 6). In that case it is Christ the "Lawgiver" whose law is both
contravened and slandered by the act of judging the
brother--a rather
obvious possibility given the allusion here to
the dominical injunction
in the Sermon on the Mount against
"judging" (Matt 7:1). Using this
identification (i.e., a Christological
one) of the "Lawgiver and Judge,"
we will suggest as a working hypothesis that the
"law" in question here
is the Torah of Jesus (apparently largely embodied
for James in the
Sermon on the Mount traditions). If we are right, it
must be seen that
"the law" is thus more than the Mosaic Law, it is the
law of
given and (re-) interpreted by Jesus the great
Lawgiver, and as such it
has a strong (though we will not say exclusively)
"sayings" (of Jesus)
component to it.
Continuing to work backwards, we see
that the similar passage in
2:8-13
(where again there is an allusion in 2:13 to the dominical saying
of Matt 7:l1), regarding the "judging"
of the poor man, means the
guilty party is, again, a transgressor of "the
law" (2:9; cf. 2:10, 11). Here
it must be noted that "the law" is also
variously called "the royal law"
(2:8)
and "the law of liberty" (2:12; cf. 1:25). Once again it seems more
than plausible to assume that the “law in question
here--which is
transgressed by the act of showing
"partiality" (2:9), and/or the equiva-
lent sin of showing "no mercy" (2:13)--is
also the saying of Jesus (Matt
7:1f.) against "judging." The further allusion
here to the Matt 7:2
tradition (in 2:13), where both passages suggest
that the injunction
against judging will be eschatologically
enforced by a final judgment
that corresponds to the mercy, or lack thereof,
shown in this age,
confirms the connection between the references to
"the law" in 4:11, 12
and those of 2:8-13.
Sloan: THE CHRISTOLOGY
OF JAMES 25
In 2:8-13, however, a further point
is made (regarding the holistic
nature of the "law") that adds to our
hypothesis that the "law" in James
is not merely OT law but is in fact the "new
law," i.e., the Torah of
Jesus.
When arguing that the same Lawgiver (“He who said”) who
forbade adultery also prohibited murder, the
author's point is that to
violate either ordinance is to sin against “Him.”
Patently of course the
One
who forbade such acts was God, the Giver of the Ten Command-
ments. But we should not fail
to note that it was precisely these two of
the Ten Commandments (though in the reverse order
in James) that
received homiletic treatment in the Sermon on the
Mount traditions of
Matt
5:21-32. This fact lends support to the notion that James' refer-
ences to the "the
law" are not to the Mosaic Law simpliciter, but to the
Law
as interpreted and transmitted for Christian tradition by the New
Moses Himself. Of course, this
"law" is not, precisely stated, a specific
commandment, but the entire obligation (as
interpreted by Christ) of
the elect before God. To break, however, a specific
law (or any specific
law), is to be a transgressor of "the
law," holistically conceived.
The "royal law" of 2:8 is
likewise not to be understood as a single
commandment--in this case the injunction, "You
shall love your neigh-
bor as yourself," Lev
19:18--but as a larger, more comprehensive
entity which is of course consistent with and/or
expressed by the
particular commandment of Lev 19:18, a favorite of
Jesus as a summary
expression of His teachings vis-a-vis the laws of God (Matt
5:43-48;
Mark 12:31; cf. Rom 13:9; Gal 5:14). This fact further
reinforces the
already apparent relationship of synonymity between the three in-
stances of "the law" in 2:9-11 and
"the royal law" of 2:8 (it may also be
noted that the same status of equivalence exists for
the contextually
parallel phrase, "the law of liberty"
in 2:12). Finally, when we consider
the very strong possibility (as suggested by many35)
that "the royal
law" is in fact a reference to "the law
of the king" (where Christ is the
royal personage in question), we have another
significant clue that
suggests the Torah of Jesus--i.e., His preaching
and teaching under-
stood as the inspired interpretation of the Mosaic
Law--as “the law"
for James. It is the “instruction” of Jesus that is
divinely authoritative
and thus may not be ignored with impunity. It is
Christ's law which in
J
19:18
to love one’s neighbor and therefore precludes “judging” one's
35 B. Reicke,
The Epistles of James, Peter, and Jude:
Introduction, Translation, and
Notes (AB; Garden City, NY:
Doubleday, 1964) 29; J. B; Adamson, The Epistle of James
(NICNT;
Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1976) 115; H. Jochums, "Der Herr cler Herrlichkeit,"
in Christuszeugnis im Nebel des Zeitgeistes:
Niciinisches Christusbekenntnis
heute
Walter Kilnneth zu Ehren (ed. U. Asendorf and Friedrich-Wilhelm Kiinneth;
Neuhausen/
26
CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL
REVIEW
fellow (2:4, 4:11, 5:9) through the merciless acts of
partiality (2:9, 13)
and harsh criticism (4:11,5:9). God through Christ
is the great and final
Lawgiver
and Judge (2:11, 4:12, 5:9).
Thus far we have argued that
"the law" in James is the Torah of
Jesus, i.e., the law of God (the Mosaic Law) as
taught by Christ.
But
we hinted earlier that this Torah of Jesus was not
necessarily exclusively
comprised of sayings traditions from Jesus. The
last passage that we
will consider in this connection, 1:18-25, forces us
to consider the
possibility that the "life of Jesus"
traditions, i.e., the events of His
Christological
experience, are also essential to what we are calling the
"Torah
of Jesus" in James.36
We have already seen that James is not
unfamiliar with the
historical/event traditions regarding Jesus. This
fact is again confirmed
when we examine the tradition critical background of
the various
references to "the word" in 1:18-23. The
reference in 1:18 to "the word
of truth" takes over, as noted earlier, a
rather traditional early Christian
expression for the gospel (2 Cor
6:7;
We
may also recall 1 Pet 1:22-25 where-though the exact expression
"word of truth" is not found-there is a reference-citing
Isa 40:6, 7
which is also alluded to in Jas 1:10, 11--to the
faithful "word of God,"
which is called both "the truth" and the
"imperishable seed" that
produces "rebirth" and is "the
word which was preached to you", i.e.,
the gospel. The ad
sensum parallel to this Petrine
passage in Jas 1:18,
where the faithful Father has "brought us forth
by the word of truth,"
seems clear. The "word of truth" in Jas
1:18 is thus almost certainly
something akin to the traditional gospel of early
Christianity. Then, in
1:21,
the "word of truth" from 1:18 has become "the word implanted
(to>n
e@mfuton lo<gon), which is able to save
your souls," a notion again
not unlike the reference in 1 Peter to the gospel
as the "imperishable
seed" (spora?j
. . . a]fqa<rtou, 1:23) which, in yet
another Petrine con-
36 Certainly OT Torah is
not limited to oracular (divine commandment) materials,
but is also based upon historical/narrative
traditions. With similar effect, our expression
"the Torah of Jesus," has the dual meaning suggested by
the twin life settings of Jesus
and the church. That is, by "the Torah of
Jesus," we are deliberately playing upon the
ambiguity of the English "of" so as to
refer both to the teachings derived from Jesus and
the apostolic theological traditions about Jesus,
particularly the apostolic reflections upon
not only his words, but his life, especially the
significance of the cross and resurrection
events (cf. Eph 2:20; 3:4, 5, 9). In so doing we are,
at worst, repeating the ambiguity of
NT
expression wherein it is sometimes extremely difficult to determine whether the
author intends to refer to historical sayings of Jesus
(Jesus tradition) or to early Christian
reflections (Spirit-inspired apostolic traditions)
upon the Christ event (see 1 Cor 7:25;
14:37;
illustrating the inextricable link
between the history of Jesus (including his words) and
the inspired apostolic reflection upon that
history. In no case do I suspect that the early
church created sayings of Jesus de novo with utterly
no regard for the history of Jesus.
Sloan: THE CHRISTOLOGY
OF JAMES 27
text, can similary produce
"the salvation of your souls" (1:9). It seems
clear then that our author is referring, in these
"word" phrases of 1:18-
23,
to the rather traditional kerygma of early
Christianity, i.e., the
message of the cross and resurrection.
Next, it must be noted that the
"word" language of 1:18-23 easily,
indeed, naturally, coalesces into the "law"
terminology of 1:25 (and
beyond, i.e., 2:8-13; 4:11, 12; 5:7-11), suggesting
thereby the synony-
mous relationship of those
two terminological constellations. The fact
that "doers of the word" (poihtai> lo<gou,
1:22) are likened to the man
who "looks intently (o!
. . . paraku<yaj) at the perfect law,
the law of
liberty" (ei]j
no<mon te<leion to>n th?j e]leuqeri<aj), and is thus a
"working
doer" (poihth<j
e@rgou, 1:25), likewise argues for the synonymous con-
nection for our author between
the "word" of 1:18-23 and the "law" of
1:25.
Finally, the parallel references in 1:25 and 2:12 to
the "law of
liberty" link the various--but
equivalent--"word" and "law" references
of 1:18-25 to the several "law"
references of 2:8-13; 4:11, 12 and 5:7-11
in such a way that the contextually given
expressions not only greatly
overlap, but, in fact, appear virtually
synonymous. Thus, in light of the
referential identity of the "word" phrases
of 1:18-23 and the "law"
expressions of 1:25 (both of which, then, are to be
related to the "law"
passages of 2:8-13; 4:11, 12 and 5:7-11), we may
not assume that
references to "law" in James, i.e., what
we have called the "Torah of
Jesus,"
lack any reference to the cross and resurrection, i.e., an "event"
gospel; nor, on the other hand, that the preached "word.
. . which is
able to save your souls" lacks didactic demand,
i.e., the implications of
the teachings of Jesus.
While our passage (1:18-25) seems,
therefore, to begin (1:18-23)
with rather traditional references to the preached
word of the gospel
(or an "event" oriented message) and to end (1:24,
25) with certain
didactic references to "law" (a body of
teaching material), such a shift
is more apparent than real. While a shift of some
sort undoubtedly does
take place between 1:18-21 and 1:22-25, it is not a
shift from gospel to
law, nor even from gospel (the saving events) to
Christian law (the
teachings of Jesus). For our author
"word" and "law" are synonymous
and both suggest the saving acts and words of God
through the person
of Jesus Christ. Thus, the shift in our passage
relates not to the
authoritative norm (i.e., whether
"word" or "law") to which response
must be given, but to the nature of the response
itself. That is, whereas
in 1:21 the "implanted word" (or
"the word of truth" from 1:18) must
be “received in humility" (e]n
p[rau<thti de<casqe),
in 1:22 the language of
response becomes more obviously active, more
apparently volitional,
for the readers must be “doers of the word” and not
merely “self-
deluding hearers.” The self-deluding hearer is
like the forgetful man
who has "looked" (kateno<hsen)
at himself in a mirror but quickly
28
CRISWELL THEOLOGICAL
REVIEW
forgets his reflection upon departing. But the
effective doer is one who
"looks intently" at "the perfect law, the law of
liberty," "abides"
(o[ paramei<naj)
by it and thus will receive the eschatological beatitude
of God (maka<rioj . . . e@stai). To what degree the
mirror illustration
may be pressed so that "the word" and the
man's image and/or the
mirror may be correlated is open to discussion. But
what seems clear in
spite of that issue is that "the word" of
1:22, 23--itself an obvious
shortening of "the word of truth" and
"the implanted word" of 1:18 and
1:21,
respectively--has become "the perfect law, the law of liberty" of
1:25.
Thus, our passage does not shift its argument from "word" (or
"gospel") to "law," nor even from
"getting in" to "staying in." Rather, it
moves more along the lines of
"proclamation" and "legitimation."
Syntactically and contextually the
shift in meaning has rather
clearly occurred with 1:22 (Gi<nesqe
de>),
but, again, it does not cor-
respond to the shift in terms from
"word" to "law," for the "word"
complex of phrases is still being used in 1:22,
23 and the "law" complex
does not begin until 1:25 (from which point it
dominates the remainder
of James except for two isolated references to
"the truth"-terminology
which falls nearer the "word" orbit of
concepts (cf. again 1:18)-in 3:14
and 5:19. Thus, the terminological clues for the
shift, expressed in terms
of response, from saving mercy (proclaimed) to
authentic salvation
(received) are to be found elsewhere. The theological shift
is signalled
terminologically with the introduction
of the catchwords for "doers"
(poi<htai) and
"hearers" (a]kroatai<). It is in fact this
very pair of related
terms in Matt 7:24-27 that introduces the decisive
criterion in the
conclusion to the Great Sermon traditions in
Matthew whereby the
"wise man" is distinguished from the "foolish
man" who "hears" the
words of Jesus but does not "do" them, and
thus comes to eschatological
ruin. The source of both James' terminology and
legitimating37 criterion
seems clear. But if this connection between the
"hearing" and "doing"
of Jas 1:22-25 and Matt 7:24-27 is correct, then
we must also notice the,
parallel use of the term "word" (1:18, 21-23;
Matt 7:24, 26). Thus, it also;
seems clear, once again--from the same source
analysis-that what
James
means by "word" (1:18, 21-23) cannot be separated, even
temporarily, from the "words" of Jesus.
Thus, we are faced with a complex of
terms which suggests a rich
variety of emphases. What James means by
"the word of truth," or,
"the word implanted," is certainly, if our earlier
tradition analysis is
correct, something very much akin to the
apostolic "gospel." But that
37 That the issue in
1:22-25 is '"legitimation" seems clear from
such expresssions as
"prove yourselves" (Gi<nesqe)
and "delude themselves" (paralogizo<menoi e[autou<j, v.22).
Indeed,
"legitimation" could well be a decisive
issue throughout the book. Cf. 1:26, 27;
2:14-26;
3:13.
Sloan: THE CHRISTOLOGY
OF JAMES 29
divine word of salvation is itself likewise
inextricably linked to a body
of authoritative teachings which itself both
proclaims a new order of
life and enjoins an authentic, legitimating response
of obedience. In
this way the "word" and "law" of
James may be very similar to the
conception of the
in the synoptic (largely Matthean)
traditions. For both James and the
synoptics the proclamation is
both gift and demand. It is the gracious
announcement of God's salvation, a
salvation that is embodied in the
life and teachings of Jesus and received by
authentic response.
What seems to have found here its
final affirmation in our overall
discussion is the fact that the authoritative
"something"--i.e., the
"word," the "law," the "royal law"
and the "law of liberty"--to which
an obedient response must be made--the response of
an "effective
doer" (poihth>j
e@rgou, 1:25) or of "faith working with
works" (h[ pi<stij;
sunh<grei
toi?j e@rgoij, 2:22)--is nothing less
than the Torah of Jesus: the
announcement of God's merciful
salvation through the appearance of
Him
whose gracious words and deeds constitute both the promise and
demand of salvation.
IV.
Conclusion
Perhaps we may conclude these
sections on the Christology of
James
by suggesting that our author's work is more apparently theo-
centric than Christocentric,
but that such a distinction, if rigorously
maintained, fails to do justice to the pervasive
substratum of Chris-
tology38 in the book. While much
of the NT could be said to contain a
Christocentric theology, James has
what we would call (more after the
synoptic pattern?) a theocentric Christology. At any rate, all attempts
to divorce theology from Christology will founder
against this book,
for it is God through Christ whose law must be
heard and obeyed.
Glearly a Christian work, this example of early
Christian literature--a
piece of prophetic wisdom in epistolary form--reflects
an author who
thoroughly familiar with certain important life of
Jesus traditions,
sayings of Jesus traditions, and the apostolic
tradition of primitive
Christianity. This author, who calls
himself "James, a bond-servant of
God
and of the Lord Jesus Christ," is intent upon calling forth from his
readers a life of true wisdom, a life that hears
the word of God through
the person of Jesus Christ and responds with a
legitimating obedience
of humility and faith.
38 Regarding the implicit
and/or latent Christology of James, see F. Mussner,
“’Direkte' und 'indirekte' Christologie im Jakobusbrief," Catholica 24 (1970) 111-17; and
R.
Obermuller, "Hermeneutische
Themen im Jakobusbrief," Bib
53 (1942) 234-44.
This material is cited with gracious
permission from:
The
www.criswell.edu
Please report any errors to Ted
Hildebrandt at:
thildebrandt@gordon.edu