_THE AUTHENTICITY OF THE EPISTLE OF ST. JAMES._
"James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus
Christ."--JAS. i. 1.
The question of the authenticity of this Epistle resolves itself into
two parts--Is the Epistle the genuine product of a writer of the
Apostolic age? if so, which of the persons of the Apostolic age who
bore the name of James is the author of it? In answering the former of
these two questions it is important to put it in the proper way. We
have done a good deal towards the solution of a problem when we have
learned to state it correctly; and the way in which we ought to
approach the problem of the genuineness of this and other books of the
New Testament is not, Why should we believe that these writings are
what they profess to be? but, Why should we _refuse_ to believe this?
Have we any sufficient reason for reversing the decision of the fourth
and fifth centuries, which possessed far more evidence on the question
than has come down to us?
It must be remembered that that decision was not given mechanically or
without consideration of doubts and difficulties; nor was it imposed
by authority, until independent Churches and scholars had arrived at
pretty much the same conclusion. And the decision, as soon as it was
pronounced, was unanimously accepted in both East and West--a fact
which was ample guarantee that the decision was universally recognized
as correct; for there was no central authority of sufficient influence
to force a suspected decision upon mistrustful Churches. Eusebius, it
is true, classes most of the Catholic Epistles among the "disputed"
(ἀντιλεγόμενα) books of the New Testament, without, however,
affirming that he shared the doubts which existed in some quarters
respecting them. This fact, which is sometimes rather hastily taken as
telling altogether against the writings which he marks as "disputed,"
really tells _both_ ways. On the one hand, it shows that doubts had
existed respecting some of the canonical books; and these doubts must
have had some reason (whether valid or not) for existing. On the other
hand, the fact that the authority of these books was sometimes
disputed in the third century shows that the verdict formally given
and ratified at the Council of Laodicea (_c._ 364)[8] was given after
due examination of the adverse evidence, and with a conviction that
the doubts which had been raised were not justified; and the universal
welcome which was accorded to the verdict throughout Christendom shows
that the doubts which had been raised had ceased to exist. If, then,
on the one hand we remember that misgivings once existed, and argue
that these misgivings must have had some basis, on the other we must
remember that these misgivings were entirely abandoned, and that there
must have been reason for abandoning them. What reason, then, have we
for disturbing the verdict of the fourth century, and reviving
misgivings long ago put to rest?
Of course those who gave that verdict and those who ratified it were
fallible persons, and no member of the English Church, at any rate,
would argue that the question is closed and may not be reopened. But
the point to be insisted upon is that the _onus probandi_ rests with
those who assail or suspect these books, rather than with those who
accept them. It is not the books that ought, on demand, again and
again to be placed on their trial, but the pleas of those who would
once more bring them into court that ought to be sifted. These
objectors deserve a hearing; but while they receive it, we have full
right to stand by the decision of the fourth century, and refuse to
part with, or even seriously to suspect, any of the precious
inheritance which has been handed down to us. It may be confidently
asserted that thus far no strong case has been made out against any of
the five "disputed" Epistles, excepting 2 Peter; and with regard to
that it is still true to affirm that the Petrine authorship remains,
on the whole, a reasonable "working hypothesis."
Do not let us forget what the epithet "disputed," applied to these and
one or two[9] other books of the New Testament, really means. It does
_not_ mean that at the beginning of the fourth century Eusebius found
that these writings were _universally regarded with suspicion; that is
a gross exaggeration of the import of the term_. Rather it means that
these books were _not universally accepted_; that although they were,
as a rule, regarded as canonical, and as part of the contents of the
New Testament (ἐνδιάθηκοι γραφαί), yet in some quarters their
authority was doubted or denied. And the reasons for these doubts were
naturally not in all cases the same. With regard to 2 Peter, the doubt
must have been as to its genuineness and authenticity. It claimed to
be written by "Simon Peter, an Apostle of Jesus Christ" and a witness
of the Transfiguration (2 Peter i. 1, 18); but the obscurity of its
origin and other circumstances were against it. With regard to James,
Jude, and 2 and 3 John the doubt was rather as to their Apostolicity.
They did not claim to be written by Apostles. There was no reason for
doubting the antiquity or the genuineness of these four books; but
granting that they were written by the persons whose name they bore,
were these persons Apostles? And if they were not, what was the
authority of their writings? The doubts with regard to the Revelation
and to the Epistle to the Hebrews were in part of the same character.
Were they in the full sense of the term Apostolic, as having been
written by Apostles, or at least under the guidance of Apostles?
Eusebius says expressly that all these "disputed" books were
"nevertheless _well known to most_ people."[10]
And it is manifest that the doubts which Eusebius records were ceasing
to exist. Only in some cases does he indicate, and that without open
statement, that he himself was at all inclined to sympathize with
them. And Athanasius, writing a very short time afterwards (A.D. 326),
makes no distinction between acknowledged and disputed books, but
places all seven of the Catholic Epistles, as of equal authority,
immediately after the Acts of the Apostles.[11] Cyril of Jerusalem, in
his Catechetical Lectures, written before his episcopate, _c._
A.D. 349, does the same (_Lect._ IV. x. 36). Some fifteen years later
we have the Council of Laodicea, and near the end of the century the
Council of Hippo, and the third Council of Carthage, giving formal
ratification to these generally received views; after which all
questioning for many centuries ceased. So that while the
classification into "acknowledged" and "disputed" writings proves that
each book was carefully scrutinized, and in various quarters
independently, before it was admitted to the canon, the cessation of
this distinction proves that the result of all this scrutiny was that
the sporadic doubts and hesitations respecting certain of the books of
the New Testament were finally put to rest.
And it must not be supposed that the process was one of general
amnesty. While some books that had here and there been excluded were
finally accepted, some that had here and there been included in the
canon, such as the Epistles of Clement and of Barnabas and the
Shepherd of Hermas, were finally rejected. The charge of uncritical or
indiscriminate admission cannot be substantiated. The facts are quite
the other way.
When we confine our attention to the Epistle of James in particular,
we find that if the doubts which were here and there felt respecting
it in the third century are intelligible, the universal acceptance
which it met with in the fourth and following centuries is well
founded. The doubts were provoked by two facts--(1) the Epistle had
remained for some time unknown to a good many Churches; (2) when it
became generally known it remained uncertain what the authority of the
writer was, especially whether he was an Apostle or not. It is
possible also that these misgivings were in some cases emphasized by
the further fact that there is a marked absence of doctrinal teaching.
In this Epistle the articles of the Christian faith are scarcely
touched upon at all. Whether the apparent inconsistency with the
teaching of St. Paul respecting the relation between faith and works,
of which so much has been made since Luther's time, was discovered or
not by those who were inclined to dispute the authority of this
Epistle, may be doubted. But of course, if any inconsistency _was_
believed to exist, that also would tell against the general reception
of the letter as canonical.
That the Epistle should at first remain very little known, especially
in the West and among the Gentile congregations, is exactly what we
should expect from the character of the letter and the circumstances
of its publication. It is addressed by a Jew to Jews, by one who never
moved from the Church over which he presided at Jerusalem to those
humble and obscure Christians outside Palestine who, by their
conscientious retention of the Law side by side with the Gospel, cut
themselves off more and more from free intercourse with other
Christians, whether Gentile converts or more liberally-minded Jews. A
letter which in the first instance was to be read in Christian
_synagogues_ (James ii. 2) might easily remain a long time without
becoming known to Churches which from the outset had adopted the
principles laid down in St. Paul's Epistle to the Galatians. The
constant journeys of the Apostle of the Gentiles caused his letters to
become well known throughout the Churches at a very early date. But
the first Bishop of the Mother Church of Jerusalem had no such
advantages. Great as was his influence in his own sphere, with a rank
equal to that of an Apostle, yet he was not well known outside that
sphere, and he himself seems never to have travelled beyond it, or
even to have left the centre of it. With outsiders, who simply knew
that he was not one of the Twelve, his influence would not be great;
and a letter emanating from him, even if known to exist, would not be
eagerly inquired after or carefully circulated. Gentile prejudice
against Jewish Christians would still further contribute to keep in
the background a letter which was specially addressed to Jewish
Christians, and was also itself distinctly Jewish in tone. Nor would
the exclusive class of believers to whom the letter was sent care to
make it known to those Christians from whom they habitually kept
aloof. Thus the prejudices of both sides contributed to prevent the
Epistle from circulating outside the somewhat narrow circle to which
it was in the first instance addressed; and there is therefore nothing
surprising in its being unknown to Irenæus, Hippolytus, Tertullian,
Cyprian, and the author of the Muratorian Canon. There is no sign that
these writers _rejected_ it; they had never heard of it.[12]
And yet the Epistle did become known at a very early date, at any rate
to some outsiders, even in the West. It was almost certainly known to
Clement of Rome, whose Epistle to the Church of Corinth (written _c._
A.D. 97) contains several passages, which seem to be reminiscences of
St. James. And although not one of them can be relied upon as proving
that Clement knew our Epistle, yet when they are all put together they
make a cumulative argument of very great strength.[13] So cautious and
critical a writer as Bishop Lightfoot does not hesitate to assert, in
a note on Clement, chap. xii., "The instance of Rahab was doubtless
suggested by Heb. xi. 31; James ii. 25; for _both these Epistles were
known to St. Clement, and are quoted elsewhere_." And the Epistle of
St. James was certainly known to Hermas, a younger contemporary of
Clement, and author of the _Shepherd_, which was written in the first
half, and possibly in the first quarter, of the second century.[14]
Origen, in the works of which we have the Greek original, quotes it
once as "the Epistle current as that of James" (τῇ φερομένῃ Ἰακώβου
ἐπιστολῇ--_In Johan._ xix. 6), and once (_In Psal._ xxx.) without any
expression of doubt; and in the inaccurate Latin translations of
others of his works there are several distinct quotations from the
Epistle. So that it would seem to have reached Alexandria just as
Clement, Origen's instructor and predecessor, left the city during the
persecution under Septimius Severus (_c._ A.D. 202).[15]
But the conclusive fact in the external evidence respecting the
Epistle is that it is contained in the Peshitto. This ancient Syriac
Version was made in the second century, in the country in which the
letter of James would be best known; and although the framers of this
translation omitted 2 Peter, 2 and 3 John, and Jude, they admitted
James without scruple. Thus the earliest evidence for this Epistle, as
for that to the Hebrews, is chiefly Eastern; while that for Jude, as
for 2 and 3 John, is chiefly Western.
And the evidence of the Peshitto is not weakened by the fact, if it be
a fact, that there was a still earlier Syrian canon which contained
none of the Catholic Epistles. There is no certain allusion to them or
quotation from them in the Homilies of Aphrahat or Aphraates (_c._
A.D. 335); and in the "Doctrine of Addai" (A.D. 250-300) the clergy of
Edessa are directed to read the Law and the Prophets, the Gospel,
St. Paul's Epistles, and the Acts, no other canonical book being
mentioned. In all Churches the number of Christian writings read
publicly in the liturgy was at first small, and in no case were the
Catholic Epistles the first to be used for this purpose.
The internal evidence, as we shall see when we come to examine it more
closely, is even more strong than the external. The character of the
letter exactly harmonizes with the character of James the first Bishop
of Jerusalem, and with the known circumstances of those to whom the
letter is addressed, and this in a way that no literary forger of that
age could have reached. And there is no sufficient motive for a
forgery, for the letter is singularly wanting in doctrinal statements.
The supposed opposition to St. Paul will not hold; a writer who wished
to oppose St. Paul would have made his opposition much more clear. And
a forger who wished to get the authority of St. James wherewith to
counteract St. Paul's teaching would have made us aware that it was
either an Apostle, the son of Zebedee or the son of Alphæus, or else
the brother of the Lord, who was addressing us, and would not have
left it open for us to suppose that the Epistle was from the pen of
some unknown James, who had no authority at all equal to that of
St. Paul. And let any one compare this Epistle with those of Clement
of Rome, and of Barnabas, and of Ignatius, and mark its enormous
superiority. If it were the work of a forger, what a perplexing fact
this superiority would be! If it be the work either of an Apostle or
of one who had Apostolic rank, everything is explained.
Luther's famous criticism on the Epistle, that it is "a veritable
Epistle of straw," is amazing, and is to be explained by the fact that
it contradicts his caricature of St. Paul's doctrine of justification
by faith. There is no opposition between St. James and St. Paul, and
there is sometimes no real opposition between St. James and Luther
(see p. 147). And when Luther gives as his opinion that our Epistle
was "not the writing of any Apostle" we can agree with him, though not
in the sense in which he means it; for he starts from the erroneous
supposition that the letter bears the name of the son of Zebedee. We
must also bear in mind his own explanation of what is Apostolic and
what is not. It has a purely subjective meaning. It does not mean what
was written or not written by an Apostle or the equal of an Apostle.
"Apostolic" means that which, in Luther's opinion, an Apostle _ought_
to teach, and all that fails to satisfy this condition is not
Apostolic. "Therein all true holy books agree, that they preach and
urge Christ. That too is the right touchstone whereby to test all
books--whether they urge Christ or not; for all Scripture testifies of
Christ (Rom. iii. 21).... That which does not teach Christ is still
short of Apostolic, even if it were the teaching of St. Peter or
St. Paul. Again, that which preaches Christ, that were Apostolic, even
if Judas, Annas, Pilate, and Herod preached it." The Lutheran Church
has not followed him in this principle, which places the authority of
any book of Scripture at the mercy of the likes and dislikes of the
individual reader; and it has restored the Epistles to the Hebrews and
of James and Jude to their proper places in the New Testament, instead
of leaving them in the kind of appendix to which Luther had banished
them and the Revelation. Moreover, the passage containing the
statement about the "veritable Epistle of straw"[16] is now omitted
from the preface to his translation. And with regard to this very
point, his former friend and later opponent Andrew Rudolph Bodenstein,
of Karlstadt, pertinently asked, "If you allow the Jews to stamp books
with authority by receiving them, why do you refuse to grant as much
power to the Churches of Christ, since the Church is not less than the
Synagogue?" We have at least as much reason to trust the Councils of
Laodicea, Hippo, and Carthage, which formally defined the limits of
the New Testament, as we have to trust the unknown Jewish influences
which fixed those of the Old. And when we examine for ourselves the
evidence which is still extant, and which has greatly diminished in
the course of fifteen hundred years, we feel that both on external and
internal grounds the decision of the fourth century respecting the
genuineness of the Epistle of St. James, as a veritable product of the
Apostolic age and as worthy of a place in the canon of the New
Testament, is fully justified.
[8] The date so frequently given, A.D. 363, cannot be substantiated,
and on the whole is not probable. See Hefele, _History of the Church
Councils_, II. vi. 93.
[9] The Epistle to the Hebrews and the Apocalypse.
[10] γνωρίμων δ' οὖν ὅμως τοῖς πολλοῖς (_H. E._ III. xxv. 3), where
γνώριμος, as usual, indicates _familiar_ knowledge. Eusebius is a
desultory writer, and one has to gather his views from statements
scattered over chaps. iii., xxiv., and xxv., some of which are not
very precise. The following table seems to represent his opinion:--
{ Four Gospels, Acts,
{ fourteen Epistles
{ _Universally acknowledged_ { of Paul (Hebrews ?),
{ (τὰ ὁμολογούμενα) { 1 John, 1 Peter,
CANONICAL BOOKS { { Apocalypse (?).
(ἐνδιάθηκοι {
γραφαί) { { _As to authenticity_--2 Peter.
{ _Disputed_ {
{ (τὰ ἀντιλεγόμενα) { _As to Apostolicity_--James,
{ Jude, 2 and 3 John.
{ _As to authenticity_--Acts of Paul,
{ Shepherd, Apocalypse of Peter.
{ _Orthodox_, but {
{ of no authority, { _As to Apostolicity_--Epistle of
{ because _defective_ { Barnabas, Doctrines of the
{ { Apostles, Gospel according to
UNCANONICAL { { Hebrews, Apocalypse (?).
{
{ _Heretical_ { Gospels of Peter, Thomas, Matthias,
{ Acts of Andrew, John, etc., etc.
[11] _Epist. Fest._ xxxix. The passage is given in full by Westcott
_On the Canon_, Appendix D., xiv. The _Ecclesiastical History_ of
Eusebius cannot have been completed later than A.D. 325, but the
earlier books were probably written about A.D. 313, soon after the
Edict of Milan. See Bishop Lightfoot, _Dict. of Chris. Biog._, I., p.
322.
[12] Harnack, _Das Neue Testament um das Jahr_ 200 (Freiburg I. B.,
1889), p. 79.
[13]
Compare Clement x. 1 with James ii. 23.
" " xi. 2 " " i. 8; iv. 8.
" " xii. 1 " " ii. 25.
" " xvii. 6 " " iv. 14.
" " xxx. 2 " " iv. 6.
" " xxxi. 2 " " ii. 21.
" " xlvi. 5 " " iv. 1.
" " xlix. 5 " " x. 20.
[14] Salmon, _Introduction to the N.T._, pp. 52, 582-91, 4th Ed.
(Murray, 1889); Zahn, _Geschichte des Neutestamentlichen Kanons_
(Erlangen, 1889), p. 962.
[15] If Zahn is right in thinking that Clement knew, and perhaps
commented on, the Epistle of James, it may have become known in
Alexandria somewhat earlier. A few passages in Clement have possible
reminiscences of James; _e.g._ in _Strom._ II. v. he says of Abraham
that he is found to have been expressly called the "friend" of God
(James ii. 23); and in _Strom._ VI. xviii., in connexion with loving
one's neighbour (the βασιλικὸς νόμος of James ii. 8), he speaks of
being βασιλικοί (Zahn, _Geschichte des Neutestamentlichen Kanons_,
I., pp. 322, 323--Erlangen, 1888). The _Hypotyposeis_, in which
Clement perhaps treated of the Catholic Epistles, were written after
he left Alexandria (_Ibid._, p. 29).
[16] Or, more literally, "a right strawy Epistle"--"eine rechte
strohern Epistel.... Denn sie doch keine evangelische Art an sich hat"
(_Luther's Werke_, ed. Gustav Pfizer, Frankfurt, 1840, p. 1412; see
also pp. 1423, 1424, and Westcott _On the Canon_, 3rd ed., pp. 448-54).