This depends on the date of the epistle. (For the discussion of this
question, see chapter I.) It is here assumed that James wrote before the
Jerusalem Conference, before A.D. 50.
Paul wrote Galatians and Romans, as well as 1 and 2 Corinthians, in the
heat of the Judaizing controversy, to answer the contention that
circumcision was essential to the salvation of the Gentiles, that
Christianity alone was not sufficient but must be supplemented by
Judaism. No issue ever stirred Paul’s nature like this. It is possible
that Paul may have had in mind a misuse of James 2:14-26 by the
Judaizers when he wrote, knowing that James in reality agreed with him
in the matter (Acts 15:14-21; Gal. 2:1-10). But James clearly is not
attacking Paul or Paul’s theory of grace. He rather has in view a
perversion of the Christian emphasis on the spiritual side as opposed to
the ceremonial ritualism of the Pharisees.
The pendulum swings from one extreme to the other. The Jews had laid too
much emphasis on religious duties (cf. James 1:26), and some of the
Christians went to the extreme of thinking that no works at all were
needed in the Christian life. Some of the Jews, on the other hand, had
already gone so far as to consider creed alone essential. “As soon as a
man has mastered the thirteen heads of the faith, firmly believing
therein ... though he may have sinned in every possible way ... still he
inherits eternal life.”[70] This Jewish unconcern for real piety in life
is reflected in the lives of some of the Jewish Christians and is the
occasion of the remarks of James.
James’s use of righteousness or justification is in the sense of actual
goodness as Jesus uses it in the Sermon on the Mount (Matt. 6:1) and of
sanctification as Paul has it in Romans 6 to 8. It is not the “imputed
righteousness” of Paul in Romans 3 and 4. James has a practical purpose,
not a theological one. He is not discussing the question as to how
Abraham was set right with God, how faith was reckoned as righteousness,
the point seized on by Paul in the verse. James quotes the whole verse
(Gen. 15:6), as Paul does, but he is concerned with it as proof that
when put to the test, Abraham lived up to his faith in that he actually
“offered up Isaac his son upon the altar” (James 2:21). It is the deed
as proof of faith that James emphasizes, though both points are in the
narrative.
James looks upon works as proof of faith, not as means of salvation.
John the Baptist had demanded “fruits worthy of repentance” (Luke 3:8).
Jesus had said, “By their fruits ye shall know them” (Matt. 7:20). Paul
will discuss death to sin on the part of the believer (Rom. 6:1-11).
Peter will show how the life will make the calling and election sure (2
Peter 1:10). The whole Epistle to the Hebrews is a clarion call to hold
fast the confession of faith to the end. John will insist that those who
say they are in the light do not walk in darkness (1 John 1:6; 2:9).
Certainly then, James is in harmony with the full drift of the gospel
message in his insistence on works as proof of the new life.
Paul, in his contrast between faith and works, has in mind the Jewish
doctrine of works as means of salvation. See 2 Esdras 9:7 f.: “Whoever
shall be able to escape either by his works or by his faith shall see my
salvation.” And even here “by faith” does not mean what Paul has in
mind, saving trust, but rather creed. The Pharisees taught the value of
works of supererogation, the “merit” of the fathers, in particular, the
merit of Abraham, whose faith and works were a storehouse for the Jews.
“We have Abraham to our father.” That was enough. So the Roman Catholics
hold that the saints may help us out of purgatory if we pay enough for
their intercession. Prayer itself becomes an _opus operatum_, a credit
in the balance sheet with God. Most Jews held works alone to be the
means of salvation. The point was keenly discussed in the Jewish schools
in Jerusalem and Alexandria.
As to faith, in this passage he is thinking of mere intellectual assent
to the unity of God or other theological tenets. This was the use of
“faith” by many of the Jews. After some of them became Christians, they
got no further. It is this idle and empty faith that James is
condemning. James does have the other sense of trust for the word, as in
2:1, “faith in our Lord Jesus Christ,” the sense in which Paul uses the
term when he contrasts it with works (Rom. 3:20-30). It is quite
important to note this distinction.
The antithesis in James is not, in reality, between faith and works but
between live faith and dead faith, the two uses of the term just
mentioned. In verse 18 the point is made absolutely clear. It is not
personal trust in Christ that James ridicules but an empty theological
tenet that does not stand the test of actual life. So then, James and
Paul go off at tangents when the same words occur, for they are talking
about different things.