James the Mediator

We have been exploring James for a few weeks and something jumped out at me in my latest reading. I believe James is writing to Jewish Christians spread throughout the Roman empire. Some of them have land and status; some do not. James is writing to bridge the gap between them, writing to them about the possibilities of growth for the poor if things don't change, but also the necessity that they do.

One of the warnings James gives is in chapter 4. He begins the chapter with cautions about what actually starts all of the quarrelings among them: battles that rage within them. They covet; they desire. He then warns: Your friendship with the world is hatred toward God (v. 4). What they use to achieve status with the world despises God. Rather than achieving status with the world, they are to submit themselves to God. They are to wash their hands! They are are to purify their hearts! (v.8) Notice how James takes purity laws (wash your hands) and applies it in terms of how lives are lived in the context of the great promise of the prophets of a new covenant written on the hearts of people. James is appealing to the law and history of this group of people to establish a new context for their relations. He is mediating.

Then he finishes his warnings with advice: Do not slander one another. He is referring to them all, here, rich and poor alike. Poor, don't speak against the rich. Rich, don't speak against the poor. Why? Because when you speak you judge one another. And when you judge one another, you judge the law. And when you judge the law, you are setting yourself above it. Notice how James has now used the law--the great unifier of the Jewish people in dispersion--and shown how their disunity is a judgment on it.

James creates a new world for his hearers to live in, one that is shaped by their Scripture for them to live out the life of the church.