The Book of James

Emily Clarence 8C #7

The Book of James is a book about the wisdom of Christ. The author of James is James
himself, which in this case, there are lots of James in the New Testament. However, the “James”
that is meant here is James the brother of Jesus. It is said to be him since the writing style and the
timeline matches, and more evidences were found to prove that it was that “James”. One of the
internal evidence was that He was the only one by that name with the authority to write the letter.
Second, his style of writing was like Jesus, as in the figure of speech. Third, the letter has strong
similarities to James’ speech in Acts 15, for example, the greeting in James 1:1 was similar to the
one in Acts 15:23, and is used nowhere else by the New Testament author. The external
evidences is that the early church accepted it as coming from James, including Clement of Rome,
Ignatius, and the Sheperd of Hermes. Also, the early Syrian Bible (the Peshitta) contained James,
and later Fathers accepted it.

The Book of James is written to the 12 tribes scattered abroad (the unbelieving Jews, all
Christians, and Jews of the Western dispersion) in Israel and around. The purpose of the letter
was to comfort the persecuted believers (1:5), James wished to commend ‘pure religion’ (v.27),
and he wanted to convict the mere “professors” of the faith who were not do-ers of faith

(2:14-26).

The book of James was written either around the 47-48 A.D. or 60-62 A.D. . The readers
were located in Israel and the surrounding areas.

The outline of James is as mentioned below:

I. Patience in Trials Rewarded

A. Purpose of Trials (vv.1-12)
B. Principles of temptations (vv.13-15)

II. Practice of Truth Required (1:16-27)

A. Truth is the instrument of life (vv.16-18)
B. Truth is the mirror of life (vv.19-27)

III. Partiality in Thoughts Rebuked (2:1-13)

A. Respect of others (vv.1-9)
B. Requirement of the law (vv.10-13)
IV. Productivity of Trust Revealed (2:14-26)
A. Profit of good works (vv.14-20)
B. Picture of good works (vv.21-26)

V. Perfection of Tongue Related (chap. 3)

A. Need of perfection (vv.1-6)
B. Lack of perfection (vv. 7-12)
C. Means of perfection (vv.13-18)

VI. Principles of Transgression Remedied (chap. 4)

A. The root of sin (vv.1-3)
B. The fruit of sin (vv.4-6)
C. The cure for sin (vv.7-17)

VII. Pervesion of Treasures Reviled (5:1-6)

VIII. Perseverance in Testing Recommended (5:7-20)

A. By patience (vv.7-11)
B. By propriety (v.12)
C. By prayer (vv.13-18)
D. By personal work (vv.19-20)