Here I conclude my string of posts dealing with whether James the brother of Jesus wrote the book of James as the book itself implicitly claims.  Again this is taken from my more academic study Forgery and Counterforgery, but I've edited it a bit for an audience of regular folk instead of irregular scholars. In my previous post I talked about how our ancient sources everywhere talk about the major concerns and interests of the the historical James and his focus on the Torah and keeping the law.  Does this book reflect any of his widely known  interests? ****************************** The book of James hints toward a James-like audience, as it is addressed to “the twelve tribes”  (that is, faithful Jews scattered throughout the world).  What is striking is that none of the cultural or cultic concerns of James of Jerusalem is in evidence in the book.  Just the opposite.  The book is thoroughly concerned about the “Law,” but not about the aspects of the Law that James himself is reported to have been interested in. Here, [...]

In my previous post I summarized the major themes and emphases of the five-chapter letter of James, one of the Catholic Epistles.  I now want to get into the questions of Who Wrote It, When, and Why.  This will take a couple of posts, and I've decided to give a fuller scoop in this case than usual, by citing how I discussed the matter in my book Forgery and Counterforgery. I think the discussion is accessible to the non-expert.  I have edited it a bit here, in paret to make it more more user-friendly). This issue is rather important for anyone interested in the history of early Christianity.  Do we have a writing from Jesus’ own brother?  Now *that* would be interesting! ****************************** The letter of James begins simply enough: “James, a slave of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes in the dispersion, greetings” (1:1).  A number of persons are named James in the New Testament, including the father of Joseph (Jesus’ “father,” Matt. 1:16), the son of Zebedee [...]

In this “New Testament in a Nutshell” thread I come now to the intriguing book of James, long one of my favorites among the Catholic epistles.  At one point in my earlier existence, I liked the book so well that I memorized it.  Don’t ask me to recite it now; that was 50 years ago. Even so, I still think it is a terrific book.  And now I realize it is intriguing for all sorts of reasons I never would have imagined back when I was able to recite it at a drop of the hat. I start here with a one-sentence, fifty-word summary. The Book of James consists of ethical instruction for followers of Jesus who are to live in ways pleasing to God as a way of demonstrating their faith, since anyone who thinks they can be saved only through what they believe does not understand that “faith without works is dead.” For the rest of this post, I will summarize the major themes and emphases of this short, five-chapter book, which, hey, [...]