EPISTOLA CANONICA B. JACOBI

• 671A

The apostle James instructed the holy clergy concerning the cultivation of the heavenly precepts, and the rule of catholic observance, and concerning the majesty of unconquered patience, and concerning the revelation of very many things, and concerning the commissioning of masters.

VERS. 1.-- James. This man, after the apostles had been sent forth to preach, took up the care and government of the church of Jerusalem. To the twelve tribes. To have a special solicitude concerning these belonged to the twelve apostles, who discharged the embassy for the Lord among the circumcision. Whence Paul also says: James, and Cephas, and John, who seemed to be pillars, gave the right hands, etc. For that reason he writes to them especially, 671Band because he himself had been ordained bishop over them by the rest of the apostles.

VERS. 2.-- All joy. Be not indignant if the wicked flourish in the world, if you suffer, because it belongs not to Christian truth to be exalted in temporal things, but rather to be brought low. The wicked have nothing in heaven, you nothing in the world. In the hope of that good toward which you strive, whatever may befall on the way, you ought to rejoice. When you shall fall into temptations. He begins from the more perfect, concerning outward temptations.

VERS. 3.-- The trying of faith, etc. (BED.) The same sentence, but in reversed order, is read in Paul, etc., as far as by which faith is proved perfect.

VERS. 6.-- But he that wavereth. He who, pressed by the conscience of sin, doubts concerning the heavenly rewards, when the wind of temptations comes upon him, easily deserts the 671Cstate of faith, and, according to the will of him that tempts, is swept at the blast of the wind through divers errors of vices.

VERS. 10.-- But the rich. He calls that man rich who puts his whole hope in riches; it is not harmful to have riches, but to love them. But let the rich man glory. Ironically. As if: He ought not to glory in his own glory, wherein he is proud and oppresses others, because it must be ended and humbled in hell. Or, Let him glory in his humility, that is, not in pride, but let him humble himself by serving others out of his riches. For as the flower of the grass. The just man flowers as the palm, the unjust as the grass: because the one remains, the other quickly passes away. The flower of the just man is hope, which awaits fruit, the root of the just man is charity, which remains unmoved; the root of the wicked is covetousness, his flower the delight of temporal things.

VERS. 11.-- The rich in his ways. The ways of the rich man are the temporal 671Dthings by which he seeks to be made blessed, which shall quickly be destroyed. The heat of the sun is the coming of the severe Judge: either unforeseen at each man's death, or in the judgment, in common. In which the just man shall remain as a fruitful tree.

VERS. 12.-- Blessed is the man. Because it is hard to exhort to contempt of the world, he adds concerning the greatness of the reward: 672ABlessed is the man, etc. Not only ought you to suffer stripes and prisons, but also the loss of temporal things, which are vile and transitory, and their lovers are to be punished.

VERS. 13.-- Let no man, when he is tempted. (BED.) Thus far concerning outward temptations, now, etc., as far as and that man sins as it were of necessity.

For that he is tempted by God. God sends the outward temptation for the proving of his own, but the inward, by which theft, adultery, murder are often conceived, God does not send.

VERS. 14.-- Every man is tempted. There are two kinds of temptations: one which proves, according to which God tempted Abraham. The other which deceives, according to which God tempts no man. When upon 672Bthe foundation we build wood, hay, stubble, the devil lays fire upon it. Let us build gold, silver, precious stones: and he will not dare to tempt; nor yet does he altogether desist, but he sits in secret places that he may kill the innocent.

Bringeth forth death. As he who, being tempted, overcomes, [has] the rewards of life; so he who, enticed by concupiscences, is overcome, deservedly incurs the ruin of death.

VERS. 17.-- Every gift, etc. (BED.) After he had taught that vices are not to us from God, but from ourselves, etc., as far as the perfect gift can be understood.

Nor of alteration. No shadow shuts off his light, so as to send in any evils. Always the goods of light are in God, but his gifts in us are sometimes such as supervening sins overshadow.

672CVERS. 18.-- Of his own will. Every good is from God, and you have not come to this by your own merits, but by the sole grace of the divine will. That we might be some beginning, etc. By this begetting let us not think that we are that which he himself is, but a certain primacy among creatures he granted to us by adoption. Whence another translator: That we might be the firstfruits of his creatures.

VERS. 19.-- Slow to anger. Let no one be angry rashly and without cause, whether against sinning subjects, or against any brethren whatsoever, or against the prosperity of the wicked, because the ripeness of wisdom is not perceived save with a tranquil mind. And he who judges in anger, even if he judges justice, yet cannot imitate the justice of the divine examination, into which disturbance does not fall.

672DVERS. 21.-- Wherefore casting away, etc. He has admonished them to seek out doctrine, for the receiving of which, and that they may be able to advance in it, he now exhorts to cleanness of body and of soul. For he who declines not from evil cannot do good. The engrafted word. That which by preaching we lay upon your hearts, or 673Athe word which was engrafted and sown in the day of redemption, when God begot you; now receive it more perfectly, and fulfil in works what you hold in mystery.

VERS. 23.-- To him that considereth the countenance. He who purposes in his mind to consider in the Scriptures, as in a glass, the countenance of his nativity, how man is born, how frail, or what he shall be, of how brief an age, set in how many miseries, has contracted great compunction and a will of repenting; but straightway, seduced by some temptation, he forgets his compunction, and returns to sins. To this inconstancy he compares him who gladly hears the word and neglects to fulfil it. And there is a likeness between him who of his own accord, without a teacher, has applied himself to the Scriptures, and him who from another 673Bhears the Scriptures, since neither has fulfilled them.

When a boy is born he wails, whereby is signified the grief of the soul, and that it enters into life unto the miseries of the flesh, which grief the soul afterwards forgets, being accustomed to the enticements of the flesh.

VERS. 26.-- Not bridling his tongue, etc. (AUG., Serm. 3 ad fratres in eremo.) What else is wordiness? etc., as far as and do thou diligently attend: He that bridleth not his tongue, his religion is vain, etc.

VERS. 27.-- And to keep himself unspotted from this world. By saeculum he understands the world, or all the things which are in the world, as are the concupiscence of the flesh, and of the eyes, and the pride of life.

673CVERS. 1.-- Do not hold the faith in respect of persons. As if he should say: The Lord does not invite the rich to the faith and despise the poor, but he chose the poor in this world, and endowed them with faith. The world casts out the poor man, courts the rich; the faith of Christ on the contrary teaches that all the glory of the rich is as the flower of the grass, while mercy toward the poor flowers unto eternity. Of the Lord of glory. He names him the Lord of glory, that his commands may be obeyed, who repays with everlasting glory that which is given to the poor for love of him.

VERS. 5.-- Hearken. (BED.) Attend more diligently, because not those who are richer in the world, etc., as far as yet these he has rendered illustrious and noble by the expectation of the kingdom to come.

Hath not God. (BED.) God chose the poor, who elsewhere says: Fear not, little flock, for it hath pleased your 673DFather to give you a kingdom. He chose poor parents also, by whose office he himself should be nourished.

VERS. 6.-- Do not the rich. More openly he shows whom he had called rich above, namely those who prefer riches to Christ, and, themselves strangers to the faith, oppress by power those who believe, and drag them to the judgment-seats of the more powerful. And there is another cause why they are not to be chosen, because they bring evils upon the faithful.

VERS. 7.-- They blaspheme. In the times of the apostles many of the Gentiles and of the Jews, and especially the richer, are found to have done these things.

VERS. 8.-- If yet the law. Because he had spoken harshly and concerning contempt of the rich, and in a manner contrary to the divine law, which commands that all be loved, 674Alest the rich be thought to be despised altogether, he adds: as if he should say, for the aforesaid causes they are not to be chosen, but if you fulfil this law which says: Thou shalt love thy neighbour (Matth. XXII), you do well; because, although the rich are not to be chosen on account of their riches, yet they are not the less to be loved for God's sake.

Royal. That is, excellent, or because it is common to all, and embraces all. Or that which says: Thou shalt not confound the person of the poor, nor honour the countenance of the mighty (Levit. XIX) [Vulg. Non consideres, "Thou shalt not regard"], and elsewhere: There shall be no difference of persons: you shall hear the little as the great, because it is the judgment of God (Deut. I).

VERS. 10.-- But whosoever. Lest they should think it a contemptible sin to transgress the law in this one matter, he adds: But whosoever, etc. But offend 674Bin one, he is become guilty of all. Truly he who offends in one point is a transgressor of the whole law, because he who sins acts against the author of the law, whom he slights in his own law, and against charity, which is the cause and mother of the whole law. Let us see this sentence from a like case: If anyone should offend me, he would offend all my brothers and friends in me, and in a manner would sin against all. So he who neglects one commandment renders useless to himself the rest, which, when fulfilled, seemed to help.

VERS. 12.-- So speak ye. (BED.) Since it is an evil that a rich man be chosen on account of his riches, etc., as far as which calls the willing to penance and remits sins.

As if he should say: Speak well, and do well: because if you neglect it, you shall be more grievously condemned than those who were 674Cin the time of Moses, because from him to whom more is committed, more is required. By how much the greater mercy a man obtains from the Lord, by so much the more unjustly does he deny mercy to his needy neighbour, and the more justly does he pay the penalties of impiety.

VERS. 13.-- But mercy exalteth itself. (BED.) As in the judgment he shall grieve who has not shown mercy, so he who has shown it, being rewarded, shall exult and rejoice.

VERS. 14.-- What shall it profit, etc. (ID.) Here he disputes more at large concerning the works of mercy, that he may console those whom he had terrified by the preceding sentence, teaching by what remedies daily sins are expiated, without which life is not passed. Lest those who offend not in one point only, but in many, be found in the judgment guilty of all.

674DVERS. 18.-- But some man will say. Not only for the aforesaid reasons ought you to be incited to work well, but also for this, lest you suffer reproach from others, because someone, having taken confidence from his own works, that he may show that faith alone avails not, will say by way of reproach: Thou hast faith, etc.

VERS 19.-- Thou believest, etc. He has proved that those who have not works have not true faith; now he makes plain of what sort the faith is that they have, lest they should make much of such a faith. And the devils believe, and tremble. (BED.) It is written, etc., as far as they are to be reckoned slower and more insolent than the devils.

675AVERS. 20.-- But wilt thou know, O vain man? (BED.) It having been proved that faith without works is dead, etc., as far as let them imitate in temptation and in working.

VERS. 21.-- Abraham our father, etc. (ID.) That Abraham is said to have been justified by faith without works, etc., as far as he is set forth as an example of both. Offering his son Isaac upon the altar? A great temptation, when he was bidden to slay his son; a great faith, when even of the dead he believed that he could receive seed; a great work, when he did not hesitate to offer his best beloved.

VERS. 22.-- Thou seest that faith did co-operate with his works, and by works, etc. Because he offered him in whom he had received the promise, the great power of faith appears: because, although he offered him, he believed that the promise was to be 675Bfulfilled, since he believed that God was able even to raise the dead.

In like manner also Raab the harlot. (BED.) Lest they should plead that they were not able to imitate the works of so great a father, etc., as far as and was numbered in the generations of the Saviour.

VERS. 1.-- Be ye not many masters. As I have admonished you to do works, so I admonish you to shun foolish masterships. Be ye not many. There were many in the times of the apostles who, coming down from Judaea to Antioch, not well instructed in the law of the faith, taught that believers from among the Gentiles ought to be circumcised, and brought in other errors, which brought upon the true preachers no small labour of controversy. These therefore he removes from the office of the word, lest they hinder 675Cthe true preachers.

Greater. (BED.) He who, being unlearned, usurps the office of teaching, and announces Christ not sincerely, deserves a greater damnation than if he alone should perish by his own wickedness; as, on the contrary, he who ministers well acquires for himself a good degree.

VERS. 2.-- In many things. Truly it is perilous to wish to be set over the rest, because not only you who are less instructed, but we all preachers, even the greater, offend in many things, some by teaching ill, and others by living ill, and in other ways. The blessed Apostle numbers himself with them, that he may reprove the more freely. The just man offends in one way, the wicked in another; the just man by the frailty of the flesh, and he does not cease to be just, whence Solomon: Seven times in the day shall the just man fall and shall rise again; as the offence is daily, so 675Ddaily is the remedy of prayers and of good works, but the wicked fall down into evil. If any man. He wishes to show the unavoidable offence of the word, that he may deter the unskilled, lest they desire preferment: because he who desires to be set over others must be more perfect than the rest, lest he offend when he ought to profit; but the unskilled are not able not to offend in preaching.

Offendeth not in word. (BED.) In that word, namely, whose offence human frailty is able to avoid. As the word of guile, of detraction, of pride, of boasting, and also of idle and superfluous speech, he is a perfect man.

VERS. 3.-- But if we put bits into the mouths of horses. (BED.) Into our own mouths much more ought we to put them. Certain books have: But as bits to horses, and 676Ait is thus joined to what follows: But as we put bits into the mouths of horses, so the tongue also is indeed a little member, and exalteth great things.

VERS. 5.-- And exalteth great things. (ID.) Rewards, if the impulse of him that directs governs it well; if ill, it exalts great destruction for itself and for its own, whence Solomon: Death and life are in the hands of the tongue (Prov. XVIII) [Vulg. in manu linguae, "in the hand of the tongue"]. It exalts life, if it teaches the Church well; death, if ill. For the matter is against those who, destitute both of life and of knowledge, presumed to teach. Great things therefore does that tongue exalt which, despising the words and the meanings of others, singularly boasts itself wise sapientiem and eloquent. Against which: Do not multiply to speak lofty things, glorying.

Behold how great a fire. So too an incontinent tongue makes a great matter of good works to perish, and so, 676Bsince it is almost impossible that the sin of the tongue be avoided even by the perfect, not everyone ought to seek the mastership.

VERS. 6.-- The universality of iniquity. He says universality, because through it almost all crimes are either contrived, as robberies, ravishments: or are perpetrated, as perjuries, false testimonies: or are defended, as when any impure man, by excusing the wickedness he has committed, feigns the good which he has not done. Which defileth the whole body. And because the tongue is such, it defiles the whole body, and makes it be reckoned unclean in the sight of God, and therefore it is a grave thing to undergo the mastership: because it is set among our members, it is one of our members, exceedingly near to us.

It inflameth the wheel, etc. (BED.) It defiles the whole 676Ccourse of temporal life, etc., as far as it compels to bring it to effect through the other members.

VERS. 7.-- For every nature of beasts, etc. (ID.) We read in Pliny that a most savage asp in Egypt was tamed by a certain householder, and, going forth daily from its cavern, was wont to receive its allowance from his table. We read in Marcellinus that a tigress, made tame, was sent from India to the emperor Anastasius.

VERS. 10.-- Out of the same mouth proceedeth. Others, seeing what we do, are led on by our example, so that they likewise bless and curse. It ought not. Truly it ought not to be that with the same mouth we bless concerning the head and curse concerning the members, because by the bitterness of cursing the sweetness of blessing is consumed.

676DVERS. 11.-- Doth a fountain. The preacher must sometimes use bitter preaching, by withdrawing, by rebuking. Which is difficult enough, that with different words tending to the same end he should be able to do both.

VERS. 12.-- Can, brethren. It cannot come to pass that a teacher be a fig tree by the sweetness of the beatitude to which he exhorts, and use sweet words, and that he be a vine, making men forget all temporal things, for which it behoves to use harsh ones: this therefore is difficult. So neither can the salt water make sweet water, that is, a preacher sharply biting the manners of others cannot in the same teaching be sweet to those same men.

VERS. 13.-- Who is a wise man and endued with knowledge among you? Those being confuted who have neither holiness of life nor 677Acontinence of tongue, he admonishes those who seemed to themselves wise, or even were so, that they should show wisdom rather by living in discipline than by teaching others, because he who is more inclined to teaching than to doing sometimes incurs boasting, or contention, or envy against other teachers, and many other evils.

VERS. 14.-- And be liars against the truth. Do not lie to God, to whom in baptism you promised to renounce the pomps of the devil, which you do not do when you wish to be proud of good things.

VERS. 17.-- But that which. This is the meekness which he commanded above was to be had, contrary to bitterness of zeal and to contentions. First indeed it is chaste. Unless chastity first sit in the mind, no perfection will follow in the work. Easy to be persuaded, consenting to good 677Bthings. [Vulg. bonus consentiens, nominative] If he does aught the less, whether through ignorance or through negligence, he yields assent to the persuasion of good men.

VERS. 18.-- But the fruit. After he had distinguished wisdom through the several virtues; that he may the more easily invite to it, he subjoins its fruit: It is sown in peace. He does not demand to seem more learned or more holy than he is: he does not tear his neighbour for his own commendation, which contentious wisdom does. Not only for the aforesaid things ought a man to seek wisdom of this sort, but also for this; because by those who make peace, as by those who cast it, this seed is sown, and there is prepared in peace the fruit of eternal blessedness, that is the reward of justice, which is repaid for just works. He therefore who here is zealous for peace, and sprinkles the ground of his heart with the works of peace as with 677Cseed, it is just that he should have eternal peace, as the fruit of this seed.

VERS. 1.-- From whence wars, etc. (BED.) He had forbidden zeal and contention, whence he disputes yet more at large, adding other vices which follow from it: from contention, concupiscence, from concupiscences, wars and strifes. For he who desires to be preferred, or to abound in temporal things, hates, envies, kills.

VERS. 2.-- Because that. On account of these things, namely that you ask God worthily [postulatis; read non postulatis, "you ask not"]; for if you were to ask him with devout intercession, he would give also the temporal things necessary for use, and not the everlasting only.

VERS. 4.-- Adulterers, know you not, etc. (BED.) He had said above concerning the open enemies of God, etc., as far as and by 677Dthis you are made enemies of God.

VERS. 5.-- Do you think? etc. You ought not to contend: for the spirit which is in you does not covet unto envy, but rather makes men of one accord, and this the Scripture says: The spirit which dwelleth in you coveteth unto envy. Or: the spirit coveteth unto, that is against envy, that is, it desires this, that envy be taken away; or, it desires that you envy the world, and love it not; or, the spirit of any man whatsoever covets temporal things unto envy, because it envies others what it has not.

VERS. 6.-- But he giveth greater grace. The Spirit of grace does not make men envy, nay rather gives grace, that is gratuitous gifts, greater than are the riches of the world. For which cause, that is, that we may know that he gives, and to whom he does not 678Agive, the Scripture says: He resisteth the proud, but to the humble he giveth grace, etc. God punishes all the wicked, but he is said specially to resist the proud, because they are struck with the greater punishment who neglect to be made subject to God by repenting But to the humble he gives grace, who in the wounds of their own vices submit themselves to the hands of the true physician.

VERS. 11.-- He detracteth from the law, he judgeth the law. Which forbade detraction. As if he should say, the law did not act [rightly]. Or, he who detracts from a brother that keeps the law detracts from and judges the law, for that it gave such commands, which bid us forget the injuries of brethren.

VERS. 13.-- But thou. Not only oughtest thou for this reason to avoid detraction, lest as a transgressor thou be judged by God, but for this also, that perhaps in nothing dost thou excel those whom thou revilest. Behold now, you that say. After the rebuke 678Bof detraction, he reproves the rashness of those who, not having certainty of life, out of covetousness of temporal things promise themselves life and gain for the time to come. We will spend there indeed a year, and will traffic, etc. He notes the manifold folly of those who both busy themselves about the increase of gains, and think that they shall live a long time, and reckon it to be of their own power to spend a year, and in all these things disdain to recall to mind the examination of the judge above.

VERS. 15.-- For what is your life? etc. He does not agree with those who say that after death there is nothing, and that death itself is nothing. But he so speaks as to teach that the life of the depraved is short in the present: which nevertheless in the time to come eternal death shall follow.

• 678C

VERS. 1.-- Go to now. In the accepted time and in the day of salvation, redeem the punishments to come by weeping and by alms.

VERS. 3.-- And the rust. (BED.) Not only shall the visible fire of gehenna genennae torment the unmerciful rich, etc., as far as and therefore he shall be the more grievously punished.

For a testimony. That is, unto the increase of punishments, that is, that by beholding it visibly you may sustain greater torments. Shall eat the flesh. That is, the bodies, or the carnal concupiscences, because the flame raging without shall torment lascivious souls, and the grief pricking within shall accuse them of their own tenacity. As fire, which consumes metals and the other things, so rust [consumes] your flesh.

678DVERS. 4.-- Behold the hire. (BED.) Great is the iniquity of men who will not receive the poor; but greater is it when they will not render to hirelings and servants the wage due for their labour. Whence Job: If my land cry against me, and its furrows weep? if I have eaten its fruits without money?

VERS. 5.-- You have feasted. (ID.) Nor have you sinned only by gathering superfluously, etc., as far as and of the other crimes which the Jews had committed.

VERS. 7.-- Be patient (ID.) The proud and the unbelieving being rebuked, etc., as far as whence the Apostle: You have your fruit in sanctification, and the end life everlasting (Rom. VI).

VERS. 10.-- The prophets. (ID.) The prophets, who were so 679Aholy that the Spirit of God spoke his mysteries through them, etc., as far as concerning the Lord as regards the issue of death.

VERS. 11.-- The patience of Job. He does not say: the end of Job, to whom temporal things were restored, but the patience of Job. And the end of the Lord, because he invites to suffering by the example of Job, and yet not that they should receive temporal things, as Job the old man, but eternal things, as Christ the new man.

And the end of the Lord. (BED.) You have heard by the lesson, you have seen with your eyes him suffering long-sufferingly longaminiter upon the cross, and you have also learned the glory of the resurrection and of the ascension by the preaching of the Gospel.

VERS. 13.-- Let him pray. Let him not murmur, nor find fault with the judgments of God, but let him run to the Church with bended knees, 679Bthat God may send consolation.

VERS. 15.-- And if he be in sins. (BED.) Many for their sins are punished even with the death of the body, etc., as far as whence it is rightly subjoined: Confess ye, etc.

VERS. 17.-- With prayer he prayed. He proves by an example how much the constant supplication of a just man avails, since Elias, by praying with only 680Aone prayer, held back the heavens for so long a time, turned away the rains from the lands, denied fruits to mortals.

And again. (BED.) When Elias saw the time, etc., as far as what then of many faithful men with many prayers?

VERS. 19.-- If any of you. The efficacy of prayer being shown, he shows of how great merit it is to pray for the brethren, and to call them back to soundness, so that he who in the earlier part removed malignant and idle speech from our tongue, might show at the end of the Epistle what we ought to speak. Let us pray, and let us sing psalms, as often as we are beaten by adversities, let us confess our sins, let us pray for one another that we may be saved: for the salvation of our neighbours, not only the temporal, but rather the eternal. For if it be of great reward to snatch from death a body that must one day 680Bdie, of how great merit is it to free from death a soul that shall live without end in the heavenly country?

VERS. 20.-- He shall save. Certain codices have: He shall save his own soul from death. And truly he who corrects one that errs acquires for himself by this the ampler joys of the heavenly life.