NATURE/GENRE
NATURE/GENRE
While the letter of James has a typical epistolary introduction, it lacks the usual epistolary postscript. Moreover, it does not contain any personal touches such as greetings, travel plans, or prayer requests. All this suggests that James is best viewed as what we might call a literary letter. Probably it was intended for those several communities in which James’s scattered parishioners had settled. More precise identification of the genre of James demands that we give attention to four further features of the letter.
The first is the flavor of pastoral admonition that pervades the letter. Imperative verbs occur with greater frequency in James than in any other New Testament book. James rebukes and exhorts his readers, and any theology that is taught comes only in conjunction with this overriding purpose.
A second feature that must be considered is its looseness of structure. We have suggested a division of the letter into five main parts. Yet these divisions are by no means well defined, as is clear from the diversity of suggested outlines for the letter.
The difficulty arises from the fact that James moves rapidly from topic to topic; sometimes he will spend a paragraph or so on a given topic (e.g., Jas. 2:1-13, 14-26; 3:1-12), but more often he appears to change subjects after only a few verses.
James’s extensive and very effective use of metaphors and figures of speech is a third noteworthy feature of his letter. The images James uses to make his points—the billowing sea, the withered flower, the brushfire—are universal in their appeal and go a long way toward accounting for the popularity of the letter.
A fourth feature of the letter is the degree to which James shares words and ideas with other teachings and works of literature of his day. The most important of these sources is the teaching of Jesus. The degree to which James is permeated by parallels to Jesus’ teaching can be accounted for only if James so thoroughly knew that teaching—probably in oral form—that it had molded his own views and attitudes. 26 But James also shares vocabulary and concepts with early Jewish works, especially the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, Sirach, and, to a lesser extent, Philo and Wisdom of Solomon. The nature of these parallels does not suggest direct borrowing; rather, they appear to result from James’s sharing of a similar background with the authors of these works.
Do these features enable us to define the genre of James more definitely? Ropes suggests "diatribe,” a popular format used for instruction and debate among some Greek authors. 27 More popular is the identification of James as parenesis. Dibelius, who is the best-known advocate of this identification, notes four features of this genre, all of which he finds in James: eclecticism (borrowing from traditional material), the unstructured stringing together of moral admonitions, repetition, and general applicability. 28 That these features are evident in James is clear, but it must be questioned whether they need be confined to a specific genre or style. Perhaps a better way of viewing James is to see it as a homily, or series of homilies, put into a letter in order to address Christians at a distance from their "pastor.” 29
The last paragraph raises the question of structure in James. Luther accused James of "throwing things together...chaotically,” 30 a judgment echoed in another form by Dibelius, who, in focusing on independent units to the exclusion of the whole, takes what we might call a form-critical approach to James. A reaction to this approach has arisen in more recent work, where the concern has been with the final form of the letter, sometimes viewed as the work of a redactor. Davids well exemplifies this trend, finding three key themes in the letter—testing, wisdom/pure speech, and poverty/wealth—that are treated in three main sections. 31 Probably the truth lies somewhere between these options. James certainly displays more continuity of thought than Dibelius allows, but it is questionable whether the diverse material of James can be fairly summarized under three (or more) topics. Rather, in his pastoral concern to deal with a number of problems, James moves fairly rapidly from one subject to another. Certain themes recur, wholeness or maturity being perhaps the most important (Jas. 1:4, 6-8; 2:4; 3:2,
8, 11-12, 16-17; 4:4-5, 8), but they are just that—themes, or motifs, and not topics under which James’s admonitions can be organized.
ADOPTION INTO THE CANON
The letter of James appears to have influenced several late-first-century works, among them the Shepherd of Hermas and 1 Clement. 32 Clement of Alexandria is said to have written a commentary on James, but no such work has survived. 33 Origen is the first to cite James as Scripture, and other third-century works show acquaintance with the letter. Eusebius cites James frequently and accords it canonical status. But by classifying it among the "disputed books” (see H.E. 3.25.3), he also serves notice that some in his day questioned its status. He may be referring to some in the Syrian church who were slow to accept as canonical all the General Epistles. But James is included in the Syriac translation, the Peshitta, and is quoted approvingly by Chrysostom (d. 407) and Theodoret (d. 458). The Western part of the early church witnesses to a similar situation, although acceptance of James came a bit later. James is not found in either the Muratorian Canon or the Mommsen catalogue (reflecting the African canon c. 360). 34 The earliest clear references to James date from the fourth century (Hilary of Poitiers and Ambrosiaster). Decisive for the acceptance of James in the Western church was Jerome’s full acceptance of the book.
James thus came to be recognized as canonical in all parts of the ancient church, and while there were hesitations on the part of some, no one rejected the book outright. Should these hesitations give us pause about the status of James? No. They were probably the product of a combination of uncertainty about the identity of the author (which James?) and the relative neglect of the book. Being practical and Jewish in its flavor, James was not the sort of book that would have been widely used in the doctrinal controversies of the early church.
James came in for its most severe criticism at the hands of Luther. His passionate embracing of Paul’s teaching on justification by faith alone as the heart of Scripture made it difficult for him to accept James. He therefore relegated it to a secondary status in the New Testament, along with Jude, Hebrews, and Revelation. Nevertheless, Luther did not exclude James from the canon, and despite his criticisms, he quoted James approvingly many times. 35 Compared with those "chief books” that clearly taught justification by faith, James appeared to Luther to be an "epistle of straw” (i.e. one made of straw; his allusion is to 1 Cor. 3:12). But he can also say, "I would not prevent anyone from including or extolling him as he pleases, for there are otherwise many good sayings in him.” 36 We do not wish to minimize Luther’s criticism of James: he clearly had difficulties with it. But his difficulties arose from a somewhat imbalanced perspective induced by his polemical context. Considered in a more balanced way, James can be seen to be making an important contribution to our understanding of Christian theology and practice, one that in no way conflicts with Paul or any other biblical author (see "Contribution” below). On both historical and theological grounds, James fully deserves the canonical status that the church has accorded it.