Thus with Abraham faith was shown to be alive, not dead; fruitful, not barren; brought to a good result or end, not cut short with mere profession or promise. So the Scripture was fulfilled (made full or complete) in the case of Abraham: “And Abraham believed God, and it [the faith] was reckoned [set down to his credit] unto him for righteousness.” Paul in Romans 4 lays emphasis on the verb “believed,” and James stresses the obedience which proves the reality of the trust.
Both points are justly made. In each instance faith precedes the works. We are set right with God by trust, but the life must correspond to the new relation with God. It was so with Abraham. He was called “the friend of God.” Compare 2 Chronicles 20:7. “Shall I hide from Abraham that which I do?” (Gen. 18:17). With the Arabs the term “Khalil Allah” (Friend of God) is the current name for Abraham. Epictetus (bk. II, chap, xvii, § 29) speaks of looking “up into heaven as the friend of God.” Plato calls the righteous man “on terms of friendship with God.” Jesus calls his disciples “friends,” no longer “servants,” in John 15:14 f. There cannot be such friendship without trust of the most absolute kind, a trust that means loyalty to the end.
One must not think that James discredits faith. He does not. He assumes the need of it. In verse 24 James uses “justified” more in the sense of final approval (set right at last) than of the initial restoration of peace with God. And even so “the faith as a ground of justification is assumed as a starting point” (Hort).
“Ye see,” says James, leaving his imaginary opponent and turning again to his readers. They can see the point, whether the empty-headed disputant does or not. It is hard for a controversialist to see anything but his own side of the question. It is “not only by faith” that a man is justified. The case of Abraham shows that works must follow faith in the natural order of grace. James has administered a severe rebuke to the antinomians who deny any responsibility for holy living and disclaim the force of the moral law. There has always been a curious type of pietism that runs easily into immorality with no compunctions of conscience, a sort of emotionalism without ethical tone or flavor. Abraham was not simply the father of the Jewish people but the father of all the spiritual Israel—the believing children of God in all the ages since, who form the elect of God and of the earth.
The Case of Rahab (2:25)
One wonders why James selects a case like this after speaking of Abraham, the father of the fruitful and God’s friend. Oesterley doubts how this verse could come from the pen of a Christian. But James may have wished to select another example at the furthest possible point from Abraham, a heathen and a proselyte, “the first of all the proselytes” in the land of Canaan (Hort). Certainly if a woman like Rahab could be saved, no one else need despair. She expressed her faith in God: “I know that the Lord hath given you the land ... the Lord your God, he is God in heaven above, and in earth beneath” (Josh. 2:9, 11, AV). Besides, she showed her courage by avowing the cause of Jehovah and of Israel, by protecting the messengers (spies, in reality), and by a life of uprightness thereafter.
It was a crisis in the history of Israel as they came to Jericho, and Rahab took her stand for God at the start; hence the high honor accorded her. She is mentioned in Hebrews 11:31 in the famous list of heroes of faith. In Matthew 1:5 she appears in the genealogy of Christ. She was counted one of the four chief beauties of Israel along with Sarah, Abigail, and Esther (Mayor). “Eight prophets who were also priests are descended from the harlot Rahab” (Megilla 14b). Certainly there is no desire in James nor in Hebrews to dignify her infamous trade, which she renounced, but only to single her out as a brand snatched from the burning by the power of God.
The Union of Faith and Works (2:26)
This is what James pleads for, not the divorce between creed and conduct, which is alas only too prevalent even today. There should be an indissoluble marriage between faith and works, a union as close as that between spirit and body. “For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, even so faith apart from works is dead.” By “spirit” here James means simply the breath of life, without which the body is dead. “False faith is virtually a corpse” (Hort).
By this striking paradox James attacks the root of the whole matter and has his last word on the subject. Hort remarks that James by the use of the phrase “justified by works” seems to be answering Paul in Romans 4:2 or a misuse of Paul’s “justified by faith” (Rom. 5:1), though he does not see how James could have seen Paul. I have already expressed my own conviction that James and Paul are not really answering one another. They are discussing different aspects of the subject and touch only at points and go off along other lines. In all probability each would agree to the statements of the other if the language of each were put in the proper perspective. Certainly they agreed when they were together in Jerusalem (Acts 15; Gal. 2:1-10). But it is important for us that our faith shall be real and vital, not hollow and dead.