Joel B. Green. <i>James: A Commentary</i>

Writing a commentary on the Letter of James comes with a certain degree of irony. James’s instruction is clear: “be doers of the word and not hearers only” (1:22) because the “mere hearer” goes on to “forget what kind of person he was” (1:24). It is not the one engaged in scholarly analysis of the text who has truly understood the letter, rather it is the one who obeys the letter’s instruction, the one who is transformed, rather than merely informed, by the message. Green is wise to address the need to shift the focus away from reading James merely for information to reading James for reformation (p. 1). His concise and insightful commentary does just this.When readers patiently listen for James’s voice they hear, as Green has, that “the baseline vocation. . . . James everywhere promotes among his readers . . . [is] consistency and integrity of heart and life in devotion to God” (p. 3)—in a word, wholeness. Along with identifying the major thrust of the letter, Green rightly appreciates the theology of James—something contested in modern scholarship. Holding together both sources of James’s theological heritage, Green notes that “James is an exemplary theologian of the Jesus movement, a practical theologian . . . who has devoured Jesus’s message and ruminated on it in relation to Israel’s Scriptures” (p. 3). To my ear, this concisely sums up the theological riches often missed in James due in no small part to uncharitable comparisons with Paul. Green encourages readers to approach James in three ways: to come to James without utilitarian or preconceived agenda, to enter fully into James’s world and concerns, and finally to “perform” James as one would a script or score (pp. 3–4). It is clear that Green has taken his own advice thus providing a reflection on the letter that penetrates the depths of James’s wisdom as a guide for disciples of Jesus.Structure in James is a notoriously difficult question with as many theories as authors who peddle them (another contested issue); however, Green wisely suggests a soft structure to the letter supported by two load-bearing observations: first that the opening chapter of James serves as a kind of “prelude . . . announcing motifs that will receive more complex development” throughout the letter (p. 20, see his helpful chart). Second, these motifs announced in chapter 1 and then expanded in the rest of the letter are set within “two paths” either “associated with those who are poor, but wise, the other associated with those who are wealthy and self-deceived” (p. 21). The commentary section echoes these two structural foundations illustrating both how James returns to themes introduced in chapter 1 such that readers should connect the thematic precis with its development and the way James uses the fundamental contrast between two opposite ways to guide his readers to the wisdom of Jesus.After Green briefly locates his working assumptions regarding authorship, audience, and setting (pp. 4–13), he organizes his comments around the traditional paragraphs of the letter (1:2–18, 19–27; 2:1–13, 14–26; 3:1–12, 13–18; 4:1–10, 11–12; 4:13–5:5, 7–12, 13–20). Each paragraph opens with Green’s original translation (accompanied by brief notes on grammar and textual variants), followed by an interpretive overview of the entire passage, and finally comments on smaller sections of the paragraph (at times accompanied by an excursus focusing on a background or interpretive issue). The commentary moves through the letter with efficient brevity yet manages to furnish the reader with excellent insight into the riches of the letter. It is clear that Green is well aware of the scholarly questions circulating around the letter (and at times contributes to these discussions), yet he does so without sacrificing concision and most of all clarity in articulating the letter’s meaning, especially for those not versed in the academic discussions. The balance struck is admirable. This is not a phrase-by-phrase, let alone a verse-by-verse, analysis of the text, rather the comments move through the flow of though contained in each paragraph noted above with an eye on interpretive insights that helps the reader understand the communicative world of James.One example that draws together several of the observations made above is how Green articulates the significance of the contrast between wealth and poverty. Commenting on 2:1–13, Green argues the term “wealthy should not be reduced to a judgment about income, property and livestock holdings, net worth, and so on. Rather, it must be understood relationally, with the wealthy characterized by their resources and rank, yes, but also and especially by the attitudes and behaviors that accompany them (see above, on 1:9–11)” (p. 66). It is not merely the presence of wealth, or its trappings, but the “internalization of the action-guiding ways of the world” (p. 44), especially the “way of wealth.” The question “is whether wealth has its way in cultivating a lifeworld [a worldview] contrary to God’s wisdom” (p. 34). Poverty too is thicker than usually appreciated: “There is more to the poor whom God has chosen than their lacking the resources required for life’s comforts. . . . God’s choice of the poor is interpreted with the phrase ‘those who love him’” (p. 67). Avoiding the reduction of wealth and poverty to either purely material or spiritual categories, Green rightly summarizes that “James’s language is social, economic, and religious all at the same time” (p. 67). This kind of skillful assessment is repeated throughout the commentary.Green’s work is well-written, concise, and full of insight into the Letter of James. Pastors and students will especially appreciate the insight-to-number-of-pages-read ratio, which is significant. At the same time, Green manages to address (and contribute to) several interpretive questions surrounding James and deftly brings to bear insights from other disciplines, namely neuroscience and metaphor theory to name but two. Clearly Green has slowly digested the wisdom of this letter and has written a clear and insightful commentary that rightly appreciates the practical (and penetrating) theology of James for the good of the church.