Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of James 5:3
Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days.
3. Your gold and silver is cankered ] Literally, rusted, the word being used generically of the tarnish that sooner or later comes over all metals that are exposed to the action of the air.
shall be a witness against you ] Better, for a witness to you. The doom that falls on the earthly possessions of the ungodly shall be, as it were, the token of what will fall on them, unless they avert it by repentance.
shall eat your flesh as it were fire ] The last words have been sometimes taken as belonging to the next clause, “as fire ye laid up treasure,” but the structure of the English text is preferable. The underlying image suggested is that the rust or canker spreads from the riches to the very life itself, and that when they fail, and leave behind them only the sense of wasted opportunities and the memories of evil pleasures, the soul will shudder at their work as the flesh shudders at the touch of fire. We may perhaps trace a reminiscence of the “unquenchable fire” devouring the carcases in Gehenna, as in Mar 9:44.
Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days ] Better, Ye laid ( or, ye have laid) up treasure in the last days. The preposition cannot possibly have the sense of “for.” St James shared the belief of other New Testament writers that they were living in “the last days” of the world’s history, and that the “coming of the Lord” was nigh (1Jn 2:18; 1Co 15:51; 1Th 4:15). For those to whom he wrote the words had a very real truth. They were actually living in the “last days” of the polity of Israel. In the chaos and desolation of its fall their heaped-up treasures would avail but little. They would be marked out in proportion to their wealth, as the first to be attacked and plundered.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Your gold and silver is cankered – That is, that you have heaped together, by injustice and fraud, a large amount, and have kept it from those to whom it is due, Jam 5:4, until it has become corroded. The word rendered is cankered ( katiotai,) does not occur elsewhere in the New Testament. It properly means to cause to rust; to rust out (Passow); to be corroded with rust (Robinson); to be spotted with rust. It is true that gold and silver do not properly rust, or become oxidized, and that they will not be corroded like iron and steel; but by being kept long in a damp place they will contract a dark color, resembling rust in appearance. This seems to be the idea in the mind of the apostle. He speaks of gold and silver as they appear after having been long laid up without use; and undoubtedly the word which he uses here is one which would to an ancient have expressed that idea, as well as the mere literal idea of the rusting or oxidizing of metals. There is no reason to suppose that the word was then used in the strict chemical sense of rusting, for there is no reason to suppose that the nature of oxidization was then fully understood.
And the rust of them – Another word is used here – ios. This properly denotes something sent out or emitted, (from hemi), and is applied to a missile weapon, as an arrow; to poison, as emitted from the tooth of a serpent; and to rust, as it seems to be emitted from metals. The word refers to the dark discoloration which appears on gold and silver, when they have remained long without use.
Shall be a witness against you – That is, the rust or discoloration shall bear testimony against you that the money is not used as it should be, either in paying those to whom it is due, or in doing good to others. Among the ancients, the gold and silver which anyone possessed was laid up in some secret and safe place. Compare the notes at Isa 45:3. There were no banks then in which money might be deposited; there were few ways of investing money so as to produce regular interest; there were no corporations to employ money in joint operations; and it was not very common to invest money in the purchase of real estate, and stocks and mortgages were little known.
And shall eat your flesh as it were fire – This cannot be taken literally. It must mean that the effect would be as if it should corrode or consume their very flesh; that is, the fact of their laying up treasures would be followed by painful consequences. The thought is very striking, and the language in which it is conveyed is singularly bold and energetic. The effect of thus heaping up treasure will be as corroding as fire in the flesh. The reference is to the punishment which God would bring on them for their avarice and in-justice – effects that will come on all now for the same offences.
Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days – The day of judgment; the closing scenes of this world. You have been heaping up treasure; but it will be treasure of a different kind from what you have supposed. It is treasure not laid up for ostentation, or luxury, or use in future life, but treasure the true worth of which will be seen at the judgment-day. So Paul speaks of treasuring up wrath against the day of wrath, and revelation of the righteous judgment of God, Rom 2:5. There are many who suppose they are accumulating property that may be of use to them, or that may secure them the reputation of possessing great wealth, who are in fact accumulating a most fearful treasure against the day of final retribution. Every man who is rich should examine himself closely to see whether there is anything in the manner in which he has gained his property, or in which he now holds it, that will expose him to the wrath of God in the last day. That on which he so much prides himself may yet bring down on him the vengeance of heaven; and in the day of judgment he may curse his own madness and folly in wasting his probation in efforts to amass property.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 3. Your gold and silver is cankered] Instead of helping the poor, and thus honouring God with your substance, ye have, through the principle of covetousness, kept all to yourselves.
The rust of them shall be a witness against you] Your putrefied stores, your moth-eaten garments, and your tarnished coin, are so many proofs that it was not for want of property that you assisted not the poor, but through a principle of avarice; loving money, not for the sake of what it could procure, but for its own sake, which is the genuine principle of the miser. This was the very character given to this people by our Lord himself; he called them , lovers of money. Against this despicable and abominable disposition, the whole of the 12th chapter of St. Luke is levelled; but it was their easily besetting sin, and is so to the present day.
Shall eat your flesh as it were fire.] This is a very bold and sublime figure. He represents the rust of their coin as becoming a canker that should produce gangrenes and phagedenous ulcers in their flesh, till it should be eaten away from their bones.
Ye have heaped treasure together] This verse is variously pointed. The word , like as, in the preceding clause, is left out by the Syriac, and some others; and , fire, is added here from that clause; so that the whole verse reads thus: “Your gold and your silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall consume your flesh. Ye have treasured up FIRE against the last days.” This is a bold and fine image: instead of the treasures of corn, wine, and oil, rich stuffs, with silver and gold, which ye have been laying up, ye shall find a treasure, a magazine of fire, that shall burn up your city, and consume even your temple. This was literally true; and these solemn denunciations of Divine wrath were most completely fulfilled. See the notes on Matt. 24, where all the circumstances of this tremendous and final destruction are particularly noted.
By the last days we are not to understand the day of judgment, but the last days of the Jewish commonwealth, which were not long distant from the date of this epistle, whether we follow the earlier or later computation, of which enough has been spoken in the preface.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Your gold and silver is cankered; the most precious and lasting metals; yet even they, with long disuse, canker, and go to decay. Under these, other metals in esteem among them may be understood.
And the rust of them shall be a witness against you: by a prosopopoeia, that which properly belongs to living persons is ascribed to dead things, as Hab 2:11; Luk 19:40. It is as much as if he had said: The rust shall be a certain evidence against you, and which will as effectually convict you, as any living witness could do, of your folly in putting your trust in perishing things, your greediness in hoarding them up, your unmercifulness in not supplying the wants of others, and your unreasonableness in denying the use of them to yourselves, when you had rather let them lie by and perish, than enjoy the comfort of them, or do good with them. The like expression we have, Mar 6:11.
And shall eat your flesh; the rust (the witness of your covetousness and cruelty) which now eats your money, shall hereafter devour yourselves, soul and body, (which he means by flesh), viz. by procuring and kindling the wrath of God upon you, (compared to fire), and likewise by galling your consciences with a vexatious remembrance of your sin and folly; and so what in the judgment is a witness against you, in hell will be a tormentor to you.
As it were fire; as if you had reserved fire in your treasure, as well as treasure in your chests.
Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days: either this may be understood metaphorically, ye have heaped a treasure of wrath for the last days, Rom 2:5; or literally, ye have hoarded up your wealth against the last and fatal days, in which God is bringing those judgments upon you which will consume all.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
3. is cankered“rustedthrough” [ALFORD].
rust . . . witness againstyouin the day of judgment; namely, that your riches were of noprofit to any, lying unemployed and so contracting rust.
shall eat your fleshTherust which once ate your riches, shall then gnaw your conscience,accompanied with punishment which shall prey upon your bodies forever.
as . . . firenot withthe slow process of rusting, but with the swiftness ofconsuming fire.
for the last daysYehave heaped together, not treasures as ye suppose (compare Lu12:19), but wrath against the last days, namely, the comingjudgment of the Lord. ALFORDtranslates more literally, “In these last days (beforethe coming judgment) ye laid up (worldly) treasure” to noprofit, instead of repenting and seeking salvation (see on Jas5:5).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Your gold and silver is cankered,…. Or grown rusty like iron, by lying long without use; this is not easily and quickly done, but in length of time gold and silver will change, and contract a rustiness; and so this conveys the same idea of hoarding up riches and laying up money, without making use of it in trade, for the support of the poor, and without distributing it to their necessities:
and the rust of them shall be a witness against you: at the day of judgment; which will be a proof that they have not been employed to such services, and for such usefulness, for which they were designed and given.
And shall eat your flesh as it were fire; that is, a remembrance of this, a sense of it impressed upon them, shall be like fire in their bones; shall distress their minds, gnaw their consciences, and be in them the worm that never dies, and the fire that shall never be quenched:
ye have heaped treasure together for the last days; either for many years, as the fool in the Gospel, for the times of old age, the last days of men, for fear they should then want; or for the last days of the world, or of time, as if they thought they should live for ever: the Vulgate Latin version reads, “ye have treasured up wrath for yourselves in the last days”; instead of riches, as they imagined; and that by their covetousness and wickedness, by a wicked disuse of their riches, and an unrighteous detention of them; but this supplement seems to be taken from Ro 2:5 though the sense is confirmed by some copies which connect the phrase, “as it were fire”, in the preceding clause, with this, “ye have treasured up as it were fire”; and the Syriac version renders it, “ye have treasured up fire”; the fire of divine wrath; this is the fruit of treasuring up riches in an ill way, and without making a proper use of them.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
Are rusted (). Perfect passive indicative (singular for and are grouped as one) of , late verb (from , rust) with perfective sense of , to rust through (down to the bottom), found only here, Sir. 12:11, Epictetus (Diss. 4, 6, 14).
Rust (). Poison in Jas 3:8; Rom 3:13 (only N.T. examples of old word). Silver does corrode and gold will tarnish. Dioscorides (V.91) tells about gold being rusted by chemicals. Modern chemists can even transmute metals as the alchemists claimed.
For a testimony ( ). Common idiom as in Mt 8:4 (use of with accusative in predicate).
Against you (). Dative of disadvantage as in Mr 6:11 ( ) where in the parallel passage (Lu 9:5) we have ‘ . “To you” will make sense, as in Matt 8:4; Matt 10:18, but “against” is the idea here as in Lu 21:13.
Shall eat (). Future middle (late form from ) of defective verb , to eat.
Your flesh ( ). The plural is used for the fleshy parts of the body like pieces of flesh (Rev 17:16; Rev 19:18; Rev 19:21). Rust eats like a canker, like cancer in the body.
As fire ( ). Editors differ here whether to connect this phrase with , just before (as Mayor), for fire eats up more rapidly than rust, or with the following, as Westcott and Hort and Ropes, that is the eternal fire of Gehenna which awaits them (Matt 25:41; Mark 9:44). This interpretation makes a more vivid picture for (ye have laid up, first aorist active indicative of , Mt 6:19 and see Pr 16:27), but it is more natural to take it with .
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
Is cankered [] . Only here in New Testament, from ijov, rust, as in the following sentence. Also poison, as ch. 3 8. The preposition kata indicates thoroughness, completely rusted.
Flesh [ ] . The noun is plural : the fleshy parts of the body. So Sept. (2Ki 9:36) : ” the flesh [ ] of Jezebel. So Revelation 19 18.
Fuente: Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament
1) Gold and silver dishonorably gotten and hoarded brings to its holders the sure wrath of God. Human greed for material things deteriorates and thwarts the purpose of God in material things, like destructive chemicals may eat and canker gold and silver.
2) Ill gotten material gain shall eat away at the natural man like fire in his bones, like cancer in his blood, and like leprosy on his body, Luk 12:19; Luk 16:19; Luk 16:31-31; Wealth doesn’t satisfy the soul and wrongly used defames a good name, Act 5:1-11.
WHAT A FOOL I’VE BEEN!
A rich man lay dying. His little daughter couldn’t understand why her big daddy was so helpless now. She asked, “Daddy, are you going away?” Yes, dear, I am going away, and I am afraid you won’t see me again,” her father answered. The little girl asked, “Daddy have you got a nice house to go to?” The rich man was silent for a moment and then began to cry. He lamented, “What a fool I have been! I have built a great business here and have amassed riches here, but I shall be a pauper there!”
W. B. K.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
3 A witness against you. He confirms the explanation I have already given. For God has not appointed gold for rust, nor garments for moths; but, on the contrary, be has designed them as aids and helps to human life. Therefore, even spending without benefit is a witness of inhumanity. The rusting of gold and silver will be, as it were, the occasion of inflaming the wrath of God, so that it will, like fire, consume them.
Ye have heaped treasure together: These words may also admit of two explanations: — that the rich, as they would always live, are never satisfied, but weary themselves in heaping together what may be sufficient to the end of the world, — or, that they heap together the wrath and curse of God for the last day; and this second view I embrace. (138)
(138) By “last days” are commonly meant the days of the gospel. The day of judgment is often called by John, in his Gospel, “the last day;” and the same seems to be called here “the last days.” The reference made by some, to the destruction of Jerusalem, has nothing in the passage to favor it. To “heap treasure,” or to lay up a store, has an evident reference to the day of judgment, as Paul makes use of the same expression in Rom 2:5, only he adds “wrath” to it, which is also added here by the Vulg. The whole verse is conminatory, and in this sentence the rich are reminded of the issue, the final issue of their conduct. The character of the store is to be learnt from the preceding part of the verse. In treasuring dishonest wealth, they were treasuring wrath for themselves.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(3) Your gold and silver . . .In like manner, the gold and silver are said to be cankered, or eaten up with rust. The precious metals themselves do not corrode, but the base alloy does, which has been mixed with them for worldly use and device. The rust of them shall be a witness to you: not merely against, but convincing yourselves in the day of judgment; and, moreover, a sign of the fire which shall consume you. So will the wages of the traitor, and the harlot, the spoil of the thief and oppressor, burn the hands which have clutched them; the memories of the wrong shiver through each guilty soul, like the liquid fires which Muhammedans say torture the veins of the damned in the halls of Eblis.
Ye have heaped . . .Read, Ye heaped up treasures in the last days:the days of grace, given you for repentance, like the years when the long-suffering of God waited in the days of Noah (Gen. 6:3; 1Pe. 3:20), or the time during which God bore with Canaan, till the iniquity of the Amorite was full (Gen. 15:16).
Some expositors have seen in this verse an instance of Jamess belief that he was living in the last days of the worlds history; and compared his delusion with that of Paul and John (1Th. 4:15, and 1Jn. 2:18). But there was no mistake on the part of the inspired. writers; freedom from error in their Sacred office must be vindicated, or who shall sever the false gospel from the true? The simple explanation is an old onethe potential nearness of Christ, as it is called. In many ways He has been ever near each individual, as by affliction, or death, or judgment; but His actual return was probably nearer in the first ages of faith than in the brutality of the tenth century, or the splendid atheism of the fifteenth, or the intellectual pride of the nineteenth. His advent is helped or hindered by the state of Christendom itself: one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day (2Pe. 3:8), there is: neither past nor future in His sight; only the presence of His own determination: and nought retards Christs Second Coming so much as the false and feeble Christianity which prays Thy kingdom come in frequent words, but waits not as the handmaid of her Lord, with loins girded about and lights burning (Luk. 12:35), until the day dawn, and the day star arise (2Pe. 1:19).
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
3. Gold cankered Literally, rusted. Gold, however, never does truly rust, or oxidize, just as fire does not eat, or rust eat flesh. Such a fact is, of course, here only figured, as an image of the perishability of human fortunes. Bloomfield says, “Gold does not, properly, rust; yet by long use it contracts a green colour, and a sort of acid humour. The ancient gold and silver might be more liable to rust, from having a greater proportion of alloy.” That greening of gold coin was viewed as a sort of rust, as appears from the poet Theocritus, (Idyl 16,) where he says that no one would give poets money; nay, “not rub off the rust of their money and give it to them.”
Witness against you Not against, but to, you. It does not testify to any crime, but prophesies that you shall be even cankered as it is.
For the last days Literally, in last days. It is to be noted that the heaping of the treasure was within, not previous to, the last days. Both last days and day of slaughter are without the Greek article, while coming, of Jas 5:7, (where see note,) has the article. Both these terms, last days and day, clearly signify the closing days of the apostolic age of the Church, coincident with the closing days of the Jewish State. See notes on 2Th 2:7; 1Ti 4:1; 2Pe 3:3; 1Jn 2:18-22; 1Jn 4:3 ; 2Jn 1:7.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Jam 5:3. Ye have heaped treasure together, &c. The literal and most exact translation of the words is, Ye have heaped up treasure in the last days; which rendering leads us to the true interpretation of them. By the last days, we understand here the end of the Jewish state; when the temple, city, and polity, were to be all destroyedtogether,andtheRomanswouldspoilthemof all their possessions. Daniel’s four monarchies are, according to Mede, the grand calendar in holy scripture, to which the mention of times and seasons in the New Testament ought in general to be referred. These four monarchies were to succeed each other: that was the long line of time; and under the last, (that is, the Roman monarchy,) the kingdom of God was to be erected: the seventy weeks prophesied of, Dan 9:24 were to be a shorter line of time; cut out of the longer line. And the last days mentioned here, and in the parallel passages of the New Testament, were the conclusion of the seventy weeks, or shorter line of time; when the city and sanctuary, or temple, were to be destroyed with an utter desolation. See 1Ti 4:1. Heaping up treasures when that desolation was approaching, could turn to no account, because they had very little or no time to enjoythem; for the rich Jews in their dispersions did many of them share the same fate with those in Judea and Jerusalem.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Jas 5:3 . Continuation of the description of the judgment: ] a further specification of riches. ] in the N. T. . . ( Sir 12:10 ), equivalent to the simple verb, only in a stronger signification. Correctly Hornejus: loquitur populariter, nam aurum proprie aeruginem lion contrahit; so in the Epistle of Jer 11 , where it is said of gold and silver images: ; see also in the same, Jer 5:23 . With too minute accuracy, Bretschneider justifies the use of the verb here, that we are to think on gold and silver vessels which are alloyed with copper (similarly Bouman). It is no less incorrect, with Pott, to weaken the idea , that it is to be understood only of amisso auri et argenti splendore, de mutato auri colore ex flavo in viridem; against this is directly following. Wiesinger thinks that because is here used figuratively, it is a matter of indifference that rust does not affect gold; but the ideas must suit each other in the figurative expression. The verb is rather here to be justified by the fact that since rust settles on metals generally, James in his vivid concrete description did not scrupulously take into consideration the difference of metals, which, however, is not to be reckoned, with de Wette, as a “poetical exaggeration.” [220]
(namely, ), ] Most expositors agree with the explanation of Oecumenius: , ; accordingly, “The rust which has collected on your unused gold and silver will testify to your hardness, and that to your injury = .” But since the preceding describes the judgment overtaking earthly glory, can only be understood with reference to it; correctly Wiesinger: “the rust is a witness of their own destruction; in the destruction of their treasures they see depicted their own.” [221] Augusti superficially explains it: “will convince you that all riches are transitory.” After their riches are destroyed, the judgment seizes upon themselves; therefore . The subject is , “the corroding rust seizes also them, and will eat their flesh” (Wiesinger). The figurative expression, although bold and peculiar, is not unsuitable, since is considered as an effect of judgment. ] is not the present (Schneckenburger), but in the LXX. and N. T. the ordinary future for ; see Buttmann, Ausf. gr. Sprach. 114 [E. T. 58], under ; Winer, p. 82 [E. T. 110]. The object belonging to is neither = (Baumgarten), nor yet in itself indicates “bloated bodies” (Augusti, Pott: corpora lautis cibis bene pasta); also Schneckenburger lays too much stress on the expression, explaining it: emphatice, quum ejusmodi homines nihil sint nisi . According to usage, denotes the fleshy parts of the body, therefore the plural is also used with reference to one individual; comp. 2Ki 9:36 : ; further, Lev 26:29 ; Jdt 16:17 ; Rev 19:18 ; Rev 19:21 ; in definite distinction from bones, Mic 3:2-3 . It is to be remarked that in almost all these passages the same verb is united with the noun. [222] The context shows that what is spoken of is not “the consuming of the body by care and want” (Erasmus, Semler, Jaspar, Morus, Hottinger, Bouman), but the punishment of the divine judgment (Calvin, Grotius, Pott, Schneckenburger, de Wette, Wiesinger, and others). The words may be united either with what goes before or with what follows. Most expositors prefer the first combination; yet already A, the Syriac version (where is wanting), and Oecumenius in his commentary put a stop after . Grotius, Knapp, and Wiesinger, considering this construction as correct, accordingly explain it: tanquam ignem opes istas congessetis; Wiesinger states as a reason for this, that without the union with the words . . . give too feeble a meaning. But this is not the case, since the chief stress rests on (so also Lange); also James could not well reckon riches as a fire of judgment. Besides, in the O. T. the judgment is frequently represented as a devouring consuming fire, which was sufficient to suggest to James to add to ; see Psa 21:10 , LXX.: ; Isa 10:16-17 ; Isa 30:27 ( ); Eze 15:7 ; Amo 5:6 . [223] The sentiment is: After the judgment has overtaken the wealth of the rich, it will attack themselves. Kern gives the sentiment in an unsatisfactory manner: “The destruction of that which was everything to the rich will punish him with torturing sorrow, as if fire devoured his flesh.” That the already draw near is said in Jas 5:1 , and James by the words indicates that the judgment is close at hand, so that this time is the last days directly preceding the judgment; accordingly, the heaping up of treasure appears as something so much the more wicked. Estius, Calvin, Laurentius, and others incorrectly supply to the verb the word in accordance with Rom 2:5 (comp. Pro 1:18 ). The object to be supplied to , which is often used absolutely (comp. Luk 12:21 ; 2Co 12:14 ; Psa 38:7 ), is contained in the verb itself, and also follows from what has preceded. The preposition is not used instead of , and are not the last days of life (Wolf: accumulavistis divitias extremae vitae parti provisuri; Morus: cumulastis opes sub finem vitae vestrae), but the last times which precede the advent of Christ (Jas 5:7 ), not merely the final national judgment (Lange). Jachmann most erroneously takes the sentence as interrogative: Have ye collected your ( spiritual ) treasures on the day ( i.e. for the day) of judgment, in order to exhibit them?
[220] Lange strangely thinks that it is here intended to bring out the unnatural fact that the princes of Israel are become rebellious and companions of thieves: “It is as unnatural for gold and silver to be eaten up with rust, as for the glory of Israel to be as corrupted as the glory of other nations corrupts, which may be compared to base metals.”
[221] Stier incorrectly understands by rust “the guilt of sin which cleaves to mammon.”
[222] Although in itself indicates only flesh according to its separate parts, yet the expression is here chosen in order to name in a concrete manner that which is carefully nourished by the rich. According to Lange, are “the externals of religious, civil, and individual life;” and the thought of James is that “the rotten fixity described as rust in its last stage transforms itself in the fire of a revolutionary movement!”
[223] Pott: Aerugo describitur, quasi invadat membra divitum, eaque quasi, ut metallum, arrodat atque consumat et quidem , tanquam flamma membra quasi circumlabens carnemque lento dolore depascens.
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
3 Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days.
Ver. 3. And shall eat your flesh ] i.e. With hell-fire, which shall consume your flesh, nay, your souls, with eternal torments. Some strong poison is made of the rust of metals; none worse than that of money.
For the last days ] Wrath for the day of wrath; or store for old age, it being the old man’s care, as Plutarch observes, , that he shall not have what to keep him while alive, and what to bury him honestly when dead.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
3 .] your gold and your silver is rusted through (“Loquitur populariter, nam aurum proprie ruginem non contrahit.” Horneius, in Huther. In ref. Ep. Jer., we have of golden and silver images of idols, . Rust, happening generally to metals, is predicated of gold and silver without care for exact precision. So that there is no need to seek for some interpretation which may make the true of gold, as that (Bretschn.) copper vessels plated with gold are intended. The stern and vivid depiction of prophetic denunciation does not take such trifles into account. In – , the prep. gives the sense of entireness; ‘thoroughly rusted’), and the rust of them shall be for a testimony to you (not, as c., , , the rust which you have allowed to accumulate on them by want of use, shall testify against you in judgment, but, as Wiesinger and Huther rightly, seeing that the rust is the effect of judgment begun, not of want of use, the rust of them is a token what shall happen to yourselves: in the consuming of your wealth, you see depicted your own), and shall eat ( is a well-known future, contracted from : cf. Joh 2:17 , and the prophecy ref. 4 (2) Kings, ) your flesh (plur. in reff. Huther remarks that in almost all the places cited, the same verb is used with the noun) as fire (i. e. as fire devours the flesh; which will account for the use of , without giving it any emphatic meaning (“your bloated bodies,” “your flesh of which alone you consist,” and the like: see De Wette), seeing that fire consumes the flesh first). The Syr., c., Grot., Knapp, Wiesinger, al. place the period at , and connect with , explaining it, (c.), “quasi ignem in vestro malo asservastis” Grot.). But the reasons given for this are not satisfactory. There is in reality no confusion of metaphor in . . . , and no want of an expressed object in . ., the verb containing its object in itself. Ye laid up treasure in the last days (i. e. in these, the last days before the coming of the Lord, ye, instead of repenting and saving your souls, laid up treasure to no profit; employed yourselves in the vain accumulation of this world’s wealth. The aor., as so often when the course of life and action is spoken of, is used as if from the standing-point of the day of judgment, looking back over this life.
is not for , here or any where: nor is the meaning ‘ for ’ or ‘ against ’ the last days. Estins, Calvin, al., with this idea, follow the vulg. in supplying “iram” after “thesauravistis,” as in Rom 2:5 . Wolf and Morus understand by the last days , the last days of life: “Accumulavistis divitias extrem vit parti provisuri:” but this is clearly wrong in N. T. diction: cf. reff.).
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
Jas 5:3 . : in Sir 12:11 we have in reference to a mirror; the Hebrew, which is followed by the Syriac, is corrupt, but evidently read , which is the same word used in the preceding verse ( ); the Hebrew word may perhaps be used in the sense of “filth” (see Oxford Hebrew Lexicon, s.v.), and possibly this more general term is what was originally intended in the verse before us, since gold cannot strictly be said to rust. The word occurs in one other passage viz. , in Sir 29:10 , but unfortunately the Hebrew for this is wanting. The force of the is intensive. : used in Jas 3:8 of the poison of the tongue, in a figurative sense; the meaning “rust” is secondary. : this metaphor is quite in the Hebrew style; (= ), though generally used of persons, is in a fair number of instances used of inanimate things in the O.T.; cf. in the N.T. Mar 6:11 ; Luk 9:5 . : a Hellenistic form, unclassical, cf. Sir 33:23 (Sept.) , cf. Sir 11:19 , Sir 45:21 (Sept.). : “The plural is used for the fleshy parts of the body both in classical and later writers while the singular is used for the whole body” (Mayor); in the Septuagint we meet with a similar phrase in a number of cases, e.g. , Mic 3:3 . ; 2Ki 9:36 ; in these and other instances the Hebrew (= ) is always in the singular (unlike “blood,” which is often used in the plural). : this comparison must probably have been suggested by the fact that fire, in a literal sense, often figures in apocalyptic pictures, cf., e.g., Enoch , cii. 1, “And in those days when He brings a grievous fire upon you, whither will ye flee, and where will ye find deliverance?” xcvii. 3, where mention is made of “the furnace of fire,” x. 13, “the abyss of fire”; this idea arose originally because “Gehenna” was conceived of as the place of torment, and a fire in the literal sense was constantly burning in the valley of Hinnom; the fire in the place of torment is referred to in Mat 25:41 , Mar 9:44 , Jud 1:7 See Carr’s interesting note on . . : see prefatory note to this chapter.
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
cankered = rusted. Greek. katioo. Only here.
rust. Greek. ios. See Jam 3:8.
a = for (App-104.) a.
have, &c. = treasured up. See Rom 2:5. 1Co 16:2.
last days. See 2Ti 3:1.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
3.] your gold and your silver is rusted through (Loquitur populariter, nam aurum proprie ruginem non contrahit. Horneius, in Huther. In ref. Ep. Jer., we have of golden and silver images of idols, . Rust, happening generally to metals, is predicated of gold and silver without care for exact precision. So that there is no need to seek for some interpretation which may make the true of gold, as that (Bretschn.) copper vessels plated with gold are intended. The stern and vivid depiction of prophetic denunciation does not take such trifles into account. In -, the prep. gives the sense of entireness; thoroughly rusted), and the rust of them shall be for a testimony to you (not, as c., , ,-the rust which you have allowed to accumulate on them by want of use, shall testify against you in judgment,-but, as Wiesinger and Huther rightly, seeing that the rust is the effect of judgment begun, not of want of use,-the rust of them is a token what shall happen to yourselves: in the consuming of your wealth, you see depicted your own), and shall eat ( is a well-known future, contracted from : cf. Joh 2:17, and the prophecy ref. 4 (2) Kings, ) your flesh (plur. in reff. Huther remarks that in almost all the places cited, the same verb is used with the noun) as fire (i. e. as fire devours the flesh; which will account for the use of , without giving it any emphatic meaning (your bloated bodies, your flesh of which alone you consist, and the like: see De Wette), seeing that fire consumes the flesh first). The Syr., c., Grot., Knapp, Wiesinger, al. place the period at , and connect with , explaining it, (c.),-quasi ignem in vestro malo asservastis Grot.). But the reasons given for this are not satisfactory. There is in reality no confusion of metaphor in . . . , and no want of an expressed object in . ., the verb containing its object in itself. Ye laid up treasure in the last days (i. e. in these, the last days before the coming of the Lord, ye, instead of repenting and saving your souls, laid up treasure to no profit; employed yourselves in the vain accumulation of this worlds wealth. The aor., as so often when the course of life and action is spoken of, is used as if from the standing-point of the day of judgment, looking back over this life.
is not for , here or any where: nor is the meaning for or against the last days. Estins, Calvin, al., with this idea, follow the vulg. in supplying iram after thesauravistis, as in Rom 2:5. Wolf and Morus understand by the last days, the last days of life: Accumulavistis divitias extrem vit parti provisuri: but this is clearly wrong in N. T. diction: cf. reff.).
Fuente: The Greek Testament
Jam 5:3. , the rust of them) Synecdoche. Even the rust of their riches and garments will be a proof of the bondage in which their possessions were so held, that they were of no profit to any, but lay unemployed, without any return.-, to you) against you.-, shall eat) with death.-, your flesh) while yet alive: he does not say .- , as fire) A proverbial expression, respecting swift and total consumption; whereas the process of rusting was before slow and partial.- , in the last days) Men are accustomed to lay up treasures for the time to come: ye have collected it too late; you will not enjoy it. The same phrase occurs, 2Ti 3:1, where see the note. The apostle here sets forth the coming of the Lord for the terror of the wicked; in the 7th and following verses, for the comfort of the holy.
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
cankered: 2Ti 2:17
a witness: Gen 31:48, Gen 31:52, Jos 24:27, Job 16:8
and shall: Jer 19:9, Mic 3:3, Rev 17:16, Rev 20:15, Rev 21:8
Ye have: Deu 32:33, Deu 32:34, Job 14:16, Job 14:17, Rom 2:5
the last: Gen 49:1, Isa 2:2, Mic 4:1, Act 2:17, 2Pe 3:3
Reciprocal: Exo 16:20 – bred worms 2Ki 5:5 – ten changes Job 36:19 – Will Psa 39:6 – he heapeth Jer 17:11 – he that Jer 48:36 – the riches Amo 3:10 – who Hab 2:11 – the stone Zec 5:4 – and it shall remain Act 8:20 – Thy Heb 10:27 – fiery 1Pe 1:7 – that
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Jas 5:3. Witness against you means that the fact of their cankering and rusting will prove they did not need them and that they had been hoarded. For the last days denotes that these treasures will be against them at the last great day of judgment.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Jas 5:3. Your gold and your silver: the other treasures in which their riches consisted.
is cankered: corroded, eaten through with rust. Literally, gold and silver do not contract rust, and hence various explanations have been given, as, for example, vessels plated with gold; but such explanations are childish: the expression may well be employed to denote the perishable nature of money.
and the rust of them shall be a witness against you: literally, shall be a testimony to you. Some render this: the rust which you have allowed to accumulate on them from want of use shall testify against you in the judgment as an evidence of your parsimony and sinful hoarding. Thus Neander: As their unused treasures of gold and silver are devoured by rust, so this will be a witness against them, their guilt being apparent from this, that what they should have used for the advantage of others, they have suffered by want of use to be corrupted. But such a meaning is contrary to the context: it is of the destruction of the rich that St. James here speaks, not of the evidence of their crime. Hence, then, the meaning is: the rust of them shall be a testimony to your destruction; the like destruction shall befall you which befalls your gold and silver.
and shall eat your flesh: the reference being not to the destruction of the body by care, to the corroding nature of riches, but to the infliction of the Divine judgment.
as it were fire: fire being the emblem of judgment: like fire shall the rust eat your flesh. So also we speak of the devouring fire. The Lord shall swallow them up in His wrath, and the fire shall devour them (Psa 21:9).
Ye have heaped treasure together. Some render this: Ye have accumulated treasures of wrath for the day of judgment, similar to the words of St. Paul: Thou treasurest up unto thyself wrath against the day of wrath (Rom 2:5). But for this meaning the words of wrath have to be supplied. It is best to render it: Ye have heaped together treasure for destruction; treasure which shall perish.
for, or in, the last days: not in the last days of your life; but either in the days that shall precede the coming of Christ, or in the last days of the Jewish nation, when those awful judgments threatened by the prophets and predicted by Jesus Christ will be poured out upon the unbelieving and ungodly Jews. We must not forget that it is to Jews that St. James writes; and the last days is a Jewish expression for the age of the Messiah, and hence is fitly employed by the sacred writers to denote the end of the Jewish economy. The zealots during the Jewish war regarded it as a crime to be rich, and their insatiable avarice induced them to search into the houses of the rich, and to murder their inmates.
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
Verse 3
Cankered; tarnished and rusted.–Ye have heaped treasure together; that is, a treasure of wrath. While they had been toiling to accumulate worldly possessions, they had been really preparing for themselves stores of remorse and suffering to come, by their deeds of oppression.
Fuente: Abbott’s Illustrated New Testament
Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days.
Again, the construction of “cankered” is the perfect – it is and it will be till the end. Rust has the thought of poison, the poison of snakes. It is that process of poisoning your gold and silver. The verse speaks of heaping treasures together for the last days. To the Jew of this time, this was most likely the piling up of riches to take with them in death. They most likely had little thought to the prophecy aspect of the last days. One of our relatives always told everyone he was taking his money with him, that he had ordered an asbestos coffin. Might have saved his money but from where we are in medical research the cancer would get him from the asbestos poisoning.
I would like to consider the gold and silver for a moment. I think this is speaking in general of money, riches etc. Anyone that has collected coins knows that coinage of Christ’s time is still around. It isn’t in the best of condition, but the coins are still being found today. They didn’t have banks to take their money to, so many buried their money in the back yard. They are still digging up money in the old Roman Empire. Even many of the non-precious metal coinage is in fair shape, so this isn’t speaking specifically to the gold and silver coins. I have a coin that is very pitted, but the image is quite visible, and this coin dates to the time of Christ. The phrase could also refer to the jewelry that was worn at the time.
Let’s take a quick read of Mar 10:17-25, a very familiar account. “17 And when he was gone forth into the way, there came one running, and kneeled to him, and asked him, Good Master, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life? 18 And Jesus said unto him, Why callest thou me good? [there is] none good but one, [that is], God. 19 Thou knowest the commandments, Do not commit adultery, Do not kill, Do not steal, Do not bear false witness, Defraud not, Honour thy father and mother. 20 And he answered and said unto him, Master, all these have I observed from my youth. 21 Then Jesus beholding him loved him, and said unto him, One thing thou lackest: go thy way, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come, take up the cross, and follow me. 22 And he was sad at that saying, and went away grieved: for he had great possessions. 23 And Jesus looked round about, and saith unto his disciples, How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the kingdom of God! 24 And the disciples were astonished at his words. But Jesus answereth again, and saith unto them, Children, how hard is it for them that trust in riches to enter into the kingdom of God! 25 It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.”
Several things to observe. First, Christ loved the man in the condition he was in, whether lost or saved. We don’t know if he was a believer in the Old Testament sense or not, but it would appear that he was. Often this account is told in light of the man being lost and not willing to give up his riches. We aren’t told either of these items from the text.
If he believed, he may well have gone and sold all that he had, we aren’t told. Christ, however used the man to show that a rich man will have a hard time entering into the kingdom. Not that he cannot, but that he will have a hard time doing it. The costs will be great. The cost is shifting from trusting their riches to trusting God.
That is where the middle class of America is today. Trusting themselves, rather than God. To trust God instead will be very difficult for them. Remember the man in my opening illustration? The man was on his death bed, not caring one whit about his riches before he bowed before God – it was a very long hard struggle through the man’s entire life before the struggle for the kingdom was over – a hard time indeed.
Fuente: Mr. D’s Notes on Selected New Testament Books by Stanley Derickson
Gold and silver do not literally rust. They corrode and tarnish. Nevertheless corrosion does the same thing as rust. It destroys the value of the metal. Christians should use money, not hoard it. Therefore the presence of rust or corroded gold in the rich man’s treasury will bear witness to his unfaithful stewardship of his wealth. James warned that the process that destroys gold and silver is the same process that destroys the people who collect these precious metals. Hoarding wealth is a particularly serious sin for Christians since we are living in the last days, the days immediately preceding the Lord’s return. We should be using our money to get the Lord’s work done, not to enable us to live lives of luxury and laziness (cf. Mat 6:19-24).
"To lay up treasure in heaven means to use all that we have as stewards of God’s wealth. You and I may possess many things, but we do not own them. God is the Owner of everything, and we are His stewards.
"The Bible does not discourage saving, or even investing; but it does condemn hoarding." [Note: Wiersbe, p. 146.]
Hoarding, as used here, means accumulating wealth just to have lots of it, for security, prestige, or just selfishness.