Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of James 1:27
Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, [and] to keep himself unspotted from the world.
27. Pure religion ] The word still presents the outward aspect of the devout life. Better perhaps, pure worship.
undefiled ] The term seems chosen with special reference to the Pharisee’s scrupulous care to avoid anything that caused ceremonial defilement. Comp. Joh 18:28, “lest they should be defiled,” where the word is that commonly used in the LXX. for polluted, or being “unclean,” as in Lev 5:3; Lev 11:23. St James reproduces the teaching of our Lord, that the real defilement comes from within, not from without, that true purity is found in “giving alms of such things as we have” (Mar 7:20-23, Luk 11:40).
before God and the Father ] The last word seems chosen with a special reference to the duty that follows. We worship the Father when we are like Him in our care for the orphans (Psa 68:5).
To visit ] The Greek word implies somewhat more than that which we commonly attach to the English; “to care for,” “look after,” as in “God hath visited his people” (Luk 7:16).
the fatherless and widows ] These were the natural and therefore proverbial types of extremest affliction. Comp. Job 29:12-13; Sir 35:14 . We find from Act 6:1, that they occupied a prominent place in what we may venture to call the “Charity Organisation” of the Church of Jerusalem. Comp. also Act 9:39; 1Ti 5:3-10.
and to keep himself unspotted from the world ] The adjective is chosen with special reference to the “undefiled.” The “world” is used as including all the circumstances that tempt to sin, especially perhaps, the mass of unrenewed humanity out of which Christians are called, but into which they are in danger of sinking back. The real defilement to be guarded against was to be found in spiritual contact with that “world,” and not, as the Pharisee thought, in touching cup or garment that was ceremonially unclean. Comp. chap. Jas 4:4. In this fullest sense of the word, God alone can thus keep a man unspotted, but it is characteristic of St James to lay stress on the co-operation of man’s will, even, we may add, as St Paul does in “keep thyself pure” (1Ti 5:22). The teaching of St James finds a striking parallel in that of Philo, who speaks of those who practise “a ritual religion” (using the same word as St James) “instead of holiness” (Philo, p. 173). Comp. also Coleridge, Aids to Reflection, Aph. xxiii. “The outward service ( ) of ancient religion, the rites, ceremonies, and ceremonial vestments of the old law, had morality for their substance. They were the letter of which morality was the spirit; the enigma of which morality was the meaning. But morality itself is the service and ceremonial ( cultus exterior, ) of the Christian religion.”
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Pure religion – On the word here rendered religion ( threskeia), see the notes at Col 2:18. It is used here evidently in the sense of piety, or as we commonly employ the word religion. The object of the apostle is to describe what enters essentially into religion; what it will do when it is properly and fairly developed. The phrase pure religion means that which is genuine and sincere, or which is free from any improper mixture.
And undefiled before God and the Father – That which God sees to be pure and undefiled. Rosenmuller supposes that there is a metaphor here taken from pearls or gems, which should be pure, or without stain.
Is this – That is, this enters into it; or this is religion such as God approves. The apostle does not say that this is the whole of religion, or that there is nothing else essential to it; but his general design clearly is, to show that religion will lead to a holy life, and he mentions this as a specimen, or an instance of what it will lead us to do. The things which he specifies here are in fact two:
(1)That pure religion will lead to a life of practical benevolence; and,
(2)That it will keep us unspotted from the world. If these things are found, they show that there is true piety. If they are not, there is none.
To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction – To go to see, to look after, to be ready to aid them. This is an instance or specimen of what true religion will do, showing that it will lead to a life of practical benevolence. It may be remarked in respect to this:
(1)That this has always been regarded as an essential thing in true religion; because
(a) it is thus an imitation of God, who is a father of the fatherless, and a judge of the widows in his holy habitation, Psa 68:5; and who has always revealed himself as their friend, Deu 10:18; Deu 14:29; Psa 10:14; Psa 82:3; Isa 1:17; Jer 7:7; Jer 49:11; Hos 14:3.
(b) Religion is represented as leading its friends to do this, or this is required everywhere of those who claim to be religious, Isa 1:17; Deu 24:17; Deu 14:29; Exo 22:22; Job 29:11-13.
(2)Where this disposition to be the real friend of the widow and the orphan exists, there will also exist other corresponding things which go to make up the religious character. This will not stand alone. It will show what the heart is, and prove that it will ever be ready to do good. If a man, from proper motives, is the real friend of the widow and the fatherless, he will be the friend of every good word and work, and we may rely on him in any and every way in doing good.
And to keep himself unspotted from the world – Compare the Rom 12:2 note; Jam 4:4 note; 1Jo 2:15-17 note. That is, religion will keep us from the maxims, vices, and corruptions which prevail in the world, and make us holy. These two things may, in fact, be said to constitute religion. If a man is truly benevolent, he bears the image of that God who is the fountain of benevolence; if he is pure and uncontaminated in his walk and deportment, he also resembles his Maker, for he is holy. If he has not these things, he cannot have any well-founded evidence that he is a Christian; for it is always the nature and tendency of religion to produce these things. It is, therefore, an easy matter for a man to determine whether he has any religion; and equally easy to see that religion is eminently desirable. Who can doubt that that is good which leads to compassion for the poor and the helpless, and which makes the heart and the life pure?
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Jam 1:27
Pure religion and undefiled before God
The true ideal of religion
In our day, perhaps more than at any previous time, attempts have been made to define religion, to give us some description of what religion is, of what is that mysterious element that mingles so largely with, and colours so largely, human life.
Religion, says one, is the sense of the infinite overshadowing and influencing life. Religion, says another, is the determination of human life by the feeling of a bond uniting the human spirit to the mysterious spirit, whose domination over the world and himself he recognises, and to which he likes to feel himself united. Religion, says another, is the feeling of man, together with the activities, customs, and institutions springing out of that feeling concerning the relation in which he supposes himself to stand to the universe. These are some definitions of religion, culled almost at random, from modern speculative literature; and when we come from the sphere of philosophy to that of theology, and still more to that of Churchism, the definitions become almost countless. Religion in some quarters is retirement from the world to a monastery or a nunnery, and a monk or a nun is called by the distinctive name religious. The more ritual sects or Churches have called it religion, to observe devoutly and strictly certain prescribed rights and forms; and mere doctrinal sects have made religion consist in modes of belief, in holding certain opinions, in interpreting difficult passages of Scripture in a certain way. Now it is with something like a feeling of relief that one turns from all the carefully put together and logically constructed, and wonderfully polished definitions philosophical, ecclesiastical, and theological, to one like that in the text. It tells us that religion in its essence is twofold–it is charity and it is purity. On the one hand it is mercifulness, kindness, generosity in our dealings with others, as exemplified in the case of the widow and the afflicted; and on the other hand, as regards ourselves, it is purity of life in all its aspects. What has been called a white soul–a life without a stain, a life on which no shadow of dishonour rests, a life which, though led in the world, and perhaps in the busiest scenes of the world, is unspotted by the meanness and falsity and impurity found in the world. That, according to the text, is pure religion and undefiled. Now, when we take that as a definition of what religion is, and when we hold it up before us, and look steadily at it, how do we feel regarding it?
1. Well, first, does not there come to us a sense of its supreme beauty? It is told of one of the best men of our time–a man who specially exemplified the ideal of the text on both its sideshow, travelling with a party up the Nile, his character produced a profound impression on the Arab attendants, and when one said of him to the Sheik or leader of the party that in his own country he was regarded somewhat as a heretic, his reply was, He may be called what you like, he may not be a good Christian; I know not; but this I know, he is a good man. Such was the impression a character like this produced upon a Mahomedan of the desert, and such is the impression of beauty and reverence which a religious life of the kind indicated in the text is calculated to produce in time upon any mind in which a trace of goodness still lingers.
2. And close upon this thought of the beauty of religion there comes to one, in looking at the text, another and a second thought–namely, the permanence and durability of religion. We cannot conceive of a time, except, perhaps, in the final break up of society, when goodness shall not be esteemed as the highest form of human life, when charity and stainlessnes of character shall not be reverenced as the noblest expression which life can take, and the highest level to which human perfection can rise. Men may fall away from that ideal, they may run amuck in selfishness and sensuality, but they will never cease in their hearts to reverence it, and after their madness is past to come back to it again.
3. Take a third thought that the text suggests. If this be religion, how very wrong we all are in the standard and criterion we often apply in our judgment of others. We laugh when we read of the child asking her parent whether such a person is an irreligious man, a bad man, because he does not hide his face in his hat at the beginning of divine service. But are we much better ourselves? Is not our test often equally false, if not equally silly? We ask whether a man can be religious who does not hold this belief, who does not belong to this or that church? I believe it is far better not to judge our neighbours in this matter at all, for we will likely be wrong; but if we are impelled to form an opinion, let us take the measuring standard of the text and apply it. There is religion. How do they stand in this matter? I fear if you were to go through our professed religious people with a measuring rod of this kind, many of them would fall very far short, and many of them would be out of the reckoning altogether. If any of you are to judge of a fruit-tree growing in your garden, what method will you take to do so? Will you bore holes into it, and see whether the sap is running, and whether the inner bark is green, or will you uncover the roots and see whether they have a firm hold, and whether they are rightly spread where the moisture lies; or will you take note of the fruit that it produces in autumn? The last way is the better way, whatever may be said in favour of the former methods; but that is not the way most men take in pronouncing an opinion as to whether a man is religious or not, and there are very few who do not think themselves perfectly qualified to sit in judgment.
4. Once more, does not the text give us an idea of a comprehensive, widespread Catholic Church? It was said of a distinguished ecclesiastic–the remembrance of whom still lingers in the hearts of those who knew him, like a strain of sweet music–it was said of him that he was a clergyman of the Church of England and an honorary member of all other Churches. The words were uttered in contempt, and were thought by some to be a piece of irony, and of refined and scornful wit; but, to my mind, no higher tribute could be paid, for they tell how he based his idea of religion, essentially not upon dogma or rite, but upon goodness, and drew to all in whom goodness could be found as spirits, kindred with himself. I do not know myself anything that brings one more truly to the gospel than this definition of religion. Take the first half of it–charity, or, as it is put here in a strong form, visiting the fatherless and widows in their affection. Can such a life as that be carried out–except in a very spasmodic way–without a strong internal spiritual impulse, like that which comes from Christ. It is hard to raise charity from men who do not feel such an impulse. You might as well raise water from a pump without a valve. You work the piston of persuasion and push the water up, but there is no valve, and it straightway flows down again. I do not think anything can produce a life dedicated to humanity, but a self-dedication to that Christ who identified Himself with it, the strong impulse that comes from personal self-consecration to Him who bore our sins and carried our sorrows. Or take the other half of this text–Keeping ones self unspotted from the world. How hard it is for any one to do that. How hopeless the work seems to any one who tries steadily to do that. To conquer old habits, and to put down passions by philosophy, is like trying to put out a fire with a scanty supply of water or a small hose. I believe if we would walk in white, we must find our hidden life in Christ, through whom we can find a sense of forgiveness for the past, and strength for the time to come. Now, I may speak to some one here who has drifted, or who thinks he has drifted, away from Christianity. I hold up to him this idea of religion, pure and undefiled. Unless he has fallen away from goodness, as well as from Christ, he must acknowledge its perfection and its beauty. (J. C. Lees, D. D.)
Pure and undefiled religion
I. The virtue of BENEVOLENCE is here described by one of its most interesting and incumbent exercises. There is no description of persons who have a stronger claim on the tender compassions of our nature than those here specified–the widow and the orphan. It is deserving of special remark how frequently and how strongly God represents them as engaging His sympathies–how explicit and peremptory His charges are in their behalf, and how full of pointed force and heavy severity His denunciations against their oppressors (Psa 68:5; Deu 10:18; Pro 23:10-11; Exo 22:22-24). If we fancy ourselves, or any dear to us, placed by Divine providence in the conditions referred to, we are powerfully sensible how much we should value the soothing sympathy and the kind attentions of friends and fellow Christians, and how deeply we should be wounded were these to be withheld. The more strongly we are sensible of this, the more imperative does the obligation that rests upon us become in behalf of those whom the Lord has afflicted. That He afflicted them is no reason why we should. Instead of its being a time when we are to keep aloof, and to affliction to the afflicted, it is a time when we are to hear the voice of Him whose very nature is love, enjoining by His providence and by His word the exercise of sympathy and kindness. The terms of the text suggest the lesson that our benevolence must not be mere emotion–no, nor mere words, or mere regrets, and sighs, and tears. Benevolence must be evinced by beneficence. Well-wishing must manifest its sincerity by well-doing. It is not in word only, but in deed. It visits the fatherless and widows in their affliction. I need not say that to visit is to visit for the purpose of consolation and relief. It is quite obvious that under the term visiting there ought to be included all that we have it in our power to do for them: all for which visiting is of any real service. And surely there is no visitation of the fatherless and the widow more truly benevolent than that of which the object is to impart to them the consolations, the joys, the hopes of the very religion itself, by whose principles we are ourselves actuated in paying the visits.
II. The second part of practical religion, pure and undefiled, contained in the text, is to keep himself unspotted from the world. To this we give the general designation of SELF-GOVERNMENT. The style in which it is expressed is quite peculiar to the Scriptures. In this sacred book God and the world are invariably set in opposition to each other; as masters of opposite characters and opposite requirements, whose services can never be reconciled. The expression may be interpreted as including the whole of Christian purity of character. God is holy. All the precepts of God are holy; and all His truths, containing the manifestations of Himself and the motives to this purity, are holy. Purity is the first and most essential attribute of whatever comes from Him who is Light, and in whom there is no darkness at all. But the world–the fallen, apostate, alien world–is in its maxims, and principles, and ways, opposed to the purity of God. It is polluting; it is infectious. It is hard to keep white robes clean in passing through the midst of all that is defiling. It is hard to shun contagion amidst crowds infected with the plague. Such, however, in a moral and spiritual sense, must be the Christians daily and hourly endeavour. With such circumspection, jealous and incessant, is he called to walk. He must have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness. He must cleanse himself from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit, perfecting holiness in the fear of God. He must, in every department of his walk and conversation, seek to make it to all apparent that, although in the world, he is not of the world.
III. Let me now guard against prevailing and injurious MISCONCEPTIONS by one or two general observations.
1. Let not the two parts of pure and undefiled religion be separated. They too often are. There are men many a time to be found who are very humane, but who are by no means patterns of personal purity or separation from the world. They found their confidence before God on their charity as the means of pacifying His anger and conciliating His good-will, and rendering Him, if not blind altogether to their vices and their self-indulgent worldliness, at least very indulgent to them, and very gentle in His verdict against them. Men of humanity, without religion, may, no doubt, do good by the direct influence of their liberality on the temporal comfort and wellbeing of others. But they contribute as directly to an opposite result, in regard to interests of a higher order–the spiritual and eternal interests of men. And what is the body to the soul?–what is time to eternity?–what is the chaff to the wheat? saith the Lord. And even where there is not open licentiousness, where there is only a mind that seeks its happiness in the world, the character is, in one view, the more dangerous from there being the less in it that does violence to the moral principles, whilst yet there is in all so lamentable a deficiency, the destitution of the hallowing and consecrating influence of piety. The mind is almost unconsciously deceived into the impression that religion is not essential to a good character. Everything appears to go on so amiably and usefully, and, on the whole, well and happily, without it. Oh that I could impress you all, deeply, permanently, influentially, with the conviction of the radical defectiveness of all principles that do not begin with God.
2. That neither the benevolence nor the purity enjoined by the text should be separated from those Christian principles of faith by which they are produced and maintained. Scriptural faith is faith that produces practice; scriptural practice is practice that springs from faith. It is with the extreme that talks of faith, to the overlooking of practice, that James has here to do. This is clear from verses 21-26, It will not do to divorce morality from religion. The principles of religion are the only principles of true morality. They form, indeed, themselves the first and highest branch of morals; the obligation that arises from our relation to God Himself being, in the strictest sense and strongest degree, of a moral character. And as all Bible morality is founded in religion, let it not be forgotten that the Bible is a revelation of God to sinners; and that the religion of a sinner must necessarily regard God as so revealed. And this is the same thing with saying that the religion of a sinner must begin with the humble acceptance of mercy, as it is made known and offered by the gospel. (R. Wardlaw, D. D.)
Benevolence and self-government enforced
The Christian religion is eminently good-will towards men; for, like its Divine Author, it breathes a spirit of universal benevolence. The benefits which it proclaims are for the whole human race–benefits which respect as well the present as the future world. We are not to understand the apostle as proposing morality to us in the abstract, but as enforcing upon our attention the necessity of personal purity and practical piety, from the acknowledged principles of our profession. Consequently it will not be either improper or unprofitable to offer in the first instance–
I. Some observations connected with THE MOTIVES AND OBLIGATIONS OF CHRISTIAN DUTY, with especial reference to the two comprehensive duties of benevolence and self-government, described in the text. God is love tits tender mercies are over all His works. Whether we trace the character of the high and lofty One in the works of nature or in the dispensation of grace, the same benevolent trait of the Deity everywhere meets our view. What return shall we make unto the Lord for all His benefits? To present themselves a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, they acknowledge to be a reasonable service. Hence their most earnest desires are that they may be holy, even as God is holy; that they may be preserved blameless and harmless, the sons of God without rebuke, in the midst of a perverse and crooked generation. And hope supports them in their conflict with every enemy of their peace, and, in faith of the promises, they anticipate the glory that shall be revealed. But, besides motives of personal holiness, there are others also which influence our conduct as respects the world at large. Thus, both individually and collectively, the benign power of the gospel is exerted. The Christian reasons, If God so loved us, we ought also to love one another. This life we know is only a preparation for a better, and accordingly as we shall have performed our parts well or ill here to our brethren that are in the world, so will our reward be hereafter. Thus we see that our own best, our immortal interests, are inseparably connected with those duties of sympathy and charity which we owe to our less fortunate brethren. Not, indeed, that our benevolent actions, or works of any other description, possess any innate value to recommend us to the favour of God, much less to merit a reward from Him: yet a reward of grace shall be given to them who, actuated by the principles of their Divine Master, have in their generation, after His example, gone about doing good. The foregoing remarks naturally lead to a further consideration, viz., that of–
II. PRACTICE THE TEST OF RELIGIOUS PRINCIPLE. Motives of duty implies duties to be performed. It sufficiently appears that the whole of Christian duty is not comprised in a system of opinions, nor in the mere observance of external ceremonies. Our Saviour hath Himself laid down a distinguishing mark, equally applicable to both true and false disciples Mat 7:20-21). Now, one essential requisite of pure and undefiled religion the text informs us is–
1. To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction. A mind truly touched with heavenly influence will lead us to view with eyes of pity and compassion all the sons and daughters of affliction, to enter into their sorrows, and to pour into their wounds the balm of consolation. And sure I am that the humblest Christian will rejoice to have it in his power to contribute to the alleviation of the common misery.
2. To keep himself unspotted from the world. My brethren, the whole world lieth in wickedness. The carnal mind is enmity against God; it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be (Rom 8:7); The imagination of mans heart is evil from his youth (Gen 8:21); That which is born of the flesh is flesh (Joh 3:6). Now examine yourselves by the test here proposed. Inquire what are your real characters in the sight of the holy, heart-searching God. Does your sympathy for the distressed spring only from natural feeling? or are you also actuated by Christian principles and motives in visiting the fatherless and widows in their affliction? (T. Sharpies, B. A.)
Benevolence and purity essential to true religion
I. It is here asserted that religion, in order to be pleasing and acceptable unto God, must exhibit itself in acts of SYMPATHISING KINDNESS AND COMPASSION towards those who are placed in circumstances of helplessness, difficulty, and distress. As all these manifestations of benevolence could not be enumerated, they are represented by the apostle under one prominent form–that of visiting the fatherless and widows in their affliction, thus presenting a case of affliction, and an occasion for kindness, from which no age of the world and no condition of society can be altogether exempt. He knew that other losses might be more easily compensated; that other sorrows might with less difficulty be soothed; that other bereavements would leave less of helplessness and loneliness behind them. He knew that the loss of property might be repaired by liberality, industry, and perseverance; that the loss of health was not invariably without its remedy; but that the loss of the fatherless and the widow would necessarily leave a vacuum which nothing could adequately supply. It is to the alleviation of this peculiar form of affliction, therefore/that the energies and the sympathies of the pure and undefiled religion of Him who cherished every form of social and domestic tenderness, who made little children the objects of His most gracious regard, and manifested towards His mother a most filial and watchful attention, are to be specially directed. In this amiable feature of its character, indeed, Christianity stands honourably distinguished from all the other forms and theories of religion which have ever prevailed in the world. It is the pure and undefiled, the compassionate and godlike religion of Jesus Christ alone, which has taught men their duty in this respect, as well as supplied them with adequate motives to the practice of it. It is this alone which has taught its professors to regard the whole human species, amidst all the diversity of its ranks, and pursuits, and conditions, as one great family. It has thus unsealed the great fountains of human sympathy and tenderness, which had hitherto been in a great degree locked up in the unconscious ignorance of our obligations, or concealed beneath the frost of selfishness.
II. But, in connection with the exercise of sympathetic kindness and practical benevolence, the apostle subjoins another essential constituent of pure and undefiled religion–that it maintains A CHARACTER UNSTAINED BY THOSE VARIOUS FORMS OF MORAL AND SPIRITUAL POLLUTION, with which the atmosphere of the present world is so deeply impregnated. Christian charity must not be less pure than generous; though she is in the world, she must not be of the world; though she blesses the earth with her presence, her origin is from heaven, and she must never forget the high and holy motives by which she is to be actuated. Like the sunbeam, she must illumine the darkest recesses of ignorance and vice without being contaminated by the contact; she must warm the desolate abodes of poverty without kindling into pride and self-righteousness; she must dispense her blessings with an open hand, and yet ascribe all the glory to that Father of lights, from whom cometh down every good and perfect gift; she must be willing, as occasion requires and her strength allows, to mingle in scenes from which the eye of taste and the sensibilities of worldly refinement, which have net been trained in the discipline of Christian humility and self-denial, would recoil; and yet she must be as the wings of a dove, which are covered with silver, and her feathers with yellow gold. But this exemption from the predominent sway and the polluting influence of the world, as contradistinguished from true and scriptural piety, is not only necessary as the concomitant of pure religion in general, but it is also indispensable to the due exercise of the duty previously inculcated. The spirit of Christian benevolence and the spirit of the world are diametrically opposed to each other. Where every effort of labour and science and art is directed with such intense energy to the main end of multiplying and accumulating wealth, it requires a more than ordinary measure of watchfulness and prayer–of the generous, and effusive, and constraining influence of the love of Christ shed abroad in the heart, to keep it untainted by the contracting and indurating spirit of covetousness and grasping selfishness. Whatever has a tendency to concentrate the thoughts and feelings upon self, and to make the enjoyment of personal gratification the great business of life, must inevitably impede the free and spontaneous development of that great and diffusive principle of Christian love. Amidst the various trials and sufferings which are more or less inseparable from the present state of existence, she unfolds to their view a world where sin and sorrow are unknown; a world whose atmosphere is health, whose resources are exhaustless, whose pleasures are untainted, and whose honours are unfading; a world in which there are neither fatherless nor widows, because all earthly unions and relations have been lost and absorbed in the delightful fellowship of one great family, of which God Himself is the Father, Jesus Christ the Elder Brother, and the eternal Spirit the all-pervading bond of holy and affectionate communion. (J. Davies, B.D.)
The evidence of true religion
The name of religion has perhaps been as much misapplied as the thing itself has been neglected. Creeds and systems of doctrine, outward observances and forms of service, conventionalisms in the use of meats and drinks, apparel, and modes of speech, have all among different parties been dignified by the name of religion. The primary cause of the mistake is to be found in the sensuous tendencies of the sinful heart; but a secondary cause, worthy of attention, consists in not keeping distinctly in view the character and gracious relations of that glorious Being with whom religion is immediately concerned. The religion described in the text is, as it were, a continuous spiritual worship, presented, in the harmonious working of renewed emotions and their consequent actions, to our God and Father in Christ.
I. THE FIRST OUTWARD MARK OF RELIGION MENTIONED BY THE APOSTLE IS BENEFICENCE. We use this word to denote the sincere and active exercise of love toward our fellow men. The connection of such love with those emotions towards God in which religion more immediately consists is best expounded in 1Jn 4:16; 1Jn 4:20. But such beneficence admits of degrees, from the easy donation of sixpence out of the accumulations of prosperous trade up to the willingly laying down our lives for the brethren. It may be doubted, therefore, what kind and what particular motive even of beneficence is enough to satisfy the question before us. To anticipate this difficulty, the apostle lays hold of one of its most real and impressive practical displays. To visit, says he, the fatherless and the widow in their affliction.
1. Religious beneficence addresses itself to the most necessitous objects. While impure beneficence, adulterated with an admixture of selfish policy, prefers a case of smaller to one of greater affliction, that which is sound at the core, and really springs from the presence of Divine love, contemplates affliction as such, and is impelled by the greatest force of desire to that wherein it finds the extremest need. Claims arising from duty to God may sometimes modify this feeling, but regard to worldly interest or convenience, never.
2. Religious beneficence especially singles out those objects which the worldly mind is disposed to despise. A poor widow is not unfrequintly like a queen dowager forsaken by the sycophant courtiers that formerly sunned themselves in the beams of her glory. The names of charity schools and charity children have passed into terms of reproach. Among all the evidences of human degeneracy this is perhaps the most widespread and manifest, that power is adored and goodness is despised. There is, therefore, a striking singularity in the conduct of the man who seeks out the fatherless and widows in their affliction. Our natural impression at once is that a Divine flame of love has been kindled in his heart, and that he is made a partaker of the nature of Him who, in the immensity of His glorious winks, has distinguished Himself by the unveiling of His goodness and the hiding of His power.
3. Religious beneficence expresses itself in personal effort and sacrifice. It is only an easy kind of beneficence when the rich give of their abundance to the relief of the poor, or where the eloquent on stated public occasions before listening thousands raise their voices on behalf of the fatherless. A feeble pulsation of love is all that is required for such benefactions. A better proof of its power is to be found in personal effort and sacrifice, or in the doing of that which is felt to be irksome in itself. Howard, descending into the depths of dungeons, placing himself in contact with the abandoned and the outcast, breathing the tainted air, of which he at length died, was an illustrious living embodiment of what the apostle has in view.
Those who in such loving sympathies are seen bending over the beds of sickness and cheering with their presence the home of sorrow and want are truly ministering angels, and present the nearest approach to that Divine love which, as a pure and glorious atmosphere, invests the regions of the heavenly paradise.
II. THE SECOND GREAT SIGN OF TRUE RELIGION MENTIONED BY THE APOSTLE IS PERSONAL PURITY OR HOLINESS, EXPRESSED IN THE WORDS, TO KEEP HIMSELF UNSPOTTED FROM THE WORLD. This may be regarded as the natural outworking of love to God, just as beneficence is more directly that of love to mankind. If ye love Me, says the Saviour, keep My commandments. Whoso, says John, keepeth His word, in him verily is the love of God perfected. On the one side is God, the sovereign Creator and Ruler of all things, holy in all His works and righteous in all His ways, most justly demanding the worship and service of men formed originally in His own image and sustained continually by His bounteous care. On the other side is the rebellious human race, sunk in sin, estranged from its Creator, conspiring with Satan, its actual god, against His law and government, and forming in its godless spirit, its selfish maxims, and its bondage to flesh and sense, the world, which bids Him defiance. To be kept, therefore, from the world, and not to be of the world, are expressions which denote an entire renunciation of all that belongs to its spirit and its relation to God–purity, that is, from its sins. The term unspotted seems to imply a notion of the word as something not only evil in itself, but also as being apt to contaminate those who are merely passing through it. As if the society of ungodly men were like a murky, polluting atmosphere, such as often envelopes our great cities, from which small particles of defilement are continually falling in silence on the objects below, and insensibly changing the brightest colours into those most nearly allied to blackness. Obviously in such circumstances the greatest care is necessary in order to keep ones self unspotted, not only by using means of protection, but also by observing regular seasons of cleansing. The world most fully presents this danger to the followers of Christ. The spirit which breathes in their necessary intercourse with society, the occasional excitement of sinful feelings by the provocations to which they are subject, the impressions continually made on their senses, and the secularising tendency even of their own lawful business, all conspire to damp the ardour of their spiritual life and to tarnish the lustre of their graces. Few Christians are absolutely without spots. But to be able in any fair measure, by the blessing of God or the use of means, to keep ones self unspotted from the contaminations of our age, is identical with a consistent and blameless Christian life. (J. M. Charlton, M. A.)
Pure religion
At first sight this text looks had. It seems subversive of all our theologics, and ethics also. The fact is, this text of ours is in no respect the simple formula of definition it looks like. It has a profound start, and takes a prodigious reach.
I. Pure religion and undefiled. Stop, now, just there. The first proposition found in the verses is this: THERE CAN BE ONLY ONE TRUE PERSONAL RELIGION FOR THE HUMAN SOUL.
1. Some argue for a mere intellectual scheme of belief. They would rest everything upon a certain fixed group of articles of faith and practice. The Christian religion has a creed of doctrines, and has a code of morals; but it is a life.
2. Some persistently press a mere poetic scheme of humane sympathy. It begins with a sigh, Oh, I wish I could be good! It continues with a song, Nearer, my God, to Thee! But it feels no sense of sin, and confesses none; so it generally rejects need of an atonement.
3. Some would urge upon us a mere routine scheme of ritual. This is little more than sentiment become artistic, devotion transmuted into devoteeism.
4. Some seek to present us with an ascetic scheme of moral observance. Of course, at its highest development, this ends in the cell of a hermit, and the white veil of a nun. But as we meet it in ordinary life, it goes not much farther than an iron rule of obedience to precept, and a strict treasuring of tradition.
5. Some insist on a scheme of mere philanthropy and benevolence. If such people knew there was a verse like ours in the Bible, they would flaunt it as the very motto on their banner–till they learned what it meant.
II. How is a man to choose? Who shall decide when all differ so? Pure religion, and undefiled before God and the Father, is this. The next proposition may be stated thus: THE STANDARD OF REFERENCE, UP TO WHICH ALL RELIGION MUST BE BROUGHT, IS DIVINE.
1. It will not do to settle it by the opinion of others.
2. Nor will it do that ones religion be settled by himself. Any one can easily make a foolish mistake, just by thinking more highly of himself than he ought to think, and so be lost.
3. All this matter must be, and certainly will be, settled by Gods opinion, and none other whatsoever.
III. We are ready to read on now somewhat further in the text. Pure religion, and undefiled before God and the Father, is this: To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction. That is enough, and the new thought runs thus: THE TEST OF ALL TRUE PERSONAL RELIGION MAY BE FOUND IN CARE FOR THE WEAK AND LONELY.
1. The subjects of Christian charity mentioned here are typal as well as specific. Out of all classes of feeble people, the unprotected, and the helpless, God has chosen for our notice widows and orphans. The most trying condition in this world is brought to mind. A lonely mother, with fatherless children, is not only a living appeal for assistance and succour, but a thorough and exhaustive type, by which to teach the lesson that a true mans piety must be tested by the care he accepts for others.
2. But when is this duty binding? That brings out the occasion. The text says, In their affliction, that is, in the time of it and in the place of it. Our help must be given when our help is needed. Consider times of narrowness, of panic, of business depression, as offering special occasion.
3. The method of bestowing help is all found in one word of the text, visit. That cannot mean mere contribution of money; it means personal contact with those we hope to benefit. The one grand obstacle to all proper endeavour is found at the present day in the actual withdrawal of living heart from living heart in mutual acquaintance and interest.
4. But how far in such matters is one expected really to go? That inquiry is answered in our text also; the measure of obligation is quite clear. The significant lesson is taught us that religion is to be tested by feeling for the fatherless, and the feeling is to be measured by the fatherhood of God!
IV. Only on one condition can this ever be done; this is found in the final clause of the text. PERSONAL, RELIGION DEMANDS THE ENTIRE SURRENDER AND SEPARATION OF THE SOUL TO CHRIST. Unspotted from the world. Oh, how much that means! No self; no waiting for applause; no expectation of return; all this is of the world, worldly, and the true religion will have none of it. Of course, then, we all see this entire verse is addressed to Christians. Only thus can it be counted a definition. The text says that religion, pure and undefiled, is for a converted man; for an unconverted man it says nothing. Humanitarianism has nothing it does not borrow from religion. Success in all its enterprises would be secured better the moment the soul of the worker puts on Christ as a penitent believer. And he who puts on Christ, puts on also the burden of Christ. (C. S.Robinson, D. D.)
The true tests of faith
It is a paradox, and yet it is perfectly true, that man is not justified by works, and yet that man is not justified without works.
I. BETWEEN OBEDIENCE AND FAITH THERE SUBSISTS AN INSEPARABLE CONNECTION,
II. OBEDIENCE IS THE REQUISITE EVIDENCE OF FAITH. It is the one evidence. And, moreover, this is the evidence by which the world will judge. We sometimes hear the ungodly babbling they know not what about Christian doctrine, and affirming that there is so much obscure, and so much mysterious, that they cannot separate that which is practical and intelligible. But we very seldom indeed find that they bring any accusation at all against a benevolent, painstaking, self-denying, active life. (S. Robins, M. A.)
The wisdom of religion
I. TRUE RELIGION IS THE DIVINE SPRING OF PURE THOUGHT AND ACTION. As a watch is moved by its spring, so our actions are moved by the force of our inward belief. It is, therefore, of the highest importance to have true and inspiring faith, like that of a minister of the seventeenth century, when he said that the first act of religion is to know what is true of God, the second act is to express it in our lives.
II. TRUE RELIGION IS AN INWARD FORCE OR YEARNING FOR PERSONAL PURITY. It is the birth and existence of a cleansing spirit within us.
III. TRUE RELIGION IS THE FLOWING OF GODS LOVE THROUGH US TO ALL MEN WITH WHOM WE HAVE TO DO. (W. Birch.)
Pure and undefiled religion
I. TO VISIT THE FATHERLESS AND WIDOWS, THAT IS, TO BE PLENTEOUS IN GOOD WORKS; THESE ARE THE VERY BEGINNINGS AND NURSERY OF THE LOVE OF GOD.
1. There is no surer and readier step to the love of God, whom we have not seen, than by the love of our brethren, whom we see (1Jn 4:20).
2. As compassion to our brethren is a fair preparation to purity of life, so doth purity of conversation commend our liberality, and make it to be had in remembrance in the sight of the Lord. It may be bread, it is not an alms, that is brought by the hand of an oppressor or a Pharisee.
3. Therefore, in the next place, as they bear this fair correspondence, and mutually uphold each other, so we must not think it possible to separate them. Both are required at our hands; and if God hath joined them both together, let no man take upon him to divorce or put them asunder.
II. For, in the next place, THESE TWO THUS LINKED AND UNITED TOGETHER WILL KEEP RELIGION PURE AND UNDEFILED; which are as the colours and beauty of it, the beauty of holiness, which hath its colour and grace from whence it hath its being and strength, and, if it be true, will shine in the perfection of beauty. Religion, if it be true, and not a name only, is as a virgin pure and undefiled, and maketh us so, and espouseth us to Christ. So is true religion, simple and solid, full of itself, having no heterogeneous matter, but ever the same, and about the same. There is nothing in our love which soureth our justice, nothing in our justice to kill our compassion, nothing in our liberality to defile our chastity, nothing in our fear to beat down our confidence, nothing in our zeal to consume our charity. A true religious man is always himself. And as religion is pure, without mixture, so it is undefiled, and cannot subsist with pollution and profaneness. Now are our Olympics, now is the great trial to be made before God and the Father. And our religion consisteth in this, to fight it out legally (2Ti 2:5); a condition they were bound to who were admitted to those games and exercises.
III. And now I have showed you the picture of religion in little, represented it to you in these two, doing of good, and abstaining from evil; filling the hungry with good things, and purging and emptying ourselves of all uncleanness. You have seen its beauty in its graceful and glorious colours of purity and undefiledness; a picture to be hung up in the Church, nay, before God Himself. And THUS IT APPEARETH BEFORE GOD AND THE FATHER, AND HATH ITS RATIFICATION FROM HIM. Application:
1. This may serve, first, to make us in love with this religion, because it hath such a Founder as God the Father, who is wisdom itself, and can neither be deceived, nor deceive us.
2. Again, if St. James be canonical and authentic, if this be true religion, then it will make up an answer sufficient to stop the mouth of those of the Romish party who are very busy to demand at our hands a catalogue of fundamentals, and where our Church was before the days of Reformation. Do the ask what truths are fundamental? Faith supposed, as it is here, they are–charity to ourselves and others. To know this, is to know all we need to know. For is it not sufficient to know that which is sufficient to make us happy? But if nothing will satisfy them but a catalogue of particulars, they have Moses and the prophets (Luk 16:29); they have the apostles; and if they find their fundamentals not there, in vain shall they seek for them at our hands.
3. To conclude then. Men and brethren, are these things so? Is this only true religion–to do good, and to abstain from evil? If this should take place amongst the sons of men, we should have more religion and less noise. Could this religion, could the gospel of Christ prevail; could we deny ourselves and take up the cross, and keep ourselves unspotted from the world, there would be then no wars, nor rumours of wars. Let us not deceive ourselves. It is the neglect and want of this that hath been the main cause of all the hot contentions which have been, and aa yet are, in the Church of Christ; I mean, amongst those who call one another Christians; whose mark and badge it is to love one another. (A. Farindon, B. D.)
True religion
1. It is the glory of religion when it is pure. The true Christian religion is called a holy faith (Jud 1:20). No faith goeth so high for rewards, nor is so holy for precepts. Well, then, an impure life will not suit with a holy faith. Precious liquor must be kept in a clean vessel, and the mystery of the faith held in a pure conscience (1Ti 3:9). We never suit with our religion more than when the way is undefiled and the heart pure Psa 119:1; Mat 5:9).
2. That a pure religion should be kept undefiled. A holy life and a bounteous heart are ornaments to the gospel. Religion is not adorned with ceremonies, but purity and charity.
3. A great fruit and token of piety is provision for the afflicted. In Matthew
25. you see acts of charity fill up the bill. Works of mercy do well becomethem that do expect or have received mercy from God.
4. Charity singleth out the objects that are most miserable. That is true bounty when we give to those that are not able to make requital (Luk 14:12-14).
5. This charity to the poor must be performed as worship, out of respect to God. The apostle saith to visit the fatherless is worship. A Christian hath a holy art of turning duties of the second table into duties of the first; and in respect to man, they worship God. To do good, and to communicate, forget not; for with such sacrifice God is well pleased (Heb 13:16). Well, then, alms should be sacrifice; not a sin-offering, but a thank-offering to God.
6. True religion and profession is rather for Gods eye than mans. It aimeth at the approbation of God, not ostentation before men (Psa 18:23).
7. We serve God most comfortably when we consider Him as a Father in Christ. We are not servants, but have received the adoption of sons. Get an interest in God, that His work may be sweet to you.
8. The relieving of the afflicted and the unspotted life must go together.
9. The world is a dirty, defiling thing. A man can hardly walk here but he shall defile his garments.
(1) The very things of the world leave a taint upon our spirits. By worldly objects we soon grow worldly. It is hard to touch pitch and not to be defiled.
(2) The lusts of the world, they stain the glory and deface the excellency of your natures (2Pe 1:4). (Your affections were made for higher purposes than to be melted out in lusts.) The men of the world are sooty, dirty creatures. We cannot converse with them but they leave their filthiness upon us. (T. Manton.)
Why men should minister to the necessity of their brethren
1. In His law and gospel the Lord requireth this duty of love and service to be done, to whom seeing we are infinitely indebted, we herein must be obedient.
2. The remembrance of our frailty, fickleness of our worldly condition, must move to charity; for such as are rich to-day may be poor to-morrow.
3. That we are members each of each other, and all members of one body; might it not move us to mutual succour?
4. If we require example, God is rich in mercy and in all goodness; He giveth abundantly to all men, and reproacheth none.
5. If we look for a president, our Saviour Christ is our Pattern, who laid down His life for us, that we should lay down our lives (much more our goods) for the brethren.
6. If reward may allure us, we have not only therefore promise of increase and multiplying our store here, as we see was performed to the widow of Sarepta, but also of eternal blessing.
7. If punishment may terrify us, then let us recount that as God promiseth exceeding great reward, both temporal and eternal, to the merciful, so He threateneth grievous punishment, both in this life and in the life to come, to the merciless, which thing should move us.
8. If we consider that by the apostle is set down as a property and effect of true religion, without which our religion is but counterfeiting, our holiness but halting, our devotion but dissimulation before God, thereby shall we be stirred up to this duty.
9. Finally, we shall be better moved hereunto, if we shall consider that we are only stewards of these goods, and that they are committed to us upon trust. (R. Turnbull.)
The ritual of the gospel
The reference is to the externals of religious worship, the cultus exterior, the ceremonial, the ritual of worship. St. James throws into contrast the old law with its gorgeous and imposing exhibitions, with the humble simplicity of the gospel, and the self-denying duties it enjoins. If religion needs a ritual, an outside by which its highest and holiest service may be made manifest, let all that is external be evidenced in the visiting of orphans and widows in the hour of their woe and want, and in a holy separation from the defilements of a wicked world. (F. T.Bassett, M. A.)
To visit the fatherless and widows.
Visiting the fatherless and widows
I. WHAT IS MEANT BY VISITING THE FATHERLESS AND WIDOWS IN THEIR AFFLICTION.
1. The objects of our charity; the fatherless and widows in their affliction; in any want or distress wherein they need and are capable of our assistance.
2. The charitable act we are to exercise towards them who are in want or distress.
II. THIS IS A NECESSARY AND PRINCIPAL PART, AND A SIGNAL TESTIMONY, OF TRUE RELIGION. Mercy and charity are those duties which the gospel, the rule of our religion, doth in a most earnest and especial manner require and press the performance of (1Ti 1:5 : 1Co 13:13; 1Pe 4:8; Heb 13:16; Luk 3:8; Mat 5:7; Jam 2:13; 1Ti 6:17-19). Other exercises of religion can be of no value in the sight of God, where this duty of charity is neglected. What an affront must it be to God to pretend to join in prayers to Him for those who are in trouble, need, sickness, or any other adversity, if He hath put it in our own power to relieve them, and we will not! What mockery is it to come and sit before God as His people, and to hear His word, if covetousness hath so possessed our hearts that we have no regard to the most plain and express commands of it! The vanity and inefficacy of all such religious exercises, without charity, is most frequently asserted in Holy Scripture (Isa 1:11-12; Isa 1:17-18; Isa 58:6-7; Isa 58:9). The great ends of religion, the glory of God, the good of His people here, and the disposing us for heaven hereafter, are most highly promoted by charity, and therefore it must be a principal part of it.
III. IT IS A SINGULAR TESTIMONY OF TRUE RELIGION, AND WHAT IT OBLIGETH ALL SORTS OF MEN TO; TO TAKE PARTICULAR CARE OF THE FATHERLESS CHILDREN AND WIDOWS OF GODS MINISTERS IN THEIR AFFLICTION, AND TO HAVE A MORE SPECIAL REGARD TO THEM IN THE EXERCISE OF THEIR CHARITY. (L. Butler, D. D.)
Work for orphans
Dr. Guthrie whispered to me, as the children left the class, Do you see that golden-haired boy with full face and laughing eyes?
Let me tell you his story; and as we descended he continued, You see, he said, that splendid boy had followed his mother to the grave; and being friendless and shelterless, he returned when night fell and stretched himself on the grave, contented if he might but die. Next morning he was found half frozen to death. His little hands were frozen as cold as those of his dead mother or the earth on which he lay. If you had only seen him! Yes, it is a noble work which God has given us to do. (Robert Koenig.)
The Egyptian emblem of charity
A boy, naked, his heart in his hand, giving honey to a bee that has lost its wings. How beautiful and how suggestive! (A. T. Pierson, D. D.)
A scholar and a sick woman
A gentleman, near London, went to visit a woman who was sick. As he was going into room, he saw a little girl kneeling by the side of the poor womans bed. The little girl rose from her knees as soon as she saw the gentleman, and went out of the room. Who is that child? the gentleman asked. Oh, sir! said the sick woman, that is a little angel, who often comes to read her Bible to me, to my great comfort; and she has just now given me sixpence. The gentleman was so pleased with the little girls conduct, theft he wished to know how she had learned to love the Word of God and to be so kind to poor people. Finding that she was one of the scholars of a neighbouring Sunday school, he went to the school, and asked for the child. She felt rather afraid when she was called to the gentleman; but he was very kind to her, and asked her if she was the little girl that had been to read the Bible to the sick woman. She said she was. The gentleman said, My dear, what made you think of doing so? She answered, Because, sir, I find it is said in the Bible, that pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this–to visit the fatherless and the widows in their affliction. Well, said he, and did you give her any money? Yes, sir. And where did you get it? Sir, it was given me as a reward. (K. Arvine.)
Traces of Jewish habits of thought
In these large and noble words we find some traces of Jewish training and habits of thought. For when we read Pure and undefiled ritualism is to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, we instantly recognise a Jewish tone of thought and speech. Among the Jews, as among most Oriental races of the ancient world, widows and orphans were of all classes the most liable to plunder and oppression. Their inheritance was often filched from them under forms of law, now that they bad no strong arm to protect them, by an unjust judge whom they were unable to bribe, or even forcibly wrested from them by some rapacious kinsman or neighbour. Hence it was that the prophets constituted themselves the champions of the defenceless orphan and widow, denounced the curse of Heaven on all who wronged them, and even, by a bold figure of speech, declared God Himself to be the Husband of the widow and the Father of the fatherless. St. James, therefore, simply carries on the Hebrew tradition when he bids us, as part of the service, or worship, we owe to God, visit orphans and widows in their affliction. (Almoni Peloni.)
Visiting
The very word visit has a Hebrew twang in it. For, to the Jew, this word meant more than to us. God visited His people when He redeemed them from bondage, or gave them abundance for want, joy for mourning. God visited Job when he cleansed him from his leprosy and gave him twice as much as he had before. And, in like manner, we visit orphans and widows, in St. James sense of the word, not when we call upon them, or say a few kind words to them, which cost us nothing, but when we defend them from insult or wrong, when we effectively minister to their wants or comfort them in their sorrow. (Almoni Peloni.)
God-like to live for others
Just as the rosebud which refuses to unfold its petals, rots at the heart and dies, while the bud which bursts into blossom and scatters fragrance all around is healthy, and beautiful, and strong; so the man who lives to himself, dies while he lives; but the man who, forgetful of self, lives for the good and happiness of others, finds in his very unselfishness, health, and peace, and joy. In the great world around us, the sparrow gives nothing to God, yet day by day God cares for the sparrow. The worm and the insect give nothing back to God, yet God never forgets them. What is the lesson? Surely it is this, viz., that it is Godlike to work for anothers good, never looking for or expecting anything in return. (A. C. Price, B. A.)
The blessedness of charity
A story is told, in the Annals of the Round Table, of a knight who set out to find the Holy Grail Forth from the castle gate rode the knight, filled with his lofty purpose, having no eyes or ears for the common things about him, and giving no heed to the grey-bearded beggar that lay asking alms. Forth he went, and began to do many wonderful works. His sword wrought prodigies of valour, in gloomy woods by robbers strongholds, in wild mountains where the dragons lay. But he never saw the holy vision, the reward of Gods true knight. Then, spirit-broken, he gave up the quest as hopeless, and rode wearily homeward. He came with head hung down and eyes that looked upon the ground. Not for me, not for me, he muttered, is the holy vision. Then he caught sight of the beggar that lay yet at his gates, Ah, now thou shalt be helped, old man, cried the knight, for I must content myself with such small acts of pity. He sprang from his horse, and laid aside spear and crested shield, and bent over the beggar tending his wounds. He bade the servants bring him bread and wine, and himself saw all his wants supplied. And lo! as he turned, there floated the wondrous vision–he saw the Holy Grail! The truest and best service we can render is that which lies before us, in our way and next to hand. (M. G. Pearse.)
Christianity beneficent
Once, referring to the fact that orphanages are never maintained by infidels, Mr. Spurgeon used the felicitous expression, The God that answereth by orphanages, let Him be God. (H. P. Hughes, M. A.)
Philanthropy and piety
John Howard, when he grew sad about his piety, put on his hat and went out among the poor. He came back a gainer.
Active charity a part of pure religion
I. The apostles words prove, first, THAT SOMETHING MIGHT APPEAR TO BE, OR BE HELD TO BE, PURE AND UNDEFILED RELIGION, WHICH IS NOT SATISFACTORY BEFORE GOD.
1. They prove, for instance, that a scriptural and orthodox creed is not in itself sufficient.
2. Neither, it here appears, is an inactive, contemplative religion such as God approves.
II. IT SEEMED NEEDFUL THUS BRIEFLY TO HINT AT ERRORS IN THIS MATTER, FOR THE PURPOSE OF SHOWING, MORE PLAINLY WHAT IS TRUE AND UNDEFILED RELIGION.
1. It is, first, as we are here told, to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, One half of the world, as has sometimes been, said, knows not how the other half lives. This will not be the case where there is pure and undefiled religion. There will be then a principle which will lead the one half to inquire into the condition of the other. And truly, there is much need.
2. When St. James mentions the widows and the fatherless, he means, of course, the destitute and afflicted of every class. He specifies these only as most especially deserving our compassion.
3. Observe, brethren, to visit. The original word is more comprehensive than any one word of ours can fully render. It is to look round for and to inspect their circumstances: to see the assistance which they need, even as God Himself did when He visited and redeemed His people, baying seen and pitied their condition.
III. I come now to THE OTHER CHARACTERISTIC OF PURE AND UNDEFILED RELIGION–to keep himself unspotted from the world.
1. In regard to worldly business, I need not say that a man does not keep himself unspotted from the world by withdrawing from it. The cases must be few where this could be needful. Religion consists in using the world, as not abusing it.
2. The pleasures and amusements of the world are still more injurious than the business of the world, to pure and undefiled religion. Many of them, either considered in themselves, or viewed in their consequences and effects, are opposed to it altogether. They involve a waste of that time and that money which ought to be employed in the service of God and the welfare of mankind.
3. He is in danger, thirdly, from its sentiments as well as from its pleasures. Because the world, avowedly, does not take its sentiments from the Bible; but sets up its own authority, enacts its own rules, and issues its own decisions. At the same time, it must not be conceived that a man acts religiously, or thinks scripturally, merely because he opposes general opinion. The only proper course is, to be independent of general opinion; to choose a course according to our special case and circumstances, which we believe that God will approve, and which we r,-solve to follow, whether approved of men or no; whether with the world, or against the world. (Bp. Sumner.)
Unspotted from the world
Unspotted from the world
Men and women grow older in this world of ours, and as the years advance they change. Of all the changes that they undergo those of their moral natures are the most painful to watch. The boy changes into the man, and there is something lost which never seems to come back again. It is like the first glow of the morning that passes away–like the bloom on the blossom that never is restored. Your grown-up boy is wise in bad things which he used to know nothing about. His life no longer sounds with a perfectly clear ring, or shines with a perfectly white lustre. He is no longer unspotted. And then when a grown man sees and knows all this either in himself or in another, he is sure also that the change has come somehow from this boy having grown up to manhood in the midst of his fellow-men. Home, school, business, society, politics, human life in general in all its various activities–out of this have come the evil forces that have changed and soiled this life. We all think of ourselves, and in our kinder moments think of our brethren, as victims. We have not cast away the jewel, but we have fallen among thieves, and it has been taken from us. We have not merely been spotted, but spotted by the world. There is something very sublime, I think, in the Bible conception of the World which we are always meeting. The Bible touches us because it seems to know all about this world–this total of created things, this cosmos, this aggregate of disorder with purposes of order manifest all through it, this sea of tempest with its tides of law, this mixture of insignificant trifles with the most appalling solemnities, this storehouse of life and activity and influence which we are crowding on and crowded by every day, out of which come the shaping forces of our life, which we call the world. The Bible knows all about it, and so we listen when the Bible speaks. Here, then, we have one fact. Our own experience discovers it. The Bible steps in and describes it. Lives spotted by the world. The stained lives. Where is the man or woman who does not know what it means? There is the most outward sort of stain–the stain upon the reputation. It is what men see as they pass us, and know us by it for one who has struggled and been worsted. Then there are the stains upon our conduct, the impure and untrue acts which cross and cloud the fair surface of all our best activity. And then, far worst of all, there is the stain upon the heart, of which nobody but the man himself knows anything, but which to him gives all their unhappiness to the other stains, the debased motives, the low desires, the wicked passions of the inner life. These are the stains which we accumulate. They burn to our eyes even if no neighbour sees them. They burn in the still air of the Sabbath even if we do not see them in the week. You would not think for the world that your children should grow up to the same stains that have fastened upon you. You dream for them of a life unspotted from the world, and the very anxiety of that dream proves how you know that your own life is spotted and stained. And that dream for the children is almost hopeless. At any rate the danger is that you will give it up by and by, and get to expecting and excusing the stains that will come upon them as they grow older. The worst thing about all this staining power of the world is the way in which we come to think of it as inevitable. We practically believe that no man can keep himself unspotted. He must accumulate his stains. It is not true. Men do go through political life as pure and poor as any most tired mechanic lives and works at his bench. And there are merchants who do carry, through all the temptations of business life, the same high standards–hands just as clean, and hearts just as tender, as they have when they pray to God or teach their little children. And social life is lighted up with the lustre of the white, unstained robes of many a pure man or woman who walks through its very midst. But the spots fall so thick that it is easy for men to say, No one can go there and escape them. It is hopeless to try to keep yourself unspotted from the world; and then (for that comes instantly), We are not to blame for the worlds spots upon us. I said this was the worst, but there is one worse thing still. When a man comes not merely to tolerate, but to boast of the stains that the world has flung upon him; when he wears his spots as if they were jewels; when he flaunts his unscrupulousness, and his cynicism and his disbelief and his hard-heartedness in your face as the signs and badges of his superiority; when to be innocent and unsuspicious and sensitive seems to be ridiculous and weak; when it is reputable to show that we are men of the world by exhibiting the stains that the world has left upon our reputation, our conduct, and our heart, then we understand how flagrant is the danger; then we see how hard it must be to keep ourselves unspotted from the world. And now, in view of all this, we come to our religion. See how intolerant religion is. She starts with what men have declared to be impossible. She refuses to bring down her standards. She insists that men must come up to her. No man is thoroughly religious, she declares, unless he does this, which it seems so hard to do, unless he goes through this world untainted, as the sunbeam goes through the mist. There is something sublime in this unsparingness. It almost proves that our religion is Divine, when it undertakes for man so Divine a, task. It could not sustain itself in its great claim to be from God unless it took this high and godlike ground, that whoever named the name of Christ must depart from all iniquity. Our religion is not true unless it have this power in it. We must bring our faith to this test. Unless our Christianity does this for us, it is not the true religion that St. James talked of, and that the Lord Jesus came to reveal and to bestow. Let us be sure of this. We go for our assurance to the first assertion of the real character of Christianity in the life of Jesus. The very principle of the Incarnation, that without which it loses all its value, surely is this, that Christ was Himself the first Christian; that in Him was first displayed the power of that grace by which all who believed in Him were afterwards to be helped and saved. And so the life of Jesus was lived in the closest contact with His fellow-men. He was always seeing the kingdoms of the world, and all the glory of them, so realising the highest temptations to which our nature is open; always feeling an hungered, so entering into the lowest enticements that tell upon our human flesh. Tilling ourselves with this idea, then, that the spotlessness of the Saviours life is the pattern of the spotless life to which we must aspire–if we begin to study it, I think the first thing that strikes us about it is its positiveness. There are two ways of defending a castle; one by shutting yourself up in it, and guarding every loophole; the other by making it an open centre of operations from which all the surrounding country may be subdued. Is not the last the truest safety? Jesus was never guarding Himself, but always invading the lives of others with His holiness. His life was like an open stream that keeps the sea from flowing up into it by the eager force with which it flows down into the sea. He was so anxious that the world should be saved that therein was His salvation from the world. He laboured so to make the world pure that He never even had to try to be pure Himself. And so we see, by contrast, how many of our attempts at purity fail by their negativeness. A man knows that drink is ruining him, soul and body, and he makes up his mind that he will not drink again. How soon the empty hour grows wearisome. I do think that we break almost all our resolutions not to do wrong, while we keep a large proportion of our resolutions that we will do what is right. Habit, which is the power by which evil rules us, is only strong in a vacant life. And even if we could resist the evil by merely holding out against it, still should we not be like castles protecting themselves, but conquering and enriching no country around their walls? All merely negative purity has something of the taint of the impurity that it resists. The effort not to be frivolous is frivolous itself. The effort not to be selfish is very apt to be only another form of selfishness. So we are sure at once, and we learn it certainly from Christ, that the true spotlessness from the world must come, not negatively, by the garments being drawn back from every worldly contact, but positively by the garments being so essentially, Divinely pure that they fling pollution off, as sunshine, hurrying on its mission to the world, flings back the darkness that tries to stop its way. And what then? Is any such purity as Christs, so positive, so strong, possible for us? As I said, if our religion cannot help us to it, then our religion fails of its task. Now let me try to show you what the faith of Christ can do for us, if we will let it, to make us so strong that the contaminations of the world cannot affect us. I am sure that there are some of us who have come here, conscious of stains and wounds from the hard conflicts of the week, who do indeed desire to know how they can be stronger and purer.
1. In the first place, Christianity is a religion of the supernatural, and, to any one who is thoroughly in its power, it must bring the presence of a live supernaturalism, and make that the atmosphere of his life. What the poor creature needs who is standing right in the midst of the worlds defilements, catching them on every side, is it not just this: the clear, sure certainty of another world, of a spiritual world with spiritual purity for its law? It is very much as if you went out of the pure, sweet, sensitive home-life in which you have been bred, into the lowest, filthiest pollution of the city. Suppose you had to live there a week, a month. What would keep you pure from its defilement? Would it not be the constant sense, the ever-present vision, of that higher realm of life that you had come from, making your present home seem dreadful to you? Would not the very knowledge that such a higher realm of life existed be your strength and protection? Nay, to alter the illustration a little, would not your presence, if you were really radiant with the purity of the better life you came from, exalt and help some poor creature there with the knowledge of the existence and the possibility of better things? And that is just the power of the Incarnation. It opened the spiritual, the supernatural, the eternal. It was as if the clouds were broken above this human valley that we live in, and men saw the Alps above them, and took courage.
2. But this is not enough. No mere sense of the supernatural ever saved a soul. Christ must come nearer to the soul than this before it can really by Him escape the corruption that is in the world. Then there comes in all the personal relation between the soul and its Saviour. Now we must mount to think what was the purpose of the Incarnation. We must get sight of that Divine pity which saw us in our sins and came to rescue us. We must understand how clear-sighted the Creator is to see and feel the need of every one among His creatures. We must grasp the bewildering thought of a personal love for our single souls. And then all must be emphasised and condensed into the worlds tragedy. We must see the Jesus of the Cross on the Cross. And what then? Do you not see? Full of profoundest gratitude the soul looks round to see what it can give to the Saviour in token of its feeling of His love. And it can find nothing. It has nothing to give. And hopeless of finding anything, it simply gives itself. It is its own no longer. It is given away to Christ. It lives His life and not its own. Can you imagine that becoming real to a man and not changing his relation to the temptations that beset him? He feels now with Christs feeling, and corruption drops away from him as it drops away from Christ. Shame, love, hope, every good passion wakes in the soul. It walks unharmed, because it walks in this new sense of consecration.
3. When I ask somewhat more minutely into the method which Christ uses to keep His servants free from the worlds corruption, I seem to come to something like this, which seems, like so much besides in the gospel, at first surprising, and then sublimely natural and reasonable, that it is by a Christlike dedication to the world that Christ really saves us from the world. Do you see what I mean? You go to your Lord, and say, O Lord, this world is tempting me, and I fear its stains. How shall I escape it? Shall I run away from it? And the answer comes as unmistakable as if a voice spoke out of the opened sky, No; go up close to this world, and help it; feel for its wickedness; pity it; sacrifice yourself or it; so shall you be safest from its infection; so shall you be surest not to sacrifice yourself to it. They say the doctors and the nurses are least likely to catch the epidemic. If you have a friend who is dishonest or impure, the surest way to save yourself from him is to try to save him. More pure and more secure in purity than the Pharisee, man or woman, who draws back the spotless skirts from the reach of the poor fallen creature who clutches at them, is the pitying man or woman who in the nearest brotherhood or sisterhood goes close to the wretched sinner and takes him by the baud to lift him. I am not surprised to hear that the man who despises the sinner and gets as far away from him as possible has become, after all, the sharer of his sin. I am surprised if the tender sympathiser who goes to the poor slave of sin, and says, My brother, my heart bleeds for you; let me help you–I am surprised if he is not armed by his pity against the contagion of the sin he tries to help, and if he does not save both his brother and himself together. (Bp. Phillips Brooks.)
Unspotted from the world
The figure is doubtless derived from the Jewish law; the touch of the ceremonially defiled, of a grave, a carcase, a bone, or an unclean animal, imparted pollution to a man, and he had to submit to a cleansing process before he could join in the temple services or associate with his brethren. The world is graphically pictured as a graveyard, leper-house, a den of unclean beasts, through which the believer must pick his way so carefully and circumspectly that he may escape contact with the all-surrounding corruptions, and come forth with his purity unsullied and unstained. (F. T. Bassett, M. A.)
Unstained purity seen best in heaven
The bloom of the hawthorn looks like snow in Richmond Park, but nearer London, or by the roadsides, its virgin whiteness is sadly stained. Contact with the world has just such an effect upon our piety: we must away to the far-off Paradise to see holiness in its unsullied purity, and we must be much alone with God, if we would maintain a gracious life below. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Charity pure
When Charity walks into the lowest places of want, we see the beautiful purity of her garments most distinctly.
Charity and unworldliness
Such a rule as this demands a nobler spirit than that of the world, which is apt to sympathise with wealth rather than with poverty, with strength rather than with weakness, with success rather than with failure. And hence, by a simple logical advance, St. James, after bidding us visit orphans and widows, bids us keep ourselves unspotted from the world. (Almoni Peloni.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 27. Pure religion, and undefiled] Having seen something of the etymology of the word , which we translate religion, it will be well to consider the etymology of the word religion itself.
In the 28th chapter of the 4th book of his Divine Instructions, LACTANTIUS, who flourished about A. D. 300, treats of hope, true religion, and superstition; of the two latter he gives Cicero’s definition from his book De Natura Deorum, lib. ii. c. 28, which with his own definition will lead us to a correct view, not only of the etymology, but of the thing itself.
“Superstition,” according to that philosopher, “had its name from the custom of those who offered daily prayers and sacrifices, that their children might SURVIVE THEM; ut sui sibi liberi superstites essent. Hence they were called superstitiosi, superstitious. On the other hand, religion, religio, had its name from those who, not satisfied with what was commonly spoken concerning the nature and worship of the gods, searched into the whole matter, and perused the writings of past times; hence they were called religiosi, from re, again, and lego, I read.”
This definition Lactantius ridicules, and shows that religion has its name from re, intensive, and ligo, I bind, because of that bond of piety by which it binds us to God, and this he shows was the notion conceived of it by Lucretius, who laboured to dissolve this bond, and make men atheists.
Primum quod magnis doceo de rebus, et ARCTIS
RELIGIONUM animos NODIS EXSOLVERE pergo.
For first I teach great things in lofty strains,
And loose men from religion’s grievous chains.
Lucret., lib. i., ver. 930, 931
As to superstition, he says it derived its name from those who paid religious veneration to the memory of the dead, (qui superstitem memoriam defunctorem colunt,) or from those who, surviving their parents, worshipped their images at home, as household gods; aut qui, parentibus suis superstites, colebant imagines eorum domi, tanquam deos penates. Superstition, according to others, refers to novel rites and ceremonies in religion, or to the worship of new gods. But by religion are meant the ancient forms of worship belonging to those gods, which had long been received. Hence that saying of Virgil: –
Vana superstitio veterumque ignara deorum.
“Vain superstition not knowing the ancient gods.”
Here Lactantius observes, that as the ancient gods were consecrated precisely in the same way with these new ones, that therefore it was nothing but superstition from the beginning. Hence he asserts, the superstitious are those who worship many and false gods, and the Christians alone are religious, who worship and supplicate the one true God only. St. James’ definition rather refers to the effects of pure religion than to its nature. The life of God in the soul of man, producing love to God and man, will show itself in the acts which St. James mentions here. It is pure in the principle, for it is Divine truth and Divine love. It is undefiled in all its operations: it can produce nothing unholy, because it ever acts in the sight of God; and it can produce no ungentle word nor unkind act, because it comes from the Father.
The words , pure and undefiled, are supposed to have reference to a diamond or precious stone, whose perfection consists in its being free from flaws; not cloudy, but of a pure water. True religion is the ornament of the soul, and its effects, the ornament of the life.
To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction] Works of charity and mercy are the proper fruits of religion; and none are more especially the objects of charity and mercy than the orphans and widows. False religion may perform acts of mercy and charity; but its motives not being pure, and its principle being defiled, the flesh, self, and hypocrisy, spot the man, and spot his acts. True religion does not merely give something for the relief of the distressed, but it visits them, it takes the oversight of them, it takes them under its care; so means. It goes to their houses, and speaks to their hearts; it relieves their wants, sympathizes with them in their distresses, instructs them in Divine things and recommends them to God. And all this it does for the Lord’s sake. This is the religion of Christ. The religion that does not prove itself by works of charity and mercy is not of God. Reader, what religion hast thou? Has thine ever led thee to cellars, garrets, cottages, and houses, to find out the distressed? Hast thou ever fed, clothed, and visited a destitute representative of Christ?
The subject in Jas 1:11 suggests several reflections on the mutability of human affairs, and the end of all things.
1. Nature herself is subject to mutability, though by her secret and inscrutable exertions she effects her renovation from her decay, and thus change is prevented from terminating in destruction. Yet nature herself is tending, by continual mutations, to a final destruction; or rather to a fixed state, when time, the place and sphere of mutability, shall be absorbed in eternity. Time and nature are coeval; they began and must terminate together. All changes are efforts to arrive at destruction or renovation; and destruction must be the term or bound of all created things, had not the Creator purposed that his works should endure for ever. According to his promise, we look for a new heaven and a new earth; a fixed, permanent, and endless state of things; an everlasting sabbath to all the works of God.
I shall confirm these observations with the last verses of that incomparable poem, the Faery Queene, of our much neglected but unrivalled poet, Edmund Spenser: –
“When I bethink me on that speech whylear,
Of mutability, and well it weigh;
Me seems, that though she all unworthy were
Of the heaven’s rule; yet very sooth to say,
In all things else she bears the greatest sway;
Which makes me loath this state of life so tickle,
And love of things so vain to cast away;
Whose flow’ring pride, so fading and so fickle,
Short Time shall soon cut down with his consuming sickle.
Then gin I think on that which Nature sayd,
Of that same time when no more change shall be,
But stedfast rest of all things, firmly stayd
Upon the pillours of eternity,
That is contrayr to mutability:
For all that moveth, doth in change delight:
But thenceforth all shall rest eternally
With him that is the God of Sabaoth hight:
O that great Sabaoth God, grant me that Sabaoth’s sight!”
When this is to be the glorious issue, who can regret the speedy lapse of time? Mutability shall end in permanent perfection, when time, the destroyer of all things, shall be absorbed in eternity. And what has a righteous man to fear from that “wreck of matter and that crush of worlds,” which to him shall usher in the glories of an eternal day? A moralist has said, “Though heaven shall vanish like a vapour, and this firm globe of earth shall crumble into dust, the righteous man shall stand unmoved amidst the shocked depredations of a crushed world; for he who hath appointed the heavens and the earth to fail, hath said unto the virtuous soul, Fear not! for thou shalt neither perish nor be wretched.”
Dr. Young has written most nervously, in the spirit of the highest order of poetry, and with the knowledge and feeling of a sound divine, on this subject, in his Night Thoughts. Night vi. in fine.
Of man immortal hear the lofty style: –
“If so decreed, th’ Almighty will be done.
Let earth dissolve, yon ponderous orbs descend
And grind us into dust: the soul is safe;
The man emerges; mounts above the wreck,
As towering flame from nature’s funeral pyre;
O’er desolation, as a gainer, smiles;
His charter, his inviolable rights,
Well pleased to learn from thunder’s impotence,
Death’s pointless darts, and hell’s defeated storms.”
After him, and borrowing his imagery and ideas, another of our poets, in canticis sacris facile princeps, has expounded and improved the whole in the following hymn on the Judgment.
“Stand the Omnipotent decree,
Jehovah’s will be done!
Nature’s end we wait to see,
And hear her final groan.
Let this earth dissolve, and blend
In death the wicked and the just;
Let those ponderous orbs descend
And grind us into dust.
Rests secure the righteous man;
At his Redeemer’s beck,
Sure to emerge, and rise again,
And mount above the wreck.
Lo! the heavenly spirit towers
Like flames o’er nature’s funeral pyre;
Triumphs in immortal powers,
And claps her wings of fire.
Nothing hath the just to lose
By worlds on worlds destroy’d;
Far beneath his feet he views,
With smiles, the flaming void;
Sees the universe renew’d;
The grand millennial reign begun;
Shouts with all the sons of God
Around th’ eternal throne.” WESLEY
One word more, and I shall trouble my reader no farther on a subject on which I could wear out my pen and drain the last drop of my ink. The learned reader will join in the wish.
“Talia saecla suis dixerunt, currite, fusis
Concordes stabili fatorum numine Parcae.
Aggredere O magnos (aderit jam tempus!) honores,
Cara Deum soboles, magnum Jovis incrementum.
Aspice convexo nutantem pondere mundum,
Terrasque, tractusque maris, coelumque profundum:
Aspice, venturo laetentur ut omnia saeclo.
O mihi tam longae maneat pars ultima vitae,
Spiritus, et quantum sat erit tua dicere facta!”
VIRG. Eclog. iv.
There has never been a translation of this, worthy of the poet; and to such a piece I cannot persuade myself to append the hobbling verses of Mr. Dryden.
2. Taken in every point of view, Jas 1:17 is one of the most curious and singular in the New Testament. It has been well observed, that the first words make a regular Greek hexameter verse, supposed to be quoted from some Greek poet not now extant; and the last clause of the verse, with a very little change, makes another hexameter: –
, ,
‘ .
“Every goodly gift, and every perfect donation,
Is from the Father of lights, and from above it descendeth.”
The first line, which is incontestably a perfect hexameter, may have been designed by St. James, or in the course of composition may have originated from accident, a thing which often occurs to all good writers; but the sentiment itself is immediately from heaven. I know not that we can be justified by sound criticism in making any particular distinction between and our translators have used the same word in rendering both. They are often synonymous; but sometimes we may observe a shade of difference, signifying a gift of any kind, here probably meaning earthly blessings of all sorts, signifying a free gift-one that comes without constraint, from the mere benevolence of the giver; and here it may signify all spiritual and eternal blessings. Now all these come from above; God is as much the AUTHOR of our earthly good, as he is of our eternal salvation. Earthly blessings are simply good; but they are imperfect, they perish in the using. The blessings of grace and glory are supreme goods, they are permanent and perfect; and to the gift that includes these the term , perfect, is here properly added by St. James. There is a sentiment very similar to this in the ninth Olympic Ode of Pindar, l. 41: –
– –
‘ .
Man, boast of naught: whate’er thou hast is given;
Wisdom and virtue are the gifts of Heaven.
But how tame is even Pindar’s verse when compared with the energy of James!
3. In the latter part of the verse, , , which we translate, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning, there is an allusion to some of the most abstruse principles in astronomy. This is not accidental, for every word in the whole verse is astronomical. In his , Father of lights, there is the most evident allusion to the SUN, who is the father, author, or source of all the lights or luminaries proper to our system. It is not only his light which we enjoy by day, but it is his light also which is reflected to us, from the moon’s surface, by night. And it is demonstrable that all the planets – Mercury, Venus, the Earth, the Moon, Mars, Ceres, Pallas, Juno, Vesta, Jupiter, Saturn, Saturn’s Rings, and Herschel, or the Georgium Sidus, with the four satellites of Jupiter, the seven satellites of Saturn, and the six satellites of the Georgium Sidus, thirty-one bodies in all, besides the comets, all derive their light from the sun, being perfectly opaque or dark in themselves; the sun being the only luminous body in our system; all the rest being illumined by him.
The word , which we translate variableness, from , to change alternately, to pass from one change to another, evidently refers to parallax in astronomy. To give a proper idea of what astronomers mean by this term, it must be premised that all the diurnal motions of the heavenly bodies from east to west are only apparent, being occasioned by the rotation of the earth upon its axis in an opposite direction in about twenty-four hours. These diurnal motions are therefore performed uniformly round the axis or polar diameter of the earth, and not round the place of the spectator, who is upon the earth’s surface. Hence every one who observes the apparent motion of the heavens from this surface will find that this motion is not even, equal arches being described in unequal times; for if a globular body, such as the earth, describe equally the circumference of a circle by its rotatory motion, it is evident the equality of this motion can be seen in no other points than those in the axis of the circle, and therefore any object viewed from the centre of the earth will appear in a different place from what it does when observed from the surface. This difference of place of the same object, seen at the same time from the earth’s centre and surface, is called its parallax.
As I shall make some farther use of this point, in order to make it plain to those who are not much acquainted with the subject, to which I am satisfied St. James alludes, I shall introduce the following diagram: Let the circle OKNS. in the annexed figure, represent the earth, E its center, O the place of an observer on its surface, whose visible or sensible horizon is OH, and the line EST, parallel to OH, the rational, true, or mathematical horizon. Let ZDFT be considered a portion of a great circle in the heavens, and A the place of an object in the visible horizon. Join EA by a line produced to C: then C is the true place of the object, and H is its apparent place; and the angle CAH is its parallax; and, because the object is in the horizon, it is called its horizontal parallax. As OAE, the angle which the earth’s radius or semidiameter subtends to the object, is necessarily equal to its opposite angle CAH, hence the horizontal parallax of an object is defined to be the angle which the earth’s semidiameter subtends at that object.
The whole effect of parallax is in a vertical direction; for the parallactic angle is in the plane passing through the observer and the earth’s center, which plane is necessarily perpendicular to the horizon, the earth being considered as a sphere. The more elevated an object is above the horizon, the less the parallax, the distance from the earth’s center continuing the same. To make this sufficiently clear, let B represent an object at any given altitude above the visible horizon OAH; then the angle DBF, formed by the straight lines OB and EB produced to F and D, will be the parallax of the object at the given altitude, and is less than the parallax of the same object when in the visible horizon OAH, for the angle DBF is less than the angle CAH. Hence the horizontal parallax is the greatest of all diurnal parallaxes; and when the object is in the zenith, it has no parallax, the visual ray passing perpendicularly from the object through the observer to the earth’s center, as in the line Zoe.
The quantity of the horizontal parallax of any object is in proportion to its distance from the place of observation, being greater or less as the object is nearer to or farther removed from the spectator. In illustration of this point, let I be the place of an object in the sensible horizon; then will LIH be its horizontal parallax, which is a smaller angle than CAH, the horizontal parallax of the nearer object A.
The horizontal parallax being given, the distance of the object from the earth’s center, EA or EI, may be readily found in semidiameters of the earth by the resolution of the right-angled triangle OEA, in which we have given the angle OAE, the horizontal parallax, the side OE, the semidiameter of the earth, considered as unity, and the right angle AOE, to find the side EA, the distance of the object from the earth’s center. The proportion to be used in this case is: The sine of the horizontal parallax is to unity, the semidiameter of the earth, as radius, i.e. the right angle AOE, the sine of ninety degrees being the radius of a circle, is to the side EA. This proportion is very compendiously wrought by logarithms as follows: Subtract the logarithmic sine of the horizontal parallax from 10, the radius, and the remainder will be the logarithm of the answer.
Example. When the moon’s horizontal parallax is a degree, what is her distance from the earth’s center in semidiameters of the earth?
From the radius 10.0000000 Subtract the sine of 1 degree 8.2418553 Remainder the logarithm of 57.2987 1.7581447
Which is the distance of the moon in semidiameters of the earth, when her horizontal parallax amounts to a degree. If 57.2987 be multiplied by 3977, the English miles contained in the earth’s semidiameter, the product, 227876.9, will be the moon’s distance from the earth’s center in English miles.
The sun’s horizontal parallax is about eight seconds and three-fifths, as is evident from the phenomena attending the transits of Venus, of 1761 and 1769, as observed in different parts of the world: a method of obtaining the solar parallax abundantly less liable to be materially affected by error of observation than that of Hipparchus, who lived between the 154th and 163d Olympiad, from lunar eclipses; or than that of Aristarchus the Samian, from the moon’s dichotomy; or even than that of modern astronomers from the parallax of Mars when in opposition, and, at the same time, in or near his perihelion. The sun’s horizontal parallax being scarcely the four hundred and eighteenth part of that of the moon given in the preceding example, if 227876.9, the distance of the moon as found above, be multiplied by 418.6, (for the horizontal parallax decreases nearly in proportion as the distance increases), the product will be the distance of the sun from the earth’s center, which will be found to be upwards of ninety-five millions of English miles.
When we know the horizontal parallax of any object, its magnitude is easily determined. The apparent diameter of the sun, for example, at his mean distance from the earth, is somewhat more than thirty-two minutes of a degree, which is at least a hundred and eleven times greater than the double of the sun’s horizontal parallax, or the apparent diameter of the earth as seen from the sun; therefore, the real solar diameter must be at least a hundred and eleven times greater than that of the earth; i.e. upwards of 880,000 English miles. And as spherical bodies are to each other as the cubes of their diameters, if 111 be cubed, we shall find that the magnitude of the sun is more than thirteen hundred thousand times greater than that of the earth.
The whole effect of parallax being in a vertical circle, and the circles of the sphere not being in this direction, the parallax of a star will evidently change its true place with respect to these different circles; whence there are five kinds of diurnal parallaxes, viz. the parallax of longitude, parallax of latitude, parallax of ascension or descension, parallax: of declination, and parallax of altitude, the last of which has been already largely explained; and the meaning of the first four, simply, is the difference between the true and visible longitude, latitude, right ascension, and declination of an object. Besides these, there is another kind of parallax, called by modern astronomers the parallax of the earth’s Annual Orbit, by which is meant the difference between the places of a planet as seen from the sun and the earth at the same time, the former being its true or heliocentric place, and the latter its apparent or geocentric place. The ancient astronomers gave the term parallax only to the diurnal apparent inequalities of motion in the moon and planets; Ptolemy, who lived in the second century, calling prosaphaeresis orbis what is now named the parallax of the great or annual orbit. This parallax is more considerable than the diurnal parallax, as the earth’s annual orbit is more considerable than the earth’s semidiameter. This parallax, when greatest, amounts in Mars, the nearest superior planet, to upwards of forty-seven degrees; in Jupiter to near twelve degrees; in Saturn to more than six degrees, etc. In the region of the nearest fixed stars, i.e. those new ones of 1572 and 1604, double the radius of the earth’s orbit does not subtend an angle of a single minute of a degree; whence it is evident the nearest fixed stars are at least hundreds of times more distant from us than the Georgium Sidus is, whose greatest annual parallax amounts to upwards of three degrees. The annual parallaxes of the fixed stars are, in general, too minute to be measured; hence their distances from the earth must be inconceivably great.
Any farther description of parallax would be useless in reference to the subject to be illustrated.
The words , shadow of turning, either refer to the darkness in which the earth is involved in consequence of its turning round its axis once in every twenty-four hours, by means of which one hemisphere, or half of its surface, is involved in darkness, being hidden from the sun by the opposite hemisphere; or to the different portions of the earth which come gradually into the solar light by its revolution round its orbit, which, in consequence of the pole of the earth being inclined nearly twenty-three degrees and a half to the plane of its orbit, and keeping its parallelism through every part of its revolution, causes all the vicissitudes of season, with all the increasing and decreasing proportions of light and darkness, and of cold and heat.
Every person who understands the images will see with what propriety St. James has introduced them; and through this his great object is at once discernible. It is evident from this chapter that there were persons, among those to whom he wrote, that held very erroneous opinions concerning the Divine nature; viz. that God tempted or influenced men to sin, and, consequently, that he was the author of all the evil that is in the world; and that he withholds his light and influence when necessary to convey truth and to correct vice. To destroy this error he shows that though the sun, for its splendor, genial heat, and general utility to the globe and its inhabitants, may be a fit emblem of God, yet in several respects the metaphor is very imperfect; for the sun himself is liable to repeated obscurations; and although, as to his mass, he is the focus of the system, giving light and heat to all, yet he is not everywhere present, and both his light and heat may be intercepted by a great variety of opposing bodies, and other causes. St. James refers particularly to the Divine ubiquity or omnipresence. Wherever his light and energy are, there is he himself; neither his word nor his Spirit gives false or inconsistent views of his nature and gracious purposes. He has no parallax, because he is equally present everywhere, and intimately near to all his creatures; He is never seen where he is not, or not seen where he is. He is the God and Father of all; who is Above all, and Through all, and In all; “in the wide waste, as in the city full;” nor can any thing be hidden from his light and heat. There can be no opposing bodies to prevent him from sending forth his light and truth, because he is everywhere essentially present. He suffers no eclipses; he changes not in his nature; he varies not in his designs; he is ever a full, free, and eternal fountain of mercy, goodness, truth, and good will, to all his intelligent offspring. Hallelujah, the Lord God Omnipotent reigneth! Amen.
In concluding these observations, I think it necessary to refer to Mr. Wakefield’s translation of this text, and his vindication of that translation: Every good gift, and every perfect kindness, cometh down from above, from the Father of lights, with whom is no parallax, nor tropical shadow. “Some have affected,” says he, “to ridicule my translation of this verse, if it be obscure, the author must answer for that, and not the translator. Why should we impoverish the sacred writers, by robbing them of the learning and science they display? Why should we conceal in them what we should ostentatiously point out in profane authors? And if any of these wise, learned, and judicious critics think they understand the phrase shadow of turning, I wish they would condescend to explain it.” Yes, if such a sentiment were found in Aratus, or in any other ancient astronomical writer, whole pages of commentary would be written on it, and the subtle doctrine of the parallactic angle proved to be well known in itself, and its use in determining the distances and magnitudes of the heavenly bodies, to the ancients some hundreds of years before the Christian era.
The sentiment is as elegant as it is just, and forcibly points out the unchangeableness and beneficence of God. He is the Sun, not of a system, but of all worlds; the great Fountain and Dispenser of light and heat, of power and life, of order, harmony, and perfection. In him all live and move, and from him they have their being. There are no spots on his disk; all is unclouded splendor. Can he who dwells in this unsufferable and unapproachable light, in his own eternal self-sufficiency, concern himself with the affairs of mortals? Yes, for we are his offspring; and it is one part of his perfection to delight in the welfare of his intelligent creatures. He is loving to every man: he hates nothing that he has made; and his praise endureth for ever!
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Pure religion; true, sincere, genuine, Mat 5:8; Joh 15:3.
And undefiled; this seems to reflect upon the hypocritical Jews, whose religion consisted so much in external observances, and keeping themselves from ceremonial defilements, when yet they were sullied with so many moral ones, Jam 1:14; Mat 23:23; Joh 18:28; devoured widows houses. They thought their religion pure and undefiled; the apostle shows here which is really so before God; in the sight of God, and according to his judgment.
God and the Father; i.e. God who is the Father, and being only explicative, as Eph 1:3; 5:20; yet this title may be given here to God with respect to what follows, and to show that such acts of charity are acceptable to him that is called the the Judge of widows, and the Father of the fatherless, Psa 68:5.
To visit; this includes all other acts of charity to them, comforting, counselling, relieving them, &c.
The fatherless and widows; he doth not exclude others from being the objects of our charity and compassion, but instanceth in fatherless and widows, as being usually most miserable, because destitute of those relations which might be most helpful to them; and possibly in those times persecution might increase the number of widows and orphans.
In their affliction; when they had most need; lest any should think it sufficient to visit them that were rich, or in a prosperous condition.
And to keep himself unspotted from the world; untainted by the evil example of men in the world, and free from the lusts of the world, moral pollutions. The apostle doth not here define religion but only instanceth in these two things, good works and holiness of conversation, as testimonies and arguments of the truth of it.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
27. Pure . . . and undefiled“Pure”is that love which has in it no foreign admixture, asself-deceit and hypocrisy. “Undefiled” is the means of itsbeing “pure” [TITTMANN].”Pure” expresses the positive, “undefiled”the negative side of religious service; just as visitingthe fatherless and widow is the active, keeping himselfunspotted from the world, the passive side of religious duty.This is the nobler shape that our religious exercises take, insteadof the ceremonial offices of the law.
before God and theFatherliterally, “before Him who is (our) God andFather.” God is so called to imply that if we would be like ourFather, it is not by fasting, c., for He does none of these things,but in being “merciful as our Father is merciful”[CHRYSOSTOM].
visitin sympathy andkind offices to alleviate their distresses.
the fatherlesswhose”Father” is God (Ps 68:5)peculiarly helpless.
andnot in the Greek;so close is the connection between active works of mercy to others,and the maintenance of personal unworldliness of spirit, word, anddeed; no copula therefore is needed. Religion in its rise interestsus about ourselves in its progress, about our fellowcreatures: in its highest stage, about the honor of God.
keep himselfwithjealous watchfulness, at the same time praying and depending on Godas alone able to keep us (Joh 17:15;Jdg 1:24).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Pure religion and undefiled,…. That which is sincere and genuine, and free from adulteration and hypocrisy:
before God and the Father; or in the sight of God the Father of Christ, and all his people; that which is approved of by him, who is the searcher of hearts, and the trier of the reins of men, “is this”: not that the apostle is giving a full definition of true religion; only he mentions some of the effects of it, by which it is known, and without which it cannot be true and genuine; and they are these:
to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction; and not only to see them, and speak a word of comfort to them, but to communicate to them, and supply their wants, as they may require, and according to the ability God has given: where there is true religion in the heart, there is love to God; and where there is love to God, there is love to the saints; and this will show itself to them, in times of affliction and distress; and where this is wanting, religion itself is not pure and undefiled:
and to keep himself unspotted from the world: from the men of the world, who defile by their evil communications; and “from the vices of the world”, as the Arabic version renders it, which are of a defiling nature; and, where religion is in its power and purity, and the Gospel of the grace of God comes with efficacy, it teaches to separate from the rest of the world, and to deny ungodliness and worldly lusts, and to live soberly, righteously, and godly.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
Pure religion and undefiled ( ). Numerous examples in papyri and inscriptions of for ritual and reverential worship in the Roman Empire (Moulton and Milligan’s Vocabulary; Deissmann, St. Paul, p. 251). As Hort shows, this is not a definition of religion or religious worship, but only a pertinent illustration of the right spirit of religion which leads to such acts.
Before our God and Father ( ). By the side of () and so from God’s standpoint (Mr 10:27). (compound verbal adjective, alpha privative, to defile), puts in negative form (cf. Jas 1:4; Jas 1:6) the idea in (pure, clean). This (). Feminine demonstrative pronoun in the predicate agreeing with .
To visit (). Epexegetic (explaining ) present middle infinitive of , common verb to go to see, to inspect, present tense for habit of going to see. See Matt 25:36; Matt 25:43 for visiting the sick.
The fatherless and widows ( ). “The natural objects of charity in the community” (Ropes). is old word for bereft of father or mother or both. In N.T. only here and Joh 14:18. Note order (orphans before widows).
Unspotted (). Old adjective (alpha privative and , spot), spotless. This the more important of the two illustrations and the hardest to execute.
To keep (). Present active infinitive, “to keep on keeping oneself un-specked from the world” (a world, , full of dirt and slime that bespatters the best of men).
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
Undefiled [] . See on 1Pe 1:4. The two adjectives, pure and undefiled, present the positive and negative sides of purity.
To visit [] . See on Mt 25:36. James strikes a downright blow here at ministry by proxy, or by mere gifts of money. Pure and undefiled religion demands personal contact with the world ‘s sorrow : to visit the afflicted, and to visit them in their affliction. “The rich man, prodigal of money, which is to him of little value, but altogether incapable of devoting any personal attention to the object of his alms, often injures society by his donations; but this is rarely the case with that far nobler charity which makes men familiar with the haunts of wretchedness, and follows the object of its care through all the phases of his life” (Lecky, “History of European Morals,” 2, 98).
To keep [] . See on 1Pe 1:4.
Unspotted [] . See on 1Pe 1:19.
Fuente: Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament
1) The test of Christian faith is the doing of the things which Jesus taught and practiced, Mat 7:16; Mat 25:40.
2) Pure, clean, undefiled religion along side of that God approved, is to inspect, to look upon, to visit with the idea of superintending, giving to orphans and widows who are bereft of father or mother, in the midst of their tribulations or afflictions, Joh 14:18.
3) The one who engages in this pure religion, is to keep or guard himself, unspotted, unspeckled from the present world order. 1Co 9:26-27; 2Co 6:14-17.
LET ME GIVE
I do not know how long I’ll live
But while I live, Lord let me give
Some comfort to someone in need
By smile or nod – kind word or deed
And I at me do what eer I can
To ease things for my fellow man.
I want naught but to do my part
To “lift” a tired or weary heart.
To change folks frowns to smiles again –
Then I will not have lived in vain
And Ill not care how long Ill live
If I can give – and give – and give.
_ 365 Sunrays
FAREWELL, VAIN WORLD
David Brainerd, under the date of April 25, 1742, wrote in his journal:
“Farewell, vain world, my soul can bid adieu; Your Saviour taught me to abandon you. Your charms may gratify a sensual mind, But cannot please a soul for God designed Forbear to entice, cease then my soul to call; ‘Tis fixed through grace – my God shall be my all. While He thus lets me Heavenly glories view, Your beauties fade; my heart’s no room for you.”
– Gospel Herald
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
27 Pure religion. As he passes by those things which are of the greatest moment in religion, he does not define generally what religion is, but reminds us that religion without the things he mentions is nothing; as when one given to wine and gluttony boasts that he is temperate, and another should object, and say that the temperate man is he who does not indulge in excess as to wine or eating; his object is not to express the whole of what temperance is, but to refer only to one thing, suitable to the subject in hand. For they are in vain religious of whom he speaks, as they are for the most part trifling pretenders.
James then teaches us that religion is not to be estimated by the pomp of ceremonies; but that there are important duties to which the servants of God ought to attend.
To visit in necessity is to extend a helping hand to alleviate such as are in distress. And as there are many others whom the Lord bids us to succor, in mentioning widows and orphans, he states a part for the whole. There is then no doubt but that under one particular thing he recommends to us every act of love, as though he had said, “Let him who would be deemed religious, prove himself to be such by self denial and by mercy and benevolence towards his neighbors.”
And he says, before God, to intimate that it appears in deed otherwise to men, who are led astray by external masks, but that we ought to seek what pleases him. By God and Father, we are to understand God who is a father.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
RELIGION DEFINED
Jas 1:27
AT the Chicago University years since, I dropped into a classroom to listen to a recitation. It was an off-day with the boys and an immense amount of halting and stammering was done, interspersed with excuses from several for not being prepared. Among the company called up, one young fellow employed the familiar student speech, Professor, I know the answer to your question, but I cant just express it. It is doubtful if that plea has ever yet influenced a professor to a more favorable mark, simply because we believe that the average man can tell all he knows, if not more.
And yet there are ideas that beggar words! The moral and spiritual realms are most fruitful of them. Pilate asked Christ, What is truth? Christ did not then answer it. Just why He did not is purely a matter of speculation.
Father Ryan, the poet priest of Louisville, in an ode entitled, The Song of the Mystic, says what seems to suggest that thoughts often rise above the reach of words:
In the hush of the valley of silence I dream all the songs that I sing;And the music floats down the dim valley Till each finds a word for a wing,That to hearts, like the dove of the deluge,A message of peace they may bring.
But far on the deep there are billows That never shall break on the beach,And I have heard songs in the silence That never shall float into speech,And I have had dreams in the valley Too lofty for language to reach.
And I have seen thoughts in the valley,Oh! me, how my spirit was stirred!And they wear holy veils on their faces,Their footsteps can scarcely be heard:They pass through the valley like virgins,Too pure for the touch of a word!
But next to God and Truth, what definition would strain the powers of human speech above that of religion! Uninspired men, in the face of the help in our text, are constantly falling short in their speeches regarding this most important theme. One says, Religion is love another, Religion is faith; while a third defines with equal ardor, Religion is obedience to Divine Law. They are all wrong, because they are all partially right. Religion is all of those things and more.
But why do we deem it necessary to form our partial definitions of that about which we have Gods mind. If we accept the Epistle of James as inspired, then it should be expected that this definition of religion is as superior to all or any that mere men will make, as Gods mind is high above the reason of man. Upon closer study we will find this text compassing this word religion as it has never been elucidated by the unaided intellect of man. By far the most tremendous phases of spiritual life are here set forth in the strongest light.
See how this text tells the relation that ones religion sustains to his own character. We are here taught the much-needed duty of keeping ourselves unspotted from the world.
There is, then, in religion a selfishness that is righteous and right. It is the selfishness of the soul interested to be first saved and then sanctified. Many times Christ and His Apostles upbraided men for sensual selfishness, such as pride, greed, and lust; but never for the selfishness that sought some spiritual good. He said, Take no thought for your life,the physical lifewhat ye shall eat; * * nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. But of the life of the soul He sought to excite men to the most intense concern. When a young man disturbed the progress of a meeting by crying out, Master, speak to my brother, that he divide the inheritance with me, He only answered, Man, who made Me a judge or a divider over you? * * Take heed, and beware of covetousness: for a mans life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth (Luk 12:13-15). But when the rich young ruler came, saying, Good Master, what shall I do that I may inherit eternal life? Jesus loved him. Both speeches were selfish, but one was sensual in its greed, while the other was the souls cry after the eternal good. When Simon Magus wanted the Holy Ghost for the purpose of sorcery, Peter looking on him with scorn, said, Thy money perish with thee, because thou hast thought that the gift of God may be purchased with money (Act 8:20). But when the Gentiles at Samaria believed and wanted the same Holy Ghost for purposes of spiritual power, Peter was the first to lay hands on them that they might receive Him. Both appeals were self-centering, but one sensually so, whilst the other was spiritual.
Christ did not rebuke the cry of the dying robber, Lord, remember me when Thou comest into Thy Kingdom. Peter was pleased to hear from the people the Pentecostal query, Men and brethren, what shall we do? (Act 2:37). And Paul gladly regarded the jailers question, Sirs, what must I do to be saved? (Act 16:30).
For the unsaved man, personal salvation ought to take precedence over all other thought. If you have read the little booklet, The Last Pages of an Officers Diary, you will remember how that officer, whose physician had told him that thirty days, at the most, would bring lifes end, gave himself solely to the question, How can I get my soul saved? The accustomed festivities of the table, the horse, the hunt, the ball, and even business appeals he despised, saying, But I have only a month to live! How can I get my soul saved? Whoever thought of condemning that sentiment as selfish? It was so, but righteously so!
But for the soul that would be saved, personal holiness is a primary necessity. Christ said, in perfect keeping with the thought of this mornings text, But seek ye first the Kingdom of God, and His righteousness. There are not a few who are seeking the Kingdom of Heaven, but are unwilling to accept Gods righteousness. You ask them if they want to go to Heaven, and they answer, Yes, I expect to do so. Do you love holiness? and if they answered truthfully they would! say, We hate it. And yet, Gods Word for itand holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord.
Wm. Acker reminded the world of an important truth when he wrote, There is no gaining admittance into the Kingdom of Heavens privy chamber of felicity, without passing through the straight gate of purity. Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God. Though holiness be that which a sinner scorns, yet it is that which a Saviour crowns. The man who hopes to wear the coronet of Heaven must be clean. Cleanness is not a question of outward behavior. It has to do with the secret springs of the soul and is known perfectly only to God and the individual man.
Outside observers suppose every man, who behaves decorously in their presence, clean. But the man who brings such behavior knows whether his heart is right and his soul is escaping dreadful blight.
The Pharisees must often have been in honest doubt if Christs speeches were the perfect truth, but when He turned upon them and told how they covered unclean hearts beneath whited reputations, they knew full well the facts in the case. Every man knows whether his character is as clean as his public record or not, and God knows. He discovers it to himself in his private reading. He who delights in that newspaper that seems the sink of all sin and spreads before the eye the sensational reports of murder, theft, jealousies, and lust let loose, knows himself to be unclean, and all the ablutions administered by sacred hands and in consecrated pools or fonts, cleanse him in nothing.
A mans favorite books tell this tale just as well. Go into a train and watch the people draw their volumes from valises, or buy from the newsboy, and the titles will tell the state of the heart. Go into a mans library, and if he loves lust, Goethes volumes will be thumb-worn, but if he hates it and shrinks shuddering from sin, Hawthorne is his favorite instead, for Hawthorne makes sin seem what it isa hideous thing.
Every man and woman who rides through the streets knows whether the heart is clean, whether the soul is keeping itself unspotted from the world, as he looks at the theatrical advertisements that line the way. Many of them are of such a character as become perfect tests of moral integrity. They can produce but one impression on the clean mind, and that is a righteous indignation that such stains on our civilization are either permitted by law, or preserved by a low public sentiment. Then again, every city is now supplied with institutions of public entertainment that test, try, and tear down the morals of the youth, and prove and publish the immorality of many that make loud profession of purity.
What Mr. Beecher said of his city is sadly so of ours, and daily growing worse. His language was: There is many an opera in New York whose central element is reeking lust of the most detestable character. Nothing can be worse. But they take a silk string and wind about it; they cover it up with exquisite title airs and melodies and scenes, and men go to enjoy themselves, and more and more they become fascinated, and gradually they lose their manliness. If you say anything to them on the subject, they answer, Why, I do not care for those things. Oh! can a person let those outrageous abominations, be dressed up so exquisitely, and dance so gaily before his eyes, that he does not think them wicked, and be unchanged? I do not believe in that purity or that integrity which can become so accustomed to prurient sins in life, that they gently pass before them without a revolt. I believe that as a tuned ear is actually pained by hideous discords, not because the books on the philosophy of music proclaim that they are disagreeable, but because they stab the ear; so a pure nature hates all that is salacious, not because custom or religion says it is bad, but because all the power of the soul feels that it is positively abominable.
Many a man, multitudes of women, get small comfort from their faith in Christ because they are conscious of having on them the stain of the world. We cant walk in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stand in the way of sinners, nor sit in the seat of the scornful, and yet enjoy the presence of God. A Welsh clergyman tells of having seen a small boy standing outside his fathers door, crying bitterly, in need of help, yet not daring to lift the latch and enter. When asked why he cried so, why he did not go in, he replied, Mother sent me out clean this morning, but I waded in a mud-hole and now see my clothes!
It is always so if we have stained ourselves with the world. Even the gracious face of God, so fatherly in its affection, so motherly in love, is torture, not joy, when we disregard the injunction of the text and suffer Satan to soil our blood-washed garments with some crimson stain. If we are to get any joy out of our faith, if we are to be religious at all, we must strive to keep ourselves unspotted from the world.
Again, this text defines religion as a benevolent motive. It tells one how he should deport himself toward the sick and suffering.
Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction.
There are different ways of interpreting that sentence. One can take this view of it: Well, that means that I am to go over and sit with that widow who has recently buried her husband and try to cheer her up and help her to forget her sorrow. I am to call at the house of those orphans and give them some sound advice, and with that, my religious duty is done. That is a very narrow interpretation. It reminds one of the case of that woman whose sister had met with a whole flock of misfortunes. A neighbor, meeting her, asked how the afflicted sister was getting on. Oh terribly! was her reply. Two of the children are down sick, her husband is out of work, and the mortgage on their home is about to be foreclosed. Isnt it shocking! Poor thing!
Of course you have done what you could to relieve her mind!
Not yet, but I am going to send her a beautiful card at Easter.
It is a good thing to do dainty benevolences, and spread some benevolences by smiles, cards, and flowers as one passes through the world. But Christians can afford to leave that sort of religion to be proclaimed by infidels, since it is their stock in trade; and prove the better faith of evangelism by renting and furnishing houses for aged parents, providing food for widowed sisters with their children, hospitals for the sick, homes for unfortunate waifs, houses of refuge for sin-hunted youth, and the Gospel for the slums and avenues alike, for country place and town in every land.
The truest benevolence yet known is that born of the fraternal spirit of religion.
Fraternity is not a question of birth or breeding or association. Jacob and Esau were called twins, yet they were strangers in character and conduct. The poet has said, One stroke of nature makes all men kin. But if so, the kinship is of the lowest sort, that of the material, and true of the links that bind us to monkeys as well as to men. It is one stroke of grace that brings the better brotherhood. It is the religion of Jesus Christ that breaks all barriers down and starts a sympathetic throb of love for all the unfortunate beneath the sun. The home may number six sons, and yet the widowed sister knows only one brother in her sorrow, because but one of the lot has grace enough to sacrifice on the altar of her need. The only brother in the family is the one that loves, and the only religionist worthy of the name is the one who lives to relieve something of the suffering and sorrow that surrounds him.
When Alexander of Russia was a small boy his father, Nicolas, noticed that he often seemed sad. One day the father said, Alexander, of what are you thinking? Of the poor serfs! was his reply, and when I come to the throne I will emancipate them. The father tried to dissuade him from that purpose, and argued that to set them free was to sacrifice great incomes. But Alexander was steadfast, and as soon as he became emperor, the sound of clanking chains on the feet of serfs was hushed from the plains of Russia. That was religion! He had read in Gods Word that all men are brothers and believed it, and his religion was no longer in doubt when he showed the true spirit of helping most, the weakest.
Pure religion, then, does not stop with reading good resolutions, or even with having them printed, framed, and hung on the wall. We often resolve to be religious. We resolve to be benevolent. We resolve to be missionary. But those resolutions are as meaningless as many that hang on office doors; they lie unused in the mind that framed them, or take up space in church, associational, and other religious records.
The Apostles were religious men, and Moody has wisely referred to the fact, that in all their writings we find not one single resolution passed, but a whole Book was required to report their Acts.
Religion is action. Mr. Chaplin said, The religion that fancies it loves God, and yet does nothing to help its brother, and evinces no love for its brother, is not piety. It may be dogma with a worm in its heart. If you love God, you will love your fellow-men.
If we love them we will give them substantial assistance when they need it. Religion has in it that element of selfishness that makes personal salvation a first concern, but it is also unselfish enough to make the comfort of others the prime object of all after living.
When the steamer Atlantic went to pieces on Mars Rock, among those who struggled against the billows to save themselves, was a clergyman, who, after much battling, came to the shore and climbed up on the beach. But he didnt seek the fire and say, Thank God, I am safe; now I will sit down, dry my clothes, and be comfortable. Looking back on the angry waves he saw men and women struggling in their last strength and ready to go down. He cried to some sailors near at hand. Boys, launch the boat! Yonder are men freezing in the rigging of the wreck; weak women ready to yield to the hungry waves, and we must save them! Back into that foaming sea he helped row the life-saving bark, despising the suggestion of danger, and forgetting personal comfort at the sight of others peril.
That was religion. That is religion nowto help the helpless and save the sinking. The most widowed are those who are not wedded to Jesus. The most fatherless among the sons of men are those who have not found a father in God. The most threatening sea is the ocean of sin that swallows its thousands daily. The most religious man is the one who gains the love of his fellows for his Lord; discovers to darkened eyes the grace of God, and snatches drowning immortals from the Sea of Iniquity that surges about them with its threat of death.
There are a great many people in these days professing to be religious. There never were so many religious organizations in the world as now. The old issues are outnumbered by the new. Every day brings to the surface some new sect that comes forth crying, Eureka! Eureka! and its few adherents turn apostles, every one, and go out to inform the disciples of the old faiths that their doctrine is wrongto say, the Bible was never interpreted until we Spiritualists arose, or we Theosophists began; hear our doctrine and get the key to Biblical mystery.
But a system of faith is not religion. What James wants to know isHow a man lives.
For as the body without the spirit is dead, so faith without works is dead also (Jas 2:26).
God is no respecter of persons: but in every nation he that feareth Him, and worketh righteousness, is accepted with Him.
Fuente: The Bible of the Expositor and the Evangelist by Riley
(27) Pure religion . . .It will be observed that by religion here is meant religious service. No one word can express this obvious interpretation of the original, taken as it must be in completion of the verse before; and certainly religion in its ordinary sense will not convey the right idea. Real worship, we may say, pure and undefiled, beheld and acknowledged as such in the presence of God, even the Fathermark the tender pathos of His divine relationshipis this:
To visit the fatherless (or, orphans) and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.Here is the double proof of the perfect life of holiness, the savour whereof is as perpetual incense before the throne of God. And the help afforded to the helpless, put thus in the first place of the two requirements, will often bring about the secondnamely, that spotless condition of unworldliness which marks, and will ever mark, the true servant of the Lord Jesus Christ. Deeds of benevolence may be and are often done by those who are not His; but all who truly belong to Him must live a life which praises Him continually in good works; not, it is hardly needful to say, as a causebut rather the natural and inevitable result of love for Him, warming the heart within.
Scrupulous indeed were the religious contemporaries of James; they would not enter where the image of Divus Csar had its votive flame, while they were ceremonially clean for the keeping of their passoverthey went not into the judgment hall lest they should be defiled (Joh. 18:28). But He whom there they cruelly sought to slay had told them before, though in vain, that which cometh out of the man, that defileth the man (Mar. 7:20), and nothing from without can defile him (Jas. 1:15). What an eternal caution may be learned here against cold reliance upon ritual! What an instance, ever, under all varieties and forms, to be applied to themselves by the erring; persecuting, and deceitful sons of men! while, on the other hand, from these words of the wise Apostle we may be sure what is truest, nay, the only true service, acceptable and accepted, of the Most HighTo visit the fatherless and the widow, beholding in them a new image of Christ, the Man of Sorrows, is to show pity verily to Him; and at the last such pure religion will receive His own approval. Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these, my brethren, ye have done it unto me (Mat. 25:40). Blessed be the ears attuned to catch the golden cadence, for it rings in angel voices round the soothers of the sick and sorrow-laden even now!
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
27. Pure religion A worshipfulness pure from these synagogue blemishes. In order to set the quarrelsome ritualism in its true light James contrasts with it a service of the most practical nature. It is a pure worshipfulness, not that quarrels, but that pours forth deeds of beneficence.
Before As viewed by.
God and the Father More correctly, our God and Father. Pure service, as our God and Father judges, is this, etc.
Unspotted from the world The Christian is like a man walking through freshly painted objects, liable, without the greatest care, to being spotted. On every side are examples of vice and temptations to compliance which demand all his care, aided by grace from above, to make his words and his works consistent with a pure profession. Our apostle does not limit all pure religion to benevolence towards orphans and widows; he only contrasts that with the religion of captious talk. But, taking in this closing clause, all religion is comprehended.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
‘Pure religion and undefiled before our God and Father is this, to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world.’
James is here giving his own meaning to the Greek word translated ‘religion’ which elsewhere indicated ‘following ceremonial requirements’. It is not intended to indicate the formation of a new religion. It is to be read in a similar light to Isa 58:5-14. Thus he is rather saying that in the eyes of One Who is both our God and Father such ceremonial requirements fall into the background besides our concern for the widows and fatherless and our being morally pure. That is true religion in God’s eyes. In other words our main concern in what we do should not be the observance of religious ceremonial but the caring for those who are close to the Father’s heart, the fatherless who have no other father and the widows who are their mothers. See Psa 68:5 – ‘Father of the fatherless and protector of widows is God in His holy habitation’. Note that they are to be visited, not just tossed a few coins. It requires personal inconvenience. See Deu 27:19; Isa 1:17; and contrast Mar 12:40 which describes the way in which the Scribes visited widows.
‘Pure religion and undefiled.’ There is a dig here against those who considered that they could keep themselves pure and undefiled through religious rites. But the problem there is that they are concerned with external purity. But God’s people are to be concerned with the purity of the heart as revealed by God-likeness in their behaviour. That is how they will keep pure and undefiled.
‘To keep oneself unspotted from the world.’ There is in fact only one way to keep ourselves unspotted from the world, and that is to set our minds on things above and look to the Lord of glory (Jas 2:1). But it is not recommending withdrawal from the world, only from its aims. For we are to go out into the world to help the widows and fatherless. This is thus simply turning us again to the perfect Law of liberty, and to the One Who can enable us to fulfil it. It is calling on us to be perfect as our Father in Heaven in perfect (Mat 5:48) by showing love to the unlovely, by loving God with all our hearts, and by loving our neighbour as ourselves. It is to avoid the attitudes and aims of the world. See 1Jn 2:15-17. For the need to be ‘unspotted’ see 2Pe 3:14.
And one of the things that is very characteristic of the world is respect of persons. We give great respect to the rich, to the powerful, and to the aristocratic. But James will now go on to point out that this respect of persons is heartily disapproved of by God Who requires that all be treated with the same love and respect.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Jam 1:27. Pure religion By the word , religion, is often meant the worship of God; but here it evidently takes in a larger compass; namely, that menvisit the fatherless, &c. “Pure and undefiled religion, that which is clear and without any flaw or blemish before the penetrating eyes of God, even the Father, consists not merelyin speculations or forms, or even in the warmth of affection during the exercise of worship; but it is thisto take the oversight of orphans and widows in their affliction, with a tender regard to their calamitous circumstances, and endeavouring to oversee them, in such a manner as to provide for their relief, performing to others in distress suitable offices of kindness and charity; at the same time taking care to keep himself unspotted inwardlyand outwardly from those bad practices and irregular indulgencies, which so generally prevail in the world about us, where so little either of religion or morality is to be found.” Archbishop Tillotson has observed, that the word , rendered undefiled, seems here to be an allusion to the excellence of a precious stone, which consists much in its being clear, and without a flaw or cloud; and surely no gem is so precious or ornamental as the amiable temper hereby described. The word , rendered to visit, properly signifies, “to take theoversightof;” and may import, entering into measures for their subsistence, as well as going to them, and converting with them in their distresses. See Matth. xxv
Inferences.Let us learn from this chapter a holy caution, and guard against those baits of lust under which death is concealed; remembering that God has bestowed upon us a power of determining our own actions, that he tempts none to evil, nor appoints to any such temptations as he knows to be in their own nature irresistible. Be our spiritual enemies ever so powerful, or ever so artful, they cannot do us any hurt, till we betray ourselves into their hands. Yet certain it is, that their artifice and their power, in conjunction with the deceitfulness of the human heart, make it requisite, that conscious to ourselves of our deficiency in wisdom, we should ask wisdom of God. Let the liberality with which he gives it, and the royal freedom with which he has promised it, encourage us to ask it with such constancy, that we may receive daily supplies; and with such firm confidence in his goodness, that we may not waver, and be like a wave of the sea tossed by the wind.
Trusting in that supply of grace which we receive from him, let us go forth calmly and cheerfully to meet such trials as the infinite wisdom of God shall appoint or permit, how various and pressing soever they may be; remembering that they tend to improve our patience, and by patience to perfect every other grace; and that if we be not overcome, we shall be approved, and made meet to receive the crown of life which the Lord has promised to them that love him. And O, that the love of this blessed Lord, who has purchased as well as promised it, may always render us superior to every trial, and more than conquerors through him that has loved us, and thereby hath acquired to himself so just a claim to our supreme affection. With hearts faithfully engaged to him, and established in the firmest resolutions for his service, let us look with indifference upon those worldly circumstances, about which they who have no sense of a higher interest are exceedingly solicitous; and let us regulate our value of all the good things of life, by a regard to their aspect upon our religious characters and hopes.If low circumstances may improve these, let us look upon them as true exaltation; and if wealth, and dignity, and applause, may endanger these, let us rather fear them, than aspire to them. Whatever we have obtained of those things which the men of the world are most ready to covet and admire, is transitory and fading as the grass, or even as the flower of the field; and sometimes, like those beautiful, but tender productions of vegetable nature, is consumed by the excess of those causes to which it owes its existence and its beauty. “Give us, O Lord, durable riches, and righteousness, and that honour which cometh from thee, and is immortal, as its great Original.”
And with what gratitude should we direct our eyes and our hearts to the unchangeable Father of lights, and acknowledge every good and every perfect gift, as descending from him; but above all, the invaluable gift of his regenerating grace, for which, if we are of the first-fruits of his creatures, we are certainly indebted to him, and are thereby laid under the strongest engagements to consecrate ourselves continually to his service. Let us therefore listen with a most obedient regard to every intimation of his will, and set a guard upon all our passions, that they may move in sweet and harmonious subjection to it. Especially, let us be slow to wrath, and not imagine that we can be justified in the exorbitances of our angry transports, because they may possibly arise in the cause of religion. The righteousness of God is not to be promoted, but on the contrary, will be disgraced and obstructed, by such outrageous ungovernable sallies. Let every impure and malignant affection be therefore banished from our minds, and let us pray that the word of God may be so ingrafted into our souls, as to become the effectual means of our salvation. Let us not rest in a mere forgetful hearing, or indeed in an ineffectual remembrance; but having looked into the gospel, that perfect law, which by binding the soul gives it the truest liberty, let us by Divine assistance continue therein, and improve, to the immediate purposes of reformation and holiness, whatever knowledge we thereby gain; correcting whatever we observe amiss in ourselves. Particularly, let us study a proper command over our tongues, and cultivate those charitable dispositions and offices, in which true and undefiled religion is here declared to consist; that widows and orphans may give us their blessing, as their guardians and friends; and that an unspotted life, untainted with the vices of a degenerate age, may bear witness, that though in the world, we are not of it, and that we act in consistency with those sublime and holy ends to which we profess as Christians to aspire.
REFLECTIONS.1st, We have,
1. The inscription of the epistle. James, who counts it his highest honour to subscribe himself a servant of God, and, or even, of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad, wherever dispersed throughout the world, sendeth greeting, wishing that all blessings may descend upon them, whether of this world or a better.
2. He exhorts them, under the persecutions and troubles which for Christ’s sake they endured, to rejoice. My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations, and by Divine Providence are permitted to be variously exercised by the malice of the wicked; esteem their reproaches your honour, and your losses your truest gain; knowing this, by divine testimony, and happy experience, that the trying of your faith worketh patience; your faith is proved genuine by this blessed effect and every exercise of it tends to confirm your hearts in meek and humble resignation. But let patience have her perfect work; be the trials never so many, never so grievous, never so long continued, bear up under them with persevering steadfastness, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing, possessing that perfect love which calleth out all fear that hath torment, and pressing forward till you arrive at the highest eminence of grace. Note; (1.) Surrounded as we are with temptations, we have need of patience, that we faint not under our trials. (2.) Philosophy may enjoin submission, but Christianity alone can teach us to rejoice under affliction. (3.) Faith is the root of all graces: as that is vigorous, these will be in exercise. (4.) The sharpest conflicts which we have to sustain, prove in their issue, when rightly improved, the greatest blessings to our souls.
3. If we would act aright under our trials, we must be upon our knees often, to beg divine direction. If any of you lack wisdom, and know not how to act in any emergence, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men, who apply according to his word, liberally, and upbraideth not; never weary in granting, nor ever reproaching his supplicants with their unworthiness, or the multitude of the favours which he bestows; and it shall be given him; all the counsel and assistance which such a one needs, shall be bestowed in answer to his prayer. But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering; not distrusting the faithfulness, power, and grace of God in Christ, however difficult and embarrassed his circumstances may be: for he that wavereth, is like a wave of the sea, driven with the wind, and tossed; the sport of every gust of temptation, restless, impatient, fluctuating, unsettled in principle and practice: for let not that man think that he shall receive any thing of the Lord, while he dishonours him by his unbelief and fickleness. Such a double-minded man, divided between Christ and the world, halting between both, and willing to reconcile the incompatible services of God and Mammon, is unstable in all his ways, and, having no fixed end in view, can never prosper in his soul, nor expect an answer to his prayers. Note; (1.) We have every encouragement to approach a throne of grace; and every possible assurance of finding relief there, if we draw near in faith. How perverse and foolish then must we be, if we make not use of this invaluable privilege? They who come to God with their requests, must honour him by their confidence in his power, truth, and love; unbelief shuts out the blessing. (2.) When the heart is unstable and wavering, prayer cannot ascend with acceptance before God.
4. Let the brother of low degree rejoice in that he is exalted to the riches of grace, and the transcendent dignity of being an heir of glory; but the rich brother, in that he is made low; taught, amidst all his affluence and grandeur, true poverty of spirit, and lowliness of mind, and ready ever to part with any thing that he possesses for the sake of Christ, because he knows the fleeting and perishing nature of all worldly wealth, and that as a flower of the grass he shall pass away, and leave it all behind. For the sun is no sooner risen with a burning heat, but it withereth the grass, and the flower thereof falleth, and the grace of the fashion of it perisheth: so also shall the rich man fade away in his ways. Often in this world riches make themselves wings, and fly away as an eagle towards heaven, and death at farthest will prove their vanity.
5. A blessing is pronounced upon faithful perseverance. Blessed is the man that endureth temptation; far from proving his heart, his trials in their issue tend to advance his truest felicity: for when he is tried, as the gold in the furnace, and comes forth brighter from the fires, he shall receive the crown of life and glory, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, hath promised, and will at the great day of his appearing assuredly give to them that perseveringly love him. Note; (1.) We must be tried, before we can be crowned. (2.) The reward of fidelity is still the gift of God, who freely promises it, and by his grace supports the faithful, and of his mercy bestows the crown of life.
2nd, Concerning the cause of all the evil of sin which we fall into, when brought into temptation, we are taught,
1. That it is not to be imputed to God. Let no man say when he is tempted to commit sin, in order to extricate himself from suffering, I am tempted of God; for this is abominably impious, since God, who is in his nature perfectly holy, cannot himself be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man to iniquity, whatever providential afflictions he may lay upon him. Note; We are very apt to cast our sins at God’s door, and to blame him for putting us into such temptations; whereas our trials are designed to exercise our graces, and not to draw us into sin.
2. We have only ourselves to blame for all the evil which is in us. But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed; foolishly and perversely following the bait which Satan lays, beguiled by his enticements, and led by corrupt affections from the paths of truth and holiness. Then when lust hath conceived, in thought and desire, it bringeth forth sin, gaining the consent of the will to the perpetration of iniquity; and sin when it is finished, in the act, and impenitently persisted in, bringeth forth death of body and soul for ever. Do not err, my beloved brethren, by entertaining false and injurious conceptions of the blessed God in this matter. Note; (1.) The root of all evil is in our own fallen hearts. (2.) Sin enslaves by flattery; it is the deceitfulness of unrighteousness yielded to, which proves our ruin; and false hope supports vain confidence, till it appears that there is a lie in our right hand. (3.) If we do not destroy the power of sin, we may be assured that it will finally destroy us.
3. All the good which is in us, proceeds from God. Every good gift, and every perfect gift, every bounty of Providence, and every spiritual endowment, which tends to the perfection of our nature in knowledge and holiness, is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, the Author of all light, natural, moral, spiritual, or eternal; with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning. The sun that gilds the firmament, is obscured often by clouds, rises and sets, is eclipsed, and moves to and fro between the tropics; or changes equivalent are produced among the heavenly bodies; but God knows no change; nothing but good, without the shadow of evil, can proceed from him. Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, not for any desert of ours, but of his rich and unmerited grace, sending us his gospel, and making it effectual, through the power of the Spirit, to quicken the souls of believers from the death of sin, and raise them to newness of life; that, as his adopted and regenerate sons, we should be a kind of first-fruits of his creatures; consecrated to him, and devoted to his immediate service. Note; (1.) All glorying must be excluded, if all good be of grace; for what then have we, which we have not received? (2.) All who are begotten by the word of truth in the gospel, must, from that moment, consider themselves as consecrated to God’s service, and bound to live to his glory.
3rdly, The apostle enjoins them,
1. To restrain their passions. Wherefore, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear God’s word; slow to speak, not daring to censure the ways of Providence and grace; slow to wrath; not disputing or quarrelling with the truths of God, or treating those who differ in point of controversy with contempt or anger: for the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God; the cause of God cannot be served by our selfish passions; nor with such a spirit may we hope to speak aright, or to convince others. Note; (1.) We should not be obstinate in our own opinions, but be willing to hear the objections of others. (2.) God’s cause is not to be served by noise and anger, but by meekness and the word of truth. Whoever is in the right, they that are angry are sure to be wrong.
2. To put away every other vile and corrupt affection. Wherefore lay apart all filthiness, and superfluity of naughtiness, every defiling lust, and malicious temper; and receive with meekness the ingrafted word, that it may take fast hold of your affections, and be incorporated with your hearts; bowing before it with all humility, and receiving it on God’s authority with faith and love; which is able to save your souls, when thus accompanied by the power of the Spirit, and yielded to by the heart unto righteousness. Note; Corrupt affections entertained, disincline and indispose the soul for receiving God’s word, turn us away from hearing it, and prejudice us against the truth.
3. We must be not only hearers of the truth, but practise it also, else it can profit us nothing. But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves, by fallacious conclusions, to the ruin of your own souls. For if any man be a hearer of the word merely, resting upon that as of any avail, and is not a doer of what he hears, he is like a man beholding his natural face in a glass; for he beholdeth himself, and, hastily passing by, straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was. Such is the careless and cursory hearer of the word: he may discover, whilst under the word, in a transient glance, something of the sinfulness and depravity of his nature, and his need of Christ; but it makes no deep or lasting impression: no sooner is he gone forth into the world, than he forgets his convictions, and continues utterly unchanged in temper and conduct. But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, attentively viewing himself in the glass of the gospel, wherein we are called from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the sons of God; and continue therein, careful to hold fast in principle, and to correspond in practice, with the things therein revealed; he, being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, diligent to obey what God commands, this man shall be blessed in his deed, made happy in God’s present service, and, if faithful unto death, his end shall be everlasting life. Note; (1.) True religion consists not in profession merely, but in practice, without which Christianity is but an empty name. (2.) The word of God is as the faithful mirror, that knows not to flatter: if we attentively view ourselves in that glass, we shall see the horrid deformity of our fallen spirits by nature, and learn to entertain the lowest thoughts of ourselves. They only are blessed, who, having discovered their real state, are seriously led to the Fountain open for sin and for uncleanness; and in a Saviour’s blood, and by the power of his grace, have their filthiness cleansed, and their nature renewed after his image, so as henceforth to walk with and please God.
4. He marks the difference between true and false religion. If any man among you seem to be religious, making such a profession, and yet bridleth not his tongue, from railing, reproach, slander, profaneness, bitterness, or proud talkativeness to display his own talents; this man’s religion is vain: however plausible he may appear, his heart is rotten; and while he would build up his own excellence by detracting from others’ worth, his hypocrisy is visible through the mask. Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father, that religion which he approves, which is dictated by his word, and aims at his glory,is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction; stretching out the kind hand of charity to relieve them, sympathizing with them, and affording them every assistance which they need, and we can give; and to keep himself unspotted from the world; neither polluted by the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, nor the pride of life; but preserved pure for God amid the overflowings of ungodliness. Note; (1.) We have to do with a heart-searching God, who requireth truth in the inward parts. Where the soul is right with God, there purity, and love, and charity, will be manifest in every word and work. (2.) This world is full of defilement; it needs much watchfulness to keep our garments unspotted.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Jas 1:27 . To is opposed ]. and are synonymous expressions (Pott, Theile, and others); the second word does not add any new idea to the first. Some expositors (Baumgarten, Bengel, Knapp, Wiesinger) arbitrarily refer the first word to what is internal, and the second to what is external. The second word (which occurs only here and in Heb 7:20 ; Heb 13:4 ; 1Pe 1:4 ), corresponding to its connection with , , brings more vividly forward purity as a being free from that by which the holy is defiled. The purity of true is, by the words . . ., marked as absolute. , in the judgment of , equivalent to , as in 1Pe 2:20 ; comp. Winer, p. 352 [E. T. 493]; Schirlitz, p. 340. That by this “the attitude of a servant before the face of the commanding lord” (Lange) is indicated, is a pure fiction. To is emphatically added , by which the relation of God, which the author has chiefly in view, is expressed: that of love. God, by reason of His love, can only esteem that worship as pure which is the expression of love. The contents of pure worship is given in the following infinitive clauses, according to its positive and negative side; still James evidently does not intend to give an exhaustive definition, but he merely brings forward in reference to the wants of his readers two chief points. Hermas, I. 2, mand. 8, gives a description of these two sides of worship, comprehending as much as possible all particulars. The first point is: the visiting of the widows and the fatherless in their affliction , as a manifestation of compassionate love. If it is said that the particular here stands for the universal (the species pro genere, Hottinger, Theile, and others); yet it is to be observed that elsewhere in the Holy Scriptures compassion is adduced as the most direct proof of love. The verb here, as in Mat 25:36 ; Mat 25:43 , Jer 23:2 , Zec 11:16 , Sir 7:35 , refers to the visiting of the suffering, in order to help them. By the explanation: “to be careful of them” (Lange), the view of a concrete instance is introduced; are placed first, in close connection with , [108] as God in Psa 68:6 is expressly called ; see also Sir 4:10 : .
The words are not an idle addition, but mark the condition in which the orphans and widows are found, to show the necessity and object of .
In the second infinitive clause, which is added with rhetorical emphasis, , [109] to the first, stands first as the chief idea. The same expression is in 1Ti 6:14 ; 2Pe 3:14 (in its proper sense, 1Pe 1:19 ). The addition , more exactly defining , is neither dependent merely on (Psa 12:8 ; Psa 141:9 ) nor merely on , but on the combined idea. The sense is: to preserve himself from the world ( = , Joh 17:15 ; comp. also the form , Mat 16:12 ), so that he is not polluted by it (so also Lange). By not merely earthly things , so far as they tempt to sin (Schneckenburger), nor merely sinful lusts (Hottinger), nor , (Oecumenius; according to Laurentius and others, the homines mundani atque impii), are to be understood; but the idea comprehends all these together; it denotes the whole earthly creation, so far as it is cut off from fellowship with God and stands under the dominion of (1Jn 5:19 ); thus especially the men who serve it in and with their sinful lusts but also all earthly possessions by which sinful lust is excited, and to which it not only conforms itself, but converts them into the instruments of its activity.
Christians by means of their divine birth, effected by the word of truth (Jas 1:18 ), are indeed taken out of the , they are no longer members of it; but, on the other hand, both by the sin which is still in them (chap. Jas 3:2 ) and by their external intercourse, they stand in connection with the world, on which account they have to preserve themselves from its contaminating influence. This preservation, as it is a work of God (Joh 17:15 ), so it is likewise a work of man (1Ti 5:22 ), and therefore a task which believers must continually strive to perform.
[108] The combination is found only here in the N. T.; it often occurs in the O. T. and Apocrypha, where sometimes and sometimes are named first.
[109] The asyndeton is thus explained, that James considered the visiting of the orphans, etc., as keeping oneself unspotted from the world, being in contradiction with the peculiar charms of the world. Lange observes: “the two clauses are not simply co-ordinate, but the second is the reverse side or sequence of the first, its pure antithesis.”
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
DISCOURSE: 2362
PURE AND UNDEFILED RELIGION DESCRIBED
Jam 1:27. Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.
ERRORS of the most fatal kind were early found in the Christian Church. So speedily had vital godliness decayed, that even in the Apostles days a mere form and profession of religion was deemed sufficient. Under the idea of exalting faith, the value of good works was depreciated, and the necessity of performing them denied. Against such errors the Apostle James lifted up his voice like a trumpet: he bore testimony against them in the most energetic manner: he declared that faith without works was dead [Note: Jam 2:20.]: that to be hearers of the word and not doers of it, was the way to deceive our own souls [Note: ver. 22.]: that the religion which did not produce self-government, was vain [Note: ver. 26.]: and that religion, which alone God would acknowledge as pure and undefiled, would lead to the most self-denying exercises of love, and to a freedom from all those corruptions with which the world abounded: Pure religion, &c. &c.
Let us consider,
I.
His description of true religion
We must remember that the Apostle is here speaking of religion solely in a practical view. He is not speaking of principles. Not that he disregards them: on the contrary, instead of setting aside the doctrines of justification by faith, as some would represent, he insists on the necessity of faith as strongly as St. Paul himself; only he distinguishes between that which is living and operative, and that which is uninfluential and dead; and affirms, that it is the living and operative faith only, which will save the soul.
Nor is the whole even of practical religion in the contemplation of the Apostle in this passage. He does not advert to the exercise of our affections towards God, but only to our actions towards men: and it is in this confined view that we must understand him as speaking in the words before us.
He informs us how religion will influence us in reference to,
1.
The world at large
[The terms here made use of draw the line with great accuracy. It is not required of us to renounce the world entirely: we are social beings, and have many social duties to perform: and, if we were to abandon society altogether, we should withhold from mankind many benefits which they have a right to expect from us. When God calls us the salt of the earth. it is necessarily implied that we are to come in contact with that mass, which, by our influence, is to be kept from corruption. But from the corruptions that are in the world [Note: 2Pe 1:4.] we are to keep ourselves unspotted. Its pleasures, riches, and honours we are to despise [Note: 1Jn 2:15-16.], even as our Lord Jesus Christ himself did [Note: Joh 17:14-16.]. Nor are we to be conformed to its sentiments and habits [Note: Rom 12:2.]: even its friendship we are neither to court nor desire [Note: Jam 4:4.]. If we would approve ourselves Christians indeed, we must feel such an influence from the cross of Christ, as to be crucified unto the world, and to have the world altogether crucified unto us [Note: Gal 6:14.]. Thus, though in the world, we shall clearly shew that we are not of the world.]
2.
That part of it which is destitute and afflicted
[Love is the life and soul of religion: and, as it will extend to all in general, so will it manifest itself particularly towards those who are bowed down with affliction. The visiting of the afflicted is an office which the true Christian will delight to execute; yet not in a slight and transient manner: he will so interest himself in all their concerns, as to relieve and comfort them to the utmost of his power [Note: This is implied in the word .]. His conduct towards them will resemble that of Job [Note: Job 29:12-13; Job 30:25; Job 31:16-20.]. It is the way in which he expresses his obligations to God [Note: Isa 58:6-7.]; and in which he shews his love to his Lord and Saviour [Note: Mat 25:45.]. He considers love and charity as a commandment stamped with peculiar authority by Christ himself [Note: Joh 13:34.]; and, in obedience to it, he desires to weep with them that weep, as well as to rejoice with them that rejoice [Note: Rom 12:15.]. This is pure and undefiled religion. Other things may pass for religion before men, but this is religion before God: it is that which he will acknowledge as agreeable to his will, and will recompense with tokens of his approbation.]
This description of religion will probably force from us a tribute of applause: but, instead of bestowing on it empty commendations, it will be proper to consider,
III.
The use we are to make of it
The Apostle doubtless designed that we should regard it,
1.
As a criterion whereby to judge of our state
[Victory over the world is one of those marks which are universally found in the Lords people, and in no other [Note: 1Jn 4:4-5.]. Other persons, it is true, may be free from open vices, and, through disappointments and infirmities, may become disgusted with the world: but their love of the world is not at all changed, provided they could have the things on which their hearts are fixed, with health and strength to enjoy them.
A delight in all the offices of love to men for Christs sake is another mark, whereby Christians are distinguished from all other persons. It is a disposition which springs out of a sense of redeeming love [Note: 1Jn 4:10-11.], and infallibly accompanies salvation [Note: Heb 6:9-10.]. The want of this disposition argues a total absence of divine grace [Note: 1Co 13:1-3.]; whilst the exercise of it warrants an assured confidence in the Divine favour [Note: 1Jn 3:17-19.].
Let us then bring ourselves to this touchstone. Let us ask ourselves, whether we do indeed account it better to go to the house of mourning than to the house of feasting? Do we consider ourselves as pilgrims and sojourners here; and value our possessions, not so much for the respect or comfort which they procure to ourselves, as for the opportunities they afford us of honouring God and benefiting our fellow-creatures?
Alas! alas! when estimated according to this rule, how little of pure and undefiled religion will be found! This is a melancholy view indeed of the Christian world; but it is the view which God himself gives us of it; and it is in vain for us to controvert it; for by his decision we must stand or fall [Note: See Mat 25:34-46.].]
2.
As a directory whereby to regulate our conduct
[The commands of God relative to these things are clear and express: Come out from the world, and be separate, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, and will be a father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty [Note: 2Co 6:17-18.]. Nor is the law respecting sympathy at all less forcibly enjoined: Bear ye one anothers burthens, and so fulfil the law of Christ [Note: Gal 6:2.].
In a word, I call upon you all to obey these great commands. Remember, it is not to any peculiarities of a sect that we are urging you, but to that which God himself dignifies with the name of pure and undefiled religion.
Say not, This is not my office: I cannot thus come out from the world, nor can I thus devote myself to deeds of charity. I readily grant that all cannot consecrate an equal measure of their time or property to these offices: but no man in the universe has any dispensation from devoting such a measure of his time and property to these things as his situation and circumstances will admit of. The command is equally obligatory on all: and a disposition to obey it ought to be equally strong in all. The various modes of our obedience will be judged of by God himself, who alone knows what our respective states and circumstances require. But this I say, He that soweth liberally shall reap liberally; and he that soweth sparingly, shall reap also sparingly. Respecting the excellence of such religion I dare appeal to your own consciences. See a person, whether of higher or lower rank, laying aside the cares and pleasures of the world, and visiting the abodes of misery: see the disconsolate widow, and the helpless children, bemoaning their bereavement, whilst to the anguish occasioned by so severe a loss, the pressure of poverty is added; and, to the want of immediate sustenance, the prospect of permanent and irremediable distress: see the compassionate visitor opening the sources of consolation which the Gospel affords, till the unhappy sufferers are brought to kiss the rod that smites them: see him administering present relief, and devising means for the future support of the family: how is he received as an angel from heaven! And how does the widows heart even sing with joy, whilst she acknowledges the hand of God in these succours, and, with feelings too big for utterance, adores her Heavenly Benefactor! Go ye, beloved, to such scenes as these, and ye will soon begin to see the beauty of religion, and to understand that paradox, It is more blessed to give than to receive. Yea, realize one such scene as this, and ye will need no further persuasion to assist the charity before us, or to emulate the zeal of those who are most active in it [Note: The particular Institution may here be more fully opened, and be further recommended by either local, or general, considerations.].]
Fuente: Charles Simeon’s Horae Homileticae (Old and New Testaments)
REFLECTIONS
Reader! observe the Apostle’s salutation, addressed to the brethren, and see whether you have a personal interest in it. Can you count it all joy, when you fall into divers temptations? Yet! If so be, by regeneration you know the Lord, and therefrom can discover God’s love and favor, in the appointment of exercises. To every child of God, renewed by grace trials, whose issue can never be finally doubtful, will always bring joy, when patience hath her perfect work, in the perfection of Jesus. In Him, and Him only, can the Church find themselves perfect and entire, and lacking nothing. And when taught these precious things, every child of God, will daily find his lack of wisdom, and as daily be led, to seek his supplies from Him, and in Him; in whom are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. Yea, and in faith, and without doubt and wavering, will the child of God seek it in Jesus, and from Jesus. And oh! how truly blessed is that child of God, who when tried, takes all his confidence in Christ.
Great Father of light! blessed forever be thy glorious Name, for that good and perfect gift, which comprehends every other, thy dear Son! And blessed be thou, O Lord, that thy gifts and callings are without repentance. Thy will, and not our purpose; thy grace, and not our deservings, are the alone standards of thy love and favor. Oh! the blessedness of that one scripture, which hath more in it of value, than a million worlds; Of his own will, begat he us with the word of truth! Lord! write it in the living tablet of my heart, for daily use, and every moment’s joy.
Precious Jesus! be thou the perfect law of liberty to my poor soul, to look into, as in a glass, from day to day. Oh! for a blessed conformity to my Lord’s image; in all things! May God the Holy Ghost, so take of the things of Jesus, and shew to me, that now by faith, I may daily behold thy face in righteousness; and ere long be satisfied in full sight, when I awake with thy likeness.
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Practical Religion
Jam 1:27
The word “religion” here means religious service. Not religious doctrine, not religious profession of a merely nominal kind; but religious service, activity, conduct. This rendering of the text does not do away with faith, theology, doctrine, or spiritual conviction of any kind; the text is not speaking about that line of things at all. We want a ritual, a ceremonial, a code of action: Very good, says James; if you want that, here it is, pure ritual, pure religious service, real, honest, useful religious conduct is this. How many persons there are blessed or unblessed with aesthetic taste in religious ritual! What a marvellous study the religious antics of some men afford! They like a splendid service. James the Apostle says, So be it; here is the splendid service, without trumpet or drum or clash of metal, without colour or pomp or studied attitude, here it is: make room at the table for the orphans, gladden by your presence and assistance the houses that have been desolated by death, pure religious service is this. Yet how to get rid of that little imp of stheticism, the bowing and beckoning and posturing and rising and falling and intoning, and only omniscience knows what besides! James looks on and says, You think you are religious pure religious service does not lie along that line at all: the orphans are round about the synagogue hungry and thirsty, or shivering with cold; pure religious service is to make room for them. That is not stheticism, that does not lie along the genius of flowers and other emblems of nothing. But James is nothing if not practical; he is nothing if not stern, downright real, almost commercial. In James’ church we seem to hear the clash of the scales as they go down upon its counter, and we hear his own voice, so clear and definite in tone, saying, We are wanting, we must have more, this will never do: you are weighed in the balance and found lacking. But we were very aesthetic; we took the Lord’s Supper upon an empty stomach; we always looked towards the east when we were doing certain things, and toward the west when we were not doing them; we always perfumed the air of the church; we always went in at one door and came out by another: does that stand for nothing? Nothing! Pure religious service, real, downright, honest piety is this, To destroy the hunger of your neighbourhood, and make the desolate sing for joy. We have always been hard upon the Unitarians; we have expelled people from the church for not pronouncing ” Shibboleth ” with a good emphasis on the h ; if any man omitted the h we simply turned him out of church: our motto was, Sound doctrine: does that go for nothing? Nothing! That is not pure religious service. Of course, if James was mistaken, there is an end of the matter; if James had no right to speak on the subject, why quote his text at all? why not override him, or depose him, or ignore him, or forget him? If James has any status in the Church at all, he says that pure religious service, the right programme, is this: “To visit the fatherless,” literally the orphan. You should increase your family by feeding the orphans; you should enlarge your service by looking out for real poverty and calling it to your hospitality; you should say Whom can I make happy this day? where can I disperse the cloud, or mitigate the storm, or lighten the weight of the burden? what blind folk can I lead across the thoroughfare, that they be not overrun or injured? where can I invest my soul’s truest love of man, because truest love of God? And although you do not know the language of flowers, although you do not know the language of emblems at all, yet you will be regarded in the heavens as having rendered a pure religious service.
But this is very legal; and there are persons who would die rather than be legal in piety. They have a prejudice against that word “legal,” principally arising, as nearly every prejudice does, from not knowing what it means. There is nothing so difficult to get rid of as ignorance. Ignorance dies hard. You cut it in two, but still both the pieces begin to wriggle; you have only two worms instead of one. You cut ignorance up syllable by syllable, but every syllable lives, and comes back and sets up a little house of its own. Ignorance is not dispersed by intelligence, paradoxical as that statement may seem to be. A man may know better, and yet retain his ignorance in the form of a prejudice. If you push him and test him intellectually, he will say at the last, I acknowledge that to be so in fact: but what I feel is this. Then he will tell you the action of some deadly superstition upon his soul. The last enemy which shall be destroyed in the Church is superstition. Many persons are afraid of good conduct, lest it should take somewhat from the honour of Christ: on the contrary, I look upon Jesus Christ as the fountain and inspiration of all good conduct. Wherever I find really good conduct, I find Jesus Christ; I say, No man can call Jesus the Lord, and no man can do the works of Jesus, but by the spirit of Jesus, although he may not know it. I will not admit that man can make any other than a waxen flower. Let me find a real flower anywhere, and I will call it a child of the sun; let me find a waxen flower anywhere, and I will say, You keep out of the sun’s way, the sun is your enemy, he will kill you with his burning look. There is a morality that is not moral, that we do not praise or even civilly recognise; we denounce it as semblance, hypocrisy: but wherever there is a real morality, a true manner of the soul, a genuine attitude of reverence, worship and aspiration, resulting in beneficence of conduct, we say, This is the garden of Christ, this is a section of Calvary. It is interesting to watch all those persons who are afraid that if they behave too well they will take somewhat from the honour of Jesus. That is an immoral state of mind; our object should always to be to create under the action of the Divine Spirit a simple, massive, noble character.
How is that character to be cultivated? By acts of service. How is a man to be strong enough to stand upright? By stooping down a great deal. The gospel always proceeds after such methods, saying, If a man would save his life, he must lose it; if a man would serve Christ, he must take up his Cross and follow him; if a man would be really dignified, he must be graciously condescending; if any man would be truly religious he must have a large household of orphans and desolate lives. Perhaps there are some who do not understand such doctrine; in a sense I am not sorry for it, in another sense I regret it very much. If the understanding of metaphysics would interfere with the operation of charity, I should regret that understanding unspeakably: it any man should be so taken up with the metaphysics of Christianity as to neglect its morals, I should describe that man as acting foolishly and suicidally. There are persons who do not know the meaning of the word “metaphysics,” but they will not be kept out of heaven on that ground. I am not sure that it is a word worth knowing. The metaphysicians have never been a very lovely or united family: one generation goeth and another generation of metaphysicians cometh, and when the next generation comes it begins to denounce the one that is gone. One longheaded, shrewd, farsighted metaphysician has settled everything and published a book upon it; another metaphysician has arisen and torn him all to pieces, and wondered how in the inscrutable providence of God such a man was ever permitted to live; and no sooner has that boaster uttered his gasconade than there rises up immediately behind him another, and he takes him by the neck and shakes him over the pit of his own ruin. So that, on the whole, I am not extremely careful that men should trouble about metaphysicians and metaphysics until the orphans are all fed, and the sore in heart are all healed, and the last shadow has been chased away from the house and the life; then you can begin what is not worth beginning. Pity the man who is so anxious about doctrine that he absolutely forgets the matter of practice. If any man who commits himself to a holy life ignores the existence of doctrine, then he ignores himself. Doctrine, in some form or under some initial aspect or ministry, exists behind everything else: thought first, then word, then deed; that is the succession of action, not in metaphysics only, but in practical life.
Have you ever helped a really poor man? Then you have prayed; you are not an atheist although you thought you were one, you are not even an agnostic, though you had quite an inclination towards that new Greek formation. You have become almost tired of the old Greek “Atheist,” because that word had acquired a bad reputation morally; but “Agnostic” was a sort of clean rag, and you thought you might flutter that as if it bore a strange device. But if you have been feeding orphans, you are not even agnostics, you are Christians. Jesus went about doing good, always doing good. He took up little children in his arms; when he set them down again there were men and women, kings and queens. He broke bread, and multiplied it as he gave it away. He never sent anybody from himself to buy or get anything; he had everything in his own soul and in his own gift. Christianity covers a very wide area of life; we may have thought it only covered a point or two here and there, whereas it covers the whole space of being, so that if a man shall dry a tear from the eyes of sorrow the angels shall say, Behold he prayeth! That is not the end, that is but the beginning, but with such a beginning a glorious end must eventuate, it cannot be kept back long; no man can do these works except the Father be in him and with him, and the very doing of these works will lead on and on until the worker clasps the Christ and says, What is all I have done to this work of thine, thou bleeding Son of God, Priest of the universe?
James is very moral, he is quite a schoolmaster in discipline. He is indeed the martinet of the Church. He will not allow a man to be cleanly on the whole, saying, Taking life as it goes, and looking upon the average of things, I think you may be allowed to pass. He takes up the garment, and looks at it through a microscope, and what an enemy that microscope is to everything that wants to hide itself! When we go back to James and say, We have fed a hundred orphans to-day, and called at places that death had emptied, and kindled a fire on the cold hearthstone in every instance, now may not we go to heaven? he says, No, let me look at your garments. Oh, that demand! There are plenty of kind-hearted souls, naturally impulsive in the right direction, who would feed any number of orphans if you would not look too critically into their lives. May we not hold the garment a little distance off and say, There, who can find fault with that? is it not right? James says, It is not for you to hold the garment, I must hold it in the name of the Judge, and I will tell you, after due criticism tomorrow, precisely the condition of the robe. You thought from the beginning of this exposition that the whole matter was going to resolve itself into one of charity, as who should say, There are orphans: here is bread; I can spare it, therefore take it. No man can be charitable in giving that which he can spare; love does not begin so long as you can “spare” it. It is when the man says, I cannot very well spare this, but I cannot keep it back from him who loved me and gave himself for me, that is charity. “Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity vaunteth not itself, doth not behave itself unseemly, is not puffed up… charity never faileth.” Charity does everything but fail. Charity is sometimes mistaken for lunacy; charity is sometimes mistaken for simple exaggeration; and there have been some men who have called it ostentatious bad men, who see themselves in everything as in a looking-glass, doubling their hideousness or giving some new aspect to their perversity.
But now we have come to a section of the thought which means travail, almost punishment Here is spiritual judgment; here is a criticism of motive. Who can put his motive into the fire and wait until it drops out and take it up again, saying, Behold the fire hath found no dross in this inspiration? In proportion as we are pressed along this direction do we need everything that is evangelical. It is at this point the gospel comes in to supply all our lack. We say to the Apostle, representing the true Judge, Why not acquit us at the point of having visited the orphan and the widows in their affliction? can we not be spared the remainder of the trial? The Apostle says, No: now the garment must be searched, and the searcher must look for spots. Who can stand? Not one.
Fuente: The People’s Bible by Joseph Parker
27 Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep himself unspotted from the world.
Ver. 27. And widows ] A vine whose root is uncovered thrives not; a widow whose covering of eyes is taken away, joys not.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
27 .] Religious service pure and unpolluted (the two adjectives seem merely to bring out the positive and negative sides of purity, as in the two members of the apodosis below) in the estimation of (reff. and Rom 2:13 ; Gal 3:11 ) Him who is our God and Father (thus with the : if without it, ‘(our) God and Father.’ That the paternal relation here ascribed to God must be understood as referring to us , is evident, were it only from the reference which Chrys. (in Caten.) recognizes: , (- ?) ; , ; , , ) is (consists in) this, to visit (“Visitare in necessitate est, porrigere manum ad eos allevandos qui premuntur”) orphans (perhaps in reference to which has preceded: so Psa 67:5 , God is called . ) and widows in their affliction (shews at the same time the reason for the , and the object of it), to (there is no copula. These asyndeta are found in our Epistle especially, where various particulars are enumerated which go to make up a whole, or apply to the description of one thing: as e. g. Jas 1:19 , ch. Jas 3:6 ; cf. also ch. Jam 5:5-6 ) preserve himself (the reflexive refers back as its subject to , as if it were . . .) unspotted from (belongs to , see ref. Prov. and cf. , Mat 16:6 ; Mat 16:12 ) the world ( , not merely earthly things as far as they tempt to sin: still less the “indoles qualis plerorumque est improba;” nor again, as c., , : but, as in ch. Jas 4:4 , the whole earthly creation , separated from God and lying in sin, which, whether considered as consisting in the men who serve it, or the enticements which it holds out to evil lust ( ), is to Christians a source of continual defilement. They, by their new birth unto God, are taken out of the world; but at the same time, by sin still dwelling in them, are ever liable to be enticed and polluted by it: and therefore must keep themselves (cf. 1Ti 6:14 ), for fear of such pollution. This keeping is indeed in the higher sense God’s work: cf. Joh 17:15 ; but it is also our work, 1Ti 5:22 . The Commentators compare Isocr. ad Nicocl. p. 36, , . Also Psa 50:8-15 ; 1Sa 15:22 ; Psa 40:7 f.: Sir 35:2 ).
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
Jas 1:27 . : As illustrating this, Dr. Taylor ( Expos. Times , xvi. 334) quotes the of Hermes Trismegistos: , , , . , . Cf. too, the following from the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs , Jos. iv. 6: “The Lord willeth not that those who reverence Him should be in uncleanness, nor doth He take pleasure in them that commit adultery, but in those that approach Him with a pure heart and undefiled lips”. : this was reckoned among the “practice of kindnesses,” which are constantly urged in Rabbinical writings, e.g., Nedarim , 39 b , 40 a; Ket. , 50 a; Sanh. , 19 b. Cf . too, Sir 4:10 , , . In the Apoc. of Peter , 15, occur these words: , . Cf. also the Apoc. of Paul , 35.
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
James
PURE WORSHIP
Jam 1:27 .
THIS is a text which is more often quoted and used than understood. The word ‘religion’ has somewhat shifted its meaning from that which it bore at the time of our translation. We understand by it one of two things. For instance, when we speak of the Mohammedan or the Brahminical religion we mean the body of beliefs, principles, and ceremonies which go to make up an objective whole. When we speak of an individual’s religion we generally mean, not that which he grasps, but the act, on his part, of grasping the consciousness of dependence, the attitude of reverence and aspiration and love and its consequences within. But when our translation was made the word meant rather worship than religion, or, to use an expression which has been recently naturalised among us, it meant the ‘cult’ of a God, and that mainly, though not exclusively, by ceremonials, or by oral and verbal praise and petition. Now, it is obvious that that is the meaning of the expression in my text, because otherwise you would have a patently absurd saying. If James meant by ‘religion’ here what we now mean by it, to say that benevolence and personal purity are religion would be just equivalent to and as absurd as saying that a mother’s love is washing and feeding her child, or that anger is a flushed face and a loud voice. The feeling is one thing, the expression of it is another. The feeling is religion, the expression of it is worship. And so if you take the true meaning, not only of the original Greek, but also of the word ‘religion’ at the beginning of the seventeenth century, then you will understand the passage a little better than some of the people that are so often quoting it do.
For the writer is not talking about religion, but about its expression, ‘worship.’ And he says that ‘ true worship, pure and undefiled… is to visit the widows and the fatherless in their affliction, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world.’ He has been, in the previous verses, striking at various forms of self-deception, such as that a man should conceive himself to be all right, because he listens to the law, and then goes away and forgets it, or that a man should think himself a real worshipper, while he does not bridle his tongue, and then he states the general principle of my text – worship has for its selectest manifestation and form these two things, beneficence and purity. Now I would deal with these words and seek to point out first –
I. The noble ideal of life that is set before us here.
You observe that there are two great departments into which all the forms of individual duty are, as it were, swept. To put these into plain words, the one is beneficence, as the sum and substance of all our duties to our fellows, and the other is keeping ourselves pure, as the sum and substance of all our duties to ourselves. Now I would notice, for it strikes me as being remarkable, that duties to other people are put first, and duties to ourselves second. I do not know that there is any question of practical morality more difficult for us to settle, with full satisfaction to ourselves, than the relative proportion, in our lives, of care for ourselves, for our own culture, for our own rectification, for our Own growth in grace and righteousness, and our obligations to our fellows. It is very hard for us to note how much we ought to give to the definite purpose of trying to make ourselves better, and how much we ought to give to the other purpose of forgetting ourselves, and seeking for the good of other people. But James, although he does not enter into the difficulties which clog the solution of that question for us individually, does seem to think that the first thing to be looked after is other people, and that in looking after such other people we shall be most efficiently keeping ourselves unspotted from the world. And it is so, for if we get around us, as it were, an atmosphere of sympathy, of unselfish regard, of unwearied effort for the benefit of other people, it is like the thin film or air that may surround some object, and prevent the fire from reaching it for a moment or two. We shall find that by no means the least powerful detergent to purge from us the spots of the world is an honest and thorough-going flinging of ourselves into the necessities and the sorrows of other people.
But I should like to put in a caution here. I believe that there are a great many good folk in this generation who have their hands so full of Christian work that they have no time at all for the development of their own Christian character in any other way, and that they lack an intelligent grasp of the principles of the gospel, and many things that would make their work upon other people a hundred times better, just because they are so busy helping other folk that they have no time at all to look after themselves. And so the Church as a whole to-day has, as I believe, not too much beneficent and religious machinery, for there never can be too much of that – but too much relatively to the strength of the Church to drive it. Your engine is too big for your boiler, and to this busy generation, in which ‘Christian worker’ has all but blotted out the conception of ‘Christian thinker’ and ‘Christian scholar,’ I believe that it needs to be preached, not so much ‘Look after other people’ as ‘Do not forget yourself.’ ‘Take heed to thyself, and to thy teaching,’ was good counsel for Paul’s young representative, and it is good counsel for us all. ‘What God hath joined together, let no man put asunder.’ ‘Visit the widows and the fatherless in their affliction,’ by all means; and ‘Keep yourselves unspotted from the world.’
I suppose that it is scarcely necessary to remark that James does not mean visiting the widows and fatherless to be taken as a complete statement of our duties to others. He Singles out that one form which sympathy and hopefulness will take, as a typical example of the whole class of actions in which love will express itself. Nor need I do more than say in passing that ‘visiting’ means more than calling on – namely, looking after and caring for. The sum of all Christian duties to others, then, is gathered up in hopeful and sympathetic love, and in regard to ourselves James sums them up in what looks, after all, rather an incomplete ideal: ‘Keep yourselves unspotted from the world.’ He does not say with any falsely ascetic twist, ‘Keep yourselves out of the world.’ No! He says, ‘Fling yourselves into it, and when you are in the thickest of the muddy ways, see that no spots and splashes of filth come on your white garments.’ That implies that it is very likely, unless we take very rigid care, that contact with the external world, and with the aggregate of Godless men which makes the world, in the New Testament sense of the phrase, will infect Christian men and women with evil, even when they are going on with their works of beneficence. And I suppose we all know that that is true.
But here you get a very negative view of the sum of Christian duty, Some people preach ‘culture’ James says, ‘Try to keep yourselves clean.’ He realises that there is something more to be done by each of us with ourselves than to develop or draw out and increase that which is in us, that there needs to be another process, and that is to get rid of a great deal that is within us. We must cease to be much of what we are before we can be that which we may be and ought to be. Slay self first that you may live. Cultivate? Yes! and crucify as well.
Nor does James think any the less nobly of the resulting self, because he says that you will form the noblest character mainly by the way of negation. I know, of course, that that is only one-sided; but do we not all know that by reason of the abounding evil around us, and the proclivities more or less dormant, but existing, to much of that evil, which are in our own hearts, we do need that the law of our life should very largely be east in the form ‘Do not.’ Any man who has honestly set himself to the task of moulding his life into the likeness which God would approve, must know that to walk through the wards of an hospital and catch no infection, to stand in a dung-heap and bring away no stench nor foulness clinging to the robes, is as easy as it is to plunge into the world and catch no contagion and no pollution there.
And yet, says James, you have to do that. He sum, up Christian duty in this negative form, that is remarkable, and he flings the whole weight and burden of it on the man himself, that is more remarkable still. And yet we have only to read the rest of the chapter to see that he is not forgetting that there must be a Divine Keeper to keep the keepers, and that we shall never keep ourselves ‘unspotted’ unless we trust to Him who has said ‘I will keep thy feet from falling.’ So we need not wonder at the emphasis that is placed on the human side of the energy that is to be put forth in order to mould men into this character. But I desire to say here what I think some tendencies of good people’s opinions in this day do especially need: that we do not get cleansed, hallowed, sanctified, by faith only, but that the office of faith is to bring into our possession the power which will sanctify us if we use our own efforts. ‘Having therefore these premises, dearly beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from all filthiness of flesh and spirit,’ and not trust to faith alone to make us pure.
II. We have here, secondly, the true and pure worship in such a life.
I need not repeat what I have already said at the beginning of these remarks as to the true bearing of the principle laid down here. Only let me remind you that the writer is not flouting, or putting away out of court, other forms of action which are more frequently called worship. True religion, which expresses itself, according to James, most nobly in the worship of life, must express itself by all the other means which men have for expressing their inmost selves, by the worship of words, by symbolical deed, by a ceremonial as well as by the visiting of the widows and the fatherless, and the keeping oneself unspotted from the world. But what is insisted upon here is that of these two ways – both of them equally natural and equally indispensable, if there be any religion to express – in some aspects the higher and the nobler is the dumb worship of a pure and beneficent life. Now, of course, we are accustomed as Nonconformists to think that texts of this sort hit the adherents of a more elaborate, sensuous, and ceremonial form of worship than finds favour in our eyes, very hard, and sometimes to forget that they hit us quite as hard. There may be quite as real ritualists amongst Nonconformists as there are amongst Anglicans or Roman Catholics – I was going to say amongst Quakers – as amongst the adherents of any form of Christian worship. For it is not the elaboration of the form, but it is the existence of it, that tempts men to trust too much to it. And the baldest – to use a modern term of opprobrium – Nonconformist worship may be just as productive of immoral reliance upon it, on the part of those who adhere to it, as the most elaborate and sensuous ceremonial that fills a cathedral with clouds of incense, and calls upon men to worship simply by looking on at a priest performing his miracle. Dear brethren, you and I need the warning as much as anybody ever did. There are people, I have no doubt, who leave their religion in their pews, and lock it up there in the box along with their hymn books, and whose notion of religion is very little more than coming to a so-called ‘place of worship’ and offering up verbal prayers. There creep in insincerity, unreality, unconscious hypocrisy; there creeps in mechanical, perfunctory utterance of the words of praise, or listening to the voice of the preacher. How many of you think about the hymns you sing, and make them the expression of your own feelings? How many of you fancy that you have spent the Sunday rightly when you go to church and listen more or less attentively to what your minister may have to say to you, and then go out and live a life in flat contradiction to the prayers, and the hymns, and the readings, and the preachings in which you have nominally taken part? Oh, Brethren! let us get into reality, and learn more and more than ever we have done that worship does not mean the external act, but the bowing of the spirit before God, and that amidst the many temptations to insincerity, unreality, and dead, fossil formalism, which adhere to all forms of oral and ceremonial worship, there is as much need to-day as ever there was that we should listen to him who says, ‘What hath thy God required of thee but to do justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?’ ‘Lord! Lord! have we not prophesied in Thy name?’ ‘Depart from Me; I never knew you.’
III. And now let me say one last word as to the only possible foundation for such a life. It is worship, it is the expression of religion, and only when it is the expression of religion will you find beneficence and purity in their highest and noblest forms. There are people that say, ‘I do not understand the Psalms; they are far too rapturous and emotional for me. I do not care about Paul and his metaphysical theology. I cannot make much of John and his mysticism. Give me James. That is plain common-sense; that is good practical morality. No clouds of darkness, no fine-spun theories.’ Yes, and James has for his fundamental principle that if you want morality you must begin with religion. He believes that visiting the widows and the fatherless in affliction, and keeping oneself unspotted from the world, or, in other words, the highest form of morality, is the body, of which religion is the soul.
I am not going to enter upon that thorny question of the possibility of having an independent theory of ethics without religion, but my point is this – theory or no theory, where will you get the practical power that will work the theory and bring it out of the region of theory into the region of daily life and fact? I know it is extremely narrow, extremely old-fashioned, extremely illiberal, and I believe it is profoundly true. Begin with Jesus Christ and the wish to please Him, and there is the root out of which all these self-regarding and other’s regarding graces and beauties will most surely come. I have no doubt that you can make your model of a life without Christianity, though I fancy that a great deal of the model comes from the Christianity. But after you have got it, then one comes and says, ‘Well! it is all very pretty – a beautiful model; do you think it will work?’ If you want it to work, obtain the fire of the Holy Spirit to get up the steam and then it will work. You must begin with religion if you are to have a vigorous moral life, and your work in the world must be worship if it is to rise to the height of these two great forms of beautiful and noble life, the regard for others and the effort at purity for yourselves.
Do not run away with the perversion of this text which says, ‘I do not frequent churches and chapels; that is not worship. The diffused worship of my life is what God wants.’ Yes, that is what God wants. And you will be most likely to render the diffused worship of a life if you have reservoirs in the life – like Sundays, like hours of private devotion and prayer – from which will flow – and without which I doubt there will not deeply and perennially flow the broad streams of devotion all through your days. ‘Work is worship’ is a monastic motto that is very frequently quoted nowadays. Well, ‘it depends; as they say. Work is worship if there is a reference to God in it, It is not worship unless there is. Brethren, begin where the New Testament begins, with faith in Jesus Christ, and you will end with a worship which harmonises the service of the lip and the service of the life. And if you do not begin so, you may flout the prayers of the Church, and look upon our gatherings together as of very little value, but I doubt extremely whether you will ever have in your life the all-present reference to God which will make common deeds worship, and I doubt whether you will ever succeed either in beneficence to others, or in keeping yourselves unspotted from the world.
Fuente: Expositions Of Holy Scripture by Alexander MacLaren
undefiled. Greek. amiantos. See Heb 7:26.
before. App-104.
visit. App-133. Compare Mat 26:36, Mat 26:43. Personal interest and sympathy are enjoined. Compare Mic 6:8.
fatherless. Greek. orphanos. Only here and Joh 14:18.
affliction. See Act 7:10.
unspotted. Greek. aspilos. See 1Ti 6:14.
world. App-129.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
27.] Religious service pure and unpolluted (the two adjectives seem merely to bring out the positive and negative sides of purity, as in the two members of the apodosis below) in the estimation of (reff. and Rom 2:13; Gal 3:11) Him who is our God and Father (thus with the : if without it, (our) God and Father. That the paternal relation here ascribed to God must be understood as referring to us, is evident, were it only from the reference which Chrys. (in Caten.) recognizes: , (-?) ; , ; , , ) is (consists in) this, to visit (Visitare in necessitate est, porrigere manum ad eos allevandos qui premuntur) orphans (perhaps in reference to which has preceded: so Psa 67:5, God is called . ) and widows in their affliction (shews at the same time the reason for the , and the object of it),-to (there is no copula. These asyndeta are found in our Epistle especially, where various particulars are enumerated which go to make up a whole, or apply to the description of one thing: as e. g. Jam 1:19, ch. Jam 3:6; cf. also ch. Jam 5:5-6) preserve himself (the reflexive refers back as its subject to , as if it were …) unspotted from (belongs to , see ref. Prov. and cf. , Mat 16:6; Mat 16:12) the world ( , not merely earthly things as far as they tempt to sin: still less the indoles qualis plerorumque est improba; nor again, as c., , : but, as in ch. Jam 4:4, the whole earthly creation, separated from God and lying in sin, which, whether considered as consisting in the men who serve it, or the enticements which it holds out to evil lust (), is to Christians a source of continual defilement. They, by their new birth unto God, are taken out of the world; but at the same time, by sin still dwelling in them, are ever liable to be enticed and polluted by it: and therefore must keep themselves (cf. 1Ti 6:14), for fear of such pollution. This keeping is indeed in the higher sense Gods work: cf. Joh 17:15; but it is also our work, 1Ti 5:22. The Commentators compare Isocr. ad Nicocl. p. 36, , . Also Psa 50:8-15; 1Sa 15:22; Psa 40:7 f.: Sir 35:2).
Fuente: The Greek Testament
Jam 1:27. , religion) It is only when a man succours the wretched, and avoids those plunged in the gaiety of the world, that the whole of the worship which he pays to God can be right.- , pure and undefiled) proceeding from pure love, and removed from the defilement of the world.-, to visit) with advice, comfort, kind offices, and of his own accords.- , the fatherless and widows) that is, the afflicted, even those who are not related to us, who are neglected by many. Synecdoche.[18]- , in their affliction) For if it is done for other reasons, that is not religion.- , himself unspotted) That effect is produced, if we abstain from intercourse with those who are of no benefit to us, nor we to them.-, to guard) with anxious care.
[18] See Append. on SYNECDOCHE.
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
world
“kosmos” = world-system. Jam 4:4; Joh 7:7 (See Scofield “Rev 13:8”)
Fuente: Scofield Reference Bible Notes
Pure: Jam 3:17, Psa 119:1, Mat 5:8, Luk 1:6, 1Ti 1:5, 1Ti 5:4
To visit: Job 29:12, Job 29:13, Job 31:15-20, Psa 68:5, Isa 1:16, Isa 1:17, Isa 58:6, Isa 58:7, Mat 25:34-46, Gal 5:6, Gal 6:9, Gal 6:10, 1Jo 3:17-19
to keep: Jam 4:4, Joh 17:14, Joh 17:15, Rom 12:2, Gal 1:4, Gal 6:14, Col 3:1-3, 1Jo 2:15-17, 1Jo 5:4, 1Jo 5:5, 1Jo 5:18
Reciprocal: Exo 22:22 – General Deu 14:29 – the stranger Deu 24:13 – shall be Jos 6:18 – in any wise Neh 13:3 – that they Job 6:27 – the fatherless Job 29:16 – a father Job 31:17 – the fatherless Psa 82:3 – do Psa 146:9 – preserveth Pro 15:25 – but Pro 23:10 – fatherless Isa 32:6 – empty Jer 7:6 – oppress Jer 22:3 – do no violence Jer 23:2 – and have Jer 49:11 – thy fatherless Hos 12:6 – keep Mat 5:42 – General Mat 25:35 – I was an Mat 25:36 – was sick Luk 3:11 – He that hath two Luk 7:12 – a widow Luk 11:41 – rather Act 4:34 – for Act 6:1 – their Act 9:36 – full Act 15:29 – if ye Phi 4:8 – are pure 1Ti 5:3 – widows
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
PURE RELIGION
Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction.
Jam 1:27
That we, through Christ, have become the sons of God, is the very central truth of the Christian faith; that God is our Father is the pledge and promise of a Fathers tender care through life, and, after death, of a mansion in our Fathers house.
But our Father is expecting gifts from His children; He is waiting and watching for proofs of their devotion. He is looking down from heaven His dwelling-place, and the fruit of our religion is beneath His searching gaze. Our service to the King of kings must be pure and undefiled.
I. To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction.This is but a sample of the innumerable good deeds that must flow freely from the Christians lively faith; a specimen of the daily life of our Master Who went about doing good. We are wont to murmur as we behold with tears the multitude of evils upon earth; the burdens which sin and sorrow lay upon loving, weary hearts. We sigh as we behold countless numbers of our brethren toiling on beneath a load of poverty and ignorance; ignorance of the Fathers love and the possibility of their admission into the family of God. But we dare not gaze too long into the darkness when the light is shining brightly above it all.
II. Behold the grandeur and nobility of the mission of the Christian brotherhood!It is ours to alleviate the sorrow that wounds and to banish the sin that defiles. The heart that for ever offers its gifts upon the altar of self soon becomes hard and ignoble, unworthy of the Fathers love; it misses some of the sweetest gifts that Heaven in its mercy bestows. Out in the world, away from self, is the labour of unselfish love. Who has not felt a warm glow of unutterable pleasure as, led by Divine charity, he has gone into the house of mourning and extended a helping hand to those whom God for discipline has smitten? This pleasure, unlike so many that the world offers to its votaries, will cast no gloom upon our life like the blight that withers and kills the fruit of the garden; it has nothing but the sweetest memories to delight the soul. If it had been possible for the Man Christ Jesus, while upon earth, to have felt the ecstasy of human joy, would He not have found it in the countless human faces upturned to Him in gratitude for diseases healed and sorrows banished; in the blind restored to sight, the bereaved mother blessed once more with a loving sons devotion; in brothers, sisters, fathers, friends reunited in the bonds that death and the devil had rudely torn asunder? These are the golden fruits of religion pure and undefiled before God, Who is the Father of the fatherless and the God of the widow.
III. If our hearts are renewed by the grace of our Master, and touched by His self-denying life and death of agony, our motives will be holier, our labour more unceasing, our offering pure and undefiled before God Who is our Father.
Rev. W. E. Coghlan.
Illustration
I have often thought that it must be a source of the keenest delight to the skilful and kind-hearted physician, when, under the blessing of the Almighty, he is able, for a time at least, to banish or to mitigate the sufferings of the human frame, and to restore those who seem almost dead to the arms of the living who love them. As also it must gladden the heart of the good priest of the Church to be able, under heavens guidance, to calm the doubts that will rise at times in the human breast, or to win a wicked and unhappy man to a better and a safer life. But, in one sense, it matters not whether our profession be that of physician, or priest, or any other lawful and honest calling in the providence of God; we all have our work to do, our mission in the brotherhood of Christ.
(SECOND OUTLINE)
PURE WORSHIP
Properly and strictly, religion is being tied down. It has a sense of confinement. Something like another word, which comes from the same root, obligation. Then it came to mean prescribed forms of worship. And the Greek word in the passage, as nearly as we can translate it, is worship. More lately, religion means a mans creed, and the spiritual affections, and the holy life, which grows out of His belief and lovethe way of salvationthe state of conduct of a man who is saved.
Here, in the text, we have it in its second sense, worshipthe minds attitude to God, and the way of worshipping God.
Good works are more than the supplement of worship. They make worship. It is not worship without them. They are worship.
The question, therefore, now is, not about the way of salvation, that is a settled thing; it supposes you are saved; the question is, How shall you, as a saved person, worship God?
What is worship? And to ascertain this, we must take rather the spirit than the letter of the text.
And what is the rule?
I. Whoever has received Christ has had to do with the most perfect act of unselfishness that the world has ever seen.He left His beautiful and happy home, and divested Himself of His glory, to visit an orphaned, widowed world. He became the hardest Worker that ever trod this earth. His whole life and death was one great unselfishness. We may say of Him, what we can say of no other, Christ had no self.
And more than this. By the act which makes you a Christian, you are no longer your own. You are boughtbought with blood. You are anothers. You are Christs. Mere worship, commonly so called, has a great deal of selfishness in it. It consists very much in asking for self what we want; or praising for what we have; or in listening to something which is to do us good. It need not be selfish. It might consist much more than it does of simple adoration of God, for what He is in Himself, for His own sake. But practical worship is far too much selfish. Therefore for worship you need to do something that will take you out of self; something more like Jesus. This is the action of every one who is no longer his own, but Christs.
II. The power of Christ as a Man was His sympathy.As a Brother, He lived with men, when He was here. As a Brother, He sits in heaven. As a Brother, He will come again in judgment. As a Brother, we have His presence now. As soon as a person is really united to Christ, he takes Christs nature. All his tender feelings are drawn out. Whatever he was before, he becomes gentle, loving, kind. He catches the sympathies of Christ. Before, he was a hard manhard to sinbecause he had never really felt sin; hard to sorrowbecause he was occupied with his own sorrows or joys; hard to happiness, because he never himself was quite happy. Now, he is capable of sympathy. The expression in the original which we have translated visit is looking to. It is the same word as bishop. It implies one who takes care, and interest, and pays attentionwhich could not be without sympathy.
III. Effort.Faithful, diligent effort, painstaking love. Real worship! It is not to sit still and pity; it is not to send money; it is to go and do it yourselfto visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction. Jesus did not stay in heaven and issue a mandate. He did not devolve His mission to another. He cameHe livedHe sufferedHe did it Himself. Here is the force that many lose. You do kindnesses, great kindnesses; but you do it by deputy. You give to missions; but you are no missionary. You bestow money; but you do not give yourself to the work after the money is spent. You feel; but you do not act. You send; but you do not go. Your religion stops where actual labour has begun.
Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary
Jas 1:27. Pure means unmixed and undefiled denotes something that is unsoiled. There is not much difference between the two words, but the former has the idea of something not attached to another ingredient to begin with, while the latter denotes that it remains so afterward. Visit. One definition of the word is “To look upon in order to help or benefit” Thayer. It has to do with one’s actions toward others. Unspotted from the world means to be free from the vices commonly practiced by mankind.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Jas 1:27. Pure religion and undefiled. Pure and undefiled may almost be regarded as synonymous terms, the one expressing the idea positively, and the other negatively. Not, as some arbitrarily think, pure referring to the inner, and undefiled to the external life. There may be a reference here to the frequent washings and purifications which characterized the Jewish worship.
before God and the Father; in His view, who looketh not so much at the out ward appearance as at the heart. The Father is added to express the relation of God to us, as one of paternal love.
is thisconsists in this. James does not here give an enumeration of all the parts of religious service, but mentions only two chief pointsactive benevolence toward the afflicted, and careful avoidance of the impurities of the world; these, he observes, and not certain ceremonial observances, are the outward forms in which real worship manifests itself.
to visit the fatherless and the widows. There is a probable reference here to before God and the Father; before Him who is the Father of the fatherless and the God of the widows.
in their affliction. No kind of religious service or worship paid to God can be of any value, if it violate the royal law of charity. The fatherless and the widows are mentioned as examples of the afflicted. But along with this active benevolence toward the afflicted there must be combined personal purity.
and to keep himself unspotted. Personal purity which, like the delicate pupil of the eye, shrinks from the very approach of everything which defileth, which garrisons the heart with holy affections to keep out those which are polluting, which maintains a conduct above suspicion, and which abstains from the very appearance of evil, is acceptable in the sight of our God and Father, and shall be rewarded with the manifestation of His glory: for, Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
from the world. By the world is here meant not merely earthly things so far as they tempt to sin, or worldly lusts, but the world as the enemy of God, the rival of God in the human heart; all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life (1Jn 2:14). Christians, by being born again by the word of truth, are separated from the worldthey are a peculiar people. But still, so long as they live in the world, they are exposed to its temptations and liable to be defiled by its pollutions. They must carefully avoid that friendship of the world which is enmity with God (Jas 4:4).
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
Observe here, 1. That the apostle doth not set down the whole of religion, but an eminent part and instance of it only: pure religion is this, that is, this is the practice of religion, without which all religion is vain; this is an eminent fruit, which springs from the root of pure religion; if pure religon live in the heart, the fruits of pious charity will appear in the life.
Observe, 2. The acts of charity, when they flow from a religious principle, do commence acts of worship; to visit the widow and fatherless, considered in itself, may be only an act of indifferency and civil courtesy; but when it is performed as an act of duty, in obedience to the command of God, or as an act of mercy and pity, for the supply of their wants by our purse, or for the comforting of their hearts by our counsel; being thus done out of conscience, it is as acceptable to God as an act of worship, to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction.
Observe, 3. How the apostle joins charity and purity together; a pretense to the one without the other discovers the insincerity of both; the relieving of the afflicted, and a life unspotted, must go together, or God accept of neither: Pure religion is this, to visit the widow, and keep himself unspotted from the world; that is, from the defilement and pollutions of the world by the lusts thereof; plainly intimating,
1. That the world is a filthy place, a dirty defiling thing. What company almost can you come into, generally speaking, that is not sooty and leprous? How hard is it to converse with them, and not be polluted and infected by them? Even as hard as it is to touch pitch, and not be defiled.
2. That it is our duty, and ought to be our daily endeavour, to keep ourselves as unstained by, and unspotted from the world as we can: and that we may escape the pollutions which are in the world through lust, let us be instant in prayer, diligent in our watch, that if we cannot make the world better, that shall never make us worse.
3. That we should more and more grow weary of the world, and long for heaven, where there is nothing that defileth, where we shall have pure hearts, pure company, every thing agreeable, and this not for a few years, but for everlasting ages. Lord! when shall we ascend on high to live with thee in purity?
Fuente: Expository Notes with Practical Observations on the New Testament
Verse 27
Pure religion, &c.; that is, true religion consists not in rites and forms, not in opinions, not in outward zeal,–but in the right moral and spiritual condition of the heart. Its end and aim is to substitute in the soul principles of heartfelt benevolence and moral purity, instead of the selfishness and corruption which naturally reign there. The various truths of the gospel reveal the way and the means by which this is to be done.
Fuente: Abbott’s Illustrated New Testament
Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, [and] to keep himself unspotted from the world.
All right, all you folks that want to know what God wants you to do in life, here it is. “Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this,” He is about to tell you directly just what He wants you to do, this is the undefiled truth of the matter directly from God.
“To visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, [and] to keep himself unspotted from the world.” Two things you are to do, visit the fatherless, or the orphans, and to visit the widows and keep yourself unspotted or pure.
Simple enough, visit the kids and widows and not sin. And just how many of us do the first two, won’t ask about the last one because we don’t do too well there either.
Many of us visit the widow when she is first grieving her loss but how many of us get around to visiting them six months after? One of the joys for my wife while ministering in the last church where we were interim pastor was to visit one of the widow ladies. The woman had been a widow for many years, and was kind of an old snip, but after visiting a few times, my wife and the widow became great friends and we fellowshipped with her many times over a few years before she died.
This could be a great blessing for any of you if you would just seek out one that could use some company. The same would probably go for an orphan. Orphans may not be as readily available to us in our society, but there are many single parent families around that aren’t far from being without parents. Big Brother/Sister agencies could match you up with someone I’d guess. It might even be a chance to share the Gospel with a child. I’m not sure you should go with that being the goal, but it couldn’t hurt to have it as a minor goal of your ministry to the child.
From our text one might assume, and probably correctly so, that the fatherless and the widows might well be widowed mothers with children rather than two separate groups. I think in the area of application viewing them individually is quite appropriate, but I think James most likely meant the two as a group.
If you have an orphanage around, then you have a great opportunity to visit and maybe assist in the work of the institution.
Yes, this will take time, and yes, God would be interested in you doing it. Time and maybe a little cash now and then.
One of the fun times of the widow just mentioned is that one time she mentioned she and her husband always walked to the burger place near their home for a burger on Friday night. The wife and I were in the habit of having a burger now and then so we started picking up an extra and she would go to the widows place and have a burger with her on Friday night.
I don’t really know the reality of a widow or orphan in Biblical days, but I’m sure it was much worse then than now. The widow and orphans were probably about on the same social ladder and poorly thought of and even if thought of, less cared for. The family was to take care of the widow, but if there is no family, then there was no one to care for them.
The New Testament is clear that the church is to care for the widow that is in need. Again, something that we seldom do in the church today.
1Ti 5:3 Speaks to the care of the widow. Even in Paul’s day he did not expect the church to care for widows that had family, nor would I imagine from the text widows that had property or money. If they were widows indeed, widows that had no one to care for them and no way to care for themselves, then the church should step in and provide her needs. “Honour widows that are widows indeed. 4 But if any widow have children or nephews, let them learn first to shew piety at home, and to requite their parents: for that is good and acceptable before God. 5 Now she that is a widow indeed, and desolate, trusteth in God, and continueth in supplications and prayers night and days.”
I might add that “needs” probably had in thought the meaning of the word – needs. Today Americans expect everything. A recent letter to the editor was from a woman that was receiving housing, food and tuition from the state and it was clear that she thought she ought to get it as well. There was no indication of work in the letter and I doubt that the state requires it. This is not what Scripture teaches, it teaches caring for needs.
In the area of orphans, we might expect that maybe if there is need we ought to meet it. Needs, as has been indicated, has a liberal meaning today. With all of the social agencies I doubt that many widows or orphans are in need today though it may occur.
When pastoring many years ago we had four widows in our group. One was well to do, had property and money enough for her life and plenty to leave to her children.
The other three ladies were in very slim finances. They were on social security but at the lowest amount in their day. They also gained a little help for their heat/lights. They were getting along with their needs being met so there was nothing the church was “required” to do. I suspect had the church grown out of its infancy we would have attempted to do some for them. I did tell them all that if they had a need to let me know and the church would help.
No, they didn’t go to Arizona for the winter, they didn’t go to the big city to shop, but they had adequate to live on. This is not to say that the church should not assist them as much as they can in the area of company/fellowship and any other way possible.
Some ways that we might assist this segment of our church:
1. Assure that they have transportation if needed and don’t wait for them to ask you for assistance, the church should find out if there is need.
2. Possibly make special times for them to gather for a potluck now and then with the church providing the pot.
3. Find help for them if they need transportation to the store, the doctor or the dentist.
4. Be inventive. They have to do all the things you do, so be sure they can get it all done. If they can’t, give them help.
This all really comes back to the fact that there is a general concern for the welfare of all believers. We ought to be giving our concern to all believers, and being sure the widows and orphans are included, then on top we are to go and visit them.
Actually the term translated “visit” has the thought of looking to see, inspection or checking out. What a better time to see if they have need than when you go to visit them.
One of the things I have observed of the Mormon Church is the great care that they give to their people. Each person is watched over by someone in the church. There is contact from time to time to see how things are going. If there is a material need it is met, if there is a social need it is met, if there is any need, the church attempts to assist as needed.
This is something that we in American churches fail to do, all too often. Yes, there is a chance that we will be taken advantage of, but we shouldn’t stop doing it. Be careful and have more than one person in the mix making the decisions about assisting members. Care should be one of the hallmarks of the church!
Note that they are in affliction. They are having difficulties. Burden is another way to translate the word or a pressing together between. Between a rock and a hard place in other words. The life of a widow with children is a hard life; it is trying to keep both ends connected. Keeping the kids on track, keeping the job on track, and keeping the home on track. Not a job for the faint hearted for sure.
In New Testament times it would have been even harder for a widow, just to get along in society as a woman. Then to add the fact that there is no man in the house to assist and provide income. James sets this pressing situation and its alleviation as the epitome of true religion.
James adds a second item of “true religion” when he adds the phrase “[and] to keep himself unspotted from the world.” The scope of this statement is quite far reaching in our day. Just how does the world tend to spot us or deface our character?
We have pressure to lie, to lust, to covet, to shirk, to sidestep responsibility, to fail our faith, to walk against God, to do anything and everything that is bad when God wants us to be good.
Our world is so full of the wrong of the Devil, and the sadder part is that Christians are often right in the middle of this wrong with the lost people that don’t know any better. The lost are depraved and don’t understand the requirements of God, but God’s people certainly do and yet many live as the world. They aren’t spotted by the world; they are indistinguishable from the world.
The world’s universities are now teaching ethics as a class that is for today’s businessman. In my early days ethics were taught in the public school system. Cheating was wrong in high school, the lie was not tolerated, yet today the lie is normal conversation.
The topics of television used to be set and all knew what the limits were; now we have directors/producers that proudly proclaim that they are pushing the limits, they are pushing decency out of our society and they are doing a very good job of it, sad to say.
We used to “not watch” certain programs because of the content, but you can’t watch commercials any more due to the same content. You can’t trust the rating systems that are in place because the standards have eroded since they were set up. G is supposedly for anyone, but there is now content that has no business in “G” rated shows.
Our society has taught our children that there is little that is out of bounds, little they can’t enjoy, and little that anyone should tell them as to right and wrong. You see, there is no wrong unless you feel it is wrong. Whatever you want as long as you feel it is okay.
Fuente: Mr. D’s Notes on Selected New Testament Books by Stanley Derickson
1:27 {19} Pure religion and undefiled before God and the Father is this, To {z} visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, [and] to keep himself unspotted from the world.
(19) The fourth: the true service of God exists in charity towards our neighbours, especially those who need the help of others (fatherless and widows), and purity of life.
(z) To care for them and to help them as much as we can.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
Taking care of orphans and widows (conduct) is a duty that lies close to the heart of God (cf. Exo 22:22-24; Deu 10:18; Isa 1:17; Jer 5:28; Eze 22:7; Zec 7:10). Yet many who professed to love Him neglected it (Psa 68:5; Ecc 4:1; Mar 12:40). [Note: See Richard D. Patterson, "The Widow, the Orphan, and the Poor in the Old Testament and the Extra-Biblical Literature," Bibliotheca Sacra 130:519 (July-September 1973):223-34.] Likewise personal moral purity (character) is an excellent external indicator of godliness (cf. Act 15:20; 1Ti 5:22).
"When we read James’s injunction to ’keep oneself unstained from the world’ (Jas 1:27), we tend to interpret that in strictly moral terms-as an injunction not to sin. But it also means to keep ourselves ’unstained’ from the world’s wrong ways of thinking, its faulty worldviews. We must learn how to identify and resist the false worldviews dominant at our moment in history." [Note: Nancy R. Pearcey, Total Truth, p. 121.]
James argued for reality. He did not want us to deceive ourselves into thinking that we are spiritual if our obedience to God is only superficial.
"Like Jesus, James sees worship not in terms of external law but as an expression of inner active goodness." [Note: Adamson, p. 85.]
"To summarize, Jas 1:22-27 insist that a person’s religion must consist of more than superficial acts. It is not enough to listen to the statement of spiritual truth (Jas 1:22-25), nor is it sufficient to engage in formal religious activity (Jas 1:26). The person whose religious experience is genuine will put spiritual truth into practice, and his life will be marked by love for others and holiness before God." [Note: Burdick, pp. 176-77.]
In this chapter James dealt with the practical problem of trials and temptations. He used this subject to remind his readers of some very basic truths that have implications in many other areas of practical Christian living. Some of these areas are consistent commitment to God and obedience to His Word. We will demonstrate behavior that is as genuinely religious as anything anyone can do when we respond to temptations to depart from God’s will appropriately. The appropriate response involves rejecting them and rejoicing in them because we believe God is using them to mature us for His glory.