In 1542, Martin Luther referred to his desire to throw the epistle of James “into the stove”:
XIX.
Against Thesis 21
James [2:22] says that Abraham
was justified by works. Therefore, justification is not by faith.
Master Heinrich responds: James
is speaking of works as the effect of justification, not as the cause.
Dr. Martin Luther: That epistle
of James gives us much trouble, for the papists embrace it alone and leave out
all the rest. Up to this point I have been accustomed just to deal with and
interpret it according to the sense of the rest of Scriptures. For you will
judge that none of it must be set forth contrary to manifest Holy Scripture.
Accordingly, if they will not admit my interpretations, then I shall make
rubble also of it. I almost feel like throwing Jimmy into the stove, as the
priest in Kalenberg did. (Martin Luther, “The Licentiate Examination
of Heinrich Schmedenstede,” 1542, trans. Lewis W. Spitz in Luther Works,
ed. Jaroslav Jan Pelikan, Hilton C. Oswald, and Helmut T. Lehmann
[Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 1999], 34:317)
With respect to “the priest in Kalenberg,” as Pelikan noted:
The preacher of Kalenberg, when
visited by the duchess, heated the room with the wooden statues of the
apostles. The statue of James was the last and as the preacher shoved it into
the stove he exclaimed, “Now bend over, Jimmy, you must go into the stove; no
matter if you were the pope or all the bishops, the room must become warm.”
Elsewhere, in his 1546 prefaces to the New Testament, he
wrote that:
In a word St. John’s Gospel and
his first epistle, St. Paul’s epistles, especially Romans, Galatians, and
Ephesians, and St. Peter’s first epistle are the books that show you Christ and
teach you all that is necessary and salvatory for you to know, even if you were
never to see or hear any other book or doctrine. Therefore St. James’ epistle
is really an epistle of straw, compared to these others, for it has nothing of
the nature of the gospel about it. But more of this in the other prefaces.] (“Prefaces
to the New Testament 1546 (1522),” trans. Charles M. Jacobs, in Luther’s Works,
ed. Jaroslav Jan Pelikan, Hilton C. Oswald, and Helmut T. Lehmann [Philadelphia:
Fortress Press, 1999], 35:362)
In his preface to the epistles of James and Jude, he offered
the following commentary concerning the Epistle of James:
Though this epistle of St. James
was rejected by the ancients, I praise it and consider it a good book, because
it sets up no doctrines of men but vigorously promulgates the law of God.
However, to state my own opinion about it, though without prejudice to anyone,
I do not regard it as the writing of an apostle; and my reasons follow.
In the first place it is flatly
against St. Paul and all the rest of Scripture in ascribing justification to
works [2:24]. It says that Abraham was justified by his works when he offered
his son Isaac [2:21]; though in Romans 4[:2–22] St. Paul teaches to the
contrary that Abraham was justified apart from works, by his faith alone,
before he had offered his son, and proves it by Moses in Genesis 15[:6]. Now
although this epistle might be helped and an interpretation devised for this
justification by works, it cannot be defended in its application to works [Jas.
2:23] of Moses’ statement in Genesis 15[:6]. For Moses is speaking here only of
Abraham’s faith, and not of his works, as St. Paul demonstrates in Romans 4.
This fault, therefore, proves that this epistle is not the work of any apostle.
In the second place its purpose
is to teach Christians, but in all this long teaching it does not once mention
the Passion, the resurrection, or the Spirit of Christ. He names Christ several
times; however he teaches nothing about him, but only speaks of general faith
in God. Now it is the office of a true apostle to preach of the Passion and
resurrection and office of Christ, and to lay the foundation for faith in him,
as Christ himself says in John 15[:27], “You shall bear witness to me.” All the
genuine sacred books agree in this, that all of them preach and inculcate [treiben]
Christ. And that is the true test by which to judge all books, when we see
whether or not they inculcate Christ. For all the Scriptures show us Christ,
Romans 3[:21]; and St. Paul will know nothing but Christ, 1 Corinthians 2[:2].
Whatever does not teach Christ is not yet apostolic, even though St. Peter or
St. Paul does the teaching. Again, whatever preaches Christ would be apostolic,
even if Judas, Annas, Pilate, and Herod were doing it.
But this James does nothing more
than drive to the law and to its works. Besides, he throws things together so
chaotically that it seems to me he must have been some good, pious man, who
took a few sayings from the disciples of the apostles and thus tossed them off
on paper. Or it may perhaps have been written by someone on the basis of his
preaching. He calls the law a “law of liberty” [1:25], though Paul calls it a
law of slavery, of wrath, of death, and of sin.
Moreover he cites the sayings of
St. Peter [in 5:20]: “Love covers a multitude of sins” [1 Pet. 4:8], and again
[in 4:10], “Humble yourselves under the hand of God” [1 Pet. 5:6]; also the
saying of St. Paul in Galatians 5[:17], “The Spirit lusteth against envy.” And
yet, in point of time, St. James was put to death by Herod [Acts 12:2] in
Jerusalem, before St. Peter. So it seems that [this author] came long after St.
Peter and St. Paul.
In a word, he wanted to guard
against those who relied on faith without works, but was unequal to the task.
He tries to accomplish by harping on the law what the apostles accomplish by
stimulating people to love. Therefore55 I cannot include him among
the chief books, though I would not thereby prevent anyone from including or
extolling him as he pleases, for there are otherwise many good sayings in him.
(“Preface to the Epistles of St. James and St. Jude 1546 (1522),” in
ibid., 35:395-97)
Martin
Foord, a defender of the historic Protestant understanding of justification,
discussed why Luther had such a low view of James:
What then was Luther’s
understanding of the status of James? This is only appreciated when we grasp
Luther’s doctrine of the NT canon. He believed the NT contained two kinds of
books: the “chief books” and those that were of less value. The early church
fathers Origen of Alexandria and Eusebius of Caesarea also distinguished
between two kinds of NT works: the recognized books (traditionally called the homolegomena) and the disputed books
(traditionally named the antilegomena).
The criterion Luther used to distinguish between the chief books and the others
was apostolic authorship. For this reason, he judged four works to be outside
of the chief books: Hebrews, James, Jude, and Revelation. Unlike the rest of
the NT these four works contained “straw,” they were not as pure.
So why did Luther believe James
was not a chief book? Firstly, he concluded that its author “James” was not an
apostle. Luther noted that the epistle of James contains sayings found in
Peter’s first letter and Paul’s Galatians. Yet the apostle James (son of
Zebedee) was martyred earlier than Peter and Paul (Acts 12:2). And thus, the
“James” who wrote this letter must have done so after the death of James
Zebedee. Luther concluded the “James” who authored the letter “came along after
St. Peter and St. Paul.”
Secondly, Luther believed James
could not be apostolic due to its content. In the first place James never once
mentions the death or resurrection of Christ, the very heart of the gospel.
Luther explains,
Now it is the office of a true
apostle to preach of the Passion and resurrection and office of Christ, and to
lay the foundation for faith in him, as Christ himself says in John 15[:27],
“You shall bear witness to me.” All the genuine sacred books agree in this,
that all of them preach and inculcate Christ.… But James does nothing more than
drive to the law and to its works.
Rather in Luther’s mind, James
simply preaches law, and does so chaotically.
Luther judged that James failed
the apostolic content test in a second way: it contradicted justification by
faith alone. He stated that James is “flatly against St. Paul and the all the
rest of Scripture in ascribing justification to works.” Luther was aware that
James’s statements about justification could be harmonized with Paul’s. But
even if this was so, he argued that James interpreted Genesis 15:6 (Jas 2:23)
in a manner contrary to Paul (Rom 4:3). (Martin Foord, “The ‘Epistle
of Straw’: Reflections on Luther and the Epistle of James,” Themelios 45,
no. 2 [2020]: 293-94)
Foord then critiques Luther’s view of James , noting that
. . . Luther did not sufficiently
recognize the evidence for the apostolic authorship of James. Two of the twelve
apostles were named James: James the son of Zebedee and James the son of
Alphaeus. Luther rightly concluded that James Zebedee was martyred too early to
be the likely author of James (Acts 12:2). And little is known of James
Alphaeus’s role in the early church. The author of James must have had a
recognized authority to be acknowledged by “the twelve tribes scattered among
the nations” (Jas 1:1). There is one other James who best fits this position:
James the brother of Jesus (Matt 13:55; Mark 6:3).
Christ sent his twelve apostles.
But over and above these he sent further apostles (1 Cor 15:7). The “last”
apostle was Paul (1 Cor 15:8). And another was James the brother of Jesus. He
was not one of the twelve but later become an apostle (Gal 1:19). It appears
the resurrected Christ himself commissioned him (1 Cor 15:7). Moreover, this
James was not any apostle but one of the three “pillar” apostles alongside
Peter and John (Gal 2:9). Indeed, this James became the leader of the Jerusalem
church (Acts 12:17; 21:18; Gal 2:12). He seems to have had a special authority
at the Jerusalem Council (Acts 15:13). And given these credentials, scholars
have concluded that James of Jerusalem, the brother of Jesus, who was an
apostle, is the best candidate as the author of James. (Ibid., 296)
Ford continues:
But what of Luther’s claim that
James is not apostolic in content because it never mentions the death and
resurrection of Jesus? Here Luther exposes an assumption about the content of
apostolic preaching: apostles must always preach the death and resurrection of
Christ for salvation. Luther cites Jesus’s words in John 15:27 as proof: “And
you [apostles] also must testify, for you have been with me from the
beginning.” Luther’s demand is related to his characteristic understanding of
the gospel and his distinction between law and gospel:
For this I must consult the
Gospel and listen to the Gospel, which does not teach me what I should do—for
that is the proper function of the Law—but what someone else has done for me,
namely, that Jesus Christ, the Son of God, has suffered and died to deliver me
from sin and death. The Gospel commands me to accept and believe this, and this
is what is called “the truth of the Gospel.”
For Luther, the gospel preaches
promise and a response of faith, whereas the law preaches command with a
response of works. Hence, Luther believed that repentance was the call of the
law, not the gospel.
It is true that the apostles were
to preach the gospel. But they were to preach more than the gospel. The
reformed tradition that arose in the reformation era differed with Luther over
the demand of the gospel. It held that the gospel called for both faith and repentance (Acts 14:15). Thus a crucial aspect of apostolic
preaching was the repentant lifestyle that is worthy of the gospel. This
matches Jesus’s teaching in the Gospels. He preached the gospel itself, but
also the way of life befitting the gospel, seen in say the Sermon on the Mount.
There is no reason in principle that an apostolic writing could not be largely
instruction about the Christian standard of living. It was a necessary aspect
of apostolic preaching. So, the books of Philemon, 2 John, and 3 John do not
specifically mention the death or resurrection of Christ but focus on issues of
practical living. Then why not James? (Ibid., 296-97)