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Old 09-09-2016, 11:53 PM   #216
Evangelical
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Join Date: Aug 2016
Posts: 3,965
Default Re: What It's Really All About -- The height of arrogance

I have spent more time outside of the recovery than in it. So what I say about James is not from the recovery or Lee. It is from the Bible and history.

I can prove from the Bible that James did not have the vision and was stuck in Judaism, "faith + works".

I can prove that James was still in Judaism, of the "circumcision party":

Galatians 2:12:
For before certain men came from James, he was eating with the Gentiles; but when they came he drew back and separated himself, fearing the circumcision party.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary says:

http://biblehub.com/commentaries/galatians/2-12.htm
Still James' leanings were to legalism, and this gave him his influence with the Jewish party (Ac 21:18-26).

So you see, a view that thinks that all of the apostles including James were believing in "faith alone" as per Paul's teachings, is not correct. Some were still stuck in their Judaism (even Peter, whom Paul had to rebuke).

He is called "James the Less", as opposed to "James the Greater":
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_the_Less

James the Great is the first class apostle and James the Less is the second class apostle.

So before you go jumping to conclusions, you can see my view is informed by the history and the facts. The facts are that James is not of the same calibre as the other books of the Bible. If we do not realize this we may fall into error.

Martin Luther was a very smart person and knew this too and is perhaps the reason he called James an "epistle of straw", although he should not have sought to remove it from the Canon. He knew its author was not of the same calibre as Paul or Peter. If we follow James more than the other books of the Bible we can end up being a "judaizing Christian" like he possibly was, and are not keeping with the truth of salvation by faith alone.
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