JAMES, EPISTLE OF. This is called by Eusebius (Hist Eccles. ii. 23 ) the first of the Catholic Epistles. As the writer simply styles himself James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, doubts have existed. both in ancient and modern times. respecting its authorship.
1. Author. It has been ascribed to no less than four different persons, viz., James, the SOI1 of Zebedee; James, the son of Alplimus ( who were both of the number of the twelve apostles) ; James, our Lord's brother (Gal. i :19) ; and to an anonymous author, who assumed the name of James in order to procure authority to a supposi titious writing.
The chief authority for ascribing this epistle to James the son of Zebedee, is the inscription to the Syriac inanuscript, published by Widmandstadt, wherein it is termed 'the earliest writing in the New Testament,' and to an Arabic NIS. cited by Cornelius a Lapide. Isidore of Seville, and other Spanish writers interested in maintaining that James traveled into Spain (Calmet's Com mentary): assert that James the son of Ze bedee visited in person the 'twelve tribes scat tered' through that as well as other countries, and afterwards addressed to them this epistle. The Mozarabic liturgy also supports the same view, and the old Italic, published by Martianay, con tains the inscription Explicit Epistola Jacobi fil. Zebeelai. But this opinion has obtained very few suffrages; for, as Calmet has observed (Pref. to his Commentary), it is not credible that so great progress had been made among the dispersed Jews before the martyrdom of James, which took place at Jerusalem about A. D. 42; and if the author, as has been commonly supposed, alludes to St. Paul's Epistles to the Romans (A. D. 58) and Galatians (A. D. 55), it would be a mani fest anachronism to ascribe this epistle to the son of Zebedee.
The claim to the authorship of the epistle, there fore, rests between James 'the Lord's brother,' and James the son of Alphwus. In the preceding article the difficult question, whether these names do not, in fact, refer to the same person, has been examined: it suffices, in this place, to state that no writer who regards James 'the Lord's brother' as distinct from James the son of Alphmus, has held the latter to be the author of the epistle: and therefore, if no claim be advanced for the son of Zebedee, James 'the brother of the Lord' remains the only person whom the name at the head of this epistle could be intended to designate. Hegesippus, cited by Eusebius (Hist. Eccles. ii: 23), acquaints us that James, the brother of Jesus, who obtained the surname of the Just, governed the church of Jerusalem along with, or after the apostles. Eusebius (/. c.) relates that he was the first who held the episcopate of Jerusalem (Je rome says for thirty years) ; and both he and Jo sephus (Antiq. xx:o, t) give an account of his martyrdom. To him, therefore, is the authorship of an epistle addressed to the Jewish Christians with good reason ascribed. The other opinion, which considers the epistle as pseudepigraphical, is treated below.
2. Authenticity and Canonicity. Eusebius, as above, observes that James, the brother of Jesus, who is called Christ, is said to have written the first of the Catholic epistles; but it is to be observed that it is considered spurious. Not many of the ancients have mentioned it, nor that called the Epistle of Jude. . . . Neverthe less, we know that these, with the rest, are pub licly read in most of the churches.' To the same effect St. Jerome:—`St. James, surnamed the Just, who is called the Lord's brother, is the au thor of only one epistle, one of the seven called Catholic, which, however, is said to have been published by some other who assumed his name, although in the progress of time it gradually ac• quired authority.' Dr. Lardner is of the opinion that this statement of St. Jerome is a mere repe tition of that of Eusebius. It was also rejected in the fourth century by Theodore of Mopsuestia, and in the sixth by Cosmas Indicopleustes. (See ANTILEGOMENA.) It is, however, cited by Clem ens Romanus in his first or genuine Epistle to the Cozinthians (ch. x., comp. with James ii :21, 23 ; and ch. xi, comp. with James ii :25, and Hell. xi :31). It seems to be alluded to in the Shep herd of Hermas, 'Resist the devil, and he will be confounded and flee from you.' It is also generally believed to be referred to by Irenxus (11(cr. iv :16, 2), 'Abraham believed God, and it was,' etc. Origen -cites it in his Comment. on John i:xix, iv, 306, calling it, however, the re puted epistle of James. (See ANTILEGOMENA.) We have the authority of Cassiodorus for the fact that Clemens Alcxandrinus commented on this epistle; and it is not only expressly cited by Ephrem Syrus (Opp. Orme. iii :51, 'James the brother of our Lord says "weep and howl,"' to gether with other references), but it forms part of the ancient Syriac version, a work of the second century, and which contains no other of the Anti legomena, except the Epistle to the Hebrews. But though 'not quoted expressly by any of the Latin fathers before the fourth century' (Hug's Intro duction), it was, soon after the time of the Coun cil of Nice, received both in the eastern and west ern churches without any marks of doubt, and was admitted into the canon along with the othcr scriptures by the councils of Hippo and Carthage. Nor (with the above exceptions) does there ap pear to have been a voice raised against it since that period until the era of the Reformation, when the ancient doubts were revived by Erasmus (who maintains that the author was not an apostle, Annot. ix New Testament), Cardinal Cajetan (Comment.in7 Canonic. Epist., 1532), and Luther. Cajetan observes that 'the salutation is unlike that of any other of the apostolical salutations, con taining nothing of God, of grace, or peace, but sending greetings after the profane manner, from which, and his not naming himself an apostle, the author is rendered uncertain.