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The Letter of James, second edition (Pillar New Testament Commentary | PNTC) is unavailable, but you can change that!

Few New Testament books have been as controversial and misunderstood as the letter of James. Its place in the canon was contested by some early Christians, and the reformer Martin Luther called it an “epistle of straw.” The sometimes negative view of the letter among modern theologians, however, is not shared by ordinary believers. Well known and often quoted, James is concise, intensely...

gentile as well as Jewish Christians.76 The early Christians came to understand that God’s eschatological people included both gentiles and Jews. James, then, may have “transferred” the term from its original Jewish roots and applied it broadly to the church of his day. However, given the other indications of audience in the letter, a reference to Jewish Christians is more likely. In this view, James would be addressing these Jewish Christians as the nucleus of a restored and renewed Israel.77 The
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