Annotation CCCXXXVII

”James, [servant] of God and of our Lord Jesus Christ.” — James 1:1

Whether the epistle of James is canonical.

The exposition of Thomas Cajetan applied to this passage, Ambrose of Compsa, [in] the first book of the Annotations, confutes, writing these [things]: “I HAVE noted, moreover, concerning the epistle of James, those words which he [Cajetan] writes: ‘It is not altogether certain whether this epistle be of James, the brother of the Lord — Jerome saying, in the book On Illustrious Men: “James, the brother of the Lord, wrote only one epistle, which is of the seven canonical” — which itself also is asserted [to be] by some other under his name, although by little and little, with time proceeding, it obtained authority. The salutation is so pure [plain], that it is conformable to no salutation of any other apostolic epistle. For it sounds nothing of God, nothing of Jesus Christ, nothing of grace [or] of peace, but [gives a] salutation after a profane manner; nor does he name himself an Apostle, but only a servant of Jesus Christ; from which, joined together at once, the author is rendered less certain.’ Thus he [Cajetan]. But I have marveled, first, that he elicits from the words of Jerome that the author of this epistle is not certain — since Jerome so expressly says (and not as one doubting, but as one asserting) that James, the brother of the Lord, wrote this epistle; and asserts that it is one of the seven canonical, and that, with time proceeding, it obtained authority. And to Paulinus he thus says: ‘JAMES, Peter, John, Jude — [these] seven wrote epistles, as mystical, so succinct — brief and long; brief in words, long in sentences [meanings]: so that rare is he who does not go blind [caecutiat] in the reading of them.’ But as to what Cajetan adds — that the salutation is conformable to no salutation of any other apostolic epistle — it has nothing of moment. For John too is like to none in this—

—this, [John,] who, having no salutation at all, at once bursts into that [text], “That which was from the beginning, etc.” That is altogether marvelous, that he [Cajetan] says there is nothing of Jesus Christ in this salutation, since it begins from here, “James, servant of Jesus Christ.” Then, [as to] that which he notes as though profane — [namely] to say “greeting [salutem]” thus baldly — he condemns not so much this Apostle as, at once, all [the apostles], and the whole apostolic council, who with these words saluted those to whom they sent the epistle: “The apostles and elder brethren, to those who are at Antioch, and Syria, and Cilicia, the brethren from among the gentiles, greeting.” Read the following book, in the confutation of the ninth heresy, objection first, second, third, and fourth.