Verse 8
... a doubleminded man, unstable in all his ways.
Two things of very great importance are evidenced by this short verse. In the first place, as Dummelow suggested, "It refers to the teaching of Christ in Matthew 6:24";[20] thus being in perfect consonance with practically everything else in the book of James.
Secondly, "doubleminded" is a word evidently coined by the author of this epistle, because it is found in no other work prior to this.[21] Significantly, Clement of Rome (95 A.D.) quoted from this passage in his First Letter to the Corinthians, thus: "Wretched are they who are of a double mind, and of a doubting heart."[22] As Lenski said, this word caught on, and writers afterward frequently used it. "It is used often after the time of James as if it caught men's fancy."[23]
For further comment on the fact of such doublemindedness with regard to sacred things being manifested in other areas of life also, see under James 1:6.
[20] J. R. Dummelow, op. cit., p. 1034.
[21] R. C. H. Lenski, op. cit., p. 532.
[22] Clement of Rome, The First Epistle of Clement, The Ante-Nicene Fathers (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 1920), Vol. 1, p. 11.
[23] R. C. H. Lenski, op. cit., p. 532.
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