James 5:1-6

The thought of trade suggests the thought of wealth, as in Revelation 18:15 οἱ ἔμποροι τούτων πλουτήσαντες�ʼ αὐτῆς.

The rich men who are here addressed are outside ‘the brotherhood.’ This appears clearly both from the character of the address and from the acts ascribed to them, and also from the absence of appeal to any Christian principle, and from the marked contrast to the paragraph which follows, in which ‘the brotherhood’ is again addressed.
The prosperity of the wicked is the insoluble problem of the O.T. Two answers are suggested here:—(a) the perishable character of that on which their prosperity rests; (b) the future retribution. Comp. Zephaniah 1:12; Zephaniah 1:14; Zephaniah 1:18; Job 20, especially James 5:18-19; Psalms 12:5; Proverbs 14:31; Ecclesiastes 5:8; Ezekiel 18:18; Amos 4:1-2.

The picture of the rich oppressor and the persecuted poor is conceived in the spirit of Hebrew prophecy, and it is true to the religious life of the Holy Family. See Luke 1:53 πεινῶντας ἐνέπλησεν�, καὶ πλουτοῦντας ἐξαπέστειλε κενούς. It has been in all ages the temptation of irresponsible wealth to oppress and persecute. It was among the evil signs of the times in the pre-exile period, Micah 2:2; Amos 3:10-11; Amos 3:15, and again broke out after the return, Nehemiah 5:1-13. Possibly this keen and cruel trade spirit was an immediate result of Babylonian influence. In the Chaldean tablets the ‘cry’ of the poor against the oppressor is frequently expressed. The slave trade, perhaps the most extensive business in the ancient world, directly tended to heartlessness and oppression; and lending money on usury for agricultural purposes was another process tending to the same result: Ezekiel 18:8; Ezekiel 18:17; Ezekiel 22:12; Isaiah 3:14-15.