James 5:1

James 5:1-6. Warnings for the Rich

1. Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl The words are nearly the same as those we have met with before in ch. James 4:9, but there is in them less of the call to repentance, and more of the ring of prophetic denunciation. The word for "howl," not found elsewhere in the New Testament, is found in three consecutive Chapter s of Isaiah (Isaiah 13:6; Isaiah 14:31; Isaiah 15:3), which may well have been present to St James" thoughts.

for your miseries that shall come upon you Literally, that are coming upon you, in the very act to come. The context points to these as consisting not merely in the cares and anxieties that come in the common course of things upon the rich, but in the special troubles that were to usher in the advent of the Judge. Historically, the words had their primary fulfilment in the woes that preceded the destruction of Jerusalem, but these were but the first in the series of "springing and germinant accomplishments" which will attain their completeness before the final Advent.