James 5:10

Take, my brethren, the prophets Better, as representing the emphatic order of the Greek, As an example of affliction and long-suffering take, my brethren, the prophets … The first of the nouns expresses simply the objective affliction, not the manner of enduring it.

the prophets who have spoken Better, who spake. The words point, perhaps, chiefly to the prophets of the Old Testament, as having, with scarcely an exception, suffered persecution (Matthew 5:12). But we must not forget that there were prophets also in the Christian Church (1 Corinthians 12:10; 1Co 14:24; 1 Corinthians 14:29; Ephesians 2:20; Ephesians 4:11; Revelation 22:9), and that these were exposed to the same trials as their predecessors. It is to their sufferings that St Paul probably referred in 1 Thessalonians 2:15, and St James may well have included them in his general reference. Stephen and his own namesake, the son of Zebedee, may have been specially present to his thoughts.