James 5:4

Behold, the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth. BEHOLD - calling attention to their sin crying for judgment. OF YOU KEPT BACK. Not as Alford 'crieth out from you.' The 'keeping back of the hire' was, on the part OF the rich, a virtual "fraud," because the poor workmen were not immediately paid. The phrase is 'kept back of you;' implying virtual, rather than overt, fraud, James refers to . Many sins "cry" to heaven for vengeance which men take no account of, as unchastity and injustice (Bengel). Sins peculiarly offensive to God "cry" to Him. The rich ought to have given freely to the poor: their not doing so was sin. A still greater sin was not paying their debts. Their g...

4_Behold, the hire_. He now condemns cruelty, the invariable companion of avarice. But he refers only to one kind, which, above all others, ought justly to be deemed odious. For if a humane and a just man, as Solomon says in Proverbs 12:10, regards the life of his beast, it is a monstrous barbarity, when man feels no pity towards the man whose sweat he has employed for his own benefit. Hence the Lord has strictly forbidden, in the law, the hire of the laborer to sleep with us (Deuteronomy 24:15). Besides, James does not refer to laborers in common, but, for the sake of amplifying, he mentions husbandmen and reapers. For what can be more base than that they, who supply us with bread by their labor should be pined through want? And yet this monstrous thing is common; for there are many of such a tyrannical disposition, that t

1-6 Public troubles are most grievous to those who live in pleasure, and are secure and sensual, though all ranks suffer deeply at such times. All idolized treasures will soon perish, except as they will rise up in judgment against their possessors. Take heed of defrauding and oppressing; and avoid the very appearance of it. God does not forbid us to use lawful pleasures; but to live in pleasure, especially sinful pleasure, is a provoking sin. Is it no harm for people to unfit themselves for minding the concerns of their souls, by indulging bodily appetites? The just may be condemned and killed; but when such suffer by oppressors, this is marked by God. Above all their other crimes, the Jews had condemned and crucified that Just One who had come among them, even Jesus Christ the righteous....

Verse James 5:4. _THE HIRE OF THE LABOURERS_] The law, Leviticus 19:13, had ordered: _The wages of him that is hired shall not abide with thee_ _all night until the morning_, every day's labour being paid for as soon as ended. This is more clearly stated in another law, Deuteronomy 24:15: _At his day thou shalt give him his hire; neither shall the sun go_ _down upon it;-lest he cry against thee unto the Lord, and it be_ _sin unto thee_. And that God particularly resented this defrauding of the hireling we see from Malachi 3:5: _I will come near to you in judgment, and will be a swift witness_ aga...

BEHOLD, THE HIRE OF THE LABOURERS WHO HAVE REAPED DOWN YOUR FIELDS - In the previous verses the form of the sin which the apostle specified was that they had hoarded their property. He now states another form of their guilt, that, while doing this, they had withheld what was due from the very laborers who had cultivated their fields, and to whose labor they were indebted for what they had. The phrase “who have reaped down your fields,” is used to denote labor in general. This particular thing is specified, perhaps, because the reaping of the harvest seems to be more immediately connected with the accumulation of property. What is said here, however, will apply to all kinds of labor. It may be remarked, also, that the sin condemned here is one that may exist not only in reference to those who are hired to cultivate a farm, but to all in our employ - to day-laborers, to mechanics, to seame...

EXPOSITION JAMES 5:1 DENUNCIATION OF THE RICH FOR (1) GRINDING DOWN THE POOR AND KEEPING BACK THEIR WAGES; (2) LUXURY; (3) MURDER. The whole section resembles nothing so much as an utterance of one of the old Jewish prophets. It might almost be a leaf torn out of the Old Testament. JAMES 5:1 GO TO NOW (see on James 4

BEHOLD THE HIRE OF THE LABOURERS, WHICH HAVE REAPED DOWN YOUR FIELDS,.... The wages agreed for by the day, with the labourers in their fields, particularly their reapers; which one instance serves for many others; and is the rather mentioned, because reaping is a laborious work, and those who are employed in it have nothing to live upon but their hand labour; and especially because they are made use of in cutting down the corn when it is fully ripe, and in great plenty; wherefore, to detain their just wages from them argues great inhumanity and wickedness; and yet this was what was done by rich men: WHICH IS OF YOU KEPT BACK BY FRAUD, CRIETH; unto God for vengeance, as the blood of Abel did; and shows that such an evil, however privately and fraudulently it may be done, will be made public, and is a crying one: AND THE CRIES OF THEM WHICH HAVE REAPED ARE ENTERED INTO THE EARS OF THE LO...

THE LORD OF SABAOTH That is, Jehovah of hosts....

JAMES 5:4 avpesterhme,noj {A} The manuscripts present three readings, avfusterhme,noj (a B*) and two forms of avposterei/n, the perfect tense, avpesterhme,noj (A B2 P Y _al_), and the present tense, avposterh,menoj (K L _al_). A majority of the Committee preferred to read avpesterhme,noj. [The earliest reading appears to be the rare word avfusterhme,noj, which copyists emended to a more familiar word. B.M.M.]...

V. THE COMING OF THE LORD AND THE LIFE OF FAITH CHAPTER 5 _ 1. The oppression by the rich and their coming doom (James 5:1)_ 2. Be patient unto the coming of the Lord (James 5:7) 3. The prayers of faith and the life of faith (James 5:13) James 5:1 The two classes whom James addresses stand out very prominently in this final chapter of his Epistle. The rich oppressors certainly are not believers but the unbelieving rich; they are not addressed as “brethren”; but others are in verse 7 and exhorted to patience. Both classes, the unbelieving rich and the believing remnant are confronted by the coming of the Lord. “Go to