James 5:14

Is any among you sick? let him call for the elders of the church; and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord: and the prayer of faith shall save him that is sick, and the Lord shall raise him up; and if he have committed sins, it shall be forgiven him.

James in this remarkable paragraph plainly has under consideration the charismatic gift of healing, one of the special gifts that attended the early propagation of Christianity for the purpose of confirming the word of God. As Tasker succinctly put it:

It is probable that the mention of oil in this passage is to be regarded as one of the accompaniments of that miraculous healing which was no infrequent occurrence in the apostolic age, and is regarded in the New Testament as a supernatural sign vindicating the truth of the Christian gospel in the early days of its proclamation.[45]

Supporting this view is the fact of the apostles, upon the Lord's instructions, using such a method when they were first sent out by Jesus (Mark 6:13).

An objection to this view has been founded on the fact that the New Testament does not say that "the elders" were the ones who usually possessed such gifts; nevertheless, the passage here may be interpreted as implying that very thing, an implication that is certainly not contradicted by anything else in the New Testament. It is inherently reasonable that the very ones usually endowed by the Holy Spirit with those special gifts would have been, of course, the elders of the church. The miraculous gift of healing was the fourth in Paul's list of nine such gifts (1 Corinthians 12:9).

The understanding of this place is further illuminated by the words of Roberts:

Since it is clearly demonstrated from the New Testament that such miraculous aid existed in the church of that age,

and since this healing would be more certain to offer aid to the sick, it would seem that it might be expected that the instructions of James concern the miraculous healings.[46]

Punchard's quotation from Bishop Browne follows this same line of interpretation, thus:

The aim of the apostolic anointing was bodily recovery, and this exactly corresponds with the miraculous cures of early ages ... so long as such powers remained in the church, it was reasonable that the anointing of the sick should be retained.[47]

Another objection to this view has been based upon the "absence from this passage of `laying on of hands' usually mentioned in connection with the miraculous gift";[48] but since the anointing with oil would necessarily involve "laying on of hands," the objection refutes itself. Carson recognized the interpretation adopted here in saying that "Some believe that we have here the exercise of the miraculous gift of healing."[49] From the citations here, it is clear enough that our interpretation does not lack scholarly support.

EXTREME UNCTION

Any interpretation of this passage must take account of the Roman Catholic doctrine of extreme unction which is erroneously based upon it. The footnote in the Douay Bible has this: "St. James promulgated here the Sacrament of Extreme Unction. Presbyters is certainly used here in the sense of priests."[50]

James did not promulgate the doctrine mentioned. Indeed, it was never even heard of in the Catholic Church itself until centuries after the New Testament was written.

In the twelfth century, Petrus Lombardus named this as the fifth of the Roman sacraments; and three centuries later the Council of Trent established the Catholic sacrament as we know it today.[51]

Regarding the notion that "presbyters," as James used the word here, actually means "priests," this is a preposterous error. There is not a single instance of any such meaning pertaining to "presbyters" in the whole New Testament.

Of the many contradictions in the Roman "sacrament" against the New Testament itself, the following may be noted: (1) The end in view in this passage is the recovery of the patient; in "extreme unction," it is his death which is imminent. (2) In the New Testament, it is the elders of the church who were to be called; in "extreme unction," it is a priest. (3) In the New Testament, it is the bodily recovery of the patient; in "extreme unction," it is the alleged salvation of the soul that is accomplished. "Anointing in the name of the Lord" does not mean that a so-called "sacrament" is in view; because, as Lenski pointed out, "All that we do in word or in deed is done `in the name of the Lord' (Colossians 3:17).[52]

Before leaving these two verses, the sharp distinction between James 5:13 and James 5:14,15 should be marked. The rule for all ages includes prayer for the suffering (James 5:13); the special rule for the miraculous healing still available when James wrote is given in the next two verses. For those who believe that miraculous cures are still being effected, the consideration should be pondered that such "cures" carry no universal conviction, being neither like the truly miraculous cures of the New Testament, nor in any manner serving to confirm the word of the Lord. Those "performing" the cures are also different. Instead of being humble servants of God who never took money for their miracles, the self-glorified "faith-healers" of today have made themselves fantastically rich; and far from being infallible, as were the apostles, in the performance of their wonders, the modern miracle workers fail more often than they succeed, and countless thousands have sought them in vain. Such considerations as these should give pause to any who might suppose that the power James mentioned in these verses is anywhere on earth available to men today.

[45] R. V. G. Tasker, op. cit., p. 130.

[46] J. W. Roberts, op. cit., p. 169.

[47] E. G. Punchard, op. cit., p. 380.

[48] T. Carson, op. cit., p. 591.

[49] Ibid.

[50] The Douay Bible (New York: Catholic Book Publishing Company, 1949), in loco.

[51] R. C. H. Lenski, op. cit., p. 665.

[52] Ibid., p. 663.