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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comVincent Word Studies - James 5:15 - 5:15
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
The sick (τὸν κάμνοντα)
Rev. gives, better, the participial force, him that is sick. The word originally means to work. Hence, “him that is laboring under disease.”
And if he have committed sins (κἃν ἁμαρτίας ᾖ πεποιηκώς)
The Greek gives a shade of meaning which can hardly be transferred neatly into English, representing not merely the fact that the man has sinned, but his condition as a sinner. Literally the words read, if he be having committed sins; i.e., in a state of having committed, and under the moral or physical consequences of transgression.
They shall be forgiven (ἀφεθήσεται)
Better, Rev., “it shall be forgiven,” supplying the commission as a subject. The verb means to send forth or discharge, and is the standard New-Testament word for forgiving. Forgiveness (ἄφεσις) is a putting or sending away of sins, with a consequent discharge of the sinner; thus differing from τάρεσις (Rom 3:25), which is a passing by of sin, a pretermission as distinguished from a remission. See, farther, on Rom 3:25.