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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comRobertson Word Pictures - James 1:17 - 1:17
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
Gift (dosis) - boon (dōrēma). Both old substantives from the same original verb (didōmi), to give. Dosis is the act of giving (ending ̇sis), but sometimes by metonymy for the thing given like ktisis for ktisma (Col 1:15). But dōrēma (from dōreō, from dōron a gift) only means a gift, a benefaction (Rom 5:16). The contrast here argues for “giving” as the idea in dosis. Curiously enough there is a perfect hexameter line here:
pāsa do / sis aga / thē kai / pān dō / rēma te / leion.
Such accidental rhythm occurs occasionally in many writers. Ropes (like Ewald and Mayor) argues for a quotation from an unknown source because of the poetical word dōrēma, but that is not conclusive.
From above (anōthen). That is, from heaven. Cf. Joh 3:31; Joh 19:11.
Coming down (katabainon). Present active neuter singular participle of katabainō agreeing with dōrēma, expanding and explaining anōthen (from above).
From the Father of lights (apo tou patros tōn phōtōn). “Of the lights” (the heavenly bodies). For this use of patēr see Job 38:28 (Father of rain); 2Co 1:3; Eph 1:17. God is the Author of light and lights.
With whom (par' hōi). For para (beside) with locative sense for standpoint of God see para tōi theōi (Mar 10:27; Rom 2:11; Rom 9:14; Eph 6:9.
Can be no (ouk eni). This old idiom (also in Gal 3:28; Col 3:11) may be merely the original form of en with recessive accent (Winer, Mayor) or a shortened form of enesti. The use of eni en in 1Co 6:5 argues for this view, as does the use of eine (einai) in Modern Greek (Robertson, Grammar, p. 313).
Variation (parallagē). Old word from parallassō, to make things alternate, here only in N.T. In Aristeas in sense of alternate stones in pavements. Dio Cassius has parallaxis without reference to the modern astronomical parallax, though James here is comparing God (Father of the lights) to the sun (Mal 4:2), which does have periodic variations.
Shadow that is cast by turning (tropēs aposkiasma). Tropē is an old word for “turning” (from trepō to turn), here only in N.T. Aposkiasma is a late and rare word (aposkiasmos in Plutarch) from aposkiazō (apo, skia) a shade cast by one object on another. It is not clear what the precise metaphor is, whether the shadow thrown on the dial (aposkiazō in Plato) or the borrowed light of the moon lost to us as it goes behind the earth. In fact, the text is by no means certain, for Aleph B papyrus of fourth century actually read hē tropēs aposkiasmatos (the variation of the turning of the shadow). Ropes argues strongly for this reading, and rather convincingly. At any rate there is no such periodic variation in God like that we see in the heavenly bodies.