Who is the man in James justified before? Does man really justify himself before God by his works?
In order to make them mesh, you have to change what justified means. I don't want to do that. I want to allow the Scripture to be as honest to me as possible.
In order to make them mesh, you have to change what justified means. I don't want to do that. I want to allow the Scripture to be as honest to me as possible.
In the Strong's Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible, the Greek word for justified "dikaioo" #1344 is:
1. to render righteous or such he ought to be
2. to show, exhibit, evince, one to be righteous, such as he is and wishes himself to be considered
3. to declare, pronounce, one to be just, righteous, or such as he ought to be
God is said to have been justified by those who were baptized by John the Baptist (Luke 7:29). This act pronounced or declared God to be righteous. It did not make Him righteous. The basis or ground for the pronouncement was the fact that God IS righteous. Notice that the NIV reads, "acknowledged that God's way was right.." The ESV reads, "they declared God just.." This is the sense in which God was justified, "shown to be righteous" not accounted as righteous.
Matthew 11:19 - "The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, 'Behold, a gluttonous man and a drunkard, a friend of tax-gatherers and sinners!' Yet wisdom is justified/vindicated/shown to be right by her deeds."
Matthew 12:37 - "For by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned." This is because our words reveal the state of our hearts. Words (just like our works) will appear to be evidences for, or against a man's being in a state of grace and righteousness.