Primary Scriptures: James 1:6-16; 2:1-7; 3:14-16; 4:1-17; 5:1-6 Story Summary: Verses with content about foolishness Location: Kingdom of Judea (Israel)
Time: Circa 50 AD
Suggested Memory Scriptures: James 1:6, 12; 4:1, 3; 5:1-3
King Solomon is reputed to be the wisest man who ever lived. While this may have been true for a period of his life, he also acted as foolishly as any man who ever lived. Through his five hundred wives and three hundred concubines, he introduced and instilled idol worship in Israel, which became the initial impetus for the nation’s downfall and destruction.
From the writings of King Solomon, it is undeniable he had knowledge of what constituted wisdom and what constituted foolishness. Whenever he acted foolishly, it was by his own informed choice, and as his distant relative, James almost certainly knew all of King Solomon’s writings and actions.
One of James’ biggest problems was the persecution of the Jerusalem church by the Jewish leaders. He surely wished they had taken Gamaliel’s advice to leave the church alone, since it would flourish if God wanted it to and would perish if it was human-based. If they persecuted the church, they might be fighting God, which was a foolish thing to do.1
One of the outcomes of the foolish behavior of the Jewish leaders was that it inadvertently helped spread Christianity. James may have recognized it as a bittersweet thing, since it shrunk the size of the Jerusalem church and led to many Christians giving up under the stress of persecution.
Watching the many members of his church, James surely became an expert in the wide variety of things people can do to be foolish. But no matter how foolishly they behaved, he possibly thought he had no room to criticize them. After all, he was around Jesus his entire life and was unable to recognize Jesus as the Messiah until after his death.
Eyewitness Bible Series
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