For after being made worthy to believe and to know the true God, they despised His life-giving and saving commandments, preferring sinful death.
Therefore God will say of them what He then said of the ungrateful Jews: "They have forsaken Me, the fountain of living water, and hewn out for themselves broken cisterns, which can hold no water" (Jer 2:13).
For those who leave God and depart from His love by turning aside from the right and true faith, the prophetic word is fitting. It also fits those who fall away from a righteous and chaste life: "Behold, those who remove themselves from You shall perish" (Ps 72:27).
Some are perplexed that Paul writes in many places in his epistles that works do not save, but faith does. Yet here the brother of the Lord says the opposite, that works save, and not faith.
Saint Theophylact resolves the difficulty by making the following distinction. He says that the term faith has two meanings.
On the one hand, faith is the simple and superficial assent of the soul, without any action. With such faith, as we say, even the demons believe in Christ, that He is the Son of God.
On the other hand, faith means an active following from love of the heart, with firm and unshaken assent.
Paul calls such faith voluntary, that is, active through love: "For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but faith working through love" (Gal 5:6).
This faith is not without works, because such faith is not given as a reward to a man who is idle in works.
Works also have two meanings. They mean the works of the old law, that is, Sabbaths, circumcision, new moons, bodily purifications, and the other observances.
They also mean the works that follow faith in Christ, which confirm and enliven it, namely the keeping of Christ's commandments.
When Paul says that works do not save, but faith does, on the one hand he means the works of observance of the old law. Without these, Abraham and all Christians who believe in Christ were justified.
On the other hand, he means voluntary faith, working through love, which is followed by works.
This is clear from Paul's own words. He said, "By the works of the law no flesh shall be justified" (Rom 3:20). And again, "We conclude that a man is justified by faith apart from the works of the law" (Rom 3:28).
And again, "Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by faith in Jesus Christ" (Gal 2:16).
Do you see that Paul everywhere adds, "by the works of the law," and not simply, "by works"?
But when the brother of God says here that faith without works is dead and does not save, he is speaking of simple and superficial assent that has no works. Therefore he added, "by itself."
By works he does not mean the works of the law, but those that follow faith in Christ and enliven it, that is, the commandments.
Thus the words of the divine Apostles James and Paul agree, and there is no disagreement between them. Each Apostle used one meaning of faith and works, according to the need each had.
The God-bearing Maximus gives a beautiful example of this: "As the remembrance of fire does not warm the body, so faith without love does not produce in the soul the light of knowledge" (First Century on Love, 31).
And again: "Do not say that you are the temple of God, says the divine Jeremiah (7:4). Do not say either: faith alone in our Lord Jesus Christ can save me.
"For this is impossible unless you also acquire love for Him, witnessed by deeds. As for bare faith, even the demons believe and tremble" (Jas 2:19).
We note here that these works of the law are called the law of sacred rites by Clement, the author of the Stromata. Therefore Christians have no need to keep them.
The old law is divided, as the wise Platon, Metropolitan of Moscow, says, into three parts: sacred-ritual, civil, and moral.
The sacred-ritual part contained the worship customs of the Jewish synagogue. These are what Paul calls works of the law, as we have already said.
They were an image and guide toward the New Covenant, and had to be abolished because Christ came.
The civil part contained what was needed to preserve the Jewish people as distinct.
The moral part contained the duties that had to be fulfilled properly toward God, one's neighbor, and oneself. This was called the Decalogue.
This part must be kept by Christians even now, because it is the eternal and unchangeable law. Before the written law, it was imprinted in nature, and therefore is called the natural law.
After the law, it was written in the New Covenant of the Gospel. Therefore the works of this part, that is, the commandments, must not be transgressed.
For this reason the brother of God says here that without these works and commandments, faith is dead.
THEOSIS