James 5:3Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Let us turn to the narrow way. How long shall there be comfort? How long rest? Have we not had enough of carelessness, laughter, and singing? The same foods, satiety, luxury, wealth, purchases, and buildings will not come again. And what is the profit? Death. And what is the end? Ashes and dust, the grave and worms.

The rotting of riches, he says, the eating of garments by moths, and the rust of silver and gold will bear witness against you. They will convict you that you gave nothing away.

Therefore in the last days, that is, at the coming of the Lord, your wealth will prove to be like fire gathered for your destruction. This is what the rich man mentioned in the Gospel experienced.

"As fire, which you have treasured up in the last days" must be joined to the words "your riches." The sense is this: "your riches, which you gathered like fire, and spent and squandered on pleasures upon the earth."

This is not because there was rust on tested gold. Rather, it is a likeness of works, which rust consumes over the course of days.

You store up wrath for yourselves in the last days. You rejoice that you have laid aside a few more copper coins, while despising the nakedness and hunger of the poor.

You do not see that you are gathering upon your own head the wrath of the inward Judge. If it is not revealed in the last days, it will fall when the end of the ages comes.

Here there is a denunciation and condemnation of the rich, but not of all rich men or of every kind. Neither Christ nor His apostles preached equality of possessions among people, nor did they condemn wealth unconditionally.

The Apostle condemns to grievous miseries only those rich men who hoped that wealth, and not the mercy of God, could turn away from them the calamities of the days to come, “you have heaped up treasure in the last days” (v. 3).

He condemns those who withheld the wages of the workers who reaped their fields, so that the cries of the reapers reached the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth (v. 4).

He condemns those who lived in luxury on the earth and indulged themselves, fattening their hearts as animals are fattened for slaughter, “as in a day of slaughter” (v. 5).

He condemns those who condemned and killed the righteous man, though He did not resist them, and therefore deserved mercy all the more (v. 6).

Rich men for whom nothing is dear except their gold truly deserve strict condemnation.

Gold and silver, which also constitute part of wealth, and an essential part at that, have rusted. Therefore, according to the sense of the passage, they too are useless and have ceased to form part of wealth.

Properly speaking, gold and silver are not subject to rust and are not destroyed by rust. Yet in the Apostle’s vivid and animated depiction, he does not observe strict precision of expression.

Since metals in general are subject to damage from rust, he transfers the concept of corrosion by rust to gold and silver as well. Moreover, this is presented as a special action of divine judgment.

Therefore the original representation here, as also further on, is entirely fitting in its striking force.

After a general instruction to the powerful and the rich, the Apostle turns with a special instruction to the rich. He exhorts them to weep and howl, since every adversity may be especially grievous for those accustomed to the comforts and abundance of life.

This will happen when their wealth rots and becomes the possession of moth and rust, when their very body decays, and afterward is delivered to fire in the last days. That is, according to the word of the Lord, when evil men go into everlasting fire.

Here the words of Christ are, as it were, reproduced: do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy.

In the Seer of mysteries it is said that, besides the special book of life, there are also books that must be opened for judgment according to what is written in them.

Perhaps, I say, on other creations of God that we have lawlessly used, defiled, and damaged, the judgment of our present life will be found written in parts.

For example, our coarse impurities may be written on earth and water, our idle words in the air, the traces of our malice in what was the object or instrument of malicious actions, and the evidence of our scandals in those whom we scandalized.