Missing scripture?

[Anima_Christi]

What is the deal with James 4:5? I was reading it and just noticed that St. James quotes a Scripture that doesn’t exist (at least not anymore).
Or do you suppose that it is in vain that the scripture says, “He yearns jealously over the spirit which he has made to dwell in us”? (Jas 4:5) Nowhere in the Bible does that passage appear.
Are there any good explanations for this discrepancy? Is it from a scripture that no longer exists? Is there such a thing as lost scripture? (I know this wouldn’t really present a problem to us Catholic since we have all the word of God preserved either in oral or written tradition), but I’d still like an explanation.
Thanks.

 

[Fidelis]

Anima Christi:

What is the deal with James 4:5? I was reading it and just noticed that St. James quotes a Scripture that doesn’t exist (at least not anymore).
Or do you suppose that it is in vain that the scripture says, “He yearns jealously over the spirit which he has made to dwell in us”? (Jas 4:5) Nowhere in the Bible does that passage appear.
Are there any good explanations for this discrepancy? Is it from a scripture that no longer exists? Is there such a thing as lost scripture? (I know this wouldn’t really present a problem to us Catholic since we have all the word of God preserved either in oral or written tradition), but I’d still like an explanation.
Thanks.

The NAB footnotes say the following:

[5] The meaning of this saying is difficult because the author of Jas cites, probably from memory, a passage that is not in any extant manuscript of the Bible. Other translations of the text with a completely different meaning are possible: “The Spirit that he (God) made to dwell in us yearns (for us) jealously,” or, “He (God) yearns jealously for the spirit that he has made to dwell in us.” If this last translation is correct, the author perhaps had in mind an apocryphal religious text that echoes the idea that God is zealous for his creatures; cf Exodus 20:5; Deut 4 :24; Zechariah 8:2.

The Haydock says this:

Ver. 5. Do you think that the scripture saith in vain: To envy doth the spirit covet, with dwelleth in you? [2] This verse is obscure, and differently expounded. By some, of an evil spirit in men, by which they covet and envy others for having what they have not. Others understand God’s spirit inhabiting in them; and then it is an interrogation, and reprehension, as if he said: Doth God’s spirit, which you have received, teach or excite you to covet and envy others, and not rather to love and wish their good? And to enable men to do this, God is not wanting, who gives us greater grace, especially to the humble that ask it, though he resists the proud. (Witham) — It is not evident to what part of Scripture St. James here alludes, the exact words are nowhere in the sacred writings. That which seems the most like this text, and the most adapted to his subject, is a passage from Ezechiel, “I will set my jealousy against thee:” (Ezechiel xxiii. 25.) i.e. I have loved thee with the love of jealousy, and I will revenge upon thee my slighted affections. (Calmet)

 

[MariaG]

Anima Christi:

What is the deal with James 4:5? I was reading it and just noticed that St. James quotes a Scripture that doesn’t exist (at least not anymore).
Or do you suppose that it is in vain that the scripture says, “He yearns jealously over the spirit which he has made to dwell in us”? (Jas 4:5) Nowhere in the Bible does that passage appear.
Are there any good explanations for this discrepancy? Is it from a scripture that no longer exists? Is there such a thing as lost scripture? (I know this wouldn’t really present a problem to us Catholic since we have all the word of God preserved either in oral or written tradition), but I’d still like an explanation.
Thanks.

Ahh. I see as I was typing, (and helping in “potty” duty) MY answer was already given.

Darn. I thought I finally could look smart.

 

[Anima_Christi]

Thanks for the response–I think Haydock’s explanation is the best of the two!

 

[Traditional_Ang]

Anima Christi:

Thanks for the response–I think Haydock’s explanation is the best of the two!

Anima Christi:

We always have the possibility of a third option…

The Old Testament was originally (for the most part) written in Hebrew). The writer of the Epistle of James is most probably St. James (the “Brother” of Jesus). This means he lived most of his life in Judea, where the Scriptures were read in Hebrew and then again in Aramaic in something called Targums because many of the people didn’t understand the Hebrew (sort of like the situation pre-Vatican II when the Scriptures were read in Latin and then in English from the Duoay-Rheims).

St. James probably memorized the Scripture in Aramaic so he could counsel and comfort people who needed it. What we’re reading is probably a Translation of one of those Aramaic Targums, which means that James just might have written his letter in Aramaic a long time before he was stoned to death in 62 A.D.

I know that’s not in keeping with what most modern biblical scholars say, but the Targum in Aramaic would have mainly been used before the fall of Jerusalem.

In Christ, Michael

 

[Anima_Christi]

OK, that’s a good explanation, but what Hebrew scripture is the Aramaic “targum” we find in James taken from?

 

[Daniel_Marsh]

Isaiah 26:9
My soul yearns for you in the night; in the morning my spirit longs for you. When your judgments come upon the earth, the people of the world learn righteousness.

Romans 8
15For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. 16The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God:

…

26Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. 27 And he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God.

Robertson’s Word Pictures of the New Testament

The Scripture (h graph). Personification as in Galatians 3:8; James 2:23. But no O.T. passage is precisely like this, though it is “a poetical rendering” (Ropes) of Exodus 20:5. The general thought occurs also in Genesis 6:3-5; Isaiah 63:8-16, etc. Paul has the same idea also (Galatians 5:17,21; Romans 8:6,8). It is possible that the reference is really to the quotation in verse James 4:6 from Proverbs 3:34 and treating all before as a parenthesis. There is no way to decide positively. In vain (kenwß). Old adverb (Aristotle) from kenwß (Proverbs 2:20), here alone in N.T. “Emptily,” not meaning what it says. Made to dwell (katwikisen). First aorist active of katoikizw, old verb, to give a dwelling to, only here in N.T. Long unto envying (proß pqonon epipoqei). A difficult phrase. Some even take proß pqonon with legei rather than with epipoqei, as it naturally does go, meaning “jealously.” But even so, with God presented as a jealous lover, does to pneuma refer to the Holy Spirit as the subject of epipoqei or to man’s spirit as the object of epipoqei? Probably the former and epipoqei then means to yearn after in the good sense as in Philippians 1:8.

bible.crosswalk.com/Commentaries/RobertsonsWordPictures/rwp.cgi?book=jas&chapter=004&verse=005&next=006&prev=004

 

[Malachi4U]

Traditional Ang:

…The writer of the Epistle of James is most probably St. James (the “Brother” of Jesus)…

Don’t you mean one of the five ‘siblings’ of Jesus?