Nevertheless this last fact is not at all called in question by
the statement of the verse. For the author has present to his
mind the condition of the congregation as it was in his own
time; he is addressing—in favour of which also διὰ τὸν
χρόνον pronounces—a second generation of Palestinean Chris-
tianity. The narrow-minded tendency, however, which this
second generation had assumed, instead of advancing in its
growth to the recognition of the freedom and universality of
Christianity as the most perfect religion, might well justify
with regard to it the utterance of a reproach such as we here
meet with. Only thus much follows from the words,—what
is also confirmed by xiii. 7,—that when the author wrote,
James the Lord’s brother had already been torn from the con-
gregation at Jerusalem by death, since he would otherwise
certainly have written in another tone.
