A Call to Repentance (4:8b-10) Here James speaks like one of the Old Testament prophets. His epistle, while thoroughly Christian, is yet nearer to the standpoint of the Old Testament prophets than any other book in the New Testament. “Cleanse your hands, ye sinners.” The priests washed their hands before they entered the tabernacle to worship (Ex. 30:19-21; Lev. 16:4). It was natural for the language to be applied to moral purity: “I will wash my hands in innocency: so will I compass thine altar, O Jehovah” (Psalm 26:6). See also Hebrews 10:22. So Pilate sought to emphasize his own freedom from guilt by washing his hands (Matt. 27:24), if by so doing he might also soothe his own conscience. It is now as it has always been: “Who shall ascend into the hill of the Lord? or who shall stand in his holy place? He that hath clean hands, and a pure heart” (Psalm 24:3 f., AV). The clean hands signify little in a moral sense—however desirable for sanitary and other reasons—unless the heart is also clean. Indeed, the Pharisees came to make the cleansing of the hands a substitute for moral cleanness (Mark 7:8 ff.). “Purify your hearts, ye doubleminded.” The word for purification here is the common one for ceremonial cleansing (Ex. 19:10), but the idea is figurative, as in 1 Peter 1:22 and 1 John 3:3. James seems to refer to Psalm 73:13. “Wash you, make you clean” (Isa. 1:16). The double-minded (cf. James 1:8) must no longer halt between two opinions. They must forsake the world and give God the whole heart. It is a brave word for reality in religion and against the hollow mockery of mere lip service. In verse 9 we have a rather unusual exhortation for the New Testament. The word for repentance does not mean sorrow but change of mind and life. The need for a change implies sorrow for the sins of one’s life, to be sure. But one may have sorrow and still not change his heart and life. The thing that counts is the change, not the degree of the sorrow. But, certainly, sorrow for sin is appropriate and natural for the sinner who turns away from it. There is certainly room for the appeal to “be afflicted, and mourn, and weep” (all aorists with a note of urgency in the tense). One is reminded of the “woe” of Jesus in Luke 6:25. We have here a call to the godly sorrow described in 2 Corinthians 7:10. There is a time to laugh and a time to mourn; yes, and a time for laughter to be turned to mourning and even for joy to be turned into heaviness, like the poor publican with downcast eyes in the Temple before God (Luke 18:13). “The words express the contrast between the loud unseemly gaiety of the pleasure-seeker, and the subdued mien and downcast look of the penitent” (Oesterley). “Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord.” This is the only proper attitude for the sinner, whether saved or unsaved. See the same figure in 1 Peter 5:6. The proud Pharisee in Luke 18:11 is the picture of all that worship should not be.