Journal ~ JamesНамуна

 PROPRIETY, PATIENCE, & PRAYERS 

There’s a lot to unpack here. But I will focus on one item today: praying and anointing a sick person with oil in the name of the Lord. There are many people we prayed for in church today but they have not received healing. Is it because they were not anointed with oil? Have we done it wrong all this time? 

Douglas J Moo, in his commentary, explains that theologians have debated over the true meaning of anointing with oil for the sick. There are two general camp of thoughts on this. First, oil is used  for its practical quality. In this thought, one group believes oil is used for its healing property. And another subgroup of this believes oils is used for pastoral purpose—an outward physical concern. Something that will show care and sympathy for the sick. Meanwhile, a second group of theologians argues that oil is used for religious purposes. A subgroup of this believes that the oil is a sacrament where the oil purifies the sick from their sins and thus brings healing. Another subgroup of this school of thought thinks that the oil is used for symbolic meaning. It symbolizes consecration. 

There are two words used in the original text: chrio or aleipho. Still, having looked at the latter, which James uses, scholars are still inconclusive about the four interpretations above. Having examined all, Douglass Moo, in his commentary, concludes that anoint means physical action with symbolic meaning. He argues that “the fact that anointing a sick person is mentioned only here in the NT epistles, and that many healings were accomplished without anointing, shows that the practice is not a necessary accompaniment to the prayer for healing.”