Re-Reading James 2:18

I was recently preparing to lead my students through James 2.  I was going through it sentence-by-sentence when I discovered something confusing in verse 18.  It reads:

"But someone will say, 'You have faith and I have works.' Show me your faith apart from your works, and I by my works will show you my faith." - James 2:18

Why was this confusing?  And what was the solution?

Diatribes:

For background, let's look at a method of writing which Saint Paul uses frequently.  

When arguing a point, he'll invent an imaginary dialogue partner to interact with.  This invented persona is supposed to be someone on the receiving end of the letter who is critiquing Paul's arguments as he makes them.  Then Paul refutes those arguments.  

This is called a "diatribe".  The most explicit example is in Romans 9:19:

"You will say to me then, 'Why then does he still find fault? For who can resist his will?'” 

Here's the important bit to remember:  The imaginary interlocutor in the diatribe is a critic on the receiving end of the letter.  

OK, now let's look at James 2:18.

Getting Things Reversed:

Throughout James' letter, he is critiquing his audience for not having works befitting their faith.  That's how he esteems his audience; as Christians lacking appropriate works.  

However, then we see what appears to be James using a diatribe: 

"But someone will say, 'You (James) have faith and I (the recipient) have works.'..." - James 2:18

Now, it looks that the interlocutor - (a simulated recipient of the letter) - is claiming to have works. But why would James have the fella saying that?  It goes directly against the critique he's making.  

In other words, why would he have his imaginary recipient of the letter claiming to have works... when his whole critique is that they don't?  His diatribe seems to have things backwards.

The Solution:

Then I realized something.  

The reason why I thought the text was a diatribe with an imaginary recipient was because of the punctuation and quotation marks.  But the original Greek doesn't have those punctuations.  Those are put in there by the translators and editors.

So what happens if you leave it out?  You get this:

"But someone will say you have faith and I have works..." - James 2:18

Now it doesn't look like a diatribe anymore.  

Originally we thought the "someone" was one of the letter's recipients.  That got everything messed up and backwards.  But if we remove the quotation marks and the comma, we can understand the "someone" as a hypothetical third-party observer who is assessing the situation objectively.  

He's a comparison sentence which may help you see what I mean:

Someone might say I am the greatest youth minister of all time.

Even though I've placed that idea on a hypothetical third-party, I'm still speaking in my own voice.  So when I say "I", I'm still talking about myself.  Likewise, when James says "I" he is still talking about himself.  And when he says "You", he's still addressing his recipients.

"But someone will say you (the recipients) have faith and I (James) have works..." - James 2:18

Now everything is back in line with his core thesis.  He's saying his recipients have faith, but not works - whereas James is the one who has both.

So my conclusion is that basically every translation is wrong.  The comma and quotes shouldn't be there.  The passage should look like this:

"But someone will say you have faith and I have works.  Show me your faith apart from your works, and I by my works will show you my faith." - James 2:18