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Sirach teaches that the sick should seek prayer, anointing with oil, and a doctor's care. James follows this tradition, directing the sick to call the elders to pray over them and anoint them with oil.
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2500 BCE
1000+ CE
Sirach 38:9
Ben Sira, Ecclesiasticus
Deuterocanon
9 My son, in your sickness don’t be negligent, but pray to the Lord, and he will heal you. 10 Put away wrong doing, and direct your hands in righteousness. Cleanse your heart from all sin. 11 Give a sweet savor and a memorial of fine flour, and pour oil on your offering, according to your means. 12 Then give place to the physician, for truly the Lord has created him. Don’t let him leave you, for you need him. 13 There is a time when recovery is in their hands. 14 For they also shall ask the Lord to prosper them in diagnosis and in healing for the maintenance of life. 15 He who sins before his Maker, let him fall into the hands of the physician.
Date: 195–180 BCE (based on scholarly estimates)
James 5:14
New Testament
13 Is anyone among you suffering? He should pray. Is anyone in good spirits? He should sing praises. 14 Is anyone among you ill? He should summon the elders of the church, and they should pray for him and anoint him with olive oil in the name of the Lord. 15 And the prayer of faith will save the one who is sick and the Lord will raise him up—and if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. 16 So confess your sins to one another and pray for one another so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person has great effectiveness. 17 Elijah was a human being like us, and he prayed earnestly that it would not rain and there was no rain on the land for three years and six months! 18 Then he prayed again, and the sky gave rain and the land sprouted with a harvest.
Date: 80–90 CE (based on scholarly estimates)
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Notes and References
"... The Jews’ approach to medicine was relatively arcane, based on herbal remedies. The texts show that they had an ambivalence toward herbalism, implying that the good it offers may be offset by its temptation to sorcery. Some pre-Christian examples include (1 Enoch 7, Sirach 38, Josephus The Jewish Wars 2.136, Jubilees 10) ... Therefore, both Hellenistic and Jewish sources indicate that a first-century author could easily have said “use the best available medicine, then let the elders pray” if that is what he meant. With that in mind, is it feasible to claim that oil was the best medicine available and thus provide an analogy to modern medicine? Would it not be equivalent to a modern pastor telling the sick to take two aspirin and pray about it? ..."
Gary S. Shogren, “Will God Heal Us? A Re-Examination of James 5:14-16a,” EvQ 61 (1989): 99–106.
* The use of references are not endorsements of their contents. Please read the entirety of the provided reference(s) to understand the author's full intentions regarding the use of these texts.
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