to purify: to wash away what defiles a person, so that nothing stands in the way of coming near to God
This verb grew up in the world of the temple. In ordinary Greek it named what a worshipper did before stepping into a sanctuary: the washings, the waiting out of a set number of days, the keeping clear of a corpse, all so that nothing about the person barred the way in. Temple rules across the Greek world used the word this way, and the Jewish law had its own version of the same requirement.
The New Testament keeps that literal setting in John and in Acts, where pilgrims and worshippers put themselves through the prescribed rite before the Passover or before entering the temple courts. The letters then take the same verb and turn it inward, moving what gets cleaned from the body to the person:
- James tells a divided people to purify their hearts.
- Peter says his readers have already purified their souls by obeying the truth.
- John says everyone who holds this hope purifies himself, and keeps on doing it.
Two things run through every use and hold the word together. It is nearly always something a person does to himself rather than something done to him, and the point of doing it is always access: the cleansing is for the sake of drawing near. That is what keeps it distinct from its neighbors. The broader verb καθαρίζω will scrub a cup, heal a skin disease, or wipe away guilt, while ἁγιάζω, "to make holy," sets a person apart as God's own. This verb does the narrower work of clearing away what would otherwise keep someone out. Its matching adjective, ἁγνός, meaning "pure," names the finished state, and 1 John 3:3 sets the two side by side: the one who hopes purifies himself, as Christ is pure.
Nuances
Whether the call to purify the heart in James 4:8 is inward moral cleansing described in borrowed temple language, or language that still keeps a real link to Jewish purity practice.
- majorityInward moral cleansing of a divided people, with the washing and purifying language drawn from the law as a picture of repentance.; D. Moo, The Letter of James (Pillar, 2nd ed., 2000), 194-196; P. H. Davids, The Epistle of James (NIGTC, 1982), 168-169; L. T. Johnson, The Letter of James (Anchor Bible 37A, 1995), 285-286
- minorityPurity language that is not simply spiritualized: James writes within a live Jewish concern for purity, so the ceremonial background remains in view alongside the moral demand.; D. Lockett, Purity and Worldview in the Epistle of James (LNTS 366, T&T Clark, 2008); S. McKnight, The Letter of James (NICNT, 2011), on 4:8