But James takes a latitudinal look at the work of patience, not merely the longitudinal view--the view that ye may be "entire, lacking nothing," "complete, with never a defect" (Moffatt). This word for entire (cf. _integer_) means complete in all its parts, whole, not unsound anywhere. At the end of the race we are to be fully developed and sound to the core in heart and limb. The word is used of stones untouched by a tool (Deut. 27:6), of a body without blemish. Epictetus (bk. III, chap. xxvi, [S] 25) uses the word of a vessel which one finds whole, unbroken, and useful. It is used of a complete or unbroken household. In the papyri Philo uses both words together, as James does here.
The substantive is used of the "perfect soundness" of the man just healed by Peter and John (Acts 3:16). This adjective occurs with "righteousness" (Wisd. 15:13) and "worship" or "religion" (4 Macc. 17). The adjective is used by Paul in his prayer for the Thessalonians, "preserved entire, without blame" (1 Thess. 5:23). This is what Jesus does for his glorious church, which is to be without "spot or wrinkle or any such thing" (Eph. 5:27). Jesus, our High Priest, "has perfected for ever them that are sanctified" (Heb. 10:14). Alas, Isaiah (1:6) found Israel wholly wanting in this soundness. James's ideal is that we shall fall short in nothing. Our destiny is to dwell in the family of God and to be like Jesus, our elder Brother (1 John 3:2). This ultimate divine fulness is not the self-sufficiency of the stoics.
"Defective in wisdom," Moffatt puts it. It is the same word that occurs at the end of verse 4. James is fond of catching up a preceding word and going on with it, even if, as here, in a new sense. "If any of you lacketh wisdom," James gently hints. Who is it that does not feel his shortcoming here, at times with painful intensity?
What does James mean by wisdom? It is more than knowledge. It is more than mere intelligent apprehension of acquired knowledge. Tennyson says: "Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers." James shows familiarity with the Wisdom of Jesus the Son of Sirach (Ecclus.)[50] and possibly also the so-called Wisdom of Solomon. Certainly he knows the book of Proverbs. But here he does not use wisdom in a philosophical or mystical sense.