Paul said the opposite. Why do you not try and figure out the apparent contradictions? They are not actually hard to do. Paul explicitly explains it to the Romans who were proselytes to Israel and knew.
How then was it accounted? While he was circumcised, or uncircumcised? Not while circumcised, but while uncircumcised.
You've (possibly intentionally) misunderstood what I said.
Abraham was imputed faith while in uncircumcision. The James passage doesn't refute that, it supports that by him using the term justified (dikaioo).
Do you not believe God imputed His own righteousness to Abraham? If it weren't for that imputed righteousness, Abraham's actions would have been sin. The action did nothing except demonstrate the faith. That's the imputed righteousness. The character that enables the conduct.
Without the imputed righteousness, Abraham would have been unable to exhibit the conduct. Righteousness is justice. Justice, just like our legal system (though it's flawed, unlike God), is the standard of conduct.
The problem isn't in understanding that we are saved through faith by grace, and it's absolutely not of works.
The problem is in NOT understanding what the word righteouness means by definition.
Righteouness isn't merely an imputed character. Righteousness is the empowerment to meet the demands of God's standard of conduct.
To deny the power to demonstrate God's conduct is to deny the imputation of righteousness by faith.
The misunderstanding is the generalization and conceptualization of the word righteousness rather than knowing the actual defintion for its complete meaning.
Righteousness is "right-ness". The rightness of heart and to exhibit the rightness of action.
By grace and faith, we've been given that which is right as our imputed character. That which is just, which is expected by the one who sets the rules and regulations whereby man must live, whether that be by society or by God.
Therefore, it is that which is expected as duty or is claimed as a right because of one's conformity to the standards of God for character and conduct.
It refers to one who acts conformably to justice and right without any deficiency or failure. Since weren't inherently righteous and acted according to our own standards of conduct; we didn't inherently have God's character and couldn't inherently bring forth the conduct required by His standard.
Now, by faith and grace alone without any works, we have been imputed that righteousness to have His character as our standard of conduct which we bring forth by His delegated power (John 1).
The issues isn't whether we're saved by faith and grace alone apart from works. The issue is not understanding that the very inherent definition of righteousness is for imputed character AND conduct by His power alone.
