" Be warned: when the most vital moments of life press our civilization, religion will drive irreligion to the wall."

Yay, happy fun execution time.

Seriously?

There are lots of metaphors that use wall. The ones you state are valid but not unique.

evokes being "up against the wall" as in at the moment of elimination.

Phrasing is important. The marathon example involves encountering an obstacle, not being driven into something by a 3rd party.

I'm actually a member of Marathon Maniacs, so I have some expertise in your example.

The company isn't in jeopardy because being up against the wall is a uncool place to hang out and all the uncool kids are there, it's jeopardy because the continued existence of the company is in question. It's an existential threat.

That's why 'driven to the wall' is not about 'execution'. It's a different phrase. The first one I gave is #16 under 'wall' at that link, the second is #21.

The company is against that wall against its will, implying it was forced there, and it does not wish to be there due to a sword of Damocles like doom hanging over it.

It is precisely about the expectation of being terminated. You've actually reinforced my point with your example.

which was what you objected to. You have said "phrasing is important"; I agree, which is why you should not be claiming the 'up against the wall' phrase means the same thing as 'driven to the wall'. The dictionary has them listed as separate idioms. The writer used 'driven', not 'up against'. The dictionary example for that is about a team in a match, not a company against the wall.

If you think that a losing team is always 'terminated', that's your own idiosyncratic view of things.

Keep in mind the context, the author specified one group doing something to another group.

OED: "to drive (or push) to the wall : to drive to the last extremity."

1st use, 1546:

"J. Heywood Dialogue Prouerbes Eng. Tongue ii. v. sig. Hiiiv, That dede without words shal dryue him to the wal. And further than the wall, he can not go."

This predates the idea of executing people up against a wall.

Not an individual pressed to a wall against their own volition. You do not seem to understand the idiom you have cited.

Why do you think that predates people being executed against a wall? It doesn't even predate firearms let alone crossbows or bows.

Where did that come from? Read it again. "shal dryue him to the wal" - not "he shall drive to the wall". "Him" is the object of the sentence.

I'll give you the other quotations:

1644 W. Prynne & C. Walker True Relation Prosecution N. Fiennes 34 The Colonell thus driven to the wall and worsted on every hand, used two pleas more for his last reserve.
1817 Scott Rob Roy III. v. 127, I see what you are driving me to the wa' about.
1828 W. F. Napier Hist. War Peninsula I. iii. iii. 336 The commissaries pushed to the wall by the delay, offered an exorbitant remuneration.
1860 L. V. Harcourt Diaries G. Rose II. 30 Being..driven to the wall, Addington complied.

See? Something or someone else drives a person to the wall, and then they are left without a choice, and forced into a particular action. The alternatives in the OED Thesaurus are "to drive into a corner" and "to corner".

People in the 16th century were not executed against a wall with firearms, or bows for that matter.

He is not being driven to the wall by a third party, he is driving there of his own actions.

People were executed by firearm in the mid thirteenth century. Though, I will grant they were more often tied to a tree.

And it's unwilling, not someone pressing forward and encountering resistance; the 'deed' is adultery, and if it's he's caught doing it.

And if ye chance in adultery to catch him,
Then ye have him on the hip, or on the hurdle;
Then have ye his head fast under your girdle;
Where your words now do but rub him on the gall,
That deed without words shall drive him to the wall.
And further than the wall he cannot go,
But must submit himself; and if it hap so
...

https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=pK07AAAAYAAJ&pg=PA71&lpg=PA71&dq=That+deed+without+words+shall+drive+him+to+the+wall&source=bl&ots=pGcW5jCMW5&sig=xqHECOavfK7ITYWDObn3mgJ5Aw8&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0CCMQ6AEwAGoVChMIzNuevMCSxgIVCzsUCh0niAB8#v=onepage&q=That%20deed%20without%20words%20shall%20drive%20him%20to%20the%20wall&f=false

The uses, and the primary meaning given by the Oxford English Dictionary, are all clearly about one person or event driving another to the wall. As, for that matter, is the use in the OP you're having an outrage party about.

"The 'to the wall' phrase raised some disagreement around whether it meant more 'up against the wall' as in a firing squad, or some other 'pressed to the limit' type connotation. Any clarification would be helpful, if you have time. Thank you, in advance."

'Driven to the wall', meaning 'cornered', as you drive a flock of sheep against a wall when you're controlled it. Yes, subservient fits, but execution doesn't. So I don't think you can just say 'substitute ...' without changing the meaning you're putting on it. The James' passage is not about killing:

It might be more helpful if there was rational evaluation showing that this is actually suggesting execution. To say that this person is advocating execution of atheist appears similar to me to this:
Robert Jeffress: Gay Wedding Cake Wars Will Escalate Into Full-Fledged Holocaust Against Christians
http://www.democraticunderground.com/113744678

I think that we should be more careful, I think rational thinking is what separates us from freepers and RWRNJs. Please prove me right.

Honestly, I think it's useless hyperbole, and I do not take it seriously. I think it more speaks to the authors credibility.

Which explains his overt hostility to atheism and his devotion to irrational religiosity

From another of his essays - linked to from the essay cited in the OP:

I also think that non-theists often find it offensive to have things like this called religion.