James 4
Good News Translation
Friendship with the World
4 Where do all the fights and quarrels among you come from? They come from your desires for pleasure, which are constantly fighting within you. 2 You want things, but you cannot have them, so you are ready to kill; you strongly desire things, but you cannot get them, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have what you want because you do not ask God for it. 3 And when you ask, you do not receive it, because your motives are bad; you ask for things to use for your own pleasures. 4 Unfaithful people! Don't you know that to be the world's friend means to be God's enemy? If you want to be the world's friend, you make yourself God's enemy. 5 Don't think that there is no truth in the scripture that says, “The spirit that God placed in us is filled with fierce desires.”[a] 6 (A)But the grace that God gives is even stronger. As the scripture says, “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”
7 So then, submit yourselves to God. Resist the Devil, and he will run away from you. 8 Come near to God, and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners! Purify your hearts, you hypocrites! 9 Be sorrowful, cry, and weep; change your laughter into crying, your joy into gloom! 10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up.
Warning against Judging One Another
11 Do not criticize one another, my friends. If you criticize or judge another Christian, you criticize and judge the Law. If you judge the Law, then you are no longer one who obeys the Law, but one who judges it. 12 God is the only lawgiver and judge. He alone can save and destroy. Who do you think you are, to judge someone else?
Warning against Boasting
13 (B)Now listen to me, you that say, “Today or tomorrow we will travel to a certain city, where we will stay a year and go into business and make a lot of money.” 14 You don't even know what your life tomorrow will be! You are like a puff of smoke, which appears for a moment and then disappears. 15 What you should say is this: “If the Lord is willing, we will live and do this or that.” 16 But now you are proud, and you boast; all such boasting is wrong.
17 So then, if we do not do the good we know we should do, we are guilty of sin.
Footnotes
- James 4:5 The spirit … fierce desires; or God yearns jealously over the spirit that he placed in us.
James 4
New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition
Friendship with the World
4 Those conflicts and disputes among you, where do they come from? Do they not come from your cravings that are at war within you? 2 You want something and do not have it, so you commit murder. And you covet[a] something and cannot obtain it, so you engage in disputes and conflicts. You do not have because you do not ask. 3 You ask and do not receive because you ask wrongly, in order to spend what you get on your pleasures.(A) 4 Adulterers![b] Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God.(B) 5 Or do you suppose that the scripture speaks to no purpose? Does the spirit that God caused to dwell[c] in us desire envy?(C) 6 But God gives all the more grace; therefore it says,
“God opposes the proud
but gives grace to the humble.”(D)
7 Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.(E) 8 Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.(F) 9 Lament and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned into mourning and your joy into dejection. 10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you.(G)
Warning against Judging Another
11 Do not speak evil against one another, brothers and sisters. Whoever speaks evil against another or judges another speaks evil against the law and judges the law, but if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge.(H) 12 There is one lawgiver and judge[d] who is able to save and to destroy. So who, then, are you to judge your neighbor?(I)
Boasting about Tomorrow
13 Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a town and spend a year there, doing business and making money.”(J) 14 Yet you do not even know what tomorrow will bring. What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.(K) 15 Instead you ought to say, “If the Lord wishes, we will live and do this or that.”(L) 16 As it is, you boast in your arrogance; all such boasting is evil. 17 Anyone, then, who knows the right thing to do and fails to do it commits sin.(M)
James 4
Douay-Rheims 1899 American Edition
4 From whence are wars and contentions among you? Are they not hence, from your concupiscences, which war in your members?
2 You covet, and have not: you kill, and envy, and can not obtain. You contend and war, and you have not, because you ask not.
3 You ask, and receive not; because you ask amiss: that you may consume it on your concupiscences.
4 Adulterers, know you not that the friendship of this world is the enemy of God? Whosoever therefore will be a friend of this world, becometh an enemy of God.
5 Or do you think that the scripture saith in vain: To envy doth the spirit covet which dwelleth in you?
6 But he giveth greater grace. Wherefore he saith: God resisteth the proud, and giveth grace to the humble.
7 Be subject therefore to God, but resist the devil, and he will fly from you.
8 Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners: and purify your hearts, ye double minded.
9 Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned into mourning, and your joy into sorrow.
10 Be humbled in the sight of the Lord, and he will exalt you.
11 Detract not one another, my brethren. He that detracteth his brother, or he that judgeth his brother, detracteth the law, and judgeth the law. But if thou judge the law, thou art not a doer of the law, but a judge.
12 There is one lawgiver, and judge, that is able to destroy and to deliver.
13 But who art thou that judgest thy neighbour? Behold, now you that say: To day or to morrow we will go into such a city, and there we will spend a year, and will traffic, and make our gain.
14 Whereas you know not what shall be on the morrow.
15 For what is your life? It is a vapour which appeareth for a little while, and afterwards shall vanish away. For that you should say: If the Lord will, and if we shall live, we will do this or that.
16 But now you rejoice in your arrogancies. All such rejoicing is wicked.
17 To him therefore who knoweth to do good, and doth it not, to him it is sin.
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