James 4, side by side

¹What causes conflicts and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from the passions at war within you?

¹From whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts that war in your members?

²You crave what you do not have; you kill and covet, but are unable to obtain it. You quarrel and fight. You do not have, because you do not ask.

²Ye lust, and have not: ye kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain: ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ye ask not.

³And when you do ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may squander it on your pleasures.

³Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts.

⁴You adulteresses! Do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore, whoever chooses to be a friend of the world renders himself an enemy of God.

⁴Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? whosoever therefore will be a friend of the world is the enemy of God.

⁵Or do you think the Scripture says without reason that the Spirit He caused to dwell in us yearns with envy?

⁵Do ye think that the scripture saith in vain, The spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth to envy?

⁶But He gives us more grace. This is why it says: “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”

⁶But he giveth more grace. Wherefore he saith, God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble.

⁷Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.

⁷Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.

⁸Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.

⁸Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded.

⁹Grieve, mourn, and weep. Turn your laughter to mourning, and your joy to gloom.

⁹Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness.

¹⁰Humble yourselves before the Lord, and He will exalt you.

¹⁰Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up.

¹¹Brothers, do not slander one another. Anyone who speaks against his brother or judges him speaks against the law and judges it. And if you judge the law, you are not a practitioner of the law, but a judge of it.

¹¹Speak not evil one of another, brethren. He that speaketh evil of his brother, and judgeth his brother, speaketh evil of the law, and judgeth the law: but if thou judge the law, thou art not a doer of the law, but a judge.

¹²There is only one Lawgiver and Judge, the One who is able to save and destroy. But who are you to judge your neighbor?

¹²There is one lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy: who art thou that judgest another?

¹³Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business, and make a profit.”

¹³Go to now, ye that say, To day or to morrow we will go into such a city, and continue there a year, and buy and sell, and get gain:

¹⁴You do not even know what will happen tomorrow! What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.

¹⁴Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.

¹⁵Instead, you ought to say, “If the Lord is willing, we will live and do this or that.”

¹⁵For that ye ought to say, If the Lord will, we shall live, and do this, or that.

¹⁶As it is, you boast in your proud intentions. All such boasting is evil.

¹⁶But now ye rejoice in your boastings: all such rejoicing is evil.

¹⁷Anyone, then, who knows the right thing to do, yet fails to do it, is guilty of sin.

¹⁷Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin.