|
[1] JAMES, a servant of God, and of our Lord Jesus the Messiah; to the twelve tribes dispersed among the Gentiles; greeting [peace].
[2] Let it be all joy to you, my brethren, when ye enter into many and various trials.
[3] For ye know, that the trial of [your] faith, maketh you possess patience.
[4] And let patience have its perfect work, so that ye may be complete and perfect, and may lack nothing.
[5] And if any of you lacketh wisdom, let him ask [it] of God, who giveth to all freely, and reproacheth not; and it will be given him.
[6] But let him ask in faith, not hesitating: he who hesitateth is like the waves of the sea, which the wind agitateth.
[7] And let not that man expect to receive any thing of the Lord,
[8] who is hesitating in his mind, and unstable in all his ways.
[9] And let the depressed brother rejoice, in his elevation;
[10] and the rich, in his depression; because, like the flower of an herb, so he passeth away.
[11] For the sun riseth in its heat, and drieth up the herb; and its flower falleth, and the beauty of its appearance perisheth: so also the rich man withereth in his ways.
[12] Blessed is the man who endureth temptations; so that when he is proved he may receive a crown of life, which God hath promised to them that love him.
[13] Let no one when he is tempted, say, I am tempted of God: for God is not tempted with evils, nor doth he tempt any man.
[14] But every man is tempted by his own lust; and he lusteth, and is drawn away.
[15] And this [his] lust conceiveth, and bringeth forth sin; and sin, when mature, bringeth forth death.
[16] Do not err, my beloved brethren.
[17] Every good and perfect gift cometh down from above, from the Father of lights, with whom is no mutation, not even the shadow of change.
[18] He saw fit, and begat us by the word of truth; that we might be the first-fruits of his creatures.
[19] And be ye, my beloved brethren, every one of you, swift to hear, and slow to speak; and slow to wrath:
[20] for the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God.
[21] Wherefore, remove far from you all impurity, and the abundance of wickedness; and, with meekness, receive the word that is implanted in our nature, which is able to vivify these your souls.
[22] But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only; and do not deceive yourselves.
[23] For if any man shall be a hearer of the word, and not a doer of it, he will be like one who seeth his face in a mirror:
[24] for he seeth himself, and passeth on, and forgetteth what a man he was.
[25] But every one that looketh upon the perfect law of liberty and abideth in it, is not a hearer of something to be forgotten, but a doer of the things; and he will be blessed in his work.
[26] And if any one thinketh that he worshippeth God, and doth not restrain his tongue, but his heart deceiveth him; his worship is vain.
[27] For the worship that is pure and holy before God the Father, is this: to visit the fatherless and the widows in their affliction, and that one keep himself unspotted from the world.
|