James 4

Submit Yourselves to God
1What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don't they come from your desires that battle within you? 2You want something but don't get it. You kill and covet, but you cannot have what you want. You quarrel and fight. You do not have, because you do not ask God. 3When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.

Explanation:
What Causes Fights Among You?

The false wisdom that comes from envy and selfish ambition produces disorder (3:16). To put it bluntly, it leads to fighting. James therefore carries his argument forthrightly to this next issue: What causes fights and quarrels among you? The term for fights is polemos; in other contexts (as in Heb 11:34), it refers to actual armed conflict and so carries a violent image. The term for quarrels is mache; it is used in other literature only for battles without material weapons and so refers more to angry disputes. James uses the terms as a pair to make his question inclusive and pointed. It is not to be avoided.

The fighting among Christians which James is addressing is an outrageous evil. Yet I have seen it accepted complacently; one church member who saw a church breaking into factions even commented cheerfully, "Oh, I love a church fight!" In reality it is a tragedy which can cripple a church's internal ministries and external witness for years before a measure of healing and purification becomes evident.

James is not talking about disagreements--the healthy conflicts that should be expected in a church whose ministries are expanding. He is writing about fighting, which is "earthly, unspiritual, of the devil" in origin, and he will call its perpetrators "you adulterous people" (4:4). So serious a crime calls for a serious response. When we Christians find ourselves embroiled in fights with each other, we should examine what we are doing in the light of this paragraph. James gives us great help by answering three questions that are hard for us to face. What Is the Fighting Really About? (4:1)

Honestly facing what James says here is one of the most decisive steps of faith in all of a person's life. For it requires tearing oneself away from self-justification and redirecting oneself toward self-examination. This is a violent uprooting of our selfishness. We try to justify our role in fights in terms of the high ideals, the critical issues and the injured rights we are supposedly defending. James does not entertain any such talk. He drives right to the fact that the fights are, at bottom, about personal desires. His point is reminiscent of 1:14, where he refused to allow excuses for temptation. People are tempted when they are enticed by their own "evil desire." There the term was epithymia; now in 4:1 the term for "desires" is hedone, which speaks more distinctly of pleasures. We get into fights because of pleasures we desire for ourselves. An important self-examining question for Christians in conflict is "What personal desire am I trying to protect or to gain?"

James does not specify examples of the desires. What he does say could refer to conflict in group relationships, such as within a church: inflexibility about issues (from a desire to have one's own way), maneuvering for position of authority (from a desire for status and admiration within the community) or criticizing others (from a desire to make oneself look good). It is equally applicable in individual relationships, such as a marital conflict: constantly exchanging hurtful words (from a desire to get even) or carrying out sexual infidelity (from a desire for selfish pleasure or simply a desire for another spouse). All of these happen in Christian churches and Christian marriages; they are all immoral.

James says the desires battle within you (with the verb in participial form, for we have a continuing problem here). Against whom are they battling? We should not be too quick to assume that James means our good and evil desires are battling against each other. Peter's parallel use of the same verb depicts the evil desires as warring not with each other but against the Christian's own soul (1 Pet 2:11). It is likely that this was the common apostolic concept and is James's own notion here. It means he is not sympathizing with the readers' internal conflicts but warning that those who fight are cooperating in their own self-destruction. How Do the Desires Lead to Fighting? (4:2)

A second way we justify our role in fights is by rationalizing the moral impurity of our actions. James's point in 4:2 is, quite simply, that our desires lead to fighting because of our immorality in trying to grasp what we want. The verb "you want" epithymeo at the beginning of this verse does not automatically signify evil desires; with the same verb Luke has Jesus desiring to eat the Passover with his disciples in Luke 22:15. But the surrounding context here in James is clearly negative, and the verb recalls James's theme of "evil desire" epithymia in 1:14. Thus the NASB translates it "you lust."

What is complicated about this verse is the determination of the correct punctuation and the resulting structure intended by James (since the ancient manuscripts have no punctuation to guide us). One tradition perceives James to be thinking in a series of clauses coming in pairs with contrasting positive and negative verbs. This is reflected in the KJV as a series of three such pairs:
Ye 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.

The NIV follows the same pattern. A more comprehensive version of this structure is advocated by Dibelius (1976:218) and Davids (1982:157-158) as a series of four pairs extending into 4:3. It could be outlined (translating literally):
You want,
and you do not have.
You murder and covet,
and you cannot obtain.
You quarrel and fight,
[and] you do not have because you do not ask.
You ask,
and you do not receive because you ask wickedly. . . .

In either variation, this view focuses on the pairs of verbs, a positive verb followed by a negated verb, as the guiding thought in James's meaning. If so, then James's intent is to describe the pattern of frustrated desires. The chief grammatical difficulty with this view is that it requires a key role for kai ("and" in an antithetical sense, similar to "but") to form each of the contrasts and therefore has to overcome the absence of kai from the third pair. Dibelius is willing to conclude that a kai must have been in the original text (1976:218), and Davids considers this a real possibility (1982:158).

A second way to punctuate the verse (preferred by Mayor 1897:131; Mitton 1966:147; Laws 1980:169; Moo 1985:140; Kistemaker 1986:131 and others) is reflected in the RSV, TEV and NASB. This view recognizes the first two contrasts of positive and negated verbs but ends the series where the text lacks the kai to continue the grammatical pattern. This view discerns two parallel statements, each asserting a cause and effect:
You want and do not have: (so) you murder.

And you covet and cannot obtain: (so) you quarrel and fight.

If this is James's meaning, then his intent is to draw a definite connection between desires and behavior. This has James making a clearer moral exhortation, warning that Christians' covetous desires lead to murderous fighting. It leaves the remainder of 4:2, with 4:3, as James's further exhortation on the matter of asking God for what they want.

This second rendering of 4:2 is to be preferred for two reasons. First, it avoids the grammatical difficulty of the missing kai. Second, the questions in 3:13, 4:1 and 4:4 are setting the outline of this section of the epistle, and the clear moral exhortation fits the context perfectly as James's answer to the question posed in 4:1. The conclusion, you quarrel and fight, is even stated with verbs sharing the same roots with the two nouns (in opposite order, fights and quarrels) in the initial question of 4:1.

Many commentators have found the verb kill (more precisely "murder") in 4:2 incongruous--too extreme for the context, especially when followed in sequence by the less violent sin of coveting (as in the rendering adopted by Dibelius and Davids, above). As a result, some have agreed with a conjecture dating back to Erasmus that the verb murder (phoneuete) is a textual error that was envy (phthoneite) in James's original text. (Cf. Mayor 1897:131; Dibelius 1976:217; Adamson 1976:168.) This makes the reading more acceptable to our hearing, but that is not sufficient reason to conclude that the text is corrupt; it is better practice of inductive study to see if sense can be made of the text and to adjust our hearing to the message. In the first place, there is no manuscript evidence for the theory of a textual error here. In the second place, this is not the only time James warns his readers about the sin of murder; he mentions it (with this same verb) in 2:11 and 5:6. Third, the frequent parallels we have found with Jesus' teaching in the Sermon on the Mount make it not at all improbable for James to be thinking with Jesus' categories, as in Matthew 5:21-22 where sins of hatred and insult are treated in the same category as murder. It is very likely, then, that murder did not strike James as incongruous at all. Moo wisely rejects the attempts to change or to dilute the term and counsels that "it is simplest to take `murder' straightforwardly and to regard it as that extreme to which frustrated desire, if not checked, may lead" (1985:141).

The purpose of 4:2, then, is to explain the answer James has just declared in the second half of 4:1 to the question he posed in the first half of 4:1. By the parallel structure James implies that quarrels and fights are like murder, and he draws a direct connection between unfulfilled coveting (the cause) and murderous fighting (the effect). James is laying bare the immorality of the motivation for our fights. We fight because we are coveting and are not able to get what we covet. What Is It That Is Going Wrong? (4:2-3)

Even with the origin of the fights identified as our own desires, and even with the immorality of certain actions exposed, there is yet a third way in which we justify our role in fights--by claiming necessity. "I had to do that, or else .......... would have happened!" This last justification is rendered indefensible by the availability of another course of action: prayer.

James makes his point in two stages, and each stage reflects a theological premise he has asserted in chapter 1. First, in 4:2, You do not have, because you do not ask. (The NIV adds God.) The theological premise is that God is graciously generous (stated in 1:5), by which James is convinced that one may ask God and rely on him for what one needs. This emphasis on prayer is another manifestation of James's consistent reliance on God's grace (refuting the portrayal of James as self-reliantly focused on works).

However, God is also pure, and he will have nothing to do with evil (as asserted in 1:13, 17). This is the basis for the second part of James's point, stated in 4:3: a warning that one may not expect God to answer prayer when one's motives are wicked. He warns against asking kakos, wrongly or wickedly, which the NIV paraphrases as with wrong motives. Adamson considers it stronger language than the KJV's "amiss" and paraphrases it "Your praying is corrupt" (1976:168). Then James explains the wrong motives: they ask in order to spend on their pleasures, emphasized by the same noun hedone translated desires in 4:1.

The conclusion for us is that our fights reveal a wrong relationship with God which is manifest in our prayer lives. Either we do not pray, because we do not trust in God's grace, or we pray with wrong motives, because we do not follow God's purity.

In all this, James is again taking his Lord at his word and applying it in full belief to a practical situation of life. Like the references to judgment in 3:13-18, James's flow of thought parallels that of Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount.

4-12

4You adulterous people, don't you know that friendship with the world is hatred toward God? Anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. 5Or do you think Scripture says without reason that the spirit he caused to live in us envies intensely? 6But he gives us more grace. That is why Scripture says: “God opposes the proud
but gives grace to the humble.”
7Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 8Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double minded. 9Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. 10Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will 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. When you judge the law, you are not keeping it, but sitting in judgment on it. 12There is only one Lawgiver and Judge, the one who is able to save and destroy. But you–who are you to judge your neighbor?

Explanation:
Don't You Know the Choice to Be Made?

As James poses (in 4:4) the third question of this section, I paraphrase it in order to display the heart of the matter. James has placed the problems of selfish ambition and fighting under his spotlight in 3:13-18 and 4:1-3. Now he addresses what to do about the problems. In light of the preceding paragraphs, a choice must be made between friendship with God and friendship with the world. The Significance of the Choice (4:4-6)
The presentation of this choice extends the parallel with Matthew 7 one step further. After inviting his hearers to ask the Father for what they needed, Jesus confronted them with a choice between wide and narrow ways leading to opposite ends--destruction and life (Mt 7:13-14). Now James's thought runs in the same direction; his purpose in this paragraph is to impress on his readers the importance and urgency of the choice.

First, the importance of the choice is clarified by the simplicity of the alternatives. It becomes a matter of whether we want friendship with the world or friendship with God. This use of world to encompass the patterns of human life contrary to God's will was apparently common enough in Christian circles for James to expect his readers to understand; Paul would use the term in a very similar sense. James thereby cuts through the complications and subtleties of our secondary goals and defines the matter in terms of primary values. Whether we will be described more accurately by 3:16 or by 3:17 will be determined by whether we want the world or God.

Second, the seriousness of the one alternative is made clear with shocking terms: you adulterous people, hatred toward God, an enemy of God. It all sounds so offensive that we are tempted to think he must be addressing non-Christians rhetorically (similar to his address of the rich oppressors in 5:1). Here, however, he must be addressing his Christian readers, for his immediate message is still too closely connected to the hypocritical wisdom and the fights and quarrels among you from 3:13 and 4:1. But he is again warning those who call themselves Christians that they may be false Christians who are really enemies of God.

James simply writes with a stronger conviction of the seriousness of sin than most of us are willing to hold. In fact he writes with a sense of moral outrage. Consider Davids's rendering of the beginning of this paragraph: " `Adulteresses!' the author cries" (1982:160). We should accept James's terms, learn from his acute sense of moral right and wrong, and apply it to ourselves in fear of the judgment that comes to any who are not true Christians. Harboring bitter envy and selfish ambition, with the actions of fighting and quarreling, makes us adulterous people who are treating God with hatred and enmity.

Third, the powerful reality of the other alternative is offered so that we will not miss it by indifference. The point of James's references to Scripture in 4:5 and 4:6 is to persuade his readers to choose God unreservedly instead of the world because God himself is jealous that they make this choice and is furthermore gracious toward them to welcome their humble commitment. Contrary to the NIV, God should be understood as the subject of the clause in the scriptural reference of 4:5 as well as 4:6.

However, 4:5 is one of the most problematic verses in the letter. We would be helped in determining the meaning if a definite Old Testament origin could be identified, but there is no verse like the last half of 4:5. In the absence of a definite reference by which to establish the meaning, two major understandings have been proposed.
One possibility is reflected in the NIV. Here the subject of the clause is spirit, pneuma, taken to mean the human spirit which God caused to live in us from creation. This is the spirit that envies intensely, so James is reminding his readers that human nature tends toward the envy and jealousy about which he has been warning since 3:14. The arguments in favor of this rendering are as follows.

1. Linguistic. James says literally that this spirit "yearns to jealousy." This verb epipothei is never elsewhere applied to God, and the noun phthonon is consistently negative in other instances.

2. Contextual. A reference to human envy would be consistent with what James has been emphasizing in the larger passage.

3. Logical. The next scriptural reference, in 4:6, would provide logical contrast by stating that God gives more grace to overcome this human tendency toward envy.

While these are worthy arguments, an alternative reflected in the NASB and the NIV margin is preferable. Here the subject of the verb is the understood he, referring to God. The object of his yearning is the spirit he caused to live in us. This spirit could be either the created human spirit or the Holy Spirit given to Christians, though the former seems more likely because it is consistent with James's only other reference to "spirit" in 2:26. In either case, the meaning is that God jealously desires us to belong wholeheartedly to him. (Even if one takes the Jerusalem Bible or Living Bible rendering with "spirit" referring to the Holy Spirit as the subject of the clause, one is left with the same meaning: that God jealously desires us.)

The arguments making this understanding of 4:5 preferable are the following.

1. Linguistic. Two terms for "envy," phthonos and zelos, are sometimes interchangeable, and zelos is used elsewhere of God. James would be choosing this more unusual use of phthonos simply for stylistic contrast, since he recently used zelos negatively of human envy in 3:14 and 3:16.

2. Grammatical. It is more natural to have the same subject for the two verbs yearns and caused to live.

3. Contextual. An emphasis on God's jealousy for righteousness in us is equally consistent with what James has emphasized in the letter.

4. Logical. A reference to human envy here would be awkward, because it would seem to ignore the point to which James has come in 4:4 and would instead return to his point in 4:1-3.

On the other hand, a reference to God's jealousy fits the flow of thought well. The point of 4:4 logically raises the objection "How does friendship with the world make me an enemy of God?" James would be answering this in 4:5 by reminding us of God's jealousy. Then 4:6 would follow as a reminder of God's grace to the humble, which protects us from being overwhelmed by God's jealousy.

If this second alternative is the correct understanding, then the Old Testament Scripture James has in mind is probably a theme rather than a particular verse--the frequent theme of God's jealousy for undivided devotion from his people (e.g., Ex 20:5). The reference in 4:6 is more specific and definite, quoting Proverbs 3:34 about God's personal stance in regard to the choice before us. He is neither passive nor indifferent but quite active in opposing the proud and giving grace to the humble. The proverb is also reflected in Jesus' teaching in Luke 14:11 and 18:14. It fits James's context perfectly here, as it reminds the readers succinctly of the two alternatives James has taken trouble to portray since 3:13--pride and humility.

Altogether, the paragraph of 4:4-6 emphasizes God's requirement of Christians: "a total, unreserved, unwavering allegiance" to God rather than to the world (Moo 1985:144). It equally emphasizes that this requirement is not an achievement by which the proud can earn God's friendship, for the call to devotion is based on God's extension of grace to the humble. Grace is what opens the way for the steps prescribed in the next two paragraphs. Steps to Be Taken Toward God (4:7-10)

James has a problem: his readers are being corrupted by bitter envy and selfish ambition leading to fights and quarrels. He has a goal: to help them learn to live in love and at peace with each other. Therefore he has a prescription for them: repentance. That is what his ten imperatives provide--a forceful call to repentance as the requisite to love and peace in the community.

There is a clear structure to this paragraph. Submit yourselves to God states the theme, which is indicated by the insertion of then to be an application drawn immediately from the preceding Proverbs 3:34. Humble yourselves before the Lord is also drawn from Proverbs 3:34 by repetition of the term for humble in verb form. These first and last of the ten imperatives are intended to be synonymous, the former introducing and the latter summarizing the theme. In between, the imperatives flow in three couplets.

Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.

Come near to God and he will come near to you.

Wash your hands, you sinners,
and purify your hearts, you double-minded.

Grieve, mourn and wail.

Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom.

James's description of becoming humble or submissive before God, then, begins with a willful rejection of and opposition to the devil, complemented by a deliberate choosing of God instead of the devil. It reflects the biblical worldview of God's enmity with evil and the choice this requires of us. God opposes or resists (antitasso) the proud in 4:6; now in 4:7 we are to oppose or resist (anthistemi) the devil. The verb anthistemi has the middle sense of "set oneself against" and so emphasizes the Christian's deliberately chosen personal stance. The contrasting action that we are to take toward God is to come near. Thus James has put this entire section in terms of knowing the choice to be made: friendship with the world or friendship with God, opposing the devil or opposing God.

Along with the presentation of this choice comes a pair of promises to encourage James's readers. The devil . . . will flee from you. Meanwhile, God . . . will come near to you. Just as there is a continuity between God's stance toward the devil and our own (opposing him), so now there is a continuity between our reverse action toward God and his action toward us (drawing near). The same verb engizo identifies our act and God's act of drawing near, to make definite that God will not give himself to us any less than we give ourselves to him. This is an assurance of God's readiness and availability.

The middle couplet requires a sincere purifying of one's life, since both verbs (katharizo and hagnizo) emphasize a moral and ceremonial cleansing, and since the two objects (your hands . . . your hearts) complement each other for external and internal cleansing. The essential connection between external washing and inward purifying is already an Old Testament theme in James's background (Deut 10:16; Is 1:15-17). James may also be prompted by Jesus' own teaching on washing of hands and purification within (Mk 7). An evidence of the unity of thought in James's letter is his reference to the double-minded in 4:8. It is the same term as in 1:8, where the double-minded man is condemned as "unstable," akatastatos. This is the evil James abhors in 3:16 as the "disorder," akatastasia, resulting from selfish ambition. From the very beginning of the epistle, James is giving a consistent picture of authentic Christian faith in practice.

The third couplet describes deep and acute sorrow--not merely regret over mistakes but actual grieving, mourning and wailing over one's sin. The three verbs, in order, make vivid impressions: talaiporeo, a state of being miserable or wretched; pentheo, the great sadness of mourning; and klaio, a vehement or bitter weeping. Again James is calling for what Jesus prescribed in the Sermon on the Mount (Mt 5:4, using a participle of the verb pentheo). The seriousness of sin is unmistakable here, and Christians today who lack that sense of seriousness about sin are weakened and corrupted. Tasker sees the importance of this application: "When the Christian compromises with the world and is double minded, it is a sure sign that his sense of the gravity of sin has become blunted" (1983:95). James is unapologetic and authoritative in his command to such a person: Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. We should not be afraid today to call for such deeply felt repentance.

The whole paragraph (not just the third couplet, as in Davids 1982:167) is a portrait of repentance. Repentance is an act of humble submission to God which includes a choice to resist the devil and to draw near to God, a commitment to moral purity both externally and internally, and a genuine remorse for one's sin.

I would love to know how James's message was received in his day. James is properly described as a "prophet-pastor" (Webster 1991:22), and I wonder whether he sounded too much like the Old Testament prophets to be very popular. He may be recalling passages like Amos's prophecies of wailing and mourning (5:16; 8:10). Amos was ordered to go away and stop prophesying. James's message is not the kind of spiritual direction most people want to hear today; the church is being pressured to rely on counsel that is only affirming, programs that are merely entertaining and music that is always upbeat. Yet the problems James has addressed require a submission that is humbling, a resistance that is demanding, an attitude that is sorrowful and life changes that are radical.

At the same time, these steps are reinforced with encouraging promises: the devil . . . will flee from you, God . . . will come near to you, and the Lord . . . will lift you up. Such promises certainly direct us to a reliance on God rather than our good works. The assurance that God will lift you up is not explicitly defined. However, since submit yourselves, then, to God is the direct application from Proverbs 3:34, and since humble yourselves before the Lord restates that first imperative to summarize the paragraph, the promise of being lifted up probably refers back to the promise of grace in 4:6. From the context of the intervening imperatives, James would be telling us to expect that God will come near to forgive sin, to restore joy and to strengthen the repentant sinner to live in purity and righteousness. Seeing the requirement of radical life changes in 4:710 expands our appreciation for that preceding promise in 4:6--he gives us more grace. Motyer comments, "What comfort there is in this verse! It tells us that God is tirelessly on our side. He never falters in respect of our needs, he always has more grace at hand for us. He is never less than sufficient, he always has more and yet more to give" (1985:150).

It would be accurate to say that James's entire letter is instructing us to live in reliance on God's grace. That sounded tame enough until James applied it to actual practice, such as ending hatred and fights. Now we see just how radical this proposition of grace-reliance really is. How do we manage not to curse people who treat us with such hostility and injustice that cursing them is exactly what we want to do? The answer is the course James has described: examination of one's own desires, choice to want God instead of the world, repentance for sin and reliance on God's grace.

Ralph Bell, an associate evangelist with the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, is a godly man who tells of learning grace-reliance in a deeply personal way. Bell is a Canadian-born black man who lives and ministers in the United States. As a young man, he struggled with experiences of racial insults and discrimination. Being so treated by fellow Christians, who were disobeying James's instructions about impartiality, was especially hurtful. Bell shared his struggles with his mother, who counseled him to keep his eyes on Jesus, because Jesus would never disappoint him. As he sought to apply that advice, he began to find the grace to see others' racism as their problem. He further sought grace from God to purify his own life of hatred toward those who mistreated him. In James's terms, Ralph Bell humbled himself before the Lord, and he found himself being lifted up by the grace of God to be able to love his enemies. How does one love hostile and hurtful people? The answer is supernaturally, by relying on the grace that God gives to the humble.

10 expands our appreciation for that preceding promise in 4:6--he gives us more grace. Motyer comments, "What comfort there is in this verse! It tells us that God is tirelessly on our side. He never falters in respect of our needs, he always has more grace at hand for us. He is never less than sufficient, he always has more and yet more to give" (1985:150).

It would be accurate to say that James's entire letter is instructing us to live in reliance on God's grace. That sounded tame enough until James applied it to actual practice, such as ending hatred and fights. Now we see just how radical this proposition of grace-reliance really is. How do we manage not to curse people who treat us with such hostility and injustice that cursing them is exactly what we want to do? The answer is the course James has described: examination of one's own desires, choice to want God instead of the world, repentance for sin and reliance on God's grace.

Ralph Bell, an associate evangelist with the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association, is a godly man who tells of learning grace-reliance in a deeply personal way. Bell is a Canadian-born black man who lives and ministers in the United States. As a young man, he struggled with experiences of racial insults and discrimination. Being so treated by fellow Christians, who were disobeying James's instructions about impartiality, was especially hurtful. Bell shared his struggles with his mother, who counseled him to keep his eyes on Jesus, because Jesus would never disappoint him. As he sought to apply that advice, he began to find the grace to see others' racism as their problem. He further sought grace from God to purify his own life of hatred toward those who mistreated him. In James's terms, Ralph Bell humbled himself before the Lord, and he found himself being lifted up by the grace of God to be able to love his enemies. How does one love hostile and hurtful people? The answer is supernaturally, by relying on the grace that God gives to the humble. Steps to Be Taken Toward Others (4:11-12)

James could end this section at this point, having directed his readers with steps toward God. He is unrelenting, however, in making the explicit application to the problem with which he began--the problem of anger, impure speech and judging within the Christian community. He introduced this topic as early as 1:19. He focused on the aspects of judging and discriminating in 2:1-13. He returned to the issue of impure speech in 3:1 and specifically the problems of cursing and envy and fighting through chapter 3 and the beginning of chapter 4. Now he drives home his call to a life of faith in personal relationships. Here the coherence of James's letter is again evident, contrary to some commentators who see it as disconnected, self-contained pieces (e.g., Dibelius 1976:207-8; Laws 1980:186; and even Davids 1982:168-69).

First comes the pointed command Do not slander one another. The verb is katalaleo ("speak against"), which could include destructive verbal attacks, gossip behind another person's back and false accusations. Such offenses are not to be practiced among Christians.

Then James repeats this first verb in anyone who speaks against his brother but adds a second verb or judges him to make clear that the speaking against is a form of judging. Judging then becomes the real focus of these verses, and the remainder of the two verses is explanation of why judging is so wrong.

The fundamental notion of "judging" with the verb krino is one of distinguishing or making a distinction. It is certainly right to distinguish between good and evil; James himself is not timid about condemning people's evil behavior. Yet he warns against judging. To see what he means, we need to draw together the line of thought James has pursued about judging all through the letter. We must begin with James's emphasis on faith, because that is still the unifying theme of the letter.

[] 1:1-18. Christians begin with a stance of faith. This faith could be summarized from 1:1-18 as confidence in God's mercy. James emphasized God's mercy with several examples: God is faithful to complete in us what we lack (1:3-4); God is generous to give to us without finding fault (1:5); God is kind to exalt us even in humble circumstances (1:9); God is reliable for us even when our own evil desires would entice us into temptation (1:13); God is, in fact, the gracious and consistent giver of every good gift (1:17-18).

[] 1:2-6. Faith in this mercy of God has radical implications for our lives. The first implication is that because of faith in God's mercy, Christians face trials with joy. They believe God instead of wavering with doubts (diakrino). If they act on the basis of doubts, they are distinguishing (or judging) a basis for life other than God's mercy.

[] 2:1-5. A second implication is that Christians are certainly not to practice partiality toward others, for then they would be discriminating (diakrino) and making themselves judges (krites). They would be treating people as if wealth instead of God's mercy were the factor determining people's value.

[] 2:8-13. The royal law commands us to be merciful. If we treat others with judgmental discrimination instead of mercy, we sin and will be judged (krino) by that law. Our lives are based on God's mercy, by which we escape judgment and receive salvation; now in the law that we obey, our lives are again based on mercy. So both in being saved and in living the Christian life, "mercy triumphs over judgment!"

[] 3:1-2, 13-18. Everyone stumbles and so is vulnerable to judgment. But because of faith in God's mercy, a Christian will act in humility. A Christian will be impartial (adiakritos, "without judging") and sincere (anhypokritos, "without hypocrisy").

Drawing upon this background, in 4:11-12 James would now help us avoid the sin of judging. He instructs us in regard to three relationships that form the context for our lives. In each case, judging is inherently contradictory to the true nature of the relationship.

First mentioned is the relationship with each other. James chooses significant terms to identify the ones his readers would be judging: brother in 4:11 and then neighbor at the end of 4:12. Jesus used the term brother in his instruction against judging (Mt 7:1-5), and he used the term neighbor in the great commandment to love (Mt 22:39). In light of all that James has written so far about God's mercy toward us, these terms now come as reminders that our family bonds in God's mercy are violated when we who have received mercy turn to judge each other; and God's goodness to us is treated with contempt when we show judgment instead of mercy to our neighbors.

Second is the relationship with the law. James insists that we are to be doers under the law, which is contradicted when we try to be judges over the law. The "law" (nomos) could refer to the Old Testament command in Leviticus 19:16, which prohibits slander, and to Leviticus 19:18, "Love your neighbor as yourself," which James quoted in 2:8. Given James's reverence for the teachings of Jesus as the royal law of the kingdom, it is likely that he also has in mind Jesus' specific command against judging in Matthew 7:1 and Jesus' own quoting of Leviticus 19:18. James's point is that if we accept God's mercy through Christ, we place ourselves under Christ's law, which commands mercy. If we then judge others instead of being merciful toward their faults, we are rejecting that law and so setting ourselves up as judges over the law. This contradicts our proper stance as recipients of grace--we are to be doers under the law.

The third relationship is with God. One (heis) as the subject of the sentence emphasizes that there is only one who is Lawgiver and Judge. When we judge each other, we are contradicting that fact. This is a revealing insight into our hearts. In judging people, what we really want is to take God's place. The United States government is arranged in judicial, legislative and executive branches, with a careful separation and balance of powers. In the realm of personal relationships, however, judging and lawgiving operate together; the one who judges another person is presuming to have authority to set the law or standard by which the other person is judged. Judging is an attempt to be in control as God is in control, which has been our rebellious desire ever since the serpent told Eve she could be "like God, knowing good and evil." Our sins of judging are attempts to set ourselves not only over the law but over the Lawgiver as well.

Now we can summarize. What James has been prescribing is a life of faith that has two facets: confidence in God's grace and passion for God's righteousness. The confidence and the passion are complementary responses to God's judgment and mercy. God's mercy triumphs over judgment on our behalf; therefore we may be confident in relying on grace. However, we who have genuinely grasped grace will become all the more eager to grasp righteousness, realizing that our lack of righteousness so nearly brought us to disaster in the fearful judgment of God. Once one has humbly sought grace for escape from judgment (4:10), it becomes unthinkable to set oneself up as judge over a neighbor (4:11). It is part of a single stance before God to submit to him for his grace (4:7) and to submit to him for his law; one cannot be both a judge over the law and a doer under the law (4:11). James is showing us a well-integrated faith in Christ as both merciful Savior to be trusted and righteous Lord to be obeyed.

Boasting About Tomorrow
13Now listen, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.” 14Why, you 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. 15Instead, you ought to say, “If it is the Lord's will, we will live and do this or that.” 16As it is, you boast and brag. All such boasting is evil. 17Anyone, then, who knows the good he ought to do and doesn't do it, sins.

Explanation:
Don't Be Arrogant

The continuity from the preceding passage is the theme of humility. Humility is characteristic of the truly wise (3:13); it is the stance for receiving God's grace (4:6); it is commanded in the description of repentance (4:10); the opposite of humility is implied in the question immediately preceding this new passage: "But you--who are you to judge your neighbor?" It is natural for James now to confront directly the opposite of humility, which we would call arrogance.

Dibelius emphatically dismisses any literary connection between this passage and the preceding verses (1976:230). Davids also misses the continuity of theme and sees no direct connection to 4:1-12 (1982:171). He is perhaps overly distracted by the question of the identity of the hoi legontes ("you who say"). He and Laws perceive two distinct classes being addressed by James: merchants in 4:13-17 and wealthy landlords in 5:1-6. Laws concludes from the term emporeusometha ("carry on business") and from the rhetorical address "Come now!" that James is speaking about a distinct class of traveling traders who at this stage would not likely have been a part of the church in sufficient numbers to be singled out as a group of Christians (1980:190). If so, James would be addressing rhetorically people outside the church for the benefit of the Christians who are actually reading his letter. This is a possibility, since James refrains from calling them "brothers" and makes no distinctly Christian references about them. On the other hand, Davids believes James reserves the term plousioi for rhetorically addressing the "rich" who are not part of the church (as in 5:1). In this view, James's avoidance of the term plousioi in 4:13 means he is there addressing people within the Christian community.

Though Davids underestimates the continuity of the humility theme, this continuity actually supports his view of the identity of the entrepreneurs in 4:13-17. James has been addressing Christians about humility ever since 3:13 and has reached a climactic reference to arrogance at the end of 4:12. He would most naturally continue to address believers in 4:13, warning them about arrogance especially in their business endeavors. James will escalate this message in the next paragraph (5:1-6) through his rhetorical address to unbelieving rich oppressors. They will serve as examples of the arrogance described in 4:13-17, carried to the level of murderous greed. This is a more elaborate example of James's argument in 2:1-7, where he first warned Christians about their own sin of favoritism and then reminded them that they were acting like the unbelieving rich who were exploiting them and blaspheming the name of Christ. Arrogance in Knowledge (4:13-14)

James begins with the interjection now listen (age nyn), a short, blunt expression to get his readers' attention. He will call their attitude boasting by the end of the paragraph. Most of us do not think of ourselves as boasting people, because we do not go around making people listen to our bragging. As a good disciple, however, James makes us examine more subtle forms of boasting. Arrogance in knowledge occurs when we assume that we control time and events. By using the categories of 4:13, Douglas D. Webster observes how comprehensively we do this: "What else is there besides time (`today or tomorrow'), purpose (`we will go'), place (`to this or that city'), goals (`to carry on business') and reward (`make money')?" (1991:125).

James has touched what has become a major pathology in our society. It is alarmingly commonplace, even among Christians, to be overextended in commitments, to be stressed because of time pressures and finally to become dissatisfied, compulsive people. Observing the sickness of contemporary family life, James Dobson has warned that if the devil can't make you sin, he will make you too busy, and that's just as bad. We are a driven people.

The attitude confronted in 4:13 is exposed as deception in 4:14: Why, you don't even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. The verse begins as a relative clause continuing 4:13 as "who do not know . . ." The use of hoitines instead of hoi ("who") emphasizes a characteristic quality of the group being mentioned--to be rendered in this case as "who do not even know." Poia is the feminine of the interrogative pronoun poios ("of what kind?"), which brings a qualitative sense to the question: "What is your life like?" The question, however, is more likely the end of the longer sentence (as in the NASB). The NIV follows a textual variation to make it a separate question, but the variation seems best explained as an attempt to smooth and clarify the reading (Davids 1982:172). The preferred result is "who do not even know what your life will be like tomorrow."

The solution to our time-stress begins with humility, and humility comes from this knowledge: that we are like a vanishing mist unless the eternal God establishes us. James has employed an Old Testament image that captures an important biblical concept. In Hosea, for example, this image is used in judgment. The nation's weak love for God is condemned by its likeness to the morning mist and the early dew that disappears (Hos 6:4). Hosea combined the images of morning mist, disappearing dew, swirling chaff and escaping smoke to portray how easily the people who trust in idols will be blown away (Hos 13:3). In Psalm 1:4, the wicked are "like chaff that the wind blows away," in contrast to the righteous, who stand firmly planted. Isaiah described people who oppose God as being blown away like chaff before the wind (Is 17:13). The biblical concept is that human life is utterly dependent on God and completely incapable of standing before God's judgment.

James would impress upon us this critical piece of knowledge: that God is the one who sustains our lives, that each day's twenty-four hours are not "ours" automatically, that God controls time and gives it as one of his good gifts, and that we would be already blown away in God's judgment were it not for his mercy. The biblical worldview is that "we receive another day neither by natural necessity, nor by mechanical law, nor by right, nor by courtesy of nature, but only by the covenanted mercies of God" (Motyer 1985:162).

This knowledge helps to dispel self-sufficiency, replacing it with the freedom to rely on God's faithful generosity. Again, far from preaching self-reliance and works-orientation, James is leading us into a life of grace-reliance. Arrogance in Attitude (4:15-16)

This life of reliance on God runs far deeper than the words we say, and care should be taken to apply James's words deeply and honestly. First, it would be a superficial spirituality to think that James's instruction is fulfilled merely by sprinkling our speech with "the Lord willing." At the same time, we should not judge those who do use this phrase; if it is done humbly as a way to keep oneself reminded of God's sovereignty, it can be a godly practice. Second, it would be a deformed spirituality to apply this by refusing to do any planning; 4:15 affirms the validity of planning to do this or that. Motyer writes, "James is not trying to banish planning from our lives, but only that sort of self-sufficient, self-important planning that keeps God for Sunday but looks on Monday to Saturday as mine" (1985:161). The spirituality James wants for us is a humble reliance on God which flows from knowing that one is in reality dependent on God for every moment. It is yet another example of how James would envision the manifestation of grace-reliance in our lives.

The sin of self-sufficiency is a serious matter. You boast is kauchasthe, a verb that can have a positive meaning, as in Romans 5:11 and 1 Corinthians 1:3, but clearly has a negative emphasis here. The NIV's and brag is actually not a second verb in the text but a prepositional phrase "in your arrogance" (cf. NASB). Moo (1985:157) points out that such a phrase in the New Testament, with the preposition en following this verb kauchasthe, always refers to the object of the boasting (for example, boasting in one's high position as in 1:9). This makes the arrogance not merely the manner of their boasting but rather the object of their boasting. The sin James is exposing is not merely a sin of omission (neglecting to recognize God's rule over their affairs); it is a sin of commission in that they even boast about their self-sufficiency. Such boasting, kauchesis, is therefore especially evil; further, all such boasting is evil. It is a blasphemous denial of God's authority and grace to think that we instead of God control events. Arrogance in Behavior (4:17)

Suddenly James shifts his emphasis from whether we know God's will to whether we do God's will. Verse 17 seems at first not to fit the thrust of the paragraph. That, however, is a clue not that James is erratic in his thought but that we have not understood his meaning. The adverb oun ("then") provides grammatical evidence that James intends a connection in thought. He may have made a jump in his line of thought without articulating the intervening steps, but it is entirely consistent with the rest of the letter for James to tell his readers to carry out their inward attitude with outward actions. In fact, James capsulizes in this one verse much of what he has already taught in the letter. His double use of the verb poieo (to do and doesn't do) reminds his readers succinctly of his earlier emphasis on doing the word of God (1:22-25). The picture of one who knows the good he ought to do and doesn't do it recalls the earlier picture of one who finds the brother or sister in need but does not do the good that ought to be done (2:15-16). The label of "sin" (hamartia) is applied with all the severe warning about sin given earlier (1:15).

James fully expects that a humble attitude will be manifest in humble actions, and an arrogant attitude will be manifest in arrogant actions. It is natural for him now to be saying in 4:17: "Do not merely say that you want to know God's will or that you recognize your dependence on his will; look carefully at what God has already said about his will, and do that."

Failure to do what one knows to be God's will is the same arrogance that James has been describing in knowledge and attitude, now carried out in behavior. Indifference toward God's will is commonplace sin today, and Motyer comments on this verse that "the whole idea of sinning by default has never been given more pointed expression" (1985:163). As we have previously found in this letter, here James carries the issues of faith into the realm of active obedience.