James 4 Clementine Vulgate
Audio: World English Bible (WEB), read by Winfred W. Henson · About the recordings
1 Unde bella et lites in vobis? nonne hinc: ex concupiscentiis vestris, quæ militant in membris vestris?
1 Where do wars and fightings among you come from? Don’t they come from your pleasures that war in your members?
2 concupiscitis, et non habetis: occiditis, et zelatis: et non potestis adipisci: litigatis, et belligeratis, et non habetis, propter quod non postulatis.
2 You lust, and don’t have. You murder and covet, and can’t obtain. You fight and make war. You don’t have, because you don’t ask.
3 Petitis, et non accipitis: eo quod male petatis: ut in concupiscentiis vestris insumatis.
3 You ask, and don’t receive, because you ask with wrong motives, so that you may spend it on your pleasures.
4 Adulteri, nescitis quia amicitia hujus mundi inimica est Dei? quicumque ergo voluerit amicus esse sæculi hujus, inimicus Dei constituitur.
4 You adulterers and adulteresses, don’t you know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Whoever therefore wants to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.
5 An putatis quia inaniter Scriptura dicat: Ad invidiam concupiscit spiritus qui habitat in vobis?
5 Or do you think that the Scripture says in vain, “The Spirit who lives in us yearns jealously”?
6 majorem autem dat gratiam. Propter quod dicit: Deus superbis resistit, humilibus autem dat gratiam.
6 But he gives more grace. Therefore it says, “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”
7 Subditi ergo estote Deo, resistite autem diabolo, et fugiet a vobis.
7 Be subject therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.
8 Appropinquate Deo, et appropinquabit vobis. Emundate manus, peccatores: et purificate corda, duplices animo.
8 Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners. Purify your hearts, you double-minded.
9 Miseri estote, et lugete, et plorate: risus vester in luctum convertatur, et gaudium in mœrorem.
9 Lament, mourn, and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom.
10 Humiliamini in conspectu Domini, et exaltabit vos.
10 Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he will exalt you.
11 Nolite detrahere alterutrum fratres. Qui detrahit fratri, aut qui judicat fratrem suum, detrahit legi, et judicat legem. Si autem judicas legem, non es factor legis, sed judex.
11 Don’t speak against one another, brothers. He who speaks against a brother and judges his brother, speaks against the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge.
12 Unus est legislator et judex, qui potest perdere et liberare.
12 Only one is the lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy. But who are you to judge another?
13 Tu autem quis es, qui judicas proximum? Ecce nunc qui dicitis: Hodie, aut crastino ibimus in illam civitatem, et faciemus ibi quidem annum, et mercabimur, et lucrum faciemus:
13 Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow let’s go into this city and spend a year there, trade, and make a profit.”
14 qui ignoratis quid erit in crastino.
14 Yet you don’t know what your life will be like tomorrow. For what is your life? For you are a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away.
15 Quæ est enim vita vestra? vapor est ad modicum parens, et deinceps exterminabitur; pro eo ut dicatis: Si Dominus voluerit. Et: Si vixerimus, faciemus hoc, aut illud.
15 For you ought to say, “If the Lord wills, we will both live, and do this or that.”
16 Nunc autem exsultatis in superbiis vestris. Omnis exsultatio talis, maligna est.
16 But now you glory in your boasting. All such boasting is evil.
17 Scienti igitur bonum facere, et non facienti, peccatum est illi.
17 To him therefore who knows to do good and doesn’t do it, to him it is sin.
Cross references (17)
Related passages for each verse, from the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge as collected and ranked by readers at OpenBible.info.
- 1 1 Peter 2:11; Galatians 5:17; Romans 7:23; James 1:14; Romans 8:7
- 2 John 16:24; Matthew 7:7–8; James 1:5; Luke 11:9–13; John 4:10
- 3 1 John 5:14; 1 John 3:22; James 1:6–7; James 4:1; Proverbs 15:8
- 4 1 John 2:15–16; Romans 8:7; Matthew 6:24; John 15:19; Galatians 1:10
- 5 2 Corinthians 6:16; 1 Corinthians 6:19; Numbers 11:29; Titus 3:3; Psalm 37:1
- 6 Matthew 23:12; Proverbs 3:34; 1 Peter 5:5; Psalm 138:6; Proverbs 18:12
- 7 1 Peter 5:8–9; Ephesians 4:27; Ephesians 6:11–12; 1 Peter 5:6; Luke 4:2–13
- 8 Psalm 145:18; Hebrews 10:22; Malachi 3:7; Zechariah 1:3; Isaiah 55:6–7
- 9 Matthew 5:4; 2 Corinthians 7:10–11; Luke 6:25; Proverbs 14:13; James 5:1–2
- 10 Psalm 147:6; Matthew 23:12; 1 Peter 5:6; Luke 14:11; James 4:6–7
- 11 1 Peter 2:1; James 5:9; Romans 2:1; Luke 6:37; Psalm 140:11
- 12 Romans 14:4; Romans 2:1; Matthew 10:28; Isaiah 33:22; James 5:9
- 13 Proverbs 27:1; Luke 12:17–20; Genesis 11:3–4; Ecclesiastes 2:1; Isaiah 24:2
- 14 1 Peter 1:24; Psalm 39:5; 1 John 2:17; Psalm 102:3; Job 7:6–7
- 15 Proverbs 19:21; Hebrews 6:3; Lamentations 3:37; Acts 18:21; Romans 1:10
- 16 Proverbs 27:1; 1 Corinthians 5:6; Psalm 52:7; Proverbs 25:14; Isaiah 47:10
- 17 John 9:41; John 13:17; John 15:22; 2 Peter 2:21; Luke 12:47–48
Cross references: OpenBible.info (CC BY), drawn mainly from the public-domain Treasury of Scripture Knowledge. · Sources & licences
What the Fathers said
Passages from the Church Fathers that expound or quote this chapter, verbatim from the public-domain Schaff edition (19th-century English translations).
How these were chosen
“Commentary” is the opening of a homily or exposition on this chapter (John Chrysostom’s homilies, Augustine’s tractates, sermons and expositions of the Psalms). “Quotes” are sentences where the edition’s own footnotes identify a quotation of a verse here, kept only when the wording matches the verse. Only works whose authorship is not in doubt are used. Psalms follow the Hebrew/English numbering (Augustine numbers them as the Septuagint does: his Psalm 50 is Psalm 51 here).
"For God," saith [the Scripture], "resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the humble." Let us cleave, then, to those to whom grace has been given by God.
And man, being a part of Thy creation, desires to praise Thee, man, who bears about with him his mortality, the witness of his sin, even the witness that Thou "resistest the proud," --yet man, this part of Thy creation, desires to praise Thee.
Read in context · Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 1, vol. 1 (1886)
"God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace unto the humble." Again, I will ask you another thing also.
Read in context · Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 1, vol. 10 (1888)
… man, very skilful in medicine, and much renowned therein, who had with his own proconsular hand put the Agonistic garland upon my distempered head, not, though, as a physician; for this disease Thou alone healest, who resistest the proud, and givest grace to the humble. But didst Thou fail me even by that old man, or forbear from healing my …
Read in context · Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 1, vol. 1 (1886)
But I pressed towards Thee, and was repelled by Thee that I might taste of death, for Thou "resistest the proud." But what prouder than for me, with a marvellous madness, to assert myself to be that by nature which Thou art?
Read in context · Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 1, vol. 1 (1886)