1 Whence come wars and whence fightings among you? Is it not thence, from your pleasures, which war in your members? 2 Ye lust and have not: ye kill and are full of envy, and cannot obtain; ye fight and war; ye have not because ye ask not. 3 Ye ask and receive not, because ye ask evilly, that ye may consume it in your pleasures. 4 Adulteresses, know ye not that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Whoever therefore is minded to be the friend of the world is constituted enemy of God. 5 Think ye that the scripture speaks in vain? Does the Spirit which has taken his abode in us desire enviously? 6 But he gives more grace. Wherefore he says, God sets himself against the proud, but gives grace to the lowly. 7 Subject yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 8 Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, sinners, and purify your hearts, ye double-minded. 9 Be wretched, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to heaviness. 10 Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he shall exalt you. 11 Speak not against one another, brethren. He that speaks against his brother, or judges his brother, speaks against the law and judges the law. But if thou judgest the law, thou art not doer of the law, but judge. 12 One is the lawgiver and judge, who is able to save and to destroy: but who art thou who judgest thy neighbour? 13 Go to now, ye who say, To-day or to-morrow will we go into such a city and spend a year there, and traffic and make gain, 14 ye who do not know what will be on the morrow, (for what is your life? It is even a vapour, appearing for a little while, and then disappearing,) 15 instead of your saying, If the Lord should so will and we should live, we will also do this or that. 16 But now ye glory in your vauntings: all such glorying is evil. 17 To him therefore who knows how to do good, and does it not, to him it is sin. | |