James 3:15

This wisdom descendeth not from above,.... If it must be called wisdom, as it ought not; an envious, quarrelsome, and contentious spirit, does not deserve such a name; yet if any will call it so, or

This wisdom descendeth not from above, but is earthly, sensual, devilish. This wisdom - in which ye "glory," as if "wise" (James 3:13-14).

This wisdom, which they pretended so much to, who so criticized on other men’ s actions, and inveighed against them, and which was accompanied with strife and envy. Descendeth not from above; i.e. from God the author of wisdom, from whom, though every good and perfect gift descends, , and even knowledge and skill in natural things, ,29; yet this wisdom, being sinful, is not from him, because it is earthly, of the earth, of no higher original than from the first Adam, who was of the earth, and earthly, ; and likewise because it is employed, and fixeth men’ s minds, on earthly things. Sensual; this may be understood either: 1. According to the reading in the text, the word here used being so rendered, , agreeable to , where soul, from whence the word is derived, is opposed to spirit, and taken for the sensitive powers, which men have in common with brutes, in distinction from the intellectual, which go under the name of spirit, and are proper to men: mere reason, without the Divine grace, being apt to degenerate into brutishness, and easily brought to serve the ends of sensual appetite, this wisdom may well be called sensual. Or: 2. According to , natural, in opposition to spiritual. The natural man is one that lives under the conduct of his own carnal reason, not enlightened, nor regenerated by the Spirit of God; a man of soul, (as the word imports), or that hath no better, no higher principle in him than his own soul. Accordingly, this wisdom here mentioned, is such as proceeds merely from a man’ s own soul, in its natural state, destitute of the light and grace of God’ s Spirit, and therefore may be termed natural. Devilish; because it is of the devil, or such as is in him, and makes men like him, who is a proud spirit, and envious, a liar and slanderer, , and who observes men’ s faults, not to amend them, but accuse them for them.

15 This wisdom descendeth not from above, but is earthly, sensual, devilish. Ver. 15. Earthly, sensual] Here is a true character of carnal wisdom; the world is a pearl in its eyes, it cannot see God. Earthly it is called, as managing the lusts of the eyes unto the ends of gain; sensual, managing the lusts of the flesh unto the ends of pleasure; and devilish, managing the pride of life unto the ends of power.

(15) This wisdom descendeth not from above . . . .—Better thus, This is not the wisdom coming down from above, but is earthly, natural, devilish. This—it were profanation to call it by the holy name of Óïößá (Sophia), being in sharpest contrast to it, of the earth earthy; natural (as margin), or “psychical,” in the second sense of the tripartite division of man—body, soul, and spirit—explained under James 1:21 (comp. Jude 1:19, “Sensual, having not the Spirit”); and even worse, akin to the craft of devils.

Verse 15. This wisdom descendeth not from above] God is not the author of it, because it is bitter-not meek. See at the end of this chapter. "James 3:18" Is earthly] Having this life only in view. Sensual] ψυχικη. Animal-having for its object the gratification of the passions and animal propensities. Devilish] δαιμονιωδης. Demoniacal-inspired by demons, and maintained in the soul by their indwelling influence.

15. This wisdom descendeth not from above] St James returns to the thought of chap. James 1:5, that true wisdom was the gift of God, coming, like every other good and perfect gift, from above (ch. James 1:17). But this was not “the wisdom” of which the “many teachers” of the party of the Circumcision were boasting. It was, however, that of the Proverbs of Solomon, and of the Wisdom of the Son of Sirach, on which so much of St James’s teaching was modelled. (Comp. Sir 1:1-10.) It was that which had been manifested to mankind in all its fulness in Christ.earthly, sensual, devilish] Each word is full of meaning. (1) The counterfeit wisdom is “earthly” in its nature and origin as contrasted with that which cometh from above. (Comp. St Paul’s “who mind earthly things,” Philippians 3:19). (2) It is “sensual.” The word is used by classical writers for that which belongs to the “soul” as contrasted with the “body.” This rested on the twofold division of man’s nature. The psychology of the New Testament, however, assumes generally the threefold division of body, soul, and spirit, the second element answering to the animal, emotional life, and the third being that which includes reason and will, the capacity for immortality and for knowing God. Hence the adjective formed from “soul” acquired a lower meaning, almost the very opposite of that which it once had, and expresses man’s state as left to lower impulses without the control of the spirit. So St Paul contrasts the natural man with the spiritual (1 Corinthians 2:14), the natural and the spiritual body (1 Corinthians 15:44; 1 Corinthians 15:46). So St Jude describes the false teachers, whom he condemns as “sensual, having not the Spirit.” What St James says then of the false wisdom is that it belongs to the lower, not the higher, element in man’s nature. It does not come from the Spirit of God, and therefore is not spiritual. (3) In “devilish” we have yet a darker condemnation. Our English use of the same word, “devil,” for the two Greek words diabolos and dœmonion, tends, however, to obscure St James’s meaning. The epithet does not state that the false wisdom which he condemns came from the devil, or was like his nature, but that it was demon-like, as partaking of the nature of the “demons” or “unclean spirits,” who, as in the Gospels, are represented as possessing the souls of men, and reducing them to the level of madness. Such, St James says, is the character of the spurious wisdom of the “many masters” of James 3:1. Met together in debate, wrangling, cursing, swearing, one would take them for an assembly of demoniacs. Their disputes were marked by the ferocity, the egotism, the boasting, the malignant cunning of the insane. St Paul’s account of the “doctrines of devils,” i. e. proceeding from demons (1 Timothy 4:1), not from the Spirit of God, presents a striking parallel. St James’s previous allusion to “demons” (see note on ch.

This wisdom descendeth not from above - Compare the notes at 1 Corinthians 3:3.

15. This wisdom—Two counter pictures of the opposite wisdoms in 15-18. There is a proud wisdom that boasts of its worldly value, and knows how to fight its way and beat all before it. Whence came it?