James 3

CHAPTER III

Teacher and Tongue, 3:1–12

James 3:1

1 James now takes up “swift to hear, slow to speak,” which were mentioned in 1:19 and develops “slow to speak” as he developed “swift to hear” in 1:19–27. A general connection is obvious: proper hearing of the Word will not make us respecters of persons (2:1–13) nor people with dead faith (2:14–26); proper hearing will bridle the tongue (1:26) and will not put the needy off with mere words (2:15, etc.).

Be not many teachers, my brethren, knowing that we shall receive greater judgment! The admonition is again most fraternal. The wording is exact; μή does not precede the verb but precedes πολλοὶδιδάσκαλοι and thus shows that while some must of necessity assume the responsibility, many others should not do so. We should think of the early churches in which any members might speak in the meetings. First Corinthians 14:26–34 is instructive: any brother might contribute some word; yet Paul lays down restrictions: it must be for the purpose of edifying only, must occur in due order, two or three only are to speak, and the women must keep silent. James has the same ideas. “Teachers” does not mean “elders” in the pastoral office; it refers to members who arise in the meeting in order to instruct their fellow members.

The participle states the reason that many should not want to avail themselves of this privilege: “since you know that we shall receive greater judgment.” James says that “we shall receive”; he includes himself. He is teaching in this epistle and is a teaching elder in the congregation at Jerusalem. He shows that he feels the weight of responsibility or rather his accountability because of thus teaching.

Everyone of us who assumes to teach, whether he is in office or not, shall receive greater or heavier (R. V.) judgment, namely from God. God will hold us the more answerable. This, of course, means in case we are faulty or wrong in what we teach or in the manner of our teaching. The claim that “to receive judgment” means “to receive condemnation” (A. V.) goes too far. James did not expect condemnation for his teaching, nor does he intend to say that all teachers will be condemned. Κρῖμα is and remains a vox media. God will look more closely at all teachers when he judges them. Teachers undertake to convey God’s Word in the way in which God wants it conveyed; God will judge them on that score. Those who do not teach will, of course, not be judged in this way.

The damage that wrong teaching, whether it be in substance or in manner, may cause is indicated by what James later says about the tongue. Untold damage may result; we see it everywhere to this day. This text about the judgment that teachers shall receive cannot be impressed too deeply upon all who teach today, whether they do it professionally or as volunteers.

James 3:2

2 Why this mention of judgment? For in many things we stumble all. Like 1 John 1:8, James makes no exception. Πολλά is an adverbial accusative: “as regards many things.” “Stumble” recalls 2:10; James does not say “fall,” for this connotes the fatal falling, and such a fall takes place only once. To stumble (iterative present) is figurative for sinning without falling from grace. One stumbles and yet goes forward on the road; when he falls fatally or, as the Greek may state it, falls to the side, his Christian career is ended. This is James’s great confession of sin. It includes far more than sins of teaching or even sins of the tongue. James places these sins into the class of the many sins which true Christians confess daily (Matt. 6:12).

If someone does not stumble in word, this one is a complete man, able to bridle also the whole body.

James loves to repeat a word and so again uses “stumble,” but he now restricts it to speech, ἐνλόγῳ, to what a person says. James names the goal which we all should strive to attain. The member of the body that it is hardest to control is the tongue. The man who is able to control his tongue is able to bridle and to keep in control also the whole body and its desires. Loss of control of our other bodily members will show itself in lack of control of the tongue. It responds to sin most easily.

The man who does not stumble “in word” is τέλειος; he has reached the goal. This word does not mean that this man never sins again, is a sinless saint. The goal of perfect sinlessness is not reached in this life. What James says is similar to what Paul writes in 1 Cor. 9:27: this man is able “to keep under his body,” make it behave itself, make it act like a horse that is under a stiff rein. “To bridle the whole body” means to restrain it and all its members including the tongue which is the hardest to restrain. “To bridle” then implies that, if it were not for the bridle, the body would run into sin; the sinful inclinations and desires are there and also the outward solicitations and incitements.

James has the same view of the body and its members that Paul has, namely the body is not the source but the territory of sin, the place where sin seeks to maintain itself even in the regenerate. Both Paul and James speak like Jesus who says that a man may do this or do that with his body or with some member of it in order to keep it in order (for instance Matt. 5:29, 30). It is the heart, the ἐγώ, that gives the tongue, the members, the body rein to run into sin or on in sin, and by God’s grace this self is also able to bridle any and all members and, when the stirring to sin comes, draw the rein tight like a masterful rider.

How many men are there who have such control of the tongue? James does not imply that there are none but only that there are not many. He implies also that such men are the ones that are qualified to teach and not those who have as yet failed to control their logos or speech, i.e., their tongue. By stating this qualification of teachers James holds up to his readers the goal which they all should attain by bridling the whole body. He asks all who have been teaching and who ever think of teaching to apply this standard to themselves; nor does he except himself as the “we” used in v. 1 shows even as he himself is following this standard in the writing of this epistle by saying not a word too much or too little. James starts with teachers but broadens out so as to include all Christians. He uses ἀνήρ as he did in 1:7.

James 3:3

3 Now if we put the horses’ bits into their mouths so that they obey us we turn about also their whole body.

The present tenses are general: we do this as a regular thing in order to get this result again and again (present infinitive). The point is that by means of putting bits only into their mouths we swing to the right or to the left as we desire, not only the horses’ heads, but their entire bodies; we make the whole horse go where it should go.

The fully attested reading is εἰδέ; it should not be replaced by the poorly attested ἴδε or ἰδού. In the translation of the A. V. James seems to be making an application to us in v. 3; but the application has been made already in v. 2 so that v. 3 brings only the illustration, the point of which is the fact that the bit in the mouth controls the horse’s whole body. Δέ is the proper connective for adding this point. The illustration is so apt because in connection with v. 2 one might question as to whether a man’s not stumbling in word proves ability to bridle his whole body. The horse is a perfect illustration.

James uses the plural “horses.” Not simply one horse obeys now and then, his whole body being turned at will by the rider or the driver by means of only the bit in the mouth, all of them are so controlled. The illustration has argumentative force: if we do this with horses, strong, spirited animals, a mere touch of the rein swinging them around, shall we not do this with ourselves who are much more than horses? The εἰ of v. 3 agrees with that used in v. 2; χαλινούς repeats the χαλιναγωγῆσαι occurring in v. 2 in the way in which James likes to repeat.

James 3:4

4 We do not agree with those who say that at this point James begins to depict the damage which the tongue is able to do. The rudder of a ship is like a bridle and a bit in the case of a horse; both the horse and the ship are controlled by a little thing. The damage done by the tongue is referred to in the figure of the little fire that gets out of control. This corrects another view, namely that James had borrowed from a book which he had read, but that he confused these figures when he began to use them. These are figures that are independently arrived at by James himself, and they are used by him with keen insight and great skill, each being exactly to the point. He uses them in pairs, which fact you may call Jewish if you wish.

Each time he offers, as it were, the minimum of two witnesses. We still demand at least two witnesses in every court.

Lo, also the ships, although being so great and driven by stiff winds, are turned by a very small rudder whither the push of the steersman intends.

This illustration is still more remarkable, hence we have the exclamation “lo.” Ships are far larger than horses. While they have no will of their own as horses have they are driven by “stiff” winds, great gales, that neither they nor anything else can swerve from their course. Σκληρός is used with reference to a dead branch that no longer bends. Yet these great ships are controlled by a very small rudder and are directed “whither the push of the one steering intends” and not whither the mighty push of the wind would drive them. Ὁρμή is the impulse given the tiller by the hand of the helmsman. Βούλομαι often = to intend; in the Koine ὅπου = both “where” and “whither.”

James 3:5

5 Thus also the tongue is a little member and (yet) boasts great things. James applies the two illustrations. The point is the smallness of the tongue and the greatness of its effect. It is said that μεγάλααὐχεῖ, whether it is written as two words or as one, is used only in an evil sense, which fact is then stressed to imply that the damage done by the tongue is introduced by v. 4. But this expression only suggests the possibility of evil. The tongue may go wrong and, being like a bit or like a rudder, may do corresponding damage. James, however, reserves the damage done by it for a separate treatment. Note the alliteration: μικρὸνμέλος … μεγάλα; so also in the following the play on ἡλίκον … ἡλίκην.

The damage which the tongue does is now illustrated in a striking way. Lo, what sized fire kindles what sized forest! The fewest words, the mightiest picture. The play on ἡλίκος should not be lost as it is in our versions. “What sized” = a tiny spark when it is used with reference to fire; yet it = immense size when it is used with reference to woods or forests. The smallness and the greatness used in the previous illustrations remain; but whereas the horses and the ships are controlled by a slight instrument, the tiny fire operates in an uncontrolled way and produces a vast conflagration. To say that these figures are clumsily employed is to misunderstand James.

James 3:6

6 And the tongue is a fire. As the world of iniquity the tongue is constituted among our members, which defiles the whole body, both setting aflame the wheel of existence and being set aflame by Gehenna.

Nothing stronger was ever said about the tongue. Editors dispute about the punctuation. Shall we draw ὁκόσμοςτῆςἀδικίας forward and then place a period after it; or shall we draw this expression to what follows? We incline toward the latter punctuation because of the article. There is no substantial difference between these constructions. In either case “the world of iniquity” refers to the tongue.

There is also a dispute about the sense of ὁκόσμος. In this case there is little reason for hesitation as to the meaning. James has three times called the tongue little but most mighty; he now calls it a regular cosmos, “a world of iniquity,” a vast organism that is composed of or marked by iniquity (according as the genitive is considered one of substance or one of quality). The tongue, we may say, is the embodiment of all wrong. It utters every wrong emotion and thought and puts every kind of a wrong deed into words. As such “it is constituted” (probably a passive as in 4:4) among the members of our body; no other member is like it or can be compared to it for range of evil influence.

The fact that what is thus said about the tongue does not apply to the tongue as such but to the uncontrolled wicked tongue is made plain by the attributive participle ἡσπιλοῦσα, which is modified by two other participles: the tongue, “the one defiling the whole body, both setting aflame the wheel of existence and being set aflame by Gehenna”—this is the tongue that is set among our members “as a world of iniquity.” James carries the figure of the fire through.

“Defiling” is thought to be a mixing of figures because it introduces a second and even an unallied figure. This is a hasty judgment which the last word of the sentence, “Gehenna,” corrects—the fires of Gehenna are full of defilement. The wicked tongue defiles not merely itself with its fire but “the whole body,” for there is no sin that is committed by any member of the body and no sin that requires the whole body for movement, attitude, etc., in which the tongue does not assume the control; and it does this by the way in which it speaks of the sin, helps to plan it, joins with what it says in carrying out the sin, defends, upholds, and continues the sin after it is done, etc. By means of a final modifier James explains how this one little member can thus control the whole body with defilement.

Since the active and the passive participle are so strongly matched, we translate καί … καί “both … and”: “both setting aflame … and being set aflame.” This means that these two participles are not continuations of ἡσπιλοῦσα, that the three participles are not a unified description that is governed by the one article: the tongue “the one defiling … and setting aflame … and being set aflame.” This is the thought of the R. V.; the A. V. separates the last participle from the other two by means of a semicolon. The two matched participles modify ἡσπιλοῦσα, “the one defiling the whole body,” by stating both how far this body defiler extends the reach of its inflammation, and whence this its terrible inflammatory power comes.

Because it is the defiler of the whole body the tongue reaches out, “setting aflame the wheel of existence.” You and I do not exist merely as separate entities. Each of us is not a house that is set off by itself so that, if it were set afire, it alone would burn. James thinks of us as houses that are set together in a great city. A fire that is kindled in any one house will spread and become a great conflagration. Forget not the forest fire that was started by an uncontrolled spark. The whole body which is defiled in every member and part has a thousand contacts in all directions. Thus the body defiler “sets aflame the wheel of existence.”

There is much discussion about ὁτροχὸςτῆςγενέσεως. We note only the following. It is pretty well agreed that we should read τροχός, “wheel,” and not τρόχος, “course” (A. V.; its margin has “wheel”); and as it did in 1:23, γένεσις should mean Dasein, “existence,” and not “birth,” “nature,” or something else. It really makes little difference whether we have “wheel” or “course.”

Where did James get this expression? It is said to be of non-Jewish origin but is here given a Jewish cast (C.-K. 234). It is thought to hail from the Orphic mystery cults and to have been adopted by James without being understood by him. This is elaborated by some to mean that the tongue = the axle of this wheel, that this axle is heated to a flame, that it then sets fire to all the spokes and to the whole wheel. C.-K. says that “the burning life wheel is the image of an instrument of torture that right drastically depicts the tortures of hell which a man may bring on himself by his unbridled tongue.”

The meaning of this expression is not a question regarding James but one regarding his readers. James wrote “the wheel of existence” and expected his readers to understand him. His whole epistle is so sensible and practical that a man such as he is would not introduce a pagan term which he had picked up somewhere and had left undigested. The holy writers are not paupers and constant borrowers.

James wrote “the wheel of existence.” And since this combination is not found elsewhere, James invented this figure: our existence moves as a wheel, and this firebrand of a tongue sets it entirely aflame. There is nothing occult, Jewish, or pagan about this thought or about the figure. The figure is not as bold as the one we have in the expression “the cosmos of iniquity.” No ordinary reader should have difficulty in understanding it. The tongue does set fire to the whole round of our being or existence. Note how some bit of slander sets a whole village or a town afire. Or see what vicious propaganda does in a whole nation or in many nations.

International hatreds are thus fanned into wars. Consider the moral and the spiritual field. Vicious moral teaching, popular religious and doctrinal errors, rage like vast conflagrations and leave countless victims in their wake. The whole round of existence is set aflame by the evil tongue.

Where does this devastating fire originate? The tongue that sets aflame thus is itself “set aflame by the Gehenna.” James does not say “by hades,” for this word means only “the unseen place” while “Gehenna,” the vale of Hinnom, has the connotation of both defilement and fire. South of the walls of Jerusalem lay the valley that had been desecrated by the worship of Moloch, in which children were burned (Jer. 2:23; 7:31; 2 Chron. 28:3; 33:6). Josiah declared the place unclean (2 Kings 23:10), and it was then used as a place for the disposal of offal (Jer. 7:32, etc.; 31:40). Thus ge ben Hinnom, “the valley of the Son of Hinnom,” furnishes the Greek word γέεννα, “Gehenna,” as a designation for hell, the place of the damned; in Matt. 5:22 it is called “the Gehenna of the fire.” Some add to the story of the valley, but we have no evidence that the Jews ever burned criminals alive, or that bodies of dead criminals were dragged out to this valley, or that constant fires were kept burning there. “Gehenna” shows that James knew what he was doing when he combined defiling and burning.

Jesus carries the wickedness of the tongue back to the heart: “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh,” Matt. 12:34; he also said: “Out of the heart proceed evil thoughts, murders, adulteries, fornications, thefts, false witness, blasphemies; these are the things which defile a man,” Matt. 15:19, etc. James goes farther, he traces the inflammatory power of the tongue back to Gehenna, to hell as the source of all defilement and moral burning. To know the devasting power of the tongue, and to know that Gehenna shoots its vile flames out through the human tongue, is to be warned so that every one of us may keep absolute control of his tongue, which is, however, done by grace alone.

James 3:7

7 Not only does the tongue do such a frightful amount of damage; man himself cannot tame it and check this damage. “For” adds this further point as an explanation of the extent of damage wrought by the tongue. For every kind of beasts and birds, of creeping things and things in the sea, are subdued and have been subdued by mankind; but the tongue no one of men is able to subdue. An unstable base thing! Full of poison death-bearing!

James uses a telling comparison. Some of these creatures are great and fierce, yet man subdues and has subdued them. James has two pairs and uses φύσις twice in the sense of the German Art, which we can duplicate by “kind”: “kind of beasts,” etc.—“human kind” (or “mankind”), the latter is the dative after passives. The one has brute nature, the other human nature (φύσις). The verbs, however, have a stronger meaning than “tame,” for not all wild things have been tamed; they have been “subdued” by man’s cunning and power. The verb = baendigen. The present passive makes the statement a general one; for the sake of emphasis James adds the perfect “have been subdued” to indicate the general past fact.

James 3:8

8 Although the tongue is so small and is caged in man’s own mouth, which man needs only to shut in order to master the tongue completely, “no one of men” is able to subdue it by any power belonging to his φύσις. There is no need to add “has been subdued.”

The next words are not appositions to τὴνγλῶσσαν so that we must assume that the nominative μεστή is made an apposition to an accusative. These additions are exclamations, and no copula need be supplied: “An unstable base thing!” (nominative, there is even alliteration in the Greek). That is what the tongue is. The adjective is the same as that used in 1:8: a κακόν or “base thing” that cannot be made to stay down in its proper place. The noun ἀκαταστασία is the word for “tumult.”

Another exclamation: “Full of death-dealing poison!” the feminine adjective is used because “tongue” is feminine. We recall Ps. 58:4 and 140:3, but these are not the source of the figure that is used by James. James needs no special source for calling the tongue poisonous with deadly poison; nor did the psalmist need a special source for his expressions. James is composing his own portrait of the tongue. The whole of v. 3–8 is written regarding the tongue as such and pictures it as it operates everywhere in the world with frightful damage.

James 3:9

9 Not until he reaches this point does James refer to his readers and thus applies what he says in a general way to Christian believers, among whom he includes himself. In connection with it we bless the Lord and Father, and in connection with it we curse human beings who are after the likeness of God. Out of the same mouth there comes blessing and cursing. These things, my brethren, ought not so to be!

Christians possess the grace of God, which is a divine power that is able to control the tongue; yet James has confessed in v. 1: “As regards many things we stumble all,” his “we” being the same as it is in this new confession.

Christians certainly bless God, whom James designates “the Lord and Father”; the two terms have one article. Search is again made to find out where James procured this title for God. Well, he coined it, which is certainly as good as if some earlier writer had done so. The double term implies that as “the Lord and Father” he certainly deserves our ascriptions of blessing, i.e., doxology, praise, laudation. The readers, no doubt, still followed the Jewish custom of adding: “Blessed be he!” whenever they named God. That is what the tongue of every Christian ought to do.

Yet what happens? Provoked by anger, which does not work the righteousness of God (1:20), we forget the royal law of love (2:8) and curse the human beings who are in the likeness of God (the imago generalis and not the imago specialis in the narrow sense of holiness and righteousness). These human beings still bear much of the divine stamp with which God created man: each is an immortal spirit, a person who has will, self-consciousness, knowledge, dominion. These are damaged but not destroyed, conscience still binds man to the right and condemns the wrong. The point of this reference to the likeness of God is the close connection existing between God and men. This fact brings out the enormity of what the tongue does when it blesses the one and curses the other and imagines that it can do both.

The two statements are simply placed side by side with καί. The repetition of ἐναὐτῇ is most effective. This is not “instrumental ἐν.” It has its first meaning “in connection with.” How blessing and cursing are connected with the tongue is obvious. The perfect γεγονότας = “have been and thus are” in accord with God’s image. Hence we are to bless them as we do God and not to curse them.

James 3:10

10 James drives the point home: “Out of the same mouth there comes out blessing and cursing.” What an enormity! “These things, my brethren, ought not so to be!” Χρή is found only here in the New Testament, it was finally displaced by δεῖ. It is not difficult to answer the question as to whether a curse is ever justified on a Christian’s tongue. No curse of his own is. The only curses his tongue may ever utter are those that have been pronounced by God on men whom God must curse; and then a Christian must be very sure that he is employing only God’s imprecations. But how many succeed in controlling the tongue in this way? This is only one field in which the tongue gets out of control.

Nor does James exclude himself. A mumbled imprecation, a hasty, suppressed one, is still a vitiation of our blessing God.

James 3:11

11 James again resorts to expressive figures to drive this thought home to the hearts of his readers as he has impressed it on his own heart. Does the spring (do you suppose) gush forth out of the same cleft the sweet and the bitter? Is a fig tree (do you suppose), my brethren, able to yield olives, or a vine figs? Nor (can) salt water yield sweet.

These things do not happen in nature. Therefore, if a similar thing happens in human life with regard to the tongue, this must be regarded as an enormity, a monstrosity. This is precisely what James wants us to think with regard to the Christian’s tongue whenever, instead of blessing men, it is in danger of cursing some one or actually does so. Rom. 12:14; Matt. 5:44. The interrogative word μήτι (μή in v. 12) expects a strong “no” as an answer; its force is: “You certainly do not suppose do you, etc.?” Certainly, no one expects a spring to gush out (βρύει) “the sweet and the bitter,” clear, drinkable water and brackish, saline, undrinkable water. No spring does that; only a Christian’s tongue will do it when it is not watched closely and held in check firmly enough.

James 3:12

12 “Sweet and bitter” are opposites and contradictory; the one is good, the other bad, and both of them do not come out of the same cleft and spring. But more must be said with reference to the tongue. James says this with another illustration. Certainly, a fig tree is not able to yield olives, nor a vine figs. While both olives and figs would be good, whether they came from their own trees or not, such a thing as bearing two different species of fruit is not possible for a tree or a vine. Οὕτε advances this thought of ability and returns to the two kinds of water; and since a spring consists of water, James now says: “Nor (can) salt water yield sweet,” i.e., the salt water cannot stop being salt and all at once yield sweet water no more than a fig tree is able to yield olives, or a vine figs. The illustrations are thus carried to a complete climax.

The implied application to the tongue is the point that it will produce according to its nature and not otherwise, and that it can have only one nature and not two or more. If it then blesses and curses out of the same mouth, something is wrong. It cannot be possible that its cursing is untrue; thus it follows that its blessing must be untrue, be nothing but formality and hypocrisy. It is, indeed, water out of the cleft, but brackish, undrinkable water to God. Even a tree and a vine yield only the one kind of fruit.

The A. V. follows a poor, amplified reading which seems to be but an effort to understand the original one. The R. V. is correct, and its translation is good. Some regard ἁλυκόν as “a salt spring,” but it is an adjective and modifies ὕδωρ just as does γλυκν: “Salt water cannot yield sweet water.” Especially the οὕτε is questioned as though it should be οὐδέ (as it is in the Sinaiticus). In our opinion οὔτε is correct, and it is not harsh or hard. It is correct because an οὔτε is implied in the previous questions; it is also correct because the οὔτε we have occurs in an assertion which ends the questions with a decisive “nor.” Why this “nor” is assailed even to the point of casting suspicion on the correctness of the reading the objectors have failed to make clear.

The Two Kinds of Wisdom, v. 13–18

James 3:13

13 The preceding section deals with the tongue; in v. 6 it declares that the defiling tongue is set aflame by the Gehenna. Between Gehenna and the tongue there lies the territory of the heart, the passions, etc., which clamor for utterance by the tongue. The opposite is also true; a good heart has good desires, etc., and these, too, use the tongue. From the tongue James advances to the heart. Wisdom should dwell there in order to express itself by means of the tongue and the conduct. James lets the thought of wisdom dominate his admonition, but not in such a way that he speaks of its presence and its absence; in a more striking way he thinks of two kinds of wisdom, one from above, the other not from above, and shows us the products of the two.

Who (is) wise and understanding among you? To regard this as equivalent to an indefinite relative clause: “whoever is wise,” etc., or to a conditional clause: “if one is wise,” etc., is to lose the power of the question. “Who is wise,” etc., asks every reader to examine himself: “Am I wise and understanding; do I lack wisdom?” The question at the same time bids the readers to examine each other and to note well those who are wise among their number, for these would be the models to follow. Moreover, the question indicates that all ought to be wise, yet that all are by no means wise as they ought to be. James has touched on wisdom in 1:5 and has shown how lack of it in understanding trials may be supplied by praying to God. The connection takes in the whole extent of wisdom in regard to true Christian conduct.

“Wise and understanding” indicate one and the same moral quality as the following “wisdom” shows. One is spiritually “wise” when he apprehends the divine truth and applies it; ἐπιστήμων adds the idea of being expert. The claim that James is thinking only of teachers (v. 1) is not supported by anything in the paragraph; all should be wise and understanding. Let him show from his excellent conduct his works in connection with wisdom’s meekness!

The touchstone to be applied is “wisdom’s meekness.” Meekness is one of the great qualities which wisdom produces in a wise person. There are other qualities which will, of course, also be present. James singles out this one because he wants to deal with that side of the Christian life in which “meekness” is essential, πραΰτης as this is explained in 1:21, which is here the meekness in relation to our brethren and fellow men, which, of course, rests on our meek attitude toward God. It is that lowly attitude of heart which is full of gentleness and mildness toward others, the opposite of arrogant self-assertion and of ruthless domination. James loves to repeat a word and thus says not merely “in connection with meekness” but with “wisdom’s meekness” and repeats the idea of “wise.”

The thought is not merely that, if one claims to be wise, he is to prove it by his conduct; the thought is far more specific: let him take his conduct and show by his works that they are connected with wisdom’s “meekness.” The emphasis is on “meekness.” Where this is absent from the conduct and cannot be shown to exist in the deeds, true wisdom is not present. A man may know much, may display great learning and other impressive qualities, “meekness” is the main thing, “wisdom’s meekness.” Ps. 25:9; 37:11; 147:6; 149:4 have been cited in this connection, but it is James who connects wisdom with meekness and thereby shows his depth of insight, which is not merely the fact that wisdom shows itself in conduct but shows itself in the meekness of that conduct.

James 3:14

14 James at once states what is wrong with so many. But if you have bitter zeal and selfishness in your heart, do not be boasting and lying against the truth! This wisdom is not one coming down from above but is earthly, sensual, demoniacal. For where there is zeal and selfishness, there is disturbance and every bad thing.

From the absence of meekness James goes back to what this absence reveals in regard to wisdom. If instead of meekness you have “bitter zeal,” fanaticism, passionate determination in your heart and “selfishness,” mercenary, selfish ambition, then do not be boasting and lying “against the truth,” namely the gospel, as if such wisdom were its fruit.

Σῆλος, a vox media, is here to be understood in the evil sense; it is not as narrow as our “jealousy” but as broad as overzealousness in any matter for which one contends; hence “bitter” is appended and is to be understood in the sense in which τὸπικρόν is used in v. 11, offensive, unpalatable to all who come in contact with this fanatic zeal. “Bitter” indicates the effect produced on others. Ἐριθεία is not found in secular Hellenistic literature nor in earlier Greek; it occurs only in Aristotle. Some connect it with ἔρις, “strife,” the German Hader. But it is derived from ἐριθεύειν, to work for wages as a mercenary, and hence = Lohnsucht, the selfish spirit that seeks its own will and advantage. “Selfishness” seems to be the best translation or “self-interest,” which terms bring out the personal motive of the heart.

“Do not be boasting and lying” may mean: “Stop boasting,” etc., (R. 851, etc.), for the readers would be doing no less than boasting and lying against the truth if they continued to have such bitter zeal and selfishness in their hearts. In G. K. ἀλήθεια is understood to mean Rechtschaffenheit, uprightness, honesty. But why do we then have “the truth” with the article? The lack of uprightness is contained in the verb “be not lying.” “Against the truth” can scarcely mean “against the fact in your case,” you pretending to be wise and understanding while you are anything but that in truth. We understand James to mean that the readers would be boasting of being wise exponents of the gospel truth but would by that boast be lying to the great injury of the gospel truth, and this they must stop. He certainly does not handle his readers with kid gloves.

James 3:15

15 If they think that this is wisdom, it is not one “coming down from above” where “the truth” has its source (the participle is used as an adjective, it is like the following adjectives and is not a part of the periphrastic tense as R. 881 supposes) but a wisdom that is “earthly,” the cheap wisdom of worldly men who do not even know what spiritual, heavenly wisdom is: “sensual,” ψυχική, of a type that goes with what animates only the body, our earthly life; still worse, “demoniacal,” demon-like, note Gehenna in v. 6. All earthly wisdom is folly; it selfishly seeks its own advantage, and men call it wise, but it always defeats itself. We have no exact English word for ψυχική, a derivative of ψυχή. By psyche the Greek understands man’s immaterial part as it animates his physical body; hence to be psychikos is to be devoted to nothing higher. The opposite is pneumatikos, spiritual, devoted to spiritual, divine, eternal interests.

This sham wisdom seeks the transient interests of the sensuous, bodily life, and even when it secures them it loses them. “Demoniacal” is not too strong, for, as was the case in v. 6, this traces the deceptive, lying wisdom back to its ultimate source. “These three words, ‘earthly, sensual, devilish,’ describe the so-called wisdom, which is not of divine origin, in an advancing series—as pertaining to the earth, not to the world above; to mere nature, not to the Spirit; to the hostile spirits of evil, instead of to God” (Ropes). In later years the church called the Gnostic “wisdom” Satanic, yet this was a reference to doctrine while James speaks of ethical wisdom.

James 3:16

16 The fruits of this wisdom show that it is just what James says it is: “For where there is zeal (which James has just called bitter) and selfishness, there is disturbance and every kind of wretched affair.” The vices are “in your heart” (v. 14); these are their outward product. We have the adjective ἀκατάστατος in v. 8 and in 1:8 and now the noun ἀκαταστασία, “disturbance,” disorder, confusion, even tumult. Is such a condition an evidence of wisdom? Is it from God, or is it from demons? Should such “wisdom” be found among Christians? To this James adds: “and every bad thing,” φαῦλονπρᾶγμα; the adjective is a synonym of κακός, the German schlecht or schlimm, morally bad or base: “every kind of wretched πρᾶγμα or affair.”

James 3:17

17 But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, yielding, obedient, full of mercy and good fruits, without vacillation, without dissimulation. Moreover, fruit of the (true) righteousness is sown in peace by those making peace.

This is the wisdom that James wants all his readers to have. Since it is the wisdom “from above,” its source heavenly and divine, James divides its inner quality: “first pure,” ἁγνή, the German lauter; this is the quality with which this wisdom affects others. Since it is “pure” it is wisdom throughout, clean in all respects, and thus graces the heart.

Then in its effect on others it is “peaceable”; it never starts quarrels, strife, dissension, and turbulence. With this goes ἐπιεικής, “yielding” toward inferiors, not insisting on strict rights. Trench cites the greatly forgiven retainer mentioned in Matt. 18:23, who experienced his lord’s yieldingness, which was expected also of him. Matched with this is εὐπειθής, “obedient” where superiors are concerned. These first three belong together.

“Full of mercy and good fruits” means “mercy” toward any that are in distress, who have special need, and “good fruits” of all kinds for all with whom this wisdom may come in contact. “Good” is to be understood in the sense of morally and spiritually beneficial. This wisdom never dispenses anything that is harmful or something that is useless.

The next two are a pair: ἀδιάκριτος, ἀνυπόκριτος, “non-vacillating, non-hypocritical.” It does not judge in one way now, in another way at another time. “Without partiality” in the A. V. is partially correct, “without doubtfulness” in the R. V. margin likewise; but “without vacillation” or wavering is nearer the meaning of the Greek word. We have the verb in 1:6 and 2:4. One can always count on this wisdom’s deciding every case in the same true way. So it also never acts the hypocrite, never wears a mask. It never speaks in a fair manner when it secretly means otherwise; its words are never hollow.

James 3:18

18 Δέ adds still more; but this is not a further description of true wisdom. It is an elaboration of the fruit of peace, “peaceable” being the first great operative quality of true wisdom. Earthly wisdom and its bitter zeal and selfishness produce disturbance and every kind of bad thing (v. 16); “fruit of the (true) righteousness is sown in peace by those making peace.” These have the true wisdom. They work to produce peace in the Christian sense, undisturbed spiritual well-being. The picture of sowing in peace is one of beautiful peace. The verb is passive, and hence the dative is naturally regarded as the dative of the agent as it is in the A. V.

The expression “fruit of righteousness is sown” is a pregnant expression which refers to the crop instead of to the seed and thus brings in the harvest. “The righteousness,” with its article in the Greek, is the true righteousness which should grace the lives of all Christians; it is the justitia acquisita even as it is sown and develops from the sowing and not the justitia imputata. We do not regard the genitive as appositional so that “fruit” = “the righteousness”; we prefer to regard it as the genitive of origin: fruit produced by the true righteousness, meaning all the good things that this righteous condition of Christians lets them taste and enjoy. “Every bad thing” comes from worldly wisdom; wholesome “fruit” from this righteousness when it is sown in peace by those who love and labor for peace.

C.-K. Biblisch-theologisches Woerterbuch der Neutestamentlichen Graezitaet von D. D. Hermann Cremer, zehnte, etc., Auflage, herausgegeben von D. Dr. Julius Koegel.

R. A Grammar of the Greek New Testament in the Light of Historical Research, by A. T. Robertson, 4th ed.