Text -- James 4:9-17 (NET)

4:9 Grieve, mourn, and weep. Turn your laughter into mourning and your joy into despair. 4:10 Humble yourselves before the Lord and he will exalt you. 4:11 Do not speak against one another, brothers and sisters. He who speaks against a fellow believer or judges a fellow believer speaks against the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but its judge. 4:12 But there is only one who is lawgiver and judge– the one who is able to save and destroy. On the other hand, who are you to judge your neighbor? 4:13 Come now, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go into this or that town and spend a year there and do business and make a profit.” 4:14 You do not know about tomorrow. What is your life like? For you are a puff of smoke that appears for a short time and then vanishes. 4:15 You ought to say instead, “If the Lord is willing, then we will live and do this or that.” 4:16 But as it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. 4:17 So whoever knows what is good to do and does not do it is guilty of sin.

Commentary -- Verse Notes / Footnotes

NET Notes: Jam 4:9

¹ tn This term and the following one are preceded by καί (kai) in the Greek text, but contemporary English generally uses connectives only between the last two items in such a series.

² tn Grk “let your laughter be turned.”

NET Notes: Jam 4:11

¹ tn Grk “brothers.” See note on the phrase “brothers and sisters” in 1:2.

² tn See note on the word “believer” in 1:9.

³ tn Grk “a judge.”

NET Notes: Jam 4:12

¹ tn Grk “who judges your neighbor.”

NET Notes: Jam 4:13

¹ tn Or “city.”

NET Notes: Jam 4:14

¹ tn Grk “who” (continuing the description of the people of v. 13). Because of the length and complexity of the Greek sentence, a new sentence was started here in the translation.

² tn Or “you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow.”

³ tn Or “a vapor.” The Greek word ἀτμίς (atmis) denotes a swirl of smoke arising from a fire (cf. Gen 19:28; Lev 16:13; Joel 2:30 [Acts 2:19]; Ezek 8:11).

NET Notes: Jam 4:15

¹ tn Grk “instead of your saying.”

NET Notes: Jam 4:16

¹ tn Grk “but now.”

NET Notes: Jam 4:17

¹ tn Or “knows how to do what is good.”

² tn Grk “to him it is sin.”