James 4:5

4:5 Or do you think the scripture means nothing when it says, ¹  “The spirit that God ²  caused ³  to live within us has an envious yearning”? ⁴ 

James 3:3

3:3 And if we put bits into the mouths of horses to get them to obey us, then we guide their entire bodies. ⁵ 

James 1:18

1:18 By his sovereign plan he gave us birth ⁶  through the message of truth, that we would be a kind of firstfruits of all he created.

James 4:6

4:6 But he gives greater grace. Therefore it says, “God opposes the proud, but he gives grace to the humble.” ⁷ 

James 5:17

5:17 Elijah was a human being ⁸  like us, and he prayed earnestly ⁹  that it would not rain and there was no rain on the land for three years and six months!

James 1:17

1:17 All generous giving and every perfect gift ¹⁰  is from above, coming down ¹¹  from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or the slightest hint of change. ¹² 

James 3:12

3:12 Can a fig tree produce olives, my brothers and sisters, ¹³  or a vine produce figs? Neither can a salt water spring produce fresh water.

James 4:15

4:15 You ought to say instead, ¹⁴  “If the Lord is willing, then we will live and do this or that.”

James 3:2

3:2 For we all stumble ¹⁵  in many ways. If someone does not stumble ¹⁶  in what he says, ¹⁷  he is a perfect individual, ¹⁸  able to control the entire body as well.

James 4:12

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? ¹⁹ 

James 1:27

1:27 Pure and undefiled religion before ²⁰  God the Father ²¹  is this: to care for orphans and widows in their misfortune and to keep oneself unstained by the world.

[4:5]  ¹ tn Grk “vainly says.”

[4:5]  ² tn Grk “he”; the referent (God) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[4:5]  ³ tc The Byzantine text and a few other mss (P 33 Ï) have the intransitive κατῴκησεν (katwkhsen) here, which turns τὸ πνεῦμα (to pneuma) into the subject of the verb: “The spirit which lives within us.” But the more reliable and older witnesses (Ì⁷⁴ א B Ψ 049 1241 1739 al) have the causative verb, κατῴκισεν (katwkisen), which implies a different subject and τὸ πνεῦμα as the object: “The spirit that he causes to live within us.” Both because of the absence of an explicit subject and the relative scarcity of the causative κατοικίζω (katoikizw, “cause to dwell”) compared to the intransitive κατοικέω (katoikew, “live, dwell”) in biblical Greek (κατοικίζω does not occur in the NT at all, and occurs one twelfth as frequently as κατοικέω in the LXX), it is easy to see why scribes would replace κατῴκισεν with κατῴκησεν. Thus, on internal and external grounds, κατῴκισεν is the preferred reading.

[4:5]  ⁴ tn Interpreters debate the referent of the word “spirit” in this verse: (1) The translation takes “spirit” to be the lustful capacity within people that produces a divided mind (1:8, 14) and inward conflicts regarding God (4:1-4). God has allowed it to be in man since the fall, and he provides his grace (v. 6) and the new birth through the gospel message (1:18-25) to counteract its evil effects. (2) On the other hand the word “spirit” may be taken positively as the Holy Spirit and the sense would be, “God yearns jealously for the Spirit he caused to live within us.” But the word for “envious” or “jealous” is generally negative in biblical usage and the context before and after seems to favor the negative interpretation.

[3:3]  ⁵ tn Grk “their entire body.”

[1:18]  ⁹ tn Grk “Having willed, he gave us birth.”

[4:6]  ¹³ sn A quotation from Prov 3:34.

[5:17]  ¹⁷ tn Although it is certainly true that Elijah was a “man,” here ἄνθρωπος (anqrwpo") has been translated as “human being” because the emphasis in context is not on Elijah’s masculine gender, but on the common humanity he shared with the author and the readers.

[5:17]  ¹⁸ tn Grk “he prayed with prayer” (using a Hebrew idiom to show intensity).

[1:17]  ²¹ tn The first phrase refers to the action of giving and the second to what is given.

[1:17]  ²² tn Or “All generous giving and every perfect gift from above is coming down.”

[1:17]  ²³ tn Grk “variation or shadow of turning” (referring to the motions of heavenly bodies causing variations of light and darkness).

[3:12]  ²⁵ tn Grk “brothers.” See note on the phrase “brothers and sisters” in 1:2.

[4:15]  ²⁹ tn Grk “instead of your saying.”

[3:2]  ³³ tn Or “fail.”

[3:2]  ³⁴ tn Or “fail.”

[3:2]  ³⁵ tn Grk “in speech.”

[3:2]  ³⁶ tn The word for “man” or “individual” is ἀνήρ (anhr), which often means “male” or “man (as opposed to woman).” But it sometimes is used generically to mean “anyone,” “a person,” as here (cf. BDAG 79 s.v. 2).

[4:12]  ³⁷ tn Grk “who judges your neighbor.”

[1:27]  ⁴¹ tn Or “in the sight of”; Grk “with.”

[1:27]  ⁴² tn Grk “the God and Father.”