Jameschapter 4
17 verses · BSBJames book hub →
Speaks with:1 Peter 5×31 Peter 2×2James 1×21 John 2×2Matthew 23×2Romans 2×2
Summary
Chapter summary
'Whence come wars and whence come fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your pleasures that war in your members?' 'Ye have not, because ye ask not. Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss.' Friendship of the world is enmity with God, but he giveth more grace, for Proverbs 3 says he resisteth the proud and giveth grace to the humble. Hence the pivot: 'Be subject therefore unto God; but resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you' (4:7-8). Then the merchants' presumption (to-morrow we will go into this city and get gain), 'what is your life? For ye are a vapor.'
Context
Epistle · James — James overview
- A. 1–10 Where Fights Come From: Wanting and Never Asking
- B. 11–12 One Lawgiver — Who Are You to Judge?
- C. 13–17 Tomorrow Is a Vapor: If the Lord Will
The outline
A.Where Fights Come From: Wanting and Never Askingvv. 1 to 10
Read vv. 1 to 10 →B.One Lawgiver — Who Are You to Judge?vv. 11 to 12
Read vv. 11 to 12 →C.Tomorrow Is a Vapor: If the Lord Willvv. 13 to 17
Read vv. 13 to 17 →
The world behind this chapter
James 4The history
The travel plan James quotes is a real business plan: go to such and such a city, spend a year there, trade, and make a profit. Jewish merchants worked exactly this way, moving along the trade routes and settling into a city long enough to work its market before moving on.
A year was the standard unit because the sea and the caravan seasons ran that way. It also assumed a lot: that the traveler would live, that the city would still want his goods, and that the roads would stay safe. None of it was guaranteed, and everyone knew it.
The language of friendship with the world uses the strongest picture Israel's prophets had for unfaithfulness — a spouse who has gone after someone else. To a hearer raised on Hosea, calling the congregation adulterous was not an insult about sex but about betrayal.
The quarrels described are not theological. James traces them to wanting things and not getting them — the ordinary machinery of envy inside a group small enough that everyone knew what everyone else had.
What it meant to them
The hearers were being told that the fights in their meetings began in their own appetites, not in the other man's stubbornness. That relocates every argument.
The correction to the merchants is not that planning is wrong but that planning as if tomorrow were owned is arrogance. Saying 'if the Lord wills' put a working man's calendar under someone else's authority.
Sources cited
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament
- Adolf Deissmann, Light from the Ancient East
The text of this chapter
This page carries no textual note on James 4. Where this site has examined a place the manuscripts differ, the examination is in the manuscripts room. Every place this site examines →
Connections from this chapter
v. 6 · Written to them
God resisteth the proud, giveth grace to humble
topics/pride→MannaFest topical index
v. 7 · Written to them
Resist the devil, and he will flee from you
topics/temptation→MannaFest topical index
This page draws on Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory; John Calvin, Commentaries; John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the New Testament and Matthew Henry, Complete Commentary.