Warning against Pride

1Whence [are] wars and fightings among you? not thence — out of your passions, that are as soldiers in your members? 2ye desire, and ye have not; ye murder, and are zealous, and are not able to attain; ye fight and war, and ye have not, because of your not asking; 3ye ask, and ye receive not, because evilly ye ask, that in your pleasures ye may spend [it]. 4Adulterers and adulteresses! have ye not known that friendship of the world is enmity with God? whoever, then, may counsel to be a friend of the world, an enemy of God he is set. 5Do ye think that emptily the Writing saith, ‘To envy earnestly desireth the spirit that did dwell in us,’ 6and greater grace he doth give, wherefore he saith, ‘God against proud ones doth set Himself up, and to lowly ones He doth give grace?’

Drawing Near to God

7be subject, then, to God; stand up against the devil, and he will flee from you; 8draw nigh to God, and He will draw nigh to you; cleanse hands, ye sinners! and purify hearts, ye two-souled! 9be exceeding afflicted, and mourn, and weep, let your laughter to mourning be turned, and the joy to heaviness; 10be made low before the Lord, and He shall exalt you.

11Speak not one against another, brethren; he who is speaking against a brother, and is judging his brother, doth speak against law, and doth judge law, and if law thou dost judge, thou art not a doer of law but a judge; 12one is the lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy; thou — who art thou that dost judge the other?

Do Not Boast about Tomorrow

13Go, now, ye who are saying, ‘To-day and to-morrow we will go on to such a city, and will pass there one year, and traffic, and make gain;’ 14who do not know the thing of the morrow; for what is your life? for it is a vapour that is appearing for a little, and then is vanishing; 15instead of your saying, ‘If the Lord may will, we shall live, and do this or that;’ 16and now ye glory in your pride; all such glorying is evil; 17to him, then, knowing to do good, and not doing, sin it is to him.