1 Where do the wars and disputes come from among you? From here that is to say, of your lusts which fight in your members? 2 Ye covet and have not; ye murder, and have envy and cannot obtain; ye fight and war and have not that which ye desire because ye ask not. 3 Ye ask and receive not because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your pleasures.
4 Ye adulterers and adulteresses, know ye not that the friendship of the world is enmity with God? Whosoever therefore that desires to be a friend of the world, makes himself the enemy of God. 5 Do ye think that the scripture says in vain, The spirit that dwells in us lusts to envy?
6 But he gives greater grace. Therefore he says, God resists the proud, but gives grace unto the humble.
7 Submit yourselves, therefore, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. 8 Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, ye sinners; and purify your hearts, ye double minded. 9 Be afflicted and mourn and weep; let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to heaviness. 10 Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up.
11 Murmur not against one another, brethren. He that speaks evil of his brother and judges his brother, speaks evil of the law and judges the law; but if thou judge the law, thou art not a keeper of the law, but a judge. 12 There is one lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy: who art thou to judge another?
13 Come now, ye that say, Today and tomorrow we will go into such a city and continue there a year and buy and sell and get gain; 14 and ye do not know what shall be tomorrow. For what is your life? Certainly it is a vapour that appears for a little time and then vanishes away.
15 Ye ought to say instead, If the Lord wills, and if we live, we shall do this or that. 16 But now ye boast in your arrogance; all such glory is evil. 17 Therefore sin is still in the one that knows to do good and does not do it.