1 Where do conflicts, where do wrangles come from, in your midst? Is it not from these passions of yours that war among your members?
2 You crave, and miss what you want: you envy and covet, but you cannot acquire: you wrangle and fight ??you miss what you want because you do not ask God for it;
3 you do ask and you do not get it, because you ask with the wicked intention of spending it on your pleasures.
4 (Wanton creatures! do you not know that the world's friendship means enmity to God? Whoever, then, chooses to be the world's friend, turns enemy to God.
5 What, do you consider this is an idle word of scripture? ??'He yearns jealously for the spirit he set within us.')
6 Yet he gives grace more and more: thus it is said, The haughty God opposes, but to the humble he gives grace.
7 Well then, submit yourselves to God; resist the devil, and he will fly from you:
8 draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded.
9 Lament and mourn and weep, let your laughter be turned to mourning, and your joy to depression;
10 humble yourselves before the Lord, and then he will raise you up.
11 &
12 follow 2:13] Do not defame one another, brothers; he who defames or judges his brother defames and judges the Law; and if you judge the Law, you pass sentence on it instead of obeying it.
12 One alone is the legislator, who passes sentence; it is He who is able to save and to destroy; who are you, to judge your neighbour?
13 Come now, you who say, "To-day or to-morrow we are going to such and such a city; we shall spend a year there trading and making money" ??14 you who know nothing about to-morrow! For what is your life? You are but a mist, which appears for a little and then vanishes.