James 3:1-12 - Restraining The Tongue

¹ My brothers, do not swell the ranks of the teachers; remember, we teachers will be judged with special strictness. ² We all make many a slip, but whoever avoids slips of speech is a perfect man; he can bridle the whole of the body as well as the tongue.

³ We put bridles into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, and so, you see, we can move the whole of their bodies. ⁴ Look at ships too; for all their size and speed under stiff winds, they are turned by a tiny rudder wherever the mind of the steersman chooses. ⁵ So the tongue is a small member of the body, but it can boast of great exploits. What a forest is set ablaze by a little spark of fire! ⁶ And the tongue is a fire, the tongue proves a very world of mischief among our members, staining the whole of the body and setting fire to the round circle of existence with a flame fed by hell.

⁷ For while every kind of beast and bird, of creeping animals and creatures marine, is tameable and has been tamed by mankind, ⁸ no man can tame the tongue ??plague of disorder that it is, full of deadly venom! ⁹ With the tongue we bless the Lord and Father, and with the tongue we curse men made in God's likeness; ¹⁰ blessing and cursing stream from the same lips! My brothers, this ought not to be. ¹¹ Does a fountain pour out fresh water and brackish from the same hole? ¹² Can a fig tree, my brothers, bear olives? Or a vine, figs? No more can salt water yield fresh.