James 5

Now listen, you rich people. Cry and wail about the misery that is coming on you.

1Go to now, ye rich men, weep and howl for your miseries that shall come upon you.

Note"Go to now" is an old English way of getting attention, closer to "come on now" or "look here" than to any instruction to go somewhere. "Weep and howl" describes the loud, public mourning of the ancient world, wailing out loud rather than crying privately.

2Your wealth has rotted, and moths have eaten your clothes.

2Your riches are corrupted, and your garments are motheaten.

NoteClothing was a major store of wealth in this world. Good robes were counted in inventories, handed down, and given as gifts, so moths in the cloth meant real financial loss, not just a spoiled coat.

3Your gold and silver have corroded. That corrosion will be evidence against you, and it will eat your flesh like fire. You have piled up treasure in the last days.

3Your gold and silver is cankered; and the rust of them shall be a witness against you, and shall eat your flesh as it were fire. Ye have heaped treasure together for the last days.

Note"Cankered" in 1611 meant eaten away by rust or corrosion. Gold and silver do not actually rust, which is part of the force of the image: the metal has been sitting unused so long that it has done what such metal should not be able to do. "The last days" was a standing expression for the closing stretch of history before God's judgment, and the Greek can be read either as "in the last days" or "for the last days," that is, stockpiling for a future that will not arrive.

4Look, you held back the pay of the workers who harvested your fields, and that money is crying out against you. The cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of Hosts.

4Behold, the hire of the labourers who have reaped down your fields, which is of you kept back by fraud, crieth: and the cries of them which have reaped are entered into the ears of the Lord of sabaoth.

Note"Sabaoth" is not a name or a place. It is the Hebrew word for armies, carried straight over into Greek without translation, in the title usually rendered "Lord of Hosts," the Lord who commands the armies of heaven. Field hands were hired by the day and paid at the end of each day, and the law required it (Leviticus 19:13, Deuteronomy 24:14-15) because a day laborer had no reserve: pay held back overnight meant no food that night. The unpaid wages "cry out," the same language the Old Testament uses of spilled blood and of the oppressed whose complaint reaches God.

5You have lived on earth in luxury and self-indulgence. You have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter.

5Ye have lived in pleasure on the earth, and been wanton; ye have nourished your hearts, as in a day of slaughter.

Note"Wanton" in 1611 meant living without restraint or self-indulgent, not specifically sexual. The picture behind "a day of slaughter" is livestock being fattened for butchering day. The Greek can be taken two ways: they fattened themselves on the day of slaughter, feasting while judgment stood ready, or they fattened themselves for it.

6You have condemned and killed the innocent person, and he does not fight back against you.

6Ye have condemned and killed the just; and he doth not resist you.

Note"The just" is singular in the Greek, the righteous or innocent one. It may be meant generally, of the poor person who has no defense in court, or of a particular victim. "He doth not resist you" can be read either as a statement (he puts up no fight) or as a question (does he not resist you?), since Greek manuscripts carried no punctuation to settle it.

7So be patient, brothers and sisters, until the Lord comes. Think of the farmer. He waits for the valuable crop the ground will give, and he waits patiently for it through the fall rains and the spring rains.

7Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain.

NoteIn this part of the world rain falls in two seasons. The autumn rains around October and November soften the baked ground so seed can be sown; the spring rains around March and April fill out the grain just before harvest. A farmer who has sown has to wait through both and can do nothing to hurry either one.

8You be patient too. Keep your hearts steady, because the Lord's coming is near.

8Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts: for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh.

9Do not complain about one another, brothers and sisters, or you will be judged. Look, the Judge is standing right at the door.

9Grudge not one against another, brethren, lest ye be condemned: behold, the judge standeth before the door.

NoteIn 1611 "grudge" meant to grumble or mutter complaints out loud, not to nurse a silent resentment. "The judge standeth before the door" is an everyday image for someone who has already arrived and is about to walk in.

10Brothers and sisters, take the prophets who spoke in the Lord's name as your example of how to suffer hardship patiently.

10Take, my brethren, the prophets, who have spoken in the name of the Lord, for an example of suffering affliction, and of patience.

11See, we call those who keep going through hardship blessed. You have heard how Job kept going, and you have seen what the Lord finally did for him. The Lord is full of compassion and mercy.

11Behold, we count them happy which endure. Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord; that the Lord is very pitiful, and of tender mercy.

Note"Happy" in 1611 meant fortunate or blessed, not cheerful. The Greek word behind "patience" here means staying under a heavy load, holding out, rather than keeping a calm temper; Job in his own book complains bitterly and never stops protesting. "The end of the Lord" means the outcome the Lord finally brought about, how the story ends. "Pitiful" in 1611 meant full of pity, compassionate, the reverse of what the word now suggests.

12Above everything else, my brothers and sisters, do not back up your word with an oath. Do not swear by heaven, or by the earth, or by anything else. Just let your yes mean yes and your no mean no, so you do not come under judgment.

12But above all things, my brethren, swear not, neither by heaven, neither by the earth, neither by any other oath: but let your yea be yea; and your nay, nay; lest ye fall into condemnation.

NoteIn ordinary speech people swore by heaven, by the earth, by Jerusalem, or by their own head, substitute formulas that avoided pronouncing God's name, and there was long-running argument among teachers about which of these oaths were actually binding and which could be wriggled out of. That is why the list is here. "Let your yea be yea" means say yes and mean it, with nothing propped underneath it.

13Is anyone among you going through hard times? He should pray. Is anyone cheerful? He should sing songs of praise.

13Is any among you afflicted? let him pray. Is any merry? let him sing psalms.

Note"Afflicted" covers hardship of any kind, trouble and suffering generally, not illness in particular; sickness comes in the next verse. The Greek verb behind "sing psalms" originally meant to pluck a stringed instrument and by this period meant to sing praise, with or without accompaniment.

14Is anyone among you sick? He should send for the elders of the church, and they should pray over him and rub olive oil on him in the name of the Lord.

14Is any sick among you? let him call for the elders of the church; and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord:

Note"Elders" translates a word for the recognized senior leaders of a local congregation, an arrangement carried over from the synagogue. Olive oil was the standard medicine of the ancient world, rubbed onto wounds and onto the sick, and it was also used ceremonially to mark a person or object as set apart. The verb used here is the everyday word for rubbing oil on, not the formal word used of anointing kings and priests, and readers have argued ever since over which sense is uppermost.

15The prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well, and the Lord will raise him up. If he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.

15And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, and the Lord shall raise him up; and if he have committed sins, they shall be forgiven him.

NoteThe Greek verb translated "save" covers both healing a body and rescuing a person in the fullest sense, and "raise him up" likewise means both getting someone up off a sickbed and raising the dead. The wording is deliberately double. "If he have committed sins" is a genuine condition: it leaves open that the illness may have nothing to do with any sin.

16So tell one another where you have gone wrong, and pray for one another, so that you may be healed. The prayer of a person who lives right is powerful and gets results.

16Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.

NoteSome ancient manuscripts read "sins" here rather than "faults." "The effectual fervent prayer" renders a single Greek participle whose sense is disputed: either prayer that is at work and energized, or prayer that is made effective by God's own working. The KJV uses two adjectives to cover both possibilities.

17Elijah was a human being with the same feelings and weaknesses we have. He prayed hard that it would not rain, and no rain fell on the land for three and a half years.

17Elias was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain: and it rained not on the earth by the space of three years and six months.

Note"Elias" is simply the Greek form of the name Elijah, and it is what the KJV column prints. "Subject to like passions" means of the same nature as we are; "passions" in 1611 meant feelings and sufferings in general, with no sexual sense. On the length of the drought, 1 Kings 17 and 18 give no total, saying only that the rain came "in the third year"; three and a half years is the figure used in Luke 4:25 and in Jewish tradition.

18Then he prayed again, and the sky gave rain, and the ground produced its crops.

18And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth brought forth her fruit.

Note"Heaven" here means the sky, which is the ordinary everyday sense of both the Hebrew and the Greek word.

19Brothers and sisters, suppose one of you wanders away from the truth, and someone brings him back.

19Brethren, if any of you do err from the truth, and one convert him;

NoteIn 1611 "err" meant to wander off a road and "convert" meant simply to turn someone back. The picture is of a person who has strayed off the path being steered back onto it, not of anyone changing religion.

20Remember this: whoever turns a sinner back from the wrong road he is on will save a soul from death and will cover over a great many sins.

20Let him know, that he which converteth the sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins.

Note"Soul" here means the person's life, the whole self, not an inner part of them. "Hide a multitude of sins" echoes Proverbs 10:12, "love covereth all sins." Whose sins get covered is left open in the Greek: the wanderer's, the rescuer's, or both.