Chapter 1

  James, bondman of God and of [the] Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which [are] in the dispersion, greeting.  

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  Count it all joy, my brethren, when ye fall into various temptations,  

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  knowing that the proving of your faith works endurance.  

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  But let endurance have [its] perfect work, that ye may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.  

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  But if any one of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all freely and reproaches not, and it shall be given to him:  

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  but let him ask in faith, nothing doubting. For he that doubts is like a wave of the sea driven by the wind and tossed about;  

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  for let not that man think that he shall receive anything from the Lord;  

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  [he is] a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.  

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  But let the brother of low degree glory in his elevation,  

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  and the rich in his humiliation, because as [the] grass's flower he will pass away.  

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  For the sun has risen with its burning heat, and has withered the grass, and its flower has fallen, and the comeliness of its look has perished: thus the rich also shall wither in his goings.  

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  Blessed [is the] man who endures temptation; for, having been proved, he shall receive the crown of life, which He has promised to them that love him.  

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  Let no man, being tempted, say, I am tempted of God. For God cannot be tempted by evil things, and himself tempts no one.  

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  But every one is tempted, drawn away, and enticed by his own lust;  

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  then lust, having conceived, gives birth to sin; but sin fully completed brings forth death.  

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  Do not err, my beloved brethren.  

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  Every good gift and every perfect gift comes down from above, from the Father of lights, with whom is no variation nor shadow of turning.  

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  According to his own will begat he us by the word of truth, that we should be a certain first-fruits of his creatures.  

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  So that, my beloved brethren, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath;  

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  for man's wrath does not work God's righteousness.  

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  Wherefore, laying aside all filthiness and abounding of wickedness, accept with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls.  

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  But be ye doers of [the] word and not hearers only, beguiling yourselves.  

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  For if any man be a hearer of [the] word and not a doer, he is like to a man considering his natural face in a mirror:  

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  for he has considered himself and is gone away, and straightway he has forgotten what he was like.  

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  But he that fixes his view on [the] perfect law, that of liberty, and abides in [it], being not a forgetful hearer but a doer of [the] work, he shall be blessed in his doing.  

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  If any one think himself to be religious, not bridling his tongue, but deceiving his heart, this man's religion is vain.  

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  Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, to keep oneself unspotted from the world.  

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