But you have dishonored the poor man. Don’t the rich oppress you, and personally drag you before the courts?
Parallel translations
- KJV But ye have despised the poor. Do not rich men oppress you, and draw you before the judgment seats?
- BSB But you have dishonored the poor. Is it not the rich who oppress you and drag you into court?
- NKJV But you have dishonored the poor man. Do not the rich oppress you and drag you into the courts?
- NASB But you have dishonored the poor man. Is it not the rich who oppress you and personally drag you into court?
- NLT But you dishonor the poor! Isn’t it the rich who oppress you and drag you into court?
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Yet they have dishonored the poor, while it is often the rich who oppress them and drag them into court. Their favoritism is both unjust and foolish.
Overview
James exposes the irony of the church's partiality: they honor the very rich who exploit them and shame the poor whom God exalts. Far from being benefactors, the powerful often used the courts to oppress believers. The favoritism is thus shown to be not only sinful but contrary to the church's own experience and interests.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 36
- Prov 17:5Whoever mocks the poor reproaches his Maker. He who is glad at calamity shall not be unpunished.
- 1 Cor 11:22What, don’t you have houses to eat and to drink in? Or do you despise God’s assembly, and put them to shame who don’t have? What shall I tell you? Shall I praise you? In this I don’t praise you.
- Prov 14:31He who oppresses the poor shows contempt for his Maker, but he who is kind to the needy honors him.
- Ps 14:6You frustrate the plan of the poor, because Yahweh is his refuge.
- Isa 3:14–15Yahweh will enter into judgment with the elders of his people, and their leaders: “It is you who have eaten up the vineyard. The plunder of the poor is in your houses.
- Eccl 9:15–16Now a poor wise man was found in it, and he by his wisdom delivered the city; yet no man remembered that same poor man.
- Acts 16:19–20But when her masters saw that the hope of their gain was gone, they seized Paul and Silas, and dragged them into the marketplace before the rulers.
- Amos 8:4–6Hear this, you who desire to swallow up the needy, and cause the poor of the land to fail,
- Acts 13:50But the Jews stirred up the devout and prominent women and the chief men of the city, and stirred up a persecution against Paul and Barnabas, and threw them out of their borders.
- Amos 5:11Therefore, because you trample on the poor, and take taxes from him of wheat: You have built houses of cut stone, but you will not dwell in them. You have planted pleasant vineyards, but you shall not drink their wine.
- Prov 22:16Whoever oppresses the poor for his own increase and whoever gives to the rich, both come to poverty.
- Ps 12:5“Because of the oppression of the weak and because of the groaning of the needy, I will now arise,” says Yahweh; “I will set him in safety from those who malign him.”
- Mic 6:11–12Shall I be pure with dishonest scales, and with a bag of deceitful weights?
- Zech 7:10Don’t oppress the widow, nor the fatherless, the foreigner, nor the poor; and let none of you devise evil against his brother in your heart.’
- Eccl 5:8If you see the oppression of the poor, and the violent taking away of justice and righteousness in a district, don’t marvel at the matter: for one official is eyed by a higher one; and there are officials over them.
- Jas 5:4Behold, the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you have kept back by fraud, cry out, and the cries of those who reaped have entered into the ears of the Lord of Armies.
- Jas 2:3and you pay special attention to him who wears the fine clothing, and say, “Sit here in a good place”; and you tell the poor man, “Stand there,” or “Sit by my footstool”;
- Acts 17:6When they didn’t find them, they dragged Jason and certain brothers before the rulers of the city, crying, “These who have turned the world upside down have come here also,
- Acts 8:3But Saul ravaged the assembly, entering into every house, and dragged both men and women off to prison.
- Amos 2:6–7Yahweh says: “For three transgressions of Israel, yes, for four, I will not turn away its punishment; because they have sold the righteous for silver, and the needy for a pair of shoes;
- Ps 10:14But you do see trouble and grief. You consider it to take it into your hand. You help the victim and the fatherless.
- Amos 4:1Listen to this word, you cows of Bashan, who are on the mountain of Samaria, who oppress the poor, who crush the needy, who tell their husbands, “Bring us drinks!”
- Isa 53:3He was despised, and rejected by men; a man of suffering, and acquainted with disease. He was despised as one from whom men hide their face; and we didn’t respect him.
- 1 Kgs 21:11–13The men of his city, even the elders and the nobles who lived in his city, did as Jezebel had instructed them in the letters which she had written and sent to them.
- Acts 4:1–3As they spoke to the people, the priests and the captain of the temple and the Sadducees came to them,
- Ps 10:8He lies in wait near the villages. From ambushes, he murders the innocent. His eyes are secretly set against the helpless.
- Acts 18:12But when Gallio was proconsul of Achaia, the Jews with one accord rose up against Paul and brought him before the judgment seat,
- Job 20:19For he has oppressed and forsaken the poor. He has violently taken away a house, and he shall not build it up.
- Ps 10:2In arrogance, the wicked hunt down the weak. They are caught in the schemes that they devise.
- Acts 5:26–27Then the captain went with the officers, and brought them without violence, for they were afraid that the people might stone them.
- Hab 3:14You pierced the heads of his warriors with their own spears. They came as a whirlwind to scatter me, gloating as if to devour the wretched in secret.
- Ps 10:10The helpless are crushed. They collapse. They fall under his strength.
- Acts 4:26–28The kings of the earth take a stand, and the rulers take council together, against the Lord, and against his Christ.’
- Acts 5:17–18But the high priest rose up, and all those who were with him (which is the sect of the Sadducees), and they were filled with jealousy,
- Jas 5:6You have condemned, you have murdered the righteous one. He doesn’t resist you.
- John 8:49Jesus answered, “I don’t have a demon, but I honor my Father, and you dishonor me.
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