But now ye rejoice in your boastings: all such rejoicing is evil.
Parallel translations
- WEB But now you glory in your boasting. All such boasting is evil.
- BSB As it is, you boast in your proud intentions. All such boasting is evil.
- NKJV But now you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.
- NASB But as it is, you boast in your arrogance; all such boasting is evil.
- NLT Otherwise you are boasting about your own pretentious plans, and all such boasting is evil.
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
Boasting in one's confident plans is arrogant and evil. Self-reliant pride about the future dishonors God.
Overview
James names the merchants' self-assured boasting as arrogance and evil, the opposite of the humble dependence he commended. Such pride exalts the self and ignores the God on whom all things depend. The remedy is the humility that gives glory to God for life and breath, recognizing every good thing as his gift rather than our achievement.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 10
- Prov 27:1Boast not thyself of to morrow; for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth.
- 1 Cor 5:6Your glorying is not good. Know ye not that a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump?
- Ps 52:7Lo, this is the man that made not God his strength; but trusted in the abundance of his riches, and strengthened himself in his wickedness.
- Prov 25:14Whoso boasteth himself of a false gift is like clouds and wind without rain.
- Ps 52:1Why boastest thou thyself in mischief, O mighty man? the goodness of God endureth continually.
- 1 Cor 4:7–8For who maketh thee to differ from another? and what hast thou that thou didst not receive? now if thou didst receive it, why dost thou glory, as if thou hadst not received it?
- Jas 3:14But if ye have bitter envying and strife in your hearts, glory not, and lie not against the truth.
- Isa 47:10For thou hast trusted in thy wickedness: thou hast said, None seeth me. Thy wisdom and thy knowledge, it hath perverted thee; and thou hast said in thine heart, I am, and none else beside me.
- Rev 18:7How much she hath glorified herself, and lived deliciously, so much torment and sorrow give her: for she saith in her heart, I sit a queen, and am no widow, and shall see no sorrow.
- Isa 47:7–8And thou saidst, I shall be a lady for ever: so that thou didst not lay these things to thy heart, neither didst remember the latter end of it.
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Christ at the center
The wisdom from above and the royal law of love are the life of those who belong to 'our glorious Lord Jesus Christ' — faith in him made visible in works.
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Original language
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