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Your gold and silver are corroded. Their corrosion will testify against you and consume your flesh like fire. You have hoarded treasure in the last days.
James 5:3 · Berean Standard Bible
Parallel translations
  • WEB Your gold and your silver are corroded, and their corrosion will be for a testimony against you, and will eat your flesh like fire. You have laid up your treasure in the last days.
  • KJV Your 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.
  • NKJV Your gold and silver are corroded, and their corrosion will be a witness against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have heaped up treasure in the last days.
  • NASB Your gold and your silver have corroded, and their corrosion will serve as a testimony against you and will consume your flesh like fire. It is in the last days that you have stored up your treasure!
  • NLT Your gold and silver are corroded. The very wealth you were counting on will eat away your flesh like fire. This corroded treasure you have hoarded will testify against you on the day of judgment.

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

Corroded gold and silver will testify against those who hoarded in the last days. Selfishly stored wealth becomes evidence of guilt.

Overview

James declares that the very corrosion of hoarded treasure will witness against its owners and consume them like fire in judgment. Hoarding in the last days, the era between Christ's comings, is shortsighted folly when the day of accounting is near. The vivid imagery warns that misused wealth secures not safety but condemnation before God.

Cross-references & the web

Cross-references · 19

  • Rom 2:5But because of your hard and unrepentant heart, you are storing up wrath against yourself for the day of wrath, when God’s righteous judgment will be revealed.
  • Jas 5:7–8Be patient, then, brothers, until the Lord’s coming. See how the farmer awaits the precious fruit of the soil—how patient he is for the fall and spring rains.
  • Rev 21:8But to the cowardly and unbelieving and abominable and murderers and sexually immoral and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars, their place will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur. This is the second death.”
  • Isa 2:2In the last days the mountain of the house of the LORD will be established as the chief of the mountains; it will be raised above the hills, and all nations will stream to it.
  • Rev 20:15And if anyone was found whose name was not written in the Book of Life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.
  • Gen 31:52This mound is a witness, and this pillar is a witness, that I will not go past this mound to harm you, and you will not go past this mound and pillar to harm me.
  • 2 Tim 2:17and the talk of such men will spread like gangrene. Among them are Hymenaeus and Philetus,
  • Mic 4:1In the last days the mountain of the house of the LORD will be established as the chief of the mountains; it will be raised above the hills, and the peoples will stream to it.
  • Deut 32:33–34Their wine is the venom of serpents, the deadly poison of cobras.
  • 2 Pet 3:3Most importantly, you must understand that in the last days scoffers will come, scoffing and following their own evil desires.
  • Job 16:8You have bound me, and it has become a witness; my frailty rises up and testifies against me.
  • Jer 19:9I will make them eat the flesh of their sons and daughters, and they will eat one another’s flesh in the siege and distress inflicted on them by their enemies who seek their lives.’
  • Gen 49:1Then Jacob called for his sons and said, “Gather around so that I can tell you what will happen to you in the days to come:
  • Job 14:16–17For then You would count my steps, but would not keep track of my sin.
  • Mic 3:3You eat the flesh of my people after stripping off their skin and breaking their bones. You chop them up like flesh for the cooking pot, like meat in a cauldron.”
  • Josh 24:27And Joshua said to all the people, “You see this stone. It will be a witness against us, for it has heard all the words the LORD has spoken to us, and it will be a witness against you if you ever deny your God.”
  • Rev 17:16And the ten horns and the beast that you saw will hate the prostitute. They will leave her desolate and naked, and will eat her flesh and burn her with fire.
  • Gen 31:48Then Laban declared, “This mound is a witness between you and me this day.” Therefore the place was called Galeed.
  • Acts 2:17‘In the last days, God says, I will pour out My Spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams.

Themes, concepts, people & topics

Topics (2)

Resources, by level

Commentaries & study tools

  • VideoBibleProject — James videosBibleProject · Lay · Free · evangelical

    Free animated overview and word-study videos for this book.

  • VideoWatch teaching on James 5:3YouTube · Lay · Free

    Sermons and teaching on this passage from across YouTube.

  • CommentaryEnduring Word — verse-by-verseDavid Guzik · Lay · Free · evangelical

    Clear, readable, conservative exposition — the best free place to start on any passage.

  • CommentaryClassic commentaries for this verseBibleHub (20+ works) · Pastoral · Free

    Matthew Henry, Barnes, Gill, the Pulpit Commentary, Ellicott, Cambridge, and more — stacked on one page for this exact verse.

  • CommentaryMatthew Henry on JamesMatthew Henry · Pastoral · Free · evangelical

    The beloved Puritan exposition of this whole book — warm, devotional, and verse by verse (free, CCEL).

  • ReferenceInterlinear, lexicon & Strong'sBlue Letter Bible · Seminary · Free

    Hebrew/Greek interlinear, word definitions, and cross-references for this verse.

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.

How James 5:3 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.

Original language

Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Greek word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.