Fathers

James 1

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James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which are in the Dispersion: Greetings. Count it all joy, my brothers, when you fall into various temptations, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. Let endurance have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. But if any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him. But let him ask in faith, without any doubting, for he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, driven by the wind and tossed. For that man shouldn’t think that he will receive anything from the Lord. He is a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways. But let the brother in humble circumstances glory in his high position; and the rich, in that he is made humble, because like the flower in the grass, he will pass away. For the sun arises with the scorching wind and withers the grass, and the flower in it falls, and the beauty of its appearance perishes. So the rich man will also fade away in his pursuits. Blessed is a person who endures temptation, for when he has been approved, he will receive the crown of life, which the Lord promised to those who love him. Let no man say when he is tempted, “I am tempted by God,” for God can’t be tempted by evil, and he himself tempts no one. But each one is tempted when he is drawn away by his own lust and enticed. Then the lust, when it has conceived, bears sin. The sin, when it is full grown, produces death. Don’t be deceived, my beloved brothers. Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom can be no variation, nor turning shadow. Of his own will he gave birth to us by the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first fruits of his creatures. So, then, my beloved brothers, let every man be swift to hear, slow to speak, and slow to anger; for the anger of man doesn’t produce the righteousness of God. Therefore, putting away all filthiness and overflowing of wickedness, receive with humility the implanted word, which is able to save your souls. But be doers of the word, and not only hearers, deluding your own selves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man looking at his natural face in a mirror; for he sees himself, and goes away, and immediately forgets what kind of man he was. But he who looks into the perfect law of freedom and continues, not being a hearer who forgets, but a doer of the work, this man will be blessed in what he does. If anyone among you thinks himself to be religious while he doesn’t bridle his tongue, but deceives his heart, this man’s religion is worthless. Pure religion and undefiled before our God and Father is this: to visit the fatherless and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained by the world.

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What the Fathers say

James 1:21

Eastern Fathers

Theophylact of Ohrid

Having said "filthiness," the apostle adds: "overflow of wickedness," wishing to urge that even if anyone falls frequently into filthiness, he should quickly desist from it, lest by remaining in it he allow evil to intensify through habit, for what we do frequently and in abundance usually becomes, as it were, nature, acquiring the property of nature. …

Commentary on James ↗

Justin Martyr

For I myself, when I discovered the wicked disguise which the evil spirits had thrown around the divine doctrines of the Christians, to turn aside others from joining them, laughed both at those who framed these falsehoods, and at the disguise itself, and at popular opinion; and I confess that I both boast and with all my strength strive to be found a Christian; not because the teachings of Plato are different from those of Christ, but because they are not in all respects similar, as neither are those of the others, Stoics, and …

The Second Apology, Chapter XIII ↗

Oecumenius

Therefore, putting away all filthiness and excess of wickedness, receive with meekness the implanted word, which is able to save your souls. James also adds to impurity the excess of nastiness, wishing to demonstrate this: Although someone frequently falls into some impurity, he should quickly depart from it, and not by remaining and lingering in it, through habit do they make the evil stronger and more difficult to cleanse: since those things are born which continually and abundantly find their way into us, to reduce to nature that …

Commentary on James ↗

Western Saints

Bede

For this reason, putting away all filthiness and abundance of malice, in meekness you have received the implanted word. First, he orders both the body and the mind to be cleansed from vices, so that they may be worthy to receive the word of salvation. For he who does not first turn away from evil cannot do good. Indeed, he designates all impurity of both flesh and soul. But malice properly refers to the depravity of the inner man. …

Commentary on the Catholic Epistles ↗