13 Go, now, ye who are saying, `To-day and to-morrow we will go on to such a city, and will pass there one year, and traffic, and make gain;'
Boast not thyself of to-morrow, For thou knowest not what a day bringeth forth.
and he was reasoning within himself, saying, What shall I do, because I have not where I shall gather together my fruits? and he said, This I will do, I will take down my storehouses, and greater ones I will build, and I will gather together there all my products and my good things, and I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast many good things laid up for many years, be resting, eat, drink, be merry. `And God said to him, Unthinking one! this night thy soul they shall require from thee, and what things thou didst prepare -- to whom shall they be?
and they say each one to his neighbour, `Give help, let us make bricks, and burn `them' thoroughly:' and the brick is to them for stone, and the bitumen hath been to them for mortar. And they say, `Give help, let us build for ourselves a city and tower, and its head in the heavens, and make for ourselves a name, lest we be scattered over the face of all the earth.'
And the dogs `are' strong of desire, They have not known sufficiency, And they `are' shepherds! They have not known understanding, All of them to their own way they did turn, Each to his dishonest gain from his quarter: `Come ye, I take wine, And we drink, quaff strong drink, And as this day hath been to-morrow, Great -- exceeding abundant!'
Come hath the time, arrived hath the day, The buyer doth not rejoice, And the seller doth not become a mourner, For wrath `is' unto all its multitude.
Give help, let us go down, and mingle there their pronunciation, so that a man doth not understand the pronunciation of his companion.'
I said in my heart, `Pray, come, I try thee with mirth, and look thou on gladness;' and lo, even it `is' vanity.
And it hath been -- as a people so a priest, As the servant so his master, As the maid-servant so her mistress, As the buyer so the seller, As the lender so the borrower, As the usurer so he who is lifting `it' on himself.
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Matthew Henry Commentary » Commentary on James 4
Commentary on James 4 Matthew Henry Commentary
Chapter 4
In this chapter we are directed to consider,
Jam 4:1-10
The former chapter speaks of envying one another, as the great spring of strifes and contentions; this chapter speaks of a lust after worldly things, and a setting too great a value upon worldly pleasures and friendships, as that which carried their divisions to a shameful height.
Jam 4:11-17
In this part of the chapter,