| New International Version | NET Bible |
| 1What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don't they come from your desires that battle within you? | 1Where do the conflicts and where do the quarrels among you come from? Is it not from this, from your passions that battle inside you? |
| 2You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God. | 2You desire and you do not have; you murder and envy and you cannot obtain; you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask; |
| 3When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures. | 3you ask and do not receive because you ask wrongly, so you can spend it on your passions. |
| 4You adulterous people, don't you know that friendship with the world means enmity against God? Therefore, anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. | 4Adulterers, do you not know that friendship with the world means hostility toward God? So whoever decides to be the world's friend makes himself God's enemy. |
| 5Or do you think Scripture says without reason that he jealously longs for the spirit he has caused to dwell in us? | 5Or do you think the scripture means nothing when it says, "The spirit that God caused to live within us has an envious yearning"? |
| 6But he gives us more grace. That is why Scripture says: "God opposes the proud but shows favor to the humble." | 6But he gives greater grace. Therefore it says, "God opposes the proud, but he gives grace to the humble." |
| 7Submit yourselves, then, to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. | 7So submit to God. But resist the devil and he will flee from you. |
| 8Come near to God and he will come near to you. Wash your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. | 8Draw near to God and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and make your hearts pure, you double-minded. |
| 9Grieve, mourn and wail. Change your laughter to mourning and your joy to gloom. | 9Grieve, mourn, and weep. Turn your laughter into mourning and your joy into despair. |
| 10Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will lift you up. | 10Humble yourselves before the Lord and he will exalt you. |
| 11Brothers and sisters, do not slander one another. Anyone who speaks against a brother or sister or judges them speaks against the law and judges it. When you judge the law, you are not keeping it, but sitting in judgment on it. | 11Do not speak against one another, brothers and sisters. He who speaks against a fellow believer or judges a fellow believer speaks against the law and judges the law. But if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but its judge. |
| 12There is only one Lawgiver and Judge, the one who is able to save and destroy. But you--who are you to judge your neighbor? | 12But there is only one who is lawgiver and judge--the one who is able to save and destroy. On the other hand, who are you to judge your neighbor? |
| 13Now listen, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money." | 13Come now, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go into this or that town and spend a year there and do business and make a profit." |
| 14Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. | 14You do not know about tomorrow. What is your life like? For you are a puff of smoke that appears for a short time and then vanishes. |
| 15Instead, you ought to say, "If it is the Lord's will, we will live and do this or that." | 15You ought to say instead, "If the Lord is willing, then we will live and do this or that." |
| 16As it is, you boast in your arrogant schemes. All such boasting is evil. | 16But as it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil. |
| 17If anyone, then, knows the good they ought to do and doesn't do it, it is sin for them. | 17So whoever knows what is good to do and does not do it is guilty of sin. |
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