JAMES CHAPTER 1 - 5

THE EPISTLE OF JAMES

The most Islamic of the Bible text
The letter of good James to the perplexed
Gives faith and works a chance upon the ground,
And raises up Your praises with the sound.
No other writing on the earth is found
So sweet in promises and praise to You.
Beloved, I take this letter in my pew
And hold it to the light and in my view,
See glories of the lowly and demise
Of those who wear the golden rings to rise
Upon the upper seats under the skies.
I follow James more than the other crowd
And sing the Psalms he sanctifies aloud,
And find the healing oil on head unbowed.

JAMES 1

1 James, a bond servant both of God
And of the Lord Jesus Christ too,
To the twelve tribes scattered abroad:
Greetings. 2 My brothers, as you do,
Count it all joy when you fall in
To trials of diverse kinds (not sin),
3 Knowing your faith when tested brings
Patience. 4 But let patience take wings
In perfect work, that you may be
Perfect, complete, no absentee.
5 If any of you lacks wisdom,
Let him ask God, who’ll give him some,
Who gives to all freely without
Reproach. 6 But let him ask believing,
With no doubting of his receiving,
Of his receiving with no doubt,
For he who doubts is like a wave
Of the sea driven and a slave
Tossed by the wind. 7 For let not that
Man think that he’ll receive the fat
Of anything then from the Lord,
8 He is a double-minded ward,
Unstable in all of his ways.
9 Let the lowly brother have praise
In his exaltation, 10 the rich
By contrast thrown into the ditch,
Because as a flower of the field
He will pass away without a yield.

Though I am counted poor here where I live,
And dwell in a house with roof like a sieve,
While those around me drive in luxury
And buy new electronics in a spree
Every Christmas, while I drink water from
My well and eat the course bread without rum,
I still possess more than the mass of men
Who make up Your great kingdom in the den
Of poverty. Beloved, cast me not out
Into the ditch with Rothschild and the stout
Inventor of bicrocroft in the mill
Of philanthropy to provide a bill
Of no taxes at all where such eat swill.
I know what wealth and trade are all about.

11 For no sooner has the sun risen
With burning heat above the mizzen
Than it withers the grass, its flower
Falls, its beauty within the hour
Perishes. So the rich men too
Will fade away in what they do.
12 Blessed is the man who endures hard
Temptation, for in his regard,
He will receive the crown of life
Which YHWH has promised without strife
To all those who love Him unmarred.
13 Let no one say when he is tempted,
“I am tempted by God”, exempted
Is God from tempting anyone
With evil, such as He would shun.
14 But each one is tempted when he
Is drawn away and lustfully
Enticed by his own desires’ fee.
15 Then, when desire has conceived, it
Gives birth to sin, and sin, when it
Is full-grown, brings forth death. 16 Do not
Be deceived, beloved brothers taught.
17 Every good gift and every one
That’s perfect is from above won,
And comes from the Father of lights,
With whom there are no vain respites,
No change nor shadow of turning,
As in false gods we must be spurning.

Belovèd, every good and perfect gift
Comes down from You, in gratitude I lift
My eye and voice to You, though You alone
Are Seer, Speaker here. I’m like a stone
For lip and sight. Receive my gentle thanks
For ever-changing gifts in ranks on ranks
Of mornings always new and starry nights
And changing leaf in season and the flights
Of robin and of goose. My hurtling life
Returns to You through all the stinging strife
To see if there is change in One when all
Is done and every face turns at Your call.
No, when You’re found You are a treasure still,
Unchanged if hidden or if found at will.

18 Of His own will he brought us out
By word of truth, that we, devout,
Might be some firstfruits of his creatures.
19 My beloved brothers and beseechers,
Let every man be swift to hear,
And slow to speak, and slow appear
To wrath, 20 for man’s anger and prod
Gives forth no righteousness of God.
21 Therefore lay by all filthiness
And overflow of wickedness,
Receive with meekness word implanted,
For saving of your souls is granted.
22 But be doers of the word, and
Not hearers only, out of hand,
Deceiving yourselves. 23 For if any
Is hearer of the word in many
And not a doer, he is like
A man who sees the natural strike
Of his face in a mirror, 24 for
He sees himself, and goes therefore
Away, and straight forgets what kind
Of man he was. 25 But he, not blind,
Who looks into the perfect law
Of liberty, goes on in awe,
And hears but does not forget but
Goes on to do the work he’s cut
Out to do, this one will be blessed
In what he does, and earn his rest.
26 If anyone among you thinks
He is religious, (though he drinks)
And does not bridle in his tongue
But deceives his own heart full strung,
This one’s religion is useless.
27 Pure, undefiled religion’s dress
Before God and the Father’s this:
To visit orphans, widows kiss
In their trouble, and keep oneself
Unspotted from the worldly shelf.

The great service of remembrance is to
Find You, Beloved, in every face You do.
This is the mirror of James and the great
Plain of judgement, the entering at the gate.
Who finds You in the face of poor and meek,
The lowly in wealth, who no longer seek,
Finds all the wealth of universe beside.
The mirror is no place at all to hide.
The law of life in Decalogue is set,
And made the scene and tent of man beset
As reflected in human face and brow
Two bow-lengths from eternity to now.
Beloved, I find You in the mirror’s way
That rises in my eyes both night and day.

JAMES 2

1 My brothers, do not keep the faith
Of our Lord Jesus Christ like wraith,
God's glory that shows in all men,
With a discriminating ken.
2 For if there comes in congregation
A man with a gold ring for station,
In fine clothes, and there comes also
A poor man in poor clothes to toe,
3 And you respect the one that wears
The fine clothes and tell him that shares
A good place, and say to the poor,
Stand there or just sit on the floor,
4 Are you not then partial among
Yourselves, and become judges flung
Of evil thoughts, though yet unstung?
5 So listen, my brothers beloved,
Has not God chosen the ungloved
Poor of this world though rich in faith,
And heirs of the kingdom, not wraith,
Which He has promised to all folk
Who love Him as the One who spoke?
6 But you've despised the poor. Do not
Rich men oppression in your lot?
Don't they bring you to court in plot?
7 Don't they blaspheme that worthy name
By which you're called away from shame?

The fact is that the rich are all resigned
To have their reward with the wined and dined,
And are not chosen by Your grace to be
A part of the heavenly eternity.
While some poor too may go to hell, the rich
Will without exception join in the ditch.
Those who possess their millions in the crowd
Rejoice now maybe but will cry aloud
When judgement pours upon them at a stitch.
Beloved, like the fine man of faith who prayed
Against the publican repentance-swayed,
I too thank You that I've not been waylaid
By wealth and power among the stied and staid.
I have a chance of Your election paid.

8 If you fulfil the royal law
According to the Scripture awe,
You shall love your neighbour as self,
You do well sitting on your shelf.
9 But if you will discriminate,
You sin, and are convicted straight
By the law in transgressors' state.

You just said by Your servant that the rich
Are out of bounds and lost in black as pitch.
And now You hope I don't discriminate
Against the neighbour coming soon or late.
No man is able on this earth of brass
To stop himself from judgement of the crass,
But if the judgement’s made upon the word
Of royal Decalogue with a heart stirred,
That judgement falls on self in judgement blurred.
O wretched man I am, says servant Paul,
And yet James too drives me against the wall.
Perhaps I'd better judge not by the law
But by new fashions, as do hand and claw
Around me in each tinselled, bangled stall.

10 For one who keeps the whole law and
Still transgresses but one command,
He's guilty of the whole to stand.
11 For He who said Do not commit
Adultery, also said fit
Do not kill. Now if you commit
No adultery, and yet you kill,
You've come to fit transgressors' bill.
12 So speak and do, as such as will
Be judged by liberty's law's will.
13 For he shall have judgement without
Mercy, who shows no mercy's grout,
And mercy rejoices aloud
Against the judgement of the crowd.
14 What does it profit, brothers mine,
Though a man claim to faith divine,
And have no works, can faith save him?
15 If brother or sister in grim
Nakedness lie, and destitute
Of daily food, less than the brute,
16 And one of you may say to them,
Depart in peace, be warmed with gem
And filled, and yet give not to those
The things the body needs, the clothes,
What does it profit, and what shows?
17 Even so faith, having no works,
Is dead, being alone in shirks.

The faithfulness of good works in the city
Does naught at all to rouse the divine pity.
You save the one and leave the other ditty.
Neither faith nor good works can save the day,
And yet You give them both to those who stray,
When You decide to give grace without pay.
Though works and faith both profit not at all,
And though they're both required against the wall,
It's You alone who have the wherewithal.
Beloved, I praise Your name for secret set,
For providence among both prick and pet,
And still rejoicing sink down into hell
Or at Your call rise up to sing a spell
In heavenly courts and quires I've hardly met.

18 Indeed, a man may say you've got
Faith and I have works for my lot,
Show me your faith without your works,
And I'll show you my faith that works.
19 If you believe there is one God,
You do a good thing on the sod:
The devils too believe and shake.
20 But will you know, vain man, mistake,
That faith without works is dead flake?

I hope, Beloved, You do not mean that Jews
And Muslims sitting safely without pews
Are devils when they take the truth in hand
That You are one and only where You stand.
It seems to my dark heart and vision here
That Trinitarians surely appear
The greater devils, if dogma alone
Determines who and what may not atone.
You save Yourself by Your admission that
They do well who admit no other cat
Is God Almighty on the heavenly mat.
Beloved, I do believe and tremble too,
As well as work away at what to do,
And never stop even to polish shoe.

21 Was not Abraham our ancestor
Justified by works, when a quester
He'd offered Isaac his own son
Upon the altar when he'd done?

Like Paul, James too is far too reticent
To use his reason fully where he's bent.
Abraham was not justified by works
Or by his faith in any sort of quirks.
The man was chosen by election sure,
And by his circumcision was made pure.
That's something in the Christian sort of way
So many preachers fail to see and say.
Besides that, Abraham just followed rule
Of Canaanite that the first-born in school
Must be a sacrifice to thirsty god.
He managed in the ritual in pod
To satisfy the neighbours with a nod.
But You demand no offering on the sod.

22 Do you see how faith wrought with works
And by works was faith without quirks
Made perfect? 23 And Scripture fulfilled
That said Abraham was well billed
With righteousness when he believed
God, and was God's friend well received.
24 You see then how that by man's acts
A man is justified in pacts
And not by faith alone in facts.
25 So also Rahab the innkeeper
Was not justified with the sleeper
By works when she received the spies
And sent them out safe to devise?
26 For as the body without spirit
Is dead, so faith without works near it
Is also dead in heaven's eyes.

Though Paul and James are read to conflict in
Theology of faith and works and sin,
Reality is that You do all things,
Beloved, despite all human questionings.
Both faith and works are Yours and not the pile
Of Paul or James or any other file.
Did Rahab make her own salvation's style,
Or Abraham convince You with a smile?
No, You chose Abraham from Ur one day
And gave him grace to go the better way;
And You chose Rahab on the city wall
To act in favour of the spies to fall.
No man is justified by faith or works,
But only by Your sovereign plan that lurks.

JAMES 3

1 My brothers, don't be many masters,
Knowing that we'll get greater plasters
Of condemnation by the casters.
2 For in many things we offend.
If any man does not intend
To offend in word, such a man
Is perfect, and such a one can
Bridle the whole body in span.
3 See, we put bits in horses' mouth,
So they'll obey us north to south,
And we turn their whole body round.
4 See also the great ships and sound,
When driven by fierce winds, are turned
About with a small helm unspurned,
Wherever the pilot finds ground.
5 Even so the tongue is so small,
And boasts great things. And see how tall
A thing a little fire sets light.
6 The tongue's a fire, a world of spite,
So is the tongue among our members
That it defiles the whole thing's embers,
And sets on fire the course of nature;
And it's set by hell's legislature.

For all his lauding works, James fears the tongue
Has victory over both old and young.
If one cannot control that tiny muscle,
Then what’s to do with every other trussle?
Methinks that James with tongue in cheek
Reminds me how the human will is weak
And all devoid of the good things to seek.
No matter where I climb, I'm on first rung.
Beloved, I too boast many things indeed,
I boast of family and ethnic seed,
I boast of faith and of my better creed,
But in my boasting tongue there is no power
But what You have vauchsafed to me an hour.
The boasting fast returns to the sweet dung.

7 For every kind of beast and bird,
And serpent and the things unheard
Within the sea, is tamed and stirred
By humankind: 8 but the tongue can
No man tame, it's unruly span
Of evil filled with deadly rate
Of poison. 9 Therefore we relate
Blessing to God, even the Father,
And with it curse we men for bother,
Which are made in similitude
Of God: so greatly's the tongue rude.
10 Out of the same mouth comes the blessing
And cursing. My brothers left guessing,
These things ought not to be, but lessing.
11 Does a spring send out at one place
Sweet water and with bitter trace?
12 Can the fig tree, my brothers, bear
The olive berries, or can share
A vine figs? So can no spring yield
Both salt water and fresh unpeeled.
13 Who is a wise man and filled by
Knowledge among you on the sly?
Let him show out of good behaviour
His works with meekness in the saviour
Of wisdom. 14 But if you have bitter
Envying and strife in your fitter
Hearts, do not boast and do not lie
Against the truth beneath the sky.

If James can see that the great power of man
Is simply to make slaves of all he can,
I am surprised he goes on to remark
The more on how the tongue's too hard to park.
I know, as do all who live by my side
That my tongue is one no one can abide.
Leave off the wonder, and forsake the pride.
But that all humankind can show before
The fancy gifts of bird and beast and boar,
Is the capacity to enslave more.
I'd rather have the eagle's eye or yet
The dog's good nose to find a finer pet.
Let the tongue go, Beloved, and look around
To see what other wonders You have found.

15 This wisdom descends not from high,
But's earthly, sensual, devilish cry.
16 For where there's envy and there's strife,
There is confusion and there's rife
Each evil work. 17 But wisdom's from
Above first pure, peaceful in sum,
Gentle and easy to entreat,
Full of mercy and good fruits meet,
Impartial, no hypocrisy.
18 The fruit of righteousness to see
Is sown in peace of those who make
Peace for the righteousness in stake.

The wisdom of king Solomon is sought
In Proverbs and the other books he wrought.
But James knows more perhaps in synergy
For finding wisdom in reality.
I've seen the human wisdom in the way
It ploys the envy and the strife that stay
In human heart and so confusion's sway
Is over all the human sort of pay.
Beloved, give me the wisdom from above
That's bold to know the gentle peace of love,
And I shall find both mercy and good fruit
In action and in faith, the both to boot.
And as I sow Islam or peace in heart,
Remind me ever of the better part.

JAMES 4

1 Where do wars come from and the fights
Among you? Do they not by rights
Come from the lusts that war within
Your members to incite to sin?
2 You lust, and do not have the gain;
You kill and want to have the vain;
You fight and war, yet you have not,
Because you do not ask a lot.
3 You ask, and still do not receive,
Because you ask amiss, believe,
And that you may consume your strength
Upon your lusts laid out at length.
4 Adulterers, adulteresses,
You are, and do you not know dresses
Of friendship of the world is yet
Enmity with the God you've met?
So everyone who'll be a friend
Of the world is God's foe at end.
5 Do you think that the Scripture states
In vain, the spirit that relates
In us lusts to envy's estates?
6 But He gives more grace. Therefore He
Says God resists the proud degree,
But gives grace to humility.
7 Submit yourselves therefore to God.
Resist the devil and his prod
And he will flee from you at last.

Submission to Your sovereignty on earth
Is like to cause me more war than it's worth.
The envy and the strife of humankind
Perform a honeycomb of power combined,
And so society is stably lined.
The war comes not, Beloved, from selfish mind,
But from the fact that there are some who still
Fail to submit to the established hill.
Beloved, breathe no word of this vast revealing
To any in this world without Your healing.
The non-conformist is enough to hate
Without bringing the anarchist in bait
Before the firing squad to see him late.
Beloved, breathe no word of Your plan and feeling.

8 Draw near to God, and He will draw
Near to you. Cleanse your hands and paw,
You sinners, and cleanse your heart's awe,
You double-minded with a claw.
9 Afflict yourselves, and mourn and weep,
And let your laughter fail to keep
Its joy, but turn joy to a heap.
10 Humble yourselves before the Lord,
And he shall lift you up adored.
11 Do not speak evil each to each,
Brothers. The one who's out to teach
Evil of his brother, and judge
His brother, speaks evil to smudge
The law, and judges the law too,
But if you judge the law, then you
Are not a doer of law true,
But a judge sitting in your pew.
12 There's one lawgiver, one who can
Save and destroy, who in your span
Are you to judge another man?

Advice of James is written the elect,
And not appeal to sinners to protect
Their lives and souls in some eternity
By duty of repentance on the lea.
There's one lawgiver, who alone can save
And who alone destroys both good and brave.
Should I presume to save my soul for good
And doing all the lovely things I should,
I judge myself as well as other man.
Beloved, I lie inert beneath Your plan.
I praise and pray the humble line You give
And fail not in Your giving me to live.
At last all faces come before Your throne
And there's no judgement left except Your own.

13 Just keep it up then, you who say
Today or tomorrow in sway
We'll go into such a town and
Continue there a year to stand
And buy and sell and get our gain;
14 Whereas you do not know in vain
What shall be on tomorrow's plane.
For what is your life? It is just
A vapour that appears like dust
A little time, and then is gone.
15 For what you should say is “If God
Wills, we shall live upon the sod
And do this or that thing by prod.”
16 But now you rejoice in your boasting,
All such glee is wickedness hosting.
17 Therefore to one who knows to do
The good and does not follow cue,
To him it is a sin in view.

In sha Allah, if God wills, is the word
I hear from every Muslim tongue when stirred.
And in that hearing I hear where the faith
Lies well and increased without need of wraith.
There is no plan that human heart can make
Except the grace that You give each in stake.
And so my breath returns and so I write
Another sonnet to my harm and spite,
But turn the thing back to Your hand of right
And pray the wrong may turn again to light.
Beloved, the song I spurn as of the night
Resounds a moment in Your sovereign will
And then returns to fill the lusted bill.
You know better than I what to fulfil.

JAMES 5

1 Just keep it up then, you rich men,
And weep and howl for pains again
That shall come on you in your den.
2 Your riches are corrupted then,
And your clothes moth-eaten to ken.
3 Your gold and silver's cankered too,
And their rust witness against you,
And they shall eat your flesh like fire.
You've heaped up treasure for the dire
Great punishment of last day's ire.
4 See how the workers' wages who
Have reaped your fields, and the which you
Kept back by fraud, cries out anew,
And the cries of those who have reaped
Have entered ear and so have leaped
Up to the Lord of sabaoth.
5 You've lived in pleasure on the earth,
And been wanton; you've nourished your
Hearts as in day of slaughter's store.
6 You have condemned and killed the just;
And he does not resist your lust.

The wealthy in this latter day have spent
Their darkened hearts attempting to invent
The neo-pagan way to watch the moon
And calculate its quarters and to croon
In awful, heathen gyrations and tune
That all must leave the Sabbath and to rest
Upon the lunar quarters and invest
In losing jobs. So workers will submit
To the authority of those who sit
Upon the rich elite whose moons relent.
Beloved, I flee to You on Sabbath day
And eat the manna You provide in pay,
And curse the rich in every prayer I say,
Awaiting Christ's appearance and his ray.

7 Be patient therefore, brothers, till
The coming of the Lord with bill.
See now, the farmer waits for fruit
Precious from the earth in his suit,
And has long patience for it, till
He gets the early rain on hill
And latter rain up to the fill.
8 So be you also patient and
Establish now your hearts to stand,
For the Lord's coming is at hand.

The revolution against empires must
Wait for the coming of the Christ I trust,
The mountain of Your sovereignty that makes
The golden image wondered at to rust,
And turns the brazen empire into dust.
So patience is the watchword at the stakes.
The rise of wicked men enflamed with greed,
Pretending violence will meet their need,
Is not the sign of Your kingdom eternal,
But war and rumoured war drunk on the mead
Depriving the poor of both vine and seed.
The image to the government's infernal.
Beloved, I lay hold on the grace You give,
The patience from above that I may live.

9 Do not grudge one another now,
Brothers, you'll be condemned somehow,
See the judge stands before the door.
10 Take now, my brother prophets' store,
Who've spoken in the Lord's name too,
For an example of the true
Suffering affliction and the cue
Of patience. 11 See, we count them glad
Who have endured. You've not been sad
To hear of Job's patience and see
The end of the Lord's fast decree:
That the Lord is most pitying,
Of tender mercy fall and spring.

Example of patience divine I see
In every prophet You have faithfully
Sent into this world's wickedness and spree.
I see them rant and fail against the crowd
Of kings usurping empires and unbowed
Changing times and Your laws to sing aloud
The pagan hymns of Wesley graciously.
The faith is tarnished and dimmed by the cloud.
Beloved, I turn from Reformation and
The Vatican and every eastern land,
Return to Your own prophets and sing grand
The anthems that the ancient seers ploughed.
If ever I may come to faith and grace,
I come by Your own prophets to Your face.

12 But above all things, brothers mine,
Do not swear, neither by the fine
Of heaven, neither by the earth,
Neither by any oath of worth,
But let your yes be yes, and so
Your negating also be no;
Lest you fall in condemning's row.

Non-swearing is the sign to great and small
Before the county courthouse standing tall
That Yours are not the pawn of government,
Now subjects of the divine laws they've bent.
Instead, Yours are the ones You've sworn to You
To rise and obey all You say to do,
So hidden in Your heart that all is true
That comes into imagination's view.
Beloved, I do not swear at all nor lift
Your name as though in offering a gift,
But come repenting to Your throne in rift
With all society and churchly pew.
I do not swear at all, though ay and nay
May pass my lips before the Judgement Day.

13 Is there among you one afflicted?
Let him pray. Is any convicted
With mirth? Let him sing Psalms not slow.

I swear off hymns by any that remain
After the Reformation came to claim
The world for Fanny Crosby and to blame
Those who retreat to praise with Psalms Your name.
I leave the hymns to others for their gain.
For bad moods prayer alone may save the day,
For glad moods singing Psalms shall be my way,
And prayer and singing Psalms shall take all time
I have to wake or sleep to dream up crime.
Beloved, let my affliction always be
That I stand at Your throne eternally
In prayer when needful in heart's clouded spree,
In singing of the Psalms when I'm in glee.
Let that, Beloved, be always where I climb.

14 Is any sick among you now?
Let him ask that the elders bow
Of the called out ones, let them pray
Over him in anointing's way
With oil in the name of the Lord:
15 And the prayer of faith and adored
Shall raise him up; and if he's done
Any sins, they're forgiven, won.
16 Confess your faults each one to each,
And pray for each other in reach,
That you may be healed in the breach.
Effectual and fervent prayer
Of a righteous man's great in share.
17 Elias was a man in tow
Of passions like our own in stow,
And he prayed earnestly that it
Might not rain, and it was seen fit
Not to rain on earth for the space
Of three years and six months in race.
18 And he prayed once more and the sky
Gave rain, and the earth which was dry
Brought forth her fruit after the try.

Physicians used to follow in an oath
That kept their patients safely found in both
Good health and joy to pay them for their growth.
Today the companies that come to make
The drugs physicians peddle for their sake
Care only for the profit that they take,
And willingly infect the populations
In hopes of gains from their further creations.
Good James looks forward to this time ungraced
When greed and folly stole science replaced.
Beloved, I ask my elders for their prayer,
Knowing there is no hope now anywhere
That the physicians come to ply their ware
In cities where integrity's effaced.

19 Brothers, if any go astray
From the truth among you one day,
And one convert him, 20 let him know,
That he which turns a sinner slow
From error of his way to go
Shall save a soul from death and hide
A multitude of sins beside.

Conversion is for those that You have chosen
Among the evil-hearted and hard-frozen
To grant them grace and life eternal here,
Despite the fall in Eden and the tear.
But it is You, Beloved, who work repentance
Upon the heart dead under sinful sentence,
And You who grant the faith to all in store,
And You who work works to salvation more.
Beloved, save every soul loved here below,
Save all or save a few, but be not slow
To hide a multitude of sins I see
And give celestial visions now to me.
Beloved, I here confess my wicked crimes
In deed and thought and also in my rhymes.

AUTHOR: THOMAS G. MCELWAIN

Copyright © 2007 Adams & McElwain Publishers and Thomas McElwain First Published in two volumes, The Beloved and I 2005, and Led of the Beloved, 2006. Second Edition, 2010 Third and revised edition, 2012 All rights reserved. No part of this verse commentary on the sacred Scriptures may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in a retrieval system, in any form or by any means, without permission in writing from publisher.

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