Evidently these early Jewish Christians had their share of trial. Who, alas, does not have his portion? The problem with us all is to learn how to find the spring of joy in the midst of sorrow. There are always perplexities and anxieties. The sea is restless even in its moments of calm beauty. Variety in Trials (1:2) There is the tone of an elder brother in this epistle, and we see it at the start when James says “my brothers.” It is no perfunctory phrase with him. It is “trials,” not “temptations,” that James here has in mind, though the same word probably means temptation in 1:12. The word in the Greek came to have either sense, though originally it meant only to try, to attempt, just as our English word “tempt” was at first simply “try.” But it is a short step from “try” to “make trial of” one when suspicion exists or evil desire arises. Hence all through the Greek we find the old Greek word used in both senses. The New Testament usage varies. There are a half dozen other passages where the word has the idea of trial (Luke 22:28; Acts 20:19; Gal. 4:14; 1 Peter 1:6; 4:12; Rev. 3:10). In 1 Peter 1:6 the identical expression “manifold trials” appears. Oesterley[47] wrongly insists that “temptation” is the meaning in James 1:2 on the ground that “the writer’s Judaism is stronger than his Christianity,” and he then uses it as an argument against the genuineness of the book. A soldier (Parry) does have “true joy” in victory over temptation, like Wordsworth’s “happy warrior,” but that is beside the mark here. There is no conflict here with the avoidance of temptation urged by Jesus (Matt. 6:13; Luke 11:4; Matt. 26:41; Luke 22:40). James refers rather to external trials into which men fall—trials that are not only unwelcome but also unsought and unexpected.[48] It is almost the picture of a stumble in the dark when one finds himself surrounded by hostile forces, just as the poor man fell among robbers (Luke 10:30). Besides, one may be surrounded by all sorts of trials at once and not merely any sort of trial (Moffatt). The word “manifold” is really many-colored, variegated, spotted, mottled, pied, dappled. “It never rains but it pours,” we say at such a time. The same word is applied to the sicknesses and torments of body and mind which Jesus healed (Matt. 4:24). It is used of the evil desires that lead silly women astray (2 Tim. 3:6), of the lusts and pleasures which once the Cretans served (Titus 3:3), of the variety in the manifestation of God’s power in connection with the gospel (Heb. 2:4), of the many sorts of strange teachings then afloat (Heb. 13:9) of which we are now beginning to learn something (incipient Gnosticism and the early stages of Mithraism, for example), of the many trials which brought sorrow to the Christians (1 Peter 1:6), and of the many sides to the grace of God (1 Peter 4:10). God has grace for every trial whatever its color, whether black or blue, yellow or green, red or crimson.