It is quite possible that those who were guilty of spiritual pride and other sins of the spirit boasted of their freedom from adultery and murder (Hort). At any rate, we must not forget that out of the heart are the issues of life, that murder springs out of hate and that all of God’s laws come from the same will (Mayor). It is disobedience to the will of God that constitutes the essence of sin. It is not a light matter to be guilty of any sin. Our only hope is in the grace and forgiveness of God. There is no room for pride on the part of sinners, setting up one sin against another sin. A Law of Liberty (2:12 f.) But James is not a pharisaic legalist nor a Judaizer. He adds these verses to make it plain that he does not have in mind the painful observance of separate rules and details. The spirit is greater than the letter. Our words and deeds are to be judged by “a law of liberty” (cf. 1:25), not of bondage. We are under grace, not the old law. We live in an atmosphere of love and liberty, not of repression and slavery. God watches the real motive in our conduct toward the rich and the poor as in all things. “Mercy glorieth against judgment”; mercy triumphs over judgment. God shows mercy to us in spite of our shortcomings, for Jesus is the pledge of our fidelity and our hope. We make so many mistakes that we should have no heart to go on if we had to be held to strict account every time we stumbled in one point. Still, we must not overlook the fact that we did stumble. It is our duty not to stumble at that point again. So we go on our stumbling way toward that goal of perfection which is ever before us. It was Jesus who said, “Judge not, that ye be not judged” (Matt. 7:1). James seems to know this saying, as he lays emphasis on the spirit and motive in holy living. VII The Appeal to Life We now come to the famous passage that is supposed by some scholars to be an attack on Paul’s doctrine of salvation by faith instead of works. James is interpreted by many to be a champion of works as against Paul’s theory of grace. It is an old controversy and is the occasion of Martin Luther’s slighting allusion to the Epistle of James as “a veritable epistle of straw.” He thought it contradicted the Epistle of Galatians, which he loved dearly as his “wife.” It is necessary, therefore, to clear the atmosphere a bit before proceeding to the exposition. The Standpoint of James This depends on the date of the epistle. (For the discussion of this question, see chapter I.) It is here assumed that James wrote before the Jerusalem Conference, before A.D. 50.