Here again My brethren serves as a transition to a new topic and indicates the beginning of an exhortation or injunction. It is meant to be general and inclusive and therefore can be rendered “my brothers and sisters” (New Revised Standard Version) or “my friends” (Revised English Bible, Good News Translation). See 1.2 and elsewhere for other ways to translate brethren.
Show no partiality as you hold the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory: this statement presents a number of problems, as reflected in different translations. It is literally “do not have the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ of glory in [or, with] partiality.” There are two main grammatical ambiguities. The first has to do with the understanding of the force of the verb translated hold, literally “to have” or “to possess.” Two interpretations have been proposed.
(1) The first interpretation is to take it as an imperative. There are two ways to handle the imperative. One is very straightforward, close to the original Greek structure; for example, “have not the faith of … with respect of persons” (King James Version), or “do not hold your faith in … with an attitude of personal favoritism” (New American Standard Bible). The other way is to shift the focus from faith to partiality, with the force of the imperative hold shifted to the prepositional phrase “with partiality” by supplying a verb like show or some other verb that goes with “partiality” or “favoritism.” This is essentially what Revised Standard Version and Good News Translation have done. Other examples are “you are men who believe in … and you must not show favouritism” (Translator’s New Testament) or “do not let class distinction enter into your faith in…” (New Jerusalem Bible).
(2) The other interpretation is to take the verb hold as an indicative “to have.” Here again it may be taken in two ways. One is a simple statement such as “you cannot at one and the same time believe in … and be a snob” (Barclay). The other way is to express the statement with an interrogative force; for example, “do you try to combine faith in … with acts of partiality?” (Goodspeed), “do you with your acts of favoritism really believe in…?” (New Revised Standard Version). In this case, though dropping the negative, the answer expected to the question is “No, you really don’t.”
On the whole the first interpretation is to be preferred. First of all, this is dictated by grammar, as the form of the negative adverb rendered as “no” is normally not used with the indicative mood. Further, it appears to fit the context better. It is more natural to take the verb “to have” as an imperative, since our author is beginning a new section with a new topic, introducing a subject matter important to his thinking. In fact, if the saying is taken as a question, it would be difficult to connect it with the explanation James goes on to give with the particle “For” in the next verse. We may observe that the imperative is in the present tense, indicating that something is happening and continuing. In order to bring out this force, we can, for example, render it like “Do not try to hold…,” “Don’t ever attempt to combine…” (Phillips), or “Stop holding….”
The second ambiguity has to do with the interpretation of a string of genitive constructions, literally “the faith of the Lord of us, Jesus Christ of glory.” The second “of” construction is not a real problem, as it can only mean our Lord, a title ascribed to Jesus Christ.
The faith of our Lord Jesus Christ can be understood in various ways. It can be taken as a subjective genitive, meaning “the faith that our Lord Jesus Christ had.” For an ordinary reader this understanding of the literal rendering may be the first to come to mind. However, this interpretation is rejected by most commentators. A second possibility, with the support of similar expressions in Mark 11.22, Rom 3.22, Gal 2.16, and the one adopted by most scholars and translators, is to take the expression as an objective genitive, meaning “to have faith in our Lord Jesus Christ.”
It is more difficult to determine how the next genitive construction of glory is to be understood. There are two related questions that yield different answers: How is the genitive to be taken? With which noun is of glory to be connected? It has been suggested that of glory is to be connected with the word partiality. But the two expressions are too far apart for this to be likely. It has also been suggested that it is to be connected with the word faith, making an objective genitive, thus giving the meaning “faith in the glory of our Lord…” or “… glorious faith in our Lord….” Here again the order of words is unnatural and forced, and therefore this interpretation has not been widely accepted.
The most likely connection is with the group of words our Lord Jesus Christ. There are a number of possibilities. For example, one can connect of glory only to Christ, thus “our Lord Jesus, the Christ of glory,” or to Jesus Christ, thus “our Lord, Jesus Christ of glory”, or to our Lord, thus “our Lord of glory, Jesus Christ” (La Sainte Bible: Nouvelle version Segond révisée; compare “Jesus Christ, our Lord of glory,” Luther 1984; “Jesus Christ, our glorified Lord,” New Jerusalem Bible). It is probably best to take of glory with the whole of the expression our Lord Jesus Christ. In this case again, there are several possibilities.
(1) We can take glory as a supplementary expression or title for the first expression, thus “our Lord Jesus Christ, the Glory.” This is what Moffatt has done, “the Lord Jesus Christ, who is the Glory.” A variation of this is seen in renderings such as “our Lord Jesus Christ who reigns in glory” (New English Bible, Revised English Bible), “our Lord Jesus Christ, who is full of glory” (Japanese New Interconfessional Translation).
(2) We can take of glory with “the Lord” understood, and make it a title attached to “our Lord Jesus Christ,” as Revised Standard Version and Good News Translation have done: “our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory” (so also King James Version, American Standard Version). The expression “the Lord of glory” does find support in 1 Cor 2.8.
(3) By far the majority of commentators and translators choose to interpret what we have here as a qualitative genitive, with of glory used as an adjective modifying “the Lord Jesus Christ,” thus “our glorious Lord Jesus Christ.” This interpretation probably has the least difficulty and is therefore the one that is most acceptable.
In some languages the word “glorious” will be expressed as “great” or “wonderful.” A possible alternative rendering of the phrase “our glorious Lord Jesus Christ” may be: “our [inclusive] wonderful [or, great] Lord Jesus Christ.” There will be some languages where the expression our Lord will give the impression that we own Jesus. In such cases we may say, for example, “the wonderful Lord Jesus Christ whom we follow [or, believe in].” For Lord see the comment on 1.1.
The word partiality, literally “face taking” or “lifting up face,” is probably coined on the basis of the Semitic idiom “receive the face.” It is rendered in old versions as “respect of persons” (King James Version, American Standard Version). The literal expression means a great deal in cultures where great weight is placed on “face saving.” To lift up someone’s face is to regard that person with favor, to make a judgment on the basis of the person’s outward appearance or social status. In many languages there will be suitable idiomatic expressions to convey this idea; for example, “look at the face,” or more elegantly, “lift up the face and raise the eyes” (Thai). Originally the Greek term translated as show … partiality was a neutral one, but later on it acquired a bad sense, referring almost always to a prejudiced attitude, an improper class distinction, judging a person on the basis of wealth or social status. This attitude is condemned both in the Old Testament (Lev 19.15; Deut 1.17) and the New Testament (Eph 6.9; 1 Peter 1.17). What James wants to say here is that favoritism or discrimination is incompatible with Christian faith. The expression used here is in plural form, likely referring to particular actions, and therefore may be rendered as “acts of partiality” (Goodspeed) or “acts of favoritism” (New Revised Standard Version). Another way to render show no partiality may be “Do not treat some people better than others because of their appearance.” But in some languages it will be possible to simply say “Do not treat some people better than others,” it being understood from the context that “appearance” is in focus (compare Contemporary English Version, “you won’t treat some people better…”).
The faith here, as in chapter 1 verses 3 and 6, is more than simply an intellectual assent to a statement about the Lord Jesus Christ. It means rather a personal trust in and commitment to him. In a number of languages the clause as you hold the faith will be expressed as “as you believe in.” Good News Translation, Contemporary English Version and other translations put this clause at the beginning of the verse. In some languages other ways of expressing this clause may have to be used, such as “since you believe…” or “because you believe….”
An alternative translation model for this verse may be:
• My dear fellow Christians, since [or, because] you believe in our [inclusive] wonderful [or, great] Lord Jesus Christ, you must never treat people differently according to their outward appearance.
Quoted with permission from Loh, I-Jin and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on The Letter from James. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1997. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .