James 5:2
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Your riches have rotted and moths have eaten your clothes.
Commentaries
Excerpts gathered from published commentaries to ground the reading.
corrupted--about to be destroyed through God's curse on your oppression, whereby your riches are accumulated (Jam 5:4). CALVIN thinks the sense is, Your riches perish without being of any use either to others or even to yourselves, for instance, your garments which are moth-eaten in your chests. garments . . . moth-eaten--referring to Mat 6:19-20.
Open source ↗In this chapter the apostle denounces the judgments of God upon those rich men who oppress the poor, showing them how great their sin and folly are in the sight of God, and how grievous the punishments would be which should fall upon themselves (Jam 5:1-6). Hereupon, all the faithful are exhorted to patience under their trials and sufferings (Jam 5:7-11). The sin of swearing is cautioned against (Jam 5:12). We are directed how to act, both under affliction and in prosperity (Jam 5:13). Prayer for the sick, and anointing with oil, are prescribed (Jam 5:14, Jam 5:15). Christians are directed to acknowledge their faults one to another, and to pray one for another, and the efficacy of prayer is proved (Jam 5:16-18). And, lastly, it is recommended to us to do what we can for bringing back those that stray from the ways of truth.
Open source ↗5:2 The wealth and fine clothes are so excessive that they deteriorate from lack of use; their destruction is a sign of the anticipated judgment.
Open source ↗Original language
The Hebrew and Greek words behind this passage, with Strong's numbers — from openscriptures (CC BY-SA).
Cross-references
Other passages the community most often connects to this one. Tap to read.
So man wastes away like something rotten, like a moth-eaten garment.
Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide yourselves with purses that will not wear out, an inexhaustible treasure in heaven, where no thief approaches and no moth destroys.
Surely the Lord GOD helps Me. Who is there to condemn Me? See, they will all wear out like a garment; the moths will devour them.
For the moth will devour them like a garment, and the worm will eat them like wool. But My righteousness will last forever, My salvation through all generations.”
and into an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, reserved in heaven for you,
You discipline and correct a man for his iniquity, consuming like a moth what he holds dear; surely each man is but a vapor. Selah
Like a partridge hatching eggs it did not lay is the man who makes a fortune unjustly. In the middle of his days his riches will desert him, and in the end he will be the fool.”
So I am like a moth to Ephraim, and like decay to the house of Judah.
Suppose a man comes into your meeting wearing a gold ring and fine clothes, and a poor man in shabby clothes also comes in.