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Selected Verse: James 1:13 - King James

Verse         Translation Text
Jas 1:13 King James Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man:

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A Commentary, Critical, Practical, and Explanatory on the Old and New Testaments, by Robert Jamieson, A.R. Fausset and David Brown [1882]
when . . . tempted--tried by solicitation to evil. Heretofore the "temptation" meant was that of probation by afflictions. Let no one fancy that God lays upon him an inevitable necessity of sinning. God does not send trials on you in order to make you worse, but to make you better (Jam 1:16-17). Therefore do not sink under the pressure of evils (Co1 10:13).

of God--by agency proceeding from God. The Greek is not "tempted by," but, "from," implying indirect agency.

cannot be tempted with evil, &c.--"Neither do any of our sins tempt God to entice us to worse things, nor does He tempt any of His own accord" (literally, "of Himself"; compare the antithesis, Jam 1:18, "Of His own will He begat us" to holiness, so far is He from tempting us of His own will) [BENGEL]. God is said in Gen 22:1 to have "tempted Abraham"; but there the tempting meant is that of trying or proving, not that of seducement. ALFORD translates according to the ordinary sense of the Greek, "God is unversed in evil." But as this gives a less likely sense, English Version probably gives the true sense; for ecclesiastical Greek often uses words in new senses, as the exigencies of the new truths to be taught required.
 
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1 And it came to pass after these things, that God did tempt Abraham, and said unto him, Abraham: and he said, Behold, here I am.
18 Of his own will begat he us with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of firstfruits of his creatures.
13 There hath no temptation taken you but such as is common to man: but God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.
16 Do not err, my beloved brethren.
17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.
10 For every beast of the forest is mine, and the cattle upon a thousand hills.
11 I know all the fowls of the mountains: and the wild beasts of the field are mine.
1 Then was Jesus led up of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil.