James 4:5 launches with one of the strongest citation formulae in all the New Testament: “Or do you think that in vain the Scripture says…” (ἢ δοκεῖτε ὅτι κενῶς ἡ γραφὴ λέγει…). Unfortunately, it follows this apparent signaling of a quotation with one of the most puzzling clauses in all the Bible: πρὸς φθόνον ἐπιποθεῖ τὸ πνεῦμα ὃ κατῴκισεν ἐν ἡμῖν.¹Note that a few interpreters think we should move the question mark from the end of 4:5 (“…which he made to dwell in us”) to the end of the clause that begins 4:6 (“But he gives a greater grace”). This might allow an interpreter to turn the supposed quotation of 4:5 into “a paraphrased adaptation of Prov. 3:34 in James 4:5–6a.” So, Douglas S. Huffman, Understanding the New Testament Use of the Old Testament: Forms, Features, Framings, and Functions (Baker Academic, 2024), 177–78, following to some degree Craig B. Carpenter and Scot McKnight, NA28, and UBS5. One advantage of this option is that James actually quotes Proverbs 3:34 in 4:6. One disadvantage is that the words and ideas are quite dissimilar between James 4:5 and Proverbs 3:34, regardless of which of the disputed translational options is adopted. Modern translations reflect various understandings of this clause. Words in brackets are included for clarity:

1. “He [God] yearns jealously over the [human] spirit that he has made to dwell in us” (ESV; cf. NIV, NRSV).
2. “He [God] jealously desires the [divine] Spirit whom He has made to dwell in us” (NASB).
3. “The [divine] Spirit who dwells in us yearns jealously” (NKJV).
4. “The [human] spirit he made to dwell in us envies intensely” (CSB; cf. NET, KJV).

The central claim of this article is that James undergirds his exhortations in the middle portion of his letter (3:7–5:9) with a narrative subtext—namely, the early chapters of Genesis, and, in particular, the person and story of Cain as it would have been understood in James’s interpretive environment; and furthermore, that the acknowledgment of this subtext resolves most of the interpretive difficulties associated with James 4:5. James assumes throughout his letter that his readers know the Old Testament—as demonstrated by quoting Scripture and alluding to scriptural examples in the rest of the letter—so the suggestion of a narrative subtext should not be viewed as remarkable. If in fact James draws upon Cain’s evil envy to warn his readers against the danger of envy in 3:7–5:9, this observation may at the same time resolve the problem of locating the source of the “quotation” in James 4:5 and guide readers into how to translate and interpret this perplexing verse.

1. Echoes of Cain (and Early Genesis) in James 3:7–5:9

In one sense, arguing that James draws upon the story of Cain and Abel is not a new suggestion to scholars of James. Many recent scholars already affirm at least an echo in the cries of the harvesters in James 5:4 (cf. Gen 4:10).²E.g. Bo Reicke, The Epistles of James, Peter, and Jude, AB 37 (Doubleday, 1964), 51; Patrick J. Hartin, “‘Come Now, You Rich, Weep and Wail…’ (James 5:1–6),” Journal of Theology for Southern Africa 84 (1993): 60; John Byron, “Living in the Shadow of Cain: Echoes of a Developing Tradition in James 5:1–6,” NovT 48 (2006): 262, though Byron thinks that in James 5:1–6, Abel should be viewed as paradigmatic of unjust suffering and Cain of envy and evil oppression.

I agree that James 5:4 echoes the Cain and Abel story but want to argue that the author begins nodding toward early Genesis in James 3:7, increasingly sharpening the focus on Cain as a negative exemplar, and continues to draw upon early Genesis and the Cain-Abel story all the way up to James 5:9. James is not exegeting Genesis 4, nor even directly commenting upon it in James 3:7–5:9. Rather, he is like a preacher who repeatedly alludes to a negative archetype so well known that naming the evil person is unnecessary to draw from his negative example.

At the end of chapter 3, James pulls his readers into the broader narrative of early Genesis and then begins to draw more specifically from the story of Cain. I am certainly not claiming that everything James says in this section is intended to connect with the Cain exemplar, but I will argue that there are many points of contact between Genesis 4 in its broader context and James 3:7–5:9 (some stronger and some weaker). The stronger allusions and echoes, of course, buttress the weaker. But reading this middle section of James with the story of Cain hovering in the back of one’s mind will illuminate many aspects of this section, a few of which are opaque until one affirms the link with early Genesis and the person and story of Cain.

I will begin in chapter 3 by observing a list of possible connections with early Genesis, then focus more specifically on the story and character of Cain in James 4 and early 5. After drawing up this list of allusions to and echoes of early Genesis, especially Genesis 4, I will show how this narrative substructure can resolve the difficult question of the original source and proper interpretation (and, thus, appropriate translation) of James 4:5.

1.1. James 3

3:7: James triggers his use of the early parts of Genesis in the middle of his discussion about the tongue. He writes: “For every kind of beast and bird, of reptile and sea creature, can be tamed and has been tamed by mankind…”³Unless otherwise indicated, English citations are from the English Standard Version (ESV). James’s list of living creatures echoes the fifth and sixth days of the creation narrative (Gen 1:20–25), including God’s command to Adam and Eve to “have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the earth” (Gen 1:28).⁴“Just as Genesis 1 divides creatures into four groups—water creatures, birds, livestock, and creeping things (Heb. Remeś, “small animal, reptile”)—so James follows the same pattern of nature’s order—beast and birds, reptiles and sea creatures.” Thomas R. Shepherd, “Creation in the General Epistles,” in The Genesis Creation Account and Its Reverberations in the New Testament, ed. Thomas R. Shepherd (Andrews University Press, 2022), 378. Also Douglas J. Moo, The Letter of James, 2nd ed.,PNTC (Eerdmans, 2021), 171. David Allen refers to James’s “taming” in 3:7 as a formal allusion to the dominion comments of Genesis 1:26 and 28.⁵David M. Allen, “Genesis in James, 1 and 2 Peter and Jude,” in Genesis in the New Testament, ed. Maarten J. J. Menken and Steve Moyise, LNTS 466 (Bloomsbury, 2012), 153. James’s list may further echo the command for Noah to bring two “of every living thing … the birds … the animals … every creeping thing of the ground…” into the ark (Gen 6:19–20; cf. 7:2–3, 8, 14, 21–23; 8:17–18), along with God’s statement after the flood: “The fear of you and the dread of you shall be upon every beast of the earth and upon every bird of the heavens, upon everything that creeps on the ground and all the fish of the sea” (Gen 9:2; cf. 9:10, 12, 15).⁶Genesis 9 follows up this final list with the requirement that lifeblood be reckoned for murder, because God made man in his own image (9:5–6), which is relevant for our later discussion. Readers at this point in James’s letter have now been pulled into the Genesis narrative, and James effectively capitalizes upon it.

3:8: James continues his discussion of the tongue with a comparison: “It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison.” Allen writes, “The serpent portrayal returns in Jas 3:8, and in more suggestive fashion, its description of the tongue as both poisonous and death-bearing transporting the intertextual reader back to Gen. 3:1-19 and the catastrophic effects of the serpent’s tongue.”⁷Allen, “Genesis in James, 1 and 2 Peter and Jude,” 153. Also Dale C. Allison, The Epistle of James, ICC (Bloomsbury, 2013), 547–48. Serpents, of course, are known for their long forked (double) tongues—which may help to lead into the following four verses about using our tongues in contradictory (or, we could say, double-tongued) ways.⁸Allen, “Genesis in James, 1 and 2 Peter and Jude,” 153, notes “the serpent, famed for its duplicitous tongue.” Once again, we find ourselves in early Genesis.

3:9: “With it we bless our Lord and Father, and with it we curse people who are made in the likeness of God.” This sentence is a clear allusion to the early Genesis narrative—clear both because of James’s use of the word “curse” (the lesser allusion) and because James employs the language of “likeness of God” (the stronger allusion). Genesis 1:26–27 reads: “God said, ‘Let us make man in our image, after our likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over the livestock and over all the earth and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.’ So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.” Dan McCartney comments, “The word for ‘likeness’ (ὁμοίωσις, homoiōsis) is found only here in the NT and is rare even in the LXX, making the allusion to Gen. 1:26 almost certain.”⁹Dan G. McCartney, James, BECNT (Baker Academic, 2009), 192 n. 25. James’s words about cursing people also evoke God’s words after the flood, words that themselves would have prepared James’s readers for his upcoming connection to Cain and his murder of his brother: “And for your lifeblood I will require a reckoning: from every beast I will require it and from man. From his fellow man I will require a reckoning for the life of man. Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed, for God made man in his own image” (Gen 9:5–6).

3:14, 16: “But if you have bitter jealousy and selfish ambition in your hearts, do not boast and be false to the truth” (3:14). “For where jealousy and selfish ambition exist, there will be disorder and every vile practice” (3:16). The twice repetition of “jealousy and selfish ambition” in these verses is the first in a series of descriptions that James will incorporate into the early parts of James 4 to evoke Cain, his heart, and his actions. More on this below.

3:15: “This is not the wisdom that comes down from above, but is earthly, unspiritual, demonic.” Regardless of the exact connotations of the first two adjectives, the third adjective “demonic” (δαιμονιώδης) reinforces the idea that the devil is involved in some way. Second-temple (and beyond) interpreters regularly included the devil in the Cain story, even though it isn’t explicit in Genesis 4. This use of the adjective “demonic” casts a backward glance to James 3:6, “set on fire by hell,” to the deadly-poisoning-tongue just referenced in 3:8 and anticipates James’s exhortation to “resist the devil” in 4:7.¹⁰Darian Lockett, “‘Unstained by the World’: Purity and Pollution as an Indicator of Cultural Interaction in the Letter of James” in Reading James with New Eyes: Methodological Reassessments of the Letter of James, ed. Robert L. Webb and John S. Koppenborg, LNTS 342 (T&T Clark, 2007), 61–62.

3:17–18: Contrasting with the “jealousy and selfish ambition” and “disorder and every vile practice” of 3:16, “the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere. And a harvest of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace.” The dual mention of “good fruits” in 3:17 and “a harvest of righteousness … sown in peace” in 3:18 may prepare readers for more Cain connections through an implicit contrast of the unaccepted gift Cain brought to the Lord with fruits that are good and a peaceful harvest of righteousness. Genesis 4:3 reads: “Cain brought an offering to the Lord of the fruit of the ground.” Later in the Pentateuch we learn that grain offerings are acceptable to the Lord (e.g., Lev 2), which suggests that it wasn’t the gift itself that occasioned God’s rejection, but, as many later ancient interpreters suggest, the inferior quality of what Cain brought in comparison to Abel, who “brought of the firstborn of his flock and of their fat portions” (Gen 4:4).¹¹Gordon John Wenham, Genesis 1-15 WBC 1 (Zondervan, 1987), 104. Once we have looked at the first paragraph of James 4, we are likely to view these last verses of James 3 as anticipatory of the story of Cain and Abel.

1.2. James 4

4:1–5: Having already evoked the early chapters of Genesis in James 3:7–12 (most prominently in James’s list of creatures to be tamed and his reference to the image of God in humans), including early hints of Cain’s jealousy and selfish ambition in the final paragraph of chapter 3, James now narrows his Old Testament focus to Cain as a negative model of what he is warning against in James 4.¹²Luke Timothy Johnson, “James 3:13-4:10 and the Topos ΠΕΡΙ ΦΘΟΝΟΥ,” NovT 25 (1983): 328–32 reminds us that the impulse to parcel up James into separate paraenetic sections under the influence of Dibelius has had an undue influence, which in practice, has separated the end of James 3 from James 4. Johnson offers a helpful list of thematic parallels between the last paragraph of James 3 and the first of James 4 that pull them together. The list of vices described in James 4 are particularly apropos to Cain, notably: “quarrels” (4:1), “fights” (4:1), “passions” (or “pleasures,” 4:1, 3), “[evil] desire” (4:2), “covet” (4:2), “cannot obtain” (4:2), “fight and quarrel” (4:2), “enmity” (4:4) and especially “desires with envy” (4:5). (I have already referenced the “bitter jealousy and selfish ambition” that appear in 3:14 and 3:16.) For readers familiar with Genesis 4, the descriptions of quarrels, fighting, and enmity are easily connected mentally to the Cain and Abel story. But what of all the descriptions of coveting, desiring, not being able to obtain, and envy? Though we may not hear it in our heads, limited as we are to our knowledge of Cain via Genesis 4, these descriptions would stand out to a first-century interpreter of Cain for two reasons:

First, later interpreters, both Jewish and Christian, described Cain’s sin as being one of envy and grasping. John Byron has assembled an impressive list of examples of ancient interpreters who understood Cain to be the paragon of envy. Josephus, for example, claimed that Cain was only “looking to gain” because he was a “covetous man,” and after the murder of Abel swindled people out of their possessions.¹³Josephus, Jewish Antiquities 1.53–55, 60–61. Philo said that Cain was a “lover of self” “who refers everything to himself” and constantly took things in unjust directions for his own benefit.¹⁴Philo, Worse 10, 19, 21, 32–34. Clement explicitly connected jealousy and envy (ζήλος καί φθόνος) with Cain’s murder of Abel, drawing a causative relationship between the two (1 Clement 4:7).¹⁵These examples are cited in Byron, “Living in the Shadow of Cain,” 265–68.

Second, even Cain’s name was thought to have a connection to envy. Philo claimed that his name meant “possession.”¹⁶Philo, Worse 10. More generally, Philo treats Abel as an exemplar of “the human capacity for good” and Cain as “the human capacity for evil.” See Hindy Najman, “Cain and Abel as Character Traits: A Study in the Allegorical Typology of Philo of Alexandria,” Eve’s Children: The Biblical Stories Retold and Interpreted in Jewish and Christian Traditions, ed. Gerard P. Luttikhuizen (Leiden: Brill, 2003), 107-118. In this regard, Angela Kim notes: “The suggestion that Cain was governed by envy is a natural association from an etymological interpretation of Cain’s name, קין, which was thought to derive from the root for קנא (‘envy’) or קנה (‘acquire’).”¹⁷Angela Y. Kim, “Cain and Abel in the Light of Envy: A Study in the History of the Interpretation of Envy in Genesis 4.1–16,” JSP 12 (2001): 71. Also Karolien Vermeulen, “Mind the Gap: Ambiguity in the Story of Cain and Abel,” JBL 133 (2014): 34; Wenham, Genesis 1–15, 101. Kim (p. 77) suggests that the getting in Eve’s comment, “I have gotten a man with the help of the Lord” could have been part of the impetus for later interpreters reading envy as the source of Cain’s fratricide. Byron comments:

With Cain in particular, the connection of his name with greed became a peg on which later exegetes could hang interpretive traditions about him. Not only was his origin attributed to an evil being, but his disposition, as revealed by his name, communicated what kind of individual he would grow up to be. The accusation that Cain was a greedy grasper is repeated often in conjunction with the details surrounding his crime of fratricide and his subsequent life following his expulsion.¹⁸John Byron, Cain and Abel in Text and Tradition: Jewish and Christian Interpretations of the First Sibling Rivalry,ThBN 14 (Brill, 2011), 32.

There are many more examples. Since James was breathing the air of first-century interpretive traditions, it is more than likely that he was both familiar with and influenced by the association of Cain with envy and evil desire. Keep that in mind as we look at the next verses.

4:2: After writing about quarrels and conflicts, James adds: “You desire and do not have, so you murder.” Are we to think that the Jewish Christians to whom James wrote were committing murder? Even if these words were mediated by Jesus’s teaching that anger was tantamount to murder (Matt 5:21–22; cf. 15:19) or anticipated James’s later discussion of killing (by removing wages, James 5:4–6), this is still a provocative accusation for James to make. But it is slightly less provocative if James is intentionally alluding to the well-known relationship between envy and murder in the story of Cain and drawing upon the illustrative potential of that story. Why emphasize murder? A narrative subtext of Cain’s murder of Abel would help to explain it.

4:4: James provocatively addresses his readers as: “You adulterous people!” Granted, this is not the clearest connection to the Cain story, but it may include yet another echo that our ears are probably not attuned to hearing. Many ancient interpreters of Cain either suggested or outrightly claimed that Cain was born of adultery; that is, the devil or an evil angel had sex with Eve.¹⁹Note in this regard, perhaps, 1 John 3:12, “We should not be like Cain, who was of the evil one (ἐκ τοῦ πονηροῦ) and murdered his brother.” Other examples cited by Byron in Cain and Abel in Text and Tradition, 16–20 include: Tertullian, Patience 5:15; Gospel of Philip 61.5–15 [Isenberg]; Targum Pseudo-JonathanGen 4:1; Pirqe Rabbi Eliezer 21 [Frielander]. Marcel Porthuis, “Eve’s Demonic Offspring: A Jewish Motif in German Literature,” in Eve’s Children: The Biblical Stories Retold and Interpreted in Jewish and Christian Traditions, ed. Gerard P. Luttikhuizen,TBNJCT 5 (Brill, 2003), 57–61 shows that in Jewish writings the adultery with demons was not only attributed to Eve, it also was sometimes attributed to Adam. Of course, the idea that Cain’s “father” was somehow the devil (or a fallen angel) could be a reason James includes some of his allusions to the devil. It could also be a (the?) reason James chose to lead this sentence with the provocative accusation that his readers were adulterous.²⁰There is a split in manuscripts that include the feminine only, μοιχαλίδες, and those that include both the masculine and feminine, μοιχοὶ καὶ μοιχαλίδες, making the original text uncertain. I register my awareness that many commentators understand James to be drawing upon the comparison of Israel’s unfaithfulness to adultery, such as appears in texts like Hosea 1–5 and Jer 2:23–5:19. But note that interpreters who hold that God is the implied subject of ἐπιποθεῖ in the disputed quotation in James 4:5 (which I do not, see below) are likely drawn to this explanation to support the view that James 4:5 is about God being righteously jealous (which it is not; it is about φθόνος, “envy,” a word never used in relation to God).

4:5: There are three allusions to the Genesis narrative in 4:5: in the words “desires with envy,” “spirit,” and “made to dwell.”²¹Chris Α. Vlachos, James, EGGNT (B&H Academic), 136, comments, “the rel[ative] clause ὃ κατῴκισεν ἐν ἡμῖν, which modifies τὸ πνεῦμα, likely reflects the OT doctrine of God’s inbreathing of the spirit into humans at creation (cf. Gen 2:7; Eccl 12:7).” Since one of the central problems I hope to resolve in this article is the proper interpretation of this verse, I will return to it after highlighting the various other echoes of the Genesis narrative in 3:7–5:9.

4:7: “Resist the devil, and he will flee from you.” Though the devil is not explicitly mentioned in Genesis 4, a case can be made that the recipients of James’s letter would have been prone to read the devil into Genesis 4, for the following three reasons: (1) As just mentioned, some Jewish interpreters viewed Cain, not as the offspring of Adam and Eve, but rather as the offspring of the devil and Eve. (2) The story of Cain and Abel is the earliest biblical example of what Schnittjer and Harmon refer to as an “extended echo effect,” where the second story (Cain and Abel) displays literary parallels with the first story (the fall of Adam and Eve), wherein the serpent plays a central role.²²“Extended echo effect refers to the recurrence of similar elements from an earlier context in a later context usually in the same sequence (a-b-c, a-b-c)…. For example, the narrative of Cain’s sin uses an extended echo effect from the sin in the garden: e.g., desire/rule (Gen 3:16; 4:7); Where are you/is your brother? (3:9; 4:9); ground cursed (3:17; 4:11, 14); and banished to the east (3:23–24; 4:16). These parallels load Cain’s sin with Adam-and-Eve-like connotations for literary and theological outcomes.” Gary Edward Schnittjer and Matthew S. Harmon, How to Study the Bible’s Use of the Bible: Seven Hermeneutical Choices for the Old and New Testaments (Zondervan Academic, 2024), 208. (3) The personification of sin in Genesis 4:7b may not simply be a literary device, but may itself suggest a personal power lying behind the sin: “And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it.”

4:8: “Cleanse your hands, you sinners” evokes Genesis 4:11: “And now you are cursed from the ground, which has opened its mouth to receive your brother’s blood from your hand.” Furthermore, δίψυχος in James 4:8, which is usually translated as “double-minded” (here in the plural δίψυχοι) may have been a word coined by James himself, as Stanley Porter argues.²³Stanley E. Porter, “Is dipsuchos (James 1,8; 4,8) a ‘Christian’ Word?,” Bib 71 (1990): 469–98. Porter acknowledges that double-mindedness as a concept was widespread. If it was, can we suggest that James was influenced in his use (and perhaps creation) of this adjective (δύο + ψυχή) via the Greek translation of early Genesis, where the word ψυχή appears thirteen times in the first nine chapters, most notably for our discussion in LXX Genesis 2:7, “man became a living soul” (ψυχὴν ζῶσαν) (cf. James 4:5 “the spirit which he made to dwell in us”) and LXX Genesis 9:5 where God says regarding the life-blood: “and from the hand of the man’s brother I will earnestly seek out the soul/life of the man” (τὴν ψυχὴν τοῦ ἀνθρώπου). “Hand” and “brother” are words that appear in the Greek text of Genesis 9:5, both of which are important words for understanding the narrative of Cain and Abel, and both words that are used by James. On the concept of double-mindedness, a connection to Cain could have arisen in James’s mind by his reading of LXX Genesis 4:7 where God speaks, “Have you not sinned if you have brought it [the sacrifice] rightly, but not rightly divided it (δὲ μὴ διέλῃς)?” If James is evoking double-mindedness in Cain, he isn’t alone in it, since other interpreters viewed Cain as double-minded, including Philo and Augustine, though often employing different words.²⁴Philo attributed a type of double-mindedness to the way Cain gave his offering. Byron argues that Philo’s approach to Cain became influential: “Philo’s mode of interpretation was particularly popular among Christian exegetes like Augustine who used the LXX to condemn Cain as a person whose mind was divided against God.” See Philo, Questions and Answers on Genesis 1.64 and Augustine, City of God 15.7.1, cited in Byron, Cain and Abel in Text and Tradition, 50. For more on double-mindedness in James, see Darian Lockett, “Structure or Communicative Strategy? The ‘Two Ways’ Motif in James’ Theological Instruction,” Neot 42 (2008): 269–87.

4:9: “Be wretched and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned to mourning and your joy to gloom” could evoke Cain’s miserable outcry in Genesis 4:13–14 after he has been confronted by God, though this obviously is not the loudest echo of the Cain story in James.

4:8, 10: The suggestion of the presence of God in the words, “Draw near to God” (4:8), and in “Humble yourselves before the Lord” (4:10) could echo Genesis 4:16 if the other suggested echoes hold: “Then Cain went away from the presence of the Lord…”

4:11: “Do not speak evil against one another, brothers” may echo the words Cain spoke to Abel just before he murdered him in Genesis 4:8: “Cain spoke to Abel his brother. And when they were in the field, Cain rose up against his brother Abel and killed him.” Notice not only the mention of speaking in Genesis 4:8 but also the emphasis on him being his brother in this and the following verse. James’s overall use of “brothers” does not seem to increase or decrease in 3:7–5:9 as compared to the rest of his letter, but some of the moments he addresses his readers as “brothers” may echo the Genesis narrative (3:9–10, 12; 4:11; 5:7, 9). I only draw attention to James’s mentions of brothers because of how important the word “brother” is in Genesis (4:2, 8–10), most memorably in Genesis 4:9: “Then the Lord said to Cain, ‘Where is Abel your brother?’ He said, ‘I do not know; am I my brother’s keeper?’”

4:12: “There is only one lawgiver and judge, he who is able to save and to destroy.” This could echo the judgment passed onto Cain by the Lord, to which Cain responded, “My punishment is greater than I can bear” (Gen 4:13). The Lord then placed a mark on Cain to protect him (4:15). That is to say, in the words of James in this verse, God has the power to save and to destroy.

4:13: The plans to go to a city, and spend a year there, and make a profit in James 4:13 may evoke the building of a city by Cain’s son, Enoch (Gen 4:17), and the beginning of commerce, as represented especially by Tubal-cain, “the forger of all instruments of bronze and iron” (Gen 4:22). Contemporary readers of Genesis should remind themselves that the Cain narrative does not end after the murder of Abel; it continues to the end of Genesis 4, as the continuing mention of Cain in the latter verses of Genesis 4 makes clear (4:17, 24, 25).

4:14: “What is your life? For you are a mist that appears for a little time and then vanishes.” I see this as a stronger allusion to Genesis 4, even though it hasn’t heretofore been called out. Eve’s name means “life.” Abel’s name means “mist.”²⁵“The term הבל has been used to indicate a variety of concepts such as ‘vanity,’ ‘nothingness,’ ‘incomprehensibility,’ ‘ephemerality,’ ‘absurdity,’ and ‘breath’ or ‘vapor,’ of which the last is considered the literal meaning.” Vermeulen, “Mind the Gap,” 35. The idea of life suddenly vanishing is precisely what happened to Abel in his unexpected death. That the mist refers to living and dying (rather than some less-specific ephemerality) is supported by the following verse 15 where James writes, “Instead you ought to say, ‘If the Lord wills, we will live…’” The combination of mist and the living/dying idea in these verses in my mind makes an allusion to Abel’s name and death more likely than not.²⁶There is even a consonance in 4:13–14 that may be intentional: the repetition of eight unvoiced labials π and two φ—perhaps a literary version of the “puff” of a temporary mist. (Sleeper does not draw this out the way I did, but the idea for looking into this came from a comment by C. Freeman Sleeper, James, ANTC [Abington, 1998], 118–19: “In verse 13 three of the Greek words begin with the letter ‘p,’ giving us assimilation that cannot be conveyed in English.”)

4:16: “As it is, you boast in your arrogance. All such boasting is evil.” This could echo Lamech’s boast to his wives about killing two people, claiming it was worse than what Cain did (Gen 4:23–24).²⁷“Perhaps, then, what Lamech is saying (quite barbarically) is that not only has he killed a man for wounding him, he has not hesitated to kill a mere boy for hurting him.” Robert Alter, Genesis: Translation and Commentary (Norton, 1996), 20.

4:17: “So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin.” This sentence of James shares similarities to God’s words to Cain: “You will be accepted if you do what is right. But if you refuse to do what is right, then watch out! Sin is crouching at the door, eager to control you. But you must subdue it and be its master” (Gen 4:7 NLT).

1.3. James 5

As we move into chapter 5, it is worth noting that Byron has (effectively in my opinion) argued that James 5:1–6 should be read against the background of Abel as an exemplar of unjust suffering and Cain as the envious and grasping oppressor.²⁸Byron, “Living in the Shadow of Cain,” 261–74.

5:4: After castigating the rich for three verses running, James turns his attention to the way wealthy landowners have treated their workers: “Behold, the wages of the laborers who mowed your fields, which you kept back by fraud, are crying out against you, and the cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord of hosts.” Here the allusion is to God’s words to Cain: “What have you done? The voice of your brother’s blood is crying to me from the ground” (Gen 4:10). The allusion is secured by: (1) the use of personification in both contexts, (2) the “crying out” in both contexts (of “blood” in Genesis, and “wages” in James), and (3) the ground/fields/harvest.

5:5: “You have fattened your hearts in a day of slaughter.” It is not immediately obvious from the grammar whether this sentence asserts that rich people are slaughtering the poor or, alternatively, that a judgment (slaughter) on the rich for what they have done is coming. But when read together with the following verse, it seems more likely that James is saying that the rich are slaughtering the poor. Since the Cain and Abel narrative by this point has already been flowing as a subtext for many paragraphs, perhaps we should view the expression “day of slaughter” as a double-reference to what the rich are doing to the poor (perhaps by starving them through withholding their wages²⁹Elsa Tamez, The Scandalous Message of James: Faith Without Works Is Dead (Crossroad, 1990), 20. Cf. Sir 34:26, “To take away a neighbor’s living is to murder him; to deprive an employee of his wages is to shed blood.”), while also alluding to the murder of Abel by Cain.

5:6: “You have condemned and murdered the righteous person. He does not resist you.” If any of the other allusions to Cain hold, the mention of murdering one righteous would seem patently to be an allusion to Cain’s murder of righteous Abel (cf. Matt 23:35 and Heb 11:4 for the use of the word “righteous” [δίκαιος] to describe Abel).

5:7: “See how the farmer waits for the precious fruit of the earth, being patient about it, until it receives the early and the late rains.” The agricultural metaphor could evoke the offering brought to the Lord by Cain.

5:9: “Do not grumble against one another, brothers, so that you may not be judged, behold, the Judge is standing at the door.” The first part of this verse may echo the grumbling of Cain against his brother (Gen 4:5–9). But the language of “standing at the door,” should suggest to the attentive reader another connection with Genesis 4:7: “And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door.” Even if the door metaphor gets applied differently in the two passages, the word “door” is unusual in the New Testament and, when used figuratively, almost always has positive connotations (e.g., John 10:1–9; Acts 14:27; 1 Cor 16:9; 2 Cor 2:12; Col 4:3; Rev 3:8, 20). The common positive use of “door” contrasts to the ominous way James uses it here in 5:9—perhaps picking up the ominous theme of Genesis 4. And, of course, God is Judge both in Genesis and James.

1.4. Other Old Testament Persons

James appeals to four other Old Testament persons as positive exemplars in his letter—but none of the four appear in the section of the letter we are studying. Prior to the section of the letter under consideration (3:7–5:9), James explicitly calls out two other Old Testament narrative models: Abraham (2:21–23) and Rahab (2:25). Following our section of concern are two other narrative ideals: Job (5:11) and Elijah (5:17–18). But in this middle section of the letter, James draws upon no other such models. The presence of these other exemplars demonstrates James’s tendency to draw upon Old Testament persons; whereas their absence in the middle section (3:7–5:9) opens the door for us to identify another, that is, Cain, who, unlike the others, is a negative example and perhaps for that reason not explicitly named.

1.5. Conclusion

To conclude the first part of this article, let me note that even if some of the suggested echoes of Cain appear less convincing on their own, this section of the letter from 3:7–5:9 contains nine stronger allusions to early Genesis that buttress the other suggested echoes. These nine include: (1) the creatures list (3:7); (2) “made in the likeness of God” (3:9); (3) the direct references to murder (4:2; cf. 5:6); (4) the “spirit which he has made to dwell in us” and “desires with envy” (4:5); (5) “cleanse your hands, you sinners” (4:8); (6) “What is your life [Eve’s name]? For you are a mist [Abel’s name] that appears for a little time and then vanishes” (Abel’s fate; 4:14); (7) “the wages of the laborers … are crying out against you … reached the ears of the Lord of hosts” (5:4); (8) “You have condemned and murdered the righteous person. He does not resist you” (5:6); and (9) “the Judge is standing at the door” (5:9). These stronger allusions strengthen the case of the numerous other echoes suggested above.³⁰As Travis B. Williams, “Intertextuality and Methodological Bias: Prolegomena to the Evaluation of Source Materials in I Peter,” JSNT 39 (2016): 180, notes, “As the number of similarities are multiplied, the likelihood of a literary connection also increases.” Of course, it isn’t simply the number, but the weight of the similarities must be factored in, as Williams himself notes. Furthermore, the difficulty in drawing up intertextual connections with prediluvian Genesis and the story of Cain before James 3:7 and after 5:9 and the ease with which such connections are produced within this middle section supports the case so far presented.

2. Resolving the Difficulties of James 4:5

Identifying the story of Cain and Abel as James’s primary narrative subtext in 3:7–5:9 may help resolve the main problems of 4:5. These problems include the following:

1. What is the source of James’s quotation? James leads with one of the clearest citation formulae in the New Testament: ἢ δοκεῖτε ὅτι κενῶς ἡ γραφὴ λέγει· (“Or do you suppose it is to no purpose that the Scripture says…”). But where is he quoting from?
2. Is τὸ πνεῦμα a reference to God’s Spirit (“the Spirit”), or is it a reference to the human spirit (“the spirit”)?
3. What is the subject of the sentence James cites when he writes πρὸς φθόνον ἐπιποθεῖ τὸ πνεῦμα ὃ κατῴκισεν ἐν ἡμῖν?³¹In other words, is τὸ πνεῦμα nominative or accusative? Is the subject an implied “He”? Thus: “He (God) jealously desires the s/Spirit which he caused to dwell in us.” Or is the subject τὸ πνεῦμα (The s/Spirit)? Thus: “The s/Spirit which he caused to dwell in us desires with envy.”

If in fact James is using Cain—as described in Genesis 4 and mediated through subsequent Jewish interpretation—as an archetype for the dangers of envy and evil desires, each of these questions is readily answered. Anticipating a conclusion, the correct interpretation of the quoted section of the verse should be: “The spirit [small “s”] which he caused to dwell in us desires with envy.”

In other words, the “Scripture” (γραφή) James cites is a combination of the reference to God putting a spirit in humans (Gen 2:7; echoed in 4:1) plus the evil envious desires potentially found in the hearts of God’s people as illustrated by Cain in Genesis 4.³²Joseph B. Mayor, The Epistle of St. James, 2nd ed. (Macmillan, 1897), 136, reminds us that “we have other instances of quotations in the N. T. which remind us rather of the general sense of several passages, than of the actual words of any one particular passage in the O. T.” Even though God had given Cain his life/soul, Cain’s motivating sin was envious desire, which led to the murder of his brother Abel.

In addition to the general observation that James connects to Genesis 4 (and surrounding chapters) in James 3:7–5:9, here are some other reasons for supporting this understanding of James 4:5.

1. James has already highlighted envious human desire as a primary concern in this section of James (3:14, 16; 4:1–2), so reading 4:5 as the envious desires of the human spirit (as exemplified in Cain) simply continues the conversation that James has already begun in the preceding verses. In contrast, the idea of God desiring jealously, or the Spirit desiring jealously, would introduce a new idea.³³Notice also the possible aural resonance between ἐπιθυμέω in v. 2 and ἐπιποθέω in v. 5. From an interpretive standpoint, in areas of dispute, it is better to draw upon ideas already present in the flow of thought than to introduce something new.
2. The word “desire” plays an important role in Genesis 4: “If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it” (Gen 4:7; cf. 3:16). In the Genesis narrative, the desire motif is intensified through the meaning of Cain’s name, and drawn out by later ancient interpreters, as discussed above. So, not only is James drawing a connection with Genesis 4, he seems particularly influenced by the theme of evil desire that is so important in Genesis 4, a theme that influenced the way later Jewish and Christian writers interpreted Genesis 4. This links with the desire of James 4:5.
3. “Envy” (φθόνος) is always used negatively in the Septuagint. The word is never used in contexts regarding God’s jealousy. Even among Hellenistic authors, both Jewish and non-Jewish, as Luke Timothy Johnson has so forcefully argued, φθόνος is uniformly used in a negative sense.³⁴Johnson, “James 3:13–4:10,” 334–46. Though in many contexts ζήλος (jealousy) and φθόνος (envy) might be viewed as synonyms, the point to be made is that although the word ζήλος is sometimes employed as a description for God, φθόνος is a word never associated with him, unless I have somehow missed a reference. Allison, The Epistle of James, 611, opines, “Had James (or his source) wanted to refer to the positive quality of divine zeal, he almost certainly would have used ζήλος.” This is a stronger argument than some commentators seem to have been willing to acknowledge.
4. This approach to 4:5 accounts for the unusual mention of murdering in James 4:2 (cf. 5:6). Are we to think that James is directly responding to reports that his readers have been murdering people?³⁵Peter H. Davids, The Epistle of James: A Commentary on the Greek Text (Eerdmans, 1982), 158, comments, “How does murder fit into this series? Many would answer: ‘It does not fit!’ Erasmus’s conjecture that instead of φονεύετε an original φθονεῖτε stood in the text has found wide acceptance…” However, among other observations, Davids disagrees, adding that “one has the biblical tradition stemming from the Cain-Abel, Ahab-Naboth pairings to influence such a connection.” I would contend that the connection to Cain and Abel is a primary reason murder is mentioned here.
5. Finally, this approach to 4:5 resolves the problem of locating the source of the quotation, a quotation that is introduced by a citation formula, but which has been contentious among interpreters. The quotation, thus, should be viewed as being drawn from Genesis 4 (in connection with 2:7) and should be understood as a condensation of two themes appearing in the early chapters of Genesis: a) the theme of God putting a spirit into a human body³⁶Sophie Laws, The Epistle of James, BNTC (Hendrickson, 1980), 174–75, writes about James 4:5, “this ‘spirit’ indwelling men may be understood as the spirit given at creation (Gen. ii. 7, vi. 3 LXX, cf. Job xxvii. 3, xxxii. 8; 1 QH iv. 31)…” and b) the theme of envious desire connected with Cain that surrounds James’s interpretive climate. In other words, James’s comment about “the spirit which he has made to dwell in us” is from Eve’s words in 4:1, “I have gotten a man with [the help of] the Lord,” which itself echoes 2:7 (cf. 7:22), “then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.” The second part of the quotation, “desires with envy” is a combination of the meaning of Cain’s name (“get,” as in 4:1 “I have gotten”) and God’s words in Genesis 4:7: “And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it.”

In other words, to draw upon Huffman’s recent taxonomy for understanding the use of the OT in the NT, James’s “quotation,” is actually a “historical reminiscence” that includes two “thematic echoes”³⁷Huffman, Understanding the New Testament Use of the Old Testament, 35. from Genesis: the putting of a spirit into humans and evil envious desires as modeled by Cain. James warns his readers against such envious desire in themselves.

One additional interpretive problem in 4:5 remains unresolved. Is πρὸς φθόνον being used adjectively (as I have so far treated it), that is, “with envy” or “enviously”? Thus: “The spirit which he made to dwell in us desires with envy/enviously.” Or, is James’s use of this prepositional phrase pointing toward the result or end of the desire? Thus: “The spirit which he made to dwell in us has desires that lead to envy?” I am uncertain which is correct, but both options fit the story of Cain well enough.

3. Conclusion

A subtext runs like a subterranean flow of magma beneath James 3:7–5:9, particularly the envious desire of Cain (as located more generally in the early chapters of Genesis and mediated through pre- and post-Jamesian Jewish interpretations of evil desire and envy). Cain is an exemplar of envy, and his negative example functions as a warning of what might happen if desire is permitted to run its course. An acknowledgment of James’s connection to the narrative of Cain and Abel resolves both the source of James’s quotation in 4:5 and ought to lead readers to understand the “quotation” (a compression of ideas appearing in early Genesis) as: “The [human] spirit which he made to dwell in us desires with envy.”³⁸Thanks are due my colleague, Darian Lockett, for interacting with me on this article and for offering many helpful suggestions and cautions.

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