James 3:14

But if ye have bitter jealousy and faction in your heart, glory not and lie not against the truth.

A pretended wisdom in one whose life and character are out of harmony with the Lord can never be the truth, even in areas where it might seem to coincide with it, the sum total of such a person's life being a lie against the truth.

Bitter jealousy and strife ... Oesterley and many others deduce from this that "The personal abuse heaped upon one another by partisans of rival schools of thought"[33] represents the type of sins condemned in this passage. Of course, such are included, but it is doubtful if the meaning may be thus restricted. The "truth" against which such evil strivings "lie" is the "truth of the gospel."[34] However, more is meant than merely contradicting the content of that which must be allowed as truthful. As Punchard observed:

Falsehood is not merely the hurt of some abstract virtue, or bare rule of right and wrong, but a direct blow at

the living Truth (John 14:6) ... All faintest shades of falsehood tend to the dark one of a fresh betrayal of the Son of man.[35]

No class of persons is any more in constant danger of falling short in this category than is the group of teachers and preachers of religious truth. Such persons are accustomed to speaking and having their words accepted; and their attitude tends to become like that mentioned by Shakespeare:

I am Sir Oracle,

And when I open my lips, let no dog bark[36]

Thus is stressed the greater need for all who "contend earnestly for the faith" to do so in a manner becoming the meekness and modesty of truly Christian teachers.

[33] W. E. Oesterley, op. cit., p. 455.

[34] R. C. H. Lenski, op. cit., p. 617.

[35] E. G. Punchard, op. cit., p. 371.

[36] William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice, Act I, Scene 1, Line 193.