Take, brothers, for an example of suffering and of perseverance, the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord.

World English Bible · Public Domain

Parallel Translations

  • WEB World English Bible

    Take, brothers, for an example of suffering and of perseverance, the prophets who spoke in the name of the Lord.

  • TYNDALE Tyndale New Testament (1534)

    Take (my brethren) the prophettes for an ensample of sufferynge adversitie and of longe pacience which spake in the name of the lorde.

  • GNV Geneva Bible (1599)

    Take, my brethren, the Prophets for an ensample of suffering aduersitie, and of long patience, which haue spoken in the Name of the Lord.

View more translations →

Cross-references (15)

Passages linked to James 5:10 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.

  • Hebrews 11:32-38 What more shall I say? For the time would fail me if I told of Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah, David, Samuel, and the prophets, who through faith subdued kingdoms, worked out righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions, quenched the power of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, from weakness were made strong, grew mighty in war, and caused foreign armies to flee. Women received their dead by resurrection. Others were tortured, not accepting their deliverance, that they might obtain a better resurrection. Others were tried by mocking and scourging, yes, moreover by bonds and imprisonment. They were stoned. They were sawn apart. They were tempted. They were slain with the sword. They went around in sheep skins and in goat skins; being destitute, afflicted, ill-treated— of whom the world was not worthy—wandering in deserts, mountains, caves, and the holes of the earth.
  • Matthew 5:11-12 “Blessed are you when people reproach you, persecute you, and say all kinds of evil against you falsely, for my sake. Rejoice, and be exceedingly glad, for great is your reward in heaven. For that is how they persecuted the prophets who were before you.
  • Hebrews 13:7 Remember your leaders, men who spoke to you the word of God, and considering the results of their conduct, imitate their faith.
  • Acts 7:52 Which of the prophets didn’t your fathers persecute? They killed those who foretold the coming of the Righteous One, of whom you have now become betrayers and murderers.
  • Acts 3:21 whom heaven must receive until the times of restoration of all things, which God spoke long ago by the mouth of his holy prophets.
  • 1 Thessalonians 2:14-15 For you, brothers, became imitators of the assemblies of God which are in Judea in Christ Jesus; for you also suffered the same things from your own countrymen, even as they did from the Jews who killed both the Lord Jesus and their own prophets, and drove us out, and don’t please God, and are contrary to all men,
  • Luke 6:23 Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in heaven, for their fathers did the same thing to the prophets.
  • 2 Chronicles 36:16 but they mocked the messengers of God, and despised his words, and scoffed at his prophets, until Yahweh’s wrath arose against his people, until there was no remedy.
  • Isaiah 39:8 Then Hezekiah said to Isaiah, “Yahweh’s word which you have spoken is good.” He said moreover, “For there will be peace and truth in my days.”
  • Jeremiah 2:30 “I have struck your children in vain. They received no correction. Your own sword has devoured your prophets, like a destroying lion.
  • Jeremiah 26:16 Then the princes and all the people said to the priests and to the prophets: “This man is not worthy of death; for he has spoken to us in the name of Yahweh our God.”
  • Matthew 21:34-39 When the season for the fruit came near, he sent his servants to the farmers, to receive his fruit. The farmers took his servants, beat one, killed another, and stoned another. Again, he sent other servants more than the first: and they treated them the same way. But afterward he sent to them his son, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ But the farmers, when they saw the son, said among themselves, ‘This is the heir. Come, let’s kill him, and seize his inheritance.’ So they took him, and threw him out of the vineyard, and killed him.
  • Matthew 23:34-37 Therefore behold, I send to you prophets, wise men, and scribes. Some of them you will kill and crucify; and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues, and persecute from city to city; that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zachariah son of Barachiah, whom you killed between the sanctuary and the altar. Most certainly I tell you, all these things will come upon this generation. “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets, and stones those who are sent to her! How often I would have gathered your children together, even as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you would not!
  • Luke 13:34 “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, like a hen gathers her own brood under her wings, and you refused!
  • Jeremiah 23:22 But if they had stood in my council, then they would have caused my people to hear my words, and would have turned them from their evil way, and from the evil of their doings.

Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)

↑ Top

Explain this verse (19 sources)

Historical commentary, presented as a primary source — not an endorsement.

John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain 10 Take, my brethren, the prophets. The comfort which…

10 Take, my brethren, the prophets. The comfort which he brings is not that which is according to the common proverb, that the miserable hope for like companions in evils. That they set before them associates, in whose number it was desirable to be classed; and to have the same condition with them, was no misery. For as we must necessarily feel extreme grief, when any evil happens to us which the children of God have never experienced, so it is a singular consolation when we know that we suffer nothing different from them; nay, when we know that we have to sustain the same yoke with them.

When Job heard from his friends,

Read full note →

“Turn to the saints, can you find any like to thee?” (Job 5:1,)

it was the voice of Satan, because he wished to drive him to despair. When, on the other hand, the Spirit by the mouth of James designs to raise us up to a good hope, he shews to us all the fore-going saints, who as it were stretch out their hand to us, and by their example encourage us to undergo and to conquer afflictions.

The life of men is indeed indiscriminately subject to troubles and adversities; but James did not bring forward any kind of men for examples, for it would have availed nothing to perish with the multitude; but he chose the prophets, a fellowship with whom is blessed. Nothing so breaks us down and disheartens us as the feeling of misery; it is therefore a real consolation to know that those things commonly deemed evils are aids and helps to our salvation. This is, indeed, what is far from being understood by the flesh; yet the faithful ought to be convinced of this, that they are happy when by various troubles they are proved by the Lord. To convince us of this, James reminds us to consider the end or design of the afflictions endured by the prophets; for as our own evils we are without judgment, being influenced by grief, sorrow, or some other immoderate feelings, as we see nothing under a foggy sky and in the midst of storms, and being tossed here and there as it were by a tempest, it is therefore necessary for us to cast our eyes to another quarter, where the sky is in a manner serene and bright. When the afflictions of the saints are related to us, there is no one who will allow that they were miserable, but, on the contrary, that they were happy.

Then James has done well for us; for he has laid before our eyes a pattern, that we may learn to look at it whenever we are tempted to impatience or to despair: and he takes this principle as granted, that the prophets were blessed in their afflictions, for they courageously sustained them. Since it was so, he concludes that the same judgment ought to be formed of us when afflicted.

And he says, the prophets who have spoken in the name of the Lord; by which he intimates that they were accepted and approved by God. If, then, it had been useful for them to have been free from miseries, doubtless God would have kept them free. But it was otherwise. It hence follows that afflictions are salutary to the faithful. He, therefore, bids them to be taken as an example of suffering affliction. But patience also must be added, which is a real evidence of our obedience. Hence he has joined them both together.

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain Because most men are wont to object, that it…
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain 10 Take, my brethren, the prophets, who have spoken…
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain Take, my brethren, the prophets; as being most eminent…
William Burkitt 1703 · Public Domain Here the apostle exhorts suffering Christians to patience, by…
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain Take, my brethren, the prophets, who have spoken in…
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain Take the prophets for an example - Once persecuted…
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 10. Take - the prophets] The prophets who…
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain Jas 5:10-11. Take the prophets — Once persecuted like…
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain Take, my brethren, the prophets - That is, in…
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain Exemplum accipite, exitus mali, et laboris, et patientiæ, Greek:…
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain the prophets--who were especially persecuted, and therefore were especially…
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 10. The prophets—In St. James’ view the Christian has…
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 10. Take, my brethren, the prophets …] Better, as…
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (10) For an example.—Another reason for endurance, an example…
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain The injunction is further strengthened by an appeal to…
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain An example of suffering affliction--
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain 10, 11. Take, my brethren, the prophets. They suffered,…
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 5:10 This verse reflects on Matt 5:11 and Luke…

↑ Top

Share