See how great a forest a little fire kindles! And the tongue is a fire, a world of iniquity. The tongue is so set among our members that it defiles the whole body, and sets on fire the course of nature; and it is set on fire by hell. For every kind of beast and bird, of reptile and creature of the sea, is tamed and has been tamed by mankind. But no man can tame the tongue. It is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison. With it we bless our God and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in the similitude of God. Out of the same mouth proceed blessing and cursing. My brethren, these things ought not to be so. Does a spring send forth fresh water and bitter from the same opening? Can a fig tree, my brethren, bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs? Thus no spring yields both salt water and fresh. — James 3:5b–12 (NKJV)
I don’t even understand what James is talking about here. He makes it sound like speech is our enemy. Didn’t you just say that it’s a great gift?
Yes, it is a great gift (so is nuclear power), but great power enables great evil. Our sinful nature can do great things with great power—greatly evil things.
This passage is the perfect follow-on for yesterday’s one. Given the power of speech, what should we expect people to do with it? That’s the secret behind this famous quote.
“Power tends to corrupt; absolute power corrupts absolutely.” — Lord Acton
Brilliant, but I prefer this modern version by Edward R. Tufte, the author of the legendary work, The Visual Display of Quantitative Information.
“Power corrupts; PowerPoint corrupts absolutely.”
Ha. That might even be literally true; anything that enhances speech enhances its potential to do harm. You can lie more effectively with charts and graphics.
Are you familiar with the book How to Lie with Statistics by Darrell Huff?
Sure. It’s a classic.
Then you know that Huff wrote it to help people know when they’re being conned. He concluded the introduction with this gem, “The crooks already know these tricks; honest men must learn them in self-defense.”
All these truisms are examples of how power enables both good and evil. In fact, Lord Acton’s quote about power corrupting isn’t exactly true. Power doesn’t actually corrupt; it just makes corruption manifest. The corruption (sin) was always there.
You keep mentioning this thing called “sin”, but I haven’t really called you out on it. It seems like you’re assuming that everyone is evil—that there are no good guys.
Yes, and I think all these quotes reflect that.
Time out. Why can’t it be true that power corrupts people who aren’t corrupt to begin with? Why can’t there be some people who don’t lie with statistics?
Sure, there are people who tell the truth with statistics. Not everyone is bad all the time; that’s not what my (and James’s) assumption is. It’s that we all have an evil core.
I think the best example of that can be seen in the structure of the US Constitution. The founding fathers believed in this Christian doctrine and so built checks and balances into our system of government.
Rather than try to limit power to only people who could handle it, they limited power period. They separated power into the three branches of government and gave each branch the power to hold the other branches accountable.
And this has worked beautifully. Our constitution is the longest surviving constitution in history.
Okay, connect that back to this passage.
The high point is, “My brethren, these things ought not to be so.”
James is referring to how with the same tongue we bless our God and Father, and with it we curse men, who have been made in the similitude of God.
This dual use is creepy. James wonders how this is even possible.
Does a spring send forth fresh water and bitter from the same opening? Can a fig tree, my brethren, bear olives, or a grapevine bear figs?
James is asking, “What’s wrong with this picture?” His point is that we should see this as a contradiction.
Why is that so important?
That contradiction challenges the validity of when we bless our God and Father.
This is on the same level as, “Faith without works is dead.” Here, praising God isn’t legit if we curse men with the same tongue. If our speech is inconsistent, then the things we say aren’t reliable. Even our confession of faith becomes suspect.
I can see why James wouldn’t be happy with that.
So, this is all part of James’s overall theme that our behavior matters. Bad behavior is concerning as an indicator, but it can also bear bad fruit.
James will give us another example of how our sin wrecks things tomorrow.
See you then.
