James 1:23

23 Those who hear but don't do the word are like those who look at their faces in a mirror.

James 1:23 Meaning and Commentary

James 1:23

But if any man be a hearer of the word, and not a doer,
&c.] The Arabic version here again reads, "a hearer of the law", and so some copies; not hearing, but practice, is the main thing; not theory, but action: hence, says R. Simeon, not the word, or the searching into it, and the explanation of it, is the root, or principal thing, (hvemh ala) , "but the work" ^F16: and if a man is only a preacher, or a hearer, and not a doer,

he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass;
or, "the face of his generation"; the face with which he was born; his true, genuine, native face; in distinction from any counterfeit one, or from the face of his mind: it means his own corporeal face. The Ethiopic version renders it, "the lineaments of his face".

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FOOTNOTES:

F16 Pirke Abot, c. 1. sect. 17.

James 1:23 In-Context

21 Therefore, with humility, set aside all moral filth and the growth of wickedness, and welcome the word planted deep inside you—the very word that is able to save you.

22 You must be doers of the word and not only hearers who mislead themselves.

23 Those who hear but don't do the word are like those who look at their faces in a mirror.

24 They look at themselves, walk away, and immediately forget what they were like.

25 But there are those who study the perfect law, the law of freedom, and continue to do it. They don't listen and then forget, but they put it into practice in their lives. They will be blessed in whatever they do.