8. If you really keep the royal law found in Scripture, ‘Love your neighbour as yourself,’ you are doing right.
9. But if you show favouritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as law-breakers.
10. For whoever keeps the whole law and yet stumbles at just one point is guilty of breaking all of it.
11. For he who said, ‘You shall not commit adultery,’ also said, ‘You shall not murder.’ If you do not commit adultery but do commit murder, you have become a law-breaker.
12. Speak and act as those who are going to be judged by the law that gives freedom,
13. because judgment without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been merciful. Mercy triumphs over judgment.
14. What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save them?
15. Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food.
16. If one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,’ but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it?
17. In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.
18. But someone will say, ‘You have faith; I have deeds.’Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by my deeds.
19. You believe that there is one God. Good! Even the demons believe that – and shudder.
20. You foolish person, do you want evidence that faith without deeds is useless?
21. Was not our father Abraham considered righteous for what he did when he offered his son Isaac on the altar?
22. You see that his faith and his actions were working together, and his faith was made complete by what he did.