2 ¹⁴ MY BROTHERS, what use is it for a man to say he has faith when he does nothing to show it? 2 ¹⁵ Can that faith save him? Suppose a brother or a sister is in rags with not enough food for the day, 2 ¹⁶ and one of you says, 'Good luck to you, keep yourselves warm, and have plenty to eat', but does nothing to supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that? 2 ¹⁷ So with faith; if it does not lead to action, it is in itself a lifeless thing.

2 ¹⁸ But someone may object: 'Here is one who claims to have faith and another who points to his deeds.' To which I reply: 'Prove to me that this faith you speak of is real though not accompanied by deeds, and by my deeds I will prove to you my faith.' 2 ¹⁹ You have faith enough to believe that there is one God. Excellent! The devils have faith like that, and it makes them tremble. 2 ²⁰ But can you not see, you quibbler, that faith divorced from deeds is barren? 2 ²¹ Was it not by his action, in offering his son Isaac upon the altar, that our father Abraham was justified? 2 ²² Surely you can see that faith was at work in his actions, and that by these actions the integrity of his faith was fully proved. 2 ^{23 [ Gn.15.6. ]} Here was fulfilment of the words of Scripture: 'Abraham put his faith in God, and that faith was counted to him as righteousness'; and elsewhere he is called 'God's friend'. 2 ²⁴ You see then that a man is justified by deeds and not by faith in itself. 2 ²⁵ The same is true of the prostitute Rahab also. Was not she justified by her action in welcoming the messengers into her house and sending them away by a different route? 2 ²⁶ As the body is dead when there is no breath left in it, so faith divorced from deeds is lifeless as a corpse.