John Calvin Commentary James 2:12

"So speak ye, and so do, as men that are to be judged by a law of liberty." — James 2:12 (ASV)

So speak ye. Some offer this explanation: that because they flattered themselves too much, they are summoned to the right tribunal. For men absolve themselves according to their own notions, because they withdraw from the judgment of the divine law.

He then reminds them that all deeds and words must be accounted for there, because God will judge the world according to his law. However, since such a declaration might have struck them with immoderate terror, to correct or mitigate what they might have thought severe, he adds, the law of liberty. For we know what Paul says,

Whosoever are under the law are under a curse (Galatians 3:10).

Hence, the judgment of the law in itself is condemnation to eternal death; but by the word liberty, he means that we are freed from the rigor of the law.

This meaning is not altogether unsuitable. However, if one examines more minutely what immediately follows, one will see that James meant something else. The sense is as though he had said, “Unless you wish to undergo the rigor of the law, you must be less rigid towards your neighbors; for the law of liberty is the same as the mercy of God, which delivers us from the curse of the law.”

And so this verse ought to be read with what follows, where he speaks of the duty of bearing with infirmities. Doubtless, the whole passage reads well in this way: “Since none of us can stand before God unless we are delivered and freed from the strict rigor of the law, we ought to act in such a way that we may not, through too much severity, exclude the indulgence or mercy of God, of which we all have need until the very end.”