James 3:9 — the mouth that blesses God is the one running people down
9By it we bless God the Father, and by it we speak evil of men, who have been made in the likeness of God.
Notice the subject: James writes "we". He is not pointing at the reader; he is placing himself inside the contradiction he describes.
Short answer
James 3:9 points at a concrete contradiction: the same tongue that blesses God speaks evil of people. The argument is not about manners but about theology. The person being torn down was made in God’s likeness, which ties the treatment of another human being directly to the praise offered the Creator.
- Written by
- Maria Luisa Navarro Schmitt
- Reviewed by
- Raphael Navarro Schmitt
- Published on
- Reading time
- 2 min read
James 3 is the hardest passage in the New Testament about speech, and the most visual: a horse’s bit, a ship’s rudder, a spark that burns down a forest, an animal nobody can tame.
Where this verse appears
The chapter opens with a warning to would-be teachers, who will be judged more strictly. The subject of the tongue enters through that door — first as the problem of people who speak in public, then as everyone’s problem.
Then come the images, one after another, all about disproportion: a tiny part steering something huge, a spark destroying an entire wood.
This verse is where the run of images lands on a real example, and the example is religious: the same gathering where God is blessed is the one where a reputation gets taken apart.
What it says
The contradiction is built in parallel: one instrument, two opposite uses. And the next verse insists this ought not to be so — James is not describing an insoluble dilemma but an incoherence.
A note on the wording here. This edition renders the second half as speaking evil of people rather than cursing them, which lowers the temperature and, oddly, raises the stakes. Cursing sounds like something other people do. Speaking evil of someone is a thing most of us did this week.
The decisive move is the closing clause. Running someone down is not merely rude: it is running down a creature made in God’s likeness. It is the same reasoning Genesis uses to ground the worth of every person, transferred to conversation. And notice who is writing: James uses the first person plural throughout, which makes the passage hard to pick up and use against other people. That is probably why it was written that way.
What to do with it today
The most honest use of this verse is domestic. Look back over the past few days — group chats, remarks about colleagues, the tone you take with the people you live with — and ask whether the mouth that prays is the one settling everything with sarcasm.
And the verse hands over a simple standard: before you talk about someone, remember they carry God’s likeness, including when they are wrong. That does not rule out criticism. It changes how criticism gets made.
A prayer to carry with you
Lord, the same mouth that praises you has wounded people you made. Guard my tongue, and remind me whose likeness I am handling when I talk about someone else. Amen.