James 1:2

Count it all joy, my brethren, when ye fall into manifold temptations;

Count it all joy ... Did not Christ say, "Blessed are ye when men shall persecute you ... rejoice and be exceeding glad"? (Matthew 5:11,12). This is exactly the thought of James here.

Manifold temptations ... Although the same word is used in James 1:12, below, it is the inner propensity toward evil that is meant there, outward trials and hardships being the thing in focus here. Wessel stated that "The word [@pietrasmos] (trials) has two meanings: external adversities here, and inner impulse to evil in James 1:12-14[8]

James could not have meant here that Christians are "to pretend that they get joy out of things which are disagreeable, for that would be an act of insincerity."[9] "The true view of temptation or trial is that it is an opportunity to gain new strength through overcoming."[10]

My brethren ... This expression occurs "sixteen times" [11] in the book of James, absolutely demanding that the letter be accepted as Christian. When James wrote, secular Israel had long ago hardened into unyielding opposition to Christianity; and there is no way to suppose that the racial Jews of the Dispersion are meant by this repeated appeal to "my brethren." If James had been directed to the Diaspora, it most certainly would have included a section hailing Jesus Christ as the Messiah; but the addressees of this epistle were already Christians.

[8] Walter W. Wessell, op. cit., p. 946.

[9] E. M. Zerr, Bible Commentary, James (Marion, Indiana: The Cogdill Foundation, 1954), p. 241.

[10] James William Russell, Compact Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, 1964), p. 571.

[11] Walter W. Wessell, op. cit., p. 945.