Peacemakers who sow in peace reap the fruit of righteousness.
18 And the fruit of righteousness. This admits of two meanings, — that fruit is sown by the peaceable, which afterwards they gather, — or, that they themselves, though they meekly tolerate many things in their neighbors, do not yet cease to sow righteousness.
As the sins before condemned arise from an affectation of being thought more wise than others, and being endued with more knowledge than they, so the apostle in these verses shows the difference between men's pretending to be wise and their being really so, and between the wisdom which is from beneath (from earth or hell) and that which is from above. I.
Commenting on James 3:13-18
And the fruit of righteousness,.... Which is either eternal life, which is the fruit of Christ's righteousness, and shall be enjoyed by all those who are justified by it; and who, in consequence of it, through the grace of God, live soberly, righteously, and godly; see Rom 6:22 or else what is enjoyed in this life, as the fruit and effect of a righteous and...