Part 12

013:002 If I possess the gift of prophecy and am versed in all mysteries and all knowledge, and have such absolute faith that I can remove mountains, but am destitute of Love, I am nothing.

013:003 And if I distribute all my possessions to the poor, and give up my body to be burned, but am destitute of Love, it profits me nothing.

013:004 Love is patient and kind. Love knows neither envy nor jealousy. Love is not forward and self-assertive, nor boastful and conceited.

013:005 She does not behave unbecomingly, nor seek to aggrandize herself, nor blaze out in passionate anger, nor brood over wrongs.

013:006 She finds no pleasure in injustice done to others, but joyfully sides with the truth.

013:007 She knows how to be silent. She is full of trust, full of hope, full of patient endurance.

013:008 Love never fails. But if there are prophecies, they will be done away with; if there are languages, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be brought to an end.

013:009 For our knowledge is imperfect, and so is our prophesying;

013:010 but when the perfect state of things is come, all that is imperfect will be brought to an end.

013:011 When I was a child, I talked like a child, felt like a child, reasoned like a child: when I became a man, I put from me childish ways.

013:012 For the present we see things as if in a mirror, and are puzzled; but then we shall see them face to face. For the present the knowledge I gain is imperfect; but then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.

013:013 And so there remain Faith, Hope, Love--these three; and of these the greatest is Love.

014:001 Be eager in your pursuit of this Love, and be earnestly ambitious for spiritual gifts, but let it be chiefly so in order that you may prophesy.

014:002 For he who speaks in an unknown tongue is not speaking to men, but to God; for no one understands him. Yet in the Spirit he is speaking secret truths.

014:003 But he who prophesies speaks to men words of edification, encouragement and comfort.

014:004 He who speaks in an unknown tongue does good to himself, but he who prophesies does good to the Church.

014:005 I should be right glad were you all to speak in `tongues,' but yet more glad were you all to prophesy. And, in fact, the man who prophesies is superior to him who speaks in `tongues,' except when the latter can interpret in order that the Church may get a blessing.

014:006 But, brethren, as things are, if I come to you speaking in `tongues,' what benefit shall I confer on you, if the utterance is neither in the form of a revelation nor of additional knowledge nor of prophecy nor of teaching?

014:007 Even inanimate things--flutes or harps, for instance-- when yielding a sound, if they make no distinction in the notes, how shall the tune which is played on the flute or the harp be known?

014:008 If the bugle--to take another example--gives an uncertain sound, who will prepare for battle?

014:009 And so with you; if with the living voice you fail to utter intelligible words, how will people know what you are saying? You will be talking to the winds.

014:010 There are, we will suppose, a great number of languages in the world, and no creature is without a language.

014:011 If, however, I do not know the meaning of the particular language, I shall seem to the speaker of it, and he to me, to be merely talking some foreign tongue.

014:012 Therefore, seeing that you are ambitious for spiritual gifts, seek to excel in them so as to benefit the Church.

014:013 Therefore let a man who has the gift of tongues pray for the power of interpreting them.

014:014 For if I pray in an unknown tongue, my spirit prays, but my understanding is barren.

014:015 How then does the matter stand? I will pray in spirit, and I will pray with my understanding also. I will praise God in spirit, and I will praise Him with my understanding also.

014:016 Otherwise, if you bless God in spirit only, how shall he who is in the position of an ungifted man say the `Amen' to your giving of thanks, when he does not know what your words mean?