1 Corinthians 12:31-13:13
English Standard Version
31 But (A)earnestly desire the higher gifts.
And I will show you a still more excellent way.
The Way of Love
13 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have (B)prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, (C)so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. 3 (D)If I give away all I have, and (E)if I deliver up my body to be burned,[a] but have not love, I gain nothing.
4 (F)Love is patient and (G)kind; love (H)does not envy or boast; it (I)is not arrogant 5 or rude. It (J)does not insist on its own way; it (K)is not irritable or resentful;[b] 6 it (L)does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but (M)rejoices with the truth. 7 (N)Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, (O)endures all things.
8 Love never ends. As for prophecies, they will pass away; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will pass away. 9 For (P)we know in part and we prophesy in part, 10 but (Q)when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away. 11 When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I gave up childish ways. 12 For (R)now we see in a mirror dimly, but (S)then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as (T)I have been fully known.
13 So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
Footnotes
- 1 Corinthians 13:3 Some manuscripts deliver up my body [to death] that I may boast
- 1 Corinthians 13:5 Greek irritable and does not count up wrongdoing
1 Corinthians 12:31-13:13
New Living Translation
31 So you should earnestly desire the most helpful gifts.
But now let me show you a way of life that is best of all.
Love Is the Greatest
13 If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. 3 If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it;[a] but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing.
4 Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud 5 or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. 6 It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out. 7 Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance.
8 Prophecy and speaking in unknown languages[b] and special knowledge will become useless. But love will last forever! 9 Now our knowledge is partial and incomplete, and even the gift of prophecy reveals only part of the whole picture! 10 But when the time of perfection comes, these partial things will become useless.
11 When I was a child, I spoke and thought and reasoned as a child. But when I grew up, I put away childish things. 12 Now we see things imperfectly, like puzzling reflections in a mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity.[c] All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God now knows me completely.
13 Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.
The Holy Bible, English Standard Version. ESV® Text Edition: 2016. Copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers.
Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
