2 Corinthians 11

Wycliffe Bible

11 I would that ye would suffer a little thing of mine unwisdom, but also support ye me.^[a]

² For I love you by the love of God; for I have espoused [spoused] you to one husband, to yield a chaste virgin to Christ [to give you, a chaste virgin, to one man, Christ].

³ But I dread, lest as the serpent deceived Eve with his subtle fraud, so your wits be corrupted, and fallen down from the simpleness that is in Christ.

⁴ For if he that cometh, preacheth another Christ, whom we preached not, or if ye take another spirit, whom ye took not [whom ye received not], or another gospel, which ye received not, rightly ye should suffer.

⁵ For I ween that I have done nothing less than the great apostles.

⁶ For though I be unlearned in word, but not in knowing. For in all things I am open to you. [For why though I be unlearned in sermon, or word, but not in science, or knowing. Forsooth in all things I am showed, or made known, to you.]

⁷ Or whether I have done sin, meeking myself [meeking, or making low, myself], that ye be enhanced, for freely I preached to you the gospel of God?

⁸ I made naked other churches, and I took wages to your service. [I spoiled, or made naked, or took gifts, of other churches, taking wages to your service.]

⁹ And when I was among you, and had need [And when I was with you, and needed], I was chargeous to no man; for brethren that came from Macedonia, fulfilled that that failed to me [supplied, or fulfilled, that that failed to me]. And in all things I have kept [me], and shall keep me without charge to you.

¹⁰ The truth of Christ is in me; for this glory shall not be broken in me in the countries of Achaia [in the regions, or countries, of Achaia].

¹¹ Why? for I love not you? God knoweth.

¹² For that that I do, and that I shall do, is that I cut away the occasion of them that will occasion, that in the thing, in which they glory, they be found [such] as we.

¹³ For such false apostles be treacherous workmen, and transfigure them(selves) into apostles of Christ.^[b]

¹⁴ And no wonder, for Satan himself transfigureth him(self) into an angel of light. [And no wonder; soothly he Satan transfigured him into an angel of light.]

¹⁵ Therefore it is not great, if his ministers be transfigured as the ministers of rightwiseness, whose end shall be after their works.

¹⁶ Again I say, lest any man guess me to be unwise [lest any man deem me unwise]; else take ye me as unwise, that also I have glory a little what.

¹⁷ That that I speak, I speak not after God, but as in unwisdom [but as to unwisdom], in this substance of glory.

¹⁸ For many men glory after the flesh, and I shall glory.

¹⁹ For ye suffer gladly unwise men, when ye yourselves be wise.

²⁰ For ye suffer, if any man driveth you into servage [if any man drive you into servage], if any man devoureth, if any man taketh, if any man is enhanced [by pride], if any man smiteth you on the face.

²¹ By unnobleness I say, as if we were frail in this part^[c]. In what thing any man dare, in unwisdom I say, and I dare.

²² They be Hebrews, and I; they be Israelites, and I; they be the seed of Abraham, and I;

²³ they be the ministers of Christ, and I. As less wise I say, I more; in full many travails, in prisons more plenteously, in wounds above manner [in wounds above manner, or over measure], in deaths oft times.

²⁴ I received of the Jews five times forty strokes one less;

²⁵ thrice I was beaten with rods, once I was stoned, thrice I was at ship-break, a night and a day I was in the deepness of the sea;

²⁶ in ways oft, in perils of rivers [in perils of floods], in perils of thieves, in perils of kin, in perils of heathen men, in perils in [the] city, in perils in desert, in perils in the sea, in perils among false brethren,

²⁷ in travail and neediness, in many wakings, in hunger, in thirst [in travail and neediness, either mis-ease, in many wakings, in hunger and thirst], in many fastings, in cold and nakedness.

²⁸ Without those things that be withoutforth, mine each day's travailing is the busyness of all churches. [Without those things that be withoutforth; mine each day's waking, or studying, the busyness of all churches.]

²⁹ Who is frail, and I am not frail? who is caused to stumble, and I am not burnt? [Who is sick, and I am not sick? who is offended, and I am not burnt?]

³⁰ If it behooveth to glory, I shall glory in those things that be of mine infirmity [that be of my infirmity, or frailty].

³¹ [For] God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, that is blessed into worlds, knoweth that I lie not [knoweth, that I gab not, or lie not].

³² The provost of Damascus, of the king of the folk of Aretas [The provost, or keeper, of Damascus, of the king of the folk Arteas], kept the city of Damascenes to take me;

³³ and by a window in a basket I was let down by the wall, and so I escaped his hands.