Fathers

1 Corinthians 2

Tap a verse to read the Fathers. Press and hold, then drag, to make a card.

When I came to you, brothers, I didn’t come with excellence of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of God. For I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. I was with you in weakness, in fear, and in much trembling. My speech and my preaching were not in persuasive words of human wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power, that your faith wouldn’t stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God. We speak wisdom, however, among those who are full grown, yet a wisdom not of this world nor of the rulers of this world who are coming to nothing. But we speak God’s wisdom in a mystery, the wisdom that has been hidden, which God foreordained before the worlds for our glory, which none of the rulers of this world has known. For had they known it, they wouldn’t have crucified the Lord of glory. But as it is written, “Things which an eye didn’t see, and an ear didn’t hear, which didn’t enter into the heart of man, these God has prepared for those who love him.” But to us, God revealed them through the Spirit. For the Spirit searches all things, yes, the deep things of God. For who among men knows the things of a man, except the spirit of the man, which is in him? Even so, no one knows the things of God, except God’s Spirit. But we received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is from God, that we might know the things that were freely given to us by God. We also speak these things, not in words which man’s wisdom teaches, but which the Holy Spirit teaches, comparing spiritual things with spiritual things. Now the natural man doesn’t receive the things of God’s Spirit, for they are foolishness to him, and he can’t know them, because they are spiritually discerned. But he who is spiritual discerns all things, and he himself is judged by no one. “For who has known the mind of the Lord, that he should instruct him?” But we have Christ’s mind.

About · Privacy · Credits · Support VRSZ

What the Fathers say

1 Corinthians 2:15

Eastern Fathers

John Chrysostom

Next, pursuing his contrast, he states the cause of this, saying, "he knoweth not because they are spiritually discerned:" i.e. the things asserted require faith, and to apprehend them by reasonings is not possible, for their magnitude exceeds by a great deal the meanness of our understanding. …

Homily on 1 Corinthians 7 ↗

Theophylact of Ohrid

The spiritual man, he says, knows all things; he knows that everything here is temporary, while the future is permanent; he knows that he will receive salvation, and that the unfaithful will be punished. Therefore he also exposes them, "yet he himself is judged by no one," that is, they cannot expose him, for the one who sees perceives both his own things and those belonging to the unseeing; on the contrary, they, like blind men, see neither their own things nor those that belong to him.

Commentary on 1 Corinthians ↗

Irenaeus

...he who is truly spiritual will interpret by pointing out, in regard to every one of the things which have been spoken, to what special point in the dispensation of the Lord is referred, and [by thus exhibiting] the entire system of the work of the Son of God, knowing always the same God, and always acknowledging the same Word of God, although He has [but] now been manifested to us; acknowledging also at all times the same Spirit of God, although He has been poured out upon us after a new fashion in these last times, [knowing that …

Against Heresies (Book IV, Chapter 33) ↗

Western Saints

Thomas Aquinas

Then when he says, But the spiritual man, he gives the reason why spiritual things are imparted to spiritual men. First, he gives the reason; secondly, he clarifies it (v. 16). The reason given is this: Spiritual things should be entrusted to one who can discern: "The ear discerns with words" (Jb 12:11); but the spiritual man is such. Therefore, spiritual things should be entrusted to him. And this is what he says: The spiritual man judges all things, and he himself is judged of no man. …

Commentary on 1 Corinthians ↗