1 Corinthians 12-16

Complete Jewish Bible

12 But, brothers, I do not want you to go on being ignorant about the things of the Spirit. ² You know that when you were pagans, no matter how you felt you were being led, you were being led astray to idols, which can’t speak at all. ³ Therefore, I want to make it clear to you that no one speaking by the Spirit of God ever says, “Yeshua is cursed!” and no one can say, “Yeshua is Lord,” except by the Ruach HaKodesh.

⁴ Now there are different kinds of gifts, but the same Spirit gives them. ⁵ Also there are different ways of serving, but it is the same Lord being served. ⁶ And there are different modes of working, but it is the same God working them all in everyone. ⁷ Moreover, to each person is given the particular manifestation of the Spirit that will be for the common good. ⁸ To one, through the Spirit, is given a word of wisdom; to another, a word of knowledge, in accordance with the same Spirit; ⁹ to another, faith, by the same Spirit; and to another, gifts of healing, by the one Spirit; ¹⁰ to another, the working of miracles; to another, prophecy; to another, the ability to judge between spirits; to another, the ability to speak in different kinds of tongues; and to yet another, the ability to interpret tongues. ¹¹ One and the same Spirit is at work in all these things, distributing to each person as he chooses. ¹² For just as the body is one but has many parts; and all the parts of the body, though many, constitute one body; so it is with the Messiah. ¹³ For it was by one Spirit that we were all immersed into one body, whether Jews or Gentiles, slaves or free; and we were all given the one Spirit to drink.

¹⁴ For indeed the body is not one part but many. ¹⁵ If the foot says, “I’m not a hand, so I’m not part of the body,” that doesn’t make it stop being part of the body. ¹⁶ And if the ear says, “I’m not an eye, so I’m not part of the body,” that doesn’t make it stop being part of the body. ¹⁷ If the whole body were an eye, how could it hear? If it were all hearing, how could it smell? ¹⁸ But as it is, God arranged each of the parts in the body exactly as he wanted them. ¹⁹ Now if they were all just one part, where would the body be? ²⁰ But as it is, there are indeed many parts, yet just one body. ²¹ So the eye cannot say to the hand, “I don’t need you”; or the head to the feet, “I don’t need you.” ²² On the contrary, the parts of the body that seem to be less important turn out to be all the more necessary; ²³ and upon body parts which we consider less dignified we bestow greater dignity; and the parts that aren’t attractive are the ones we make as attractive as we can, ²⁴ while our attractive parts have no need for such treatment. Indeed, God has put the body together in such a way that he gives greater dignity to the parts that lack it, ²⁵ So that there will be no disagreements within the body, but rather all the parts will be equally concerned for all the others. ²⁶ Thus if one part suffers, all the parts suffer with it; and if one part is honored, all the parts share its happiness.

²⁷ Now you together constitute the body of the Messiah, and individually you are parts of it. ²⁸ And God has placed in the Messianic Community first, emissaries; second, prophets; third, teachers; then those who work miracles; then those with gifts of healing; those with ability to help; those skilled in administration; and those who speak in various tongues. ²⁹ Not all are emissaries, are they? Not all are prophets, are they? or teachers? or miracle-workers? ³⁰ Not all have gifts of healing, not all speak in tongues, not all interpret, do they? ³¹ Eagerly seek the better gifts.

But now I will show you the best way of all.

However, keep on eagerly seeking the things of the Spirit; and especially seek to be able to prophesy. ² For someone speaking in a tongue is not speaking to people but to God, because no one can understand, since he is uttering mysteries in the power of the Spirit. ³ But someone prophesying is speaking to people, edifying, encouraging and comforting them. ⁴ A person speaking in a tongue does edify himself, but a person prophesying edifies the congregation. ⁵ I wish you would all speak in tongues, but even more I wish you would all prophesy. The person who prophesies is greater than the person who speaks in tongues, unless someone gives an interpretation, so that the congregation can be edified.

⁶ Brothers, suppose I come to you now speaking in tongues. How can I be of benefit to you unless I bring you some revelation or knowledge or prophecy or teaching? ⁷ Even with lifeless musical instruments, such as a flute or a harp, how will anyone recognize the melody if one note can’t be distinguished from another? ⁸ And if the bugle gives an unclear sound, who will get ready for battle? ⁹ It’s the same with you: how will anyone know what you are saying unless you use your tongue to produce intelligible speech? You will be talking to the air! ¹⁰ There are undoubtedly all kinds of sounds in the world, and none is altogether meaningless; ¹¹ but if I don’t know what a person’s sounds mean, I will be a foreigner to the speaker and the speaker will be a foreigner to me. ¹² Likewise with you: since you eagerly seek the things of the Spirit, seek especially what will help in edifying the congregation.

¹³ Therefore someone who speaks in a tongue should pray for the power to interpret. ¹⁴ For if I pray in a tongue, my spirit does pray, but my mind is unproductive. ¹⁵ So, what about it? I will pray with my spirit, but I will also pray with my mind; I will sing with my spirit, but I will also sing with my mind. ¹⁶ Otherwise, if you are giving thanks with your spirit, how will someone who has not yet received much instruction be able to say, “Amen,” when you have finished giving thanks, since he doesn’t know what you are saying? ¹⁷ For undoubtedly you are giving thanks very nicely, but the other person is not being edified. ¹⁸ I thank God that I speak in tongues more than all of you, ¹⁹ but in a congregation meeting I would rather say five words with my mind in order to instruct others than ten thousand words in a tongue!

²⁰ Brothers, don’t be children in your thinking. In evil, be like infants; but in your thinking, be grown-up. ²¹ In the Torah it is written,

²² Thus tongues are a sign not for believers but for unbelievers, while prophecy is not for unbelievers but for believers. ²³ So if the whole congregation comes together with everybody speaking in tongues, and uninstructed people or unbelievers come in, won’t they say you’re crazy? ²⁴ But if you all prophesy, and some unbeliever or uninstructed person enters, he is convicted of sin by all, he is brought under judgment by all, ²⁵ and the secrets of his heart are laid bare; so he falls on his face and worships God, saying, “God is really here among you!”

²⁶ What is our conclusion, brothers? Whenever you come together, let everyone be ready with a psalm or a teaching or a revelation, or ready to use his gift of tongues or give an interpretation; but let everything be for edification. ²⁷ If the gift of tongues is exercised, let it be by two or at most three, and each in turn; and let someone interpret. ²⁸ And if there is no one present who can interpret, let the people who speak in tongues keep silent when the congregation meets — they can speak to themselves and to God. ²⁹ Let two or three prophets speak, while the others weigh what is said. ³⁰ And if something is revealed to a prophet who is sitting down, let the first one be silent. ³¹ For you can all prophesy one by one, with the result that all will learn something and all will be encouraged. ³² Also, the prophets’ spirits are under the prophets’ control; ³³ for God is not a God of unruliness but of shalom.

As in all the congregations of God’s people, ³⁴ let the wives remain silent when the congregation meets; they are certainly not permitted to speak out. Rather, let them remain subordinate, as also the Torah says; ³⁵ and if there is something they want to know, let them ask their own husbands at home; for it is shameful for a woman to speak out in a congregational meeting.

³⁶ Did the word of God originate with you? Or are you the only people it has reached? ³⁷ If anyone thinks he is a prophet or is endowed with the Spirit, let him acknowledge that what I am writing you is a command of the Lord. ³⁸ But if someone doesn’t recognize this, then let him remain unrecognized.

³⁹ So, my brothers, eagerly seek to prophesy; and do not forbid speaking in tongues; ⁴⁰ but let all things be done in a proper and orderly way.

15 Now, brothers, I must remind you of the Good News which I proclaimed to you, and which you received, and on which you have taken your stand, ² and by which you are being saved — provided you keep holding fast to the message I proclaimed to you. For if you don’t, your trust will have been in vain. ³ For among the first things I passed on to you was what I also received, namely this: the Messiah died for our sins, in accordance with what the Tanakh says; ⁴ and he was buried; and he was raised on the third day, in accordance with what the Tanakh says; ⁵ and he was seen by Kefa, then by the Twelve; ⁶ and afterwards he was seen by more than five hundred brothers at one time, the majority of whom are still alive, though some have died. ⁷ Later he was seen by Ya‘akov, then by all the emissaries; ⁸ and last of all he was seen by me, even though I was born at the wrong time. ⁹ For I am the least of all the emissaries, unfit to be called an emissary, because I persecuted the Messianic Community of God. ¹⁰ But by God’s grace I am what I am, and his grace towards me was not in vain; on the contrary, I have worked harder than all of them, although it was not I but the grace of God with me. ¹¹ Anyhow, whether I or they, this is what we proclaim, and this is what you believed.

¹² But if it has been proclaimed that the Messiah has been raised from the dead, how is it that some of you are saying there is no such thing as a resurrection of the dead? ¹³ If there is no resurrection of the dead, then the Messiah has not been raised; ¹⁴ and if the Messiah has not been raised, then what we have proclaimed is in vain; also your trust is in vain; ¹⁵ furthermore, we are shown up as false witnesses for God in having testified that God raised up the Messiah, whom he did not raise if it is true that the dead are not raised. ¹⁶ For if the dead are not raised, then the Messiah has not been raised either; ¹⁷ and if the Messiah has not been raised, your trust is useless, and you are still in your sins. ¹⁸ Also, if this is the case, those who died in union with the Messiah are lost. ¹⁹ If it is only for this life that we have put our hope in the Messiah, we are more pitiable than anyone.

²⁰ But the fact is that the Messiah has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have died. ²¹ For since death came through a man, also the resurrection of the dead has come through a man. ²² For just as in connection with Adam all die, so in connection with the Messiah all will be made alive. ²³ But each in his own order: the Messiah is the firstfruits; then those who belong to the Messiah, at the time of his coming; ²⁴ then the culmination, when he hands over the Kingdom to God the Father, after having put an end to every rulership, yes, to every authority and power. ²⁵ For he has to rule until he puts all his enemies under his feet. ²⁶ The last enemy to be done away with will be death, ²⁷ for “He put everything in subjection under his feet.”^[b] But when it says that “everything” has been subjected, obviously the word does not include God, who is himself the one subjecting everything to the Messiah. ²⁸ Now when everything has been subjected to the Son, then he will subject himself to God, who subjected everything to him; so that God may be everything in everyone.

²⁹ Were it otherwise, what would the people accomplish who are immersed on behalf of the dead? If the dead are not actually raised, why are people immersed for them? ³⁰ For that matter, we ourselves — why do we keep facing danger hour by hour? ³¹ Brothers, by the right to be proud which the Messiah Yeshua our Lord gives me, I solemnly tell you that I die every day. ³² If my fighting with “wild beasts” in Ephesus was done merely on a human basis, what do I gain by it? If dead people are not raised, we might as well live by the saying, “Let’s eat and drink, for tomorrow we die!”^{[c] 33} Don’t be fooled. “Bad company ruins good character.” ³⁴ Come to your senses! Live righteously and stop sinning! There are some people who lack knowledge of God — I say this to your shame.

³⁵ But someone will ask, “In what manner are the dead raised? What sort of body do they have?” ³⁶ Stupid! When you sow a seed, it doesn’t come alive unless it first dies. ³⁷ Also, what you sow is not the body that will be, but a bare seed of, say, wheat or something else; ³⁸ but God gives it the body he intended for it; and to each kind of seed he gives its own body. ³⁹ Not all living matter is the same living matter; on the contrary, there is one kind for human beings, another kind of living matter for animals, another for birds and another for fish. ⁴⁰ Further, there are heavenly bodies and earthly bodies; but the beauty of heavenly bodies is one thing, while the beauty of earthly bodies is something else. ⁴¹ The sun has one kind of beauty, the moon another, the stars yet another; indeed, each star has its own individual kind of beauty.

⁴² So it is with the resurrection of the dead. When the body is “sown,” it decays; when it is raised, it cannot decay. ⁴³ When sown, it is without dignity; when raised, it will be beautiful. When sown, it is weak; when raised, it will be strong. ⁴⁴ When sown, it is an ordinary human body; when raised, it will be a body controlled by the Spirit. If there is an ordinary human body, there is also a body controlled by the Spirit. ⁴⁵ In fact, the Tanakh says so: Adam, the first man, became a living human being;^[d] but the last “Adam” has become a life-giving Spirit. ⁴⁶ Note, however, that the body from the Spirit did not come first, but the ordinary human one; the one from the Spirit comes afterwards. ⁴⁷ The first man is from the earth, made of dust; the second man is from heaven. ⁴⁸ People born of dust are like the man of dust, and people born from heaven are like the man from heaven; ⁴⁹ and just as we have borne the image of the man of dust, so also we will bear the image of the man from heaven.

⁵⁰ Let me say this, brothers: flesh and blood cannot share in the Kingdom of God, nor can something that decays share in what does not decay. ⁵¹ Look, I will tell you a secret — not all of us will die! But we will all be changed! ⁵² It will take but a moment, the blink of an eye, at the final shofar. For the shofar will sound, and the dead will be raised to live forever, and we too will be changed. ⁵³ For this material which can decay must be clothed with imperishability, this which is mortal must be clothed with immortality. ⁵⁴ When what decays puts on imperishability and what is mortal puts on immortality, then this passage in the Tanakh will be fulfilled:

⁵⁶ The sting of death is sin; and sin draws its power from the Torah; ⁵⁷ but thanks be to God, who gives us the victory through our Lord Yeshua the Messiah!

⁵⁸ So, my dear brothers, stand firm and immovable, always doing the Lord’s work as vigorously as you can, knowing that united with the Lord your efforts are not in vain.

16 Now, in regard to the collection being made for God’s people: you are to do the same as I directed the congregations in Galatia to do. ² Every week, on Motza’ei-Shabbat, each of you should set some money aside, according to his resources, and save it up; so that when I come I won’t have to do fundraising. ³ And when I arrive, I will give letters of introduction to the people you have approved, and I will send them to carry your gift to Yerushalayim. ⁴ If it seems appropriate that I go too, they will go along with me.

⁵ I will visit you after I have gone through Macedonia, for I am intending to pass through Macedonia, ⁶ and I may stay with you or even spend the winter, so that you may help me continue my travels wherever I may go. ⁷ For I don’t want to see you now, when I am only passing through; because I am hoping to spend some time with you, if the Lord allows it. ⁸ But I will remain in Ephesus until Shavu‘ot, ⁹ because a great and important door has opened for my work, and there are many people opposing me.

¹⁰ If Timothy comes, see that he has nothing to be afraid of while he is with you; for he is doing the Lord’s work, just as I am. ¹¹ So let no one treat him with disrespect. Help him on his way in peace, so that he will return to me, for the brothers and I are expecting him.

¹² As for brother Apollos, I strongly urged him to go and visit you along with the other brothers; and although it was not at all his desire to come at this time, he will come when he has the opportunity.

¹³ Stay alert, stand firm in the faith, behave like a mentsh, grow strong. ¹⁴ Let everything you do be done in love.

¹⁵ Now, brothers, you know that the household of Stephanas were the first people in Achaia to put their trust in the Messiah, and they have devoted themselves to serving God’s people. ¹⁶ I urge you to submit yourselves to people like these and to everyone who works and toils with them. ¹⁷ I am glad that Stephanas and Fortunatus and Achaicus are here, because they have helped make up for your not being here. ¹⁸ They have refreshed my spirit, just as they have yours. I want you to show appreciation for people like these.

¹⁹ The congregations in the province of Asia send greetings to you. Aquila and Priscilla greet you in union with the Lord, as does the congregation that meets in their house. ²⁰ All the brothers send you their greetings. Greet one another with a holy kiss.