Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to 1 Corinthians · About this commentary
He Who Prophesies Builds Up
1 Corinthians 14:1-5
1 Follow after love and earnestly desire spiritual gifts, but especially that you may prophesy. · WEB
The argument resumes with one criterion: prophecy is preferred to languages because it reaches other people.
Follow after love and earnestly desire spiritual gifts, but especially that you may prophesy 1 Corinthians 14:1.
The discussion resumes exactly where it broke off 1 Corinthians 12:31, and the resumption proves the arrangement was deliberate: love was not a substitute for the gifts but the thing they had to be placed around. Both imperatives stand — follow after love and earnestly desire gifts — and a preference is added.
For he who speaks in another language speaks not to men, but to God, for no one understands, but in the Spirit he speaks mysteries 1 Corinthians 14:2.
The gift is described without disparagement. It is real, it is addressed to God, and it conveys mysteries. What it does not do is communicate to anyone present, and that single fact governs the entire chapter.
But he who prophesies speaks to men for their edification, exhortation, and consolation 1 Corinthians 14:3.
Three effects, all of them landing on other people: building up, urging on, comforting. This is the plainest description in Scripture of what prophecy does in a congregation, and none of the three has to do with predicting the future.
He who speaks in another language edifies himself, but he who prophesies edifies the assembly 1 Corinthians 14:4.
The comparison in one sentence, and the criterion is the one announced at the start: gifts are given for the profit of all 1 Corinthians 12:7. Note that self-edification is not denied or condemned — it is simply the smaller thing. In a congregation that had turned its gifts into personal distinctions, the measure has shifted from what a gift does for its holder to how many people it reaches.
Now I desire to have you all speak with other languages, but even more that you would prophesy. For he is greater who prophesies than he who speaks with other languages, unless he interprets, that the assembly may be built up 1 Corinthians 14:5.
The balance here is careful and is often lost. He wishes them all to have the gift they prized — this is not a campaign against it, and he will forbid anyone to prohibit it 1 Corinthians 14:39. What he ranks is usefulness in the assembly, and the ranking is conditional: unless he interprets. Interpreted, the gift does what prophecy does, and the comparison disappears. The whole chapter's argument is therefore not about which gift is more spiritual but about whether anybody in the room understood.
And the closing clause names the standard by which everything in this chapter will be judged: that the assembly may be built up. It recurs four more times before the chapter ends 1 Corinthians 14:12 1 Corinthians 14:17 1 Corinthians 14:26.
settled What this mark means