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1 Corinthians

About this book
Chapter 13

1 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels,⁠ but I do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.⁠ 2 And if I have prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so that I can remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.⁠ 3 If I give away everything I own, and if I give over my body in order to boast, but do not have love, I receive no benefit. 4 Love is patient, love is kind, it is not envious. Love does not brag, it is not puffed up.⁠ 5 It is not rude, it is not self-serving, it is not easily angered or resentful.⁠ 6 It is not glad about injustice, but rejoices in the truth. 7 It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. 8 Love never ends. But if there are prophecies, they will be set aside; if there are tongues, they will cease; if there is knowledge, it will be set aside.⁠ 9 For we know in part, and we prophesy in part,⁠ 10 but when what is perfect comes, the partial will be set aside. 11 When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. But when I became an adult, I set aside childish ways. 12 For now we see in a mirror indirectly, but then we will see face to face.⁠ Now I know in part, but then I will know fully, just as I have been fully known. 13 And now these three remain: faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love.⁠

Texts in conversation

Compare Testament of Job 11:24 and 1 Corinthians 13:1

Pseudepigrapha, Testaments · New Testament

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Summary

The Testament of Job describes Job's daughters singing in the language of angels after putting on heavenly sashes. Paul similarly connects the tongues of angels with the tongues of men, likely reflecting the same Jewish tradition.

Passages

Testament of Job 11:24

Pseudepigrapha, Testaments
22 Rise then and gird these around you before I die in order that you may see the angels come at my parting so that you may behold with wonder the powers of God.” 23 Then rose the one whose name was Day Yemima and wound it around herself; and immediately she departed her body, as her father had said, and she put on another heart, as if she never cared for earthly things. 24 And she sang angelic hymns in the voice of angels, and she chanted forth the angelic praise of God while dancing. 25 Then the other daughter, Kassia by name, put on the girdle, and her heart was transformed, so that she no longer wished for worldly things. 26 And her mouth assumed the dialect of the heavenly rulers Archonts and she sang the doxology of the work of the High Place and if any one wishes to know the work of the heavens he may take an insight into the hymns of Kassia. 27 Then did the other daughter by the name of Amalthea’s Horn Keren Happukh gird herself and her mouth spoke in the language of those on high; for her heart was transformed, being lifted above the worldly things. 28 She spoke in the dialect of the Cherubim, singing the praise of the Ruler of the cosmic powers virtues and extolling His glory.
75–50 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in the Testament of Job

1 Corinthians 13:1

New Testament
1 If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but I do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2 And if I have prophecy, and know all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith so that I can remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3 If I give away everything I own, and if I give over my body in order to boast, but do not have love, I receive no benefit.
55–57 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in 1 Corinthians

References

“... “Tongues of men” would then refer to human speech, inspired by the Spirit but unknown to the speaker; “tongues of angels” would reflect an understanding that the tongues-speaker was communicating in the dialect(s) of heaven. That the Corinthians at least, and probably Paul, thought of tongues as the language(s) of angels seems highly likely—for two reasons: (1) There is some evidence from Jewish sources that the angels were believed to have their own heavenly language (or dialects) and that by means of the “Spirit” one could speak these dialects. Thus in the Testament of Job 48-50 Job’s three daughters are given “charismatic sashes”; when these were put on they allowed Hemera, for example, to speak “ecstatically in the angelic dialect, sending up a hymn to God with the hymnic style of the angels. And as she spoke ecstatically, she allowed ‘The Spirit’ to be inscribed on her garment.” Such an understanding of heavenly speech may also lie behind the language of 1 Cor. 14:2 (“speak mysteries by the Spirit”). ...”
Gordon D. Fee, The First Epistle to the Corinthians (Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans, 1987), 630–631.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

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Testament of Job 11:24 and 1 Corinthians 13:1

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