1 Corinthians 14.1-4.
Most of the time when Christians quote this particular passage
1 Corinthians 14.4 NIV - Anyone who speaks in a tongue edifies themselves, but the one who prophesies edifies the church.
Yeah, tongues are okay, but. But but but.
Except the word but isn’t in the original text of this verse. The word which gets translated but in nearly every English-language bible, is
Thing is, whenever translators think there’s a contrast between the two sentences, they can’t just translate de as a new sentence, a semicolon, or even “and.” They gotta turn it into a “but.”
So instead of writing
John 1.17 NIV - For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ.
they gotta insert a “but” between those sentences,
John 1.17 NLT - For the law was given through Moses, but God’s unfailing love and faithfulness came through Jesus Christ.
and imply there’s a conflict between law, and grace and truth, where really there’s no such thing.
But the reason they gotta imply such a thing, has nothing to do with the text. It has to do with their pre-existing beliefs.
Then you’re gonna push grace, and encourage people to reject law. Because that’s what people tend to do with contrasts. They’re not presented as “There’s A, and there’s B, and they’re different,” but as “People do A, but they should do B.” Hence dispensationalists insist people do Law, but they should do grace. Not, as Jesus teaches, that we should do both.
So back to 1 Corinthians 14. Paul and Sosthenes did wanna present a contrast between tongues and prophecy. But again, it’s not so people would reject tongues and only do prophecy. It’s so people would recognize only one of the two activities is appropriate for church gatherings. Only one of the two is a group activity. Wanna guess which one?
1 Corinthians 14.1-4 KWL - 1 Pursue love. Be zealous for the supernatural.
- Most of all so you can prophesy:
- 2 Tongues-speakers speak to God, not people.
- Nobody else understands them, and they speak secrets to the Spirit.
- 3 Prophesiers speak to people: They build up, help out, and advise.
- 4 Tongues-speakers build up themselves. Prophesiers build up a church.