But be zealous for the better gifts. And I shew unto you yet a more excellent way.1 If I speak with the tongues of men, and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal.†2 And if I should have prophecy and should know all mysteries, and all knowledge, and if I should have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.3 And if I should distribute all my goods to feed the poor, and if I should deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.4 Charity is patient, is kind: charity envieth not, dealeth not perversely; is not puffed up;†5 Is not ambitious, seeketh not her own, is not provoked to anger, thinketh no evil;6 Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth with the truth;7 Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.8 Charity never falleth away: whether prophecies shall be made void, or tongues shall cease, or knowledge shall be destroyed.9 For we know in part, and we prophesy in part.10 But when that which is perfect is come, that which is in part shall be done away.11 When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child. But, when I became a man, I put away the things of a child.12 We see now through a glass in a dark manner; but then face to face. Now I know I part; but then I shall know even as I am known.13 And now there remain faith, hope, and charity, these three: but the greatest of these is charity.
The great cannot subsist without the small, nor the small without the great. There is a kind of mixture in all things, and thence arises mutual advantage. Let us take our body for an example. The head is nothing without the feet, and the feet are nothing without the head; yea, the very smallest members of our body are necessary and useful to the whole body. But all work harmoniously together, and are under one common rule for the preservation of the whole body.
Give praise to the Lord on the harp; sing to him with the psaltery, the instrument of ten strings.3 Sing to him a new canticle, sing well unto him with a loud noise.4 For the word of the Lord is right, and all his works are done with faithfulness.5 He loveth mercy and judgment; the earth is full of the mercy of the Lord.12 Blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord: the people whom he hath chosen for his inheritance.22 Let thy mercy, O Lord, be upon us, as we have hoped in thee.
The rule of truth which we hold, is, that there is one God Almighty, who made all things by His Word, and fashioned and formed, out of that which had no existence, all things which exist. Thus saith the Scripture, to that effect "By the Word of the Lord were the heavens established, and all the might of them, by the spirit of His mouth." And again, "All things were made by Him, and without Him was nothing made." There is no exception or deduction stated; but the Father made all things by Him, whether visible or invisible, objects of sense or of intelligence, temporal, on account of a certain character given them, or eternal; and these eternal things He did not make by angels, or by any powers separated from His Ennoea. For God needs none of all these things, but is He who, by His Word and Spirit, makes, and disposes, and governs all things, and commands all things into existence,-He who formed the world (for the world is of all),-He who fashioned man,-He [who] is the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, above whom there is no other God, nor initial principle, nor power, nor pleroma,-He is the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, as we shall prove.
Now there stood by the cross of Jesus, his mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalen.26 When Jesus therefore had seen his mother and the disciple standing whom he loved, he saith to his mother: Woman, behold thy son.†27 After that, he saith to the disciple: Behold thy mother. And from that hour, the disciple took her to his own.
Mary the mother of our Lord stood before the cross of her Son. None of the Evangelists hath told me this except John. The others have related how that at our Lord’s Passion the earth quaked, the heaven was overspread with darkness, the sun fled, the thief was taken into paradise after confession. John hath told us, what the others have not, how that from the cross whereon He hung, He called to His mother. He thought it a greater thing to shew Him victorious over punishment, fulfilling the offices of piety to His mother, than giving the kingdom of heaven and eternal life to the thief. For if it was religious to give life to the thief, a much richer work of piety it is for a son to honour his mother with such affection. Behold, He saith, thy son; behold thy mother. Christ made His Testament from the cross, and divided the offices of piety between the Mother and the disciples. Our Lord made not only a public, but also a domestic Testamnet. And this His Testament John sealed, a witness worthy of such a Testator. A good testament it was, not of money, but of eternal life, which was not written with ink, but with the spirit of the living God: My tongue is the pen of a ready writer. (Ps. 45:1) Mary, as became the mother of our Lord, stood before the cross, when the Apostles fled, and with pitiful eyes beheld the wounds of her Son. For she looked not on the death of the Hostage, but on the salvation of the world; and perhaps knowing that her Son’s death would bring this salvation, she who had been the habitation of the King, thought that by her death she might add to that universal gift.
But Jesus did not need any help for saving the world, as we read in the Psalm, I have been even as a man with no help, free among the dead. (Ps. 87) He received indeed the affection of a parent, but He did not seek another’s help. Imitate her, ye holy matrons, who, as towards her only most beloved Son, hath set you an example of such virtue: for ye have not sweeter sons, nor did the Virgin seek consolation in again becoming a mother.
About CSB. A personal translation of the New Testament, rendered directly from the public-domain Greek in a literary style — not a scholarly critical edition, and not for liturgical or doctrinal authority. It is one reader's work, offered for enjoyment; where it matters, weigh it against an established translation. (Placeholder text — final wording to come.)