The Great Commentary of Cornelius a Lapide: the First Epistle to the Corinthians
Chapter 13
i. He points out that of all gifts and graces, charity is the first, and that without charity no gift or virtue is of any use.
ii. He enumerates (ver. 4) the sixteen conditions of charity, or the modes of its manifestation towards our neighbours.
iii. He shows (ver. 8) the eminency of charity from the fact that it will remain in heaven, when faith is changed into sight and hope into fruition.
The whole of this chapter is in praise of charity. The Apostle treats of charity at such length, not only because charity is the queen of all virtues, but also because he wishes by charity, as by a most effectual medicine, to cure the pride and divisions of the Corinthians; for charity effects that superiors do not despise inferiors , and that inferiors do not feel bitter when their superiors are preferred before them. But, especially, he commends charity to them as a most excellent gift, that they may seek it rather than the gift of tongues, or of prophecy, or of miracles, which things the Corinthians were in the habit of considering most important. And this is why, in preparing his passage to charity, he said, at the end of the preceding chapter : “ Covet earnestly the best gifts: and yet show I unto you a more excellent way,” viz., of charity.
Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels . Some hold that the tongue of angels is Hebrew, and that this was the tongue used by God, the angels, and Adam in Paradise (of which see below, ver. 8). Secondly, the Glossa , Durandus , Greg. Ariminensis (in 2 dist. 9, qu. 2), and Molina (1 p., qu. 106, art. 1) think from this passage of the Apostle, that angels speak as men, not only by forms impressed on the angel who hears, but also by gestures and signs, spiritual signs (since they are as it were a kind of spiritual conversation and form of speech), imprinted on them at their creation, as the Hebrew tongue was imprinted on Adam. Hence Franciscus Albertinus (Lib. Corollariorum Theologicorum Corollario 11) says that each angel has his own proper tongue, different from the tongue of every other angel, because the Apostle says, “Though I speak with the tongues of angels,” not with the tongue . But it seems to follow from hence, that if angels make use of those signs and speak to one, they cannot conceal them from others ; for nothing natural can practise concealment but only that which is free ; but these signs are natural, imprinted on them with their nature at their creation. Whence others, with S. Thomas, think that angels speak in this way, that they direct their thoughts to another, and form a wish to make them known to him, and that then, from the meet appointment of God and their meeting, a proportionate object is formed, and that this is placed as it were within a sphere of knowledge, and becomes intelligible to him, to whom they wish to speak, and not to another ; so that he and none else sees and understands this object, placed as it were before his eyes; from which some conclude that angels by their nature cannot lie. But the contrary seems truer, viz., that they can lie ; because angels can form in their intellect a concept that is false, and opposed to the judgment of their mind, and can direct it to the other, to whom, in this way, they speak : even as man forms a false mode of speech and one opposed to his judgment when he lies. For angels do not exhibit to the sight of others the very acts of their will in themselves, that is, the very volitions and intentions, but they form in their mind concepts of these actions, whether true or false, just as they will, and represent them to him to whom they speak. But we may leave these points to be more thoroughly disputed and settled by the Schoolmen.
The tongues of angels mentioned here are not therefore addressed to the senses, as Cajetan thinks, but to the intellect, since these tongues are the very concepts of angels, most perfect and most beautiful. The tongues of angels is certainly a prosopopoeia and hyperbole, that is, it denotes a most exquisite tongue. So we say in common phrase, “ He speaks divinely ; ” by a similar hyperbole it is said “ the face of an angel,” that is, a most beautiful face. So Theodoret and Theophylact speak, because, as we know, angels are most beautiful in themselves, and show themselves such, both in appearance and speech, when they assume a body. So therefore Paul here, as elsewhere afterwards, speaks on a supposition by hyperbole, chiefly for the sake of emphasis. His meaning is — If there were tongues of angels surpassing the Hebrew, Greek, Latin, and I knew them, but yet did not use them for the good of my neighbour, what else would it be but an empty and noisy wordiness ? So Gal. i. 8; Rom. viii. 39. Paul here points at the Corinthians, who were wont to admire the gift of tongues more than other gifts.
A tinkling cymbal, giving forth an uncertain and confused sound. The Greek ἀλαλάζον is an onomatopoeia, and denotes sounding “alala, alala.” So Apion Grammaticus, because of his garrulity, was called “the cymbal of the world” (Suetonius, Lib. de Præclaris
Grammaticis).
Ver. 2. — Though I have all faith , so that I could remove mountains , and have not charity , I am nothing. Erasmus thinks that this is a hyperbolic fiction, as though he should say, “ Charity by far excels faith,” just as we say, “Virtue alone is the only nobility.” But this is far too cold ; for in the following verse, speaking of almsgiving and martyrdom if charity is wanting, he says, it profiteth me nothing . Therefore, I am nothing imports I am of no value, and have no grace in the presence of God ; and in truth, because the righteous man is of some account before God, the rest of men, being unrighteous , are, in the eyes and estimation of God, as nothing. In other words, without charity nothing profiteth, nothing makes friendship with God ; there is nothing which wins for a man righteousness and salvation, not even faith, though it be most great and most excellent, so that it can remove mountains, such as Gregory Thaumaturgus had, who, by his faith, moved a mount from its place, that he might make a place to build a church, as Eusebius narrates.
You will say, therefore, If a penitent exercises himself in good works before reconciliation, they profit him nothing. Some answer that they profit him, because the penitent, they say, has charity —not infused charity which makes righteous, but that charity which is a sincere love towards God, by which he longs for reconciliation. But this affection is not and cannot be called charity ; for Holy Scripture, here and elsewhere, calls charity that most eminent virtue, greater than faith and hope, which makes us friends of God.
Secondly, because the affections of fear, hope, and faith dispose to righteousness, therefore they are something, even without the affection of that love. I reply, Good works profit the sinner who repents nothing, unless charity follow. For so, he says, almsgiving profits nothing, as will appear in ver. 3. For disposition by itself is useless and of no account unless there follow the form to which it disposes ; therefore works without charity are nothing, that is, they confer no righteousness or salvation ; and a man without charity is nothing so far as the spiritual being is concerned, in which, by supernatural regeneration, he receives a supernatural and Divine being, and is made a new creature of God, a son and heir of God. Hence it follows that faith alone does not justify.
Beza replies that here faith which works miracles alone is in question ; for justifying faith, which lays hold of the mercy of God in Christ, can be separated from charity indeed in thought, but not in reality, any more than light from fire. But on the other hand, since faith which works miracles includes and presupposes faith properly so called, which is the beginning of justification (nay, faith which works miracles is the most excellent faith, as the Apostle here signifies when he says : “ Though I have faith so that I could remove mountains”), therefore, if faith which works miracles can exist without charity, it will also be able to be justifying faith. Secondly, the Apostle says “all faith,” which Beza dishonestly translates “whole faith : ” if all, therefore also justifying.