⁴⁰ But she is happier if she stays as she is, in my judgment, and I think that I also have God's Spirit.

¹ Now concerning the things about which you wrote to me: it is good for a man not to touch a woman.

⁸ Therefore he who rejects doesn't reject man, but God, who has also given his Holy Spirit to you.

¹¹ I have become foolish in boasting. You compelled me, for I ought to have been commended by you, for in nothing was I inferior to the very best apostles, though I am nothing.

⁸ For though I should boast somewhat abundantly concerning our authority, (which the Lord gave for building you up, and not for casting you down) I will not be disappointed,

⁹ that I may not seem as if I desire to terrify you by my letters.

¹⁰ For, "His letters," they say, "are weighty and strong, but his bodily presence is weak, and his speech is despised."

³⁶ What? Was it from you that the word of God went out? Or did it come to you alone?

³⁷ If any man thinks himself to be a prophet, or spiritual, let him recognize the things which I write to you, that they are the commandment of the Lord.

¹ Am I not free? Am I not an apostle? Haven't I seen Jesus Christ, our Lord? Aren't you my work in the Lord?

² If to others I am not an apostle, yet at least I am to you; for you are the seal of my apostleship in the Lord.

³ My defense to those who examine me is this.

³⁵ This I say for your own profit; not that I may ensnare you, but for that which is appropriate, and that you may attend to the Lord without distraction.

²⁵ Now concerning virgins, I have no commandment from the Lord, but I give my judgment as one who has obtained mercy from the Lord to be trustworthy.

²⁶ I think that it is good therefore, because of the distress that is on us, that it is good for a man to be as he is.

⁸ But I say to the unmarried and to widows, it is good for them if they remain even as I am.

⁶ But this I say by way of concession, not of commandment.

¹⁵ Regard the patience of our Lord as salvation; even as our beloved brother Paul also, according to the wisdom given to him, wrote to you;

¹⁶ as also in all of his letters, speaking in them of these things. In those are some things hard to be understood, which the ignorant and unsettled twist, as they also do to the other Scriptures, to their own destruction.