Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teaches, but which the Holy Spirit teaches; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
All Commentaries on 1 Corinthians 2:13 Go To 1 Corinthians 2
Cornelius a Lapide
AD 1637
Which things also we speak, not in the words which man"s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth. I.e, not in words taught by Cicero, Demosthenes, or Aristotle, such as human wisdom teaches, but in words inspired by the Holy Ghost.
Comparing spiritual things with spiritual. In other words, we teach this spiritual wisdom from the Scriptures and other spiritual writings, and do not base it on philosophical, rhetorical, or earthly reasons, ideas, or speeches, as S. Chrysostom says. Å’cumenius says: "If we are asked whether Christ rose on the third day, we bring forward testimony and proofs from Jonah. If we are asked whether the Lord was born of a Virgin, we compare His mother in her virginity to Anna and Elizabeth in their sterility, and thence rove it." The Apostle here gives à priori the cause and reason why, at God"s command, he refrained from using eloquence and human wisdom in his preaching. The reason is that Divine and human wisdom so widely differ. Since, then, speech should be fitted to the subject—matter, it was evidently right that that speech, by which Divine wisdom was published, should be adapted to it, and should differ from the words of human wisdom—that is to say, that it should be simple, grave, efficacious, and Divine, as proceeding from the Holy Spirit, who would reject all rhetorical ornamentation. In this matter we are bidden to learn, forbidden to use ornament. For as words of human wisdom carry with them the wisdom and the spirit of the speaker, so do the words of the Holy Spirit bring into the soul the wisdom of God, and of his Spirit speaking by the Apostles.
