¹ I earnestly wish ye could bear with me a little in [my] folly: and indeed bear with me.

² For I am jealous over you with godly jealousy: for I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present [you as] a chaste virgin to Christ.

³ But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ.

⁴ For if he that cometh preacheth another Jesus, whom we have not preached, or [if] ye receive another spirit, which ye have not received, or another gospel, which ye have not accepted, ye might well bear with [him].

⁵ For I suppose I was not a whit behind the very greatest apostles.

⁶ But though [I am] rude in speech, yet not in knowledge; but we have been thoroughly made manifest among you in all things.

⁷ Have I committed an offense in abasing myself that ye might be exalted, because I have preached to you the gospel of God without reward?

⁸ I robbed other churches, taking wages [of them], to do you service.

⁹ And when I was present with you, and wanted, I was chargeable to no man: for that which was lacking to me the brethren who came from Macedonia supplied: and in all [things] I have kept myself from being burdensome to you, and [so] will I keep [myself].

¹⁰ As the truth of Christ is in me, no man shall stop me of this boasting in the regions of Achaia.

¹¹ Why? because I love you not? God knoweth.

¹² But what I do, that I will do, that I may cut off occasion from them who desire occasion; that in what they glory, they may be found even as we.

¹³ For such [are] false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ.

¹⁴ And no wonder; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light.

¹⁵ Therefore [it is] no great thing if his ministers also are transformed as the ministers of righteousness; whose end shall be according to their works.

¹⁶ I say again, Let no man think me a fool; if otherwise, yet as a fool receive me, that I may boast myself a little.

¹⁷ That which I speak, I speak [it] not according to the Lord, but as it were foolishly, in this confidence of boasting.

¹⁸ Seeing that many glory after the flesh, I will glory also.

¹⁹ For ye suffer fools gladly, seeing ye [yourselves] are wise.

²⁰ For ye suffer, if a man bringeth you into bondage, if a man devoureth [you], if a man taketh [from you], if a man exalteth himself, if a man smiteth you on the face.

²¹ I speak as concerning reproach, as though we had been weak. But in whatever respect any is bold, (I speak foolishly) I am bold also.

²² Are they Hebrews? so [am] I. Are they Israelites? so [am] I. Are they the offspring of Abraham? so [am] I.

²³ Are they ministers of Christ? (I speak as a fool) I [am] more; in labors more abundant, in stripes above measure, in prisons more frequent, in deaths often.

²⁴ From the Jews five times I received forty [stripes] save one.

²⁵ Thrice was I beaten with rods, once I was stoned, thrice I suffered shipwreck, a night and a day I have been in the deep;

²⁶ [In] journeyings often, [in] perils of waters, [in] perils of robbers, [in] perils by [my own] countrymen, [in] perils by the heathen, [in] perils in the city, [in] perils in the wilderness, [in] perils in the sea, [in] perils among false brethren;

²⁷ In weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness.

²⁸ Besides those things that are without, that which cometh upon me daily, the care of all the churches.

²⁹ Who is weak, and I am not weak? who is made to fall into sin, and I burn not?

³⁰ If I must needs glory, I will glory of the things which concern my infirmities.

³¹ The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed for evermore, knoweth that I lie not.

³² In Damascus the governor under Aretas the king kept the city of the Damascenes with a garrison, desirous to apprehend me:

³³ And through a window in a basket I was let down by the wall, and escaped his hands.