Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might know the things freely given to us by God, which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words. (2:12–13)
The process of the Spirit’s transmission of God’s truth is called inspiration. His truth cannot be discovered by man; it can only be received. In order to be received, something must first be offered. God’s truth can be received because it is freely given. The Spirit who is from God, not the spirit of the world (that is, human wisdom) has brought God’s Word—which comprises the things freely given to us by God. The Bible is the Spirit’s vehicle for bringing God’s revelation.
The we’s and the us of verses 12–13 (as in vv. 6–7, 10) do not refer to Christians in general but to Paul himself. God’s Word is for all believers, but was revealed only to the apostles and the other writers of Scripture. Only those men properly can be said to have been inspired. The promise of John 14:26 (“But the Helper, the Holy Spirit … will teach you all things, and bring to your remembrance all that I said to you”) is for the benefit of all believers, but was given only to the apostles. Paul and the other writers of Scripture did not record their own ideas and interpretations. They recorded what God gave them and only what He gave them. We have received … that we might know. The Spirit used words that the human writers knew and used, but He selected them and arranged them in precisely the order that He wanted. The Bible, therefore, not only is God’s Word but God’s words.
It is not simply the “Word behind the words” that is from God, as many liberal and neoorthodox interpreters maintain. “All Scripture is inspired by God [lit., ‘God-breathed’]” (2 Tim. 3:16). Scripture means “writings,” and refers specifically to what God’s chosen men wrote by His revelation and inspiration, not to everything they said and wrote. It refers, as Paul explains, to the things freely given to us by God, to the “God-breathed” words they recorded.
When Jesus responded to Satan’s first temptation in the wilderness, He said (quoting from Deut. 8:3), “Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God” (Matt. 4:4). God gave His own Word in His own words. “Every word that proceeds out the mouth of God” is revealed, inspired, and authoritative. Which things we also speak, not in words taught by human wisdom, but in those taught by the Spirit, combining spiritual thoughts with spiritual words.[1]
12 The amazing thing is that such communication is indeed possible! For when one becomes a believer in Jesus, that person receives the Holy Spirit as a gift (see Ac 2:38; Ro 8:9b, 14–15). This is what Paul now reminds the Corinthians of—that believers have “received … the Spirit who is from God.” This reality enables us to understand the foregoing about how, through the cross and resurrection of Christ, the powers of this age are coming to nothing. Those, however, who have not received God’s Spirit—those who are still caught up in the “spirit of the world”—do not understand this “secret wisdom” (v. 7).
With this message, of course, the apostle is able to address on the deepest level possible those among the Corinthians who loved the sophisticated rhetoric and wisdom of the world. If that is the level on which they desire to operate, says Paul, they will miss out on the full meaning of Jesus Christ, the purpose of his coming into the world, the salvation he has to offer, and the many gifts he has to offer. “What God has freely given” is actually a passive participle of the verb charizomai (GK 5919), with God as the expressed agent (called a “divine passive”; cf. NASB, “the things freely given to us by God”). It denotes in the broadest way possible all communication of teachings and gifts from God to us.[2]
12 With this sentence and the next we come to the heart of things, the central issue in the entire paragraph. The argument began with the assertion that Paul does indeed speak wisdom among the “grown-ups” of God’s people. That wisdom in fact is not esoteric knowledge of deeper truths about God; rather it is simply God’s own plan for saving his people. As such it is contrasted to “wisdom” of the leaders of the present age, who cannot know God’s wisdom because it is the “secret, hidden” wisdom that was/is destined for, and finally revealed to, those who love God. That revelation has been given by the Spirit, who alone knows the inner secrets of God, and whom, as this verse now affirms, “we have received.” Since “like is known by like,” the Spirit, who alone knows the thoughts of God, becomes the link on the human side for our knowing the thoughts of God.
As before (vv. 6–9) Paul makes this point once again by way of antithesis to those of the present age. He is forever reminding the Corinthians that they belong to a different world order, a different age, and therefore must not do as they are now doing—pursue or think in terms of merely human sophia. In receiving the Spirit,287 it was not “the spirit of the world” that “we have received.” If this were made to walk on all fours, it could be seen as unusual language. But Paul’s point is simple. He is not suggesting that there is a “spirit” of the world comparable to the Holy Spirit, nor is he referring to demonic “spirits.” He is rather saying something about the Holy Spirit. The Spirit whom we have received is not “of this world”; rather, the divine Pneuma is “the Spirit who is from God.” The implication, of course, is that, since the Corinthian believers have the Holy Spirit, who is not of this world, they should desist thinking like this world.
The final clause of the sentence picks up the main concern of all that has preceded (esp. vv. 6 and 10) and thereby gives the reason, spoken to in this context, for Paul’s and their having received the Spirit, namely, “that we may understand what God has freely given us.” This latter phrase in particular picks up the motif “what God has prepared for those who love him” (v. 9) and gives us a clear glimpse into the content of the wisdom that God has revealed to his people by the Spirit. The verb Paul uses here (charizomai) seems to be a deliberate allusion to the “grace” (charis) of God, or the “gift” (charisma) of salvation (as in Rom. 6:23); it appears here in the neuter plural (“what things have been freely bestowed”) because it is reflecting the preceding neuter plurals (v. 9). Therefore, this language seems determinative that Paul, in talking about God’s wisdom in this passage, is referring to salvation through the Crucified One (as in 1:23–24; 2:2). And God’s people are to “understand” that precisely because they have received the Spirit.[3]
2:12 the Spirit who is from God … what God has freely given us. God was deliberate in granting his Spirit. Although the church used the language of the Spirit, it seemed to have lost sight of why God sent his Spirit. God gave his Spirit not as a reward to the “wise” but to enable all believers to comprehend the magnitude of God’s gift through Christ. Those who are truly spiritual are those whose lives evidence that they have grasped God’s wisdom.[4]
12. Once again an emphatic we contrasts Christians with ‘wise’ heathen. Whatever be the case with others, we are led by God’s Spirit. Some understand the spirit of the world to mean Satan, and this would give an excellent sense. However, Satan does not seem to be referred to in just this way (though ‘the prince of this world’, John 12:31, comes near to it, and cf. Eph. 2:2). Further, it goes beyond what is required by the context. Throughout this passage Paul is opposing a ‘wisdom’ that is not satanic but human. It seems that we should accept some such meaning as ‘the spirit of human wisdom’, ‘the temper of this world’ (Lenski, ‘It is what makes the world “world” ’). Believers have not received the spirit of worldly wisdom. In passing we notice that the word for world here is kosmos, ‘the ordered universe’, not aiōn, ‘age’ (as in vv. 7–8), which means the world in its temporal aspect.
We who are Christ’s have received the Spirit who is from God (cf. Gal. 3:2), and this brings the assurance that we have real knowledge. The Christian’s certainty is a certainty of faith, but that does not make it any the less a certainty. He has understanding of what God has freely given us.[5]
12. The reason why believers know divine wisdom is now explained: they have received the Holy Spirit who discloses the things of God to them. We stands here for all believers, and those who believe have received … the Spirit who is from God. The mark of believers is that they have ‘received’ the Spirit, and elsewhere Paul speaks of the inception of the Christian life as receiving (lambanō) the Spirit (Rom. 8:15; Gal. 3:2, 14). Indeed, the mark of being a Christian is the presence of the Spirit in one’s life (Rom. 8:9). When Paul speaks of not receiving the spirit of the world, the reference could be to demonic beings, but it is more likely rhetorical, as in the phrases ‘spirit of slavery’ (Rom. 8:15, csb) and ‘spirit of fear’ (2 Tim. 1:7, csb). The purpose of the gift of the Spirit is that believers should understand what God has granted in his grace to them. Believers do indeed possess wisdom, but the wisdom they enjoy cannot be ascribed to their own intellects or to their gifts. It is granted to them by the Holy Spirit; thus the wisdom they have is not discovered by them but revealed to them by the Spirit.[6]
12. Now we have received not the spirit of the world but the Spirit who is from God, that we may know the things freely given to us by God.
a. “Now we have received.” In the previous verse, Paul spoke in generalities that involved man’s spirit. But here he specifies the Corinthians and himself by using the plural personal pronoun we. This pronoun takes the first place in the Greek sentence and so receives emphasis. With this inclusive pronoun, Paul has come to the heart of the paragraph on God’s Spirit versus man’s spirit. He offers the comforting assurance that we have received the Spirit, whom God has given us.
b. “Not the spirit of the world but the Spirit who is from God.” The negative clause not the spirit of the world has been interpreted in various ways:
it describes the rulers of the world who crucified Jesus (v. 8);
it denotes evil that has established its own rules and objectives (see 2 Cor. 4:4; 1 John 4:4; 5:19);
it is equivalent to the wisdom of this world (1:20);
it is the spirit in man that is worldly.
We say that the spirit of the world is the spirit that makes the world secular. From the time Adam and Eve fell into sin, the spirit of this world has revealed itself in opposition to God’s Spirit: for example, in the lawlessness prior to the flood, in the building of the tower of Babel, and in the false teachers who sought to destroy the church in apostolic days (2 Peter 2; 1 John 4:1–3; Jude 4–19). It is the spirit that rules a person in whom God’s Spirit does not live. It is a power that determines “all the thinking and doing of men, which places itself over against the Spirit who is of God.”
By contrast, as Paul expresses in eloquent Greek, believers have received the Spirit that proceeds from God (see John 15:26; Gal. 4:6). God’s Spirit comes to the believers from a sphere other than this world and conveys knowledge of God, creation, redemption, and restoration. Since Pentecost, God’s Spirit dwells in the hearts of all believers (6:19).
c. “That we may know the things freely given to us by God.” Why does God grant us the gift of his Spirit? The answer is that we may know innately the things that pertain to our salvation. The Spirit teaches us the treasures we have in Christ Jesus, whom God handed over to die on a cross so that we have eternal life (1 John 5:13). If God delivered up his Son, he certainly will graciously give us in him all things (Rom. 8:32). Believers appropriate the gift of salvation through the work of the Holy Spirit. They realize through faith that in Christ sin and guilt have been removed from them, that God is reconciled to them, and that the way to heaven has been opened for them.[7]
[1] MacArthur, J. F., Jr. (1984). 1 Corinthians (pp. 62–63). Moody Press.
[2] Verbrugge, V. D. (2008). 1 Corinthians. In T. Longman III &. Garland, David E. (Ed.), The Expositor’s Bible Commentary: Romans–Galatians (Revised Edition) (Vol. 11, p. 279). Zondervan.
[3] Fee, G. D. (2014). The First Epistle to the Corinthians (N. B. Stonehouse, F. F. Bruce, G. D. Fee, & J. B. Green, Eds.; Revised Edition, pp. 120–121). William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company.
[4] Vang, P. (2014). 1 Corinthians (M. L. Strauss, Ed.; p. 36). Baker Books.
[5] Morris, L. (1985). 1 Corinthians: an introduction and commentary (Vol. 7, p. 62). InterVarsity Press.
[6] Schreiner, T. R. (2018). 1 Corinthians: An Introduction and Commentary (E. J. Schnabel, Ed.; Vol. 7, p. 83). Inter-Varsity Press.
[7] Kistemaker, S. J., & Hendriksen, W. (1953–2001). Exposition of the First Epistle to the Corinthians (Vol. 18, pp. 88–89). Baker Book House.
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