The Hymn to Charity in the first letter to the Corinthians

Chapter 13 of 1 Cor is rightly known as the “hymn to charity” or to agape, as we refer to the Greek term used by the Apostle. The Holy Father defines it as “the Magna Carta of all ecclesial service” and adds: “it sums up all the reflections on love which I have offered throughout this Encyclical Letter”(n. 34).

Agape is typically Christian love, translated as charity by Latin writers, and Saint Paul underscores above all the absolute need for it in difference to charismatic gifts, of which he spoke amply on in the letter’s preceding chapter. These gifts are bestowed as the Holy Spirit sees best, “distributing them individually to each person as he wishes” (1 Cor 12:11). They could be excellent and especially spectacular, but without charity, they would be useless to those who had received them.

The apostle uniquely praises charity, describing how it works. At this point, he uses a series of verbs that underscore, precisely, the workings of agape. The different versions in today’s languages at times to not succeed in relaying the same expressiveness as the original Greek and they mute its active nature, affirming the quality of this clearly Christian love as something static: “Love is patient, love is kind. It is not jealous” (cf. 1 Cor 13:4). Instead, charity is active, “it acts with a generous and benevolent spirit […] it rejoices with the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things” (vv. 4. 6-7), excluding at once every shadow of negativity: “It is not jealous, (love) is not pompous, it is not inflated, it is not rude, it does not seek its own interests, it is not quick-tempered, it does not brood over injury, it does not rejoice over wrongdoing” (vv. 4-6). They are actions that speak of our daily contact with neighbors, both those that we meet on a regular basis and those that we meet infrequently, or perhaps whom we meet just once. We do not need to wait for something extraordinary to happen; it is in our daily lives that charity can express all of its marvelous fruits. In fact, it is a divine love, as the same apostle describes to the Romans: “the love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the holy Spirit that has been given to us.” (Rom 5:5).

“Love never fails” (1Cor 13:8), while the charismatic gifts one day will cease (cf. vv. 8-12). A triad essentially characterizes Christian life – faith, hope and love - “but the greatest of these is love!” (v. 13). It is with this incisive statement that the magnificent hymn to agape closes.

Prof. Msgr. Antonio Miralles

Pontifical University of the Holy Cross

Videoconference, February 28, 2006