to keep me from becoming conceited
The phrase "to keep me from becoming conceited" highlights the potential danger of pride that can accompany spiritual experiences. The Greek word "huperairomai" means to exalt oneself or to be overly proud. Paul acknowledges the human tendency to become prideful, even in spiritual matters. This serves as a reminder that humility is a virtue that must be cultivated, especially when one is entrusted with divine revelations. It is a call to remain grounded and to attribute all glory to God.

I was given a thorn in my flesh
The "thorn in my flesh" is a metaphorical expression that has been widely debated among scholars. The Greek word "skolops" can mean a stake or a sharp object, indicating something that causes persistent discomfort or pain. Historically, this "thorn" has been interpreted as a physical ailment, a spiritual struggle, or opposition from others. From a conservative Christian viewpoint, this thorn serves as a reminder of human frailty and the need for dependence on God's grace. It is a tool used by God to refine and strengthen one's faith.

a messenger of Satan
The phrase "a messenger of Satan" suggests that the thorn was an instrument of spiritual warfare. The Greek word "angelos" means messenger, and in this context, it implies that Satan was allowed to afflict Paul. This aligns with the biblical theme that God can use even the adversary's actions for His purposes, as seen in the account of Job. It emphasizes the sovereignty of God and the reality of spiritual opposition in the life of a believer.

to torment me
The word "torment" comes from the Greek "kolaphizo," which means to strike with a fist or to buffet. This indicates that the thorn was a source of ongoing distress for Paul. In a conservative Christian understanding, this torment serves as a means of spiritual discipline, teaching reliance on God's strength rather than one's own. It is a reminder that suffering can have a divine purpose, shaping character and deepening one's relationship with God.

so that I would not become conceited
The repetition of the phrase "so that I would not become conceited" underscores the primary reason for the thorn: to prevent pride. This repetition highlights the seriousness with which God views pride and the lengths He will go to cultivate humility in His servants. It serves as a powerful lesson that God's ways are higher than ours, and His discipline, though painful, is ultimately for our good and His glory.

"And round about they dug a trench full deep,

And wide and large, and round it fixed their stakes."

--Homer, Iliad, vii. 441.

A sharp-pointed stake of this kind was often used as a means of torture in the punishment known as impaling, and the two Greek words for "impaling" and "crucifying" were indeed almost interchangeable (Herod. i. 128; ix. 18). So in Euripides (Iphig. in Tauris. 1430)--

"Say, shall we hurl them down from lofty rock,

Or fix their bodies on the stake?"

It is significant that men like Celsus and Lucian, writing against the faith of Christians, used the term "stake" instead of "cross," as more ignominious, and spoke of Jesus as having been "impaled" instead of "crucified" (Origen, c. Cels. ii.; Lucian, De morte Peregr., p. 762). So Chrysostom used the word "impaled" of St. Peter's crucifixion. On the other hand, medical writers, such as Dioscorides and Artemidorus, by whose use of the word, as possibly coming to him through St. Luke, St. Paul was likely to be influenced, apply the term to what we call a "splinter" getting into the flesh and causing acute inflammation (Diosc. ii. 29; iv. 176). Dioscorides, it may be noted, was a native of Anazarba in Cilicia, and probably a contemporary of St. Paul's. The word used figuratively, therefore, comes to bring with it the sense of some acute form of suffering, something, to use a word of like history and significance, excruciating in its character. So used, it might, as far as the word itself is concerned, be applied to any sharp agony, either of mind or body.

The history of the interpretations which have been given to this mysterious term is not without interest as a psychological study. Men have clearly been influenced, to a large extent, by their subjective tendencies. They have measured the sufferings of St. Paul by their own experience, and thinking that he must have felt as they felt, have seen in his "thorn in the flesh" that which they felt to be their own sharpest trial. Some of these conjectures may be dismissed very briefly. It cannot be, as some have thought, the remembrance of his own guilt in persecuting the disciples of Christ, for that would not have been described as a "thorn in the flesh" nor could he well have prayed that it should depart from him. For a like reason, it could not have been, as some Protestant commentators have imagined, any doubt as to the certainty of his own salvation, or of his being included in God's pardoning love. We may safely set aside, again, the view that he refers to his struggle with heathen enemies, like Demetrius, or Judaising rivals, for these had been included in his list of sufferings in 2Corinthians 11:22-23, and here he is clearly speaking of something generically new. There remain two hypotheses. (1) That he speaks of the conflict with sensual passion; and (2), that he refers to some chronic infirmity of body that brought with it constantly recurring attacks of acute pain. For each of these a strong case may be made out. In favour of (1) it may be urged that the language of St. Paul in not a few places implies the existence of such a struggle with temptation. He sees a law in his members warring against the law of his mind (Romans 7:23). Sin wrought in him all manner of concupiscence (Romans 7:8). He found it necessary to keep under his body, and bring it into subjection (1Corinthians 9:27). What has been said as to the question, "Who is offended, and I burn not?" suggests a special sympathy with that form of struggle against evil; and in the "fire-tipt darts of the wicked one" of Ephesians 6:16 (where we have the participle of the same verb), we may, perhaps, trace an allusive reference to impulses of this nature. It is clear that with some temperaments temptations such as this, besides the moral pain which they bring with them, may inflict a bodily suffering little less than excruciating, and the words that speak of the "flesh" as the seat of suffering, and of its being a "messenger of Satan," at least fall in with the view thus presented. Nor is it enough to say, on the other hand, that St. Paul's character made such temptations impossible. The long line of patristic, and mediaeval, and modern Romish interpreters who have taken this view, though of little weight as an authority, is, at least, evidence that they knew the bitterness of such temptations, and though their thoughts may have been coloured by the experiences of the monastic life and enforced celibacy, as in the story of the temptations of St. Antony, we may fairly read in their testimony the fact that sensual temptation may assail men who are aiming at a high ascetic standard of holiness. Experience seems, indeed, to show that the ecstatic temperament, with its high-wrought emotional excitement, is more than most others liable to the attacks of this form of evil. So the daily evening hymn of St. Ambrose includes the prayer, "ne polluantur corpora." So Augustine bewails the recurrence in dreams of the old sensuous temptations to which he had yielded in his youth (Confess. x. 30); and Jerome is not ashamed to tell the history of such temptations, alternating here also with ecstatic visions of divine glories, to the female friend whom he exhorts to persevere in her vow of chastity (Epist. ad Eustochium, c. 7). It may be added that this view falls in with the tone in which St. Paul approaches "the thorn in the flesh" as the crown of all his infirmities. No self-humiliation could go beyond this disclosure of what most men hide. As in the confessions of Augustine and Jerome, just referred to, the last veil is withdrawn, and men are told that the man who has had visions of God is one of like passions with themselves, subject, as they are, to the strongest temptations of his sensuous nature. As in the triumphs of the Emperors of Rome, a slave rode in the same chariot with the conqueror, and bade him ever and anon remember that he also was a man, so here there was a continual reminder that he too might become as others were. If there was any danger of being exalted above measure by the abundance of the revelations, nothing could more easily bring a man down from that ideal height than the consciousness that this was his besetting temptation. . . .