1If I speak with the tongues of men and of messengers, and do not have love, I have become sounding brass, or a clanging cymbal; 2and if I have prophecy, and know all the secrets, and all the knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, and do not have love, I am nothing; 3and if I give away all my goods to feed others, and if I give up my body that I may be burned, and do not have love, I am profited nothing.

4Love is long-suffering, it is kind, love does not envy, love does not vaunt itself, is not puffed up, 5does not act unseemly, does not seek its own things, is not provoked, does not impute evil, 6[does] not rejoice over unrighteousness, and rejoices with the truth; 7it bears all things, it believes all, it hopes all, it endures all.

8Love never fails; and whether [there be] prophecies, they will become useless; whether tongues, they will cease; whether knowledge, it will become useless; 9for we know in part, and we prophesy in part; 10and when that which is perfect may come, then that which [is] in part will become useless. 11When I was a child, I was speaking as a child, I was thinking as a child, I was reasoning as a child, and when I have become a man, I have made useless the things of the child; 12for we now see obscurely through a mirror, and then face to face; now I know in part, and then I will fully know, as I was also known; 13and now there remains faith, hope, love—these three; and the greatest of these [is] love.