Now concerning the things of which you wrote to me: It is good for a man not to touch a woman.

But I say to the unmarried and to the widows: It is good for them if they should remain as I also [remain];

Therefore I consider this to be good because of the present distress, that [it is] good for a man to be as he is:

And this I say for your own profit, not that I may put a snare upon you, but for that which is proper, and that you may serve the Lord without distraction.

Now concerning virgins, I have no command of the Lord; but I give judgment, as having received mercy by the Lord to be faithful.

Am I not an apostle? Am I not free? Have I not seen Jesus Christ our Lord? Are you not my work in the Lord?

My defense to those who examine me is this:

Or did the word of God go forth from you? Or did it come to you only?

If anyone thinks that he is a prophet, or [is] spiritual, let him recognize that the things which I am writing to you are the commandments of the Lord.

For even if I should boast somewhat more concerning our authority, which the Lord gave us for edification and not for your destruction, I will not be ashamed,

"For his letters," they say, "are severe and boisterous, but his bodily presence [is] feeble, and his speech amounts to nothing."

I have become a fool in boasting; you have compelled me! For I ought to have been commended by you; for in nothing have I been inferior to the super apostles, though I am nothing.

Therefore he who rejects [this] does not reject man, but God, who has given His Holy Spirit to you.

and consider that the longsuffering of our Lord is salvation--just as also our beloved brother Paul, according to the wisdom given to him, wrote to you,

as also in all his letters, speaking in them about these things, in which are some things hard to understand, which the unlearned and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do also the rest of the Scriptures.