For if I pray with a tongue, my spirit prays, but my understanding is unfruitful.
Paul has just told the Corinthians that anyone speaking in a language nobody present knows should pray for the power to interpret it. Two questions follow: what is "my spirit," as against "my mind" — and what fails to bear fruit?
Paul draws a line between the inner self and the thinking mind. One writer traces the word "spirit" through the New Testament and stops at this verse.
See 1 Thessalonians 5:23, where the word "spirit" plainly means the spirit of a man, in contrast with mere soul and body. See 1 Corinthians 14:14 and the verses after it. There we have the man's spirit as distinct from his intelligence. The spirit is the vessel of the action, or power, of the Holy Spirit.
One reading is that the speaker himself did not follow his own words. He felt God at work in him, yet the meaning never reached his own thinking.
Perhaps he did not understand himself. He was the unknowing instrument of the Spirit. Yet he had a powerful sense that God was speaking through him. So in the Spirit he felt he was in communication with God, although his understanding was unfruitful.
Another writer rejects that reading. For him, "unfruitful" means producing nothing, not failing to understand.
If Paul prayed in an actual tongue, his spirit prayed. If his spirit prayed, then he knew what he was praying, for "who knows a person's thoughts except the spirit of that person, which is in him?" (1 Cor. 2:11). But his understanding was unfruitful. Some have said this means he did not understand; but this is plainly wrong. Unfruitful means not bearing fruit. So suppose I pray in the assembly in a tongue the assembly does not know. I understand myself, but my understanding bears no fruit in the understanding of others.
Someone might object that prayer is a special case. It goes up to God, not out to people. Paul's own example shuts that door.
Praying in a tongue is ruled out on this principle just as firmly as any other kind of speaking in a tongue. And it is clearly the strongest case. It is an address to God, who of course understood it all. So it settles the question against prayer in any unknown tongue. Communion is the joy of the assembly; at the very least edification is essential. If the assembly as a whole cannot understand it, it has no claim to be heard there — unless someone interprets it, directly or indirectly.
Everything spoken aloud when believers gather goes in one of two directions. Both need words others can follow.
"But," says the apostle, "I will pray with my spirit, but I will pray with my mind also." … He argues at once that if you bless in the spirit only, the one who is in the place of an outsider cannot say "Amen" to the thanksgiving. He does not know what is being said. You may give thanks ever so well, but there is no edification for the other. So even in prayer and praise the same principle holds. In the assembly everything is done for the assembly. The speaker must be either the voice of the assembly to God or the voice of God to the assembly. It is solemn to realise that even giving thanks well in this way would not justify the thanksgiving. The gift comes from God, but that does not by itself justify using it.
A prayer can be in the hearers' own language and still leave them unable to join in. That puts this verse to work in any ordinary meeting.
I must know what to pray about. And I must pray so that others can understand me — in a language they know, and loud enough to hear. I once said to a brother, "I never say Amen to your prayers." He said, "Don't you? Why not?" "Because I never hear what you say," I replied. He was a mumbler. There should be no such thing in public. The point is what is profitable.
- Spirit — the verse separates a person's spirit from his mind. The spirit is the vessel the Holy Spirit works through. Paul wants both spirit and mind engaged.
- Unfruitful — commentators differ on whose mind is barren. Some hold that the speaker did not grasp his own words. Others say it simply means his prayer produced nothing in the hearers.
- Fruit — the gift was real, but Paul measures it by fruit, not by power. A prayer can be genuine in spirit and still yield nothing.
- Amen — the test is whether the outsider can say "Amen." If he cannot follow the words, the thanksgiving may be excellent and still leave him with nothing.
- Assembly — in a meeting the speaker is either the voice of the assembly to God or the voice of God to the assembly. So speaking clearly, and loud enough to be heard, is part of the service.
What is it then? I will pray with the spirit, but I will pray also with the understanding; I will sing with the spirit, but I will sing also with the understanding.
Paul has just raised a problem: someone prays in a language nobody else in the room can follow. His answer refuses to choose between spiritual power and plain sense — he will have both, in prayer and in song. (Where older translations read "understanding," the ESV reads "mind.")
One writer insists the problem was never that the speaker failed to grasp his own words:
Verse 14 has often been wrongly interpreted through inattention to what the verse actually says. If Paul prayed in an actual tongue, his spirit prayed. If his spirit prayed, then he knew what he was praying... But his understanding was unfruitful. Some have said this means he did not understand; but this is transparently wrong. Unfruitful means not bearing fruit. So suppose I pray in the assembly in a language the assembly does not know. I understand myself, but my understanding bears no fruit in the understanding of others.
Paul does not throw away what he has; he adds to it. The setting decides what fits — alone with God, or with others:
He will have his private blessings, and shared ones too. All that God gave he would use thankfully, but in the spirit of a sound mind. What he said to God alone, others need not know. What he prayed and sang with others must make sense to himself and to them.
Prayer and singing are not stray examples. One writer treats both as marks of the assembly — the church gathered together — and answers those who doubt that singing is spiritual at all:
In the assembly the Spirit should control every motion... God's assembly is marked by prayer — the expression of dependence — and singing, which is the outlet of the heart's joy. Some people think it is not spiritual to sing — I do not think they have the Spirit's mind... What a lovely picture of the assembly in action — ministry that profits, and prayer, singing, and worship. That is what God's assembly is put together for: to turn to Him in prayer, song, and worship.
The verse names two requirements. One makes praise possible at all. The other makes it shared:
The apostle brings singing forward along with praying and blessing. He does this to show what marks the true working of the Spirit of God in the assembly: the saints joining in together with understanding. Singing in this corporate way is the expression of the hearts of all to God as one. Without a spiritual nature the saints cannot sing to God at all. Without spiritual understanding they cannot sing in communion with one another. So when we are gathered together, let us sing with both the spirit and the understanding also.
In public the two do not count equally. What reaches the mind carries the greater weight with Paul, and the person who understands least sets the standard:
But we see also that prayer, singing, blessing, thanksgiving, as well as prophesying, had their full place in the assembly. They are all to edification... Power on its own is not enough, however clearly divine it is. What comes with the understanding, and so speaks to the understanding, carries the greatest weight with the apostle. He counts it as speaking with the Lord's authority. That is as true of prayers and hymns as it is of teaching. The least in the assembly is presumed to go intelligently with the praise or thanksgiving that rises up to God.
If a hymn is meant to voice everyone, then personal enjoyment of it is not enough reason to announce it:
Suppose someone has found great joy in a certain hymn. It is a completely false principle for him to think he must at once take it to the assembly and ask everyone there to sing it with him. It is no doubt very natural to assume that what I find to be good, I should ask others to share. But it goes against the truth of 1 Corinthians 14... the hymn should be the expression of the minds and hearts of the saints at that particular time, and this shuts us up to the Spirit of God.
The same rule reaches the person who is only singing along:
We may sing a hymn of praise tunefully with our lips, but if our spirit is not with it, it is not acceptable worship to God. I must sing with the spirit and with the understanding. My heart must be right before my lips.
- Unfruitful — the word does not describe a confused speaker. It means his understanding bore no fruit in anyone else.
- Both — Paul keeps the spirit and adds the mind. What he says to God alone can stay private. What he brings to others must make sense to them all.
- Shared — a spiritual nature makes praise to God possible. Spiritual understanding makes it praise offered together.
- Measured — even the quietest person there should be able to follow the thanksgiving rising to God. So what reaches the mind carries the greatest weight.
- Costly — choosing a hymn is serious work, and singing one is honest work. The heart must be right before the lips.