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OET (OET-RV) So when perfection comes, partial things will disappear.
In this section Paul talked about the importance of love. He described how a person who loves will behave toward others. He concluded that love is more important than any of the spiritual gifts. One day all the spiritual gifts will cease, but love will never cease.
Here are some other possible section headings:
Love
Paul urged believers to act in love
The way of love
but when the perfect comes, the partial passes away.
But when what is perfect comes, what is imperfect will go away.
In the future we will know these things fully, and the things we know only in part will come to an end.
but: The Greek conjunction that the BSB translates as but indicates a contrast between what things are like at the present time (13:9) and what things will be like in the future (13:10).
when the perfect comes, the partial passes away: Paul wrote about what things will be like in eternity. At that time people will not need spiritual gifts and so they will come to an end.
Here is another way to translate this clause:
some day what is perfect will appear, and the things that are not perfect will disappear
the perfect: The phrase the perfect refers to the perfect knowledge of God and perfect knowledge of his will that we will have in the future.
In some languages there is no word for perfect and it may be possible to translate it as:
what is full/complete
that which has no faults
we will know/understand completely
the partial: The Greek phrase that the BSB translates as the partial refers to the spiritual gifts Paul mentioned in 13:9.
Here are some other ways to translate this word:
the things that are not full/complete
the things that we know only a little
passes away: The phrase passes away indicates that what is partial will come to an end. The Greek word is the same word that the BSB translated as “will cease” in 13:8b and “will be dismissed” in 13:8d. Paul spoke about the future. In some languages it may be natural to use the future tense:
will disappear
will end
Note 1 topic: figures-of-speech / metaphor
ἔλθῃ τὸ τέλειον
˓may˒_come (Some words not found in SR-GNT: ὅταν δέ ἔλθῃ τό τέλειον τό ἐκ μέρους καταργηθήσεται)
Paul speaks here as if the perfect could “come,” by which he means that people experience the perfect. He uses this metaphor because he uses the verb comes also for Jesus’ return (See: [4:5](../04/05.md); [11:26](../11/26.md)), and he wishes to identify the coming of the perfect with the coming of Jesus. The time when the perfect comes will be when Jesus comes back. If it would be helpful in your language, you could express this figure of speech with a comparable metaphor or express the idea plainly and connect the perfect to Jesus’ return in another way. Alternate translation: [we experience the perfect at Jesus’ return]
Note 2 topic: figures-of-speech / explicit
τὸ τέλειον, τὸ ἐκ μέρους
(Some words not found in SR-GNT: ὅταν δέ ἔλθῃ τό τέλειον τό ἐκ μέρους καταργηθήσεται)
Here, that which is partial refers back to the “knowing” and “prophesying” in [13:9](../13/09.md). The phrase the perfect contrasts with partial, so the perfect refers to full knowledge and experience of God and of what God says. If it would be helpful in your language, you could express the idea behind what perfect and partial refer to more explicitly. Alternate translation: [the perfect experience of God … the partial experience of God, including knowledge and prophecy,]
13:1-13 Paul interrupts his discussion of spiritual gifts (resumed in ch 14) to emphasize that love is more important than any spiritual gift (cp. 8:1-3). The most important thing for Christians is to become deeply and consistently loving people.
OET (OET-RV) So when perfection comes, partial things will disappear.
Note: The OET-RV is still only a first draft, and so far only a few words have been (mostly automatically) matched to the Hebrew or Greek words that they’re translated from.
Acknowledgements: The SR Greek text, lemmas, morphology, and VLT gloss are all thanks to the CNTR.