(16)I say again, let no one think me foolish; but if it can not be so, yet receive me even if as foolish, that I too may boast myself a little. (17)What I speak, I speak not after the Lord, but as in foolishness, in this confidence of boasting. (18)Seeing that many boast after the flesh, I also will boast. (19)For ye gladly bear with the foolish, being yourselves wise. (20)For ye bear with it, if one brings you into bondage, if one devours you, if one takes you, if one exalts himself, if one smites you on the face. (21)I say it as a reproach, that we were weak. But in whatever any one is bold (I say it in foolishness), I also am bold. (22)Are they Hebrews? So am I Are they Israelites? So am I. Are they Abraham's seed? So am I. (23)Are they ministers of Christ? (I speak as beside myself,) I am more; in labors more abundantly, in stripes above measure, in prisons more abundantly, in deaths often; (24)of the Jews five times I received forty stripes save one; (25)thrice I was beaten with rods; once I was stoned; thrice I suffered shipwreck; a night and a day I have spent in the deep; (26)by journeyings often, by perils of rivers, by perils of robbers, by perils from my countrymen, by perils from the heathen, by perils in the city, by perils in the wilderness, by perils in the sea, by perils among false brethren; (27)by weariness and painfulness, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, in fastings often, in cold and nakedness. (28)Beside those things that are without, there is that which comes upon me daily, the care of all the churches. (29)Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is offended, and I do not burn? (30)If I must needs boast, I will boast of things which belong to my infirmity. (31)God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed forevermore, knows that I lie not. (32)In Damascus, the governor under Aretas the king kept guard over the city of the Damascenes, wishing to apprehend me; (33)and through a window I was let down in a basket through the wall, and escaped his hands. XII. TO boast is surely not expedient for me; for I will come to visions and revelations of the Lord. (2)I know a man in Christ, above fourteen years ago (whether in the body I know not, or whether out of the body I know not, God knows) such a one caught up even to the third heaven. (3)And I know such a man (whether in the body or without the body I know not, God knows), (4)that he was caught up into paradise, and heard unspeakable words, which it is not lawful for a man to utter. (5)Of such a one I will boast; but of myself I will not boast, save in my infirmities. (6)For if I should desire to boast, I shall not be foolish, for I shall speak truth; but I forbear, lest any one should reckon of me above what he sees me to be, or hears from me.