1 Corinthians 12:11

“But all these worketh that one and the selfsame Spirit, dividing to every man severally as He will.”

That one: in opposition to the plurality of believers; the same: in opposition to the diversity of gifts.

The partic. διαιροῦν, dividing, has no expressed object; the emphasis is on the act of dividing. With the adj. ἰδίᾳ, we must understand the subst. μοίρᾳ.

By the words: as He will, the apostle does not ascribe to the Spirit a capricious and fantastic mode of procedure. The good pleasure of God is never exercised except in perfect harmony with all the perfections of His character, His wisdom, goodness, righteousness. The analogous phrase, 1 Corinthians 15:38, shows how entirely the notion of arbitrariness is excluded, in the apostle's view, from the idea of the Divine pleasure. One may compare in some respects Matthew 25:15. The deliberate will (βούλεσθαι), here ascribed to the Holy Spirit, seems to me to imply His personality, as the act of giving supposes His Divinity. The words: to every man as He will, are undoubtedly intended to sweep away, from the more gifted of the Corinthians, every feeling of self-merit, and, from the less favoured, every tendency to discontentment. It will be seen that this double intention is precisely what inspires the following passage (1 Corinthians 12:13-30). But, first of all, 1 Corinthians 12:12 serves by a figure to bring out again the fundamental thought of the passage, 1 Corinthians 12:4-11.