Saulo de Tarso, aka St. Paul, was the first Psychologist.

Dear reader, I challenge you to read this letter that St. Paul wrote to his friends in Corinth more than 2,000 years ago. The man gave his friends the first “how to” list of self-analyses. And at the end, he challenges you to grow up and dare to look into yourself without fear as long you have love.

“If I speak in human and angelic tongues but do not have love, I am a resounding gong or a clashing cymbal. And if I have the gift of prophecy and comprehend all mysteries and all knowledge; if I have all faith to move mountains but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give away everything I own, and if I hand my body over so that I may boast but do not have love, I gain nothing.”

“Love is patient; love is kind. It is not jealous, [love] is not pompous, it is not inflated, it is not rude, it does not seek its own interests, it is not quick-tempered, it does not brood over injury, it does not rejoice over wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things. Love never fails.”

“If there are prophecies, they will be brought to nothing; if tongues, they will cease; if knowledge, it will be brought to nothing.”

“For we know partially, and we prophesy partially, but when the perfect comes, the partial will pass away.”

“When I was a child, I used to talk as a child, think as a child, reason as a child; when I became a man, I put aside childish things.”

“At present, we see indistinctly, as in a mirror, but then face to face. At present, I know partially; then I shall know fully, as I am fully known.”

“So, faith, hope, love remain, these three; but the greatest of these is love. “[1]

[1] Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians [13:1–13]

File: El Greco Paul (cropped).jpg From Wikimedia Commons, the free media repository