Expositor's Bible Commentary Commentary 2 Corinthians 12:11

"I am become foolish: ye compelled me; for I ought to have been commended of you: for in nothing was I behind the very chiefest apostles, though I am nothing." — 2 Corinthians 12:11 (ASV)

His boasting as a fool now virtually over, Paul again reiterates that it had been by coercion. It was not really the foolish boasting of his opponents that had driven him to boast but the folly of the Corinthians in heeding the boasting of his opponents. If any Christian community was qualified to write Paul’s testimonial, it was the Corinthian church. Yet they had remained silent, forcing Paul to speak up. His action had been excusable, but not theirs.

They had every good reason to commend him, for, as they well knew, he was “not in the least inferior to the ‘super-apostles’ ” at Jerusalem . “Even though I am nothing” is either an ironical citation of his opponents’ opinion of him or a serious disavowal of any personal merit that could have made him worthy of apostleship (cf. 1 Corinthians 15:8–10).