16 But be it so, I did not burden you: nevertheless, being crafty, I caught you with guile.
16 Be that as it may, I have not been a burden to you. Yet, crafty fellow that I am, I caught you by trickery!
16 But granting that I myself did not burden you, I was crafty, you say, and got the better of you by deceit.
16 And why is it that I keep coming across these whiffs of gossip about how my self-support was a front behind which I worked an elaborate scam? Where's the evidence?
16 But be that as it may, I did not burden you. Nevertheless, being crafty, I caught you by cunning!
16 Some of you admit I was not a burden to you. But others still think I was sneaky and took advantage of you by trickery.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on 2 Corinthians 12:16
Commentary on 2 Corinthians 12:11-21
(Read 2 Corinthians 12:11-21)
We owe it to good men, to stand up in the defence of their reputation; and we are under special obligations to those from whom we have received benefit, especially spiritual benefit, to own them as instruments in God's hand of good to us. Here is an account of the apostle's behaviour and kind intentions; in which see the character of a faithful minister of the gospel. This was his great aim and design, to do good. Here are noticed several sins commonly found among professors of religion. Falls and misdeeds are humbling to a minister; and God sometimes takes this way to humble those who might be tempted to be lifted up. These vast verses show to what excesses the false teachers had drawn aside their deluded followers. How grievous it is that such evils should be found among professors of the gospel! Yet thus it is, and has been too often, and it was so even in the days of the apostles.