This verse is the answer to the question in the second half of the previous verse. The implicit answer is made explicit in Revised English Bible, “No, you are the letter we need.” Paul does not need a written letter from human authorities to establish his apostolic authority. The existence of the Christian community at Corinth, the result of Paul’s missionary activity there, is proof enough that Paul is a genuine apostle.

The language in this verse is figurative language. Some translators may need to say “You are like a letter which recommends us” and “you are like a letter written on our hearts.” The passive idea contained in written may have to be made active by saying something like “which you have written” or using the impersonal “which someone wrote.” But probably Paul is thinking of the Holy Spirit as the author of the figurative letter of recommendation, as in verse 3.

You yourselves are: in Greek the verb form already contains the pronoun, “you are.” However, an explicit pronoun is added by the writer, providing emphasis to the statement, as seen in Revised Standard Version‘s You yourselves are. Some translations say simply “you are” (Revised English Bible, New American Bible), but many translations correctly add the pronoun yourselves (Bible en français courant, New International Version). So in languages having emphatic forms of the pronoun, it should probably be used here.

Some good Greek manuscripts read written on your hearts (so Revised Standard Version, NRSV footnote), but the editors of the UBS Greek New Testament regard the better reading to be “written on our hearts” (so Good News Translation, New Revised Standard Version, Revised English Bible, New American Bible). “Our hearts” seems to fit the context better (see also 7.3). Languages differ as to whether to use the singular or plural of “heart” in such a context. In some cases the use of the plural will be understood to mean that each person had more than one heart. If this is the case, then the singular should obviously be used.

As has been noted above on 1.8, it is not clear here whether the first person plural pronoun our is an epistolary plural and refers to Paul alone (so Moffatt, An American Translation, and Parola Del Signore: La Bibbia in Lingua Corrente), or whether it really does include his associates also. Parola Del Signore: La Bibbia in Lingua Corrente translates all of the first person plural pronouns in 3.1-6 with first person singular pronouns.

Read by all men is a literal translation. Since the context seems to include both men and women, it may be better in most languages to use a word such as “everyone” (Good News Translation and New Jerusalem Bible) or “everybody” (New International Version). The passive verbs read and known may be easily transformed into active forms, since the agent is specifically mentioned in the text: “so that everyone may read and know….”

For some translators the model provided by Knox for this verse may prove helpful: “Why, you yourselves are the letters [of recommendation] we carry about with us, written in our hearts for all to recognize and to read.”

Quoted with permission from Omanson, Roger L. and Ellingworth, Paul. A Handbook on Paul’s Second Letter to the Corinthians. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1993. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .