I was reading through the last three chapters of Second Corinthians this morning. I came across the following (in the ESV):

But whatever anyone else dares to boast of (I am speaking as a fool) I also dare to boast of that.

Are they Hebrews? So am I. Are they Israelites? So am I. Are they offspring of Abraham? So am I. Are they servants of Christ? I am a better one—I am talking like a madman—with far greater labors, far more imprisonments, with countless beatings, and often near death. (2Co 11.21-23)

Paul is belittling the false teachers who are apparently wooing the Corinthians with tales of strength and "street cred". Paul says, essentially, "hey, if that's your measuring stick, check out what I've got!" He's been on this riff since the beginning of chapter 10, and it goes through the end of chapter 12, where it sets up Paul's conclusion in chapter 13.

The larger context is important, but it isn't my primary purpose in looking at these few verses. What I noticed about the verses is that the structure is obviously repetitive in the English if you stop and read it, even though the paragraph formatting used by most Bible translations don't convey it:

Are they Hebrews? So am I. Are they Israelites? So am I. Are they offspring of Abraham? So am I. Are they servants of Christ? I am a better one—I am talking like a madman—with far greater labors, far more imprisonments, with countless beatings, and often near death.

By this time I was jonesin' to get into the Greek, but I had to leave the house and go to work. But I can take a little break now to look at this, so I hopped into the NA27. And the structure/repetition/pattern is even more evident there.

Ἑβραῖοί εἰσιν; κἀγώ.
Ἰσραηλῖταί εἰσιν; κἀγώ.
σπέρμα Ἀβραάμ εἰσιν; κἀγώ.
διάκονοι Χριστοῦ εἰσιν; παραφρονῶν λαλῶ, ὑπὲρ ἐγώ·

ἐν κόποις περισσοτέρως,
ἐν φυλακαῖς περισσοτέρως,
ἐν πληγαῖς ὑπερβαλλόντως,
ἐν θανάτοις πολλάκις.

Now, on the way I've highlighted the repetition in the first four lines, the thing to remember is that κἀγώ is a crasis for καὶ ἐγω. And then Paul uses ὑπὲρ ἐγώ. In colloquial terms, it's like Paul is saying "So am I" three times, and the fourth time he says, "I am so that!" or "I am so much more (a servant of Christ)".

But we sort of got that in the English. It's the second part that is almost like Mad Libs (Remember those? Or am I dating myself too much?). Here's the template:

[PREPOSITION ἐν] [DATIVE PLURAL NOUN] [ADVERB] {4x}*

Not only that, but we have a similar progression to the first four lines. These last four lines progress in severity, from "labors" to "imprisonments" to "beatings" to "near death". And that matches up with the descending specificity in the groups/persons in Paul's questions: "Hebrews" to "Israelites" to "seed of Abraham" to "servants of Christ". Let's look at all of this in a table:

The effect of all of Paul's "boasting" in these short verses is to show the Corinthians that if they choose to measure Paul on some sort scale that has a positive correlation with suffering and persecution (more suffering == better score) then they have no choice but to score Paul as high as is possible. Paul breaks the curve.

And in these verses, he's only starting! He actually lists out several of the things he suffered as an apostle in later verses (2Co 11.24-33), serving to annihilate this argument against him.

These few verses (2Co 11.21-23) really do convey the point and serve as a reminder and example to us. This is the calling that we who are Christians must be willing to encounter. I know I forget about it in the relative security of the United States, working at a Bible Software company, with Christian friends and family who great and encouraging to be around. This reminds me that I need to be ready to encounter whatever for the gospel of Christ. Paul did. And I'm supposed to imitate him as he imitates Christ. (cf. 1Co 11.1 and previous verses, 1Co 10.23-33).

* After I typed the "{4x}", I thought: "I wonder if anyone has ever written a praise chorus based on this section of Scripture." Yes, I'm in rare form tonight, apparently. If such lyrics wouldn't be about the painful portion of Paul's apostolic career, I'm sure it would've been done by now.