<p>14:29 <i>And let the prophets speak by two or three, and let the others discern them- </i>The limitation of the prophets to &quot;two or three&quot; is similar to that concerning the limitation of tongue speakers to &quot;two or three&quot;. Perhaps the connection is in the fact that if only two or three were giving messages from God, speaking forth His word, then there would only be the need for two or three to speak in languages, assuming each prophet has his own dedicated inspired 'translator' into other languages.</p><p>How did it come about that the early church knew which books were inspired and which weren&rsquo;t? Paul and Peter were aware that there would be false prophets within the early church as well as true ones (2 Pet. 2:1). These false prophets wrote down their false teachings and claimed they were inspired. So there had to be a system of deciding whether a prophet was true, or false. There was a Holy Spirit gift which enabled the early church to &lsquo;discern the spirits&rsquo;- to know for sure who was inspired and who wasn&rsquo;t (1 Cor. 12:10; 1 Jn. 4:1). 1 Cor. 14:29 suggests that as soon as a person claimed to be &lsquo;prophesying&rsquo; from God, then the person with the gift of discerning spirits was to be present with them and to confirm their words. And Paul goes on to say that anyone who doesn&rsquo;t submit to this, doesn&rsquo;t really have the Holy Spirit gifts. The scenario presented here is radically different to the idea of all present speaking in ecstatic utterances out of their control- which was the picture in the surrounding religious cults at Corinth, and is the Pentecostal scene to this day.</p>