<p>11:12 <em>But what I do, that I will continue to do, so I may not provide an opportunity to those that desire such an opportunity, and so that their boasting will be shown to be not the same as ours</em>- Clearly there were some at Corinth seeking opportunity to bring Paul down. He was up against consciously organized opposition, which he understandably sums up as &quot;the satan&quot; / adversary. Paul's boasting is made, he claims, so that he can as it were out boast the opposition. He has made up his mind to go down the path of human boasting, and says he will continue to do so, because he will deprive his critics of any opportunity to boast. But as observed many times in this letter, we are here reading flow of consciousness writing. Paul is writing down his thoughts as they come into his mind, and all emotions are at first blush contradictory. For it is obvious that my justifying himself, he will not by any amount of autobiographical truth somehow shut down his opponents by outboasting them. Nor will be rid them of opportunity to attack him. And such a path of action is in contradiction to his correct principle of not comparing ourselves amongst ourselves as men (10:12).</p>