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1 Corinthians 14:16

Else if thou shalt bless with the spirit, how shall he that holdeth the place of the unlearned say, Amen, to thy blessing? because he knoweth not what thou sayest.

Challoner: AmenThe unlearned, not knowing that you are then blessing, will not be qualified to join with you by saying Amen to your blessing. The use or abuse of strange tongues, of which the apostle here speaks, does not regard the public liturgy of the church, (in which strange tongues were never used,) but certain conferences of the faithful, ver. 26, etc., in which, meeting together, they discovered to one another their various miraculous gifts of the Spirit, common in those primitive times; amongst which the apostle prefers that of prophesying before that of speaking strange tongues, because it was more to the public edification. Where also not, that the Latin, used in our liturgy, is so far from being a strange or unknown tongue, that it is perhaps the best known tongue in the world.

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The verse in its languages

Vulgate (Clementine): Ceterum si benedixeris spiritu, qui supplet locum idiotæ, quomodo dicet : Amen, super tuam benedictionem ? quoniam quid dicas, nescit.
Greek New Testament (SBLGNT): ἐπεὶ ἐὰν εὐλογῇς πνεύματι, ὁ ἀναπληρῶν τὸν τόπον τοῦ ἰδιώτου πῶς ἐρεῖ τὸ Ἀμήν ἐπὶ τῇ σῇ εὐχαριστίᾳ; ἐπειδὴ τί λέγεις οὐκ οἶδεν·

Haydock's commentary

How shall he that holdeth the place of the unlearned (literally, an idiot) say Amen to thy blessing? When persons speak, or pray, and the ignorant have had no instruction concerning such prayers, they cannot know when to say Amen: and when infidels come into such meetings, where they hear many persons at once speaking many tongues, which are understood by no body, will they not be apt to say, you are mad? The like in a manner happened on the day of Pentecost, when the disciples having received this gift, and speaking with tongues, the people hearing them, cried out, they were drunk. (Acts ii. 13.) Yet St. Chrysostom takes notice, that the fault and madness was in the hearers, not in those who spoke tongues. (hom. xxxvi.) (Witham)

Amen. The unlearned not knowing that you are then blessing, will not be qualified to join with you by saying Amen to your blessing. The use or abuse of strange tongues, of which the apostle here speaks, does not regard the public liturgy of the Church, (in which strange tongues were never used) but certain conferences of the faithful, (ver. 26. &c.) in which, meeting together, they discovered to one another their various miraculous gifts of the Spirit, common in those primitive times; amongst which the apostle prefers that of prophesying before that of speaking strange tongues, because it was more to the public edification. Where also note, that the Latin, used in our liturgy, is so far from being a strange or unknown tongue, that it is perhaps the best known tongue in the world. (Challoner)

From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.

The Fathers on this verse

St Irenaeus Against Heresies: Book I, Chapter XIV. The various hypotheses

1. This Marcus then, declaring that he alone was the matrix and receptacle of the Sige of Colorbasus, inasmuch as he was only-begotten, has brought to the birth in some such way as follows that which was committed to him of the defective Enthymesis. He declares that the infinitely exalted Tetrad descended upon him from the invisible and indescribable places in the form of a woman (for the world could not have borne it coming in its male form), and expounded to him alone its own nature, and the origin of all things, which it had never before revealed to any one either of gods or men. …

St John Chrysostom Homilies on First Corinthians, Homily XXXV

Ver. 16 . “Else,” saith he, “if thou bless with the spirit, how shall he that filleth the place of the unlearned say the Amen at thy giving of thanks, seeing he knoweth not what thou sayest?”