05. Chapter 5. THE EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS

CHAPTER V THE EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS THE problems connected with the background of the Epistle to the Galatians are almost the exact opposite of those in the Epistles to the Corinthians. In the latter, the questions of place and date are tolerably certain, and of quite subordinate importance, but it is both difficult and important to determine the nature of the controversy which called forth the Epistles. In the former, on the other hand, the nature of the controversy is quite plain, but it is extremely hard to fix the places from which and to which St. Paul wrote, or the time at which he sent the letter. The nature of the controversy is clearly fixed by the whole trend of the Epistle. From beginning to end, it is engaged in controverting the proposition that Gentile Christians ought to be circumcised and observe the Jewish Law; it is also obvious that this proposition had been set up by Christian teachers who had come to Galatia after St. Paul had left his converts, and we can scarcely be wrong in identifying these teachers with those of the Jerusalem propaganda described on pp. 29 ff. So much is plain, and it is only subordinate points which will later require further discussion. But the difficulties begin when one asks (what is, after all, in reality the previous question) where did the Galatians live, and when did St. Paul write to them? It is, therefore, necessary to discuss these questions at some length. WHERE WAS GALATIA?

There are two meanings which can conceivably be given to the word “Galatia.” It may mean the comparatively small district which was once the Kingdom of the Galatae, a Celtic people, generally supposed to be identical with the Galli of Western Europe, who are also called Γαλάται by Greek writers; or it may be the much larger district which the Romans made into the Province of Galatia. The Galatians invaded Asia in the third century before Christ, and ultimately occupied a district towards the north of the ancient kingdom of Phrygia. Later on they came more or less under the domination of Pontus, and played an important part in the wars between the Romans and Mithridates. Ultimately, in the first century before Christ, the kingdom of Galatia passed into the possession of Amyntas, King of Pisidia, together with other territory. Amyntas was the tributary of the Romans, and on his death in 25 b.c. the Romans took over all his possessions as a new Province of the Empire, and gave it the name of Galatia, because the ancient kingdom of Galatia was the most important part, and contained Ancyra, the capital of the whole. Thus, politically, all the inhabitants of the Province, which included Derbe, Lystra, Iconium, and Pisidian Antioch, the cities visited by St. Paul on his first journey, were Galatians, while ethnographically only the inhabitants of a comparatively small district to the north could be so called. The question is whether St. Paul means “political Galatians,” or “ethnographical Galatians.” To form a choice between these two possibilities a very important preliminary question is whether the Acts represents St. Paul as founding Christian communities in the Kingdom or in the Province of Galatia. For this purpose two passages in the Acts have to be considered, in which there is a reference to “Galatia.”

(1) Acts 16:6 : Διῆλθον δὲ τὴν Φρυγίαν καὶ Γαλατικὴν χώραν κωλυθέντες ύπὸ τοῦ ἁγίου πνεύματος λαλῆσαι τὸν λόγον ἐν τῇ Ἀσίᾳ ἐλθόντες δὲ κατὰ τὴν Μυσίαν ἐπείραζον εἰς τὴν Βιθυνίαν πορευθῆναι, καὶ οὐκ εἴασεν αὐτοὺς τὸ πνεῦμα Ἰησοῦ, παρελθόντες δὲ τὴν Μυσίαν κατέβησαν εἰς Τρῳάδα. The question here is, What is the district described as Galatian? The answer is not simple, and such authorities as Lightfoot and Ramsay are found to give different answers.

There is, unfortunately, a small but important variant in the text concerning the first word—διῆλθον. The text given is that found in אΒCDΕ d e, and some others against the mass of late MSS., which read διελθόντες. There can be no doubt but that on purely manuscriptal grounds διῆλθον deserves the preference; but Lightfoot, Ramsay, and Ask with all show a certain preference for διελθόντες, mainly on the ground that διῆλθον is the easier reading grammatically, and may have been introduced in order to simplify the long and awkward string of participles which διελθόντες introduces. It is hard to think that there is much real weight in this argument; but in view of the fact that the opinion exists, it is desirable to follow Askwith’s example and consider both forms.

If διελθόντις be read, we have a series of participles (διελθόντες … κωλυθέντες … ἐλθόντες) qualifying ἐπείραζον. The only natural interpretation is that these three participles represent three stages which led up to the attempt to enter Bithynia. In other words, the writer means to say, “First they went through τὴν φρυγίαν καὶ Γαλατικὴν Χώραν, secondly they were prevented from preaching in Asia, finally they came opposite Mysia and tried to enter Bithynia.” The important point is that it implies that the Φρυγία καὶ Γαλατικὴ Χώρα was traversed before Asia was reached.

If διῆλθον be read, the matter is not so plain: κωλυθέντες may be retrospective, and in that case the sentence means “they passed through the Phrygian and Galatian region, because they had already been prevented from preaching in Asia.” In that case the region in question was reached after Asia had been found to be shut against their preaching. But this meaning is not necessary. It is a grammatical heresy to suppose that the Greek aorist participle must imply a temporal relation: it is strictly timeless, and the context determines whether the relation between the acts implied in the main verb precedes, follows, or is simultaneous with those implied in the participle. So here διῆλθον κωλυθέντες means “they passed through, in a state of inability to,” etc., and nothing is said as to whether this state of inability was reached before, after, or during the passing through. Moreover, it is a general rule of Greek grammar that the participle rather than the main verb is emphatic; the stress is not on the “passing through” (which probably implies preaching, as διέρχεσθαι has almost the technical sense of “to make a missionary journey”), but on the fact that they were hindered from preaching in Asia. Thus, though κωλυθέντες may be retrospective, it need not be taken in this sense.

It is, therefore, necessary to ask whether the phrase, τὴν Φρυγίαν καὶ Γαλατικὴν χώραν, is more easily interpreted as a place reached after the frontier of Asia, or as one which had already been passed through.

It is first desirable to notice the exact meaning of the Greek phrase. It cannot mean “Phrygia and the Galatian district,” which would be τὴν Φρυγίαν καὶ τὴν Γαλατικὴν χώραν—a reading which is actually found in later MSS., and was certainly introduced in the interest of the belief that two districts were indicated. Nor can it mean “the Phrygian and Galatian districts,” which would require τὰς Φρυγίας καὶ Γαλατικὰς χώρας. In fact, it can only mean one thing—the χώρα which is Phrygian and Galatian, or more shortly the Phrygo-Galatic χώρα. This much is common ground to Lightfoot and Ramsay. But at this point they differ: Lightfoot thinks that the phrase means “the country which was once Phrygia and Galatia,” or alternatively the parts of Phrygia bordering on Galatia. Ramsay thinks that it means the district in the Province of Galatia which had originally been Phrygian, and was probably known in Latin as Regio Phrygia Galatica. To appreciate this question it is necessary to take into consideration the really great change in our knowledge of the political geography of Asia, and of the nomenclature applied to it, made by the recent researches of archaeologists, especially Ramsay. The main point is that by the time of St. Paul an enormous province had been created in the middle of Asia Minor, with the old Kingdom of Galatia as its centre. Among the parts of other kingdoms which had been attached to it were ethnologically Phrygian districts, including Antioch and Iconium, and Lycaonian districts, including Lystra and Derbe. Other parts of Phrygia belonged to the Province of Asia, and other parts of Lycaonia to the Regnum Antiochi, which was not yet incorporated into any province. Thus it would be natural to describe the part of Phrygia which was in Galatia as Phrygia Galatica, in contrast to Phrygia Asiana, and the part of Lycaonia as Lycaonia Galatica in contrast to Lycaonia Antiochiana. In the light of these facts it is clear that the most probable explanation is that ἡ Φρυγία καὶ Γαλατικὴ χώρα means the district of Phrygia recently added to the Province of Galatia,—Phrygia Galatica. It is indeed hard to see what other district could be meant, for the fact that Galatia proper had two hundred years previously been Phrygian would hardly justify us in applying to it the phrase “Phrygo-Galatic district.”

Moreover, consideration of the map shows that a nice discrimination between “retrospective” and other exegesis of κωλυθέντες is unnecessary. The hindrance to St. Paul’s preaching was probably just before or just after he entered the Phrygo-Galatic region, and in consequence of this hindrance he continued his journey across it, instead of immediately passing into Asia. In the end he must enter Asia, but as he could not preach in it, he postponed his entry as long as possible. In Acts 16:1 ff. St. Paul is in Lystra in Lycaonia Galatica, and it is implied in Acts 16:2 that he went on to Iconium, which was either the last city in Lycaonia Galatica, or the first in Phrygia Galatica, a long day’s journey (30 miles) from the frontier of Asia, and less than 20 miles from the great road to Ephesus. Here St. Paul would naturally have passed into Asia, and I understand St. Luke to mean that, as he found it impossible to preach in Asia, he went round to the south of the Sultan Dagh, through Antioch, to Kinnaborion, and so up to Kotiaion, or perhaps by a road branching off just before Kinnaborion to Dorylaion. Here he was κατὰ τὴν Μυσίαν, and intended to go straight on to Nicomedia—Bithynia can scarcely mean any other town— but being hindered by the “Spirit of Jesus,” he turned to the left and went to Troas. I take διῆλθον τὴν Φρυγίαν καὶ Γαλατικὴν χώραν to mean merely that he kept to the south of the Sultan Dagh instead of going to the north of it through Phrygia Asiana, which would have been the more natural route. Probably the reason which influenced St. Paul was the desire to see Pisidian Antioch again, when he found it was impossible to preach in Asia, i.e. in Philomelium, to which he would have naturally gone from Iconium viviâ Laodicea and the main route; for preaching in Asia means preaching along the main road to Ephesus. This view is, of course, hypothetical, and the evidence at our disposal is quite insufficient to enable us to say exactly which route St. Paul took. The important point is that the phrase, ἡ Φρυγία καὶ Γαλατικὴ χώρα, seems most naturally to refer to Phrygia Galatica in which was Antioch and possibly Iconium. If so, the suggestion is that the Churches in Lystra, Derbe, Iconium, and Pisidian Antioch might naturally be described as Galatian Churches, and in this case the foundation of Christianity in Galatia must be dated in St. Paul’s first missionary journey, when he and St. Barnabas visited these towns.

(2)     Acts 28:22-23 : καὶ κατελθὼν εἰς Καισαρίαν, ἀναβὰς καὶ ἀσπασάμενος τὴν ἐκκλησίαν, κατέβη εἰς Ἀντιόχειαν, καὶ ποιήσας χρόνον τινὰ ὲξῆλθεν διερχόμενος καθέξης τὴν Γαλατικὴν χώραν καὶ Φρυγίαν στηρίζων πάντας τοὺς μαθητάς Cf. also Acts 19:1 : ἐγένετο δὲ … Παῦλον διελθόντα τὰ ἀνωτερικὰ μέρη ἐλθεῖν εὶς Ἔφεσον.

It is clear that these two passages describe a journey from Antioch to Ephesus, covering again the ground which St. Paul had previously gone over. Nor is the first part of the route, which is not described, difficult to identify. St. Paul must have gone from Antioch, through the Syrian Gates, through Tarsus and the Cilician Gates, across Lycaonia Antiochiana, and so to Derbe, where he entered Lycaonia Galatica, and thence through Lystra to Iconium, where he entered Phrygia Galatica; after this he would visit Pisidian Antioch, and finally the reference to the ἀνωτερικὰ μέρη probably means that, instead of taking the main road along the south banks of the Lycus and Maeander valleys, he took a smaller road to the north, passing in the end to the north of M. Messogis. When one grasps these facts, the meaning of the change of expression in Acts 28:23 from that in Acts 16:6 becomes plain. In the latter place, St. Luke says τὴν Φρυγίαν καὶ Γαλατικὴν χώραν because he means that one single district was Phrygian-Galatian. In the former place he says τὴν Γαλατικὴν χώραν καὶ Φρυγίαν, because he means two districts, namely the Galatic region of Lycaonia, and Phrygia.

Moreover, the fulness of expression in the one case and not in the other is adequately explained by the circumstances. In Acts 16:6 St. Paul is at Iconium, and he has the choice between the northerly road to Laodicea and the Phrygian-Asiatic district on the one hand, and the southerly road to Antioch, continuing in the Phrygian-Galatian district, on the other hand. To have said Φρυγίαν here would have been ambiguous, for the whole point was that he stayed in one part of Phrygia instead of in another. Nor would Γαλατικὴν χώραν without further definition have been enough. At Iconium he was on the borders of the Phrygian-Galatian and the Lycaonian-Galatian districts. It is true that the latter would really have been sufficiently excluded by the context; but the point is that St. Luke had just described a check in St. Paul’s journey, and the simplest and best style of expression was one which defined the district accurately, and did not leave it to the context to decide whether Phrygian or Lycaonian Galatia was intended. In Acts 18:22 the situation is different. If he started from Antioch and went straight ahead, as καθέξης implies, after passing through Lycaonia Antiochiana—and no other route is possible—he would necessarily come to the Galatian district of Lycaonia, and after that to Phrygia—first Phrygia Galatica and afterwards Phrygia Asiana. The route is thus sufficiently indicated, and there was no check at any point to render further definition necessary.

Thus the meaning of the two passages in Acts in which a reference to “Galatian” is found, points to the Churches of Derbe and Lystra as those covered by the expression ἡ Γαλατικὴ χώρα in Acts 18:23, and Iconium and Antioch as those covered by ἠ Φρυγία καὶ Γαλατικὴ χώρα in Acts 16:6. There is nothing in the Acts which need point to any other “Galatian” Churches, and the theories which make St. Paul travel into the middle of the old Kingdom of Galatia are unsupported by the strict interpretation of Acts, and make St. Paul undertake long and dangerous journeys to sparsely populated regions, instead of keeping, as is far more probable, to the great roads and main centres of the Greek-speaking population. The only weak point in the view here adopted is the insufficiency of inscriptional evidence for the forms used. But this is not a serious matter: the attempt to make St. Luke or St. Paul always use correct official language has been pressed too far. Whether Phrygia Galatica, Lycaonia Galatica, Phrygia Asiana, and Lycaonia Antiochiana were official terms or not, there is no doubt that Phrygia was divided between the Province of Galatia and the Province of Asia, and that Lycaonia was divided between the Province of Galatia and the Kingdom of Antiochus. The districts existed, whatever the official names may have been, and St. Luke’s expressions indicate them with sufficient precision. Whether he was using the names which a Roman official writing Greek would have used is a point of secondary interest, and, after all, it must not be forgotten that, so far as there is any inscriptional evidence, it supports the Lucan phraseology.

Turning to the Epistle itself, the question is one based on the consideration of two probabilities. (1) Is it probable that St. Paul made important missionary journeys outside the districts covered by the narrative in Acts? (2) Is it probable that he would refer to the inhabitants of Derbe, Lystra, Iconium, and Antioch as Galatians? The answer to the first question is, on the whole, in the negative. It is, of course, true that it is fairly clear from the Epistle that St. Luke only gives the outline of St. Paul’s journeys, but it is impossible to see any point in the three great journeys at which a visit to the old Kingdom of Galatia can be interpolated, and there is, therefore, a considerable improbability against any theory which identifies the Galatia of the Epistle with a district outside those which the Acts state that he visited. To the second question diametrically opposed answers have been given. German writers especially have thought it improbable that the inhabitants of Lycaonia or Phrygia would care to be addressed as Galatians, since their only connection with Galatia was derived from the political arrangements of a conquering nation. But these arguments largely rest on the wholly unproved assumption that the recipients of the Epistle must have been ethnographically Phrygians or Lycaonians, if the Churches of Iconium and Lystra were intended. It is far more probable that they were, or (what is here the important point) preferred to think that they were, Greek or Roman, and identified themselves with Greek and Roman civilization, rather than with the Phrygians, whose name was a synonym for slave, or with the Lycaonians, whose name had become the general title of brigands.

Moreover, one may fairly ask what other generic title than “Galatians” St. Paul could have used, if he was seeking a common name for inhabitants of Lystra and Iconium. The Lystrans were ethnologically Lycaonians, and the inhabitants of Iconium were ethnologically Phrygians. Both were politically Galatians; but was there any other name which could be applied to both?

Thus, there is good reason for thinking (1) that Acts refers to the inhabitants of Pisidian Antioch, Iconium, Derbe, and Lystra, as belonging to Galatia; (2) that Acts does not narrate any visit of St. Paul to the old Kingdom of Galatia; (3) that “Galatian” is the term which St. Paul would naturally use to describe these Churches.

Taken together, these facts seem to afford extremely strong evidence in favour of the “South Galatian” view. Nor is this impression weakened by considering the “North Galatian” arguments. I am unable to find that any argument of importance has ever been put forward in support of the “North Galatian” view, except that Acts 16:6 must mean that St. Paul passed first through Phrygia and then through Galatia, after he had been prevented from preaching in Asia. This view is subject to the objection that it sacrifices the proper meaning of τὴν Φρυγίαν καὶ Γαλατικὴν χώραν, reads into the aorist participle κωλυθέντες a meaning which, though possible, is not necessary, and makes St. Paul wander wildly through some of the most desolate tracts of Asia, instead of keeping to the main roads and centres of the Greek-speaking population. The first of these objections is remedied by Lightfoot’s suggestion, that τὴν Φρυγίαν καὶ Γαλατικὴν χώραν means the country, which was Phrygian before the Galatians conquered it. This is grammatically possible; but it is not likely that St. Luke would have plunged in this way into references to events which had happened two centuries previously.

Thus the balance of evidence in favour of the South Galatian theory seems to be overwhelmingly strong, and the answer to the question, “Where was Galatia?” must be that it was the Roman Province, and that the Galatians to whom St. Paul was writing were the inhabitants of Pisidian Antioch, Iconium, Derbe, and Lystra.

II.
WHEN WAS GALATIANS WRITTEN? On the South Galatian hypothesis the earliest date for the Epistle is St. Paul’s return from his first missionary journey. The choice of a date after this point depends on the view taken of the indications supplied by the Epistle itself. These indications are found in the interpretation of two passages: Galatians 4:13 and Galatians 1:11-24, Galatians 2:1-14. THE MEANING OF Galatians 4:13 In Galatians 4:13 St. Paul says: “Ye know that on account of physical infirmity I preached to you formerly.” The Greek for “formerly” is τὸ πρότερον, and the suggestion has been made, notably by Lightfoot, that this must mean “on the former of two visits”; that is, after St. Paul had been twice to Galatia, and before a third visit. Assuming for the moment that τὸ πρότερον must have this meaning, it is important to decide what is its chronological significance. On the North Galatian theory, followed by Lightfoot, it means that the Epistle was written after the visit recorded in Acts 18:23, for the visit mentioned in Acts 16:6 was the first, and that in Acts 18:23 the second, visit to Galatia. On the South Galatian theory the interpretation is less simple. St. Paul visited the Galatian Province for the first time on his first missionary journey, and for the second time on his second journey. Therefore, it would at first seem that Galatians must have been written after the visit on the second journey; but the matter is complicated by the fact that on the first journey St. Paul paid two visits to each of the Galatian Churches, except, perhaps, Derbe, which was the turning-point. Thus, if St. Paul was thinking of the individual Churches rather than of the locality as a whole, he might have said, “the former of my two visits,” at any time after the second visit on the first journey; and the first, not the second, missionary journey, becomes the terminus a quo for the dating of the Epistle. But it is much more probable that this view, that τὸ πρότιρον means on the former of two occasions, is incorrect. It can equally well be used with no comparative sense, beyond that involved in a contrast between past and present, in the sense of “originally.” It is in the “Koine” Greek more common in this sense than in the more classical significance, and in the New Testament this is almost indisputably its meaning in all the ten passages in which it is found.

It is, therefore, more than hazardous to base any theory, or objection to any theory, as to the chronology of Galatians on the view that τὸ πρότερον implies that St. Paul had already paid two visits to the Galatians, for it probably makes no such implication. There is even much to be said for Askwith’s contention (p. 75 ff.), that εὐηγγελισάμην in Galatians 4:13 has more point, if it be supposed that St. Paul, when he wrote, had only once been in Galatia; but the point is too fine to be made the basis of an argument. THE MEANING OF Galatians 1:11-24, Galatians 2:1-14 The interpretation of Galatians 1:11-24, Galatians 2:1-14 is more difficult, and affords one of the most intricate problems connected with the historical background of the Pauline Epistles. It may be divided into two main questions. (i.) Does St. Paul mean that all the events described took place before the conversion of the Galatians, or before the sending of the Epistle? In other words, does the plan of this section involve his giving a sketch of his relations with the Apostles at Jerusalem up to the time of his converting the Galatians, or up to the time when he wrote to them? (ii.) With what narratives in the Acts can we identify the events mentioned in the Epistle? and, if we cannot identify them at all, when are they likely to have happened?

(i.) The plan of the opening sections of Galatians is to offer a defence against the attacks of Christian missionaries belonging to the Jerusalem or Judaizing party, who had thrown doubt on St. Paul’s claim to be an Apostle of Christianity.

St. Paul probably admits in Galatians 1:6 that there was a difference between the gospel preached by himself and his opponents, but he claims that his mission was direct from Christ and God the Father, not from men, i.e. not from the Church at Jerusalem. This he states in Galatians 1:1, and repeats at greater length in Galatians 1:11 ff.: “For I make known to you, brethren, that the gospel preached by me is not according to man: for neither did I receive it from man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ.” He then goes on to show that this contention, that he has received a direct commission from Christ, not from the Church at Jerusalem, is borne out by his history, and he especially explains the nature of his relations to the Church at Jerusalem during two visits to that city. The question is whether this plan entailed his giving a sketch of all the occasions when he came into contact with the Apostles of Jerusalem up to the time of his visit to Galatia, or up to the time of his writing the letter. It is clear that it is impossible to dogmatize on this point. It is possible that he did neither the one nor the other, but merely discussed the incidents which had been fastened upon by his opponents as proving his subordination to Jerusalem. It is too often overlooked, in considering this question, that we have to deal with a controversy of which one side only is extant. St. Paul is not writing in a calm scientific spirit for the good of future historians, but is doing his best to pulverize an opponent. Now, in controversy, it is the business of a writer to answer arguments advanced against him, not necessarily to meet them before hand, and we have no real right to assume that St. Paul discusses every occasion which brought him into contact with the Jerusalem Apostles: he may have limited himself to those incidents which had been attacked. This last point is, in fact, the one which can be advanced with most probability—the incidents dealt with are those which, at least in the opinion of the opposing party, could be used against St. Paul, or, on the other hand, were necessary to St. Paul’s purpose of answering attacks.

Thus with regard to the plan of this part of the Galatians, we can only say that it is intended to answer attacks on the character of St. Paul’s apostleship, but it remains more or less uncertain whether he meant to give an account (α) of all his interviews with the Church at Jerusalem up to the time of his conversion of the Galatians, (β) of all his interviews up to the time of writing the Epistle, or (γ) only of those interviews which had been used against him in controversy.

It must, however, be admitted that while all three of these interpretations are possible, there would be more logical force in St. Paul’s argument if he gave an account of all his visits to Jerusalem at least up to the time of the conversion of the Galatians, and that this interpretation has therefore a superior probability, if it be found to be consistent with the other factors which influence a decision as to the date of the Epistle.

(ii.) Bearing this conclusion in mind, it is now possible to consider in detail the events narrated in Galatians 1:13-24, Galatians 2:1-14. These events can be summarized as follows: (a) St. Paul’s life to his conversion (IGalatians 1:13-16); (β) his action immediately after the conversion (Galatians 1:16-17); (γ) a visit to Jerusalem (Galatians 1:18-20); (δ) visit to Syria Cilicia (Galatians 1:21-24); (ε) a second visit to Jerusalem (Galatians 2:1-10); (ζ) St. Peter’s visit to Antioch (Galatians 2:11-14).

(a) St. Paul’s Life up to his Conversion (Galatians 1:13-16).—In Galatians 1:13-16 St. Paul says, “For ye have heard of my manner of life in time past in the Jews’ religion, how that beyond measure I persecuted the Church of God, and made havoc of it: and I advanced in the Jews’ religion beyond many of my own age among my countrymen, being more exceedingly zealous for the traditions of my fathers. But when it was the good pleasure of God, who separated me from my mother’s womb, and called me through His grace to reveal His Son in me, that I should preach Him among the Gentiles, immediately I conferred not with flesh and blood,” etc. This account presents no real difficulty in connection with Acts, which agrees with the Epistle in representing St. Paul as a persecutor up to the time of his conversion. It is true that St. Paul (Acts 1:1-26, Acts 2:1-47, Acts 3:1-26, Acts 4:1-37, Acts 5:1-42, Acts 6:1-15, Acts 7:1-60, Acts 8:1-40, Acts 9:1-43) says nothing about the sudden vision described in Acts 9:1-43, but it is an exaggeration of exegesis to pretend that the phrase “to reveal His Son in me” can be regarded as contradictory to the narrative in Acts.

(β), (γ), (δ). These passages present more difficulty. The sequence of events in Acts and Galatians can best be shown in parallel columns.

The difference between these accounts is obvious, and one cannot entirely escape the admission that either one or both are incomplete or inaccurate. There are, however, two points which are especially worth notice. In the first place, the expression in Galatians, “I returned (ὑπέστρεψα) to Damascus,” implies that he had previously been there. It would seem as though St. Paul, for the moment at least, regarded his conversion, or the complex of events of which his conversion was the centre, as having taken place at Damascus, and this more or less corroborates the narrative in Acts, according to which the conversion took place on the road to Damascus, and was followed immediately by a period of temporary blindness passed through in Damascus. In the second place, the statement in Galatians that St. Paul departed to the “districts of Syria and Cilicia” after the first visit to Jerusalem, corroborates the statement in Acts, that, owing to a plot of the Greek-speaking Jews, he was taken by the Christians to Caesarea and sent to Tarsus, his native town in Cilicia. But the points in which Acts and Galatians wholly fail to corroborate each other are the visit to Arabia and the description of the visit to Jerusalem. With regard to the visit to Arabia, whatever may have been its nature, room can only be found for it if we suppose that St. Luke has telescoped together two visits to Damascus, consciously or unconsciously, and that the events described in Acts 9:19-25 really cover three years. It should also be noted that the account of St. Paul’s escape from Damascus in a basket is corroborated by 2 Corinthians 11:33 (“In Damascus the ethnarch of Aretas the king guarded the city of the Damascenes to take me, and I was let down in a basket through a window”), and is brought into relation with Aretas, the King of the Nabatean kingdom of Arabia. But for the present purpose the question is not of primary importance. The events at Jerusalem are a more serious matter. The two accounts are best placed in parallel columns.

No amount of argument can alter the fact that Acts speaks of a period of preaching in Jerusalem, which attracted sufficient attention to endanger St. Paul’s life, while Galatians says that he was unknown by face unto the Churches of Judaea. Considerations which may be allowed to tell on the other side are the possibilities that St. Paul never spoke to any one except the Apostles and Greek-speaking Jews, and that Judaea means “with the exception of Jerusalem.” But to most minds this seems very forced and improbable. The general impression made by Galatians is that this visit was a purely private one, during which St. Paul only met St. Peter and St. James of the leaders, while Acts suggests a rather stormy career of preaching in the company of the Apostles and St. Barnabas, who in the Epistles is spoken of as an Apostle (cf. Galatians 2:9; 1 Corinthians 9:5-6).

Thus there is a real and essential difference between Acts and Galatians. Probably both documents refer to the same visit, as both place it between St. Paul’s departure from Damascus and his departure to Tarsus in Cilicia; but they give divergent accounts of the character of the visit. This is possibly to be explained by defective information on the part of St. Luke, but probably a more important factor is the different purposes for which the two accounts were written. St. Paul is controverting the accusation that he was disloyal to the authorities at Jerusalem, and that he had derived his commission to preach from them. St. Luke is either giving a merely historical account, or is chiefly concerned to show that St. Paul’s gospel was not essentially different from that of Jerusalem. St. Paul wishes to show his independence; St. Luke, to make plain his agreement. The importance of this fact is not so much direct as indirect. It shows that we cannot expect St. Luke and St. Paul to agree closely in their accounts of the same events, and that their disagreement in descriptions is not really any proof that they do not refer to the same things. To what extent this is due to the pressure of controversy influencing St. Paul in one way, and the necessity of omitting irrelevant details affecting St. Luke in another, is impossible to say; the fact remains that when they are relating the same events they sometimes differ so widely that it is only the context which enables us to be sure that they are not referring to different incidents.

(ε) The Second Visit to Jerusalem.—This is placed by St. Paul “after fourteen years.” It is somewhat doubtful whether he means fourteen years after his conversion, or fourteen years after the first visit. Probably the latter is right (see p. 288 f.), but the point is for the present purpose immaterial. Really important is the omission of any statement as to the reason why he ever left Tarsus and came to Antioch. According to Acts 11:25, this was at the desire of St. Barnabas, the delegate from Jerusalem, and when St. Paul appears in Acts at Antioch there is no suggestion that he is in any way superior to St. Barnabas; indeed, until the two reach Cyprus St. Paul always is mentioned in the second place. Why did St. Paul say nothing about this? If the account in Acts is accurate it seems admirably calculated to have afforded a weapon for those who maintained that he was subordinate to the Apostles at Jerusalem. One can only suppose that there were some other facts which prevented this incident from being used by St. Paul’s opponents, but were either unknown to St. Luke or seemed to him to be immaterial for his purpose. Once more it is plain that one cannot safely assume that either Acts or Galatians gives a complete account of all the occasions when he came into contact with the original Apostles. The further course of events is most important and difficult. St. Paul says that he went up to Jerusalem, and that various incidents took place. What exactly were these incidents, and to what narratives in Acts do they correspond?

Probably the least confusing manner of dealing with these very complicated and perhaps insoluble questions is to adopt a somewhat artificial division of the material, not entirely justified by the text, and say that there are two problems: (1) the circumcision of Titus, and (2) the interview with St. James, Cephas, and St. John; and it is disappointing, even if honest, to be obliged to admit at the outset that no satisfactorily high degree of probability can be claimed for any solution to either problem.

(1)The Circumcision of Titus.—As so often happens in passages which present exegetical difficulties, the text is uncertain. The ordinary text found in all critical editions and in all translations of modern times is: ἀλλʼ οὐδὲ Τίτος ὁ σὺν ἐμοὶ Ἕλλην ὢν ἠναγκάσθη περιτμηθῆναι· διὰ δὲ τοὺς παρεισάκτους ψευδαδέλφους, οἵτινες παρεισῆλθον κατασκοπῆσαι τὴν ἐλευθερίαν ἡμῶν ἣν ἔχομεν ἐν Χριστῷ Ἰησοῦ, ἵνα ἡμᾶς καταδουλώσουσιν, οἷς οὐδὲ πρὸς ὥραν εἵξαμεν τῇ ὑποταγῇ, ἵνα ἡ ἀλήθεια τοῦ εὐαγγελίου διαμείνῃ πρὸς ὑμᾶς. “But not even Titus who was with me, being a Greek, was compelled to be circumcised, but because of the false brethren privily brought in, who came in privily to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, that they might bring us into bondage, to whom we yielded in subjection, no! not for an hour, that the truth of the gospel might continue with you.” This text is found in all Greek MSS. (including אB) except D, but not in the Old Latin version, or in the Peshitto Syriac. It has in so far a claim to recognition that it has not merely much manuscript support, but provides a sentence so impossible to construe and difficult to explain that it invites alteration. The serious rival to this text is found in D, Irenaeus, Victorinus, Tertullian, Ambrosiaster, Primasius and the Old Latin version: ἀλλʼ οὐδὲ Τίτος … ἠναγκάσθη περιτμηθῆναι, διὰ δὲ τοὺς παρεισάκτους ψευδαδέλφους … πρὸς ὥραν εἴξαμεν τῇ ὑποταγῇ ἵνα ἡ ἀλήθεια, κ.τ.λ., omitting the words οἷς οὐδὲ before πρὸς ὥραν.

Intermediate stages between these two readings are found in Marcion, some Greek MSS. known to Victorinus, and the Peshitto Syriac, who read, οὐδὲ πρὸς ὥραν εἴξαμεν, κ.τ.λ. but without οἷς, and in Jerome’s Commentary on Galatians, which reads οἷς πρὸς ὥραν εἴξαμεν without οὐδέ. The question is whether these stages represent emendations of the ordinary text or of that found in D, etc. Undoubtedly, Tertullian and Irenaeus represent an older type of text than anything found, as a whole, in our extant MSS., but in any given instance there is always the chance that they have a purely Western corruption, and that the great MSS. are right. The crucial point of the textual argument is to be found in the reading of the Peshitto and Marcion. This seems to be certainly an emendation; but it may be explained equally well as an emendation of the one text as of the other. If we assume the text of the MSS. to have been the original, it is possible that Marcion and Rabbula (the maker of the Peshitto) struck out οἷς to improve the grammar; if we assume the text of Tertullian and Irenaeus, they may have inserted a negative in order to exclude the exegesis that St. Paul really did “yield in subjection.”

It will be seen, therefore, that the real difficulty is not that the textual authorities are equally balanced, but that it is so difficult to see which of the variants is really the lectio ardua which explains the others. The question is, Which is more likely to have seemed ardua to early scribes, and so to have first invited alteration? Would they have been more shocked by the suggestion that St. Paul had circumcised Titus, or by an anacoluthon in his statement that he did not do so? Personally, I think that they would have been more tolerant of anacoluthon, and therefore am inclined to prefer the text of Irenaeus and Tertullian; but it must be admitted to be a point on which a decision is impossible. The matter is complicated rather than elucidated by the fact that the verse is, whatever reading be adopted, susceptible of meaning either that Titus was or was not circumcised. The meaning depends entirely on the emphasis placed on the words. “Titus was not compelled to be circumcised” is as possible as “Titus was not compelled to be circumcised,” and the meaning of one is the opposite of the other. Both interpretations (and, in fact, many variations of each type) have often been suggested, but it is unnecessary for the present purpose to discuss them; the truth is that it is quite impossible ever to decide from the actual wording what really happened. This is one of the results which spring from the fact that Galatians is really a letter, dealing with facts which were well known both to the writer and to his correspondents, though not to us. St. Paul was not writing for our benefit, but for the Galatians, who knew all about Titus, and therefore it was unnecessary for him to make plain the fact that Titus had or had not been circumcised—what he had to do was to discuss the importance of the fact.

When, however, we look at the question in this light, no longer as a question of exegesis, but as one of general probability, the point assumes a somewhat different aspect, though it still remains obscure. St. Paul is here defending himself against attack: there is, therefore, a probability that the incidents with which he deals are those which his opponents had used to prove that he was subordinate to the Apostles at Jerusalem. Certainly this is the case with the first visit to Jerusalem, and with the interview with the Apostles on the second visit; clearly these were facts out of which St. Paul’s opponents had tried to make capital, and had thus forced him to give his own account of what had happened. If we might assume that this is also the case with the episode of Titus, it would follow that he had been circumcised, that St. Paul’s opponents had used this as an argument, and that St. Paul, therefore, found it necessary to explain that, though Titus had been circumcised, it was not under compulsion, but as an act of grace, perhaps of misplaced concession to false brethren, whose true character he did not at the time perceive. At first sight this seems convincing, but it may be argued, on the other hand, with equal plausibility, that the incident of Titus is only mentioned in order to prove that the interview at Jerusalem was not really a permanent submission, as could be seen from the fact that Titus (who was a Gentile) was not circumcised, in spite of the pressure exercised by the false brethren, to whom he yielded only on matters of temporary importance, not on those of principle. Nor is it possible to base a decision between these two lines of argument on our knowledge of what St. Paul is likely to have done. St. Paul argues in his Epistles against the necessity of circumcision, but on the other hand, he circumcised Timothy, who was, after all, a Greek, even though his mother was a Jewess, and we may safely say that no one after reading Galatians 5:1-26 would ever have expected such a concession to Jewish feeling, though Galatians 5:11 (“If I preach circumcision, why am I persecuted?”) may be taken as implying that in some way he had given rise to the statement that he did recommend circumcision.

Thus the only possible summing up of the whole point seems to be that a verdict of “not proven” ought to be returned. It is possible to make attractive statements in the spirit of an advocate for either side, but if a judicial attitude is to be observed, no other verdict is conceivable. If, however, I were obliged to take sides, I should say that there is a balance of argument in favour of the view that Titus was circumcised.

(2)The Interview with St. Peter, St. James, and St. John at Jerusalem.—The main question here is whether this interview can be placed at the time of the Apostolic Council described in Acts 15:1-41, or at that of the visit during the famine described in Acts 11:30 and Acts 12:25. The popular view is the identification of the visit with the Apostolic Council, and the arguments in favour of this view are best set out in the additional note to Acts 2:1-47. in Lightfoot’s Commentary pp. 123–128. The other view has been defended by Ramsay, Weber, and Bartlett, and still more recently by C. W. Emmet. It will probably be simplest to begin by stating shortly the main arguments for both views, and afterwards discussing them in more detail. The case for the Identification of the Interview inGalatians 2:1-21withActs 12:1-25—The main argument for this view will always be found in the fact that St. Paul’s reasoning seems to imply that this interview took place on his second visit to Jerusalem, and the second visit to Jerusalem according to Acts was that in the time of the famine. A priori this raises a presumption in favour of the view that St. Luke and St. Paul refer to the same visit, and the onus probandi is really on those who deny it.

Secondary arguments in favour of this view are not wanting. It is plain that if St. Paul intended to give an account of the occasions on which he came into contact with the Apostles, it would have seriously injured his argument to omit a visit to Jerusalem. Moreover, two striking parallels can be found between the account given of the second visit in Acts and Galatians 2:1-21. These can best be shown in parallel columns:

Galatians and Acts speak of a visit to Jerusalem made by St. Barnabas and Saul, in accordance with prophetic instructions, and connected with the relief of the poor, and both describe this visit as the second which St. Paul paid to Jerusalem after his conversion.

Such is the main case in favour of the identification of St. Paul’s interview with the Apostles with the visit at the time of the famine. To my mind it is extremely strong. The case for the Identification of the Interview inGalatians 2:1-21withActs 12:1-25—Lightfoot has stated the case as follows: “The geography is the same. In both narratives the communications take place between Jerusalem and Antioch: in both the head-quarters of the false brethren are at the former place, their machinations are carried on in the latter: in both, the Gentile Apostles go up to Jerusalem apparently from Antioch, and return thence to Antioch again. The time is the same, or at least not inconsistent. St. Paul places the event fifteen or sixteen years after his conversion: St. Luke’s narrative implies that they took place about the year 51. The persons are the same: Paul and Barnabas appear as the representatives of the Gentile Churches, Cephas and James as the leaders of the circumcision. The agitators are similarly described in the two accounts: in the Acts, as converted Pharisees, who had imported their dogmas into the Christian Church; in the Epistle, as false brethren who attempt to impose the bondage of the Law on the Gentile converts. The two Apostles of the Gentiles are represented in both accounts as attended: ‘certain other Gentiles’ (ἐξ αὐτῶν) are mentioned by St. Luke; Titus, a Gentile, is named by St. Paul. The subject of dispute is the same; the circumcision of the Gentile converts. The character of the conference is in general the same; a prolonged and hard-fought contest. The result is the same; the exemption of the Gentiles from the enactments of the Law, and the recognition of the apostolic commission of Paul and Barnabas by the leaders of the Jewish Church.”

Such are the positive arguments for the two identifications. It remains to compare them, and see which seems to give the best explanation of the facts and to be least susceptible to serious criticism.

It is plain that Lightfoot’s argument as to the geography applies equally well to either identification, and that so far as the persons engaged are concerned the representatives of Antioch were on both occasions St. Barnabas and St. Paul. Thus the points which really have to be considered are: (1) the probability or reverse of the presence of St. Peter and St. James in Jerusalem during the famine relief; (2) the character of the meeting; and (3) the result of the meeting. In considering all these points it must be remembered that the task of those who think that the private interview of Galatians 2:1-21, took place during the famine relief is to show on the one hand that such an interview is not improbable during that time, and on the other hand that the account in Galatians 2:1-21, does not agree with that in Acts 15:1-41; while those who regard this interview as having been a preliminary to the Apostolic Council, have to reverse this process, and show that Galatians 2:1-21. does agree with Acts 15:1-41, and implies a state of affairs which was improbable during the famine relief.

(1)The probability of St. Peter’s and St. James’ presence during the Famine Relief.—It has to be admitted that St. Luke does not state that these Apostles were present in Jerusalem, still less that they discussed the nature of the preaching of St. Paul, but this objection really resolves itself into the question of the presence or absence of the Apostles, for it must be remembered that St. Barnabas— the Cypriote—had been sent to Antioch to investigate the preaching of the Cyrenaeans and Cypriotes, and that this visit was his first return to Jerusalem since he had taken the serious step of approving of this preaching and fetching St. Paul from Tarsus to help in carrying it on. If, therefore, the Apostles were present in Jerusalem they must have discussed, at least in private, as St. Paul says in Galatians 2:1-21, the nature of this preaching. Thus everything turns on the question of the presence or absence of the Apostles. It is, therefore, desirable to consider the circumstances of the visit to Jerusalem in the time of the famine with somewhat greater closeness. In the middle section of Acts St. Luke has had to attempt the most difficult task which is ever laid on a historian,—the narration of the history of events in two separate places. The interest passes backwards and forwards between Jerusalem and Antioch. In Acts 11:19-30 the centre is Antioch; St. Luke describes how the Cyrenaeans and Cypriotes preached to the Gentiles, how St. Barnabas was sent from Jerusalem to investigate, how he approved of their teaching, and called St. Paul from Tarsus to help in carrying it on, and how at the time of the famine St. Barnabas and St. Paul took relief to Jerusalem. Thus he brings the history down to the time of the famine, which was in 46 a.d.

Then he goes back, takes up the history of Jerusalem for the same period, and in Acts 12:1-25 describes the death of St. James and the imprisonment of St. Peter, the death of Herod Agrippa I., which took place in 44 a.d., ending with the statement that after this the “word of the Lord increased and multiplied.” He then adds a verse (Acts 12:25) referring to the ministrations of St. Barnabas and Saul, thus bringing the Jerusalem narrative up to the time of the famine, and connecting it with Antiochene section. Whether this verse is intended to represent the beginning or the end of the relief work depends on the text followed—a problem which will never be settled with complete certainty—but it is at least clear that St. Barnabas and St. Paul are represented as in Jerusalem during the period of quiet which followed the death of Herod Agrippa I. This means that St. Peter was out of prison; but the question is whether he was not also out of Jerusalem. This depends on the exegesis of Acts 12:17 which says that St. Peter ἐξελθὼν (from the house of Mary) ἐπορεύθη εἰς ἔτερον τόπον. It has been argued that this means “went to another town.” But the truth seems to be that τόπος is almost exactly the equivalent of “place,” and that whether it is “town” or “house” depends entirely on the context. For instance, in Acts 4:31 (ἐσαλεύθη ὁ τόπος ἐν ᾦ ἦσαν συνηγμένοι) it certainly means either “house” or “room.” In the present case the only guide which is given to the meaning is in the adjective ἔτερον. This means “another of two” (Lat. alter), and thus connects τόπον with the place from which St. Peter went out. Now, the place from which he went out (ἐξελθών) was the house of Mary, the door of which he had with some difficulty succeeded in having opened. Therefore the strict interpretation of the passage is that he went to another house. There is nothing in the context to suggest anything else. The most probable view, therefore, is that St. Peter remained in Jerusalem, and is perhaps supported by the fact that in Acts 15:1-41. St. Luke clearly states that St. Peter was in Jerusalem at the time of the Council. It is indeed probable that St. Luke has omitted some, perhaps a whole series, of St. Peter’s incidental absences from Jerusalem between Acts 12:1-25 and Acts 15:1-41, but he shows no consciousness of having taken him out of Jerusalem and never brought him back.

Even if this argument be rejected, it remains clear that St. Luke regards the mission of St. Barnabas and St. Paul with relief for the famine as at all events ending later than the peace of the Church which followed Herod’s death, and we certainly have no reason to believe that St. Peter, if he had left Jerusalem until the storm was past, did not return when quiet was re-established. There is, therefore, no justification in the history of St. Peter for the view that he could not have seen St. Paul during the famine visit, and if the identification of the private interview of Galatians 2:1-21 with this visit appears to be otherwise probable, no reasonable objection can be made from any theory that St. Peter was not at that time in Jerusalem. A minor objection of the same nature has, however, been based on the phrase in Acts 11:30 to the effect that St. Barnabas and St. Paul took alms to the presbyters, not to the Apostles. Hence, it is argued, we must conclude that there were no Apostles in Jerusalem at that time. This objection rests partly on a misapprehension of the difference between an Apostle and a presbyter. The Apostles were the active founders of Churches; the presbyters were the administrative officers of Churches after they had been founded. It is also partly due to ignoring the importance of the narrative in Acts 6:1-15, in which St. Luke describes how the Apostles in Jerusalem were set free from relief work by the appointment of the “seven.” St. Barnabas and St. Paul, therefore, would be likely to take alms to the presbyters rather than to the Apostles, but to discuss the nature of their preaching with the latter rather than with the former.

(2)The Subject under Discussion, and the Character of the Meeting at Jerusalem.—Lightfoot’s statement that the subject of discussion was the circumcision of the converts, and that the character of the conference was in general a prolonged and hard-fought contest, is open to dispute. Certainly the subject of discussion at the Apostolic Council was the circumcision of the converts, and their general relation to the Jewish Law; but this is not exactly the description which St. Paul gives of his conference with the Apostles. He says they had a private discussion as to “his gospel.” This is surely a different matter. He had already been preaching to the Gentiles: the question was whether he should continue to do so, and he says that the Apostles agreed that he should go on as he had begun. It is, to my mind, more probable that this represents something anterior to the great missionary activity which called out the protests from Jewish Christians and so led up to the Council. The question of circumcision may have been discussed, but St. Paul seems anxious to give the impression that this was not the question which he discussed at Jerusalem. Moreover, it must be remembered that it is quite doubtful whether St. Paul did or did not allow Titus to be circumcised, and that if a text and interpretation be adopted which means that Titus was circumcised, the matter is really settled— such a concession is unthinkable at the time of the Council, though, perhaps, possible at the earlier date. Nor is it at all clear that Lightfoot was right in saying that the character of the conference was in general a hard fought contest. So far as the conference itself is concerned, St. Paul does not hint at any fighting, and the whole idea of contest is based on the doubtful text and doubtful interpretation of Galatians 2:3. If we follow the most ancient text, that of Irenaeus and Tertullian, St. Paul states that he yielded for the moment, and whether that statement refers to the circumcision of Titus (as I am inclined to believe) or to something else, it is inconsistent both with Lightfoot’s description and with Acts 15:1-41.

Moreover, it is in any case true that on the main point there is more discrepancy than agreement between Acts 15:1-41 and Galatians 2:1-21 St. Paul says that he had a private meeting which settled the matter. He does not breathe a word as to this private meeting having been merely preliminary to a public meeting, which had had epoch-making consequences for Christianity, and really settled the question of circumcision; and he observes this silence, in any case curious, in spite of the fact that this same question is one of the two main topics of the Epistle, in which he is at pains to argue the point against adversaries whose leaders had, on Lightfoot’s theory, already conceded it to him.

(3)The Result of the Conference.—The end of the last paragraph holds equally good as a criticism of Lightfoot’s statement that the result of the interview in Galatians 2:1-21 was the same as that in Acts 15:1-41. So far as St. Paul tells us, the only result of the private interview was that the Apostles agreed that he was doing good work. If they had gone on to draw the—no doubt logical—conclusion that St. Paul’s converts were not obliged to be circumcised, surely St. Paul would have said so? The fact is that the result of the interview was, according to St. Paul, merely that he was encouraged to go on preaching to the Gentiles; which, if the interview be placed at the time of the famine, is what he actually did immediately afterwards on an hitherto unprecedented scale. The result of the Council was that a letter was written to at least some of his converts, disclaiming the necessity of following the Jewish Law, and asking them to observe either the main precepts of the moral law, or a food law. If the three-clause text which implies the former (see pp. 48 ff.) be taken, it is perhaps just possible that this is formally covered by St. Paul’s expression. “they imparted nothing to me” (προσανέθεντο), but if the four-clause text implying a food law be adopted, it is impossible to make his words agree with the facts as stated in Acts xv. In either case he is omitting facts of the first importance, and relating those of subordinate importance which led up to them. It is this which, on the hypothesis that Acts 15:1-41 and Galatians 2:1-21 must refer to the same event, has led so many of the ablest German scholars to regard the account in Acts 15:1-41 as wholly unhistorical. So far the balance of argument seems to be decidedly against the identification of the private interview with the Apostolic Council, and therefore in favour of the suggestion that it took place during the visit to Jerusalem in the time of the famine. It is, however, necessary to examine two important objections which are brought against the latter theory.

(1)     A Chronological Objection.—In Galatians 2:1 St. Paul says that he went up to Jerusalem “after fourteen years.” If this be taken to mean fourteen years after his first visit, it implies seventeen years after the conversion, and if the famine was in 46–7, this would place the conversion in the year 30, which, though not impossible, is at least very early, though it has been adopted by Harnack. It is possible that St. Paul means fourteen years after his conversion, not after his first visit; this would give 33 as the year of the conversion, and no difficulty would then exist. But it must probably be admitted that this is the less natural interpretation, which ought not to be adopted unless it is quite impossible to fit the other view into the chronology of St. Paul’s life. Nevertheless, in view of the other arguments in favour of not identifying the interview in Galatians 2:6-10 with Acts 15:1-41, I am prepared to think either that the conversion did really take place in 30 (31 even is just within the possible limits), or that the fourteen years ought, after all, to be taken as from the conversion; but I feel that this chronological difficulty is real, and the only serious objection to placing the interview at the time of the famine.

(2)The Objection that such an Interview would have rendered the Apostolic Council unnecessary.—This objection is best stated by McGiffert in the form that it is impossible to think that St. Barnabas and St. Paul twice went to Jerusalem with the same object, and that from the Epistle it is clear that the main object of the second visit was to secure the recognition of Gentile Christianity. This objection has already been partly discussed; it does not gain strength on examination, for it really assumes all that it ought to prove. The whole point is that the journey described in Galatians 2:1-21 had not the same object as that in Acts 15:1-41. The truth is that St. Paul does not definitely state what the real purpose of his visit was in any indisputable manner. What he does definitely say is that his interview with the Apostles was a private conversation, secondary to the main object of his journey; but what this main object was he does not directly state, though he very probably alludes to it when he says that he was zealous to “remember the poor.” In fact, a very plausible paraphrase of Galatians 2:1-21 would be “I did, I admit, describe my teaching to the Gentiles, but I did not do this with any idea of recognizing a superior authority, and I only discussed the matter in a private conversation, secondary to my main purpose, because I valued the opinion and experience of the men of high position in the Church. They never suggested any change in my method, but only begged me to continue my care for the poor—which was the main object which I had in hand at the time.” The main result of the above discussion is to show a balance of probability in favour of the identification of the “interview” in Galatians 2:1-21 with an interview unrecorded by St. Luke during St. Paul’s visit to Jerusalem at the time of the famine. Against this has to be set the chronological difficulty. The more popular identification with the Apostolic Council, or more accurately with a conference preceding it, has been seen to be open to many objections, of which the most important are: (1) that Galatians 2:1-21 seems to imply that this was St. Paul’s second visit, whereas according to Acts it was really his third; and (2) that it is very hard to think that St. Paul would mention a private discussion without mentioning the result of the official meeting. It is now desirable to consider two lines of argument by means of which the attempt has been made to meet these objections. The only at all satisfactory answer, if Acts be regarded as a trustworthy source of information, is that St. Paul is not describing his visits to Jerusalem, but to the Apostles. This view has partially been dealt with above (pp. 282 ff.). It implies that the Apostles were all absent from Jerusalem during the famine. There is certainly no evidence that they were absent sufficient to render this a positive argument in favour of the identification of Galatians 2:1-21 with Acts 15:1-41, but, on the other hand, there is no evidence that they were present, and therefore this is a possible answer to the objection, though it must be noted that St. Paul, in describing the object of his visit, does, in fact, say that he went to Jerusalem, and does not say that he went to the Apostles.

Some scholars, however, who maintain the identification of the interview with the preliminaries to the Apostolic Council, are dissatisfied with this method of dealing with the difficulty. They attempt to solve it by postulating more or less serious inaccuracy in the Lucan narrative. Of these attempts the best is that of McGiffert, who maintains that Acts 15:1-41, Galatians 2:1-21, and the visit in the time of the famine, are all one and the same. St. Luke was misled by the fact that he found in his sources two accounts—one describing especially the philanthropic side of the mission, the other its controversial aspect. These accounts differed so much that he thought that they really belonged to different occasions. There is nothing intrinsically improbable in this suggestion, for early writers were certainly liable to make two incidents out of two varying accounts of the same event. But it has several disadvantages: it avoids the actual difficulty of making St. Paul describe as his second visit to Jerusalem what was really his third, but it removes none of the other objections to the identification of the “private interview” with Acts 15:1-41, and adds to them the one serious difficulty—that of chronology— attached to the alternative theory, for the famine provides, on McGiffert’s view, the fixed date for this meeting in Jerusalem.

Still more radical is the view of Schmiedel (Enc. Bibl., “Council of Jerusalem”), which represents the mass of advanced German criticism; he thinks that Galatians 2:1-21 must refer to the same incident as Acts 15:1-41, but that the two accounts are so divergent as to prove that the account in Acts is quite inaccurate in describing an official meeting of the Church, and in imagining the existence of the Apostolic Decrees. According to this criticism there was never either an Apostolic Council or Apostolic Decrees. Some critics of this school go further, and think that the account of a visit to Jerusalem for the relief of the famine is also unhistorical. Such views have, however, of recent years, found less and less support, and are not likely ever to regain their position. It is, however, quite legitimate to use the penetrating and in many ways really moderate criticism of Schmiedel, to show the difficulties of accepting the view that Galatians 2:1-21 and Acts 15:1-41 refer to the same situation. To sum up: each of the rival views has its own difficulties. The identification of Galatians 2:1-21 with a supposed interview during the time of the famine has to meet the two objections that there is no proof that the Apostles were at that time in Jerusalem, and that it is more difficult to fit into the general chronology of St. Paul’s life. The alternative view is liable to the objection that it appears to describe as St. Paul’s second visit to Jerusalem, what according to Acts was really his third; and that it makes St. Paul omit the ultimate decisions of the Council, which were, in any case, most important for the purpose of his Epistle, while giving an account of a private interview which it is assumed had been held previously. The question is, Which set of objections can be most easily answered? It is here that opinions have differed, and probably will continue to differ: my own view is that the objections placing Galatians 2:1-21 at the time of the famine are much the less serious, but I recognize that they are real, and prevent one from claiming the right to feel quite certain on the subject. Probably many of those who take the opposite view would be prepared, mutatis mutandis, to say the same.

(ζ) St. Peter’s Visit to Antioch.—According to the Epistle St. Peter came down to Antioch, and was at first willing to move freely in Gentile circles, but after a time messengers from St. James came from Jerusalem to Antioch, and persuaded St. Peter and the other Jewish Christians to draw back and separate themselves from the Gentile Christians. Against this St. Paul protested, and he quotes the incident here in order to show that he never had accepted any position of subordination to Jerusalem, or had altered the character of his own teaching. The questions of historical importance are whether this visit of St. Peter ought to be placed chronologically after St. Paul’s interview with the Apostles in Jerusalem, and what its relation is to the Apostolic Council of Acts 15:1-41.

Lightfoot and Lipsius both think the visit of St. Peter to Antioch took place after the Council, on the ground that St. Paul is giving a series of events arranged in chronological order. Probably every one will agree that this is the most obvious view to take; but the difficulty has been felt that the incident described is most improbable at that time. In the first place, supposing the Apostolic Decrees were a food law, it is difficult to imagine both St. Peter and St. Paul ignoring them until St. James sent to remind them of the agreement, and almost harder to think either that St. Paul objected to keeping the agreement which he had just made, or, in the alternative, that St. James was trying to insist on more than the Council had conceded; and one or other of these alternatives seems to be necessarily implied. In the second place, if the Council did not prescribe a food law, but agreed to recognize the Antiochene position, which only asked for moral requirements, it is equally hard to imagine that St. James should so soon afterwards have encouraged a movement which, at the Council itself, he failed to support.

These difficulties have led Zahn and Turner to suggest that St. Paul does not here follow the chronological order of events, but passes, after considering the two occasions on which he came into contact with the Apostles in Jerusalem, to deal with the single occasion when St. Peter came down to Antioch; it is not stated definitely that St. Peter did this before or after the events previously mentioned, but historical probability points clearly to an occasion anterior to the Council. In support of this conclusion it is urged that in the previous section St. Paul indicates the chronological order by beginning each sentence by ἔπειτα (Galatians 1:18, Galatians 1:21, Galatians 2:1), and that when in Galatians 2:11 he omits to insert ἔπειτα, he implies that he is no longer following the chronological order.

There is a sufficient amount of weight in this reasoning to render the theory just possible; it is, indeed, to my mind, the preferable form of the interpretation which places the “interview” in Galatians 2:1-21 in the time of the Apostolic Council. At the same time, it cannot be denied that the straightforward view is that St. Paul is throughout following the chronological order, and that when he says, “But when Peter came,” etc., he means that this happened after the meeting in Jerusalem, which he had just described.

It is, therefore, no small advantage for the view that Galatians 2:1-21. ought to be placed in the time of the famine, that it avoids all these difficulties. It is then possible to take Galatians 2:1-21 as giving the chronological order of events, and at the same time not to read into the account of the “interview” in Jerusalem details only derived from Acts 15:1-41 If we confine ourselves to Galatians 2:1-21, we know nothing of any agreement as to the conditions of intercourse between Jewish and Gentile Christians. All we know is that the Apostles approved of St. Paul’s teaching, and agreed that he should continue to preach to Gentiles, while they kept to the Jews; and, so far as we know, nothing was said as to what the members of the Jerusalem school should do if they happened to be in the province of the mission to the Gentiles. But, if this be recognized, the account of St. Peter’s visit to Antioch becomes intelligible. After he had agreed that St. Paul should continue his work on his previous lines, he came to Antioch, and at first fell in with the custom of the Antiochene Christians, and mixed freely with the uncircumcised Gentile Christians who did not obey the Jewish Law. Afterwards, other members of the Church at Jerusalem came to Antioch, who were shocked at this laxity, persuaded both St. Peter and St. Barnabas to adopt a stricter line, insisted that it was one thing to encourage preaching to the Gentiles, but quite another to derogate from the sacredness of the Law, or to excuse converts from all observance of it, and were stoutly resisted by St. Paul.

Moreover, it is noticeable that this tallies very closely with the account which St. Luke gives of the scene at Antioch before the Council, and the τινὰς ἀπὸ Ἰακώβον in Galatians correspond exactly to the τινὲς κατελθόντες ἀπ τῆς Ἰουδαίας in Acts.

Thus, on the view that the “interview” in Galatians 2:1-21 refers to an incident in the time of the famine, this section must be taken to mean that, just before the Apostolic Council, St. Peter was in Antioch, and was somewhat vacillating in the presence of the conflicting claims of the local Church and of the representatives of the Church in Jerusalem. This must have been directly after St. Paul’s and St. Barnabas’ return from the first missionary journey, as described in Acts. On this theory, the incident really presents no special difficulties; it falls naturally into place as one of the events which made the Council necessary; that this is historically probable has been recognized by Zahn and Turner, but inasmuch as they still hold to the view that the “interview” belongs to the time of the Council, they are obliged to accept the exegetical improbability that St. Paul has deserted the chronological order of events. The other view, placing the “interview” in the time of the famine, enables us to follow the lines both of historical and of exegetical probability at the same time. Thus regarded, the incident of St. Peter’s visit to Antioch is a valuable though secondary argument in favour of the early date of the “interview.” In order to apply the results of the preceding investigation to the date of the Epistle, the main point is to establish the latest date mentioned by St. Paul. As to this it is obvious that three views are possible. (1) On the theory that the “interview” must be placed at the time of the Apostolic Council at Jerusalem, and that St. Paul in Galatians 2:1-21 follows the chronological order of events, the visit of St. Peter to Antioch is the latest date mentioned. (2) On the same view, but with the amendment that St. Paul is not following the chronological order, the latest point is the proceedings in Jerusalem immediately preceding the Council. (3) On the view that the “interview” belongs to the time of the famine, the latest date is the visit of St. Peter to Antioch, which must be placed either immediately before, or far more probably immediately after, the first missionary journey, just before the Apostolic Council, when the Judaic controversy was at its height.

Whichever view be adopted—to my mind the third is the most probable—it is clear that this latest date mentioned in the Epistle gives us the terminus a quo, before which it cannot have been written. The question which remains is to fix a terminus ad quem. This cannot be done even with the same degree of probability as the earlier date: it depends on the view taken of the general plan of the Epistle, and on the consideration of probabilities which appeal with very varying force to different minds. The main lines of discussion may be stated thus: First, it may be argued that St. Paul in Galatians 1:1-24 and Galatians 2:1-21 is giving an account of the events not up to the time when he visited them, but up to the time of his writing; in this case the terminus a quo established above is actually the date of the Epistle, and we must regard it as written either just before or just after the Apostolic Council, according to the view adopted. Or, secondly, it is possible to hold that St. Paul is only giving an account of events up to the conversion of the Galatians. It should be noticed that for those who hold the South Galatian view—that the Epistle was sent to Pisidian Antioch, Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe—the second of these alternatives is only possible if we suppose that St. Peter’s visit to Antioch preceded the first missionary journey. Ramsay seems to have overlooked this point when he argues in one place (Paul the Traveller, p. 187) that St. Paul omits the Council of Jerusalem, because it was held after the conversion of the Galatians, and in another (p. 160) that the visit of St. Peter to Antioch took place on St. Paul’s return from his first journey, and finally (p. 191) dates the Epistle during St. Paul’s visit to Antioch after the second journey. This is inconsistent reasoning; if St. Paul omitted the Council because it was posterior to the conversion of the Galatians, he ought also to have omitted St. Peter’s visit to Antioch, and the fact that he does not do so shows that the omission of the Council must be otherwise explained.

Or, thirdly, it may be that he is merely giving an account of the events in his career which played a part in the campaign between him and the Judaizers, either for attack or defence, apart from any question as to their chronological relation to the conversion of the Galatians. The third possibility is, to my mind, the most generally probable, but can obviously neither be proved nor disproved: it is only serviceable in so far as it raises a presumption that if St. Paul omits all mention of events which would certainly have been of use either to himself or to his opponents in the Judaic controversy, this must have been because the events in question had not yet taken place. The adoption of the North Galatian theory, which holds that St. Paul did not found the Churches in Galatia until his second journey, leaves us free to think that St. Paul, in Galatians 1:1-24 and Galatians 2:1-21, describes only events anterior to the foundation of the Churches. In this case, when combined, as it always is, with the identification of the “interview” in Galatians 2:1-21 with the Apostolic Council, the North Galatian theory gives us no help in fixing the terminus ad quem of the dating of the Epistle. It is necessary to look for other indications. These can be found in one direction only—the connection of the Epistle with that to the Romans. The relationship of Galatians to Romans is extraordinarily close. It is similar to, though possibly slightly less marked, than that of Colossians to Ephesians, and 1 Thessalonians to 2 Thessalonians. This has been worked out in detail by Lightfoot, in his edition of Galatians, pp. 45 ff., and the conclusion which he draws is that, if we are to judge from literary affinity, Galatians must have been written just before Romans. The same view is adopted by Askwith, who does not, however, adopt the North Galatian hypothesis. According to Lightfoot, therefore, Galatians was most probably sent from Corinth, just before St. Paul’s last journey to Jerusalem. On the North Galatian theory this view seems to me to be the most probable,and it is important as drawing attention to the evidence afforded by the relation of Galatians to Romans. On the South Galatian theory the position is different. The earliest date to which the Epistle can possibly be ascribed is the one which seems to me the most probable. If we adopt this view the dispute with St. Peter at Antioch is the latest incident mentioned in the Epistle, and St. Paul wrote immediately afterwards, just before the Council, on receipt of the news that the Jerusalem mission, which had caused trouble in Antioch, had also disturbed the Galatian Church. This hypothesis accounts satisfactorily for the absence of any mention of the Apostolic Council and its decrees in a manner which no other hypostheses does: it is, other hypothesis does: it is, of course, only possible if the conflict with St. Peter be regarded as earlier than the Council. It is best fitted to the view which identifies the “interview” in Galatians 2:1-212 with an incident of the visit to Jerusalem in the time of the famine. It is just possible, on the more usual identification of that interview with the preliminaries of the Council, if we suppose (with Zahn and Turner) that the conflict with St. Peter happened earlier, and think that the Epistle was written from Jerusalem during the visit at the time of the Council, but before it had actually held its official meeting as described in Acts 15:1-31. But this seems unlikely: if for no other reason, because the way in which Jerusalem is mentioned suggests that St. Paul was not at the time of writing in that city. On this view, then, the Epistle was written shortly before the Council, after St. Paul’s return from the first missionary journey. Was it, in this case, written from Antioch? This is the most obvious place, but the objection is that St. Paul refers to Antioch without saying or implying that he was writing there. This is not a very serious objection, but those who feel it to be important can suppose that the Epistle was written at some time during St. Paul’s journey from Antioch to Jerusalem described in Acts 15:3. It is a point in favour of this view that St. Luke’s words “they passed through (διήρχοντο) both Phoenicia and Samaria, declaring the conversion (ἐπιστροφή) of the Gentiles.” Διέρχεσθαι is the usual word for a journey of propaganda, and St. Luke seems to imply that St. Paul and St. Barnabas went more or less slowly to Jerusalem, gathering adherents as they went. Moreover, if the Epistle was written during this journey it would give a better explanation of the absence of all greetings from a definite Church, and would throw an interesting light on the phrase in Galatians 1:2, “all the brethren who are with me, ” which would be more appropriate as a reference to his companions on the way up to Jerusalem, than as a paraphrase for the Church at Antioch.

Thus, to my mind, the most probable view is that Galatians was written while St. Paul was going from Antioch to Jerusalem, just before the Apostolic Council. It is, however, necessary to point out that the one serious objection to this view is that it does not account for the resemblance of Galatians to Romans, if the traditional date of Romans,—written from Corinth before St. Paul’s departure for Jerusalem,—be accepted. The only possible view seems to be that St. Paul wrote Galatians after his return from the first missionary journey during the controversy which led up to the Council; that there was then a temporary lull in the Judaistic controversy, or that the Judaizing propaganda passed over Macedonia and Achaia, and that when it broke out in Rome, St. Paul sent a longer and fuller statement of the arguments which he had used for the Galatians. This is possible: at the same time, there is no other evidence that the controversy had first a lull and afterwards a recrudescence. The choice seems to be between Lightfoot’s date, which satisfies the literary problem caused by the resemblance of Galatians to Romans, but fails to meet the historical difficulties raised by St. Paul’s silence as to the Council and its decrees, and the theory placing Galatians before the Council, which satisfies these historical difficulties, but fails to meet the literary problem. Personally, I find the historical difficulties greater than the literary ones, and thus prefer the early date, but there will probably always be those who take the opposite position: what is desirable is that the adherents of both views should recognize that there is a real weakness, as well as a real strength, in their own position, and that it is just this weakness which is their opponents’ justification. The possibility of another date for Romans is discussed in this connection on pp. 363 ff.

It is, of course, hardly necessary to say that there are other views which demand respect, if only because of the authority which years of study have lent to the names of those who support them, but they seem, on the whole, largely to partake of the weakness of both the theories already mentioned, without having the really strong points of either.

Perhaps the best example of this type is the view advocated by Zahn. He has taken the view which was traditional in Germany among those who maintained the North Galatian theory, that is to say, that the Epistle must have been written soon after St. Paul’s second visit to the Galatians,—taking τὸ πρότερον in Galatians 4:13 necessarily to mean “on the former of two occasions.” On the North Galatian theory this meant after Acts 18:23, but Zahn is a “South Galatian,” and therefore regards Acts 16:6 as the second visit of St. Paul to the Galatians. Therefore the question resolves itself for him into an attempt to ascertain how soon after this, and at what place, St. Paul is likely to have had news of Galatia. Zahn decides that it must have been at Corinth, and probably before the arrival of Timothy and Silas from Macedonia (see pp. 72 ff.). Thus Galatians is, also according to Zahn, the earliest of all the Pauline Epistles. In many ways this is an attractive theory, and in Zahn’s hands its strong points are made very clear, but it plainly suffers from all the disadvantages of dating the Epistle as contemporaneous with Romans, and also from those attaching to the system which dates it before the Council, for it gives no adequate explanation of St. Paul’s silence as to the Apostolic Decrees on the one hand, nor of the close resemblance to Romans on the other. It sacrifices the historical probability that St. Paul would have mentioned the decrees had he known them, to the probably erroneous view that τὸ πρότερον must mean the “former of two visits”; and it sacrifices the literary probability that Galatians is contemporaneous with Romans to the supposed necessity of interpreting τάχεως in Galatians 1:6 as “within a few months of my last visit.” It is, therefore, so far as I can judge, inferior in probability to either of the other theories.

ST. PAUL’S OPPONENTS AMONG THE GALATIANS The foregoing discussion, dry and full of tedious details as it necessarily has been, was essential if any thorough attempt was to be made to fix the position of the Epistle to the Galatians in the history of the Judaistic controversy by a comparison of the chronological data supplied by itself, by Acts, and by Romans. The result has been to show that it may, at the earliest, belong to the period immediately preceding the Council, or at the latest to the last visit of St. Paul to Corinth when he sent the Epistle to the Romans. It now remains to take up a different side of the question, and ask what light the Epistle throws on this controversy itself. On any view of the date of the Epistle two things stand out clearly. In the first place, there was a divergence of opinion between St. Paul and the Jewish school as to the relation of Christians to the Jewish Law. In the second place, there was an attack on St. Paul’s apostolic authority. The Judaizers clearly maintained that every Christian was bound to observe the Jewish Law, and to be circumcised (cf. especially Galatians 4:21Galatians 5:2, Galatians 6:12). Probably they argued that the promise of the Messianic kingdom was made to the seed of Abraham (cf. especially Galatians 3:16 ff.; Galatians 3:29; Galatians 4:21 ff., in which St. Paul is clearly combating this argument), and that therefore those who wished to belong to the kingdom must become members of the family of Abraham by means of circumcision, and observe the Law which God had given to this family. This kind of teaching had been propagated at Antioch by preachers who were, or at any rate claimed to be, the representatives of St. James, the brother of the Lord, and the head of the Church at Jerusalem. It is extremely important to understand the attitude of mind which this Judaizing teaching implies. But as it is also the theme of the greater part of the Epistle to the Romans, its discussion is better postponed, as is also the consideration of the question whether the controversy with the Judaizers belongs to one period only, or broke out at intervals throughout St. Paul’s career,—a question which is of course intimately associated with the respective dates of Galatians and Romans.

Peculiar, however, to Galatians is a subordinate point in the controversy: the accusation made that he was in reality an advocate of circumcision. This is certainly implied by Galatians 5:11, “But I, brethren, if I still preach circumcision, why am I still persecuted?” Clearly St. Paul had done something to give colour to this accusation. Either it must have been his treatment of the episode of Titus, if, as I believe, Titus really was circumcised, or, if a later date be given to the Epistle, it may have been his treatment of Timothy whom he circumcised in Lystra (Acts 16:3). It is difficult or impossible to discover exactly what the facts were, but it is not impossible that St. Paul did actually recognize circumcision for Jews, and that at first he was prepared, in the spirit which said, “neither is circumcision anything nor uncircumcision,” to admit it as expedient for Gentiles such as Titus, who were otherwise likely to offend Jewish Christians. On the whole, however, the point probably belongs to the comparatively unimportant category of those rather silly accusations of inconsistency which can always be made with some show of correctness against any prominent man. In any controversy the little men are always ready to shout “inconsistency” against the leaders of the opposite side— usually with some degree of speciousness. It never matters very much, for truth triumphs over tactics, and it is not finally hindered by the small mistakes of great men. The controversy in which St. Paul was engaged is in this respect no different from many others.

It is also possible that the danger of a forged letter purporting to be from St. Paul, was present to St. Paul’s mind when he wrote at the end of his Epistle, “See with how large letters (πηλίκοις) I have written to you with mine own hand” (Galatians 6:11). In this case the obvious comparison is to the situation in Thessalonica (see p. 95), but it is clear that the inference is by no means necessary. The whole passage is obscure. Πηλίκοις certainly ought to mean “how large,” but it is far from unlikely that it had, in St. Paul’s time, a greatly weakened meaning: it is doubtful whether the emphasis ought not rather to be placed on the τῇ ἐμῃ χειρί, and the sentence explained as implying that St. Paul had written the whole letter himself, instead of using an amanuensis. In this case it is unimportant for the explanation of the situation in Galatia. The question can never be cleared up entirely, as the sentence is necessarily as obscure to us, as it was plain to those who saw the original letter. It serves in this respect to illustrate the true epistolary character of the letter.

Besides this, a bitter attack seems to have been made on St. Paul’s personal authority. St. Paul nowhere formulates its character, but we can easily see what it was. His opponents claimed that the leaders of the Church at Jerusalem had special authority; that St. Paul was an Apostle— a delegate—from them, and that if he taught contrary to their commission, his doctrine had no validity. That this was the view promulgated by the Judaizers is as certain as it is, according to St. Paul’s evidence, that it was not really based on the actual attitude of the leaders at Jerusalem themselves. Knowing even only the little which we do of the life of Jesus, we can see how such a view may have been justified. The “Twelve” had been appointed by Jesus. He had given them a commission to prepare men for the coming of the Kingdom. They had visibly received the gift of the Spirit. Authority was theirs: and if St. Paul, or any one else, also had authority, he had it only in a secondary degree, because the leaders at Jerusalem had given it to him. It is important to contrast this with the attack made on St. Paul’s apostolate at Corinth, for the difference is typical of the Greek and Jewish standpoints. The Jewish mind sought for authority and order. It asked for a properly constituted governing body. The Greek mind, on the other hand, asked for inspiration. Validity for the Jew meant the possession of the proper commission from the proper people, and the delivery of the proper message in the proper way: for the Greek it meant inspiration by the Holy Spirit, the revelation through man of the hidden things of God. Thus, among St. Paul’s opponents the Jew said, his mandate is irregular; the Greek, his message is inadequate. No doubt this would be an unjust statement if it were taken as a characterization of all Jews or all Greeks, but it does seem fairly to represent the extremes to which the majority of Greeks and Jews were liable. The antithesis which is thus implied between constituted authority and the freedom of inspiration goes deeper and lasted longer than the controversies between St. Paul and his opponents on either side. It is, indeed, an antithesis which will never be resolved; it can be traced through all history, and both factors are ultimately beneficial. The use of the factor which emphasizes authority, and demands a proper mandate from the proper source, is to give stability: its abuse leads to stagnation. The use of the other factor, which seeks truth, freedom, and inspiration, is to ensure progress: its abuse leads to anarchy.

Literature.—The best commentaries are those of J. B. Lightfoot, 1865; Th. Zahn, in his Kemmentar zum Neue Testament, 1905; R. A. Sieffert, in Meyer’s Kritischexegetisch Kommentar über das Neue Testament, 1899; F. Lipsius, in Holtzmann’s Handkommentar, 1892; W. Bousset, in J. Weiss’ Die Schriften des Neue Testament, 1908; and W. M. Ramsay, Historical Commentary on the Galatians, 1899. Other important contributions are W. M. Ramsay, The Church in the Roman Empire, 1893, and St. Paul the Traveller and Roman Citizen, 1895; E. H. Askwith, The Epistle to the Galatians i, 1902; O. Zöckler, in Studien und Kritiken, for 1895, pp. 51–102: V. Weber, Die Adressaten des Galaterbriefes, 1900; and the articles in the Encyclopædia Biblica, Hastings’ Dictionary of the Bible, and the Realencyclopædie fur Theologie, ed.3. 

¹ It is amusing to note that various writers, whom it is kinder not to mention, have waxed eloquent on the permanence of national characteristics, as illustrated by the fickle Galatians in the first century and the French in the nineteenth.

¹ See further Appendix I. and the map accompanying it.

² See Ramsay’s Church in the Roman Empire, pp. 77 ff., and Lightfoot’s Epistle to the Galatians, p. 22.

³ E. H. Askwith, The Epistle to the Galatians: an Essay on its Destination and Date (Macmillan and Co., 1902). This is by far the most thorough statement of the questions concerned, which has as yet been made, either in English or German. It does not, however, seem to be sufficiently well known, perhaps because it is too thorough and too scientific to attract superficial attention.

¹ Zahn’s explanation (Kommentar zum N. T., bd. ix. p. 16), that St. Luke means “Phrygia, and a part of Galatia,” seems to me to be linguistically impossible. Φρυγίαν must be an adjective and co-ordinate with Γαλατικήν.

¹ See further Appendix I. and map facing p. 316.

¹ Though in the case of Iconium the reservation must be made that it possibly belonged to Lycaonia Galatica (see Appendix I.).

¹ Jülicher tries to ridicule the suggestion that St. Paul would use the name of a province, by saying that no one would refer to the inhabitants of Frankfort-on-the-Main as men of Hesse Nassau. Such arguments are surely valueless. I might equally well say that no one would refer to inhabitants of Natal as Zulus, or of Cape Town as Kaffirs, but might quite well refer to both as South Africans. Both arguments seem to me to darken counsel by specious but false analogies.

¹ John 6:62; John 7:50, John 9:8; 2 Corinthians 1:15; Ephesians 4:22; 1 Timothy 1:13; Hebrews 4:6; Hebrews 7:27, Hebrews 10:32; 1 Peter 1:14.

¹ The exegesis of the verse is difficult: … εἰς ἕτερον εὐαγγέλιον ὃ οὐκ ἐστὶν ἄλλο εἰ μὴ τινές εἰσιν οἱ ταράσσοντες ὑμᾶς, κ.τ.λ., may be explained by taking ἕτερον and ἄλλο in antithesis to each other—and it then becomes a nice question what the two words mean—or by taking ἄλλο with εἰ μὴ in the sense “nothing else but that there are some who,” etc.

¹ See further Appendix III. p. 320.

¹ Or, if another text be followed, “to whom we did not yield even for a moment,” or with still another exegetical possibility, “to whom we did not yield even for a moment in any real subjection.”

¹ Expositor, March, 1910, reprinted in The Eschatological Question in the Gospels, and other Studies, pp. 191 ff.

¹ In his Epistle to the Galatians, pp. 123 ff.

² Lightfoot explains in a footnote that “this is calculated by a back reckoning of the time spent from the Apostolic Council to the appointment of Festus, the date of which is fixed independently at A.D. 66.” A modern writer would probably speak less certainly: see Turner’s article on Chronology in Hastings’ Dictionary of the Bible.

¹ See Appendix II. p. 317.

¹ This view is taken by Lightfoot, Zahn, and Bousset; the other interpretation is followed by Ramsay and McGiffert.

¹ History of Christianity in the Apostolic Age, pp. 172 ff.

¹ Or was it only one messenger? The Latin evidence is in favour of τινά, not τινάς, and אΒDϜΓ latt. Orig. read ἦλθεν, not ἦλθον, in the next clause. Origen, who read τινὰς and ἦλθεν, explained it as meaning that St. James himself came to Antioch.

¹ See article on “Chronology” in Hastings’ Dictionary of the Bible.

¹ The alternative, which, until the coming of the South Galatian theory, was the most popular in Germany, is that it was written from Ephesus. This view is based on the ideas (1) that the τὸ πρότερον in Galatians 4:13 implies two visits to Galatia—thus the Epistle was written after the visit in Acts 18:23—and (2) that it was written very soon after this visit, because St. Paul says, “I marvel that you are so quickly removing,” etc. (Galatians 1:6). Thus it is thought that St. Paul must have heard of the Galatian defection soon after his arrival in Ephesus, and then wrote the Epistle before writing to the Corinthians.

¹ It is desirable to notice that on the North Galatian theory no theory can explain the absence of any reference to the Apostolic Decrees. If we think that the Galatians lived in North Galatia, we cannot avoid the fact that the Apostolic Council took place, not only before the Epistle was written, but also before the Galatian Church was founded, and it is extraordinarily hard to understand St. Paul’s silence as to the decrees. It is, therefore, not surprising that German critics, who hold the North Galatian theory, mostly reject the historical character of the decrees. I must confess that if I held the North Galatian theory I should do the same, and regard the Apostolic Decrees as Lucan rather than historical.

¹Kommentar zum N. Testament. IX. Der Brief des Paulus an die Galater. Cf. his Einleitung in das Neue Testament, I. pp. 138 ff.

¹ Acts 16:3.