Galatians 2

Galatians 2:1-2

II. Ἔπειτα διὰ δεκατεσσάρων ἐτῶν πάλιν ἀνέβην εἰς Ἱεροσόλυμα μετὰ Βαρνάβα, συνπαραλαβὼν καὶ Τίτον· ἀνέβην δὲ κατὰ ἀποκάλυψιν, καὶ ἀνεθέμην αὐτοῖς

II. 1. 2. ‘An interval of fourteen years elapsed. During the whole of this time I had no intercourse with the Apostles of the Circumcision. Then I paid another visit to Jerusalem. My companion was Barnabas, who has laboured so zealously among the Gentiles, whose name is so closely identified with the cause of the Gentiles. With him I took Titus also, himself a Gentile. And here again I acted not in obedience to any human adviser. A direct revelation from God prompted me to this journey.’ διὰ δεκατεσσάρων ἐτῶν] Are the fourteen years to be counted from St Paul’s conversion, or from the visit to Jerusalem just recorded? The following considerations seem to decide in favour of the latter view: (1) The stress of the argument lies on the length of the interval during which he had held no communication with the Judaic Apostles; and (2) Individual expressions in the passage tend the same way: the use of διὰ δ. ἐτῶν, in preference to μετὰ δ. ἔτη, implies that the whole interval was a blank so far as regards the matter in hand, the intercourse of St Paul with the Twelve; and the words πάλιν ἀνέβην, ‘again I went up,’ refer us back to the former visit, as the date from which the time is reckoned. As the latter visit (supposing it to be the same with that of Acts xv.) is calculated independently to have taken place about A.D. 51, the date of the first visit will according to this view be thrown back to about A.D. 38, and that of the conversion to about A.D. 36, the Jewish mode of reckoning being adopted. For διὰ, ‘after the lapse of,’ see Acts xxiv. 17, and Winer, § xlvii. p. 475.

καὶ Τίτον] Titus is included in the ‘certain others’ of Acts xv. 2, and is specially named here on account of the dispute to which he gave rise (ver. 3). He was sent from Antioch with others whose names are not mentioned, probably as a representative of the Gentile Christians; just as on the return of the mission the Apostles of the Circumcision sent back Judas and Silas to represent the Jewish believers, Acts xv. 27. The incident would present itself all the more vividly to St Paul’s mind, inasmuch as Titus was much in his thoughts, if not actually in his company, at the time when this epistle was written. See 2 Cor. ii. 13, vii. 6, 13—15, viii. 16, 23, xii. 18.

κατὰ ἀποκάλυψιν] ‘by revelation.’ In St Luke’s narrative (Acts xv. 2) he is said to have been sent by the Church at Antioch. The revelation either prompted or confirmed the decision of the Church. See the detached note, p. 125.

2. ‘Arrived at Jerusalem, I set forth the principles of the Gospel, as I had preached it and still preach it to the Gentiles the doctrine of grace, the freedom from the ceremonial law. This explanation I gave in a private conference with the leading Apostles of the Circumcision. In all this I had one object in view; that the Gospel might have free course among the Gentiles, that my past and present labours might not be thwarted by opposition or misunderstanding.’ ἀνέβημην] The middle ἀνείβισθαι has the sense ’to relate with a view to consulting,’ ’to refer,’ as 2 Macc. iii. 9; see also Acts xxv. 14, τῷ βασιλεῖ ἀνέβητο τὰ κατὰ τὸν Παῦλον, where the idea of consultation is brought out very clearly in the context, vv. 20, 26. ‘Inter conferentes,’ says Jerome here, ‘acqualitas est; inter docentem et discentem minor est ille, qui discit.’ See the notes on προσοντίβισθαι, i. 16, ii. 6.

Galatians 2:2

τὸ εὐαγγέλιον ὃ κηρύσσω ἐν τοῖς ἔθνεσιν, κατ’ ἰδίαν δὲ τοῖς δοκοῦσιν, μὴ πῶς εἰς κενὸν τρέχω ἢ ἑδραμον. ὃ κηρύσσω] ‘I preach,’ not ἐκήρυσσον, ‘I preached,’ for his Gospel had not changed. See the note on οἰκ ἐστιν, i. 11.

κατ’ ἰδίαν δὲ τοῖς δοκοῦσιν] ‘but in private to those of repute.’ The foregoing αὐτοῖς is best referred to the Christians of Jerusalem generally, as implied from Ἱεροσίλεμα (ver. 1). If so, this clause, which follows, is inserted not to exclude a public conference, but to emphasize his private consultations. These private communications probably preceded the general congress, which occupies the prominent place in St Luke’s narrative (Acts xv. 6 sqq) and seems to be alluded to in the Acts, though not very distinctly, in the words (xv. 4). ‘They declared what things God had done with them.’ The private consultation was a wise precaution to avoid misunderstanding: the public conference was a matter of necessity to obtain a recognition of the freedom of the Gentile Churches. τοῖς δοκοῦσιν] ’the men of repute, of position.’ See Eur. Hec. 294 λόγος γὰρ ἐκ τ’ ἀδοξοῦντων τῶν καὶ τῶν δοκοῦντων, with Pflugi’s note; Heruel. 897 ἐντυχίον ἰδέσθαι τῶν πάροι οὐ δοκοῦντων, Herodias vi. 1 τῆς συγκλήτου βουλῆς τοὺς δοκούντας καὶ ἡλικία σεμνοτάτους κ.τ.λ. The expression itself therefore is a term of honour, and conveys no shadow of depreciation. So far as it is coloured with any tinge of disparagement here, this is due (1) to the repetition of the word δοκοῦντες, (2) to the addition of στέλω εἶναι, εἶναί τι, the latter especially, and (3) to the contrast implied in the whole passage, between the estimation in which they were held and the actual services they rendered to him. On the other hand, it will be seen (1) That this disparagement is relative, not absolute; a negation of the exclusive claims urged for them by the Judaizing party, not a negation of their Apostolic rank and worth; (2) That the passage itself contains direct evidence of mutual respect and recognition between St Paul and the Twelve (vv. 8, 9, 10).

On the tense of τοῖς δοκοῦσιν see the note on ver. 6.

μὴ πῶς εἰς κενὸν τρέχω κ.τ.λ.] ’lest I might be running, or had run, to repurpose.’ The kindred passage 1 Thesin. 5, μήπως ἐπείρασεν ὑμῖς ὁ περᾶξων καὶ εἰς κενὸν γένηται ὁ κύπος ἡμῶν, seems to show that τρέχω is here the subjunctive rather than the indicative, this being moreover the more likely mood in itself. See the note there. The use of the subjunctive (τρέχω) here, rather than the optative (τρέχομαι), is in accordance with the spirit of the later Greek, which prefers the more direct mode of speech in all such cases. In the New Testament the optative seems never to occur with particles of design etc; see Winer § xii. p. 360. In the second clause the change of mood from the subjunctive (τρέχω) to the indicative (ἑδραμον) is rendered necessary by the change of tense, since the consequences of the past were no longer contingent but inevitable: comp iv. 11. τρέχω] is a reference to St Paul’s favourite metaphor of the stadium; see v. 7 and the note there. For the expression εἰς κενὸν τρέχειν comp. Phil. ii. 16, where, as he c, it refers to his missionary career.

But what is the drift of the passage? Is it a natural expression of misgiving on the part of St Paul, who was not altogether satisfied with the soundness of his teaching, until he had consulted with the Apostles of the Circumcision? So Tertullian takes it, ade. Marc. i. 20, v. 3, and esp. iv. 2. This is perhaps the prima facie sense of the passage, slightly favoured by οὐδὲ προσανέθιντο, ver. 6. But on the other hand such an admission would be so entirely

Galatians 2:3

³άλλ’ οὐδὲ Τίτος ὁ σὺν ἐμοὶ Ἕλλην ὧν ἠναγκάσθη

alien to the spirit of the passage, so destructive of St Paul’s whole argument, and so unlikely under the circumstances, that this interpretation must be abandoned. The words therefore must be taken to express his fear lest the Judaic Christians, by insisting on the Mosaic ritual, might thwart his past and present endeavours to establish a Church on a liberal basis. By conferring with them, and more especially with the Apostles of the Circumcision, he might not only quiet such lurking anxiety (μῖσος) as he felt, but also, if there were any lack of unanimity, win them over to his views.

3. St Paul is here distracted between the fear of saying too much and the fear of saying too little. He must maintain his own independence, and yet he must not compromise the position of the Twelve. How can he justify himself without seeming to condemn them? There is need of plain speaking and there is need of reserve. In this conflict of opposing aims and feelings the sense of the passage is well-mighted. The meaning of individual expressions is obscure. The thread of the sentence is broken, picked up, and again broken. From this shipwreck of grammar it is even difficult to extricate the main incident, on which the whole controversy hinges. Was Titus circumcised or was he not? This is not only a reasonable question, but a question which thoughtful writers have answered in different ways. On the whole, the following reasons seem to decide for the negative. (1) The incident is apparently brought forward to show that St Paul had throughout contended for the liberty of the Gentiles; that he had not, as his enemies insinuated, at one time conceded the question of circumcision. It is introduced by way of evidence, not of apology. (2) It is difficult to reconcile the view that Titus was circumcised with individual expressions in the passage. St Paul could scarcely say ‘we yielded no not for an hour’ in the same breath in which he confessed to this most important of all concessions: he could hardly claim for such an act the merit of preserving ’the truth of the Gospel,’ i.e. the liberty of the Gentile Christians, which it was most calculated to compromise. In order to maintain that view, it is necessary to lay undue stress on the words ἠναγκάσθη, and ἡ ἠναγκάσθη, which from their position seem quite unemphatic: as if the former signified that the circumcision of Titus was an act of grace, not of compulsion; and the latter, that the Apostle in yielding was not doing homage to superior authority. (3) Taking into account the narrative in the Acts, both the occasion and the person were most inopportune for such a concession. There was an agitation among the Judaizers to force the rite of circumcision on the Gentile converts. Paul and Barnabas had gone up from Antioch in order to protect them from this imposition. They were accompanied by certain representatives of the Gentile Church, of whom Titus was one. No act could be conceived more fatal to the interests of St Paul’s clients at such a moment, or less likely to have been permitted by him. Accordingly the vast majority of early writers take the view that Titus was not circumcised, even though in many instances they adopted a reading (the omission of οἱ οὐδὲ in ver. 5) most unfavourable to this conclusion. See p. 122.

St Paul is here indirectly meeting a charge brought against him. Shortly before he visited Galatia the first time, he had caused Timothy to be circumcised (Acts xvi. 3). This fact, which can scarcely have been unknown to the Galatians, for Timothy accompanied him on his visit, may have afforded a handle to the calumnies of his enemies. There was a time, they said,

Galatians 2:4

περιτμηθῆναι· ⁴διὰ δὲ τοὺς παρεισάκτους ψευδάδελ-

when he himself insisted on circumcision. Comp. v. 11 and the note on i. 10. By stating how he acted in the case of Titus, who was truly a Gentile, he rebuffs this assertion.

3—5. ‘But while I held conferences with the Apostles of the Circumcision, I did not yield to the clamours of the disciples of the Circumcision. An incident which occurred will show this. Titus, as a Gentile who was intimately acquainted with me, was singled out as a mark for their bigotry. An attempt was made to have him circumcised. Concession was even urged upon me in high quarters, as a measure of prudence to disarm opposition. The agitators, who headed the movement, were no true brethren, no loyal soldiers of Christ. They were spies who had made their way into the camp of the Gospel under false colours and were striving to undermine our liberty in Christ, to reduce us again to a state of bondage. I did not for a moment yield to this pressure. I would not so compromise the integrity of the Gospel, the freedom of the Gentile Churches.’

3. οὐδὲ Τίτος! ’not even Titus.’ Why ’not even’? Is it (1) ’not even Titus, who as my fellow labourer would be brought constantly in contact with the Jews, and therefore might well have adopted a conciliatory attitude towards them’? Compare the case of Timothy, Acts xvi. 3, ‘Him would Paul have go forth with him, and took and circumcised him on account of the Jews, etc.’ In this case ὁ σὺν ἐμοὶ is emphatic. Or is it (2) ’not even Titus, though the pressure exerted in his case was so great’? A more exact knowledge of the circumstances than we possess would alone enable us to answer this question. Perhaps both ideas may be combined here.

‘Ἕλλην ὡς!’ being a Greek, perhaps giving the reason why the point was not conceded. There seems to be a tacit allusion to the case of Timothy. ‘You maintain,’ St. Paul seems to argue, ’that I allowed the validity of the Mosaic law in circumcising Timothy (Acts xvi. 1, 3). But Timothy was half of Jewish parentage. How did I act in the case of Titus, a true Gentile? I did not yield for a moment.’

In Ἕλλην all idea of nationality is lost: comp. Mark vii. 26 Ἕλληνὶς Συμεφωνίκισσα (or Σῖρα Φωνίκισσα) τῷ γίνῃ. Thus the Peshito sacrificing the letter to the spirit frequently translates Ἕλλην ‘an Aramean,’ e.g. here and iii. 28. See Colossians, p. 390.

ἡναγκάσθη! ‘was compelled,’ though the pressure was extreme. This pressure doubtless came from the more bigoted Judaizers, the converted Pharisees mentioned in Acts xv. 5.

4. What part was taken in the dispute by the Apostles of the Circumcision? This question, which forces itself upon us at this stage of St. Paul’s narrative, is not easily answered. On the whole it seems probable that they recommended St. Paul to yield the point, as a charitable concession to the prejudices of the Jewish converts: but convinced at length by his representations, that such a concession at such a time would be fatal, they withdrew their counsel and gave him their support. Such an account of the transaction seems to accord alike with the known facts and with the probabilities of the case. It is consistent with the timid conduct of Peter at Antioch shortly after (Gal. ii. 11), and with the politic advice of James at a later date (Acts xxi. 20). It was the natural consequence of their position, which led them to regard tenderly the scruples of the Jewish converts. It supplies probable antecedents to the events of the Apostolic congress. And lastly, it best explains St. Paul’s language here. The sensible undercurrent of

Galatians 2:5

φους, οἵτινες παρεισῆλθον κατασκοπῆσαι τὴν ἐλευθερίαν ἡμῶν, ἣν ἔχομεν ἐν Χριστῷ Ἰησοῦ, ἵνα ἡμᾶς καταδουλώσουσιν, ὅτι οὐδὲ πρὸς ὥραν εἴξαμεν τῇ ὑποταγῇ, ἵνα

feeling, the broken grammar of the sentence, the obvious tenure of particular phrases, all convey the impression, that though the final victory was complete, it was not attained without a struggle, in which St Paul maintained at one time almost single-handed the cause of Gentile freedom.

διὰ δὲ τοὺς παρεισάκτους κ.τ.λ.] ‘But to satisfy, to disarm, the false brethren, the traitorous spies of the Gospel’—At this point the connexion of the sentence is snapped, and we are left to conjecture as to the conclusion. It seems as if St Paul intended to add, ’the leading Apostles urged me to yield.’ But instead of this a long parenthesis interposes, in the course of which the main proposition of the sentence is lost sight of. It is again resumed in a different form, ‘from those then who were held in repute,’ ver. 6. Then again it disappears in another parenthesis. Once more it is taken up and completed, transformed by this time into a general statement, ‘well, they of reputation added nothing to me in conference.’ The counsels of the Apostles of the Circumcision are the hidden rock on which the grammar of the sentence is wrecked. For διὰ τοὺς παρ. ψευδ. compare Acts xvi. 3 περιέτειν αὐτὸν διὰ τοὺς Ἰουδαίους.

Of other possible explanations two deserve to be considered; (1) That there is an ellipsis of οὐκ ἠναγκάσθη περιτμηθῆναι σοῦ περιτμηθῆναι αἱτὸν διὰ τοὺς παρεισ. ψευδ. So Fritzsche, Opus. p. 181. (2) That the parenthesis flows back into the main proposition, so that the regular construction would have been διὰ τοὺς παρεισ. ψευδ. οὐδὲ πρὸς ὥραν εἴξαμεν, the εἰς being redundant. See the note, ver. 6. So Winer, § lxiii. p. 711 sq. But as

Titus would not have been circumcised under any circumstances, the refusal to yield could scarcely be attributed to the pressure from the false brethren. If either of these explanations were adopted, St Paul’s meaning must be: ‘To the scruples of the weaker brethren I would have conceded the point, but the teaching of the false brethren made concession impossible.’ So in fact Augustine takes it, de Mendac. § 8 (vt. p. 424, ed. Ben.).

παρεισάκτους, παρεισῆλθον] The metaphor is that of spies or traitors introducing themselves by stealth into the enemy’s camp, as in Jude 4 παρεισάντων γὰρ τινες ἄνθρωποι. See Plut. Popl. 17 ἐπιδουλεύων δὲ τὸν Πορσίνον ἀνελεῖν παρεισῆλθεν εἰς τὸ στρατόπεδον, Polyb. I. 7. 3. ii. 55. 3. For παρεισάγειν see 2 Pet. ii. 1. The adjective occurs in Strabo, xvii. p. 794 παρεισάκτος ἐπικληθεὶς Πτολεμαῖος. The camp thus stealthily entered is the Christian Church. Pharisees at heart, these traitors assume the name and garb of believers.

κατασκοπῆσαι] ’to act as spies on,’ κατασκοπεῖν generally signifies ’to examine carefully,’ the form κατασκοπεῖν being most frequently used where the notion of treachery is prominent. For instances of the sense in the text however see 2 Sam. x. 3, 1 Chron. xix. 3.

καταδουλώσουσιν] ‘reduces to abject slavery.’ The reading of the received text, καταδουλώσωνται, is a correction of some classicist, introduced for two reasons: (1) To substitute the middle voice, which is more common in classical writers; the transcriber not seeing that the sense here requires the active; ’enslave not to themselves, but to an external power, the law of

Galatians 2:6

ἡ ἀλήθεια τοῦ εὐαγγελίου διαμείνη πρὸς ὑμᾶς· ἁπὸ δὲ τῶν δοκούντων εἶναί τι· ὁποῖοί ποτε ἦσαν, οὐδέν

Moses’ (2) To restore the usual classical government of Tea with the conjunctive. Tea however is found several times in the New Testament with the indicative future, and sometimes even with the indicative present, as in iv. 17: see Winer, § xli. p. 360 sq. This, though not a classical usage, is justified by similar constructions of ὄκως, ὄφρα, in classical writers.

5. οἷς οὐδί κ.τ.λ.] ’to whom Ies,’ Paul and Barnabas, who were sent to Jerusalem to plead the cause of the Gentile Christians, ‘yielded no not for an hour.’ For the omission of οἷς οὐδί in some texts see the detached note, p. 122.

τῇ ὑποταγῇ] ‘by the submission which was required of us,’ or possibly ’the submission with which we are taunted,’ as in 2 Cor. i. 17 μήτ᾽ ἄρα τῇ ἐλαφρίᾳ ἐχρησόμην;

ἡ ἀλήθεια τοῦ εὐαγγελίου] ’the truth of the Gospel,’ i.e. the Gospel in its integrity. This expression in St Paul’s language denotes the doctrine of grace, the maintenance of Christian liberty, as opposed to the false teaching of the Jud. izzers. See ii. 14, and comp Col. i. 5. 6, where the same idea seems to be indirectly involved.

διαμείνη πρὸς ὑμᾶς] ‘may abide with you,’ the Gentile Churches. See the introduction, p. 26. The idea of firm possession is enforced by the compound verb, by the past tense, and by the preposition.

6-9. ‘The elder Apostles, I say, who are so highly esteemed, whose authority you so exclusively uphold—for myself, I care not that they once know Christ in the flesh: God does not so judge men; He measures them not by the outward advantages they have had, not by the rank they hold, but by what they are, by what they think and do—well, these highly esteemed leaders taught me nothing new; they had no fault to find with me. On the contrary, they received me as their equal, they recognised my mission. They saw that God had entrusted to me the duty of preaching to the Uncircumcision, as He had entrusted to Peter that of preaching to the Circumcision. This was manifest from the results. My Apostleship had been sealed by my work. God had wrought by me among the Gentiles, not less than He had wrought by Peter among the Jews. This token of His grace be-towed upon me was fully recognised by James and Cephas and John, who are held in such high esteem, as pillars of the Church. They welcomed myself and Barnabas as fellow-labourers, and exchanged pledges of friendship with us. It was agreed that we should go to the Gentiles and they to the Jews.’

Much force is lost in the A. V. by translating of δοκούντες throughout this passage as a past tense instead of a present. St Paul is speaking not of the esteem in which the leading Apostles of the Circumcision were held by the Christians of Jerusalem at the time of the conferences, but of the esteem in which they are held, while he is writing, by his Galatian converts. The mistake seems to have arisen from following the Vulgate ‘qui videbantar.’ The Old Latin apparently had the present in most recensions, though not consistently in all four places. Of the older English Versions, Tyndale’s alone translates by a present in this verse, and the Genevan in verse 9.

τῶν δοκούντων εἶναί τι] ’those who are looked up to us authorities.’ The expression is sometimes used in a deprecatory way, as in Plat. Apol. 41 εὖν δοκωσί τι εἶναι μηδίν ὄντες, Euthyd. 303 c τῶν πολλῶν ἀνθρώπων καὶ τῶν

Galatians 2:7-8

μοι διαφέρει, πρόσωπον Θεός ανθρώπου οὐ λαμβάνει· ἐμοί γὰρ οἱ δοκοῦντες οὐδὲν προσανέθεντο, ἵλλὰ tοὐναντίον ἰδόντες ὅτι πεπίστευμαι τὸ εὐαγγέλιον τῆς ἀκροβυστίας καθὼς Πέτρος τῆς περιτομῆς, 8 ὁ γὰρ σεμνῶν δὴ καὶ δοκοῦντων τι εἶναι οὐδὲν ὑμῖν μέλει, Gorg. 472 κ ἐνίοτε γὰρ ὡν καὶ καταψευδομαρτυρηθεῖς τις ὑπὸ πολλῶν καὶ δοκοῦντων εἶναι τι, and passages from later writers quoted in Wetstein: comp. Gal. vi. 3 εἰ γὰρ δοκεῖ τις εἶναι τι μηδὲν ὡν, and Ignat. Polyc. 3. The exact shade of meaning which it bears must always be determined by the context. Here it is depreciatory, not indeed of the Twelve themselves, but of the extravagant and exclusive claims set up for them by the Judaizers. Thus it is nearly an equivalent to οἱ ἐπερλίαν ἀπόστολοι of 2 Cor. xi. 5, xii. 11.

ὁποῖοί ποτε ἦσαν] Does ὁποῖοί ποτε here mean ‘qualescunque,’ or has ποτέ its proper temporal sense ‘in times past’? In a classical writer we should decide for the former: in St Paul the latter seems more probable, as ποτέ never occurs with the meaning ‘cunque’ in the New Testament, and accordingly it is rendered in the Latin versions ‘aliquando.’ This decides the import of the whole phrase. It does not mean ‘what reputation they enjoyed,’ but ‘what was their position, what were their advantages in former times,’ referring to their personal intercourse with the Lord. The ‘knowing Christ after the flesh’ (2 Cor. v. 16) is in itself valueless in the sight of God. The same reproach is conveyed by the words here, as in

2 Cor. x. 7 τὰ κατὰ πρόσωπον βλέπετε. πρόσωπον λαμβάνει] A translation

of the Hebrew נשא פנים which signifies properly ’to accept the face’ (Gesenius Thes. p. 916, x. v. נשא), or perhaps better, ’to raise the face’ of another (opposed to הפיל פנים ’to make the countenance fall,’ e.g. Job xxix. 24; comp. Gen. iv. 5), and hence ’to receive kindly,’ ’to look favourably upon one.’ In the Old Testament accordingly it is a neutral expression involving no subsidiary idea of partiality, and is much oftener found in a good than in a bad sense. When it becomes an independent Greek phrase however, the bad sense attaches to it, owing to the secondary meaning of πρόσωπον as ‘a mask,’ so that πρόσωπον λαμβάνειν signifies ’to regard the external circumstances of a man,’ his rank, wealth, etc., as opposed to his real intrinsic character. Thus in the New Testament it has always a bad sense. Hence a new set of words, προσωπολ ἡμπτῆς, προσωπολημπτῆς, etc. which appear to occur there for the first time.

Θεός ανθρώπου] The natural order is altered for two reasons; (1) To give Θεός an emphatic position, and (2) To keep the contrasted words Θεός ανθρώπου together

ἐμοί γὰρ κ.τ.λ.] The sentence, which was begun in ἀπὸ δὲ τῶν δοκοῦντων

eἰνοί τι and then broken off by the parenthesis, is here resumed, but in a different form, ‘well, to me those of reputation communicated nothing.’ See the note on ver. 4. Otherwise the γὰρ may be attached to ὁποῖοί ποτε ἦσαν οὐδὲν μοι διαφέρει, the parenthesis running back into the main proposition of the sentence, ‘whatever position they once held makes no matter to me: for to me they communicated nothing’: Winer § lxiii. p. 711 sq. But the interposition of the words πρός. Θ. ἀνθρ. οὐ λαμβ. is an objection to this construction.

προσανέθεντο] ‘communicated,’ see the note on i. 16. Προσανεῖσθαι is ’to communicate, to impart,’ whether for the purpose of giving or of obtain-

Galatians 2:9

ἐνεργήσας Πέτρῳ εἰς ἀποστολὴν τῆς περιτομῆς ἐνήργησεν καὶ ἐμοὶ εἰς τὰ ἔθνη, καὶ γνόντες τὴν χάριν τὴν δοθεῖσάν μοι, Ἰάκωβος καὶ Κηφᾶς καὶ Ἰωάννης, οἱ δοκούντες στύλοι εἶναι, δεξίας ἔδωκαν ἐμοὶ καὶ Βαρυάβα ing instruction. In this passage the former meaning prevails, in i. 16 the latter. The context here decides its sense: ’they imparted no fresh knowledge to me, they saw nothing defective or incorrect in my teaching; but on the contrary, they heartily recognised my mission.’

7. πιστεύσου τὸ εὐαγγ.] ‘I have

been entrusted with the G-spel,’ a common construction in St Paul: see the note on 1 Thess. ii. 4. The perfect here, implying a permanent commission, contrasts with the aorist in Rom. iii. 2 ἐπιστεύσου τὰ λόγια τοῦ Θεοῦ.

τὸ εὐαγγ. τῆς ἀκροβυστίας! denotes a distinction of sphere and not a difference of type: see Tertul Praeser, Hacr. 23 ‘Inter se distributionem officii ordinaverunt, non separationem evangelii, nec ut aliud alter sed ut aliis alter praedicareunt.’

8. ὁ ἐνεργήσας Πέτρῳ] ‘He that

worked for Peter.’ For the omission of ὁ Θεὸς comp. i. 6, 15; for ἐνεργίᾳ see the note on 1 Thess. ii. 13. The dative Πέτρῳ ought probably to be translated ‘for Peter,’ not ‘in Peter’; comp. Prov. xxxi. 12 ἐνεργεῖ γὰρ τῷ ἀνδρί (γυνὴ ἀνδρεία) εἰς ἀγαθὰ πάντα τὸν βίον. As ἐνεργείν is an inseparable compound, it is doubtful whether the preposition could govern Πέτρῳ, and accordingly the construction elsewhere is ἐνεργεῖν ἢ τιν. Comp. Acta Paul. et Thecl. § 40 ὁ γὰρ σοὶ συνεργήσας eis τὸ εὐαγγέλιον κάμοι συνήργησεν εἰς τὸ λούσασθαι

9. Of the two words ἰδόντες and γνόντες, the former describes the apprehension of the outward tokens of his commission, as evinced by his successful labours; the latter the contrition arrived at in consequence that the grace of God was with him: see iv. 8. 9. Ἰάκωβος καὶ Κηφᾶς καὶ Ἰωάννης] The best supported and doubtless, the right reading. The variation Πέτρος καὶ

Ἰάκωβος καὶ Ἰωάννης arose from the desire of maintaining the precedence of St Peter. On the other hand the correct text presents two coincidences with the narrative of the Acts, which deserve notice. First In i. 19 James is styled the Lord’s brother, while here and in ver. 12 this designation is dropped. St Luke’s narrative explains this omission. In the interval between

St Paul’s two visits James the son of Zebedee had been put to death. No term of distinction therefore was now needed, as there was no likelihood of confusion, James the son of Alpheus though an Apostle not holding any very prominent rank. Secondly. The relative positions here assigned to Peter and James accord exactly with the account in the Acts. When St Paul is speaking of the missionary office of the Church at large, St Peter holds the foremost place (ver. 7, 8); when he refers to a special act of the Church of Jerusalem, St James is mentioned first (ver. 9). See Acts xii. 17, xv. 13, xxi. 18.

στύλοι] ‘pillars.’ A natural metaphor occurring now and then in classical writers (e.g. Eur. Iph. T. 57 στύλοι γὰρ εἶκον εἰσὶ πώδες ὄρσενες, and Esch. Agam. 897), but commonly used by the Jews in speaking of the great teachers of the law. See the examples given in Schöttgen: comp. Clem. Hom. xviii. 14 ἑπτὰ στύλους ἐπάρξαντας κόσμῳ, said of the patriarchs. So in Clem. Rom § 5 the Apostles Peter and Paul are called οἱ μέγιστοι καὶ δικαιότατοι στύλοι; comp. Iren. iv. 21. 3. In this metaphor the

Galatians 2:10

κοινωνίας, ἵνα ἡμεῖς εἰς τὰ ἔθνη, αὐτοὶ δὲ εἰς τὴν περιτομήν· ¹⁰μόνον τῶν πτωχῶν ἵνα μνημονεύωμεν, ὁ καὶ ἐσπούδασα αὐτὸ τοῦτο ποιῆσαι.

Church is regarded as the house or temple of God; as Rev. iii. 12 ποιῆσω αὐτὸν στήλεν ἐν τῷ ναῷ τοῦ Θεοῦ μου: comp. 1 Tim. iii. 15. The accent of στίλος is doubtful. On the one hand the v is universally long in poetry even of a late date (see Rost u. Palm,

Griech. Worterb. s. v., and comp

Orac. Sib. iii. 250, 251). On the other, the authority of the oldest accepts in the MSS. and the quantity of the Latin ‘stylus,’ are in favour of στίλος. The latter not improbably represents the common pronunciation of the Apostolic age. See Lipsius

Gramm. Unters. p. 43.

δεξιὰς ἔδωκαν] ‘gacc pledges.’ The outward gesture is lost sight of in this expression, as appears from the fact that the plural δεξιὰς δοῦναι, δεξιὰς λαμβάνειν, is often used of a single person; 1 Macc. xi. 50, 62, xiii. 50. As a symbol of contract or friendship this does not appear prominently in the Old Testament (Eur. x. 19, and perhaps 2 Kings x. 15; see below on κοινωνίας), nor is it especially Jewish. In the patriarchal times the outward gesture which confirmed an oath was different, Gen. xxiv. 2. The giving the right hand however was a recognised pledge of fidelity with other Eastern nations, with the Persians especially (Corn. Nep. Dat. c. 10 ‘fidemque de ea re more Porsarum dextra dedisset,’ Diod. xvi. 43 ἔστι δὲ ἡ πίστις αὕτη βεβαιοτάτη παρὰ τοῖς Πέρσαις, comp. Justin xi. 15. 13; and from Persian influence the symbol and the phrase may have become more common among the Jews. Even Josephus (Ant. xviii. 9. 3) speaks of this not as a Jewish practice, but as μέγιστον παρὰ πᾶσι τοῖς ἑκείνῃ βαρβάραις παρὰκείνῃ τοῦ θαρσεῖν τοῖς ὁμιλοῦσιν, in reference to Artabanus the Parthian king. Where personal communication was inconvenient, it was customary to send images of right hands clasped, as a token of friendship: Xen. Anab. ii. 4. 1 δεξιὰς παρὰ βασιλέως φίροντες, Ages. 3. 4; comp. Tacit. Hist. i. 54, ii. 8. κοινωνίας, ‘of fell nership,’ not a superfluous addition, for ’to give the hand’ (π’ 1π) in the language of the Old Testament, like the Latin ‘do manus,’ generally signifies ’to surrender,’ e.g. Lament. v. 6, 2 Chron. xxx. 8; see Gesen. Thes. p. 566.

ἵνα ἡμεῖς. The ellipsis of the verb occurs in St Paul under various conditions. A foregoing Iva is one of these; see 1 Cor. i. 31, 2 Cor. viii. 13, Rom. iv. 16; comp. 2 Cor. viii. 11. 10. ‘Henceforth our spheres of labour were to be separate. One reservation however was made. They asked me to continue, as I had done hitherto, to provide for the wants of the poor brethren of Judæa. Independently of their request, it was my own earnest desire.’ μόνον] ‘only they asked us’: comp. Ignat. Rom. 5 μόνον ἵνα Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ ἐπιτέχω. For similar instances of an ellipsis after μόνον, see vi. 12, 2 Thess. ii. 7 μόνον ὁ κατέχων ἄρτι ἕως ἐκ μέσου γέηται. The latter passage presents an exact parallel also in the derangement of the order for the sake of emphasis.

Two occasions are recorded, on which St Paul was the bearer of alms from the Gentile converts to the poor of Jerusalem; (1) on his second journey to Jerusalem, Acts xi. 29, 30, some years before the interview of which he is speaking; and (2) on his fifth and last journey, Rom. xv. 26, 27, 1 Cor. xvi. 3, 2 Cor. ix. 1 sq. Acts xxiv. 17, shortly after this letter was written. These facts throw light on the incident

[I. II, 12]

III

¹¹ Ὅτε δὲ ἦλθεν Κηφᾶς εἰς Ἀντιόχειαν, κατὰ πρόσωπον αὐτῷ ἀντέστην, ὅτι κατεγνωσμένος ἦν. ¹² πρὸ

in the text. His past care for their poor prompted this request of the elder Apostles. His subsequent zeal in the same cause was the answer to their appeal.

ὁ καὶ ἀποδίωσα κ.τ.λ.] ’this was my own heartfelt desire.’ ‘I needed no prompting to do this.’ The Galatians had personal experience of this zeal, for their own alms had been solicited by St Paul for this very purpose shortly before, 1 Cor. xvi. 1—3. See the introduction, pp. 25, 55.

The transition from the plural (μνημονεύωμεν) to the singular (ἐαποδίωσα) is significant. Before St Paul had any opportunity of fulfilling this request, he had parted from Barnabas; Acts xv. 39.

αὐτὸ τοῦτο; is best taken in apposition with ὁ, see Winer § xxiii. p. 184 sq; a construction not without example in classical Greek, but more frequent in the LXX and New Testament, inasmuch as it reproduces the common Hebrew idiom: comp. Mark vii. 25, Acts xv. 17, 1 Pet. ii. 24.

11—14. ‘At Jerusalem, I owed nothing to the Apostles of the Circumcision. I maintained my independence and my equality. At Antioch I was more than an equal. I openly rebuked the leading Apostle of the Circumcision, for his conduct condemned itself. He had been accustomed to mix freely with the Gentiles, eating at the same table with them. But certain persons arrived from James, and he timidly withdrew himself. He had not courage to face the displeasure of the Jewish converts. The rest were carried away by his example. Even Barnabas, my colleague, and fellow-apostle of the Gentiles, went astray.’

11. ‘Ὅτε δὲ] This occurred probably during the sojourn of Paul and Barnabas at Antioch, immediately after the Apostolic congress (Acts xv. 30—40).

The inconsistency which St Peter thus appears to have shown so soon after his championship of Gentile liberty at the congress, is rather in favour of than against this view; for the point of St Paul’s rebuke is his inconsistency. But in fact there is scarcely an alternative. An earlier residence at Antioch (Acts xiii. 1—3) is out of the question, for St Paul is plainly narrating events in chronological order. Neither again is it probable that a later occasion (Acts xviii. 23) can be intended; for after the separation of Paul and Barnabas, there is no notice of their meeting again.

To this passage is probably to be attributed the ecclesiastical tradition that St Peter founded the Church of Antioch (Euseb. Chron. A.D. 44). Jerome (ad loc.) states still more definitely that he was bishop of this see first, whence he was translated to Rome. See also Euseb. H. E. iii. 22, 36, Chrysost. Op. III. p. 70, ed. Ben.

κατεγνωσμένος, not ‘reprehensible,’ but ‘condemned.’ His conduct carried its own condemnation with it, as St Paul shows vv. 15 sq: comp. Rom. xiv. 23 ὁ διακρινόμενος, τὸν φάγῃ, κατακέκριται, Joh. iii. 18 ὁ μὴ πιστεύων ἤδη κέκριται, Barnab. 10 κεκριμένοι ἤδη τῷ θανάτῳ, Joseph. B. J. ii. 8. 6 ἤδη γὰρ κατεγνώσθαι φασι κ.τ.λ. The condemnation is not the verdict of the bystanders, but the verdict of the act itself.

This passage was made the ground of an attack on St Paul in an Ebonite fiction of the second century, where St Peter says to Simon Magus (whose name is used as a mask for St Paul). ‘Thou hast withstood me to the face … If thou callest me condemned, thou accusest God who revealed Christ to me.’ See the whole passage Clem. Hom. xvii. 19: comp. p. 61, and the notes on ii. 13, iv. 16, 24.

Galatians 2:13

τοῦ γὰρ ἐλθεῖν τινὰς ἀπὸ Ἰακώβου μετὰ τῶν ἐθνῶν συνήσθιεν· ὅτε δὲ ἦλθον, ὑπέστελλεν καὶ ἀφώριζεν ἑαυτόν, φοβούμενος τοὺς ἐκ περιτομῆς, Ἰκαὶ συνυπεκρίθησαν αὐτῷ [καὶ] οἱ λοιποὶ Ἰουδαῖοι, ὥστε καὶ

12. ὅτε δὲ ἦλθεν.

13. ἐλθεῖν τινὰς ἀπὸ Ἰακώβου] ‘certain came from James.’ Of these nothing more can safely be inferred than that they belonged to the Church of Jerusalem. It is not improbable however, that they came invested with some powers from James which they abused. Compare the expression in the Apostolic letter (which seems to have been drawn up by him) Acts xv. 24, τινὰς ἐξ ἡμῶν ἐξελθόντες ἐτάραξαν ὑμᾶς… οἷς οἱ διεστιλόμεθα, and xv. 1 τινὰς κατελθόντες ἀπὸ τῆς Ἰουδαίας. The terms on which St James stood with believers of this stamp may be gathered from the language in Acts xxi. 20 sq.

συνήσθιεν] The Judaizers who troubled the Church at this time are described, Acts xv. 5, as converts belonging to the sect of the Pharisees. The prohibition against eating meat with the impure was one of the leading principles of this sect, Luke xv. 2. As the agape was the recognised bond of brotherhood in the infant Church, this separation struck at the very root of Christian life. St Peter’s vision (see especially Acts x. 27, xi. 3) had taught him the worthlessness of these narrow traditions. He had no scruples about living ἐθνικῶς. And when in this instance he separated himself from the Gentiles, he practically dissembled his convictions.

ὅτε δὲ ἦλθον] ‘but when they came.’ The reading ἦλθεν yields no good sense, whether we refer it to St James with Origen (c. Cels. ii. 1 ἐλθόντος Ἰακώβου) or to St Peter with other writers. I have given it a place nevertheless, as an alternative reading, on account of the weight of authority in its favour: for though it can scarcely have been the word intended by St Paul, it may possibly be due to an error of the original amanuensis. For a similar instance of a manifestly false reading highly supported and perhaps to be explained in this way, see Phil. ii. 1 εἶτις σπλάγχνα καὶ οἰκτιρμοί. Such readings are a valuable testimony to the scrupulous exactness of the older transcribers, who thus reproduced the text as they found it, even when clearly incorrect. In this passage the occurrence of the same words ὅτε δὲ ἦλθεν, ver. 11, is the probable cause of the mistake.

ὑπέστελλεν καὶ ἀφώριζεν] ‘gradually withdrew and separated himself.’ Both verbs govern ἑαυτόν: compare Polyb. vii. 17. 1 ὑπέστελαν ἑαυτοὺς ὑπὸ τινα προπεπτικοῦν ὀφρίν. The words describe forcibly the cautious withdrawal of a timid person who shrinks from observation, ὑπέστελλεν denoting the partial, ἀφώριζεν the complete and final separation. The word ὑποστέλλειν is frequently used, as in the passage quoted, in describing strategical operations; and so far as it is metaphorical here, the metaphor seems to be derived from military rather than from nautical matters. Comp. στέλλεσθαι, 2 Thess. iii. 6.

τοὺς ἐκ περιτομῆς, not ‘Jews’ but ‘converts from Judaism,’ for this seems to be the force of the preposition: Acts x. 45, xi. 2, Col. iv. 11, Tit. i. 10.

13. οἱ λοιποὶ Ἰουδαῖοι] i.e. the rest of the Jewish converts resident at Antioch, who, like St Peter, had mixed freely with the Gentiles until

Galatians 2:14

Βαρνάβας συναπήχθη αὐτῶν τῇ ὑποκρίσει. Ἦλλ’ ὅτε εἶδον ὅτι οὐκ ὀρθοποδοῦσιν πρὸς τὴν ἀλήθειαν τοῦ εὐαγγελίου, εἶπον τῷ Κηφᾷ ἔμπροσθεν πάντων Εἰ σύ

the arrival of their brethren from Jerusalem. The observance of Pharisaic practices with the latter was a genuine expression of bigotry, but with the Jews of Antioch and with St Peter it was ὑπόκρισις, the assumption of a part which masked their genuine feelings and made them appear otherwise than they were. The idea at the root of ὑπόκρισις is not a false motive entertained, but a false impression produced. The writer of the epistle prefixed to the Clementines, doubtless alluding to this passage, speaks of some who misrepresented Peter, as though he believed that the law was abolished, ‘but did not preach it openly’; Ep. Petr. § 2. See on ver. 11.

καὶ Βαρνάβας! ‘Ἔσενν Βαπνάβας’ my own friend and colleague, who so lately had gone up to protect the interests of the Gentiles against the pressure of the Pharisaic brethren. It is not impossible that this incident, by producing a temporary feeling of distrust, may have prepared the way for the dissension between Paul and Barnabas which shortly afterwards led to their separation: Acts xv. 39.

From this time forward they never again appear associated together. But on the other hand, whenever St Paul mentions Barnabas, his words imply sympathy and respect. This feeling underlies the language of his complaint here. ‘Ἔσενν Βαπνάβας.’ In 1 Cor. ix. 6 also he connects Barnabas with himself, as one who had laboured in the same disinterested spirit and had the same claims upon the Gentile converts. Lastly in Col. iv. 10 he commends Mark to the Colossian Church, as being the cousin of Barnabas.

συναπήχθη αὐτῶν τῇ ὑποκρίσει] ‘Ἔσενν

cavried away with their dissimulation,’ as the A. V. rightly. Their dissimulation was as a flood which swept every thing away with it. Coup. 2 Pet. iii. 17 ἵνα μὴ τῇ τῶν ἀθέαμων πλῶνη συναπαχθέντες ἐκπίσητε κ.τ.λ., Zosimus Hist. v. 6 καὶ αἰτῇ δὲ ἡ Ἐπάρη συναπήγετο τῇ κοινῇ τῆς Ἑλλάδος ἄλωσεν. In all these passages the dative seems to be governed by the preposition, and cannot without harshness be taken as the instrumental case.

14. 15. ‘Seeing that they had left the straight path and abandoned the true principles of the Gospel, I remonstrated with Cephas publicly. Thou thyself, though born and bred a Jew, dost nevertheless lay aside Jewish customs and livest as the Gentiles. On what plea then dost thou constrain the Gentiles to adopt the institutions of the Jews?’

15. οὐκ ὀρθοποδοῦσιν πρὸς κ.τ.λ.] i.e. ’they diverge from the straight path of the Gospel truth.’ The word ὀρθοποδεῖν appears not to occur elsewhere, except in later ecclesiastical writers, where its use may be traced to this passage of St Paul. Its classical equivalent is εἰθυπορεῖν. The preposition πρὸς here denotes not the goal to be attained, but the line of direction to be observed: see Winer § xlix. p. 505. For ἡ ἀλήθεια τοῦ εὐαγγελίου see the note on ii. 5.

εἶπον] Were all the concluding verses of the chapter actually spoken by St Paul at the time, or is he adding a comment while narrating the incident afterwards to the Galatians; and if so, where does the text cease and the comment begin? To this question it seems impossible to give a definite answer. St Paul’s narrative in fact loses itself in the reflexions suggested by it. Text and comment are so

GAL

Galatians 2:15-16

Ἰουδαῖος ὑπάρχων ἐθνικῶς καὶ οὐχ Ἰουδαϊκῶς ζῇς, πῶς τὰ ἔθνη ἀναγκάζεις Ἰουδαϊζειν: ¹⁵ἡμεῖς φύσει Ἰουδαῖοι καὶ οὐκ ἐξ ἐθνῶν ἁμαρτωλοί, ¹⁶εἰδότες δὲ ὅτι οὐ δικαιοῦται ἄνθρωπος ἐξ ἔργων νόμου, ἐὰν μὴ διὰ πίστεως

blended together that they cannot be separated without violence. The use of the word ἁμαρτωλοί, vv. 15, 17, marks the language of one speaking as a Jew to Jews, and therefore may be regarded as part of the original remonstrance; and yet, though there is no break in the continuity from that point onward, we find at the end of the chapter that St Paul’s thoughts and language have drifted away from Peter at Antioch to the Judaizers in Galatia. For similar instances where the direct language of the speaker is intermingled with the after comment of the narrator, see John i. 15—18, where the testimony of the Baptist loses itself in the thoughts of the Evangelist, and Acts i. 16—21, where St Peter’s allusion to the death of Judas is interwoven with the after explanations of St Luke.

Ἰουδαῖος ὑπάρχων] almost equivalent to φύσει Ἰουδαῖοι below; see i. 14. In such cases ὑπάρχων implies a contrast between the original and the after state, e.g. in Phil. ii. 6. Here it is very emphatic: ‘If you, born and bred a Jew, discard Jewish customs, how unreasonable to impose them on Gentiles.’ ἐθνικῶς ζῇς] i.e. mix freely with the Gentiles and thus of necessity disregard the Jewish law of meats. The present tense describes St Peter’s general principles, as acted upon long before at Caesarea (Acts x. 28), and just lately at Antioch (ver. 12), though at the exact moment when St Paul was speaking, he was living Ἰουδαϊκῶς and not ἐθνικῶς.

οὐχ Ἰουδαϊκῶς] The best MSS agree in reading the aspirated form οὐχ. For other examples of anomalous aspirates in the Greek Testament see

Winer § v. p. 48, and comp. the note on Phil. ii. 23 ἀφίδα. In this particular instance the aspirate may perhaps be accounted for by the γδ with which the Hebrew word (יהודים) represented by Ἰουδαῖοι commences.

ἀναγκάζεις] i.e. practically oblige them, though such was not his intention. The force of his example, concealing his true principles, became a species of compulsion.

Ἰουδαϊζειν] ’to adopt Jewish customs,’ opposed to ἐθνικῶς ζῇς, which in connexion with Ἰουδαῖος ὑπάρχων is equivalent to ἰλληνίζεις; comp. Esth. viii. 17 καὶ πολλοὶ τῶν ἐθνῶν περιττίμοντο καὶ Ἰουδαϊζῶν διὰ τὸν φύζων τῶν Ἰουδαίων, Plut. Vit. Cic. 7 ἴνοχ. 1 τῷ Ἰουδαϊζειν. See the note on Ἰουδαϊσμός, i. 13.

15, 16. ‘Only consider our own case. We were born to all the privileges of the Israelite race: we were not sinners, as we proudly call the Gentiles. What then? We saw that the observance of law would not justify any man, that faith in Jesus Christ was the only means of justification. Therefore we turned to a belief in Christ. Thus our Christian profession is itself an acknowledgment that such observances are worthless and void, because, as the Scripture declares, no flesh can be justified by works of law.’

Of many constructions proposed, the simplest and best is to understand the substantive verb in ver. 15, ‘We (are) Jews by birth etc.’ The δί of ver. 16, which is omitted in the received text, is certainly genuine.

15 φύσει Ἰουδαῖοι] ‘Jews by birth, not only not Gentiles, but not even proselytes. We inherited the Jewish religion. Everything was done for us, which race could do.’ See especially Phil. iii. 4, 5.

Galatians 2:16

Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ, καὶ ἡμεῖς εἰς Χριστὸν Ἰησοῦν ἐπιστεύσαμεν, ἵνα δικαιωθῶμεν ἐκ πίστεως Χριστοῦ καὶ οὐκ ἐξ ἔργων νόμου, ὅτι ἐξ ἔργων νόμου οἱ δικαιωθῶς.

16. διὰ πίστεως Χριστοῦ Ἰησοῦ.

ἐξ ἰθνῶν] Not ‘of Gentile descent,’ but ’taken from, belonging to the Gentiles’: comp. Acts xv. 23.

ἀμαρτωλοῖς ‘sinners.’ The word was almost a synonyme for ἰθνη in the religious phraseology of the Jews. See 1 Macc. ii. 44, Clem. Hom. xi. 16 οὕτως ὡς οὐχὶ Ἰουδαῖος, ἁμαρτωλὸν κ.τ.λ.; and compare Luke vi. 32, 33 with Matt. v. 47, and especially Matt. xxvi. 45 with Luke xviii. 32. Here ἁμαρτωλοῖς is used in preference to ἰθνη, not without a shade of irony, as better enforcing St Paul’s argument. See the note on ver. 17.

16. ἰὰν μὴ’ retains its proper meaning, but refers only to οὐ δικαιούται, ‘He is not justified from works of law, he is not justified except through faith.’ See the note on i. 19.

καὶ ἡμεῖς] ‘see ourselves,’ notwithstanding our privileges of race. Compare καὶ αὐτοί, ver. 17.

ἐπιστεύσαμεν] ‘became believers.’ See the note on 2 Thess. i. 10. The phrase πιστεύειν εἰς or ἐπὶ τινα is peculiarly Christian; see Winer § xxxi. p. 267. The constructions of the LXX are πιστεύειν τινί, rarely πιστεύειν ἐπὶ τινα or ἐπὶ τινα, and once only ἐπὶ τινα, Wisd. xii. 2 πιστεύειν ἐπὶ Θεόν. The phrase, which occurs in the revised Nicene and other creeds, πιστεύειν εἰς ἐκκλησίον, though an intelligible, is yet a lax expression, the propriety of which was rightly disputed by many of the fathers, who maintained that πιστεύειν εἰς should be reserved for belief in God or in Christ. See the passages in Suicer Thesaur. s. v. πιστεύειν, and Pearson On the Creed Art. IX.

ἐκ πίστεως Χριστοῦ] It seems almost impossible to trace the subtle process which has led to the change of prepositions here. In Rom. iii. 30, on the other hand, an explanation is challenged by the direct opposition of ἐκ πίστεως and διὰ τῆς πίστεως. Both prepositions are used elsewhere by St Paul with δικαιοῦν, δικαιοσύνη, indifferently; though where very great precision is aimed at, he seems for an obvious reason to prefer διὰ, as in Ephes. ii. 8, 9, Phil. iii. 9 μὴ ἔχων ἰμὴν δικαιοσύνην τὴν ἐκ νόμου ἀλλὰ τὴν διὰ πίστεως Χριστοῦ κ.τ.λ., which words present an exact parallel to the former part of this verse, οὐκ ἐξ ἔργων νόμου, ἰὰν μὴ διὰ πίστεως Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ. Faith is strictly speaking only the means, not the source of justification. The one preposition (διὰ) excludes this latter notion, while the other (ἐκ) might imply it. Besides these we meet also with ἐπὶ πίστεως (Phil. iii. 9), but never διὰ πίστην, ‘propter fidem,’ which would involve a doctrinal error. Compare the careful language in the Latin of our Article xi, ‘per fidem, non propter opera.’ ὅτι is the best supported, and doubtless the correct reading. The reading of the received text διότι has probably been imported from the parallel passage, Rom. iii. 20.

ὅτι ἐξ ἔργων κ.τ.λ. A quotation from the Old Testament, as appears from the Hebraism οὐ πάσα, and from the introductory ὅτι. This sentence indeed would be an unmeaning repetition of what has gone before, unless the Apostle were enforcing his own statements by some authoritative declaration. The words are therefore to be regarded as a free citation of Psalm cxliii. 2 οὐ δικαιωθήσεται ἐνώπιόν σου πᾶς ζῶν. For πᾶς ζῶν, 2

S-2

Galatians 2:17

πᾶσα σάρξ. ¹⁷εἰ δὲ ζητοῦντες δικαιωθῆναι ἐν Χριστῷ εὑρέθημεν καὶ αὐτοὶ ἁμαρτωλοί, ἄρα Χριστὸς ἁμαρτίας

very common Hebrew synonymic, πᾶσα σάρξ (כל-ביד) is substituted by St Paul. In Rom. iii. 20 the passage is quoted in the same form as here. In both instances St Paul adds ἐξ ἑργων νόμου as a comment of his own, to describe the condition of the people whom the Psalmist addressed. In the context of the passage in the Romans (iii. 19) this comment is justified by his explanation, that ‘whatever is stated in the law applies to those under the law.’

For οὐ πᾶσα see Winer § xxvi. p. 214 sq.

17, 18, 19. ‘Thus to be justified in Christ, it was necessary to sink to the level of Gentiles, to become ‘sinners’ in fact. But are we not thus making Christ a minister of sin? Away with the profane thought. Not the guilt is not in abandoning the law, but in seeking it again when abandoned. Thus, and thus alone, we convict ourselves of transgression. On the other hand, in abandoning the law we did but follow the promptings of the law itself. Only by dying to the law could we live unto God.’

17. Among a vast number of interpretations which have been given of this verse, the following alone deserve consideration.

First: We may regard Χριστὸς ἁμαρτίας διάκονος as a conclusion logically inferred from the premises, supposing them to be granted: ‘If in order to be justified in Christ it was necessary to abandon the law, and if the abandonment of the law is sinful, then Christ is made a minister of sin.’ In this case ἄρα is preferable to ἄρα.

If the passage is so taken, it is an attack on the premises through the conclusion which is obviously monstrous and untenable. Now the assumptions in the premises are twofold: (1) ‘To be justified in Christ it is necessary to abandon the law,’ and (2) ‘To abandon the law is to become sinners’; and as we suppose one or other of these attacked, we shall get two distinct meanings for the passage, as follows: (1) It is an attempt of the Judaizing objector to show that the abandonment of the law was wrong, inasmuch as it led to so false an inference: ‘To abandon the law is to commit sin; it must therefore be wrong to abandon the law in order to be justified in Christ, for this is to make Christ a minister of sin’; or (2) It is an argument on the part of St Paul to show that to abandon the law is not to commit sin; ‘It cannot be sinful to abandon the law, because it is necessary to abandon the law in order to be justified in Christ, and thus Christ would be made a minister of sin.’

Of these two interpretations, the latter is adopted by many of the fathers. Yet, if our choice were restricted to one or other, the former would seem preferable, for it retains the sense of ἁμαρτωλοί (‘sinners’ from a Jewish point of view, which it had in ver. 15, and is more consistent with the indicative εὑρέθημεν, this proposition being assumed as absolutely true by the Jewish objector. But on the other hand, it forms an awkward introduction to the verse which follows.

It is probable therefore that both should be abandoned in favour of another explanation: For

Secondly: We may regard Χριστὸς ἁμαρτίας διάκονος as an illogical conclusion deduced from premises in themselves correct: ‘Seeing that in order to be justified in Christ it was necessary to abandon our old ground of legal righteousness and to become sinners (i.e. to put ourselves in the position of the heathen), may it not be argued that Christ is thus made a

Galatians 2:18-19

διάκονος; μὴ γένοιτο· ¹⁸εἰ γὰρ ἃ κατέλυσα ταῦτα πάλιν οἰκοδομῶ, παραβάτην ἐμαυτὸν συνιστάνω· ¹⁹ἐγώ minister of sin!’ This interpretation best develops the subtle irony of

ἁμαρτωλοί; ‘We Jews look down upon the Gentiles as sinners: yet we have no help for it but to become sinners like them.’ It agrees with the indicative εἰρίθημεν, and with St Paul’s usage of μὴ γένοιτο which elsewhere in argumentative passages always negatives a false but plausible inference from premisses taken as granted. And lastly, it paves the way for the words διὰ νόμου νόμῳ ἀπέβηνον which follow. In this case ὅρα is to be preferred to ἄρα, because it at once introduces the inference as a questionable one. It may be added also in favour of ἄρα, that elsewhere μὴ γένοιτο follows an interrogation. Ἄρα expresses bewilderment as to a possible conclusion. Any attempt further to define its meaning seems not to be justified either by the context here, or by its usage elsewhere. Ἄρα hesitates, while ἄρα concludes.

εἰρίθημεν] involves more or less prominently the idea of a surprise: comp. Rom. vii. 10, 2 Cor. xi. 12, xii. 20. Its frequent use however must be traced to the influence of the Aramaic dialect: see Cureton Corp. Ign. p. 271.

ἁμαρτίας διάκονος] while yet He is dικαιωσύνης διάκονος, thus making a direct contradiction in terms.

μὴ γένοιτο] ‘Nay, verily,’ ‘Away with the thought.’ This is one out of several LXX renderings of the Hebrew הַלְיָלָה [ad profana] and so ‘absit,’ see Gesenius Thes. p. 478. Another rendering of the same is Ἰλεως, sc. ὁ Θεός, which occurs Matt. xvi. 22 Ἰδεώς σω Κέρες, ‘far be it from thee, Lord’: see Glass. Phil. Sacr. p. 538. Μὴ γένοιτο is not however confined to Jewish and Christian writings, but is frequent for instance in Arrian; see Raphael Annot. Rom. iii. 4.

18. ‘If, after destroying the old law of ordinances, I attempt to build it up again, I condemn myself, I testify to my guilt in the work of destruction.’ The pulling down and building up have reference doubtless to the Mosaic law, though expressed as a general maxim [raura]. The difficulty however is to trace the connexion in γὰρ.

With the interpretation of ver. 17 adopted above, it seems simplest to attach γὰρ to μὴ γένοιτο. ‘Nay verily, for, so far from Christ being a minister of sin, there is no sin at all in abandoning the law: it is only converted into a sin by returning to the law again.’ For this use of γὰρ after μὴ γένοιτο comp. Rom. ix. 14, 15, xi. 1. παραβάτην ἐμαυτὸν συνιστάνω’ ‘I make myself out, establish myself, a transgressor.’ It will have been seen that much of the force of the passage depends on the sense which the Jews attached to ἁμαρτωλός. Having passed on from this to ἁμαρτία, St Paul at length throws off the studied ambiguity of ἁμαρτωλός (‘a non-observer of the law,’ and ‘a sinner’) by substituting the plain term παραβάτης.

ἐμαυτὸν συνιστάνω is opposed to

Χριστὸς ἁμαρτίας διάκονος, though from its position ἐμαυτὸν cannot be very emphatic.

συνιστάνω] ‘I prove,’ like συμβιβάζω, as Rom. iii. 5, v. 8; comp. 2 Cor. iii. 1.

19. Establishing the statement of the foregoing verse: ‘For in abandoning the law, I did but follow the leading of the law itself.’ ἐγώ. Not ‘I Paul’ as distinguished from others, for instance from the Gentile converts, but ‘I Paul, the natural man, the slave of the old covenant.’ The emphasis on ἐγώ is explained by the following verse, ζῶ δὲ οὐκίτι ἐγώ κ.τ.λ.

Galatians 2:20

γὰρ διὰ νόμου νόμῳ ἀπέθανον, ἵνα Θεῷ ζήσω· ²⁰Χριστῷ συνεσταύρωμαι· ζῶ δὲ οὐκέτι ἐγώ, ζῇ δὲ ἐν ἐμοὶ Χρισ-

διὰ νόμου νόμῳ ἀπέθανον] In what sense can one be said through law to have died to law? Of all the answers that have been given to this question, two alone seem to deserve consideration. The law may be said in two different ways to be παύσσωγος εἰς Χριστόν. We may regard i. Its economical purpose. The law bore on its face the marks of its transitory character. Its prophecies foretold Christ. Its sacrifices and other typical rites foreshadowed Christ. It was therefore an act of obedience to the law, when Christ came, to take Him as my master in place of the law. This interpretation however, though quite in character with St Paul’s teaching elsewhere, does not suit the present passage: For (1) The written law—the Old Testament—is always ὁ νόμος. At least it seems never to be quoted otherwise. Νόμος without the article is ’law’ considered as a principle, exemplified no doubt chiefly and signally in the Mosaic law, but very much wider than this in its application. In explaining this passage therefore, we must seek for some element in the Mosaic law which it had in common with law generally, instead of dwelling on its special characteristics, as a prophetic and typical dispensation. Moreover, (2) the interpretation thus elicited makes the words διὰ νόμου νόμῳ ἀπέθανον an appeal rather to the reason and intellect, than to the heart and conscience; but the phrases ’living unto God,’ ‘being crucified with Christ,’ and indeed the whole tenour of the passage, point rather to the moral and spiritual change wrought in the believer. Thus we are led to seek the explanation of this expression rather in ii. Its moral effects. The law reveals sin; it also provokes sin; nay, in a certain sense, it may be said to create sin, for ‘sin is not reckoned where there is no law’ (Rom. v. 13). Thus the law is the strength of sin (1 Cor. xv. 56). At the same time it provides no remedy for the sinner. On the contrary it condemns him hopelessly, for no one can fulfil all the requirements of the law. The law then exercises a double power over those subject to it; it makes them sinners, and it punishes them for being so. What can they do to escape? They have no choice but to throw off the bondage of the law, for the law itself has driven them to this. They find the deliverance, which they seek, in Christ. See Rom. vii. 24, 25, and indeed the whole passage, Rom. v. 20—viii. 11. Thus then they pass through three stages, (1) Prior to the law—sinful, but ignorant of sin; (2) Under the law—sinful, and conscious of sin, yearning after better things; (3) Free from the law—free and justified in Christ. This sequence is clearly stated Rom. v. 20. The second stage (διὰ νόμου) is a necessary preparation for the third (νόμῳ ἀπέθανον). ‘Provide,’ says Luther on iii. 19 (the edition of 1519), ‘ut remissio propter salutem, ita praevariatio propter remissionem, ita lex propter trangressionem.’

What the Mosaic ordinances were to the Jews, other codes of precepts and systems of restraints were in an inferior degree and less efficaciously to other nations. They too, like the Jews, had felt the bondage of law in some form or other. See iv. 9, v. 1, and the note on iv. 11.

νόμῳ ἀπέθανον] ‘I died to law.’ For the dative comp. Rom. vi. 2, 11 (τῇ ἀμαρτίᾳ), and for the idea of ‘dying to the law’ Rom. vii. 1—6, esp. ver. 4 καὶ ὑμεῖς ἐθανατῶθητε τῷ νόμῳ, and ver. 6 κατηργήθημεν ἀπὸ τοῦ νόμου ἀποθα-

τός· ὁ δὲ νῦν ζῶ ἐν σαρκί, ἐν πίστει ζῶ τῇ τοῦ υἱοῦ τοῦ Θεοῦ τοῦ ἀγαπήσαντός με καὶ παραδόντος ἑαυτόν

20. τῇ τοῦ Θεοῦ καὶ Χριστοῦ τοῦ ἀγαπήσαντος.

νόητες ἐν ᾧ κατεχόμεθα (literally, ‘we were nullified, i.e. discharged, by death from the law in which we were held’).

20, 21. ‘With Christ I have been crucified at once to the law and to sin. Henceforth I live a new life—yet not I, but Christ liveth it in me. This new life is not a rule of carnal ordinances; it is spiritual, and its motive principle is faith in the Son of God who manifested His love for me by dying for my sake. I cannot then despise God’s grace. I cannot stultify Christ’s death by clinging still to a justification based upon law.’

20. An expansion of the idea in the last verse

Χριστῷ συνταύρωμα! ‘I have been crucified with Christ.’ A new turn is thus given to the metaphor of death. In the last verse it was the release from past obligations; here it is the annihilation of old sins. The two however are not unconnected. Sin and law loose their hold at the same time. The sense of feebleness, of prostration, to which a man is reduced by the working of the law, the process of dying in fact, is the moral link which unites the two applications of the image, see Rom. vii. 5, 9—11. Thus his death becomes life. Being crucified with Christ, he rises with Christ, and lives to God.

The parallel passage in the Romans best illustrates the different senses given to death. See also, for a similar and characteristic instance of working out a metaphor, the different applications of ἡμέρα in 1 Thess. v. 2—8.

For the idea of dying with Christ etc., see Rom. vi. 6 ὁ παλαιός ἡμῶν ἄνθρωπος συνταυρωθῇ. comp. Gal. v. 24, vi. 14, Rom. vi. 3, Col. ii. 20, ἀπο-θακείν σὺν Χριστῷ, and Rom. vi. 4, Col.

ii. 12, συνταφῆναι. Comp. Ignat. Rom. § 7 ὁ ἡμὸς ἔριος ἐσταύρωται. The correlative idea of rising and reigning with Christ is equally common in St Paul.

ζῶ δὲ οὐκίτι ἐγώ] The order is significant; ‘When I speak of living, I do not mean myself, my natural being. I have no longer a separate existence. I am merged in Christ.’ See on ἐγώ ver. 19.

ὁ δὲ νῦν ζῶ] Not exactly ἦν νῦν ζῶ ζωήν, but ὁ limits and qualifies the idea of life: ‘So far as I now live in the flesh, it is a life of faith’: comp. Rom. vi. 10 ὁ γὰρ ἀπέθανεν, τῇ ἡμαρτῇ ἀπέθανεν ἐφάπαξ, ὁ δὲ ζῇ, ζῇ τῷ Θεῷ, Plut. Mor. p. 100 P ὁ καθείδουσι, τοῦ σώματος ἱππος ἐστι καὶ ἀνάπαυσις.

νῦν, ’now’: his new life in Christ, as opposed to his old life before his conversion; not his present life on earth, as opposed to his future life in heaven; for such a contrast is quite foreign to this passage.

ἐν πίστει] in faith, the atmosphere as it were which he breathes in this his new spiritual life.

The variation of reading here is perplexing. For τοῦ υἱοῦ τοῦ Θεοῦ may be pleaded the great preponderance of the older authorities: for τοῦ Θεοῦ καὶ Χριστοῦ, the testimony of a few ancient copies, and the difficulty of conceiving its substitution for the other simpler reading.

με…ἐμοῦ] ’loved me, gave Himself for me.’ He appropriates to himself, as Chrysostom observes, the love which belongs equally to the whole world. For Christ is indeed the personal friend of each man individually; and is as much to him, as if He had died for him alone.

21. οὐκ ἀθετῶ κ.τ.λ.] ‘I do not set at nought the grace of God. Setting

Galatians 2:21

ὑπὲρ ἐμοῦ. ² οὐκ ἀθετῶ τὴν χάριν τοῦ Θεοῦ· εἰ γὰρ διὰ νόμου δικαιοσύνη, ἄρα Χριστὸς ὠφεὰν ἀπέθανεν.

at nought I call it: for, if righteousness might be obtained through law, then Christ’s death were superfluous. For ἀθετῶ ’to nullify’ see Luke vii. 30, 1 Cor. i. 19: its exact sense here is fixed by ὠφεὰν ἀπέθανεν. ‘The grace of God’ is manifested in Christ’s death. The connexion of γὰρ is with the idea of ἀθετῶ, and may be explained by a supplied clause, as above.

ὠφεὰν not ‘in vain,’ but ‘uselessly, without sufficient cause,’ or, as we might say, ‘gratuitously,’ John xv. 25 ἐμπορὰν με ὠφεὰν Ps. xxxiv 19); comp. LXX of Ps. xxxiv. 7 ὠφεὰν ἔκρυψάν μοι ἀσφθοράν, Hebr. 20, where Symmachus had ἀνυτίω; Ecclus. xx. 23.