Commentary on Galatians 2.7–3.1

Do you see what the Judaizers establish? Christ, who is the cause of our righteousness, they make out to be the cause of sin as well, as Paul too says: "Is Christ then a minister of sin?" Then, having reduced the argument to absurdity, he needed no further argument to overthrow it, but was content with a simple denial, saying only, "God forbid." For against shameless things no arguments are needed; a denial alone suffices. "For if I build up again what I tore down, I prove myself a transgressor." See Paul's understanding. They wished to show that one who does not keep the law is a transgressor; but he turned the argument the opposite way, showing that one who keeps the law is a transgressor, not of faith only but of the law itself. What he says is something like this: "The law has come to an end, and we confessed this by leaving it and fleeing to the salvation that comes by faith. If, then, we insist on setting it up again, we become transgressors, contending to keep what God has abolished." Then he shows how it was abolished: "For through the law I died to the law." This admits a twofold interpretation. Either he means the law of grace (for he is accustomed to call this too a law, as when he says, "The law of the Spirit of life has set me free"), or he means here the old law, showing that through the law itself he died to the law; that is, "The law itself led me to give no further heed to it. If, then, I were to give heed to it, I would be transgressing it." How, and in what way? Moses says, "The Lord your God will raise up for you a prophet from among your brothers, like me; you shall listen to him," speaking of Christ. So those who do not obey him transgress the law. And "through the law I died to the law" must also be understood in another way. The law commands that everything written in it be done, and punishes the one who does not do it. So we have all died to it, for no one fulfilled it. And see how here too he wages the battle against it in measured terms. For he did not say, "The law died to me," but "I died to the law." What he means is this: "Just as a corpse, a dead man, cannot obey the commands of the law, so neither can I, who died by its curse; for I died by its own word. Let it not, then, give orders to the dead man whom it killed itself; and killed with a death not of the body only but also of the soul, through which it brought on the bodily death too." That this is what he means he showed by what follows. "So that I might live to God, I have been crucified with Christ." For since he had said, "I died," so that no one might say, "How, then, do you live?", he added the cause of the life too, and showed that the law killed him while he was alive, but Christ took him dead and gave him life through death; and he shows a twofold wonder: that he both gave life to the dead and granted life through death. By life he here means the immortal life; for this is the meaning of "So that I might live to God, I have been crucified with Christ." "And how was one who lives and breathes crucified?" someone says. "That Christ was crucified is plain; but how were you crucified, and yet live?" See how he explains this too, saying, "It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me." By saying, "I have been crucified with Christ," he hinted at baptism; by saying, "It is no longer I who live," at the way of life that follows, through which our members are put to death. What is "Christ lives in me"? "Nothing is done by me," he says, "that Christ does not wish." For just as by death he means not this common death but death to sins, so by life he means release from them; for it is not possible to live to God otherwise than by having died to sin. As, then, Christ underwent the death of the body, so I underwent death to sin. "Put to death, then, your members that are on earth: sexual immorality, impurity, adultery"; and again he says, "Our old self was crucified with him," which took place in the washing. After this, if you remain dead to sin, you live to God; but if you raise it up again, you have ruined such a life. But Paul was not such a man; he remained dead throughout. "If, then, I live to God," he says, "a life other than the life under the law, and have become dead to the law, I can keep nothing of the law."

And see the exactness of his way of life, and marvel exceedingly at that blessed soul. He did not say, "I live," but, "Christ lives in me." Who will dare to utter this word? For since he had made himself obedient to Christ and cast out everything worldly, and did everything according to his will, he did not say, "I live to Christ," but, what was much more, "Christ lives in me." For just as sin, when it prevails, is the thing that lives, leading the soul wherever it wishes, so, when sin has been put to death and what pleases Christ is done, such a life is no longer a human life, since he lives in us, that is, works and rules in us. But since he had said, "I have been crucified with Christ," and "I no longer live, but have died," and he seemed to many to be saying something incredible, he added: "And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God." "What I have said," he says, "concerns the life of the spirit; but if one examines this life of the senses too, I have this also through faith in Christ. For as far as the old way of life and the law were concerned, I deserved the ultimate punishment and would long ago have perished. For 'all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,' and while we lay under the sentence, Christ set us free. For all had died, if not in fact, yet by sentence. Since the law had accused and God had pronounced sentence, Christ came and gave himself up to death and snatched us all from death. So 'the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith.' For if this were not so, nothing would have prevented all from being destroyed, as happened in the flood; but the coming of Christ, stopping the wrath of God, made us live through faith." That this is what he means, hear from what follows; for having said, "The life I now live in the flesh I live by faith," he added, "in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me." What are you doing, Paul, appropriating what is common and making your own what was done for the whole world? For he did not say, "who loved us," but "who loved me." Yet the evangelist says, "God so loved the world"; and you yourself say, "He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up," not for you, but "for us all"; and … What, then, does he mean here? Considering the despair of human nature and the ineffable care of Christ, from what he freed us and what he granted us, and set on fire by love for him, he speaks so. For the prophets too often appropriate to themselves the God of all, saying, "O God, my God, to you I rise early." Besides this, he shows that each of us ought rightly to owe Christ as much gratitude as if he had come for him alone. For he would not have refused to show so great a dispensation even for one; so great is the measure of love with which he loves each man, as great as that with which he loves the whole world. The sacrifice was offered for the whole of human nature, and it was able to save all; but those who have made use of the benefit are the believers only. Yet the fact that not all came did not turn him away from such a dispensation. Just as the banquet in the Gospel had been prepared for all, and when those who were invited would not come he did not take away what was set out but called others, so he has done here too. For the sheep that strayed from the ninety-nine was one, yet he did not despise even it. Paul hints at this very thing too when speaking of the Jews, saying: "What if some were unfaithful? Does their faithlessness nullify the faithfulness of God? By no means! Let God be true, though every man be a liar." Then he so loved you as even to give himself up, and to bring you, who had no hope of salvation, to such and so great a life; and do you, after so many good things, run back to the old ways? Since, then, he has set out the arguments with exactness, he now proclaims vehemently in a declaration, saying, "I do not nullify the grace of God." Let those hear who even now Judaize and give heed to the law; for this is said to them. "For if righteousness were through the law, then Christ died for nothing." What is more grievous than this sin? What is more shaming than these words? For if Christ died, it is plain that it was because the law was unable to justify us; but if the law justifies, Christ's death was superfluous. And how could it make sense to say that so great a thing, so full of awe, surpassing human reason, so ineffable a mystery, for which patriarchs were in travail, which prophets foretold, at which angels were astonished as they looked on, which all confess to be the sum of God's care, happened in vain and for nothing? Considering, then, the excess of the absurdity, if they should say that so great and mighty a thing had happened superfluously (for this followed from what they were doing), he even uses words of insult against them, saying thus:

[Gal 3:1] "O foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you, before whose eyes Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified?" Here he strikes them hard. For he did not say, "Who deceived you? Who abused you? Who misled you?" but, "Who has bewitched you?" Here at last he passes on to another main point. In what went before he showed that he was an apostle not from men nor through man, and had no need of the apostles' teaching; but here, having established himself as a trustworthy teacher, he speaks with greater authority, making a comparison between faith and law. At the beginning he said, "I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting"; here, "O foolish Galatians!" Then he was in labor with his indignation; but now that he has made his defense concerning himself, he bursts it out openly, after the proof. And if he calls them foolish, do not be surprised; he does this not transgressing the law of Christ that forbids calling one's brother a fool, but keeping it exactly. For it is not simply said, "Whoever calls his brother a fool," but "whoever does so without cause." And who would more justly have received this title than those who, after so many and such great things, clung to the former things as if nothing had happened? If you call Paul insolent for this, you will call Peter a murderer because of Sapphira and Ananias. But if to say that is madness, much more is this. And see, I pray, how he does not use this vehemence from the opening, but after the refutations and the proofs, when they were receiving the rebuke not from him but from the refutations themselves. For when he had shown that they were thrusting out faith and making the death of Christ superfluous, then he brings in the rebuke, and not even then as they deserved; for they deserved much harsher words. And see how at once he relaxes, putting a rebuke that is not without praise. For "bewitched" shows that they had formerly done things that deserved envy, and that what happened was the spite of a demon, who blew fiercely against their prosperity. When you hear of envy here, and in the Gospel of an "evil eye" meaning the same thing, do not think that the glance of the eyes naturally harms those who are looked at; for the eye, the member itself, could not be evil, but Christ there calls envy by this name. Merely to see belongs to the eyes, but to see with evil comes from the perverted mind within. For since through this sense the sight of things flows into our soul, and envy is born mostly in the case of wealth, and wealth is seen with the eyes, and power and retinues too, he therefore called "evil eye" not the eye that sees, but one that sees with jealousy from wickedness of soul. By saying, "Who has bewitched you?" he shows that these men do this not as guardians, nor as supplying what is lacking, but mutilating what is there. For it belongs to envy not to add what is lacking, but to take something away from what is complete and to spoil the whole. He says this not as if envy had power of itself, but as of men who teach these things and have come to it out of jealousy. "Before whose eyes Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed among you as crucified." Yet he was crucified not in the land of the Galatians but in Jerusalem; how, then, does he say "among you"? He is showing the power of faith, which can see even what is far off. And he did not say "was crucified," but "was portrayed as crucified," showing that with the eyes of faith they saw more exactly than some who were present and watched what was done. For many of those watched and gained nothing; but these, though they did not see with their eyes, saw more exactly through faith. He says this both rebuking and praising them: praising, because they received what had happened with such full assurance; rebuking, because him whom they saw stripped for them, impaled, nailed … (for he showed all this by saying, "was portrayed among you as crucified"), him they left and ran to the law, without any reverence for those sufferings. And see, I pray, how everywhere he leaves aside heaven, earth, sea and everything else, and proclaims the power of Christ, carrying the cross about with him; for this above all was the sum of his care for us. "This only I want to learn from you: did you receive the Spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith?" "Since you do not follow long arguments," he says, "and do not wish to look into the greatness of the dispensation, I wish to persuade you by a brief word and a very swift proof, seeing your extreme want of sense." Above, he persuaded them from what he said to Peter; but here he strips for the contest with them, establishing everything not from what happened elsewhere but from what took place among themselves, and persuading and making his proof no longer only from what was given to all in common, but from the gifts given to them in particular. That is why he says, "This only I want to learn from you: did you receive the Spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith?" "You received the Holy Spirit," he says; "you worked miracles, cleansing lepers, prophesying, speaking in tongues. Did the law give you so great a power? Yet you did nothing of the kind before. Or was it faith?" [2] How, then, is it not the utmost madness, after receiving so many benefits from faith, to leave it and desert to the law, which provided nothing of the kind? "… are you now being perfected by the flesh?" Again he brought in the reproach at the right moment. "You ought," he says, "to have made progress as time went on; but not only have you not advanced, you have even been carried backward. Those who begin from small things go on to greater; but you, who began from great things, have been carried down to their opposite. Even if you had begun from carnal things, you ought to have advanced to spiritual things; but as it is, having begun from spiritual things, you have been carried down to carnal ones. … After the wonders you have come to circumcision; after seeing the sun you look for a lamp; after solid food you run to milk." And he did not say "you are being initiated" (teleisthe), but "you are being perfected" (epiteleisthe), a word also used of sacrifice, showing that those men cut them like brute beasts without their noticing, while these gave themselves over to suffer whatever those wished; as if someone, from being a general and a champion after countless trophies and victories, were to give himself over to the disgrace of deserters and offer his body to be branded by anyone who wished. "Did you suffer so many things in vain? If indeed it was in vain." This is much more stinging than the former. For the recalling of the signs did not have such power as the display of their contests and their endurance of sufferings for Christ. "All those things you endured," he says, "these men wish to make into your loss, and to snatch away your crown." Then, so as not to shake their souls and slacken their sinews, he did not stop at the sentence, but added, "if indeed it was in vain." "For if you recover yourselves, it was not in vain." Where now are those who cut off repentance? For look: these received the Spirit, worked signs, became confessors, enduring countless dangers and persecutions for Christ, and after such achievements fell from grace. "Yet nevertheless," he says, "if you will, you can recover yourselves." "Does he, then, who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you do so by works of the law or by hearing with faith?" "Were you counted worthy of so great a gift," he says, "and did you perform so many wonders because you kept the law, or because you held fast to faith? Plainly because of faith." For since those men kept turning this over and over and carrying it about, saying that faith has no strength unless the law is added to it, he shows the opposite: that when the commandments are added, faith will benefit nothing further; for faith has its strength when nothing from the law is added to it. "For you who would be justified by the law," he says, "have fallen away from grace." But this he says further on, when he uses greater boldness, taking his starting point from what had already been established; for the present he constructs his starting point from what had happened in the past. "When you gave heed not to the law but to faith, then you received the Spirit, and the signs …" Then, since the argument was about the law, he moved on to another, most combative point, bringing Abraham forward, very seasonably and with great abundance, saying: "Just as Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness." "The miracles done by you," he says, "show the power of faith; but if you wish, I will persuade you from ancient narratives too." For since the patriarch was much spoken of among them, he brings him forward and shows that he too was justified in this way. If he who lived before grace was justified by faith, though he abounded in works, much more are you. For what harm did he suffer from not being under the law? None; faith sufficed him for righteousness. "For there was no law then," he says. "Nor is there a law now, just as there was none then." That is why, after removing the need of the law, he then brought in the one justified before the law, so that he would not meet this objection. For just as then it had not yet been given, so now, having been given, it has come to an end. Then, since they prided themselves on being descended from Abraham, and feared that if they left the law they would be cut off from kinship with him, Paul turns this too around to the opposite and dissolves their fear, showing that it is above all faith that produces kinship with him. He established this more clearly in the letter to the Romans, but he does it no less here too, saying: "Know, then, that it is those of faith who are the sons of Abraham." Then he establishes this very thing from an ancient testimony: "And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, In you shall all the nations be blessed." If, then, not those who have a natural kinship with him are his sons, but those who imitate his faith (for this is the meaning of "in you, the nations"), it is plain that faith brings one into this kinship.