PART THREE
PART THREE
The New Life Through the Holy Spirit
5:13–6:10
In this next main section of his letter, Paul comes to the religio-ethical application which so often constitutes the conclusion of his letters. He does this, however, in very close connection with the preceding: negatively, by the admonition that the freedom in Christ may not be taken as a freedom for the flesh; and, positively, by setting forth the service of love in its inseparable oneness with the salvation in Christ, indeed, by setting it forth as the integrating constituent element of that salvation. The ethical is not an independent thing, and does not depend upon human freedom, but is in its entirety determined by the soteriological and Christological main content of the letter.
SPIRIT AND FLESH
5:13–25
13 For ye, brethren, were called for freedom; only use not your freedom for an occasion to the flesh, but through love be servants one to another.
14 For the whole law is fulfilled in one word, even in this: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.
15 But if ye bite and devour one another, take heed that ye be not consumed one of another.
16 But I say, Walk by the Spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh.
17 For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are contrary the one to the other; that ye may not do the things that ye would.
18 But if ye are led by the Spirit, ye are not under the law.
19 Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these: fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness,
20 idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousies, wraths, factions, divisions, parties,
21 envyings, drunkenness, revellings, and such like; of which I forewarn you, even as I did forewarn you, that they who practise such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.
22 But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,
23 meekness, self-control; against such there is no law.
24 And they that are of Christ Jesus have crucified the flesh with the passions and the lusts thereof.
25 If we live by the Spirit, by the Spirit let us also walk.
13 What with the rejection of the law as a means for achieving righteousness before God, the Jewish fear that the gospel of Christ might undermine the great ethical force which, despite everything, issued from the Jewish religion of law, is quite understandable. Understandable also is their fear that the Christian life would not offer enough defense against the ethical normlessness of Paganism. For that reason, Paul, after he has maintained the sufficiency of the gospel of Christ over against the synergism of Judaistic Christianity, not only stresses the necessity of the ethical life, but also points out its bases and its inter-relationships.
The introduction to this is a full maintenance of the freedom wrought by Christ (see the Exposition of verse 1). The ye is placed at the beginning for emphasis: it marks the contrast with the bondage of the false teachers. The whole statement shows cause: over against the confusion brought about by the Judaizers (verse 12) there is the clear calling of Christ to freedom. By the divine word of power, through the Holy Spirit (see above), they have been brought out of the captivity of the law (see the Exposition of verse 1) into freedom. Now follows a limitation: this freedom may not become an occasion for the flesh, that is, for sinful human nature, for wicked impulse. The flesh wants freedom to express itself as it will. Christ has not called the believers for such a freedom. Hence Paul immediately lays down the requirement of service—that is, service for each other. Christ set them free, so that they might be able to do that. And the through love shows the way in which this service must take place.
14 It is characteristic of Paul’s mode of thinking that he should return to the law at this point, and bind the command of love upon the hearts of the Galatians by an appeal to the law. The law is and remains for him also an expression of the will of God. Nevertheless, he does not bind believers to the law in the concrete and historical form of the Torah, but in the form of the command of love, in which the whole law has its summary and fulfillment. This summary of the law, which came to expression long ago in Leviticus 19:18, is, together with the command of love to God, taken as the epitome of the law also in the teaching of Jesus (Mt. 22:34 ff., Luke 10:25 ff.; cf. Matt. 19:19 and 7:12). That Paul is referring back to this, just as he does in Rom. 13:9, is not expressly stated, but can definitely be accepted. Elsewhere too he speaks of the law of Christ (6:2 and 1 Cor. 9:21). In this entire summary, Paul’s purpose is both to let the law come into its own proper validity in the life of believers; and to graft its fulfillment upon a different principle from that of human self-vindication through works—namely, the salvation brought by Christ. For the love, in which the law has its fulfillment, is the fruit of faith (verse 6). Thus in this Epistle the apostle can on the one hand proclaim freedom from the law, and on the other can require love as the fulfillment of the law. This fulfillment remains a divine requirement. But since the law, as demanding agent, cannot effectuate the fulfillment, it is not the imperative of the law but the bond of faith in Christ which forms the ground and origin of the fulfillment of the will of God. This does not remove the requirement, but bases it upon the salvation brought by Christ (compare verses 1, 13, 24, and 25). Thy neighbor means any and all whom God puts upon our way (cf. Mt. 5:43 ff.). As thyself: that is, as self-evidently and as intensely as thyself. Basic to this thought is not the notion that we must love ourselves also, but rather the thought that self-love is natural, instinctive, to man. Just as directly and unhesitatingly as he loves himself, one must love his neighbor. The fact that Paul does not speak of the love for God in this connection does not mean that he regards it as of less importance. Love for God is much more the source and the condition of love for the neighbor (Mt. 22:38, 39). What is evident from the omission is that Paul is not giving a systematic treatment of ethics here. He speaks according to the need of the moment, and has his eye on human social relationships.
15 To bite (wound, inflict pain) and to devour (leave no room for) and to consume constitute a climax. It is to be understood of various gradations of social hatred and jealousy. Some refer this discussion to the extant differences in the churches brought on by the work of the heretical teachers. There may be truth in this, although it is very clear that Paul does not condemn, but rather commands, a resolute attack upon those teachers. Hence, we presumably are to think of the life “after the flesh” more generally. It is the life which becomes dominant when the freedom in Christ is denied or abused. Then it goes from bad to worse. This, too, could come of it, that the Galatians would drive each other wholly to spiritual destruction so that deliverance would no longer be possible.
16 Over against this giving each other and themselves up as a prey to sin, Paul, continuing in the line of verses 13 and 14, emphatically presents to his readers (“I say”) the vision of the Christian life. In this the Spirit and the flesh are opposed in irreconcilable conflict. The Spirit is the worker of the new life in the fellowship of Christ’s death and resurrection (cf. 2:20). The Walk by the Spirit goes to show that this life realizes itself not only in Christ but also in the present historical reality of the believer. He must walk by the Spirit, that is, he must in fellowship with Christ let himself be ruled by the Spirit. The principle of the Spirit does not make human effort unnecessary, but arouses it and equips it to put all its forces into the service of the Spirit. The tense of walk points to a continuing condition. The life through the Spirit does not consist of a separable series of deeds, but assumes an inner conversion which is sustained by God (cf. verse 25). The second clause adds to this a statement about the future: ye shall not fulfil. He who walks by the Spirit will be able to resist the flesh in the end—resist it, that is, in its wicked desire bent on total domination.
17 The desperate necessity to choose one or the other, the Spirit or the flesh, becomes apparent from the irreconcilable conflict between them, and from the strength which the flesh too continues to exercise. The desire of the flesh takes offence at the Spirit which wants to put it in bondage. Hence, too, the Spirit is also the great enemy of the flesh, and its desires are diametrically opposed to those of the flesh. This antithesis is once more expressly postulated in explanation of the opposed desires. The question is how we are to understand the last clause. As we see it, the words that ye may not do speak of the result of this irreconcilable conflict: because of it the believers, too, do not do what they want to do by virtue of the new man in them. Thus comes the struggle between willing and doing (Rom. 7:13 ff.). This is a general truth. There is always the resistance of the flesh. Irrespective, therefore, of what the believer wants to do, this counteracting influence is always at work. Hence the new life, too, is subject to a penetrating, internal dualism. Still, this is not the last thing that can be said of the matter. It is not passivity but action that is in order. According to verse 16, believers must in this dualism conduct the fight against the flesh. That becomes apparent from verse 18.
18 Over against the not doing “the things that ye would,” the apostle poses something else, namely, the being led of the Spirit. The result of that will be: no longer being under the law. The if ye are led does not imply that believers are passive; it is at the same time a matter of letting themselves be led (cf. verse 16). The thing does not happen without regard to their will. In this, too, the Spirit is the principle of the new life, and by it the flesh is resisted and its conquest is impeded (verse 16). The concluding ye are not under the law designates the condition of curse (cf. 3:13), bondage (cf. 3:22, 25, and 4:1–3), impotence and spiritual death (cf. 3:21), which has so often been described in the preceding portions. In this verse the emphasis is on the spiritual inability in which man lives, if he has only the law. He is defenceless against the flesh. In this lies the connection with the preceding verse. If one is to offer resistance in the struggle between Spirit and flesh, one must be in the service of the Spirit and not in that of the law. That the demand of the law remains (verse 14) is not denied, of course. The issue, in short, is the strength, the power, that is necessary for the fulfillment of the law.
19–21 Now the apostle proceeds to describe the desire of the flesh in its concrete expression. To this he will later contrast the fruit of the Spirit. Of these works of the flesh, he says emphatically, first of all, that they are manifest. This does not mean to say that they always happen in public; it means rather that they can plainly be recognized as works of the flesh (cf. Rom. 1:19). No one need be mistaken about that.
Of the vices which Paul names here, the first are related to sexual aberrations such as often came to the fore in the paganism of that day and its cultic extravagances. But we are, presumably, also to think of the general statements which Jesus gave in the Sermon on the Mount (cf. Mt. 5:28 ff.). Fornication refers to illegitimate sexual intercourse in the widest sense of the word. Uncleanness in Paul’s writings is always used in an ethical sense, and often, as apparently here also, in the sexual sense. Lasciviousness means the lack of restraint, abandon.
The nature of the sins named in verses 20 and 21 is different. Idolatry is the service or worship of images in a pagan sense; the word occurs only in Christian literature. Sorcery originally means the preparation of medicines; more pregnantly it comes to mean the preparation and application of magical devices. The word, accordingly, also lies in the sphere of idol-worship and magic. Enmities, being plural, stresses the continuous and the numerous. Strife, jealousies, wraths designate the sins of a loveless, egoistic, and unrestrained social life. Factions are intrigues, machinations, the use of objectionable methods. In the same direction are divisions, schisms, and parties, that is, camps and sects. To these verse 21 adds envyings, that is, envy in all its manifestations, drunkenness, and revellings—drinking-bouts, carousels, and orgies. All these, and the like of them, for the list is by no means exhausive, are works of the flesh and form an impediment to coming into the Kingdom of God. To this the apostle testifies with all the authority of the ministration of the keys (cf. Mt. 16:19); he does so solemnly beforehand. He says it now, that is, now that he must counteract the heretical teachers who give themselves out as supporters of the law. But he has said it before also, in precisely the same way, when he was with them in person. For the preaching of the gospel has never meant a yielding to sin. Who practise such things: not sin as such so much as the obtuseness to conversion, the living in sin, prevents the entry into the kingdom of God. That kingdom is to be understood here in its eschatological significance. And there is no doubt about this judgment: they shall not inherit.
22–23 In this part the fruit of the Spirit is set in contrast with the works of the flesh. The whole passage reminds one of the description of love in 1 Cor. 13:4–6. The word fruit indicates more plainly even than work that the issue in this matter is not what man himself can do. A fruit is not something that is made or done. It comes up out of a definite principle, in this instance, the principle of the Spirit. The singular stresses the fact that what the Spirit works constitutes a unity. By this fruit of the Spirit no particular charismata in the sense of 1 Cor. 12 is intended but rather that which the Spirit grants to all who live by Him. In all this, human responsibility is not, of course, eliminated. Rather, the possibility is indicated by which this responsibility can be fruitfully assumed.
Love, joy, and peace stand at the head of the series. As is evident from the context, love is to be understood especially as the love for the brethren (cf. verse 14 ff.). As the fruit of the Spirit, this love is entirely determined by the salvation granted in Christ: that is, its motive (cf. e.g., Mt. 18:23 ff.), its intensity (cf. e.g., Mt. 18:22 and 5:43 ff.), and its object (cf. Lk. 10:30 ff.). Joy has religious sense here: delight in God because of the salvation in Christ, the reconciliation, and being received as children. In this the gospel quality of the fruit of the Spirit is clearly evident. It comes out in peace also. In the New Testament, the word can in general designate a condition of blessedness and well-being that will arrive in the grand future (cf. Lk. 2:14); it can mean also the peace brought by Christ between God and the believers (Rom. 5:1); it can mean, further, the removal of enmity between men in their relations with each other (Eph. 2:14 ff.); and it can mean, finally, the affective state of those who trust in God (Rom. 15:13 and Phil. 4:7). In this connection, it presumably points particularly to human social relationships. In this sense, peace can form the transition from joy to long-suffering. The last term assumes attack, provocation, incentive to wrath. And the fruit of the Spirit makes for the preservation of love and peace despite these all. Kindness, which is named here as in 2 Cor. 6:6 alongside of long-suffering, designates the expressions which the latter takes. Goodness refers to an attitude towards others. Faithfulness, in this instance, is to be understood in a religious sense. It can also be translated as loyalty (Rom. 3:3 and Tit. 2:10), and this rendering is probably the preferable one. Meekness is elsewhere (Mt. 5:5) designated as meekness over against God. Here the force is ethical: gentleness, tolerance. The last word of the series, self-control, means personal temperance in general. It can be interpreted as referring specifically to sexual relations (1 Cor. 7:9) as well as to pleasures in general, and signifies restraint, moderation. Sometimes, however, it refers to self-control in the expression of love to others.
These, then, are the gifts that the Spirit gives to those who permit themselves to be guided by Him. But it is true of such also that the law does not turn against such as they. The antithesis, law-gospel, still lurks in the background. The against expresses the fact that the law constitutes a threat to man. It not only subjects man to itself, constituting him a slave, but also takes position against him. The reference presumably is to the curse, the spoliation, which the law brings upon the disobedient (cf. 3:10, 13). Hence the law is not against those who walk by the Spirit because in principle they are fulfilling the law (verse 14). In this again it is evident that the requirement and the strength of the law continue. But the fulfillment of the law is guaranteed now, in Christ, by the Spirit. Hence that takes place which was impossible for man and for the law, and the threat of the law is lifted.
24 The lordship of the spirit brings with it the crucifixion of the flesh. For the flesh is also present with those who exhibit the fruit of the Spirit (cf. verse 17). If in this connection, therefore, we read of they that are of Christ Jesus, this is no news. For it is Christ Jesus that grants the Spirit (cf. 2 Cor. 3:17). Now, however, believers are named for Christ, for the apostle speaks of the crucifying of the flesh. Their belonging to Him (cf. 3:29) makes for a full life-fellowship between Christ and the believers (cf. 2:19 ff.). They share His cross, too, in so far as Christ there bore the curse of the law (3:13), and broke the power of sin. So the lordship of the flesh and its passions is also denied. That is part of what was overcome on the cross. Hence it can be said of those who are of Christ that they have crucified the flesh. There came a moment of time in their lives in which they were taken up into that fellowship of life, and in which, therefore, the dominion of the flesh over them was broken. The phrase to crucify is intended to designate the relationship with the cross of Christ, and also to express the absolute rejection and denial of the flesh. It does not mean that since that moment the flesh can no longer bring an influence to bear, but rather that its corruptness is acknowledged and is assigned to death, not by the cross of Christ alone, but by the believers themselves also. By the passions and the lusts thereof we are to think of the sinful, corrupt urges such as have been indicated in the preceding discussion. In all this the flesh, the sinful nature, is revealed in its total power and influence.
25 It may be doubtful whether this verse is the conclusion of the preceding matter, or the introduction to the applicatory material still forthcoming in the letter. The transition is fluid. Verse 25 picks up where verse 16 left off, and the sequel gives it a new concrete development.
The chiastic construction gives this short statement unusual force. It proceeds from a definite assumption (If we live by the Spirit …), the truth of which must prove itself (by the Spirit let us also walk). The first points out the principial relation to the Spirit. He is the new life-principle of freedom (cf. 2 Cor. 3:17). He grants the effectual power of divine grace which operates through Christ in the believers. The second clause speaks of the activity of believers which they exercise in the strength of the new principle granted them. In accordance with that they must live. The Spirit must also become the norm, the rule, of this manifestation of life. He creates a new life-style. And this new manner of life must be made manifest, must be distinguishable. Paul includes himself. For the believers this walking by the Spirit remains a constantly renewed mandate and a continuous exertion.
καλεῖν: in the effectual sense.
ἀφορμὴ (ἀπό and ὁρμάω): point of departure, bridgehead, occasion.
ὁ πᾶς νόμος: the law considered as a unit as distinguished from the individual commandments.
πληρόω has the force not only of the doing of the law, but also of its interpretation (cf. Matt. 5:17 ff); such an interpretation, in other words, as does full justice to its bearing and context. In connection with ἐν ἑνὶ λόγῳ which designates an activity of thought, we shall have to conceive of πεπλήρωται in this sense: the whole law finds in this one word its total expression (cf. Rom. 13:9). The perfect tense suggests the definitive, to which one need not again return.
ἀναλωθῆτε: subjunctive aorist: things have not yet reached such a pass, but threaten to come to it.
οὐ μή when taken with the subjunctive aorist or the indicative aorist is the most decisive form of denying a future event.
ἐπιθυμία: originally vox media, the word is here modified to mean evil desire by the addition of σαρκός.
Only as an exception is ἐπιθυμεῖν used for the desire of love (cf. Luke 22:15).
One can take the ἵνα as either final or consecutive. If the former is accepted, one must ask who it is that postulates this purpose. And, presumably, one would have to think, then, of the flesh as well as of the Spirit. However, it is very difficult, logically, to regard these two opposing principles as the common subject, both together realizing this purpose. Hence we prefer the idea of a consecutive use although it is not an original use, and is limited even in the New Testament. Elsewhere, too, however, such a weakened but consecutively colored meaning can be found (cf. John 1:19, Rev. 9:20, and Luke 9:45, and others).
The θελεῖν does not refer simply to the willing of the natural man.
The εἰ is not purely hypothetical but introduces a condition of fact. The first clause is, however, the presupposition of the second.
This so-called catalogue of vices shows some variations in the different manuscripts. In a few, the list begins with μοιχεία, that is, adultery. In some instances, too, the difference amounts to uncertainty about a singular or a plural. And φόνοι follows φθόνοι in some manuscripts. It is easy to understand, of course, that in such listings various changes, omissions, additions, and the like, should appear. Lists of sins, similar in kind, occur repeatedly in the letters (cf. Rom. 1:29 ff, 13:13, and 1 Cor. 5:10). In profane literature, too, especially the Stoical, one encounters similar catalogues.
Some derive the πορνεία from πέρνημι. The meaning would then be: intercourse with a prostitute for a fee.
ζῆλος: zeal: also used in bonam partem.
θυμός: originally the meaning was breath, then disposition. In the New Testament it is often used to designate an outburst of passion or wrath.
ἐριθεία is often brought into context with ἔρις. It stems, however, from ἔριδος: wage worker. Thence its metaphorical sense.
αἱρέσεις comes from αἱρέομαι: to choose. It refers to the choice one must make between various opinions; thence the official opinion itself, the party, the sect. Later it also means heresy, that is, a meaning distinguished from the true one.
The future tense connotes certainty.
πίστις
One can regard the τῶν τοιούτων as being neuter also. Even if, in view of the context, one should prefer this, he would still have to interpret it in such a way that those who live accordingly do not have the law against them.
Some relate this to the time when faith began, others to the time of baptism. The one need not rule out the other. Baptism a posteriori confirms the favor obtained by grace.
πάθος: passion, that which operates in man, even though he does not will it.
ἐπιθυμίαι: the desires in which the παθήματα work themselves out. But the two words are approximately synonymous here.
The στοιχεῖν is more rigid than the περιπατεῖν of verse 16. The idea of a row or rule is contained in it. It is used for movement in a definite line, as in military formations or in dancing.