Christian Freedom

Christian Freedom

CHRISTIAN FREEDOM

(5:2-12)

Let them not think that the law's demands can be satisfied by a token compliance with this or that requirement (such as circumcision); the law's demands can be satisfied only by total performance.

Those who have misled them into the course which they are now disposed to follow will have much to answer for.

(a) The law demands total commitment (5:2-6)

See, this is myself, Paul, speaking to you: if you get yourselves circumcised, Christ will be of no use to you. Once again, I solemnly assure every man who gets himself circumcised that he is under an obligation to perform the whole law. Those of you who seek justification by the law have been estranged from Christ; you have fallen out of your state of grace. For we by the Spirit, on the ground of faith, wait expectantly for the hope of righteousness. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any validir,; what matters is faith, working through love.

TEXTUAL NOTES

v 3 xrakty om D` G 1739 pc latVg(2) got arm

oit om K~: 062

aoLiIoar / 7rXijgwoar 436 pc syr°c" Mcion (ex Mt. 5:17?)

5:2 To his exposition of gospel freedom as against legal bondage Paul adds further arguments, by no means unrelated to what he has already said: in particular, he emphasizes the hopelessness of their plight if they rely on law-keeping, and the blessedness of the life of the Spirit to which they are called.

'IS& sytu fIaUXog X>yw uµiv. J. L. White (The Body of the Greek Letter [Missoula, Montana, 1972], 60-63) regards this personal note as a feature of what he calls the `body-closing' (cf. R. W. Funk's `apostolic parousia', Knox FS, 249-268); he compares Phm. 19 (e),cb fIafXog eypaWa) and Rom. 15:14f. (xal autos Eyw £ypaVa). He does not compare 1 Thes. 2:18 (Eyw µ%v rlavXoS ...), for that does not come in the `body-closing' but in a passage where Paul distinguishes himself from his colleagues Silvanus and Timothy. But Phm. 19 is also a doubtful parallel, for there Paul incorporates a signed IOU into a personal letter. Both in Rom 15:14f. and here, however, Paul is projecting his presence as effectively as he can among those to whom his letter is sent.

Paul speaks with the authority of an apostle of Jesus Christ-the apostle of Jesus Christ, so far as his Galatian readers are concerned-but he does not expressly invoke his apostolic authority in giving them the serious warning which immediately follows. `This is Paul speaking to you'-Paul whom you know, Paul your friend and father in Christ, not `the brothers who are with me' (1:2) but I, Paul, myself. Others had apparently undertaken to say what Paul believed or practised in the matter of circumcision (cf. v 11); here is Paul's own account.

ott Eav 7rE@LtE tviloOE. The verb is probably to be taken in the middle voice: `if you have yourselves circumcised' (cf.nEpttEtvojivp, v 3). Paul applies directly to the Galatians the general principle stated above in 2:21: `if righteousness [before God] is attained through law, then Christ died in vain'. For the Galatians to submit to circumcision as a legal obligation would be an acknowledgement that law-keeping (in this particular form) was necessary for the achievement of a righteous status in God's sight. Such an acknowledgement would be to nullify the grace of God (OOETEty t71v xapLV tov OEov, 2:21).

X(?totos vµ&S ovSev dWEXrloEL. Christ will provide unlimited help to those who place their undivided trust in him, but no help at all to those who bypass his saving work and think to become acceptable to God by circumcision or other legal observances.

5:3 µaptveoµaL Se nhXLV. This solemn asseveration repeats and reinforces the warning of v 2. That is the point of itdkLv here; it does not imply that he had already given them this warning when he was with them. When he was with them there was probably no occasion to mention circumcision. The occasion to mention it had only recently arisen.

icavti &vOpwtrp rrrpttetvoµevw, `to every one who has himself circumcised' (middle voice; cf. also 6:12, 13). One might be circumcised involuntarily-as, of course, every male Jewish infant was (although even that was reckoned to carry an obligation with it)-but for a Gentile Christian to accept circumcision by choice, as a matter of religious duty, implied the acceptance of the whole way of life to which circumcision was the initiatory rite.

ocpEtX,Etr)s Eatly ... atot~oat, a periphrasis for ocE(XEt atoLfaaL, `he is obliged to do....' Cf. Soph. Aj. 589f.: ov xatoLoO' Eyw 6EOt; / 6)g 01b&V &pxefv EIµ' 6cpEL4TTJs 9 TL; ('Do you know that I am under no obligation to satisfy the gods any longer?').

In vv 2 and 3 it is indicated explicitly for the first time that the Gentile Christians of Galatia were being urged to accept circumcision. This might have been inferred from earlier references to circumcision in the letter, and its Galatian recipients knew from the outset what Paul was getting at, but only now does he say so in so many words. The `agitators' had not insisted on Gentile converts' submission to the Jewish law in its entirety; they strongly recommended circumcision as a token fulfilment of the law-together, possibly, with the observance of sacred days (4:10). It may be that they thought the Galatians could be more easily persuaded to take further steps in legal observance when once they had taken the primary step of circumcision; if, on the other hand, they themselves were acting under the pressure of militants in Judaea, circumcision was the one thing needful. If fraternizing with the uncircumcised was treasonable in the militants' eyes, then the `agitators', by persuading Gentile Christians to be circumcised, would (they fondly imagined) be immune from the charge of treason (see further on 6:12 below).

Paul, for his part, emphasizes that the Galatians cannot hope to make the legal grade by a merely token fulfilment of the law. If the agitators represented cicumcision as the final (but necessary) stage in the initiatory process of which the earlier stages were faith, baptism, reception of the Spirit-completing in the flesh what had been begun in the Spirit, as Paul ironically puts it (3:3)-Paul argues that this is an impossible position to hold. Circumcision as a minor surgical operation is neither here nor there, but circumcision voluntarily undertaken as a legal obligation carries with it a further obligation-nothing less than the obligation to keep the whole law. He who submits to circumcision as a legal requirement, necessary for salvation, accepts thereby the principle of salvation by law-keeping, and salvation by law-keeping implies salvation by keeping the whole law.

Not all rabbis would have agreed with Paul on this point, but many would. Gamaliel II, for example, is said to have wept when he came to the end of the thirteen requirements of Ezk. 18:5-9, saying, `Only he who keeps all these requirements will live, not he who keeps only one of them' (b. Sanh. 81a). A similar story is related of him in b. Makk. 24a, with reference to the 613 precepts of the law; but his colleagues held that he who kept but one was regarded as having kept them all (cf. Midr. Tehillim 15.7). R. Aqiba is credited with a specially liberal attitude in this regard, summed up in L. Finkelstein's statement that he sometimes `asserted God's mercy to be such that a single meritorious act will win a man admission to the future world' (Akiba New York, 1936], 186; cf. E. P. Sanders, PPJ, 125-147). The difference among rabbinical interpreters in this regard does not run along the line separating Shammaites from Hillelites. What concerns us here is Paul's position, which has already been set out in 3:10, where he interprets Dt. 27:26 in this sense. He may well have held the same position before his conversion: we cannot know for certain (see note on v 11).

o),,ov toy voµov noLtloat. Cf. 6 alas voµoc, v 14 (with note ad loc. ).

There was ample precedent for Gentiles' acceptance of circumcision as a prelude to full incorporation into Jewish faith and life. In Jud. 14:10 Achior the Ammonite, impressed by the downfall of Holofernes, had himself circumcised (tcg6EtEjEto tilt' (3d.pxa, middle voice) there and then and joined the house of Israel, with his family, `unto this day'. The Idumaeans subdued by John Hyrcanus were allowed to retain their homeland `provided they had themselves circumcised (EL JLE(J6tir tvotvto to alSoia, middle voice) and were willing to follow the Jewish laws' (Josephus, Ant. 13.257). It was not unknown, indeed, for a man to accept circumcision from self-regarding motives, with no serious intention of conforming to the Jews' religion; examples are Azizus of Emesa, for a short time husband of Drusilla (Josephus, Ant. 20.139), and Polemo of Cilicia, for a short time husband of her elder sister Berenice (Ant. 20.145f.). On the other hand, no amount of law-keeping or conformity to Jewish ways mattered in the eyes of stricter Jews unless circumcision had been accepted: only when King Izates of Adiabene had himself circumcised did the Galilaean Eleazar acknowledge him as a true proselyte (Ant. 20.44-48).

In warning the Galatians as he does here, does Paul mean, `Circumcision carries with it the obligation to keep the whole law, and this you are quite unable to do'? If one of them were to say, in answer to his warning, `In that case, we will keep the whole law', Paul could not have said, `That is quite impossible', for he himself had kept it all (Phil. 3:6b). The Pauline reply to such a declaration of intent would have been rather, `Even if you do keep it all, there is no salvation that way; I speak from personal experience.' Perhaps his choice of words, ocpEiXEtrls >otiv, implies that the way of law-keeping is a way of bondage-no fit way for those whom Christ has liberated (v 1). Being obliged to keep the law, in part or in whole, is for such people a return to bondage under the atoLXEia (4:9), a return to the curse incurred by all who are E~ eeYwv voµov (3:6). (When Paul uses similar language of himself, 6q)r:LtrigEtµi, in Rom. 1:14, he speaks of his Christian duty in terms of a personal debt, not in terms of a legal requirement; cf. Rom. 8:12; 15:27.)

5:4 xatrlpyrl0ilt£ &no XQLatov, proleptic aorist, `you have become estranged from Christ'; `your association with Christ has been nullified'. Cf. the same verb used in the opposite sense in Rom. 7:6, xatt1@y1Oiev &no tov voµov, `we have been released from the law'. Circumcision would be `the sacrament of their excision from Christ' (E. Huxtable, Galatians, 239, quoted by G. G. Findlay, Galatians, 306).

oCttves iv voµw StxatovaOE, `you who (the class of people who) seek to be justified by law'-conative present. They could seek justification through faith in Christ (and obtain it) or they could seek it through legal works (and miss it; cf. Rom. 10:3). To seek it through faith in Christ was to seek it on the ground of God's grace; to seek it through legal works was to seek it on the ground of their own merit. Whether this antithesis is supported by rabbinical teaching or not (see E. P. Sanders, PPJ, 297), it expresses Paul's understanding of the situation. Paul has already made it clear (3:10) that those who seek justification through legal works do not attain it (cf. Rom. 11:7) but rather incur the curse of the law; what he emphasizes here is the incompatibility of faith and works, of divine grace and human merit, where the justification of the sinner before God is in question.

trlc x&@Ltoc tlEJTEaatc, `you have fallen out of grace'-the reverse experience to that of Rom. 5:2, tily npooaycuyily Eaxrlxaµev ... els rv x&pLv tavttly iv ?I Eotrlxaµev, `we have obtained access into this grace in which we stand'-`into our present state of grace'. God had called the Galatians Ev x&QLtL (1:6); to forsake his call for the way of law involved self-expulsion from his grace, because they no longer relied on it (see on 2:21).

5:5 r`lµcts yap nvcvtati ex niatews iran(ba btxatoavvrls anEx6EX6tE6a. Perhaps because he is so concerned with the current situation in the Galatian churches, Paul in this letter makes minimal reference to the Christian hope. Here is such a reference, however: by contrast with the vain hope of righteousness by legal works, he says, we who believe in Christ are enabled by the Spirit, through faith, to wait confidently for the hope of righteousness. The law holds out no such sure hope as this. The `hope of righteousness' is the hope of a favourable verdict in the last judgment (Rom. 2:5-16). For those who believe in Christ such a verdict is assured in advance by the present experience of justification by faith, with its concomitant rejoicing `in hope of the glory of God' (Rom. 5: If.; cf. I Thes. 5:8, `the hope of salvation'). In their case the eschatological verdict of `not guilty' is already realized. Their hope is not vague or uncertain; it is fostered and kept alive by the indwelling Spirit of God. The theme of the Spirit's ministry in giving actuality here and now to the heritage of glory which awaits the believer in the resurrection order is amplified elsewhere in the Pauline corpus (cf. Rom. 5:1-5; 8:10f.; 2 Cor. 5:5; Eph. 1:13f.); it is in fact the most distinctive feature in Paul's doctrine of the Spirit. Compare the present and future aspects of `adoption' (Gal. 4:4-7; Rom. 8:15-25). (See F. D. Bruner, A Theology of the Holy Spirit [Grand Rapids, 1970], 273.)

Here and in v 6 it is faith and Spirit that Paul opposes to circumcision (cf. 3:1-5). It is noteworthy that here he does not make baptism (cf. 3:27) the Christian counterpart to Jewish circumcision (contrast Col. 2:11f.).

5:6 ev yap Xptotti0 'ITloov o*UE JTegLToµrl tt loxvet ovtE aXpo(3uot(a. The Christian fellowship embraced both circumcised and uncircumcised; it made no difference whatsoever to their new existence `in Christ Jesus'. In the old order the distinction between circumcision and uncircumcision was of great importance; in the new order it had lost all relevance (cf. 3:28a; also Col. 3:11, where in the new humanity ovx evt ... JTEQLtoµ7l xal &Xp0(3UOT(a).

The statement that for Christians neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any religious validity appears in two other places in Paul's writings: Gal. 6:15 (see below) and 1 Cor. 7:19. In each place a different positive statement is added to the negative statement. In 1 Cor. 7:19 the positive statement is: `but (what matters is) the keeping of God's commandments! This could be taken, in an appropriate context, as a rabbinical ruling comparable (say) to Yohanan b. Zakkai's comment on the water of purification: `Neither does a dead body defile, nor does water purify; but the Holy One, blessed be he, says, "I have laid down a statute, I have issued a decree; you shall not transgress my decree" ' (Num. Rub. 19:8 on Nu. 19:2). So one might envisage another rabbi as saying, `Neither circumcision nor uncircumcision matters in itself, but God has given a commandment, and his commandments must be kept.' Paul's intention is quite different: being circumcised or uncircumcised, he means, is irrelevant to the doing of God's will. J. W. Drane, Paul: Libertine or Legalist? (London, 1975), 65, sees in the clause `but the keeping of the commandments of God' (1 Cor. 7:19) an instance of Paul's more positive attitude to the principle of law (as a rule of life) in 1 Corinthians than in Galatians. Paul probably knew that the permissive Corinthians required a different emphasis from the Galatians, with their leaning to legalism.

a),,X,a JTlotts St' &ythTTlg evE(jyovµ£vrl, `but (what avails is) faith operating through love'. It is better to construe ivEpyou[ttvrl as middle voice than as passive, as though the meaning were `faith energized (produced) by love'. In every NT occurrence of a form of EveeYEw which might be either middle or passive, a good case can be made out for taking it as middle (pace J. A. Robinson, Ephesians, 241-247). More importantly, in keeping with the general teaching of this and other Pauline letters, faith is viewed as the root, love as the fruit. See J. B. Lightfoot, Galatians, 204f.; E. D. Burton, Galatians, 281. G. S. Duncan (Galatians, 157f.) inclines to the rendering 'faith . . . which is set in motion by love'; he refers to 2:20, where 'Paul declares that what brought him to rest exclusively on faith was the revelation of a Saviour who loved him'. But in the present context the 'love' is much more likely to be Christian love than the love of God in Christ; cf. v 13: 'through love serve one another'. J. B. Lightfoot observes that 'these words 8t' &y&,nrls Eveeyou thvrl bridge over the gulf which seems to separate the language of St Paul and St James. Both assert a principle of practical energy, as opposed to a barren, inactive theory' (Galatians, 205).

Love, the primary fruit of the Spirit (v 22), is poured out through the Spirit into the hearts of those who are justified by faith (Rom. 5:5). It may be formally true that Paul does not make justification by faith the basis of his ethical teaching (cf. A. Schweitzer, Mysticism, 220-226, 294-297; E. P. Sanders, PPJ, 434- 442), but the faith by which believers are justified is the faith which operates through love; it was by hearing with faith, the Galatians have already been reminded, that they received the Spirit (3:2). Justification by faith and life in the Spirit are like two sides of one coin; neither is present without the other. `Works based on faith are wrought through love, but man is not justified by love' (M. Luther, In epistulam Pauli ad Galatas, 1535, WA 40/2, 35).

This reference to 'love', after the mention of 'faith' and `hope' (v 5), completes the 'primitive Christian triad' of graces-faith, hope and love, 'the quintessence of the God-given life in Christ' (G. Bornkamm, Paul, 219). Cf. 1 Cor. 13:13; 1 Thes. 1:3; 5:8; Rom. 5:1-5 (see A. M. Hunter, Paul and his Predecessors [London, 21961], 33-35). See p. 41.

(b) Stern words for the trouble-makers (5:7-12)

You were running well. Who put an obstacle in your way to prevent you from following the path of obedience to the truth? This persuasion does not come from him who calls you. 'A little leaven leavens the whole batch of dough.' I have confidence in the Lord with regard to you that you will not be otherwise minded; but the one who is causing you trouble will bear his judgment, whoever he may be. As for me, my brothers, if I am still preaching circumcision, why am I still being persecuted? In that case the cross has ceased to be a stumbling-block. I wish that those who are upsetting you would complete their cutting operationon themselves!

TEXTUAL NOTES

v 7 nrlo,n A B

µ'n nELOOOaL add [albevL nrL9euOe G laV1`91s' Lucif Pelag

v 8 oux o/n D° pc lat" Lucif M.Vict

v 9 ~vµoL / boXot D lat Lucif

v 10 Ev xvetw om B

vII ell xvpvoow / xrlpvoow D G pc latb°K(;' Ambst

v 12 ocpekov / a@a P'~

a:roxolovraL / autoxoipwvraL P46 D G

5:7 'ETQEXETE xaXws. Paul uses an athletic metaphor for their spiritual progress, as he had used it of his own apostolic service in 2:2, µr1 uog rig xEVOV teexw t1 Kbgaµov (see note ad loc. and cf. 1 Cor. 9:26; 2 Tim. 4:7; Acts 20:24). When Paul last saw the Galatians, and when he last had news of them, up to the moment that he learned of the agitators' visit, the reports of their progress were encouraging. It was all the more astounding that they should have been side-tracked so quickly.

tic vµas Ev£xoWEV; The verb was used in this kind of context originally of breaking up a road so as to prevent progress (neoxoartEtV), but then came to mean `hinder' or `delay', originally with the dative of disadvantage (cf. Rom. 15:22; 1 Thes. 2:18 for other Pauline occurrences). C. E. DeVries takes Evxontw here to be an athletic term, `cutting in' in front of a runner so as to trip him up ('Paul's "Cutting" Remarks about a Race: Galatians 5:1-12', Tenney FS, 115-120). His further suggestion that the reference might be to the particular form of `cutting' involved in circumcising is far-fetched, despite the use of aaroxoartw in v 12 (the literal force of xontw in irvxonrw is otiose, and Paul is not much given to etymologizing).

[t71] &4166a, the truth of the gospel mentioned above in 2:5, 14. Cf. R. Bultmann, TDNT I, 238-247 (s.v. &7,,i19rta); D. J. Theron, `AAHOEIA in the Pauline Corpus', EQ 26 (1954), 3-18; A. C. Thiselton, NIDNTT III, 874-901 (s.v. `Truth').

[tl nEi0Ea0at. The phrase r 6C410Eia µrl nEl0E00ar was imported from here in some texts into 3:1, to follow the question ris vµas ar(3aaxavev; which is closely parallel to tic vµas avExoWEV; and manifestly requires the same answer. The Western addition µrlSEVL Jtri0Ea0E makes the whole sentence run: `Who has hindered you? Obey no one (in such a way as) not to obey the truth.' The addition may have been due to a desire to make nELaµovrl (v 8) more immediately relevant to the preceding construction.

5:8 r1 JLELQµovil ovx ex tov xak0f1VTog 16µ&s. With the Western addition at the end of v 7, this means: `Obedience (to someone in such a way as not to obey the truth) does not come from him who calls you' (so BDF 488.1 (a)). If ovx be omitted in v 8, with a few Western witnesses, the meaning must be: `Obedience (to the truth) comes from him who calls you.'

This is the only Pauline (and NT) instance of nEtaµovrl. It is, in fact, a rare word; apart from `persuasion' it is used to mean `confidence', `reliability'. If we reject the Western addition (at the end of v 7), v 8 must mean: `The persuasion (that draws you away from the truth) does not come from him who calls you'-'persuasion' in the sense of `being persuaded'.

`He who calls you' is, of course, God: the present tense is used here because (as in Rom. 9:11; 1 Thes. 2:12 (?); 5:24) there is no emphasis on the time at which he called them, as there is in 1:6, where Paul expresses astonishment at their defecting so quickly from him who had (recently) called them, &ato tov xaXeoavtos vµas.

If the persuasion does not come from him who called them, it is implied that it comes ultimately from his great adversary, whoever the human agents were who put obstacles in their path (cf. 1 Thes. 2:18, EvsxoiEV ffLcL o aatavas).

5:9 µtxea lvµi1 oXov To CPveaµa ~vµoi. A few Western witnesses have bokoi ('spoils', `adulterates') in place of i;vµot ('leavens'). This is plainly a proverbial saying, used by Paul also in 1 Cor. 5:6, where he introduces it with oivx otSatE...; and goes on in some detail to apply the figures of ~tiµrl and cpveaµa ('lump,' `batch of dough') to the alarming possibilities of the tolerance of ztoevE(a in the Corinthian church. (To much the same effect is the proverbial verse from Menander's Thais quoted in 1 Cor. 15:33, cp0Elpovoty rlerl oµuXiac xaxai.) xpio0' Here he thinks primarily of the principle of legalism, which has no more right to invade the Christian community than leaven had any right to be present in a Jewish house on Passover Eve, although he could have used the same figure in relation to the quarrelsomeness against which he issues a warning in v 15 below and in relation to the general tendency to gratify `the desires of the flesh' (v 16).

The use of leaven as a symbol of evil and corrupting influences goes back to the prohibition of leaven for seven days at Passovertide (Ex. 12:14-20; Dt. 16:3-8). Hence Paul urges the Corinthian church to sweep out the `old leaven... of malice and evil' and celebrate their lifelong Christian festival `with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth' (1 Cor. 5:7f.). When Jesus reminded his hearers that great enterprises may spring from small beginnings (with special reference to the kingdom of heaven) and illustrated his point with the parable about the handful of leaven which could leaven three measures ((yata Te(a) of flour (Mt. 13:33), he drew his analogy from the normal use of leaven in breadmaking; but there is no direct relation between this parable and the proverb twice quoted by Paul.

In a discussion of the defiling property of leaven in m. Orl., Gamaliel I (Paul's teacher) is quoted as saying that a quantity of leaven falling into dough ,can never render the dough forbidden unless it suffices of itself to leaven the dough' (2.12)-but that is a halakhic ruling, not a proverbial saying.

5:10 i;yb ,nenotOa Els vµas ev xvpicu. The omission of £v xvelcu in B is probably accidental. The inclusion of the phrase adds weight to Paul's expression of confidence: his confidence arises from his trust in Christ and from his awareness that his Galatian friends and he are fellow-members of Christ: `I have confidence regarding you in the Lord.' For similar phraseology cf. Rom. 14:14; Phil. 2:24; 2 Thes. 3:4 (nEro(9aµsv Se ev xveiw e(p' vµas). He knows how the logic of the gospel works, and if they have really received the gospel (as he is convinced they have), they must accept the same logic and think no differently (oiSev aXXo (FQOVoETE) from himself. Cf. RSV `that you will take no other view than mine'. Something to the same effect comes to expression in Phil. 3:15 (ooot ovv t>XEtot, TOf)TO cpeovwµcv• xal El f iteews (peoVEtTE...

o SE tapaaowv vµ&S (3aat6.OEL tb xeiµa. Paul's converts may still have been wavering at the time his letter reached them; they may already have been persuaded by the agitators. But even so, there was hope-good hope, Paul persuaded himself-that his letter would make them change their minds and rely on free grace as they had done before. The agitators were no converts of his-more probably they were his settled opponents-and he could expect to make no impression on them by his arguments. Yet some of them might read his letter, or learn of its contents, and a word of warning for them would not come amiss.

This presupposes that the singular 6 Taeaoowv is generic, in view of the plural oL taQ6.000vtes in 1:7 (cf. v 12 below, of &vaotatovvtes vµas). They could indeed have had an outstanding leader, or they may have invoked some impressive authority in Judaea. In any case, whoever troubled them by trying to impose circumcision on them would have to endure the judgment such conduct incurred. Similarly Paul says of the `false apostles' who infiltrated the church of Corinth, `Their end will be according to their works' (2 Cor. 11:15).

oasts i;av 7l, an instance of the Hellenistic encroachment of Eav on &v after a relative (cf. Acts 3:23, r`jtts Eav ...); see also v 17; 6:7. The meaning may be that Paul is not quite sure of the identity of the agitators, or of the authority behind them. Or it may be that he suspects the identity of that authority, but prefers to name no names.

J. L. White (The Body of the Greek Letter, 61, 64f.) finds in the `confidence formula' of this verse a further feature characteristic of the `body-closing unit' of a letter, he compares Rom. 15:14f.; Phm. 21.

5:11 'Eyw Se, &SEXToi, EL acE@LTOdV Ett xr1evoaw. This argument, not obviously related to anything in the immediate context either before or after, can be explained only as a reply to some allegation which was being made about Paul, and to which (he suspected) his converts might be disposed to pay heed. The allegation was apparently to the effect that Paul `still' preached circumcision. (The mainly western omission of ETL before xrlpv(3ow is stylistically motivated; sTt was felt to be inelegant here so shortly before its occurrence in the apodosis.) `If I still preach circumcision', he says-but when had he preached circumcision? Not, we may be sure, since he was commissioned to be an apostle of Jesus Christ: the logic of the law-free-and therefore circumcision-free-gospel was implicit in his Damascus-road experience. But if Paul had engaged in proselytization among Gentiles before his conversion, he would certainly have preached circumcision then: such a zealot for the traditions would not have viewed circumcision as optional, as something which might be neglected if expediency so directed (as the merchant Ananias advised King Izates of Adiabene, according to Josephus, Ant. 20.40-42). Paul's critics, if they knew of such earlier activity on his part, might have said, `He used to preach circumcision, and (when expedient) he still preaches it' (cf. E. Barnikol, Die vor- and fruhchristliche Zeit des Paulus [Kiel, 1929], 18ff., for Paul's pre-conversion mission to the Gentiles).

G. Howard (Crisis, 10, 39, 44) holds that those who represented Paul as still preaching circumcision honestly believed that he did so: it was only recently that he had disclosed the law-free character of his gospel to the `pillars' in Jerusalem, and that at a private meeting (2:2), so that others were still unaware of it.

But did Paul, by word or action, lend any verisimilitude to this representation? From our perspective, it is easy to see how preposterous was the charge that he still preached circumcision; but his contemporaries may not always have seen the situation so clearly. Perhaps he was accused of being a trimmer: of recommending circumcision on some occasions and forbidding it on others. Such an accusation might spring from his essentially neutral attitude towards circumcision. Circumcision per se, he held, was neither here nor there (cf. v 6): a Jewish believer had no need to remove the mark of circumcision, any more than a Gentile believer needed to receive it (I Cor. 7:18f.). Should Jewish believers circumcise their sons? According to Acts 21:21, 24, it was rumoured that Paul forbade the Jews of the dispersion to do so, but James the Just and his fellow-elders are sure that the rumour is false. The Paul of the epistles, who himself conformed to Jewish ways when living among Jews (1 Cot 9:20), would not have forbidden other Jewish believers to follow his example in this. If they wished to circumcise their infant sons out of regard for an ancestral custom and not as though the rite retained any covenant significance or established any claim on God, it is difficult to see how, on his own principles, he could have objected to their doing so. His own circumcision of Timothy, which took place, according to Luke (Acts 16:3), after the decision reached at the Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15:28f.), was intended for sociological convenience, not religious validity. (If this epistle should be dated after Timothy's circumcision, the Galatian Christians-especially if they were South Galatians-would certainly have known of it. If, in accordance with the position preferred in this commentary, the epistle be dated earlier, and the recipients learned of Paul's circumcision of Timothy some time later, what must they have thought about it?)

True, even in the matter of Timothy's circumcision, Paul could not be said to preach circumcision; but his critics could have claimed some colourable ground for insisting that he was not always so totally opposed to circumcision as he appeared to be in his dealings with the Galatians. To claim this would be to overlook, whether inadvertently or deliberately, a fundamental distinction: the Galatians were Gentile believers for whom circumcision was not an ancestral custom, and they were being urged to accept it in order to secure the approval of God. The agitators who visited them may well have said, as the strict Jew Eleazar said to King Izates (in contrast to the earlier advice given him by the accommodating Ananias), `In your ignorance... you are guilty of the greatest offence against the law and thereby against God. For you ought not only to read the laws but also, and even more, to do what they command. How long will you remain uncircumcised? If you have not yet read the law concerning this, read it now, that you may know the nature of your impiety' (Josephus, Ant. 20. 44f.).

TL Ett 6L6)Xoµat; `Our former persecutor', as some Christians called him (1:23), now endured persecution himself. Elsewhere Paul speaks of his 07,,l,ets, `tribulations' (neither 0Xipit nor the verb 0X1(3w occurs in this letter), frequently in close association with his 61wy to(, `persecutions', and treats them as tokens of his participation in the sufferings of Christ (cf. 2 Cot 1:5; Phil. 3:10; Col. 1:24). His afflictions came to him from a variety of quarters, but those which he has in mind here were due to his proclamation of a law-free gospel. He implies that, if he included some element of law (e.g. circumcision) in his preaching (cf. 1:10, ri itt &v0gt)nots 7jpcoxov), he would be exempt from persecution. He would indeed have been exempt from the kind of attack launched by the militants who insisted on circumcision; for him to have preached circumcision would have meant going along with them. That the agitators' own zeal was reinforced by a desire to avoid persecution is stated in 6:12 below (see note ad loc. ).

aea xaTTIL:)tat to oxav&akov tov otaveov. The oxavSaA.ov of the cross, for Jews (cf. 1 Cor. 1:23), lay in the curse which it involved for one who was hanged on it (cf. 3:13). That one who died such a death should be proclaimed as Lord and Christ was intolerable. In the eyes of Gentiles the idea that salvation depended on one who had neither the wit nor the power to save himself from so disreputable a death was the height of folly. But there is a more general ox&v&akov attached to the cross, one of which Paul is probably thinking here: it cuts the ground from under every thought of personal achievement or merit where God's salvation is in view. To be shut up to receiving salvation from the crucified one, if it is to be received at all, is an affront to all notions of proper self-pride and self-help-and for many people this remains a major stumblingblock in the gospel of Christ crucified. If I myself can make some small contribution, something even so small as the acceptance of circumcision, then my self-esteem is uninjured.

But to nullify the scandal of the cross is to rob the cross of its saving potency, it is to nullify Christianity as such: `the aim of the Epistle to the Galatians is to show that all Christianity is contained in the Cross; the Cross is the generative principle of everything Christian in the life of man' (J. Denney, The Death of Christ, 152).

5:12 "OTEkov xai &atoxoWovtaL 01 &vaataTOUVTEs vµa;. Here the agitators are called of &vaOTaTOVVTE; vµas, a stronger expression than of tc(oovtE; vµas (1:7). The aorist participle of this verb is used in Acts 17:6 (ol ThV olxouµEVrly &vaotavcuaavtE;) of those (presumably Jewish militants) who had sown subversion in one city after another of the Roman Empire and in Acts 21:38 of the Egyptian who fomented a rising with 4,000 sicarii (o ... &vaotacwaas ... tov; tci@axt3x6X(ou; avSpa; tcov oLxapi(uv) in the neighbourhood of Jerusalem about AD 54. The most famous non-literary instance of the verb comes in P. Theon, Oxy. 119.10 (2/3 cent. AD), where the bad boy writing to his father, reports his mother as saying of him, &vaOTaTOi µE• &pQOV avtov ('he upsets me; away with him!'). Paul's point here is that the agitators are subverting the Galatians, undermining their faith.

OcpcXov with the future indicative expresses an attainable wish: `Would that they would ... !' As for the middle of &Jtoxotttco, there is little doubt that Paul means `they had better go the whole way and make eunuchs of themselves!' (NEB)-or rather `have themselves made eunuchs'. A eunuch is called &Jtoxexo[tRvos in Dt. 23:1 (LXX), where he is debarred from the ExxXrlo(a xvplov. Several commentators since R. Bentley, Critica Sacra, ed. A. A. Ellis (Cambridge, 1862), 48, have noted the verbal parallel in Dio Cassius, Hist. 80 1,(79).] where &Jtox6JtrE6v completes the process which begins with JtEpttEµvEty. Greek commentators regularly understood Paul's language thus; the Latins operated with a more ambiguous form of words, like Vg. utinam et abscindantur qui vos conturbant (cf. AV `I would they were even cut off which trouble you'). Some more recent commentators (e.g. H. N. Ridderbos, Galatians, 194f.) have noted that Pessinus, in North Galatia, was the centre of the cult of Cybele, who was served by galli, emasculated priests; but there is no need to posit such an allusion here. Elsewhere Paul demotes literal circumcision to the status of mere mutilation, xatatoµtj (Phil. 3:2), reserving the sacral term itciton for those who `worship by the Spirit of God' (Phil. 3:3).

VI

FLESH AND SPIRIT

(5:13-26)

The law of God is summed up in the commandment to love one another; but such love, with all its attendant graces, is fostered in those who live by the Spirit. The old order of the 'flesh' manifests itself in a very different set of attitudes and activities.

(a) The way of love (5:13-15)

For you, my brothers, were called for freedom. Only, do not treat your freedom as a springboard for the 'flesh', but serve one another through love. For the whole law is fulfilled in one commandment, namely this: 'You shall love your neighbour as yourself.' But if you bite and devour one another, take care that you do not exterminate one another.

TEXTUAL NOTES

v 13 SLa rig ayanr15 / try ayanrl tov nvevµatog D G 104 latvg(s•cl) copsabo(codd) Ambst (ex Rom. 15:30)

v 14 evt Xoyp / vµty Mcion Epiph / vµty cv cvt koyw D` G larb Ambst / oXtyw 2495 syr''e'

nE7141pwtaL / nkilQovtaL D G' 0122 byz / avaxe(paXawvtat 365 pc

w5 oravtov / ws eavtov P46 G L N" P (The same variant appears in Rom. 13:9 G L P. The cause in both places may be haplography, but the reflexive pronoun of the 3rd person encroaches on the forms for the 1st and 2nd persons in Hellenistic Greek; cf. BDF 64(1).)

5:13 `The dogmatic part of the Epistle ... passes naturally over to the practical part, inasmuch as the voµos is one of the chief ideas of the dogmatic part. It was necessary to show that freedom from the law does not by any means do away with the obligations of moral conduct' (F C. Baur, Paul, ETr I [London, 1875], 255). But henceforth the obligations of moral conduct are fostered not by the dictates of the law but by the operation of the free Spirit.

vµEts yap in' EXEVOEpia exXrlOrltE, &SEXcpoi. £ni with the dative here expresses purpose (`you were called for freedom'); cf. 1 Thes. 4:7 (ov yap ix&a£oEV r`lµag o OEbs Eni &xaOapo(a); Eph. 2:10 (xtto0evtEs ... i.ni Epyots &y0ots). This is the purpose for which God originally called them (cf. 1:6)-in' ikEVOEpia. If in v 1 Christian freedom is the bulwark against legal bondage, here it is the bulwark against libertinism: µovov µ7l Trly iXEVOEpiav EIS &cpopµ7ly Trl oapxi (note the ellipsis of the verb: some such imperative form as a,aµ(3&VFTE or ExETE is to be understood with trly ekEVOEp(av as its object). If freedom can be misused as an &Topµrl ('occasion') for undesirable ends, law is similarly misused in Rom. 7:8, where `sin, taking occasion (&cpopltrly ... .a(3ovoa) through the commandment [forbidding covetousness], wrought in me all kinds of covetousness'.

W. Schmithals (Paul and the Gnostics, 51-53) thinks that Paul here launches an attack on the libertinism of the gnostics. But not all libertines were (or are) gnostics, any more than all gnostics were (or are) libertines; and there is nothing in the present context to suggest that the libertinism against which Paul now warns his readers was gnostic in origin or character.

The `flesh' ((y&p~) is used here not simply of weak human nature nor yet of life under bondage to the oTOtxEia as opposed to life in the Spirit; it denotes (as in vv 16f., 19, 24; 6:8) that self-regarding element in human nature which has been corrupted at the source, with its appetites and propensities, and which if unchecked produces the `works of the flesh' listed in vv 19f.

Many of Paul's friends would have assured him that the tendency to misuse the freedom of the Spirit as an excuse for enthusiastic licence could be checked only by a stiff dose of law. But Paul could not agree: the principle of law was so completely opposed to spiritual freedom that it could never be enlisted in defence of that freedom: nothing was more certainly calculated to kill true freedom. The freedom of the Spirit was the antidote alike to legal bondage and unrestrained licence.

The danger of unrestrained licence is touched on but briefly in the letter to the Galatians: it was danger from the opposite extreme that currently presented the greater threat to them. But how seriously Paul warned against the tendency to pervert gospel liberty into unrestrained licence may be seen in his Corinthian correspondence. The particular `work of the flesh' to which the Galatians were chiefly prone at this time seems to have been quarrelsomeness (v 15).

According to R. Jewett ('The Agitators and the Galatian Congregation', 209-212), the Galatian Christians had been disposed to accept `external' features of the law, such as circumcision and the sacred calendar, without appreciating its more ethical emphases; hence Paul's ethical admonition to them. But Paul's understanding of the gospel excluded the principle of law in any form: to be `under law' was compatible with being under the dominion of sin, with living xata oapxa. The ethical emphases of the law could be effectively satisfied not through submission to the law but through `walking by the Spirit' (v 16). The law belongs to existence in the flesh, and stimulates the very sins that it forbids (3:19).

&XX& Sta Tfls &y&nrls SovXEVETE &xxrlxots, resuming the theme of v 6b. The article preceding &y&nrls may refer back to the &y&nrl of v 6b. There is at least one form of bov),.Eia that is not incompatible with Christian freedom. As Paul himself is the boilos of Christ (1:10) and of his converts (2 Cor. 4:5), so his converts should be Sov7,,ot one of another. But this is a completely different form of slavery from that against which he otherwise warns them. It is as though he said, `If you must live in slavery, here is a form of slavery in which you may safely indulge-the slavery of practical love for one another.' One could similarly envisage him as saying, `If you must live under law, live under the law of love-that is, the law of Christ' (cf. 6:2). This slavery, this law, are impelled by the Spirit within, not imposed by an external authority.

The call to freedom, then, is a call to oneness in Christ and to loving service within the believing community. The liberty of the gospel is not to be exercised in isolated independence. The Christian does not emulate the self-sufficiency of the Stoic, in se ipso torus teres atque rotundus (Horace, Satire 2.7.86); his sufficiency is in Christ, and he is involved in the interdependent and loving fellowship of the people of Christ.

5:14 o yap nas voµos Ev ivi Xoyw 1tE3t?QwtiaL. In v 3 Paul has warned his readers that everyone who submits to circumcision (as a legal requirement) thereby undertakes the obligation to keep every other requirement of the law (oXov T6v voµov). Here he tells them how the whole law may be fulfilled-by loving one another. Whereas 6kos o voµos in v 3 is the sum-total of the precepts of the law, o atas voµos here is the law as a whole-the spirit and intention of the law. On the distinction see H. Hubner, `Das game and das eine Gesetz', KD 21 (1975), 239-256; Das Gesetz bei Paulus (Gottingen, 1978), 37-39. In the phrase :v evi Xoyp we should probably understand Xoyos in the sense of `commandment' which, like Heb. dabdr, it sometimes bears in the Pentateuch (cf. Ex. 34:28 and Dt. 10:4, xai Eypapev... tovs Sexa k6yovs). The commandment in which `the whole law' is fulfilled (perfect TEAkpwtat, `stands fulfilled') is Lv. 19:18b, 'AyaltrloEts tov JtXio(ov oov ws oeavrov. In Rom. 13:9, after quoting some sample commandments from the second half of the decalogue which express one's duty to one's neighbour, Paul says that they are all summed up iv Tw Xoyw rovtw- `You shall love your neighbour as yourself'. He spells out the lesson of this: `Owe no one anything, except to love one another, for he who loves his neighbour has fulfilled the law.... Love does no wrong to a neighbour, therefore love is the fulfilling of the law' (Rom. 13:8-10). By thus quoting Lv. 19:18b Paul `has isolated a keldl (basic principle of the law), as was customary in rabbinic practice' (H.-J. Schoeps, Paul, 208). Aqiba called this text `the great kelal of the Torah' (Gen. Rab. 24:7 on Gn. 5:1; cf. Sipra, Qedosim 2.4).

Lv. 19:18b was quoted by Jesus as the `second' commandment alongside the `first' commandment of Dt. 6:4, enjoining perfect love to God (Mk. 12:28-31). In Lk. 10:27 a lawyer sums up the law in these two commandments, in response to Jesus' question; Jesus then tells him the story of the good Samaritan to explain what is meant by loving one's neighbour as oneself. Between them these two commandments, on which `all the law and the prophets depend' (Mt. 22:40), comprehend the whole of one's duty to God and neighbour, therefore, said Jesus, `there is no other commandment greater than these' (Mk. 12:31 b).

If Aqiba summed up the law in terms of Lv. 19:18b, Hillel, four generations earlier, is said to have summed it up, and incidentally explained the meaning of Lv. 19:18b, when he quoted the negative golden rule to a would-be proselyte: `What is hateful to you, do not to your neighbour, that is the whole law (kol hattorah [cf. Paul's o at&S vo[tos]), everything else is commentary (perish); go and learn it' (b. Shab. 31a). (On the historicity of this Hillel tradition see J. Neusner, The Rabbinic Traditions about the Pharisees before 70, I [Leiden, 1971], 321-324.) Compare Jesus' positive formulation of the golden rule: 'whatever you wish that men would do to you, do so to them; for this is the law and the prophets' (Mt. 7:12).

For this reason loving behaviour is said to `fulfil the law of Christ' (Gal. 6:2). `Thus the true intention of the Law is fulfilled in the man who is set in love by Christ' (W. Gutbrod, TDNT IV, 1076, s. v. voµog).

Here and elsewhere Paul's ethical teaching is based on the tradition of Jesus' teaching (cf. especially Rom. 12:9-13:14, and compare Rom. 14:14 with Mk. 7:19b); perhaps that is why he calls this tradition `the law of Christ' (6:2). `Paul is in complete accord with Jesus: the real demand of the law is love, in which all the other commandments are summed up' (R. Bultmann, `Jesus and Paul' [1936], ETr in Existence and Faith [London, 1964], 224).

See J. Moffatt, Love in the NT (London, 1929); A. Nygren, Agape and Eros, ETr (London, 1932-39); C. S. Lewis, The Four Loves (London, 1960); H. W. Montefiore, `Thou shalt love the neighbour as thyself', NovT 5 (1962), 157-170; C. Spicq, Agape in the NT, ETr, I-III (St. Louis, 1963-66); V. P. Furnish, The Love Command in the NT (Nashville, 1972).

5:15 el S> &XXiovs SaxvetE xal xatec OLEtE, P)`,EatEtE [ti] vat' &kkik(Ov &vaXw6~tE. Paul's concern for the well-being of all his converts, weak and strong alike, comes out clearly from here to 6:10.

The introduction of the new teaching into the Galatian churches appears to have provoked controversy and quarrels: this was not the least of the troubles caused by the agitators. Internecine strife is the only `work of the flesh' against which Paul specifically warns the Galatians. There is no allusion in this letter, for example, to the sexual irregularities against which he puts the Thessalonians on their guard (1 Thes. 4:3-8), apart from their inclusion in the comprehensive list of vices in vv 19-21 below.

But the vice against which he does warn the Galatians here is serious enough; if not checked, it could lead to the disintegration of their fellowship and the disappearance of the churches of Galatia. The language which Paul uses suggests a pack of wild animals preying on one another: `if you keep on biting one another and tearing one another to pieces, take care lest you be annihilated by one another' (cf. BAG, s.v. xateoO(w, &vctXioxw).

(b) Walking by the Spirit (5:16-18)

What 1 mean is this: walk by the Spirit, and you will not fulfil the desire of the flesh. For the desire of the flesh is opposed to the Spirit, and that of the Spirit is opposed to the flesh,- these are contrary to each other, to prevent you from doing the things you wish. But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under law.

TEXTUAL NOTES

v 17 tavra yap p461v'd' tt" B D"G 1739 lat / tavta SE K2 A C D2 W byz syrh"

5:16 Aeyw Se, `What I am saying is this' (cf. 4:1, XEy(o SE).

Jtvevµatt JLEpuJtatELtE, `walk by the Spirit'. For this ethical or religious sense of JtEptJtatEw (the prefix is otiose) cf. Heb. hdlak. Nouns meaning `way' are found in many languages in the sense of the ethical or religious life (Gk. oSos as in 1 Cor. 4:17; Acts 9:2, etc.; Heb. haldkdh, Syr. 'urhd, Arab. assabil, Sanskrit pathin, mdrga, Chinese tao, etc.). The Galatian Christians have already been reminded that they received the Spirit when they believed the gospel and that his presence with them was attested by mighty works (3:2, 5); let his presence be attested also by their way of life. `Walk by the Spirit' means `let your conduct be directed by the Spirit'.

The way of the Spirit is the way of freedom; the way of the Spirit is the way of love. The law of love (v 14) has the same construction as the statutes of the decalogue and of the Torah in general, but it is a different kind of law. No external force or sanction can compel the loving of a neighbour as oneself; such love must be generated from within-by the Spirit.

xai bTAUtiav oapxos ov [t tEX,EaritE, `and you will by no means fulfil the desire of the flesh'-ov µrl with the aorist subjunctive expresses a strong negative statement relating to the future. The RSV mistakenly translates the clause as a negative command: `do not gratify the desires of the flesh'. The words rather express a promise, which will be realized in those who walk by the Spirit. One might substitute hypotaxis for parataxis and render: `if you walk by the Spirit you will not fulfil the desires of the flesh' (cf. NEB). According to Philo (Migr. Abr. 92), circumcision was held to signify `the excision of pleasure and all passions' (~Sov~g xai JtaOcov Jt&vtwv Extoµrlv). It was no doubt natural to suppose that the most effective prophylactic against gratifying the flesh was the law, but Paul denies this. His persecuting activity in earlier days he now recognized as a species of gratifying `the desire of the flesh' (little as he thought so at the time), and the law did not guard him against it; it rather encouraged it. But the incapacity of the law (to... &Svvatov tov vbµov, Rom. 8:3) had now given way to the power of the Spirit.

The antithesis between atvEVsa and od can be brought out in written English if both Spirit and Flesh are spelt with initial capitals: `the Flesh' is `the power that opposes God' (E. P. Sanders, PPJ, 553) and enslaves human beings (cf. Rom. 8:6ff., 12f.). According to R. Jewett, `the flesh is Paul's term for everything aside from God in which one places his final trust' (Paul's Anthropological Terms [Leiden, 1971], 103). E. Kasemann makes some penetrating observations on the antithesis between JtvEVµa and caps in Perspectives on Paul (London, 1971), 25-27; cf his Romans, 218-227.

5:17 rl yap oap~ i;JtLOv[1ei xata tov Jtvrvµatos, to SE Jtveito xath TI]; oapxos, tav&a yap &XXrlXots &vtixEttat, lit., `for the flesh desires against the Spirit and the Spirit against the flesh, for these are opposed to each other.' There is a formal resemblance between this statement and Philo's µ&xEtat o Xoyos tcit n&6Et xai s;v tavrw µevEty ov Svvatat, `Reason is at war with passion and cannot remain in the same place with it' (Leg. All. 3.116). The writer to Diognetus goes in another direction when he says (Ep. Diog. 6:5f.), `The flesh hates the soul and wages war against it,... and the world hates the Christians, because they are opposed to its pleasures. The soul loves the flesh and limbs which hate it, and Christians love those that hate them' (this involves a confusion between the `ethical' and `physical' senses of oap~, and yields a meaning not unlike Eph. 5:29, o,Sels yap JLOTE t7ly iavtOV oapxa itkrloev, &WC exteETel xci ea),.JLE6 avtijv).

The antithesis between flesh and Spirit is treated later in Rom. 8:5-9, 12f., where it is emphasized that the flesh leads to death whereas the Spirit is the guarantee and, indeed, the very principle of resurrection life. The conflict between the two in human experience belongs to that `eschatological' tension which, so long as believers remain in mortal body, is inseparable from their life in Christ (cf. 2 Cor. 4:16-5:5).

It is natural to compare the interior conflict between flesh and Spirit with the tension described in Rom. 7:7-25, and the resolution of that tension in v 16 above ('walk by the Spirit, and you will not fulfil the desire of the flesh') with the liberating experience of Rom. 8:2-'the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus has set you free from the law of sin and death'. But (so far, at least, as Paul's language is concerned) the two forms of conflict are not identical. In Rom. 7:7-25 the power of indwelling sin prevents the person existing under law from fulfilling the divine law in which his inmost self delights: the `law of sin' in his members wages war against the `law of his mind' (Rom. 7:22f.), and at this stage no mention is made of the Spirit, whereas the conflict in the present text is that between flesh and Spirit. It might be said, indeed, that it is basically the same conflict that is described in different language in this passage and in that, but this would have to be established by exegetical argument: it could not be assumed.

Certainly v 16 expresses the gist of Rom. 8:5-9, 12f.; but it does not necessarily follow that v 17 expresses the gist of Rom. 7:7-25. Further light might be shed on the question by the final clause of v 17, 'a µrl a Eav AeXrltg tavta Jto6~r£ (lit. `in order that you may not do whatsoever things you wish' or `lest you do whatsoever things you wish'), if its precise force were certain. The construction (Na with the subjunctive) normally expresses purpose, but sometimes in Hellenistic literature (e.g. 1 Thes. 5:4) it is used to express consequence (cf. BDF 391.5; C. F. D. Moule, Idiom-Book, 142f.), and if this were so here, the meaning would be: `The result of this conflict is that you cannot do the things you wish'.

But to whom does the pronoun `you' refer? Presumably to the Galatian Christians who are being addressed. They had received the Spirit (3:2); otherwise they would have no experience of the conflict between the Spirit and the flesh. Is the meaning then that the `flesh' prevents them from doing what their mind approves and following the promptings of the Spirit? This is the view of those who relate v 17 closely to Rom. 7:7-25; so J. B. Lightfoot, Galatians, 210: `The parallel passage, Rom. vii. 15, 16, determines the meaning of 9eXety here. It denotes the promptings of the conscience; "video meliora proboque". Or is it that `the object of the striving of the Spirit in the believer is that he may be saved from yielding to the evil tendencies of his own nature' (preferred by C. F. Hogg and W. E. Vine, Galatians, 278f.)? The main difficulty with both of these views is that the inhibiting of `you' from doing `the things you wish' is ascribed either to the flesh or to the Spirit, to the exclusion of the other, whereas the text seems to ascribe it to both, or (unless tavta yd &X7,.~Xotc &vtfxEttat is a parenthesis) to the conflict between them. E. D. Burton (Galatians, 302) takes the Na clause to be a proper clause of purpose, the purpose being that `of both flesh and Spirit, in the sense that the flesh opposes the Spirit that men may not do what they will in accordance with the mind of the Spirit, and the Spirit opposes the flesh that they may not do what they will after the flesh. Does the man choose evil, the Spirit opposes him; does he choose good, the flesh hinders him' (so, with variations of emphasis, F. Sieffert, Galater, 332f.; H. Schlier, Galater, 248-250; F. Mussner, Galaterbrief, 377f.). But the believer is not the helpless battleground of two opposing forces. If he yields to the flesh, he is enslaved by it, but if he obeys the prompting of the Spirit, he is liberated and can make a positive and willing response to the command `Walk by the Spirit' and similar moral imperatives, `doing the will of God from the heart' (as it is put in Eph. 6:6).

H. b. Betz (Galatians, 280) concludes (perhaps rightly) that v 17 presents a `pre-Pauline' anthropology on the basis of which Paul works out his own more complex doctrine, which finds more developed expression in Rom. 7-8. What is said in Rom. 7-8, however, is not simply to be substituted for his statements here, as though these were insufficient and merely preliminary; they are appropriate to their present context.

5:18 EL SE rrvm.tats ayEQOE, ovx EotE vJro voµov. Here existence `under law' is antithetic to being `led by the Spirit'. It is existence `under law', according to Rom. 7:15, that exposes one unprotected to the malignity of indwelling sin, and involves one in the frustrating situation: `What I do is not what I want; it is rather the very thing I hate.' But there is no reason why those who were born under law should continue in this state any longer, even more emphatically there is no reason why those who have been delivered from spiritual bondage should gratuitously place themselves under law. With the coming of Christ and the completion of his redeeming work, the age of law has been superseded by the age of the Spirit. For the Galatians to retreat from grace to law would be to exchange the freedom of the Spirit for bondage to the stoicheia. When Paul in 2 Cor. 3:17 concludes his contrast between the death-denouncing letter and the life-giving Spirit with the affirmation that `where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty', he sums up in one epigram all that he has taught on this subject.

To be `led by the Spirit' is to walk by the Spirit-to have the power to rebut the desire of the flesh, to be increasingly conformed to the likeness of Christ (2 Cor. 3:18), to cease to be under law. To be under law affords no protection against the desire of the flesh. `Spirit' is equally opposed to `law' as to `flesh'. To be led by the Spirit brings simultaneous deliverance from the desire of the flesh, the bondage of the law, and the power of sin: `sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace' (Rom. 6:14). To be `under grace' is to be `led by the Spirit'. `The grace of God is the gift of God; but the greatest gift is the Holy Spirit himself, and therefore he is called grace' (Aug. Sermon 144.1). Cf. N. P. Williams, The Grace of God (London, 1930), for the thesis that the grace of God cannot be adequately conceived in impersonal terms-that it must be frankly equated with the person of the Holy Spirit, so that `there is no "higher gift than grace"; grace is "God's presence and his very Self, and Essence all divine" ' (110, quoting J. H. Newman's hymn `Praise to the Holiest' from The Dream of Gerontius). To experience grace of this order as a living reality is the effect of receiving `the Spirit of sonship' (Rom. 8:15).

It is not surprising that, in the one other reference to the leading of the Spirit to be found in his letters, Paul says that `all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God' (Rom. 8:14). So in Gal. 4:4f. the redemption effected by Christ for those previously `under law' meant their receiving `adoption as sons' (vloOeo(a, as in Rom. 8:15). If to be `under law' is to be a slave, to be led by the Spirit is to be a freeborn son or daughter, to enjoy `the glorious liberty of the children of God' (Rom. 8:21)-the liberty for which, as Paul has just told the Galatians, they had been `called' (v 13).

Bringing `the Jewish nomism against which Paul fought' up to date, E. Kasemann affirms that `it represents the community of "good" people which turns God's promises into their own privileges and God's commandments into the instruments of self-sanctification' (Perspectives on Paul, 72). Walking by the Spirit, the antidote to nomism of every kind, calls for resolution and staying power, as is made plain by Paul's frequent use of athletic metaphor for the Christian life. The struggle between flesh and Spirit is bound up with that 'eschatological tension'-arising from `belief in Jesus' resurrection as an event of the past and the experience of the Spirit as already given'-with which Christians are compelled to live so long as they exist on earth in mortal bodies (see J. D. G. Dunn, Unity, 23).

(c) The works of the flesh (5:19-21)

Now the works of the flesh are well known; they are as follows: fornication, impurity, wantonness, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, quarrelsomeness, jealousy, outbursts of rage, selfish ambitions, dissensions, party-spirit, envy, drunkenness, revelry and the like. I warn you, as I have warned you before, that those who practise such things will not inherit the kingdom of God.

TEXTUAL NOTES

v 19 nopveLa l praem µoLxsLa K2 D (µoLXei.at G)' 0122 byz syr` Iren'at Ambst

v 20 Eeic / eeEts C G iY 0122 byz lat syri ` cop Mcion CIem.Alex Epiph Iren'a' ~r)Xog / ~'qXot K C W 0122 byz lat syr''l' cop Mcion CIem.Alex Epiph Iren'a' Cypr

v 21 wuovoL P46 tt B pc copsa Mcion Clem.Alex Orig Iren'at Aug / c0ovoL povoL A C D G ' 0122 byz lat cop' (for this 'Gorgiastic' assonance cf. Rom. 1:29, cpOovov (povov, which may indeed have influenced the reading here).

5:19 tpavE S£ >atty to epya tris aapxos. `Paul considers that what constitutes proper behaviour is self-evident' (E. P. Sanders, PPJ, 513)-even the pagans having an innate awareness of it (Rom. 1:18-21, 32; 2:14-16). Therefore violations of proper behaviour show themselves publicly for what they are.

Lists of vices and virtues, such as we have here in vv 19-23, are well attested in literature of this period.

Examples outside the NT are found in 1QS 4.2-14 and in the catechesis of the Two Ways (Did. 1:1-6:3; Barn. 18:1-21:9). As for the NT catalogues of vices, these are studied by E. Schweizer in `Traditional ethical patterns in the Pauline and post-Pauline letters and their development', Black FS (2), 195-209; in addition to the present list, he examines those in 1 Thes. 4:3-6; 1 Cor. 5:9-13; 6:9-11; 2 Cor. 12:20f.; Rom. 13:13; 1:29-31; Col. 3:5-8; Eph. 4:17-19; 5:3-5. These lists `emphasize sins against the common life in the brotherhood'; their function is not to `distinguish an outstanding group of high moral standards from the abominable immorality of the world' but `to show the church how much this world is still living in its midst' (207).

See A. Vogtle, Die Tugend- and Lasterkataloge im NT (Munster, 1936); S. Wibbing, Die Tugend- and Lasterkataloge im NT and ihre Traditionsgeschichte = BZNW 25 (Berlin, 1959); W. Barclay, Flesh and Spirit (London, 1962).

JtopvE(a, `fornication', means primarily traffic with Jtogvat ('harlots'); it is found also as a near-technical term (like Heb. zenut) for sexual relations within prohibited degrees (as in Mt. 5:32; 19:9; Acts 15:20, 29; 21:25; 1 Cor. 5:1) and, more widely, of sexual irregularity in general. This wider sense is probably intended here. In some of his letters Paul warns his converts specifically against this vice: &3TEXEO0at vµag &no zfsnopvE(as, 1 Thes. 4:3; ()EVyETE rv Jtoeve(av, 1 Cor. 6:18. It was so common in Graeco-Roman antiquity that, except when carried to excess, it was not regarded as specially reprehensible. Some of the Pauline churches had difficulty in abandoning their former pagan tolerance of it; there is no hint, however, that it was a major problem in the churches of Galatia.

&xaOapo(a, `impurity', has a wider range of meaning than nogvE(a. It includes the misuse of sex, but is applicable to various forms of moral evil: Demosthenes, for example, uses it of one who, pretending to be a man's friend, uses perjury to do him an injury (Meid. 119). In Pr. 6:16 LXX &xaOapo(a Wvxf15 is a paraphrase for to'abat napsb, `an abomination to his [God's] soul'. The word is used, naturally, of physical and ritual uncleanness, but it is its ethical sense that is relevant here, the tendency of vice to spread its corrupting influence.

&o£XyEta, `wantonness', is vice that throws off all restraint and flaunts itself, `unawed by shame or fear', vice paraded with blatant impudence and insolence, without regard for self-respect, for the rights and feelings of others, or for public decency.

5:20 E(bcoXo?.acp(a, `the worship of idols'-not only of graven images but of any substitute for the living and true God. In Col. 3:5 covetousness is described as a form of idolatry, because the thing coveted becomes an object of worship. In 1 Cor. 10:14 participation in a feast in a pagan temple is participation in idolatry.

(Papµaxe(a, `sorcery', the use of cpaeµaxa, `drugs', as in black magic, to do harm to others. In itself the word is as neutral as `pharmacy', its English derivative, meaning the dispensing of drugs for medical purposes. But it acquired two pejorative senses: the use of drugs to poison people and (as here) the use of drugs in witchcraft. In Ex. 7:11 cpap.taxo( is used of the `sorcerers' (Heb. mekass'pim) at Pharaoh's court. Apart from its present occurrence, the only occurrences of cpaeµaxsia in the NT are in Rev. 9:21; 18:23 (cf. cpapµaxov, Rev. 9:21, and (papµaxos, Rev. 21:8; 22:15). Sorcery was a serious offence in Roman law: it was dealt with by a standing court, the quaestio perpetua de sicariis et ueneficis (in which no very sharp distinction was made between the ueneficus as sorcerer and as poisoner).

exOpau, 'enmities', 'hostilities'-between individuals, or between communities, on political, racial or religious grounds. Not only hostile acts but the underlying hostile sentiments and intentions are in view. The £xOpos is the one who cherishes the hostile thought and performs the hostile act; the object of his hostility is not necessarily ex0e6s towards him (the term is not inevitably correlative). Jesus told his disciples to love their ix0po( (Mt. 5:44; Lk. 6:27, 35), and in this sense Paul quotes Pr. 25:21, `If your sx0p6s is hungry, give him bread to eat' (Rom. 12:20). Plainly the disciple who takes this teaching to heart does not cherish a spirit of ixOpa towards his >'xOpos. This particular `work of the flesh' can be neutralized by ?yairrl, the primary fruit of the Spirit (v 22).

Epos, `strife' or `quarrelsomeness', occurs frequently in lists of vices. `Strife' was personified and deified in early Greek thought: in Homer and Hesiod Eris is the goddess whose malignant influence produces war and destruction. Paul is specially concerned to keep 9Qcg out of his churches (cf. 1 Cor. 1:11; 3:3); it is the antithesis of the `peace' which belongs to the fruit of the Spirit (v 22).

~flxoS is not necessarily a vice (see note on ~rlxwiljs, 1:14). It was a word with an honourable heritage in the Greek Bible: Phinehas (Nu. 25:11), Elijah (1 Ki. 19:10, 14) and Mattathias (1 Macc. 2:24-26) had all shown zeal for God in times of apostasy, and it was from their precedent that the militant Zealots of the first century AD took their designation. Paul not only refers to the zeal which he showed in his persecuting days (Phil. 3:6) but speaks of his Oeov ~71Xos, a `zeal' or concern like God's, for the fidelity of the Corinthian church (2 Cor. 11:2). In Rom. 10:2 he credits his Jewish brethren with ~~xoS OEov, `zeal for God' (here the genitive is objective, whereas in 2 Cor. 11:2 it is subjective), but it is an uninformed zeal, ov xcrr' en(yv(Oaw. It is only the context that can indicate whether ~~xog is used in a good or bad sense; when, as here, it appears in a list of vices, it is plainly used in a bad sense, of selfish jealousy (cf. Rom. 13:13; 1 Cor. 3:3; 2 Cor. 12:20, in all of which places it is associated with get;). Another's success may move a man to ~flxog in the sense of noble emulation, which is a good thing, or it may stir him to ~i)kos in the sense of resentment that another has enjoyed success or distinction (thus far) denied to him, and that is a bad thing, a work of the flesh. But vigilance and grace are necessary to prevent the good ~fkos from degenerating into the evil ~i kos.

Ou tol,'outbursts of rage', is the plural of Ovtbg, another word which (like lflXog) can be used in a nobler and a less noble sense. For Plato Ovµos is the `spirited' element in the human soul, which needs to be directed by the rational element, much as a sheep-dog requires to be controlled by the shepherd (Rep. 4.440D). Aristotle is specially aware of the menace of uncontrolled Ovµog which, he says, `does seem to hear the voice of reason, but to hear it wrongly, like those impetuous servants who rush off before hearing all that is said and then do not carry out their orders properly, or like dogs which start barking before waiting to see if one is a friend or not' (Eth. Nic. 7.1149a3). Paul uses Oup6g of divine retribution against those who `obey wickedness' in Rom. 2:8; elsewhere (2 Cor. 12:20; Eph. 4:31; Col. 3:8) he uses it pejoratively, of something which Christians should renounce. The plural appears here and in 2 Cor. 12:20. The word has much in common with og'' . To Ovµos as to opytil the injunction applies, Be angry (6py(i;ro0s) without sinning' (Eph. 4:26, quoting Ps. 4:4 LXX)-a way to achieve this ideal being `Do not let the sun go down on your anger' (opyr ).

epL9eia in the NT is always something to be avoided as evil. The plural is found here and in 2 Cor. 12:20 (indeed, the sequence Epis, ~11Xos, Outo(, EpL6eiaL occurs in both passages). It is derived from Eet8os, `hireling', `one who works for pay'; thus, when Tobit became blind, his wife Anna >1eL6rveio (as a dressmaker, evidently) to maintain the household (Tob. 2:11). But EptOela came to denote a mercenary spirit, selfish ambition, and its similarity to gets (with which it is not connected etymologically) probably suggested the rivalry and contention to which such a spirit gives rise. Cf. Rom. 2:8; Phil. 1:17; 2:3 (and Jas. 3:14, 16).

Stxooiao(at, `dissensions', `divisions'. The other NT occurrence of the word is in Rom. 16:17, where Paul puts his readers on their guard against those who cause `dissensions' and stumbling blocks (oxavSaka), meaning probably those who introduce divisive teaching. Its one LXX occurrence is in 1 Macc. 3:29, which speaks of the SLyoarao(a caused by the Seleucid decrees abolishing the distinctive features of Judaism, the cleavage between those who adhered uncompromisingly to the old ways and those who were more pliable. The introduction of legalism was bound to cause divisions in the Galatian churches.

Meeoets are not so different from SLxoorao(cu. The noun is a derivative from alpsoµaL, `choose', and means basically `choice'; it gives us our word `heresy' and in the later NT documents, together with the associated ateetLxos, has the sense of `heresy' (2 Pet. 2:1) and `heretic' (Tit. 3:10). (See M. Simon, `From Greek Hairesis to Christian Heresy', Grant FS, 101-116.) In Acts it is used of parties within Judaism-the Sadducees (5:17), the Pharisees (15:5; 26:5), the Nazarenes (24:5, 14; 28:22). Its other Pauline occurrence is in 1 Cor. 11:19, of factions in the Corinthian church (it is not expressly used, though it might well have been used, of the partisan spirit deplored in 1 Cor. 1:11f.; 3:4; these undesirable manifestations are called EeLSes). The formation of cliques, with the resultant exhibitions of party spirit, is in view both at Corinth and in Galatia.

5:21 cpOovoL are related to ~rlXos, but whereas ~fXo; can have a noble side to it, cp06vos is wholly evil. It is the grudging spirit that cannot bear to contemplate someone else's prosperity. `The envious', said Socrates, `are pained by their friends' successes' (Xen., Mem. 3.9.8). W. Barclay (Flesh and Spirit, 48) illustrates this vice by the story of the illiterate man who asked Aristides (not recognizing him) to record his vote for Aristides's ostracism `because I am tired of hearing him called "the Just" ' (Plut., Aristides 7). Or we may think of the reply of the owner of the vineyard to the man who complained that the lasthired workmen had been over-generously paid: `do you begrudge my generosity?' (lit. `is your eye evil because I am good?') (Mt. 20:15).

00at, `drunkennesses', i.e. drunken orgies. As gluttony is excessive indulgence in food, so µhO1l is excessive indulgence in wine (and strong drink): both forms of excess are vices, but drunkenness is the more perilous because it weakens people's rational and moral control over their words and actions. In 1 Cor. 5:11 and 6:10 it is closely associated with rapacity and verbal abuse (the thOvoos is neighbour to the Xotho(?os and the &pjra~). In 1 Thes. 5:7 it weakens the vigilance which is necessary for safety in moments of crisis; it is an enemy to sobriety (v1j(PELv) and leads to dissipation (aowtia, Eph. 5:18).

xwtot, `revels', `revelry', occurs three times in the NT, and always in close association with drunkenness (µE6aL here and in Rom. 13:13; Jtotot in 1 Pet. 4:3). In classical Greek the word does not have such bad repute: it denoted, for example, the joyful procession and banquet held in honour of a citizen who had distinguished himself, as in a victory at the games (cf. Pindar, Pyth. 5.22, SESE~at tov&E xCoRov &v>pwv). The closing stages of such a celebration, however, might well be attended by that would invite moral censure. W. insobriety M. Ramsay (Galatians, 453) reminds us that among the Greeks `Komos, the Revel, was made a god, and his rites were carried on quite systematically, and yet with all the ingenuity and inventiveness of the Greek mind, which lent perpetual novelty and variety to the revellings. The Komos was the most striking feature in Greek social life.'

Here, then, we have been given a list-not an exhaustive one-of `the works of the flesh' or, as they are called in Eph. 5:11, `the unfruitful works of darkness'. Some of them are perversions of qualities neutral or even good in themselves; others (like &oeX'yELa and (pOovos) are by their very nature evil. It is not necessary to suppose that all of them, including fornication and impurity, `reflect the actual behaviour of the Galatians' (R. Jewett, `The Agitators and the Galatian Congregation', 211). The fact, however, that the list includes not only those vices which belong to the stock-in-trade of Jewish polemic against paganism but enmity, quarrelsomeness, jealousy, outbursts of rage, selfish ambitions, dissensions, party spirit and envy, suggests that it was in these forms that the `flesh' manifested itself in the Galatian Christians (cf. v 26). For Paul, as R. Jewett wisely points out, flesh `is not rooted in sensuality but rather in religious rebellion in the form of self-righteousness which was in his terms a "boasting in one's own flesh" ' (Paul's Anthropological Terms, 114).

a neoX£yw vtiv, xaOws 7tpoEtnov. The relative a has to oIkoLa tovtois as its antecedent but it also anticipates to toLavta, the object of of Jr(JOooovtEs in the following onL clause. For the wording cf. 2 Cor. 13:2, 7tpoEip1xa xad

OTL of to toLavta npaooov'res (3aoLXE(av 6EOb ov XkTIpovosiloovoty. T6 totavra means the various `works of the flesh'. In I Cor. 15:50, `flesh and blood (oap~ xai aiµa) cannot inherit the kingdom of God', oapi; has a different sense from its present one: there, as the collocation with aWa makes plain, it denotes the mortal body as presently constituted. But a close parallel to the present passage is provided in I Cor. 6:9f., where (without using the word (Japl;) Paul gives a catalogue of eleven types of wrongdoer who `will not inherit the kingdom of God' (cf. also Eph. 5:5). While good deeds in themselves do not admit one to the kingdom, evil deeds of the type mentioned certainly exclude one (cf. E. P. Sanders, PPJ, 517f.). In m. Sanh. 10.1-3 several categories of sinners are listed as having no `portion in the world to come' (heleq la'blam habba'); contrariwise, according to m. Ab. 5.22, `the disciples of Abraham our father... inherit the world to come' (noh"Cm ha'olam habba').

The expression `kingdom of God' has not appeared earlier in the letter, but Paul could evidently assume his readers' familiarity with it, no doubt because it had figured in his original preaching to them (ngoelnov may refer to oral instruction). (According to Acts 14:22, he and Barnabas warned their South Galatian converts that `through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God'.) The kingdom of God for Paul lies in the future: it is the heritage of the people of God in the age to come, the resurrection age. The gift of the Spirit here and now is the first instalment (&naQXr, Rom. 8:23) and guarantee (&epa4(bv, 2 Cor. 1:22) of that coming heritage.

In the later epistles there is more of a `realized' emphasis than in the earlier ones; cf. Col. 1:13, where believers have already been transferred by God `into the kingdom of his dear Son'-but there may be a distinction between the (present) kingdom of Christ (cf. 1 Cor. 15:25) and the (future) kingdom of God. (In Eph. 5:5 `the kingdom of Christ and of God' is one and the same kingdom.)

(d) The fruit of the Spirit (5:22-26)

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith, gentleness, self-control: against such things as these law has nothing to say. And those who belong to Christ [Jesus] have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.

If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in line with the Spirit. Let us not become boastful, challenging one another, envying one another.

TEXTUAL NOTES

v 23 eyxeatELa / add ayvELa D` G late' vg (S. CD Iren'a' Cypr Ambst

v 24 XQLotov P46 D G byz lat syr / XQLo'tov Irloov tt A B C P ' 1739 pc cop

5:22 6 be xaenbs tov nvevµatos. There may be some significance in the contrast between the `works' of the flesh and the `fruit' of the Spirit, but it is not because the figure of `fruit' or `harvest' is inappropriate to evil. In 6:8 below the process of sowing and reaping is applied equally to the flesh and to the Spirit. (Cf. the principle `you will know them by their fruits' in Jesus' teaching in Mt. 7:16-20//Lk. 6:43-45.) Paul lists nine graces (again, not an exhaustive list) which make up the fruit of the Spirit-the lifestyle of those who are indwelt and energized by the Spirit. The first of these and, as he puts it in 1 Cor. 13:13, `the greatest of these' is &y&nrl.

It is not quite accurate to say, as R. C. Trench does, that `&yditrl is a word born within the bosom of revealed religion' (Synonyms of the NT [London, 91880, reprinted 1961], § xii, 41); it is true that (unlike the verb &yand(o, which is attested as early as Homer) it is not found before the LXX, but the LXX translators used it because of its superficial similarity to Heb. 'aha¢ah as much as for any other reason, and as a synonym for §ews as often as not (in the LXX there is none of the contrast between &y&nrI and Sews suggested, e.g., in the title of A. Nygren's Agape and Eros; it is used of Amnon's passion for Tamar in 2 Sa. [LXX 2 Ki.] 13:15 and repeatedly of the mutual ardour of the lover and his beloved in Canticles). In the LXX and the NT it means divine love when this is the meaning indicated by the context (as, in the NT, it most usually is).

Paul has already spoken of love as the expression of faith (v 6) and of practical neighbourly love as the fulfilment of `the whole law' (vv 13f.). As for its being the fruit of the Spirit, he enlarges on this in Rom. 5:5, where the love of God has been `poured out' (Exx>xvtcu) into the hearts of believers by the Spirit. This is God's own love, as manifested in Christ (cf. Rom. 8:25, 38f.), which floods their lives and springs up in a responsive love to God and Christ and to one another, and overflows to all mankind (cf. 6:10, npos 3ravtas). `The love of Christ' is the motive force behind Paul's own apostolic ministry, as he beseeches men and women on Christ's behalf to be reconciled to God (2 Cor. 5:14f., 18-20). Paul's classic celebration of divine love is 1 Corinthians 13, where, as many expositors have said, his description of love could be a penportrait of the character of Jesus. `Christian love springs to life when Christ is incarnated again in a man [or woman] who has given himself [or herself] absolutely to him' (W. Barclay, Flesh and Spirit, 76). (See the bibliography at the end of the note on v 14 above.)

xapa, 'joy', is mentioned, like love, in Romans 5 among the blessings which accrue to believers. We 'rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ', says Paul, 'through whom we have now received our reconciliation' (Rom. 5:11). This rejoicing includes rejoicing 'in hope of the glory of God' (Rom. 5:2)- paraphrased in the RSV as 'our hope of sharing the glory of God'-another aspect of 'the hope of righteousness' for which, according to Gal. 5:5, believers wait 'through the Spirit, by faith'. Hope (>i?rls) is not listed separately here as belonging to the fruit of the Spirit, but it is an important element in Christian joy. It is hope that enables believers to rejoice even in sufferings, and their endurance of sufferings in a Christian spirit strengthens their hope (Rom. 5:3-5). Paul prays that 'the God of hope' may fill the Roman Christians 'with all joy and peace in believing' (Rom. 15:13); the kingdom of God, he tells them, means 'righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit' (Rom. 14:17).

The juxtaposition of peace and joy in these two texts is not haphazard: `since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ' (Rom. 5:1), and peace and joy are spiritual twins. To have peace with God (the indicative Exoµev in Rom. 5:1 is a preferable reading to the subjunctive ExwµEv) is to be reconciled to him, and it is those who have been reconciled through Christ that have greatest cause to rejoice in God (Rom. 5:11).

In Paul's usage elp>jvrl may have in it something of the sense of 'wellbeing' or 'wholeness' inherent in Heb. sdlom. Those who are at peace with God receive something of the 'peace of God' which, as Paul puts it elsewhere, garrisons their hearts and minds 'in Christ Jesus' (Phil. 4:7) and should act as arbiter within their community (Col. 3:15). God himself is 'the God of peace' (Rom. 15:33; 16:20a; 2 Cor. 13:11; Phil. 4:9; 1 Thes. 5:23; cf. Heb. 13:20); dissension and all that threatens peace come from a very different source (cf. v 20). In the OT wisdom literature the sowing of discord among brothers is hateful and abominable to God (Pr. 6:19). Peace is therefore one of the marks of the children of God-not only peace with God but peace with one another: in the home (I Cor. 7:15), in the church (1 Cor. 14:33; Eph. 4:3), in the world (Rom. 12:18), between Jew and Gentile (Eph. 2:14-18). 'Let us then pursue what makes for peace (Ta Ti1S ELQYlv7lc) and for mutual upbuilding' (Rom. 14:19); this is the way to receive the blessing pronounced by Jesus on `the peace-makers, for they shall be called sons of God' (Mt. 5:9).

One could well believe that love, joy and peace formed a triad in early Christian language, like faith, hope and love (see end of note on 5:6). In the upper-room discourse of the Fourth Gospel Jesus gives his disciples 'my peace' (Jn. 14:27), bids them abide in 'my love' (Jn. 15:9f.) and desires that they know 'my joy' (Jn. 15:11).

taxgoOvµ(a, `patience', is a positive virtue. It shares the same semantic field as &vox,rl, birotovrl and XoQTEQ(a, but is specially close to the third of these. It embraces steadfastness and staying-power. If in English we had an adjective `long-tempered' as a counterpart to `short-tempered', then saxpo9vµ(a could be called the quality of being `long-tempered'. The Latin NT renders µaxpoOus(a by longanimitas, but the English derivative `longanimity', used as its equivalent in the Douai-Rheims-Challoner NT, has not passed into common currency.

µaxpo0vµia is a quality of God: he is gaxe60vµog xal itokuXeos (Ex. 34:6; Ps. 103 [LXX 102]:8, where taxe60vµos renders Heb. 'erek 'appayim, lit. 'long in nostrils' [from which anger is vented], RSV 'slow to anger'). The same quality is to be reproduced in men and women-perhaps it is included in the image of God-so that e1ritwv &vr1e µaxeo0vµei (Pr. 19:11), `a merciful man is patient', i.e., he defers his anger, Heb. he'erik 'appb).

In 1 Macc. 8:4 the Romans' advance to world dominion is ascribed to their µaxpoOvµ(a, `that Roman persistency which would never make peace under defeat' (R. C. Trench, Synonyms of the NT, § liii, 184). In Test. Jos. 2:7 Joseph tells how he was steadfast (isax@^vgoa) in all his temptations, and adds that `taxpoOus(a is a great medicine and vnotovrl yields many good things'.

In the NT God shows patience (µaxeo0utet) over his elect (Lk. 18:7; NEB 'he listens patiently to them'); and towards the impenitent (Rom. 2:4; 9:22; in great µaxeo0vµia he postpones the day of retribution). t1 &y6.tt1 µaxeo0vµ6, says Paul (1 Cor. 13:4); he urges his Christian friends to display µaxeo0ut(a to one another and to all (Eph. 4:2; Col. 1:11; 3:12; 1 Thes. 5:14).

xprlototr)s, `kindness', is also a quality of God. `Taste and see that the Lord is kind' (oTI xpilotos o xvpLos), says the psalmist (Ps. 34:8 [LXX 33:9]), in words echoed in 1 Pet. 2:3, and again, `0 give thanks to the Lord, for he is kind' (oTL xprloTOc, Ps. 136 [LXX 135]:1). God is `kind (xprl(Jtos) to the ungrateful and ungenerous', and those who imitate him in this `will be sons of the Most High' (Lk. 6:35). His `kindness and severity' (xprlotoTrls xai &noToµ(a) are displayed in his dealings with mankind (Rom. 11:22): his kindness to sinners is designed to lead them to repentance (Rom. 2:4) and his kindness to believers should encourage them to `continue in his kindness' (Rom. 11:22). There is no better way to continue in his kindness than by showing others `the kindness of God' (cf. 2 Sa. [LXX 2 Ki.] 9:3, although 94os, not xprl(YTOTnc, is the LXX word there), treating them as God has treated us (Eph. 4:32). For love, according to 1 Cor. 13:4, is not only patient (taxeoOvl6) but kind ()(prloTEVETaL).

&ya0wovvrl, `goodness', has a range of meaning as wide as the adjective &ya06s. But in the present setting it may well mean 'generosity'-it is the antithesis to cp0ovos, which figures among the works of the flesh. The comment on woovoc (v 21) referred to Mt. 20:15, `is your eye evil (3tovrlp6s) because I am good (&yct06g)?'-where `generous' is precisely what aya06s means.

Jt(otts may mean either the act or attitude of believing (JrtoTel)etv), i.e. faith, trust, which is its most frequent sense in Paul's letters, or the quality of being worthy of belief-faithfulness, trustworthiness, loyalty. The sense of `faith' is probably to be attached to Jt(oTLg when it is listed as one among various `gifts' of the Spirit (1 Cor. 12:9; cf. Rom. 12:3, 6)-not the exercise of justifying faith but the appropriate measure of faith necessary for accomplishing some work for God. But the decisive factor in the present instance is the context in which the word appears. Its eight companions denote ethical qualities, and one should expect Jttotts to denote an ethical quality also, the quality of being JttoT6g. The adjective 3uLGT6g usually means `faithful', `dependable', in Paul, although occasionally, as in Gal. 3:9, it means `believing' (cf. 2 Cor. 6:15). God is Jrtotos (I Cor. 1:9; 10:13; 2 Cor. 1:18; 1 Thes. 5:24; 2 Thes. 3:3); in the one place where Paul speaks explicitly of God's Jt(otts (Rom. 3:3) it is his faithfulness that is plainly intended. Because God is faithful, because he can be relied upon, his people are to be faithful too, and the Spirit enables them to be so. The statement, `it is required of stewards that they be found trustworthy' (1 Cor. 4:2), is made with primary reference to apostles and their colleagues, but every Christian is in some degree a steward (obxovoµos) and is expected to be trustworthy (Jttotos) in the discharge of whatever the stewardship may be (cf. Lk. 12:42). This is the lesson of the parallel parables of the talents (Mt. 25:14-30) and the pounds (Lk. 19:11-27): `he who is faithful in a very little is faithful also in much' (Lk. 16:10).

In the Apocalypse Jesus Christ is called `the faithful witness' (Rev. 1:5) and each of his followers is called to be his `faithful witness', even though, as with Antipas of Pergamum, this witness involves martyrdom (Rev. 2:13): `here is the patience and faith (n(ods) of the saints' (Rev. 13:10).

5:23 Jrpavtrls, `gentleness', is defined by Aristotle (Eth. Nic. 2.1108a) as the mean between excessive proneness to anger (opyLXoTrlc) and incapacity for anger (&opyrlo(a). Moses was Jteabs ocp6bea, `very gentle' (Nu. 12:3), in the sense that, in face of undeserved criticism, he did not give way to rage but rather interceded with God for the offenders. Jesus was `gentle (Jteavs) and lowly in heart' (Mt. 11:29) but was perfectly capable of indignation (Mk. 3:5). Paul entreats the Corinthians `by the meekness (JteadTrls) and gentleness (btteixeLa) of Christ' (2 Cor. 10:1), but if the words that follow that entreaty are an expression of meekness and gentleness, one wonders what he would have said had he been unrestrained by these qualities. (There, as here, Paul's affectionate concern for his converts is matched by his fierce denunciation of those who troubled them.) `The meek (oi... Jteaetg) shall inherit the land' (or `the earth'), according to Ps. 37 (LXX 36):11-a saying which is incorporated in one of the Matthaean beatitudes (Mt. 5:5)-the suggestion perhaps being that the hotheads will wipe one another out and leave the meek in possession. For an animal to be Jteavs is to be tame or tamed (the verb Jteavvw is used of taming wild animals), but as an ethical quality Jreavs implies self-control, the fruit of control by the Spirit of God. Jteavtrls has much in common with l.taxeoOvµ%a, with which it is conjoined in Eph. 4:2 and Col. 3:12. Christians should show `all gentleness (Jtaoav ... 7tpavtqta, RSV `perfect courtesy') to all men' (Tit. 3:2).

EyxpatEta, `self-control', has something in common with rreavrrls, but denotes control of more sensual passions than anger. According to Aristotle, who devotes the seventh book of his Nicomachean Ethics to a discussion of the difference between EyxpatEta and its opposite, &xpaoia, the man who is Eyxpatrls has powerful passions, but keeps them under control; the &xpatis does not deliberately choose the wrong, but he has no strength to resist temptation (Eth. Nic. 7.1145bff.). As an ethical term, Eyxpateta was introduced by Socrates (Xen. Mem. 1.5.4). Plato sets it in opposition to over-indulgence in food and sex (Rep. 3.390B, Q. Paul says that the athlete practises it (EyxpaTE'UFtat) in all things, and applies the lesson to the spiritual athlete (1 Cor. 9:25). In 1 Cor. 7:9 he advises single or widowed persons who cannot exercise sexual restraint to marry (Fi b% ovx Eyxpatevovtat, yaµrlaatw(Jav). The word-group is more often used with a sexual connotation than otherwise; hence `chastity' can usually be a suitable rendering. In the second century AD we meet a Christian sect called the Encratites (their best-known member being Tatian, the compiler of the Diatessaron); they were so called because of their insistence on EyxpaTEta which, however, they interpreted as asceticism, including abstention from flesh, wine and marriage (Iren. Haer. 1.28.1; Euseb. HE 4.28f.). How far this lifestyle departed from the NT standard of Eyxpateta may be seen from I Tim. 4:1-5.

The punctuation of Nestle-Aland26 (but not of UBS3) divides these nine virtues into three groups of three, which would make for ready memorization. They are not the preconditions of justification; they follow it spontaneously. They are naturally found together, unlike the gifts of the Spirit, which are variously apportioned, one to this person and another to that person (Rom. 12:6-8; 1 Cor. 12:8-11). Where love is present, the other virtues will not be far away; it is love that binds them all together in perfect harmony (cf. Col. 3:14).

If the works of the flesh as -a whole be compared with the fruit of the Spirit as a whole, it will appear that the works of the flesh are disruptive of xotvwvia, whereas the fruit of the Spirit fosters it.

xaTa Twv TOLO5TWV ovx eotiv voµos. Paul does not simply mean that the nine virtues which make up the fruit of the Spirit are not forbidden by law; he means that when these qualities are in view we are in a sphere with which law has nothing to do. Law may prescribe certain forms of conduct and prohibit others, but love, joy, peace and the rest cannot be legally enforced. `A vine does not produce grapes by Act of Parliament; they are the fruit of the vine's own life; so the conduct which conforms to the standard of the Kingdom is not produced by any demand, not even God's, but it is the fruit of that divine nature which God gives as the result of what he has done in and by Christ' (S. H. Hooke, `What is Christianity?' in The Siege Perilous [London, 1956], 264).

In Aristotle (Pol. 3.13, 1284a) the statement xata S£ ttuv totovtwv ovx >aTi voµos is used of persons who surpass their fellows in virtue (&pcti) like gods among men. They do not need to have their actions regulated by laws; on the contrary, they themselves constitute a law (a standard) for others (avtoi y&p Fiat voµos). Paul probably does not quote directly or consciously from Aristotle: the saying may have passed into proverbial currency, like many phrases from Shakespeare or the AV which are frequently quoted without awareness of their source. Aristotle's statement shows some (rather remote) affinity with what Paul says here; it has more in common with the observation in 1 Tim. 1:9 that the law is not laid down for the just but for the lawless and disobedient'.

5:24 of SE tov XQLotov ['Ii)oov], `the people of Christ [Jesus]'. For the designation cf. 1 Cor. 15:23. It includes all believers, unlike the misuse of the name of Christ by those who claimed in a distinctive sense eycu Si: XpLotov (1 Cor. 1:12; cf. 2 Cor. 10:7).

tiIv oapxa irotavpwoav. It is because they are Christ's in the sense of being members of Christ, incorporated eV Xptotcw, that they have `crucified the flesh'. The aorist probably indicates their participation in Christ's historical crucifixion. When Paul said earlier XetotaO ouveotavpwµat (2:19), he meant that the cross of Christ severed his relation to the law; here he says that the cross of Christ severs believers' relation to the `flesh'. For Paul, as we have seen already, the law and the flesh belong to the same pre-Christian order. But the cross of Christ severed Paul's relation to the law only as he himself was `crucified with Christ', thus becoming `dead to the law' that he might live to God; so also the cross severs the relation of believers in general to the flesh only as they reckon themselves to have been crucified in the historical crucifixion of Christ. The crucifixion of the former self-centred ego, that it may be replaced by the new Christ-centred mind-'it is no longer 1 who live, but Christ lives in me' (2:20)- is not materially different from the crucifixion of the flesh, that it may be replaced by a Spirit-imparted life and a Spirit-directed conduct. Cf. Rom. 8:13, `if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live'.

Those who belong to Christ, then, those who acknowledge his lordship in no merely formal way (cf. Rom. 14:8, tov xvp(ov eoµ>v), have made a clean break with what they formerly were (cf. Rom. 6:6, o JtaXaio; rlµtuv avOQw3to; ovvEOTavpthOrl, Na xataQYrl07l to odto trls aµaeT(as); they have been delivered from the `present evil age' (1:4) and have become members of the new creation (6:15). It is the cross of Christ that makes this clean break. As truly as law and flesh are bound up for Paul with the present evil age, so truly is the indwelling Spirit the witness that the age to come has already broken in through the Christ-event. `Ideally, we must understand, this crucifixion of the flesh is involved in Christ's crucifixion; really, it is effected by it. Whoever sees into the secret of Calvary... is conscious that the doom of sin is in it; to take it as real, and to stand in any real relation to it, is death to the flesh with its passions and desires' (J. Denney, The Death of Christ, 162).

Alongside such a historical statement as this, in the indicative, stands the hortatory counterpart, in the imperative, as in Rom. 6:11 ('reckon yourselves to be dead to sin but alive to God in Christ Jesus'); Col. 3:5 ('put to death therefore your members that are on earth...'). What has been effected once for all by the cross of Christ must be worked out in practice.

ovv Tots JtaOrlµaow xai Tats EJt6OvµiaL;. The bTLOUµiaL are the desires by which the JtaO>j rata ('passions') are directed this way or that; if unchecked, they will express themselves in `works of the flesh'. There can be no more decisive check upon them than their `crucifixion'. Paul's own misdirected ~1lXo;, which had found expression in the persecution of the church, was now recognized by him to have been a Jt60ito or EJt60vµia Til; oapxo;. As such, it had been decisively `crucified'; as a quality of his character, it had been redirected along the path of God's will and Christ's service. See further on 6:14.

5:25 Et l;Tntcv trvevµatL, Jtvevµatt xai. etoLxcoµEV, `If the Spirit is the source of our life, let the Spirit also direct our course' (NEB). That their new life in Christ was lived by the Spirit they knew; the moral corollary of this, Paul reminds them, is that their conduct should be governed by the Spirit: they should march in line (keep in step) with him. For this ethical sense of JTOtxaw (denominative from atotxoc, `row') cf. 6:16; Rom. 4:12; Phil. 3:16; also Acts 21:24. On its significance here cf. A. Oepke, Galater, 145f.

Here too we have the characteristic Pauline interplay between indicative and imperative: we live by the Spirit (granted); therefore let us keep in step with the Spirit. He does not suggest that it is possible to do the former without also doing the latter. There is little material difference between Jrvevµait oiotx6v (here), Jtvevµacrt 3tEetJrace6v (v 16) and Jtvevµart 6yeo0at (v 18). Walking by the Spirit is the outward manifestation, in action and speech, of living by the Spirit. Living by the Spirit is the root; walking by the Spirit is the fruit, and that fruit is nothing less than the practical reproduction of the character (and therefore the conduct) of Christ in the lives of his people. `In his usual way, Paul draws an exhortation out of his doctrine. The death of the flesh is the life of the Spirit. If God's Spirit lives in us, let Him govern all our actions' (J. Calvin, Galatians, 106).

It is those whose conduct is directed by the Spirit who are, in Paul's estimation, the true TLVEVµaILXO( (cf. 6:1), in contrast to those who claimed to have reached a stage in spirituality where ethical considerations lost their relevance.

5:26 The ethical considerations which were in danger of losing their relevance in the Galatian churches were those affecting personal relationships. The positive exhortation `let us keep in line with the Spirit' had, for their situation, the corollary: `let us not become boastful, challenging one another, envying one another'. To be xEv6bo~og is to boast where there is nothing to boast about: xcvoSo~ia (cf. Phil. 2:3) is empty pride or conceit, mere pretentiousness; it is synonymous with &Xa~ovEla (cf. 1 Jn. 2:16). The verb Jteoxct4oµat (here only in the NT) is used of mutual challenges to combat or athletic contest; it can be extended to other areas of life, as in Philo's story of Demosthenes who, when challenged to a slanging match (JreoxXriOEls EJLI XoiSoe(as), declined because, as he said, the winner would come off worse than the loser (Agric. 110). The spirit which Paul here deprecates has a refined manifestation in challenge to theological debate; perhaps it was in this way that the Galatians were challenging one another. As for envy, Paul has already warned them against this in general terms by including cp06vot among the works of the flesh (v 21); his specific warning against it here implies that it threatened the peace of the churches of Galatia. (The use of the dative of the person after cpOovEw-&kkrjots (pOovovvrEs-is classical; P46 B and many other manuscripts have the unclassical accusative &Xkikovs.) As has been indicated above (v 15), these were the evils against which the Galatians had to be put specially on their guard.

`Gnostic pneumatics', says W. Schmithals, `are splendidly described by the characterization in Gal. 5:26' (Paul and the Gnostics, 49). The language might indeed be applicable to certain Gnostics, if Gnostics were known to be in view; but any one acquainted with church life at local level knows that the tendencies against which Paul utters this warning-spiritual pride, mutual provocation and envy-can arise among the most ordinary Christians, who are quite innocent of gnosticism or ecstasy.

VII

MUTUAL HELP AND SERVICE

(6:1-10)

Mutual help is the hallmark of the community of faith. Gentleness, not arrogance, is the way of Christ. The teacher deserves the support of those whom he teaches. There is a rule of sowing and reaping in life; those who do good to others will reap a harvest of eternal life.

My brothers, even if some one be caught in some fault, you who are spiritual are to put the person in question right, in a spirit of gentleness. Have regard to yourself lest you be tempted also. Bear one another's burdens; so you will fulfil the law of Christ. If any one thinks he is something when he is a mere nothing, he is hoodwinking himself. Let each one examine his own work; then he will keep his achievement to himself alone and not compare it with someone else's, for each person will carry his own load.

Let the person who receives instruction in the word give a share in all good things to the one who imparts it.

Do not be misled: God is not to be treated with contempt. Whatever a person sows, this is what he will reap. Whoever sows for the flesh will reap a harvest of corruption from the flesh, whoever sows for the Spirit will reap a harvest of eternal life from the Spirit. Let us not grow slack in doing good; at the proper time we shall reap a harvest if we do not give up. So then, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all, especially to fellow-members of the family of faith.

TEXTUAL NOTES

v 1 avOpw3tos / tL; el; uµwv P syrpeS' / avOpwnos c vµwv q' pc syr°c1 copra

v2 avanl,rlpwoEtr B G lat syrpe5;' Mcion / aJronXr1ewoEtE P46 / avaX.rlpwaaTE K A C D W byz Clem.Alex

v 4 exaotos om P46 B syrpesn copsa(cod

v 7 j om Mcion Tert

V 10 ExoµEv / EXwµEV K B` 33 al

6:1 'AbEXTo(, £av xat neoX,r)µcpOrl 1xvOewnos ev TLVL napaLDtcuµaTt, vttg o[ nvEVµaTtxol xatapTltETE Toy Totovtov. The general teaching of 5:13-26 is now applied to some more specific situations. If mutual envy and provocation are to be renounced, mutual aid is to be fostered. One form of aid is that given to a member of one of the churches who may fall into some `transgression' (Jtapatttwµa). The precise force of neo],,qtp071 is uncertain: it may mean that he finds himself inadvertently involved in some wrongdoing, or that he is detected in it by someone else. The wrongdoing may fall under the heading of one of the `works of the flesh' (5:19-21); it will certainly be inconsistent with the fruit of the Spirit. Whatever form it takes, the offender must be rehabilitated, and not made to feel like a pariah. It is likely that Paul is not thinking of behaviour which so flagrantly flouts accepted standards that it brings the community into public disrepute (cf. 1 Cor. 5:5) or which can best be dealt with by a temporary withholding of social fellowship (1 Cor. 5:11; Rom. 16:17). A Jtapaitrcoµa is not a settled course of action but an isolated action which may make the person who does it feel guilty. The rehabilitation must be undertaken by those who are truly JtvEVµarLxo(, whose life and conduct alike are controlled by the Spirit of Christ. Paul uses the same verb (xacaet(l;w) in an ethical sense when he begs the Corinthian Christians to be joined (xatrJpttoj. voL) in unity of mind (1 Cor. 1:10) and, more generally, to mend their ways (xatapti~Eo0c, 2 Cor. 13:11).

Since gentleness is included in the fruit of the Spirit (5:23), it follows that spiritual people will take this or any other kind of action `in a spirit of gentleness' (s;v Jtvevµatt JteavtrItos). It is easy for certain types of religious people to sit in judgment on one who has suddenly yielded to some moral temptation, to make their disapproval manifest, but this is not the way of Christ. If there were in the Galatian churches, as in the church of Corinth, some who regarded themselves as Jtvrutattxo( in a superior sense (cf. 1 Cor. 2:15; 3:1; 14:37)-`whoever feels himself a Pneumatiker' (H. Lietzmann, An die Galater, 38)-Paul impresses on them that one test of true spirituality is a readiness to set those who stumble by the wayside on the right road again in a sympathetic and uncensorious spirit. Similarly in Rom. 15:1 Paul calls on the Svvato(, those who are spiritually `strong', to show their strength by consideration for those who are spiritually weak, to the point of restricting their own liberty on their behalf. There Paul includes himself with the `strong' (7ltris of Svvatoi), and here, though he says vµeig of JtvevµaTtxo(, he no doubt reckons himself a Jtvevµattx6g (cf. 1 Cor. 7:40).

axoJUAV oEavtov µTl xaL av AE6(Ja301~s. The realization of one's personal vulnerability to temptation should prevent self-righteousness in the treatment of those who have yielded to it. Cf. 1 Cor. 10:12, `let any one who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall'. This cautionary word is directed to each individual: `consider yourself'.

6:2 'ALkkjwv to (3apr) (3at3T6.1ETe. This more general injunction includes the precept of v 1. The obligation of burden-bearing is reciprocal, but a special responsibility lies on the Jtvevµattxo( to bear the burdens of the weaker, cf. Rom. 15:1, `we who are strong ought to bear with ((3aot6tety) the failings (&oOevirata) of the weak'. Paul himself was foremost in doing this very thing (cf. 1 Cor. 8:13; 2 Cor. 11:28f.). To bear the burdens of others is a divine quality; cf. Ps. 55:22 (LXX 54:23), EJtiptpov >;nl Kvptov trv tEitv&v Gov, xai avtos or StaOpEWet, echoed in I Pet. 5:7, Jtaoav T71v µhgtµvav vµtuv i;JttptipavTEc en' avtov, 6Tt avtCO µeXet ite(?i vµtwv. To obey this injunction therefore is to he God-like.

J. G. Strelan, `Burden-Bearing and the Law of Christ: A Re-examination of Galatians 6:2', JBL 94 (1975), 266-276, argues that Paul is here enjoining the sharing by each member of a common financial burden (primarily the maintenance of missionaries and teachers, as in v 6, together possibly with their contribution to the Jerusalem relief fund). The `law of Christ' which would be thus fulfilled is that referred to in 1 Cor. 9:14 `that those who proclaim the gospel should get their living by the gospel'. Financial burdens would not be excluded from the (3apr1 which are to be shared, but the case for seeing financial burdens as predominantly in view has not been made out.

xat ovTo)g avartXlWWthosTE Tbv voµov Tov XetoTov, `by so doing you will fulfil the law of Christ'. The `law of Christ' is not essentially different from the commandment of love to one's neighbour (quoted in 5:14), in which `the whole law' is comprehended. Paul speaks of his commitment to this `law' in 1 Cor. 9:20, where he describes himself as >vvotos XptoTov (cf. C. H. Dodd, "Evvotos XQIOTOV', More NT Studies [Manchester, 1968], 134-148). It may be that Paul speaks of the law of Christ here as a contrast to the law which his converts were being urged to accept: the law of Christ is a `law' of quite a different kind, not enforceable by legal sanctions. `The law of Christ is essentially concerned with the quality of the act and the direction in which it is moving' (C. H. Dodd, Gospel and Law [Cambridge, 1951], 77f.).

See E. Bammel, `Noµos XQIotov', SE 3 = TU 88 (1964), 120-28; H. Schurmann, `"Das Gesetz des Christus" (Gal 6, 2). Jesu Verhalten and Wort als letztgultige sittliche Norm nach Paulus', Schnackenburg FS, 282-300.

In fine, the `law of Christ' is for t'aul the whole tradition of Jesus' ethical teaching, confirmed by his character and conduct (cf. Rom. 13:14; 2 Cor. 10:1) and reproduced within his people by the power of the Spirit (cf. Rom. 8:2, b ... voµos tov JtvrvtacosTf ~wfjs eV XQIOTw 'Irl(Yov). The existence of this tradition provided a criterion by which claims to be guided by the Spirit were to be tested. `The Spirit of Christ must accord with "the law of Christ" (J. D. G. Dunn, Unity, 193).

`Galatians, which in attacking "Jewish" legalism proclaims the true freedom based on Christ, consequently contains more exhortation, admonition, and summons to obey the "law of Christ" ... than any other letter, and to quite a remarkable degree-a third of the whole letter' (G. Bornkamm, Paul, 83).

6:3 Et yap SoxEi, tts Ewat TL µrlSev wv. Twice over in this clause a neuter pronoun (Ti, t1lSv) is used in agreement with a masculine. For SoxEi TI; dvat Tt (`... to be someone special') cf. Gal. 2:6, 01 SoxovvTE; etva( TI. With µ718£v 6v ('being a mere nothing, a mere cipher') cf. 1 Cor. 13:2; 2 Cor. 12:11, ovSev EiRL, `I am nothing' (for the distinction between the two negative pronouns cf. Eur. frag. 532, TO ntlv et; ovSev [Et, `what is good-for-nothing tends to become absolutely nothing').

Like other gnomic sayings of which this section provides several examples, this one is not thrown out at random but is relevant to the situation in the Galatian churches: it is a warning against spiritual pride. The Galatians were not to think of themselves more highly than they ought to think (cf. Rom. 12:3). If they did, they would be inhibited from fulfilling `the law of Christ' by bearing one another's burdens or restoring those who had been overcome by some sudden temptation (this is probably the significance of the connective yap in the present sentence).

The form of the saying is similar to that of 1 Cor. 8:2, where knowing nothing, not being nothing, is the subject: et tts boxer eyvwxEVat tt, ovJtw iyvw xaOws bet yvtwvat (cf. 1 Cor. 3:18; also Plato, Apol. 2l D, where Socrates contrasts the man who oteta( tt e'LSevat ovx elbhs, `thinks he knows something when he does not', with himself, on, a µr1 oi.Sa ovbi; oLotat elbevat, `because what I do not know I do not even think I know').

qQEVaJtata ~avtov, `he deceives his own mind ((pprlv)'. The verb (not attested earlier) is hapax legomenon in the NT; cf. the noun cgQEVaJtatrls in Tit. 1:10, where members of the circumcision party are called µatatok6yot xai q QEVaJtataL, `foolish speakers and deceivers'.

6:4 to be Epyov eavtov boxtµa~Etw >xaocos. The most practical principles of the gospel are apt to be debased. In his Diocesan Letter of February 1980 the Bishop of Peterborough (D. R. Feaver) remarks that at the General Synod of the Church of England there was `a confusion in the minds of many which identified the apostolic precept, "bear ye one another's burdens", with minding other people's business'.

What Paul stresses here is personal responsibility. It is not for one Christian to assess or judge the ministry of another, each one is answerable to God for his own. Cf. 1 Cor. 4:3-5, where he takes little account of other people's estimate of his service: `it is the Lord who judges me'. The duty of self-examination was inculcated in several contemporary schools; the Pythagoreans, for example, were required to interrogate themselves regularly: 7cT JtapE(3rly; tL S' EeEi;a; t( µoL NOV ovx etEk9GOrl; `Wherein have I transgressed? What have I done? What duty have I left unfulfilled?' (Diog. Laert., Vit. Phil. 8.22). The Christian's selfexamination is conducted in the light of the law of Christ-especially the law or standard which is embodied in the person of Christ. (Cf. 1 Cor. 15:28 for self-examination before the Lord's Supper.)

xal tote dg eavtov µovov to xavxrlµa ihet xal ovx cg nov stepov. The xavxqµa is the ground of a person's boasting, his achievement. When in Rom. 15:17 Paul says that he has reason to boast (xavxrJots) so far as his work for God is concerned, he goes on to say that he will not venture to speak about what Christ has not done through him and that he will avoid building on anyone else's foundation (vv 18, 20). Similarly in 2 Cor. 10:13-18 he refuses to boast etc to &µetea, beyond the limit of his apostolic sphere (which includes Corinth), in contrast to those who invade another's sphere and boast of their achievements there. As the interlopers in Corinth are in view in 2 Cor. 10:13-18, so the trouble-makers in Galatia are probably in view here. It is not comparison with another (etc nov itepov) that provides a true standard of assessment; in 2 Cor. 10:12 Paul speaks of the folly of those who `measure themselves by one another, and compare themselves with one another'. The Pharisee in the parable made the same kind of mistake when he thanked God that he was not `like other men,... even like this tax collector' (Lk. 18:11).

6:5 exaotos yap to 1SLov cpoptiov (3aot6.aEL, `for each person will carry his own load'. This is another common maxim, applicable to a wide variety of situations. Here the connective yap suggests that Paul applies it to the situation with which v 4 deals: one's responsibility before God. In the `day of Christ' Paul would not be asked how his achievement compared with Peter's: his xavxTlµa would be the quality of those who had been won for Christ through his own ministry (Phil. 2:16). At that tribunal `each of us will give an account of himself to God' (Rom. 14:12; cf. 2 Cor. 5:10). Cf. R. Jewett, `The Agitators and the Galatian Congregation', 211.

The partial resemblance between this maxim and v 2a (&kkikwv to (3apr1 (3aot6~ETE) is fortuitous; the cpoptiov of v 5 is not one of the 136prl that can be borne for another (cpopTiov, a classical word, occurs here only in Paul; of its other NT occurrences the best known is Mt. 11:30, `my burden is light'but the dominical cpo@T(ov there [see note on 5:1] is quite different from the personal (poptlov here).

6:6 KOLVWVE(Tco SE o xatr)xovµevog toy ),oyov tw xatllxovvtL Ev J[aoLV aya0ois. The relevance of this injunction in the present context is not immediately obvious, but it is an instance of the mutual help inculcated in v 2a. The teacher relieves the ignorance of the pupil; the pupil should relieve the teacher of concern for his subsistence. This is another way of stating the principle that `the labourer deserves his wages' (Lk. 10:7; 1 Tim. 5:18; cf. Mt. 10:10) or, as Paul elsewhere paraphrases those words of Jesus, `those who proclaim the gospel should get their living by the gospel' (1 Cor. 9:14). Whereas the emphasis in those other places is on the right of the preacher or teacher to claim his support, here it lies on the duty of those who are taught to make material provision for their teachers.

If Paul followed with his Galatian converts the policy which he adopted in Thessalonica (1 Thes. 2:9), Corinth (1 Cor. 9:15-18) and Ephesus (Acts 20:33-35), he could give them this instruction all the more freely because he refrained from claiming his own support from them. His unwillingness to accept material support from his converts may have as its background the rabbinic injunction not to derive worldly profit from the Torah (so Hillel, m. Ab. 1.13; 4.7; Zadok, Ab. 4.7); but he made it his personal policy both by way of example to his converts not to live at the expense of others (2 Thes. 3:6-13) and, where necessary, to stop the mouths of those who would have liked to ascribe mercenary motives to him (2 Cor. 11:7-12). Besides, he had a naturally independent spirit in this regard: it embarrasses him even to express gratitude for a gift of money from Philippi, while he deeply appreciates the loving thought which prompted it (Phil. 4:10-20).

It has been asked why, if `the Lord commanded that those who proclaim the gospel should get their living by the gospel' (1 Cor. 9:14), Paul felt free to disregard a dominical command (cf. D. L. Dungan, The Sayings of Jesus in the Churches of Paul [Oxford, 1971], 1-39). The answer probably is that Paul interpreted the Lord's command not as a duty to be performed but as a right to be claimed-or not claimed, as might be most expedient. He was not free to choose whether to preach the gospel or not, but he was free to choose whether to preach it free of charge or not, and he chose to make it free of charge (1 Cor. 9:12b, 15-18).

Nevertheless, the claim which he chose to forgo for himself he asserted strongly for others, as he does here. The singular 6 xatrlxwv is a generic reference to those who exercised a teaching ministry in the churches-certainly not to the intruding trouble-makers! Pagan priests received fees for their sacrificial services; `one of the objects that Paul had most at heart was to train his converts in voluntary liberality, as distinguished from payments levied on ritual. He saw what a powerful, educative influence such liberality exerts on the individual, and what a strong unifying influence it might exert between the scattered parts of the Church' (W. M. Ramsay, Galatians 459).

The content of the xatrlxrlots would include predominantly the JtapahooEts which the apostle-founders had delivered to the churches. The verb xatrlxew ('instruct') is treated like h&baoxw, which takes two objects-the person taught and the subject taught-and so the passive can be accompanied by one of these objects (here tbv Xoyov, the content of the teaching). Cf. Acts 18:25 (xatrlxrlµevos trly ohov tov xvp(ov); 1 Thes. 2:15 (tag Jtaeahooets &s hthax&rltE). As for the verb xotvwvEw ('go shares with'), it may have as its subject the giver (as here; so also Rom. 12:13, tats x@E(aas tcbv &y(wv xotvwvovvtes) or the receiver (so Rom. 15:27, toys JtvEVµatLxoi; avtiuv Exotvwvrloav T& E6vrl). The ayaO& are the `good things' of life in general (cf. Lk. 1:53; 12:18f.; 16:25), not least to oapxtxa of Rom. 15:27; 1 Cor. 9:11.

6:7 Mil n),,avaoOE, `make no mistake', `do not be misled', a common phrase in such paraenetic passages (cf. I Cor. 6:9; 15:33; Jas. 1:16). Marcion and Tertullian (Adv. Marc. 5.4) knew a text which (accidentally) omitted the negative, so that nkavaoOE was construed as indicative: `you are mistaken'. Possibly the middle voice should be recognized rather than the passive: `do not mislead yourselves' (cf. 1 Cor. 3:18, MiiSr; :raVT6V E~anatatw).

6EOs ov µvxtrlp(l;etat. µvxtrlp(~w, `turn up the µvxtrlp' ('snout') in mockery or contempt, is found here only in the NT, but is common enough in the LXX (as is also the derivative noun µvxtrlptoµos), not explicitly of the mocking of God, with the probable exception of Ezk. 8:17 (xad thou avtoi d); µvxtrlp(lovtE;). In 2 Ch. 36:16//1 Esd. 1:51 and Je. 20:7 the verb is used of mocking the prophets and other messengers of God. The mocking or despising of God lay in the behaviour of those who, `consciously stressing the possession of the divine Pneuma, for this reason held themselves to be perfect Christians and openly boasted of their piety (Gal. 5:26; 6:3), but at the same time were sowing to the o6 and were doing that equally consciously and emphatically' (W. Schmithals, Paul and the Gnostics, 54). One may agree with this, without accepting Schmithals's view of the anti-gnostic thrust of the letter.

o yae iav onEtprl avOpwJto;, tovto xal OE(JLoEi. This is a common prudential maxim, applying a law of nature to human conduct (cf. Mt. 7:16-20//Lk. 6:43; Lk. 19:21; 1 Cor. 9:11; 2 Cor. 9:6, the last passage referring to the quantity, not the quality, of seed and crop). LXX instances are Ho. 8:7 ('sow the wind and reap the whirlwind'); Jb. 4:8; Pr. 22:8; Sir. 7:3. Cf. also Test. Levi 13:6 (xal oJtEipETE Ev tats ipvxat; vtthv &ya06., ... Eav yap oAE(erlTE xax&, naaav tapaxiiv xal OXtipty OEp(oETE); Plato, Phdr. 260D (Jtotov Ttva otci ... Ti]V erltopiXily xaQJtov tuv EonELQE OEe(~Etv;); Dem., De Cor. 159 (o yae to wJt>pµa Jtapaoxwv, ovto; TWV Cpvvt(Ov atTto;); Gorgias ap. Aristot. Rhet. 3.3.4, 1406b (cdaxptiw; µev tonEt(Ja;, xaxw; Si; e0Eptoa;); Plut. De Pythiae oraculis 394E (onEtpovTE; X,you; xaL OEp(?ovtE; 60b; [LET&, µaxt1; vnovl,.ov; xal JtoXEµtxov;); Cicero, De Or. 2.65 ('ut sementem feceris, ita metes'). Things being what they are, the consequences will be what they will be.

6:8 &L o OJLE(QWV Etq trly o&Qxa Eavtov Ex t71S oaQxos OE&FEL wOoQ&v. The o&Qi here, as in 5:13, 16f., 19, is the unregenerate, `uncrucified' self. Sowing `for the flesh' is the practising of such things as are included among `the works of the flesh' in 5:19-21; such sowing cannot produce the harvest of the kingdom of God but the harvest of destruction (as in the parable of the weeds, Mt. 13:24-30). Paul has more particularly in mind here such `works of the flesh' as quarrelsomeness and envy, to which the Galatian Christians appear to have been specially prone (cf. 5:15, 26); indulgence in such things would have disastrous results in their personal and corporate lives alike. To sow E1s to irvevµa, on the other hand, is to cultivate the fruit of the Spirit and reap eternal life. Cf. Rom. 6:20-23 ('the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life through Christ Jesus our Lord'); 8:13 ('if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body you will live') for the same idea expressed without the metaphor of sowing and reaping. The eternal life is the resurrection life of Christ, mediated to believers by `the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead' (Rom. 8:11); cf. G. Vos, The Pauline Eschatology (Grand Rapids, 1952), 163f. But its future aspect, with their appearance before the tribunal of Christ, to `receive good or evil, according to the deeds done in the body' (2 Cor. 5:10), is specially implied here. Any one who did not seriously believe in such a coming assessment, or thought that the law of sowing and reaping could safely be ignored, would indeed be treating God with contempt.

6:9 ib bi xaXov AOLovvtcs µrl iyxaxcup.EV. Cf. 2 Thes. 3:13, vµEig Se, a&Xcpo(, ]Li] >;yxaxr]or]TE xa)AJtoioUVtcs. Exhortations to perseverance are common in Paul's writings: cf. 1 Cor. 15:50, 58; 16:13; Phil. 1:27f.; 2:15f.; 4:1; 1 Thes. 3:5, 13; 5:23. For the Hellenistic verb eyxaxEw ('give up', `slacken') see also Lk. 18:1; 2 Cor. 4:1, 16; Eph. 3:13 (in all its NT occurrences it is preceded by the negative). Christians have been justified by faith and cleansed from guilt, they have received the Spirit, but they must persevere in holy living and not rest on their oars. Paul knew the necessity of this in his own life (cf. 1 Cor. 9:26f.).

xaLQcu yaQ 1610) 6eQ(ooµev, µ7l ExXvoµevot. To persevere in doing what is good is to `sow to the Spirit'; those who do so without growing faint (for this classical sense of ExXvotaL cf. Mt. 15:32//Mk. 8:3; Heb. 12:3, 5 [quoting Pr. 3:11]) will reap the appropriate harvest in due course. With xaLQ44... 16(0) cf xaLQotc'6iotg in 1 Tim. 2:6; 6:15; Tit. 1:3, where the proper time for the fulfilment of God's promises is indicated, either at Christ's first advent or at the parousia. Here the eschatological harvest may be in view. It is unlikely that the Jerusalem relief fund is specifically referred to in to... xak6v EotovvtE;, even if Paul does speak of its completion as `this fruit' or `this harvest' (tov xaQ3T6v tovtov, Rom. 15:28).

6:10 It has been pointed out, however, that Paul not only speaks of the Jerusalem relief fund as `this fruit' or `this harvest' but uses the very figure of sowing and reaping when writing about this matter in 2 Cor. 9:6-9. Contributions to the fund are there described as a form of sowing which will yield for the donors a harvest of eternal blessing. To enforce this lesson Paul quotes Ps. 112 (LXX 111):9, `he has scattered abroad, he has given to the poor; his righteous (or charitable) conduct remains for ever.' It is pointed out further that the present exhortations xaXov Jtotovvtrs µr] Eyxaxcutrv (v 9) and EpycthtrOa to &ya06v Jtpds Jt&vtas (v 10) coincide in sense with the exhortation in 2 Cor. 9:8 to `abound to every good work' (Eis Jtav Egyov &ya06v). (Note the synonymity of &ya06v and xa),.ov in this sense.)

These affinities form part of the evidence on which it is argued that these verses (Gal. 6:6-10) `are specific in intent, and form an exhortation to participate in the Jerusalem collection' (L. W. Hurtado, `The Jerusalem Collection and the Book of Galatians', JSNT, Issue 5 [Oct. 1979], 53). If this is so, the allusiveness of the language makes it necessary to suppose that Paul had already communicated with the Galatians about the collection, so that they would understand the present allusion in the light of what they had already been told. Such a prior communication can be neither denied nor affirmed.

A connexion between Gal. 6:6-10 and the Jerusalem collection was earlier suggested by J. B. Lightfoot, Galatians, 55, and H. Lietzmann, An die Galater, 39f. K. F. Nickle notes the affinity between Gal. 6:6-10 and 2 Cor. 9:6-9, but finds in it only a reflection of `the extent to which Paul's involvement in his collection project moulded the vocabulary he used to refer to sharing of sustenance for any purpose' (The Collection [London, 1966], 59 n. 55). Paul uses the same vocabulary in reference to his apostolic ministry in Corinth: `if we have sown spiritual good among you, is it too much if we reap your material benefits?' (1 Cor. 9:11)-where he is not `apparently' speaking as `the agent of the movement of the Gospel from Jerusalem to the Gentiles' (so Hurtado, `The Jerusalem Collection ... ', 61 n. 27). See on 2:10, above.

6 xatpov >rxotcv, `as we have opportunity'; but ws is here used very much in the sense of etas, `while'.

EpyulthteOa io &ya06v Jtpos Jtavzas. Cf. Barn. 19:8, XOIVWOVtlOEIC Ev Jtaoty Jta,llotov oov xal ovx EpEts iota Etvat• Et yap Ev Td) &TO&piw xotvwvot T Eorre, Jtooc,o µaXXov Ev tots cwOaptois;

µaXuota SE npos tons oixe(ous tfls ,nlarcw;. Cf. Eph. 2:19, where Gentile believers are called oLxELoL tov Oeo , `members of God's household', fellow-members with believers of Jewish birth, who belonged to his oLxos-the oLxos of faith-before any Gentile did. Here the oExELOL ttjs tatew; include Jews and Gentiles indiscriminately: there is no priority given to the Jerusalem church, although it naturally comes within the scope of the injunction. FellowChristians had a prior claim on the generosity of their brethren, not only in the same local church but in any or every church. This principle is illustrated in the Jerusalem relief fund, but it is outrunning the evidence to see a specific reference to that fund in this paragraph.

VIII

CONCLUDING COMMENTS

AND FINAL GREETING

(6:11-18)

Let others boast in their achievements or in the number of disciples they can notch up: Paul will boast in nothing but the cross of Christ. The scars which he will carry to the end of his days mark him out as the branded slave of Christ: let no one else interfere with him.

With a final benediction he concludes his letter.

(a) The true ground of boasting (6:11-16)

See in how large letters I write with my own hand!

Those who wish to make a fine show in external matters are the people who urge you to accept circumcision; they do so only to avoid being persecuted for the cross of Christ. For not even those of the circumcision party keep the law themselves; they want you to be circumcised so that they may have cause for boasting in your flesh. But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been `crucified' to me and I to the world. Neither circumcision nor uncircumcision is anything in itself there is now a new creation. As for all those who keep in line with this rule, peace and mercy be on them and on the Israel of God.

TEXTUAL NOTES

v 11 uiXtxots / flXLxotg P46 B" 33 / aotxta.ots 642

v 12 XgLoiov / add ITIoov P46 B K IF pc

8twwxwvtaL / btwxovzaL P46 A C G K L P pm

v 13 1E(DLTEµvoµEVOL / nEQLTeTtYlREVot P46 B F (G) L W al

v 15 outs yag / sv yap Xgtotw Irloov outs M A C D G byz lat syi_ copb° arm (ex 5:6)

Ea'Cty / LQX'UEL X2 D2 K L P' byz lat°g (ex 5:6)

v 16 ototXlIaovow / oioLxrlawow P46

xat iXeos om M.Vict

6:11 "ISEZE nrlX(xots vµly 7p6µµao1v Eypa1pa T1 :[t ~ x-Lp(. eypapa is best taken as epistolary aorist: Paul is writing at this very moment. It is just conceivable that he refers to the whole letter if (contrary to his custom) he wrote it all with his own hand (so Chrysostom ad loc.). In 1:20 he used the present Yeacfco but without emphasis on the act of writing and without the implication that he was dispensing with the services of an amanuensis: quifacit (scribit) per alium facit (scribit) per se. (For similar uses of yp&c)co cf. 1 Cor. 14:37; 2 Cor. 1:13; 13:10; 2 Thes. 3:17; for the epistolary eygaia cf. Rom. 15:15(?); 1 Cor. 5:11; 9:15; Phm. 19, 21.) But it is much more probable that Paul, having dictated the letter up to this point, now takes the pen himself and writes the remaining sentences with his own hand. Whether the `large letters' were due or not to the condition of his eyesight cannot be said. Still less probable is A. Deissmann's explanation that `writing was not an easy thing to his workman's hand' (Light from the Ancient East, ETr [London, 1927], 166 n. 7). Most improbable of all is N. Turner's suggestion that he `had actually been crucified at Perga in Pamphylia' and sustained permanent damage to his hand (Grammatical Insights into the NT [Edinburgh, 1965], 94; reference is made in this connexion to Gal. 2:19; 6:14, 17).

Elsewhere Paul penned the final greetings (cf. 1 Cor. 16:21; Col. 4:18; 2 Thes. 3:17f.); here he took the pen in order to write the concluding comments, and to write them in large letters for emphasis, as likely as not. Some of these comments recapitulate the main emphases of the letter. Plutarch (Cato Maior 20.348B) reports that Cato wrote a history of Rome for his son `with his own hand and in large letters' (18(a XEtpl xal tEyaXots YeaµµaaLv), but that was to make it easier for the boy to read. Paul used unusually large letters here, said Theodore of Mopsuestia, `to show that he himself was neither ashamed of what he was saying nor inclined to deny it' (ed. H. B. Swete, I, 107).

Paul evidently expected the original letter to be read by all the churches to which it was addressed; otherwise he could not assume that all of them would see the `large letters' which he made. So far as this letter is concerned, then, he did not arrange for several copies to be made so that each church would receive a copy for itself. If one or more of the Galatian churches wished to have a copy for permanent reference, then a copy would have to be specially made before the original was sent to the next place. Cf. A. Lindemann, Paulus im altesten Christentum (Tubingen, 1979), 29.

6:12 `000L 0s Xovaty Evnteoawn10`at ev oapx(. The idea that this is a deliberate contrast to Paul's handwriting, which did not make a fine external show (H. Alford, The Greek Testament, III [London, 51871], 64, endorsed by F. Field, Notes on Translation of the NT [Cambridge, 1899], 191), is far-fetched. Whereas Paul was concerned about the Spirit's inward work in his converts, so that Christ should be `formed' in them (cf. 4:19), the Judaizers' concern was for an external mark, a mark produced in the `flesh' of those whom they could win over to their side. The verb Evitpoownarw, `make a good showing (Jtpo(3wJtov)', is found in P. Tebt. 19.12 (114 BC). While Ev aapxl may mean `externally' (cf. Phil. 3:3f.), the literal sense of aa€~ cannot be excluded where circumcision is the subject.

o&roL &vayx6. ovaw vµas nepttesvEO9aL. The present has conative force here ('they try to compel you', `they urge you'), as the imperfect has in Acts 26:11, ilvayxa&ov (3Xaocprltety ('I tried to make them blaspheme'). If the trouble-makers insisted that circumcision was necessary to salvation, this was a form of pressure approaching compulsion: &v&yxrl vµ&S JTEpLZE4tVEQOat, they may have said. (Cf. 2:14, &vayxatELc 'Lov&att;ECV.)

µbvov va tw otaupcw tov XpLOtov µ1l SLUJxwvtaL. The dative TCu otaupw expresses cause ('because of the cross of Christ'); for such a use of the dative cf. Rom. 11:20, 30, 31; 2 Cor. 2:13 (r µ1l Eb@Ety µE). See BDF 196.

If the trouble-makers could persuade the Gentile Christians to accept circumcision, that might preserve the Jerusalem church and its daughter-churches in Judaea from reprisals at the hands of Zealot-minded militants for being linked with uncircumcised Gentiles. To such militants the cross of Christ, as it was proclaimed by Paul and those who agreed with him, was a 6x&v&akov (cf. 5:11) because it excluded the principle of salvation by adherence to the law of Moses. Those who refused to require circumcision from Gentile converts (a refusal enshrined in the Jerusalem decree of Acts 15:28f.; 21:25) were liable to be persecuted-persecuted in fact, as Paul says, for the cross of Christ. Those who demanded that Gentile believers should be circumcised hoped to avoid such persecution. This clause of purpose provides a strong argument in support of R. Jewett's thesis `that Jewish Christians in Judea were stimulated by Zealotic pressure into a nomistic campaign among their fellow Christians in the late forties and early fifties' ('The Agitators and the Galatian Congregation', NTS 17 [1970-711, 205).

6:13 oi& yaQ of 7tEQLTeµv6icVOL avtol vbµov Tuk6oaouoLV. In of JLE(JLteµv6µevoL we have a grammatical and an exegetical problem. Is the participle middle or passive, and if middle, what is the force of the middle? And who, in fact, are o[ ztEQLteµv6µevoL? They are not the addressees; they are indicated by the third person, not the second. The two problems are interdependent: the exegetical problem will be treated first.

E. Hirsch, `Zwei Fragen zu Gal 6', ZNW 29 (1930), 192-197, understood of nEpLTEµvoicvoi ('those who receive circumcision') to be Gentiles who had yielded to the persuasion of the Judaizers: the task of keeping the whole law to which their circumcision had committed them was beyond their capacity, so they made up for their defective law-keeping by persuading other Gentile converts to be circumcised. A similar interpretation is maintained by J. Munck, Paul, 87-89; H.-J. Schoeps, Paul, 65; A. E. Harvey, The New English Bible: Companion to the NT (Oxford/Cambridge, 1970), 615f. It has the advantage of taking the present participle here in the same sense as in 5:3 ()tavii &vOpcu3ncp JTEQ6TEtVO0V(0).

E. D. Burton (Galatians, 352-354) takes of 7tEQLTEµv6pEvoL as referring `in general to those who under the influence of the judaizers receive circumcision', not `specifically to those who among the Galatians had been circumcised'. `Other Gentile believers who get themselves circumcised do not in fact keep the law', Paul is understood as saying, `and no more will you.' But Burton takes the subject of the following 0eXouoLV vµas 7tEQLTeµveoOaL to be not of nE(JLTEµv6µ.EvoL but the Judaizers-the people who, in v 12, avayx6l ouoLV vµas neQLT9µvEO0aL. He is right in recognizing the subject of 0>`XovaLV to be the Judaizers (OEXouoLV vµas JTEQLTEµvE(Y0aL and avayx610vOLV vµas JLE(JLTElLVE00aL mean almost the same thing), but the construction of v 13 demands that the subject of 0e.ouoLv and of o'S%... TuXbooouoiv be one and the same, i.e. of 1tc1TEµvotEvot. The present participle nEQLTEµvoµevoL is best taken as middle voice with causative significance ('causing to be circumcised'); cf. W. W. Goodwin, Greek Grammar (London, 1887), 266; A. T. Robertson, Grammar of the Greek NT (New York, 1914), 808f.; E. V. N. Goetchius, The Language of the NT (New York, 1965), 104. (The variant rtEpttET[tYlVOi would denote people who are already in a state of circumcision.) That Judaizers are intended is confirmed by ov... avto(-they are the last persons who might be expected to be remiss in law-keeping. W. Schmithals (Paul and the Gnostics, 27f.) identifies of nEptTEµvoµEvot with the trouble-makers, but (in accordance with his thesis) he regards them as basically antinomian (which would make Paul's statement that not even they keep the law pointless). J. B. Lightfoot (Galatians, 222f.) renders of 3TEp1Tesv6µevot aptly enough as 'the circumcision party, the advocates of circumcision', and quotes as a parallel the apocryphal Acts of Peter and Paul, 63 (ed. C. Tischendorf) = Martyrdom of Peter and Paul, 42 (ed. R. A. Lipsius and M. Bonnet), where Simon Magus refers to Peter and Paul as ovrot 01 7tEp1TEtvoltEVO1 (but Peter and Paul insist that the circumcision of which they speak is of the heart). Cf. J. Bligh, Galatians in Greek (Detroit, 1966), 218.

G. Howard (Crisis, 15) compares Paul's rebuke to Cephas who, while living like a Greek himself, `compelled' Gentile Christians to live like Jews (2:14). The parallel is inexact: Cephas did not habitually compel Gentile Christians to judaize, although that could have been the effect of his temporary withdrawal from table-fellowship with them at Antioch. The persons referred to in 6:13 made it their policy to persuade Gentile Christians to submit to circumcision. Whether or not they taught that, after circumcision, it was necessary to go on and keep the rest of the law, Paul says that in practice they failed to keep it themselves. In his eyes, indeed, they were as guilty of vnoxptots as were the `play-actors' at Antioch: their concern, he implies, was not for the law as a matter of principle but for the sake of boasting about those who followed their teaching: Na s;v t4. vµEispqp oapxi xavxrlowviat. The more Gentiles they could notch up as having been circumcised at their instance, the weightier the evidence which they could adduce of their zeal for the law. This was mere scalphunting-or (salva reverentia) an apter description would be suggested by the bride-price which David paid for Michal (1 Sa. 18:25-27).

6:14 'Etol SE xiyEVOtto xavxaoOat Ei µ7l s;v rw oTavpw Tov xvpiov iµwv 'Ii(70i) XQLGTOV. Let others boast in things external: Paul makes his boast in something nobler. Boasting in one's own record belongs to the old order of law (cf. Rom. 2:23, os >;v voµw xauXaoat) and flesh (cf. Phil. 3:4, nenot89vat eV oapxi); it is 'excluded' (eEx)Eia9~, Rom. 3:27) from the new order of faith.

µ7l 'votio elsewhere in Paul is used absolutely (cf. 2:17; 3:21); its integration here into a sentence is similar to the instances of y(voµat with the infinitive found (e.g.) in Acts 20:16 (67LwS µ7l Y Vrhat aviw xpovoipt(3float); 22:6 (iytVETO Ss [Lot... JtE@LoCFTe&Wat (f6g).

In 2 Cor. 11:21f. and Phil. 3:4-6 Paul mentions some aspects of his heritage and personal achievement in which he would have naturally boasted before his conversion-the very things in which the trouble-makers in Galatia now make their boast. Such boasting `refers to man's attitude of sinful self-reliance before God, and so is characteristic of life in the old dominion' (R. C. Tannehill, Dying and Rising, 62; cf. R. Bultmann, Theology of the NT, ETr, I [London, 1952], 242f.).

But the nobler object of Paul's present boasting was, by all ordinary standards of his day, the most ignoble of all objects-a matter of unrelieved shame, not of boasting. It is difficult, after sixteen centuries and more during which the cross has been a sacred symbol, to realize the unspeakable horror and loathing which the very mention or thought of the cross provoked in Paul's day. The word crux was unmentionable in polite Roman society (Cicero, Pro Rabirio 16); even when one was being condemned to death by crucifixion the sentence used an archaic formula which served as a sort of euphemism: arbori infelici suspendito, `hang him on the unlucky tree' (Cicero, ibid. 13). In the eastern provinces of the empire the Greek word otavpos must have inspired comparable dread and disgust to its Latin equivalent.

One could have understood it if the early Christians, knowing that the crucifixion of Jesus was an undeniable fact, had admitted it reluctantly when they were compelled to do so. But Paul, Roman citizen by birth and religious Jew by upbringing, not only dismisses as the merest refuse ((jx15(3aXa, Phil. 3:8) those things in which he had once taken a proper pride but embraces as the most worth-while goal in life the knowledge of the crucified Christ and boasts in his cross-a shocking paradox indeed. The `utterly vile death of the cross' (mors turpissima crucis, as it is called in the Latin version of Origen's commentary on Mt. 27:22ff.) was so central to Paul's gospel that he called his message `the word of the cross' (o Xoyos iov (Ytavgov, 1 Cor. 1:18), nor was he surprised that such an offensive message should be a scandal to Jews and sheer absurdity to Greeks. How could a message like that win any acceptance in the Graeco-Roman world of Paul's day? That it did find acceptance was due, Paul declared, to its being the power and the wisdom of God; but only the 'demonstration (&n6bEt~ts) of the Spirit' (1 Cor. 2:4) could make this plain to believers. See M. Hengel, Crucifixion, ETr (London, 1977), with bibliography at end; also U. Wilckens, `Das Kreuz Christi als die Tiefe der Weisheit Gottes zu 1. Kor 2, 1-16', in Paolo a una Chiesa Divisa, ed. L. de Lorenzi (Rome, 1980), 43-81, with discussion, 81-108.

St' ov itoi xooloc eotavp(0tat xo.yd) xooµgp. The relative ov may have as its antecedent either Iioov Xptotov or otauew. The latter is more probable, with a play on the rather wide range of meaning of otaupos and otavpow. Because Paul has been `crucified with Christ' (2:19), the cross is a barrier by which the world is permanently `fenced off' (eotavp(Otat, perfect) from him and he from the world.

For one who makes the cross his supreme, indeed his solitary, ground of boasting all the accepted standards of social life are necessarily turned upside down: a total `transvaluation of values' has taken place. Not only does he no longer know any one xaca aapxa (by `worldly standards'); he has made a radical reassessment of everything in the light of the cross. It is true that 'crucifixion to the old world of boasting means a lasting separation from that world' (R. C. Tannehill, Dying and Rising, 63); a lasting separation has also been effected from the whole contemporary world, with its climate of opinion and canons of honour and dishonour.

The crucifixion of the world does not here mean, as M. Werner supposed (The Formation of Christian Dogma, ETr [London, 1957], 73f., 95, 107), that because of its `crucifixion' through the cross of Christ the world is now in process of passing away in the sense of 1 Cor. 7:31.

When xoaµos is used thus by Paul, it denotes a power opposed to God; cf. 4:3 (ta ITOIXEta tov xooµov); 1 Cor. 2:12; 3:19, where the Spirit/wisdom of the world are contrasted with the Spirit/wisdom of God. In this xoaµos sin, death and the law are dominant forces, the sting of death being sin and the strength of sin being the law (1 Cor. 15:56). Elsewhere Paul uses aiwv in much the same sense (cf. 1:4, `the present evil age'; 1 Cor. 1:20; 2:6; 2 Cor. 4:4); in Eph. 2:2 (xata toy akvu tov xooµov tovtov) the two words are combined.

x&yui xoo.up. Cf. 2:19; being `crucified to the world' is part of what is involved in being `crucified with Christ'. The cross here is the cross as it has been presented and interpreted throughout the epistle. `With this interpretation it is the annihilative and the creative power in Christianity; the first commandment of the new religion is that we shall have no God but Him who is fully and finally revealed there' (J. Denney, The Death of Christ, 163).

In response to the question, `what difference does Christianity make-to you or to a society of Christians?' J. E. Powell quotes Gal. 6:14 in full and adds: `The Christian is the individual to whom that is true, and to him the difference is nothing and everything: nothing that can be defined in terms of opinion or policy or judgement or decision; and yet everything, through thinking and judging and acting in the knowledge that men and human society, though not improvable, are redeemable, and that, in the way which only Christians know, their redemption has been performed and is available for ever' (Wrestling with the Angel [London, 1977], 64).

But let Isaac Watts have the last word:

6:15 ovTE yap JLEQLTOh1I TL sOTLV ovTE &x0o(3vot(a. In some strands of transmission the text of this verse has been largely contaminated by the text of 5:6, which in any case speaks to very much the same effect. It is striking that, for all the sternness of his warning against accepting circumcision as something required by God, Paul should twice in this letter emphasize that circumcision and uncircumcision per se matter nothing at all. In the old order of the law, where the distinction between Jew and Gentile was of fundamental importance, it mattered greatly whether a man was circumcised or not; now it is totally irrelevant.

&XXa xaiv71 xt(ots. Cf. 2 Cor. 5:17, d its Ev Xptotw, xatv7l xT(ois. To be Ev Xetotw is what matters. In him the µeootolxov tov cPeayµov which separated Jew and Gentile has been demolished (Eph. 2:14). In this new situation the issue of circumcision or of any other ancestral tradition (cf. 1:14) loses all religious significance. Paul, as a man in Christ, conformed or did not conform to these traditions indifferently, according to his current company and other circumstances. To insist on them as matters of obligation was wrong, completely inconsistent with membership in the `new creation'-life in Christ.

The `new creation' in its fulness belongs to the future, but to those in Christ it is already realized through the Spirit. Christ is head of the new creation; in him they have been transferred from their former existence `in Adam', the head of the old creation, and await the final manifestation of the new creation on the day of resurrection when `in Christ all shall be made alive' (1 Cor. 15:22).

B. D. Chilton (`Galatians 615: A Call to Freedom before God', Exp Tim 89 [1977-78], 311-313) suggests that, after the analogy of b'riyydh in rabbinical Hebrew (cf. m. Ab. 1:12; 4:1; 6:1), x1(61; here may mean `humanity': `God has set aside the polarity of Jew and Gentile (cf. 328) in favour of an altogether "new humanity". There is available for "anyone in Christ" (2 Co 517) a status before God which frees him from the constraints which he once suffered.'

According to Georgius Syncellus (8th cent. AD), Chron., ed. Dindorf (= CSHB 20), 1, p. 48, Gal. 6:15 is a quotation from the Apocalypse of Moses, an apocryphon not otherwise known. Syncellus may have derived this information from Euthalius (5th cent. AD). But in the absence of hard evidence the statement must be regarded with scepticism.

6:16 xai 6001 Tto xavovt TO1tw 0TO1x>j0OU0LV, e(ei Vii Est' avtovs xai i`Xeos, xai £1ti Toy 'Ioeahk Tov 6eov. The classical construction of the opening clause would be 6001 av with the subjunctive. The xav(uv is apparently the principle just laid down about the `new creation': the reference then is to members of the new humanity who are guided by this principle, in contrast to those who maintain the continuing validity of circumcision and similar legal requirements. For 0tOL)(w cf. 5:25.

For the mention of Israel cf. Ps. 125 (LXX 124):5; 128 (LXX 127):6 (E'tQilvTl E3ti Toy 'Iagcclk); also the closing ascription of the Eighteen Benedic tions: 'Blessed art thou, 0 Lord, who dost bless thy people Israel with peace' (bdruk 'attah Y" haMMebar''k 'et 'ammo Yisra'el bPsdlorn).

The relation of `the Israel of God' to `all those who keep in line with this rule' is disputed. A common interpretation equates the two categories, the xa( before EJt[ tov 'Iopar]X tov 9EOV being treated as epexegetic. `They who pursue these things [the `new things of grace']', says Chrysostom ad loc., `shall enjoy peace and amity, and may properly be called by the name of "Israel": This is in agreement with the position which is taken up explicitly as early as Justin Martyr, that the Christian church is `the true, spiritual Israel' (Dial. 11.5). This interpretation is defended by N. A. Dahl, `Der Name Israel: Zur Auslegung von Gal 6, 16', Judaica 6 (1950), 161-170. There is a continuity between the older Israel and the church in that the church is a community of both Jews and Gentiles; thus U. Luz equates the Israel of God with the church of Jews and Gentiles (Das Geschichtsverstandnis bei Paulus [Munchen, 1968], 269). On this W. D. Davies remarks that if it were correct one would expect to find support for it in Rom. 9-11 `where Paul extensively deals with "Israel" ' (`Paul and the People of Israel', NTS 24 [1977-78], 10 n. 2)

Dahl's Judaica article is followed by G. Schrenk's 'Der Segenwunsch nach der Kampfepistel' (Judaica 6 [1950], 170-190), which takes the Israel of God to be a designation for Jewish Christians. (In an earlier article, 'Was bedeutet "Israel Gottes"?', Judaica 5 [1949], 81-94, Schrenk gives a survey of interpretations.) A similar position to Schrenk's is maintained by D. W. B. Robinson, 'Distinction between Jewish and Gentile Believers in Galatians', ABR 13 (1965), 29-48. But it is difficult to see how Paul, with his concern to treat as indifferent those distinctive features which divided Jews from Gentiles, could have continued to think or speak of Jewish Christians as a separate group within his churches.

W. D. Davies ('Paul and the People of Israel', 10) thinks that the Israel of God `may refer to the Jewish people as a whole'. It may, provided we bear in mind Paul's observation that `not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel' (Rom. 9:6). If o 'IopailX xata oapxa (1 Cor. 10:18) denotes the empirical Israel, 6 'Iopar1X tov OeoU may denote the Israel seen by God as the true Israel. So Marius Victorinus, the earliest Latin commentator on Paul, comments on the phrase: `not "on Israel" in the sense of any and every Jew, but "on the Lord's Israel"; for Israel is truly the Lord's if it follows the Lord, not expecting its salvation from any other source'.

E. D. Burton (Galatians, 357f.) construes the sentence so as to have 'peace' invoked on 'them' (i.e. 'those who keep in line with this rule') and 'mercy' on the Israel of God. The order 'peace and mercy', if the two are taken closely together, is illogical, he says, 'placing effect first and cause afterwards' (the logical order is 'mercy and peace' or 'grace and peace'). P. Richardson (Israel in the Apostolic Church [Cambridge, 1969], 81-84) follows Burton's construction, placing the comma after Eat' avro)s, not after xai iXcos. In Burton's opinion, xai E),,eos is an afterthought, with xai Eati 'toy 'Iopa~X 'rov 0Eov a second afterthought.

But the reference to the Israel of God need not be an afterthought. If Paul knew the additional (19th) benediction to the Eighteen Benedictions, he would have been familiar with a prayer which asks God for `peace... and mercy on us and on all Israel thy people' (sdlom... werahamim 'dlenu weal kol Yisrd'el 'ammeka). If so, the words 'and on the Israel of God' would have come readily from his tongue.

F. Mussner (Galaterbrief, 417 n. 59) probably indicates the true sense when he identifies the Israel of God here with atas 'IapatjX of Rom. 11:26. For all his demoting of the law and the customs, Paul held good hope of the ultimate blessing of Israel. They were not all keeping in line with `this rule' yet, but the fact that some Israelites were doing so was in his eyes a pledge that this remnant would increase until, with the ingathering of the full tale (atxtjpw.a) of Gentiles, ,all Israel will be saved'. The invocation of blessing on the Israel of God has probably an eschatological perspective.

(b) The marks of Jesus (6:17)

From now on let no one cause me any trouble: I carry in my body the marks of Jesus.

TEXTUAL NOTE

v 17 Irloov P46 A B C' 33 al latt / XQLctov P W 81 pc copbo / xvetov Irlaov K L byz lat19 syrpe5b / xU(tou Irlaov XQLotov K lat" copra / xvptov rlµwv Irloov XQLorov D' G Ambst Pelag

6:17 Tov XoL7tov, a classical formula (cf. Eph. 6:10); the genitive may be regarded as a specimen of the 'genitive of time within which' construction: 'within the time that remains'. The accusative (to) Xoinov is commoner in the NT, especially (like Tov Xowtov here) in epistolary conclusions; cf. 2 Cor. 13:11; Phil. 3:1; 4:8.

Let no one interfere with me (xonovg p.ot µrlSelg Jrapsxet(0), says Paul, because I am the slave-the branded slave-of another. We may compare his words in Rom. 14:4 (not referring to himself): `Who are you to pass judgment on the servant (olxrtrls) of another? It is before his own master that he stands or falls: Paul's opponents might criticize his presentation of the gospel and his missionary policy; but it was not to them that he was responsible. Nor was it for him to make decisions about the content of his gospel or the wisdom of making it equally available on the same terms to Jews and Gentiles: it was for him to obey the Lord who commissioned him to preach that gospel to the Gentiles (as others were commissioned to preach it to the Jews).

The `marks of Jesus' which he carried in his body are accepted by him as the marks of branding or tattooing which certified that a slave (especially a recaptured runaway slave) was the property of this or that owner. The simple name 'Jesus' occurs, as W. Kramer has pointed out, in `statements about participation by Christians in the death and resurrection of Christ', such as 2 Cor. 4:10f. Of., 14b (Christ, Lord, Son of God, ETr [London, 1966], 200). One of these statements (2 Cor. 4:10) bears a specially close resemblance to this: Paul speaks of carrying around in his body 'the dying of Jesus' (thvtoTE T7ly vex@CUOLV tov 'I1oov ev t4) otuµatt ateet(peeovtes) and explains his language by saying that 'while we live we are always being given up to death for Jesus' sake, so that the life of Jesus may be manifested in our mortal flesh' (2 Cor. 4:11).

In contrast to the now irrelevant mark of circumcision, Paul asserts that he has marks on his body which do mean something real-the ot(yµata or scars which he has acquired as the direct consequence of his service for Jesus. These proclaim whose he is and whom he serves. Among them the most permanent were probably the marks left by his stoning at Lystra (Acts 14:19; cf. 2 Cor. 11:25), and if the church of Lystra was one of those to which this letter was addressed, some at least of his readers would have a vivid recollection of that occasion.

W. Klassen, `Galatians 6:17', Exp Tim 81 (1969-70), 378, compares the incident in Josephus, War 1.197 where Antipater (Herod's father) strips off his clothes and exhibits his many scars (tpavµata) as witnesses to his loyalty to Caesar.

It has been pointed out that the term at(yµata was used of the tattoomarks by which devotees of various religious cults were identified as worshippers of this or that divinity-a practice forbidden in Israel by Lv. 19:28, although in Is. 44:5 a faithful Jew will write `Yahweh's' on his hand to indicate whose servant he is.

E. Dinkier thought that Paul's body was marked (probably at baptism) with X, the initial letter of the Greek form of 'Christ' ('Jesu Wort vom Kreuztragen', Bultmann FS, 125).

See F. J. Doelger, Sphragis: Studien zur Geschichte and Kultur des Altertums, V, 3-4 (Paderborn, 1911), 49f., 105 n. 3; U. Wilckens, 'Zu den syrischen Gottern', Deissmann FS, 1-19, especially 7-9.

Less probable explanations of the ot(yµata have been offered-e.g. by E. Hirsch, 'Zwei Fragen zu Gal 6', ZNW 29 (1930), 196f., that Paul refers to the eye-trouble resulting from his exposure to the blinding light of the divine glory on the Damascus road (see reply by 0. Holtzmann, `Zu E. Hirsch, Zwei Fragen zu Gal 6', ZNW 30 [1931], 82f.).

While the genitive tov 'I-qoov denotes Jesus as Paul's xvQLos, the one whose slave he is, the wording of 2 Cor. 4:10f. already quoted reminds us that when dealing with this subject Paul can use tov 'Iioov to denote his participation in the sufferings of Jesus (as also in his risen life); see 0. Schmitz, Die Christusgemeinschaft des Paulus im Lichte seines Genetivgebrauchs (Giitersloh, 1924). It is plain in any case that Paul accepted the sufferings he endured in the course of his apostolic ministry as his participation in the sufferings of Christ (xotvwv(a TWrv 71a&r1µatwv avtov, Phil. 3:10); in fact, he was eager to absorb in his own person as great a share as possible of the sufferings of Christ in order that his fellow-Christians might have less of them to bear (cf. 2 Cor. 1:5-7; Col. 1:24). But this aspect of his thought is not to the fore in the present passage.

See also J. H. Moulton, 'The Marks of Jesus', Exp Tint 21 (1909-10), 283f.: 0. Betz, TDNT VII, 663f. (s.v. oriyµa); E. Guttgemanns, Der leidende Apostel and sein Herr (Gottingen, 1966), 126-135; U. Borse, 'Die Wundmale and der Todesbescheid', BZ NF 14 (1970), 88-111.

(c) Final greeting (6:18)

The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit, my brothers. Amen.

TEXTUAL NOTE

v 18 rlµurv / om tt P 1739 al

Xgiotot / om P pc

6:18 `H x&pts Tov xup(ou ~uv 'Irloov Xetotov µET& tov nvEVµatos vµwv, &6EXcpo(. The `grace' of the opening salutation (1:3) is caught up and repeated in this closing benediction. Apart from the added vocative &SEXcpo(, the benediction is identical, or nearly so, with that of Phm. 25 and Phil. 4:23 (where vµwv is lacking). Cf. 2 Tim. 4:22a, 6 xvQLog [IF-T& Tov nvEVµatbs (YoU).

µsta tov Jtvevµatdg vµdv is a variant on the simpler µe6' vµdv, as found in Rom. 16:20; 1 Cor. 16:23; Col. 4:18; 1 Thes. 5:28; 1 Tim. 6:21; 2 Tim. 4:22; cf. teta Jt&vtwv vµdv in 1 Cor. 16:23; 2 Cor. 13:14; 2 Thes. 3:18; Tit. 3:15. `The grace of our (the) Lord Jesus (Christ)' appears in Rom. 16:20; 1 Cor. 16:23; Phil. 4:23; 1 Thes. 5:28; 2 Thes. 3:18; it is abridged to i xBett in Col. 4:18 (cf. Eph. 6:24, i x&@Lc [LEta Jt&vtwy tdv &yaJtwytwv toy xv@Lov f ui)v 'I71oo'UV Xpcotov ev &(p6aeo(q); 1 Tim. 6:21; 2 Tim. 4:22b; Tit. 3:15; Phm. 25; it is expanded to the triadic `H x&QLS tov xue(ou 'Iioov Xpcatov xai 1j &y&JT-Q tov 6EOV xaI'r xotvwvia tov &y[ou JtvEVµatos [MTh Jt&vtwv vµdv in 2 Cor. 13:14.

&[tjv, from Heb. 'anion, `steadfast', `sure', a formula of confirmation (cf. 1:5). It would form the congregation's response to the reading of the letter; it would be pleasant to think that a well-meant and hearty `Amen' was forthcoming in all the congregations to which this letter was sent.

There is no means of knowing what effect Paul's letter had on the Galatian churches to which it was addressed. To be sure, circumcision soon ceased to be an issue in the lands of the Gentile mission. (If, as Col. 2:11 has suggested to some, it figured in the tendency against which Paul polemicizes in Colossians, it did so as part of a voluntary asceticism which was believed to lead its devotees on to a higher spiritual plane.) The disappearance of circumcision as an issue could have been due in part to Paul's letter, or it could have been due to the apostolic decree of Acts 15:28f., which circulated far beyond the Gentile Christians of Syria and Cilicia to whom it was primarily addressed. In any case, the judaizing movement received a setback from which it never recovered through the catastrophe of AD 70. The church of Jerusalem in exile made nothing like the impact on Gentile Christianity that was made by the first-generation church of Jerusalem.

This does not mean that the positive teaching of Galatians was embraced and maintained in its entirety. The religious mind is too prone to subject itself to regulations; the liberating gospel of sovereign grace is too 'dangerous' to be allowed unrestrained course. As Paul became less a figure of controversy, as his memory was venerated and his writings canonized, his teaching was overlaid with a new legalism. When, from time to time, someone appeared who understood and proclaimed the genuine message of Galatians, he was liable to be denounced as a subversive character-as, indeed, Paul was in his own day. But the letter to the Galatians, with its trumpet-call to Christian freedom, has time and again released the true gospel from the bonds in which well-meaning but misguided people have confined it so that it can once more exert its emancipating power in the life of mankind, empowering those who receive it to stand fast in the freedom with which Christ has set them free.

GENERAL INDEX

INDEX OF MODERN AUTHORS

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