3. The origins of Paul’s gospel
We have seen in Galatians 1:6–10 that there is only one gospel, and that this gospel is the standard by which all human opinions are to be tested. It is the gospel which Paul presented.
The question now is, what is the origin of Paul’s gospel, that other messages and opinions should be assessed and judged by it? Without doubt it is a very wonderful gospel. We think of the epistle to the Romans, the Corinthian epistles and those mighty prison epistles like Ephesians, Philippians and Colossians. We are impressed by their majestic sweep, their depth, their consistency, as Paul outlines the purpose of God from eternity to eternity. But where did Paul get it all from? Was it the product of his own fertile brain? Did he make it up? Or was it stale second-hand stuff with no original authority? Did he copy it from the other apostles in Jerusalem, which the Judaizers evidently maintained, as they tried to put his authority under theirs?
Paul’s answer to these questions may be found in verses 11 and 12: I want you to know, brothers and sisters [a favourite formula of his to introduce an important statement], that the gospel I preached is not of human origin. I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it; rather, I received it by revelation from Jesus Christ. The reason why Paul’s gospel was the yardstick by which other gospels were to be measured is now clear. It is that his gospel was ‘not of human origin’. ‘I preached it,’ Paul could say, ‘but I did not invent it. Nor did I receive it from a man, as if it were already an accepted tradition handed down from a previous generation. Nor was I taught it, so that I had to learn it from human teachers.’ Instead, I received it by revelation from Jesus Christ. This would mean that it was revealed by Jesus Christ. Alternatively, the genitive could be objective (cf. ‘I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ’, nrsv), in which case Christ is the substance of the revelation, as in verse 16, rather than its author. Whichever way we take it, the general sense is plain. Just as in verse 1 he asserted the divine origin of his apostolic commission, so now he asserts the divine origin of his apostolic gospel. Neither his mission nor his message was derived from another human being; both came to him direct from God and Jesus Christ.
Paul’s claim, then, is this. His gospel, which was being called in question by the Judaizers and deserted by the Galatians, was neither an invention (as if his own brain had made it up), nor a tradition (as if the church had handed it down to him), but a revelation (for God had made it known to him). This is why Paul dared to call the gospel he preached ‘my gospel’ (cf. Rom. 16:25). It was not ‘his’ because he had made it up but because it had been uniquely revealed to him. The magnitude of his claim is remarkable. He is affirming that his message is not his message but God’s message, that his gospel is not his gospel but God’s gospel, that his words are not his words but God’s words.
Having made this startling claim to a direct revelation from God without human means, Paul goes on to prove it from history, that is, from the facts of his own autobiography. The situation before his conversion, at his conversion and after his conversion were such that he clearly got his gospel not from any man, but direct from God. We shall look at these three situations in turn.
1. What happened before his conversion (1:13–14)
Here the apostle describes his pre-conversion state in Judaism, that is, ‘when I was still a practising Jew’ (neb). What he had been like in those days was well known. You have heard of my previous way of life, he says, for he had told them. He mentions two aspects of his pre-Christian days: his persecution of the church, which he now knew to be the church of God (13), and his enthusiasm for the traditions of his fathers (14). In both, he says, he was fanatical.
Take his persecution of the church. Paul persecuted the church of God intensely. The phrase seems to indicate the violence, even the savagery, with which he set about this grim work. What he tells us here we can supplement from the book of Acts. He went from house to house in Jerusalem, seized any Christians he could find, men and women, and dragged them off to prison (Acts 8:3). When these Christians were put to death, he cast his vote against them (Acts 26:10). Not satisfied with persecuting the church, he was actually bent on destroying it (13). He was determined to stamp it out.
He was equally fanatical in his enthusiasm for Jewish traditions. I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my own age among my people and was extremely zealous for the traditions of my fathers, he writes (14). He had been brought up according to ‘the strictest sect’ of the Jewish religion (Acts 26:5), namely as a Pharisee, and this is how he had lived.
Such was the state of Saul of Tarsus before his conversion. He was a bigot and a fanatic, whole-hearted in his devotion to Judaism and in his persecution of Christ and the church.
Now a man in that mental and emotional state is in no mood to change his mind, or even to have it changed for him by someone else. No conditioned reflex or other psychological device could convert someone in that state. Only God could reach him – and God did!
2. What happened at his conversion (1:15–16a)
The contrast between verses 13 and 14 on the one hand and verses 15 and 16 on the other is dramatically abrupt. It is clearly seen in the subjects of the verbs. In verses 13 and 14, Paul is speaking about himself: ‘I persecuted the church of God and tried to destroy it . . . I was advancing in Judaism . . . and was extremely zealous for the traditions of my fathers.’ But in verses 15 and 16 he begins to speak of God. It was God, he writes, who set me apart from my mother’s womb; God who called me by his grace; and God who was pleased to reveal his Son in me. In other words, ‘in my fanaticism I was bent upon a course of persecution and destruction, but God (whom I had left out of my calculations) arrested me and changed my headlong course. All my raging fanaticism was no match for the good pleasure of God.’
Notice how at each stage the initiative and the grace of God are emphasized. First, God set me apart from my mother’s womb. Like Jacob who was chosen before he was born, in preference to his twin Esau (cf. Rom. 9:10–13), and like Jeremiah who before he was born was appointed to be a prophet (Jer. 1:5), so Paul, before he was born, was set apart to be an apostle. If he was thus consecrated an apostle before his birth, then he clearly had nothing to do with it himself.
Next, his pre-natal choice led to his historical call. God called me by his grace, that is, his utterly undeserved love. Paul was fighting against God, against Christ, against other people. He neither deserved mercy, nor asked for it. Yet mercy found him, and grace called him.
Third, God was pleased to reveal his Son in me. Whether Paul is still referring to his experience on the Damascus road or to the days immediately following it, what was revealed to him was Jesus Christ, God’s Son. Paul had been persecuting Christ, because he believed that Jesus Christ was an impostor. Now his eyes were opened to see Jesus not as a charlatan but as the Messiah of the Jews, the Son of God and the Saviour of the world. He already knew some of the facts about Jesus (he is not claiming that these were revealed to him supernaturally, either then or later; cf. 1 Cor. 11:23), but now he grasped their significance. It was a revelation of Christ for the Gentiles, for God was pleased to reveal his Son in me so that I might preach him among the Gentiles. It was a private revelation to Paul, but it was for a public communication to the Gentiles (see Acts 9:15). And what Paul was commissioned to preach to the Gentiles was not the law of Moses, as the Judaizers were teaching, but good news (the meaning of the verb ‘preach’ in verse 16) – the good news of Christ. This Christ had been revealed, Paul says, in me. We know that it was an external unveiling, for Paul claimed that he saw the risen Christ (e.g. 1 Cor. 9:1; 15:8–9). Yet essentially it was an inner illumination of his soul, God shining into his heart ‘to give the light of the knowledge of God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ’ (2 Cor. 4:6). And this revelation was so inward, and became so much a part of him, that he was able to make it known to others. Hence the New English Bible phrase ‘to reveal his Son to me and through me’.
The thrust of these verses is very compelling. Saul of Tarsus had been a fanatical opponent of the gospel. But it pleased God to make him a preacher of the very gospel he had been so bitterly opposing. His pre-natal choice, his historical call and the revelation of Christ in him were all the work of God. Therefore, neither his apostolic mission nor his message came from human beings.
However, the apostle’s argument is not yet complete. Granted that his conversion was a work of God, as is plain from how it happened and what preceded it, did he not receive instruction after his conversion, so that his message was, after all, from human beings? No. This too Paul denies.
3. What happened after his conversion (1:16b–24)
In this rather longer paragraph the emphatic statement is the first, at the end of verse 16: my immediate response was not to consult any human being. We know that Ananias came to him, but evidently Paul did not discuss the gospel with him, nor with any of the Jerusalem apostles. He now expands on this statement historically. He produces a series of three alibis to prove that he did not spend time in Jerusalem, having his gospel shaped by the other apostles.
a. Alibi 1: He went into Arabia (1:17)
According to Acts 9:20 Paul spent a little while in Damascus preaching, which suggests that his gospel was already clearly enough defined for him to announce it. But it must have been soon afterwards that he went into Arabia. Bishop Lightfoot comments: ‘A veil of thick darkness hangs over St. Paul’s visit to Arabia.’ We know neither where he went nor why he went there. Possibly it was not far from Damascus, because the whole district at that time was ruled by King Aretas of Arabia. Some people think he went into Arabia as a missionary to preach the gospel. St Chrysostom describes ‘a barbarous and savage people’ who lived there, whom Paul went to evangelize. But it is much more likely that he went into Arabia for quiet and solitude, for this is the point of verses 16 and 17: my immediate response was not to consult any human being . . . but I went into Arabia. He seems to have stayed there for three years (18). We believe that in this period of withdrawal, as he meditated on the Old Testament Scriptures, on the facts of the life and death of Jesus that he already knew and on his experience of conversion, the gospel of the grace of God was revealed to him in its fullness. It has even been suggested that those three years in Arabia were a deliberate compensation for the three years of instruction which Jesus gave the other apostles, but which Paul missed. Now he had Jesus to himself, as it were, for three years of solitude in the wilderness.
b. Alibi 2: He went up to Jerusalem later and briefly (1:18–19)
The occasion is probably that referred to in Acts 9:26, after he had been smuggled out of Damascus, being lowered down the city wall in a basket. Paul is quite open about this visit to Jerusalem, but he makes light of it. It was not nearly as significant as the false teachers were obviously suggesting. Several features of it are mentioned.
For one thing, it took place after three years (18). This almost certainly means three years after his conversion, by which time his gospel would have been fully formulated.
Next, when he reached Jerusalem, he saw only two of the apostles, Peter and James. He went to get acquainted with Cephas, that is, Peter. The Greek verb (historēsai) was used of sightseeing, and means ‘to visit for the purpose of coming to know somebody’ (Arndt–Gingrich). Luther comments that he went to these apostles ‘not commanded, but of his own accord, not to learn anything of them, but only to see Peter’. Paul also saw James, who seems here to be numbered among the apostles (19). But he did not see any of the other apostles. They may have been absent, or too busy, or even frightened of him (cf. Acts 9:26).
Third, he was in Jerusalem for only fifteen days. Of course, in fifteen days the apostles would have had some time to talk about Christ. But Paul’s point is that he had no time in a fortnight to absorb from Peter the whole counsel of God. Besides, that was not the purpose of his visit. Much of those two weeks in Jerusalem, we learn from Acts (9:28–29), was spent in preaching.
To sum up, Paul’s first visit to Jerusalem was only after three years, it lasted only two weeks, and he saw only two apostles. It was, therefore, ludicrous to suggest that he obtained his gospel from the Jerusalem apostles.
c. Alibi 3: He went off to Syria and Cilicia (1:20–24)
This visit to the extreme north corresponds to Acts 9:30, where we are told that Paul, who was already in danger for his life, was brought by the believers to Caesarea, where they ‘sent him off to Tarsus’, which is in Cilicia. Since he says here that he went to Syria as well, he may have revisited Damascus and called at Antioch on his way to Tarsus. Be that as it may, the point Paul is making is that he was up in the far north, nowhere near Jerusalem.
As a result, he was personally unknown to the churches of Judea that are in Christ (22). They only knew him by hearsay, and the rumour they had heard was that their erstwhile persecutor had turned preacher (23). Indeed, he had become a preacher of the faith which they had accepted and which previously he had tried to destroy. Learning this, they praised God because of me. They did not glorify Paul, but God in Paul, recognizing that Paul was a signal trophy of God’s grace.
Not until fourteen years later (2:1), presumably meaning fourteen years after his conversion, did Paul revisit Jerusalem and have a more prolonged consultation with the other apostles. By that time his gospel was fully developed. But during the fourteen-year period between his conversion and this consultation he had paid only one brief and insignificant visit to Jerusalem. The rest of the time he had spent in distant Arabia, Syria and Cilicia. His alibis proved the independence of his gospel.
What Paul has been saying in verses 13 to 24 may be summarized like this: The fanaticism of his pre-conversion career, the divine initiative in his conversion, and his almost total isolation from the Jerusalem church leaders afterwards together combined to demonstrate that his message was not of human origin but from God. Further, this historical, circumstantial evidence could not be denied. The apostle is able to confirm and guarantee it by a solemn affirmation: I assure you before God that what I am writing to you is no lie (20).
4. Conclusion
We return, in conclusion, to the assertion which these autobiographical details have been gathered together to establish:
I want you to know, brothers and sisters, that the gospel I preached is not of human origin. I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it; rather, I received it by revelation from Jesus Christ.
(11–12)
Having considered Paul’s lack of contact with the Jerusalem apostles during the first fourteen years of his time as an apostle, can we accept the divine origin of his message? Many do not.
Some people admire Paul’s massive intellect, but find his teaching harsh, dry and complicated; so they reject it.
Others say that Paul was responsible for corrupting the simple Christianity of Jesus Christ. It used to be fashionable to drive a wedge between Jesus and Paul. It is generally recognized nowadays, however, that you cannot do this, for all the seeds of Paul’s theology are to be found in the teaching of Jesus. Nevertheless the ‘wedge theory’ has had strong advocates. For example, Lord Beaverbrook wrote a little life of Christ which he called The Divine Propagandist. He tells us that he wrote it ‘as a man of affairs’, and that he was ‘trying to understand Jesus in the flickering light of a limited intelligence and certainly restricted research’. ‘I have searched the gospels and neglected theology,’ he says. His theme was that the church has much misunderstood and misrepresented Jesus Christ. As for the apostle Paul, Lord Beaverbrook’s opinion is that he was ‘incapable by nature of understanding the spirit of the Master’. He ‘did damage to Christianity and left his imprint by wiping out many of the traces of the footsteps of his Master’. But Paul cannot have misrepresented Christ if he was communicating a special revelation of Christ, which is what he claims in Galatians 1.
Other people take the view that Paul was just an ordinary man, sharing our passions and our fallibility, so that his opinion is no better than anybody else’s. But Paul says his message is not of human origin but from Jesus Christ.
Yet others say that Paul simply reflected the view of the first-century Christian community. But Paul is at pains in this passage to show that his authorization had nothing to do with the church. He was totally independent of the church leaders. He got his views from Christ, not from the church.
This, then, is our dilemma. Are we to accept Paul’s account of the origin of his message, supported as it is by solid historical evidence? Or shall we prefer our own theory, although supported by no historical evidence? If Paul was right in asserting that his gospel was not of human origin but from God (see Rom. 1:1), then to reject Paul is to reject God.