Who were these opponents? Paul never identifies them clearly. He depicts them at the beginning of the letter as certain people “who are disturbing” the Christians in Galatia “and wish to pervert the gospel of Christ” (1:7). He is undoubtedly thinking about them when he talks about his opponents at the time of the meeting in Jerusalem: “false brothers secretly brought in, who slipped in to spy on our freedom that we have in Christ Jesus, that they might enslave us” (2:4). The troublemakers in Galatia certainly are of the same mentality as the †Judaizers of Acts 15:1, 5, who wanted to impose on Gentile converts the obligation of living like Jews. In the confrontation at Antioch (Gal 2:11–14), Paul reproved Peter for acting as though he agreed with the Judaizers. By refusing to eat with Gentile Christians, Peter was pressuring them to “live like Jews” (2:14).
We have to wait until Gal 4 to find another direct mention of Paul’s adversaries, and there what is at stake is the personal loyalty of the Galatians. Paul does not name his opponents but says with feeling, “They show interest in you, but not in a good way; they want to isolate you, so that you may show interest in them” (4:17). This attempt to seduce his readers away from him pains the Apostle, since he cares deeply about his relationship with his Galatian Christians.
Although they may only be rhetorical flourishes, three sentences in Gal 5 suggest the possibility that the Apostle did not have specific information about these troublemakers. In the first sentence he asks, “Who hindered you from following [the] truth?” (5:7). In the second, he maintains that there is one person chiefly responsible, but he is unable to say who he is: “The one who is troubling you will bear the condemnation, whoever he may be” (5:10). In a third strong statement, he refers to a group: “Would that those who are upsetting you might also castrate themselves!” (5:12).
Paul’s final remarks in his own hand at the end of the letter are more concrete. Here Paul states explicitly what was possible to surmise from chapter 2—namely, that the troublemakers are “trying to compel” the Galatians “to have yourselves circumcised” (6:12–13), the same language of compulsion used earlier in reference to Titus (2:3). To counter the strategies of these Judaizers Paul denounces their motives: they “want to make a good appearance in the flesh,” meaning that they are trying to please people and avoid persecution for “the cross of Christ” (6:12), the true basis of justification. Before his own conversion, Paul persecuted the Church (1:13, 23). Now he is persecuted because he does not preach circumcision (5:11). Finally, Paul accuses these rival teachers of inconsistency: “Not even those having themselves circumcised observe the law themselves” (6:13).
These statements do not reveal the precise identity of the Judaizers; all we can tell is that they are Jewish Christians. It is important to see that Paul does not take aim at Jews in general but rather engages in an intramural polemic against certain Jewish Christian missionaries who observed the Mosaic law and wanted to impose laws specific to the Jewish people on Gentile converts. For us, the precise identification of Paul’s adversaries and a detailed determination of their position are secondary. What primarily interests us is the content of the Apostle’s teaching. In a certain sense we are indebted to the Judaizers since their error elicited such a vigorous reaction from Paul, forcing him to give expression to profound and essential aspects of our faith in a letter full of apostolic teaching and vitality.
The Letter to the Galatians and Christian Life Today
Besides the perennially important themes of justification by faith and Christian freedom, several other topics in Galatians stand out for their relevance to the Church of the twenty-first century.
In an age that wants to trim the Christian message to conform to contemporary culture, it is necessary to recall Paul’s uncompromising commitment to the unchanging gospel of Jesus Christ. Today it is not Jewish tradition that seeks to refashion the gospel but secular ideologies that would erase what is distinctive in its moral requirements, as well as theological currents that deny that salvation is available only in and through Jesus Christ. Paul’s words echo through the centuries as a sharp warning: “Even if we or an angel from heaven should preach [to you] a gospel other than the one that we preached to you, let that one be accursed!” (1:8).
The most-quoted verse in Galatians is probably 2:20: “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me; and the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (RSV). While many things can be said about this verse, contemporary readers especially cherish the poignant declaration that grounds every Christian’s identity in Christ’s personal love and gift of himself “for me.”
Less noticed, but equally important for the sake of the new evangelization, is Paul’s confidence that Christian life is marked by a palpable experience of divine power, so much so that the Apostle can cite it in argument: “Does, then, the one who supplies the Spirit to you and works mighty deeds among you do so from works of the law or from faith in what you heard?” (3:5). The Church must seek to recover Paul’s confidence and the experience of the early Church.
Although Galatians has sometimes been interpreted erroneously to teach the replacement of Israel by the Church, the letter is better understood as showing the close relation between Jews and Christians, since Abraham is our common father in faith (3:7–14).
Through Gal 4:4–7 many Christians have grasped—and many still need to grasp—the life-changing truth that God has adopted us as his sons and daughters and has demonstrated that extraordinary fact by sending the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, raising us to a dignity that is scarcely imaginable.
Finally, Paul’s teaching in Gal 5:16–25 about the role of the Holy Spirit in empowering and guiding Christian conduct is nothing less than revolutionary. He begins with an extraordinary claim: “Live by the Spirit and you will certainly not gratify the desire of the flesh” (5:16). Then Paul interprets Christian experience by explaining the interior conflict between fallen human nature, “the †flesh,” and the indwelling Spirit of God (5:17). To avoid confusion between these opposing principles of conduct, Paul contrasts the “works of the flesh” (5:19–21) with the good fruit that the Spirit produces: “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control” (5:22–23). In doing so he demonstrates that being guided by the Holy Spirit leads to conduct that surpasses the law’s demands (5:18, 23).
When Paul heard that the Christians in Galatia were beginning to accept the teaching of the Judaizers, it must have seemed to him an unmitigated disaster. He responded passionately, bringing to bear all his zeal, his love, and his powers of persuasion to return the Galatians to the right path. Nearly two thousand years later, we cannot help but be grateful for that trial, since it elicited from Paul such a wonderful clarification of the gospel and such rich teaching about how to †live as a Christian. Paul’s gospel is that we are justified by faith in Jesus Christ, the one who loved us and gave himself for us on the cross (2:16, 20; 3:1). Christ freed us from the law so that we might live by the Holy Spirit and not gratify the desire of the flesh, so that through love we might serve one another (5:13, 16).
1. Auguste Sabatier, with George Gillanders Findlay, The Apostle Paul: A Sketch of His Doctrine (London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1899), 153–54.
2. Some prefer a division into two parts, the first doctrinal (1:6–5:12), the second exhortative (5:13–6:10). This division, however, does not distinguish between the autobiographical argument (1:11–2:21) and the doctrinal one (3:1–5:12). Other interpreters propose four divisions, distinguishing two successive proofs (3:1–47 and 4:8–5:12) in the doctrinal argument.
3. Greco-Roman rhetoric distinguished three kinds of discourse corresponding to diverse situations that required persuasion: forensic rhetoric, intended to accuse or defend a person in court; deliberative rhetoric, addressed to a political assembly to argue for or against a proposed action; and demonstrative rhetoric, used on special occa
sions—a city festival, for instance—in order to praise and celebrate notable achievements. For a concise but helpful overview, see Michael Gorman, Apostle of the Crucified Lord (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2004), 83–85.
4. Some commentators think that Acts 15 synthesizes the debates and conclusions of more than one meeting.
5. Acts 16:3 reports that Paul had Timothy circumcised, although the situation was quite different from requiring circumcision of Gentile believers, since Timothy was born of a Jewish mother.
Outline of the Letter to the Galatians
Opening Greeting (1:1–5)
Reproof and Declaration of Loyalty to the Gospel of Christ (1:6–10)
I. Paul’s Defense of His Gospel with Autobiographical Arguments (1:11–2:21)
A. The Divine Origin of Paul’s Gospel (1:11–24)
1. Introduction to Part 1 (1:11–12)
2. From Persecutor to Apostle (1:13–24)
B. Official Recognition of Paul’s Gospel (2:1–10)
1. Second Visit to Jerusalem and a Controversy (2:1–5)
2. Agreement among the Apostles (2:6–10)
C. The Incident at Antioch and the Gospel of Paul (2:11–21)
1. Paul Opposes Peter’s Inconsistent Conduct (2:11–14)
2. The Doctrine of Justification (2:15–21)
II. Arguments from Christian Experience and from Scripture (3:1–5:12)
A. Variety of Arguments (3:1–18)
1. An Argument from Experience: The Gift of the Spirit (3:1–5)
2. An Argument from Scripture: The Faith and Blessing of Abraham (3:6–14)
3. A Legal Argument: The Priority of the Promise over the Law (3:15–18)
B. The Temporary Role of the Law; the Superiority of Faith (3:19–4:11)
1. The Provisional Nature of the Law (3:19–22)
2. The Two Periods of Salvation History (3:23–4:7)
3. Direct Address (4:8–11)
C. An Appeal to Remember Their Love in the Past (4:12–20)
D. Another Argument from Scripture and a Conclusion (4:21–5:12)
1. The Two Sons of Abraham and Two Covenants (4:21–31)
2. Concluding Exhortations and Admonitions (5:1–12)
III. Application to Christian Life (5:13–6:10)
A. Freedom: Not License but Service in Love (5:13–15)
B. The Power of the Spirit over the Flesh (5:16–25)
C. Not Conceit but Solidarity (5:26–6:6)
D. Do What Is Good (6:7–10)
Paul’s Handwritten Postscript (6:11–18)
An Unusual Beginning
Galatians 1:1–5
All of Paul’s letters to churches differ from other letters of his day in the way they begin, but Galatians is unique among them all. A typical greeting at the beginning of a letter is found in Acts 23:26: “Claudius Lysias to his excellency the governor Felix, greetings.” (“Greetings” is literally “rejoice.”) In contrast, Paul usually introduces himself as an apostle of Christ, mentions one or more of his coworkers as sending the letter with him, and names the church to which he is writing with a complimentary description of their relationship to God. He expresses a prayer-wish that his readers may enjoy †grace and peace. Paul normally follows his initial greeting by expressing thanks to God for the recipients of the letter and for God’s work in their lives. However, the crisis that Paul discerns in Galatia that has motivated him to write this letter (see “Historical Setting” in the introduction, pp. 23–25) leads him to depart from his customary pattern.
Initial Greeting (1:1–5)
1Paul, an apostle not from human beings nor through a human being but through Jesus Christ and God the Father who raised him from the dead, 2and all the brothers who are with me, to the churches of Galatia: 3grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, 4who gave himself for our sins that he might rescue us from the present evil age in accord with the will of our God and Father, 5to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.
NT: Acts 2:24; 9:15; 16:6; Rom 1:7; Gal 2:20
Catechism: Christ’s gift his Father’s will, 2824
[1:1–4]
As in his other letters, Paul begins Galatians with a prayer-wish for its recipients (v. 3). Instead of opening with “rejoice” (Greek chaire), as secular letters of that period normally did, Paul prays that his readers enjoy grace (charis), the gratuitous favor of God, and peace, an echo of the Jewish customary greeting (2 Macc 1:1). †Grace and peace come from a relationship with God that recognizes him as our Father and a relationship with his Son Jesus the †Messiah. By saying “our,” Paul refers to the standing that he shares with the Galatians as a fellow Christian. His invocation of grace and peace from God and Jesus Christ suggests that his letter will be read at a liturgical gathering of the Christian community and expresses his participation in their assembly.
In other respects, however, this letter to the Galatians begins differently. Immediately after Paul’s name and title of apostle is a jarring negative, not, which is then countered by but. This tone of controversy is very unusual at the beginning of a letter. Paul feels a need to immediately repudiate certain opinions about the nature of his apostleship and to vigorously affirm the divine origin of his apostolic calling. We can infer that opponents of his apostolate have discredited him with the Galatians, perhaps spreading the idea that he was not an apostle of Christ in the full sense of the term but only an emissary sent by the community in Antioch, the church from which Paul began his missionary work.1 Paul firmly denies having received his commission from human beings or through the mediation of a human being such as Peter or one of the other apostles. Paul received his apostleship through Jesus Christ and God the Father.
It is important to note the contrast between “from human beings” and “through Jesus Christ” because it shows that for Paul, Jesus Christ is not merely a man but a divine person. Paul’s use of prepositions here is also significant. The first part of the sentence uses two prepositions—“from human beings” and “through a human being”—which might lead a reader to expect a parallel expression, “through Jesus Christ from the Father.” Instead Paul uses a single preposition, “through,” for Christ and the Father, indicating the union of Christ with the Father. Likewise in verse 3, Paul employs a single preposition, “from,” to indicate God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ as the one source of grace and peace.
Paul’s denial in this first sentence that his apostleship comes from human beings prepares for the first, autobiographical part of the letter (1:11–2:21), in which he will defend the divine origin of the †gospel he preaches (1:11–12). Other elements in his opening section prepare for the second, more doctrinal section (3:1–5:12). Paul immediately recalls fundamental points of †faith that the Galatians seem not to have fully grasped: Christ’s resurrection (1:1) and the passion and death by which he gave himself for our freedom (1:4). The Galatians are in the process of turning back to slavery (4:9; 5:1)!
Like the earliest apostolic preaching, Paul presents the resurrection as the work of God the Father who raised Jesus.2 To refer to the passion, Paul combines two other early formulations from the gospel traditions. The first is Jesus’ statement that the Son of Man has come to “give” his life as a ransom for many (Matt 20:28; Mark 10:45); the second is that Christ died “for our sins” (1 Cor 15:3). Paul’s wording, Christ, who gave himself for our sins, emphasizes the total personal commitment of Christ in saving us. Galatians 2:20 will emphasize this even more, speaking of Christ’s love.
Christ’s purpose in offering himself was to rescue us from the present evil age, a liberation analogous to that of the exodus, when God saw the affliction of his people and came down “to rescue them from the power of the Egyptians” (Exod 3:8; see 18:9–10; Acts 7:34). Such a goal is therefore perfectly in accord with the will of our God and Father (Gal 1:4), who wills salvation. On Christ’s part, redemption is a work of obedience to the Father (see Rom 5:19; Phil 2:8) and of generous love for human beings (see Gal 2:20; Ep
h 5:2, 25–26). Instead of freeing people from Egypt, Christ frees people from the present evil age. This phrase refers to the distinction that Jews and Christians of Paul’s day made between “this age” and “the age to come.”3 This present age is the world that was created “very good” (Gen 1:31) but now contains evil because it has become subject to Satan, “the ruler of this world” (John 12:31), on account of sin. The age to come will occur when God intervenes to establish his kingdom.
The Jewish people expected the transition from the present to the future age to take place in the days of the Messiah. They anticipated a clear-cut chronological separation between the ages:
The present age / The age to come
The early Christians, however, came to recognize that the future age was inaugurated at the resurrection of Christ (see vertical line 1 in fig. 4), although the present evil age remains temporarily until the return of Christ (vertical line 2). They were aware of living in the overlap between the present age and the age to come.
Figure 4. The overlap of the ages. [Based on Michael Gorman, Apostle of the Crucified Lord (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2016), 172. Used by permission.]
Christians no longer belong to the present age; instead, they belong to the “new creation” (Gal 6:15; see 2 Cor 5:17). They still find themselves in the world, but, having a new life in Christ, they must no longer conform themselves to this age (Rom 12:2).
In verse 4 Paul prepares for his doctrinal discussion, in which he will contrast the time of slavery to the †elemental powers of the “world” with the time of freedom obtained by Christ (see Gal 3:23–25; 4:3–5) and will vigorously urge the Galatians to stand firm in that freedom (5:1).4
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