_Paul, an apostle, not of men._ That is, because the other Apostles were sent by Christ while still mortal, Paul by Christ when wholly deified, and therefore in every way immortal. So says S. Augustine. But the simpler explanation is to take _not of men_ to mean, not of _mere_ men, but of Christ, _m... [ Continue Reading ]
SAINT PAUL'S EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS CHAPTER 1 CONTENTS The Galatians were Gentiles who emigrated from Gaul into Greece, and so were called Gallo-Greeks. Suidas thinks that these Gauls were Sennonians, who, under the leadership of Brennus, invaded Rome, but being repulsed by Camillus, crossed ov... [ Continue Reading ]
_Who gave Himself._ to be an expiatory victim for an atonement, and to the death of the Cross, that He might pay the price of our redemption. _For our sins._ " _Righteousness Himself_," says S. Jerome, " _gave Himself, that He might destroy the unrighteousness in us; Wisdom gave Himself to undo our... [ Continue Reading ]
_I marvel that ye are so soon removed_ from Christianity to Judaism, from the liberty of the Gospel to the slavery of legal ceremonies, from the church to the synagogue. "The allusion," says S. Jerome, "is to the Hebrew, 'to roll,'" and hints that, "You Galatians are as easily moved as a globe or a... [ Continue Reading ]
_Which is not another._ S. Jerome and Ephrem omit _another_, and interpret the clause: "You transfer yourselves to another Gospel, which indeed is no Gospel." The meaning of the received text is "You transfer yourselves to another Gospel, which still is not another; for there is no other true Gospel... [ Continue Reading ]
_Do I now persuade men, or God?_ Theophylact, Vatablus, and Erasmus explain this to mean: " _Am I now persuading you to human things or to Divine_?" as though the Apostle were showing, not the persons he was addressing, but his subject-matter, _i.e._, what he is putting forward to be believed. For t... [ Continue Reading ]
_The Gospel which was preached of me is not after man._ It is not a human but a Divine Gospel; it is not man's but God's, or, as Ephrem puts it, it is not from man, _i.e._, it does not spring from man's opinions or from man's invention, but from God. Hence he adds:... [ Continue Reading ]
_For I neither received it of man, neither was I taight it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ._ Viz., when I was carried by Him into the third heaven (2Co 12:1).... [ Continue Reading ]
_I persecuted the Church of God and wasted it._ That is, I did my best to storm it and overturn it. Cf. Psalms 129:1-2, The word translated _waste_ here comes, as some think, from a word denoting the burning of a town by an enemy, or else, as Erasmus held, from one denoting the surrounding of it. Ei... [ Continue Reading ]
_In mine own nation being more exceedingly zealous._ A more eager lover and follower; or better still, a more jealous lover of it, on behalf of the national institution, handed down to me from my ancestors; a zealot of the law though through ignorance. So much more when he knew the truth was he zeal... [ Continue Reading ]
_To reveal His Son in me._ In my soul. The phrase is a Hebraism. He says _in me_ rather than _to me_, to denote that he had received no bare revelation by ear or eye, but that in his inmost heart he had so entirely drunk in Christ and His teaching and Spirit that Christ was in him and spoke by him ... [ Continue Reading ]
_Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to see Peter._ Chrysostom and Theophylact remark on the distinction between _ι̉δει̃ν_ and the word _ίστορη̃σαι_, used here. This latter is used of those who visit and go round splendid cities, like Rome, and carefully inspect its monuments, its Pontiff,... [ Continue Reading ]
_And was unknown by face._ The Christians in Judæa had not seen my face. He says this, says Chrysostom, to prove that he had not taught in Judæa, nor preached circumcision and the Old Law, as the Judaisers alleged he had done. _Which were in Christ_ inHis faith and religion; which were Christians.... [ Continue Reading ]