Galatians (The New FFF Commentary Series)

[Ransom]

Here begins the FFF discussion of Paul's Epistle to the Galatians.  I'm going to begin with a few notes on authorship and dating in this post. The next one will outline the major themes, and the third will bridge the gap between Paul's day and ours by discussing the letter's contemporary significance.

After that, I'll shut up for a little while, and let the discussion ensue. Basically, I want to buy myself some time to start in on the text itself.  But feel free to chime in anytime with comments, questions, or what have you (and I will try to answer the latter in time).

Authorship

Almost certainly Paul. Of all Paul's letters, Galatians is the one usually deemed the most authentic. Where the authorship of other Pauline letters was uncertain, Galatians has often been used for comparison to establish their authenticity.

Dating

Traditionally, it was believed that Galatians was written no earlier than about AD 50-52 following Paul's third missionary journey, to the churches that he established in the northern part of Asia Minor in the Roman province of Galatia.  "North Galatianism" was assumed until the 17th century, and hence that is the dating you'll find in older commentaries. See the subscript to Galatians in the KJV, for example: "Unto the Galatians written from Rome."

However, when archaeology began to uncover new knowledge about the world of the Bible, conservative Bible scholars became persuaded that it wasn't the northern political district that Paul was writing to, but a southern ethnic district that was populated by Gauls who had immigrated there in the third century BC.  Therefore, this was actually the region Paul had gone through on his first missionary journey, and therefore Galatians was written around 46-50 BC, probably from Jerusalem or Antioch.  South Galatianism is now the dominant theory amongst conservative scholars, and amongst liberals you will find them split between North and South Galatian theories.

The South theory resolves some dating and harmonization problems with the book of Acts. For example, if the later date is true, then why does Paul need to write a complicated theological argument to the Galatians in favour of justification by faith?  Why could he not simply have appealed to the apostolic letter circulated after the Jerusalem council of Acts 15?

On the other hand, if Paul's meeting with the Twelve in Jerusalem was not the Acts 15 council, but an earlier meeting (Acts 9:26-28) and the Galatian epistle was written between the first missionary journey (Acts 13-14) and the Jerusalem council (Acts 15), then the need for this letter makes sense.

 

[Ransom]

Major themes

We don't have the original letter from the Galatians that presumably outlined the problem that Paul was addressing. But it's pretty easy to see what it was all about: legalism.

There were Pharisees who had converted to Christianity and were agitating the churches by telling them circumcision, the sign of the covenants with Abraham and Moses, was necessary to be saved. This was the controversy that should have been officially settled at the Jerusalem Council, where members of the Pharisee party insisted, "It is necessary to circumcise them and to order them to keep the law of Moses" (Acts 15:5). Thus, in response, the apostles circulated a letter (15:22-29) declaring that this was not necessary.

We call these Pharisee legalists "Judaizers," because they were trying to turn Christianity back into Judaism.  But they are simply a specific variety of legalist: someone who says that faith in Christ is insufficient in itself to save you, but there's also some other legal requirement.

So the first major theme of Galatians is justification by faith alone. By contrast with the works-righteousness of the Judaizers, this is the true Gospel: that man is put in a right relationship with God by faith in Christ alone. This was the doctrine that the Galatians were turning away from. The tone of Galatians reflects the urgency with which Paul saw the situation. The circumcision issue put the very Gospel at stake.

A second theme is the unity of believers. Paul says that before God there is no difference between an apostle or a non-apostle (2:6); no difference between a Jew or Gentile, a man or woman, or a freeman and a slave (3:28-29). He was willing to face down Peter over table fellowship, lest the idea got out that there were two sets of standards for Jews and non-Jews. As the saying goes, the ground is level at the foot of the cross.

A third theme is liberty. Specifically, in Galatians, Paul is writing about our liberty from the works of the Law as a means of gaining God's favour.  Christian liberty is never a justification to do whatever we want.  Rather, it is a freedom to obey God without the burden of the Law's requirements.  When Paul speaks of liberty, he exhorts the Galatians to use their liberty for good: bearing one another's burdens (6:2) or helping other members of the church (6:10).

 

[Ransom]

Bridge

Galatians has contemporary significance because we still have legalists with us today.

Some of these are literal Judaizers.  Seventh-day Adventists claim that while the rest of Christendom observes only nine of the Ten Commandments, only they and other similar groups observe all ten by keeping the Sabbath on Saturday. Practically speaking, however, the SDAs' legalism doesn't stop at the Ten Commandments; they think Christians should observe other parts of the Law as well, for example, the dietary regulations.  More recently, the Sacred Name or Hebrew Roots movements have emerged to advocate a return to Christianity's Jewish or Hebrew origins, whether that means the restoration of the Hebrew names of God or Jesus, the observance of the Jewish feasts instead of Christian observances, or obedience to the Torah. When someone argues for Christianity becoming more Jewish, it's a safe bet you're talking to a Judaizer.

Other Christian traditions want to return us to the bondage of works.  Galatians was a key text for the Reformers, who saw Galatians as an apologetic, not merely against Phariseeism, but the very "Christian" system of the Roman church that they strove to reform.  Closer to our own time, back in the mid-1990s, I used to be approached regularly on the bus by members of the International Churches of Christ, an organization that at one time generated more complaints to cult watchdog organizations than any other group but Scientology.  Amongst the ICOC's various errors, they follow the Campbellite teaching of requiring baptism for salvation. They also taught an extreme form of "discipleship" in which a discipler had the authority to micro-manage the personal lives of the members he was discipling.  Is this not the very same kind of works added to faith that the Judaizers preached?  I'm sure you can come up with your own examples from your own experience, as well.

Finally, other world religions seek God's favour through doing good works. For example, Islam is one of the fastest-growing religions in the world, and they have many active apologists. In Islam, Allah cannot be known; he can only be obeyed. If you've ever read one of those "ask the imam" Web sites, you've seen the extremes that Islamic works-righteousness goes to.  Do you want to bring the Gospel to your Muslim, Hindu, or Buddhist friends?  Help them understand that it is not what they can do in their own righteousness that puts them in a right relationship with God; it is Christ's righteousness, and what he has done for them.  That is the Gospel of Paul, of Galatians, and of the Bible.

 

[Ransom]

Paul, an apostle (Galatians 1:1):  The letter to the Galatians begins with this declaration: Paul is an apostle. He does not make this declaration in every one of his letters, though he does in most of them. Sometimes he is a "servant"; to Philemon he is a "prisoner." To the Thessalonians, he identified himself simply as "Paul."

But here, he makes the apostolic declaration front and centre. I imagine that part of the reason was that his authority was part of the very problem in Galatia, as we'll see shortly.

not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead (1): Paul was no ordinary missionary. He wasn't sent first by men, and he didn't receive his commission from men; rather, he had a direct revelation from Christ himself, who gave him his marching orders.  Paul had not witnessed the passion of Jesus like the Twelve had, but he had had a direct experience of the risen Christ himself.

and all the brothers who are with me, To the churches of Galatia (2): Sometimes Paul names the brothers who are with him, for example, Timothy or Silvanus. Here, he does not.  This letter is Paul's alone.  I imagine that, again, since it is his apostleship that is being challenged, he chooseses to fight his own battle, as it were.

Nonetheless, "all the brothers" are there in the background. What Paul says, he does not say alone. He has the agreement of the other Christians that are with him, whether that means the men who often travelled with him, like Barnabas or Timothy, or the local church in the city where he wrote the letter.

 

[Ransom]

Like all of Paul's writings, Galatians is a letter. For the most part, it follows the usual convention for letters in the Hellenistic world.

• It begins by identifying the sender (i.e. "Paul, an apostle").
• It then identifies the recipients ("the churches of Galatia").
• It gives a salutation. In Paul's letters, this is a formulaic greeting: typically, a variation on "Grace and peace to you from the Lord Jesus," or something like it.  "Grace" was typical of a Hellenistic salutation, while "peace" (shalom) was a typically Jewish idea.  It could be that Paul used both because as a Jew and a Roman citizen, he was part of both the Hellenistic and Jewish worlds. Or perhaps it was his way of expressing the unity of Jews and Gentiles in Christ.
• It conveys thanksgiving (or a blessing) for the recipients. Typically this was a short, formulaic wish for good health or protection from danger.  Paul's thanksgivings are usually more extensive than the Greek formula, and more theological: he gives thanks for his recipients' continued faith, for example.  Often he anticipates the topics that he will be treating in detail later in the letter.
• Then comes the body of the letter.
• Finally, the closing. In a secular letter, this meant personal greetings, a personal postscript from the sender, another wish for good health, and a closing such as "Farewell." Again, Paul's closings are more theological than their secular counterparts: he offers a benediction instead of a mere health wish, typically something along the lines of "The grace of the Lord Jesus be with your spirit."

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ (Gal. 1:3): If you want to see a textbook example of this letter structure, look to Philippians or Philemon.  In Galatians, Paul dispenses with the thanksgiving. The urgency of the situation is such that he delves right into the body of his letter after an abbreviated opening. This is a passionate letter. It's somewhat of an angry letter. (Perhaps he is not particularly thankful for the Galatians at the moment.)

Nonetheless, I do find it telling that he doesn't dispense with his usual salutation. Even as he is upset with the Galatians' compromise in the faith, he is still being pastoral. He hasn't lost his graciousness. The correction he is about to administer is out of love, not malice.

 

[Ransom]

One of the themes of Galatians is a defense of the true Gospel, and so Paul extends his salutation to give a thumbnail sketch of what the Gospel is.

who gave himself for our sins (Gal. 1:4): Paul doesn't speak too deeply about sin in Galatians. However, he does treat the topic at length in his letter to the Romans, which is a later, and significantly more developed, treatment of the same topics.  In fact, he devotes the first three chapters of that longer letter to the effects of sin on the human race.  Man ought to know there is a God because the evidence is all around him. However, he has shut knowledge of God out of his mind and turned to worshiping created things instead of their Creator.  Having rejected God, they turn to the things that God hates, and Paul uses the examples of sexual immorality and idolatry as particularly symptomatic of their rebellion.  Even the supposedly righteous Jews, who had the privilege of receiving the Law on Mt. Sinai, are not immune to rebelling against God.  No one is righteous; all are subject to the wrath of God.  That's the bad news.

But the good news is that Jesus Christ, as God incarnate in human flesh, was the one man without sin. He was put to death on the cross, not for his own sins, but for ours.  His death showed the righteousness of God by meeting the requirements of divine justice. It is the objective basis upon which God declares sinful men to be righteous. There is a transfer of natures that took place: our sins were imputed to Christ (who knew no sin), and his righteousness was imputed to us. The guiltless God-man was declared guilty and condemned, and we guilty sinners are declared righteous and saved.

This promise is for everyone who will have faith in the promises of Scripture concerning Christ's ability to save.  And this faith alone is sufficient basis for our justification.  The Judaizers were denying that faith alone was sufficient; it needed circumcision to be truly efficacious.  But because salvation comes by faith alone, there is no room for other works. Our salvation comes at God's mercy, not because we have earned it.

to deliver us from the present evil age (4): We have been saved from the penalty of sin by Christ's substitutionary atonement on the cross. But we are also being saved: God has set us apart from the world. We are being saved in this life from the power of sin. We have the Holy Spirit in us, and one of his works is to make us more like Christ.  We also will be saved.  We will be glorified in the end and saved from the very presence of sin.

according to the will of our God and Father (4): Salvation was never a contingency plan.  All of this was planned right from the beginning.  God told Satan in the Garden of Eden that a child of Eve would crush him. The risen Christ showed his disciples on the road to Emmaus that his death and resurrection were taught throughout the Scriptures.  It was all by the "definite plan and foreknowledge of God" (Acts 2:23).

to whom be the glory forever and ever. Amen (5): As the Reformers said: soli Deo gloria, to the glory of God alone. Everything God does is for his own glory. Everything we do should be to his glory as well.

 

[Bob H]

Major themes

We don't have the original letter from the Galatians that presumably outlined the problem that Paul was addressing. But it's pretty easy to see what it was all about: legalism.

There were Pharisees who had converted to Christianity and were agitating the churches by telling them circumcision, the sign of the covenants with Abraham and Moses, was necessary to be saved.........

We call these Pharisee legalists "Judaizers," because they were trying to turn Christianity back into Judaism.  But they are simply a specific variety of legalist: someone who says that faith in Christ is insufficient in itself to save you, but there's also some other legal requirement........

A question to all to start with. Is it possible that a convert {these Judaizars for example} can believe in works salvation {along with teaching it} and still be a true convert?



I may be getting ahead of myself but are the "certain came from James" in Gal 2:12 the same crowd as these "Judaizars" in chap. 1?

 

[Smellin Coffee]

Paul, an apostle (Galatians 1:1):  The letter to the Galatians begins with this declaration: Paul is an apostle. He does not make this declaration in every one of his letters, though he does in most of them. Sometimes he is a "servant"; to Philemon he is a "prisoner." To the Thessalonians, he identified himself simply as "Paul."

But here, he makes the apostolic declaration front and centre. I imagine that part of the reason was that his authority was part of the very problem in Galatia, as we'll see shortly.

not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead (1): Paul was no ordinary missionary. He wasn't sent first by men, and he didn't receive his commission from men; rather, he had a direct revelation from Christ himself, who gave him his marching orders.  Paul had not witnessed the passion of Jesus like the Twelve had, but he had had a direct experience of the risen Christ himself.

and all the brothers who are with me, To the churches of Galatia (2): Sometimes Paul names the brothers who are with him, for example, Timothy or Silvanus. Here, he does not.  This letter is Paul's alone.  I imagine that, again, since it is his apostleship that is being challenged, he chooseses to fight his own battle, as it were.

Nonetheless, "all the brothers" are there in the background. What Paul says, he does not say alone. He has the agreement of the other Christians that are with him, whether that means the men who often travelled with him, like Barnabas or Timothy, or the local church in the city where he wrote the letter.

So Paul's apostleship is being challenged. Since things were confirmed in the eyes of two or more witnesses, why does he go to his own defense alone? Why not list the people who could confirm his defense?

And Christ Himself giving initial marching orders to Paul? Not according to Acts 13:

Now in the church at Antioch there were prophets and teachers: Barnabas, Simeon called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen (who had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch) and Saul.  While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, ?Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.? So after they had fasted and prayed, they placed their hands on them and sent them off.

Luke says that Paul was in the church of Antioch ministering when (Luke believed) the Spirit told the church to send Barnabas and Paul.  Paul wasn't the Lone Ranger Missionary, sent by God through his spectacular visions in his inaugural trip and it Luke testified it was the church that initially sent him.

 

[Ransom]

A question to all to start with. Is it possible that a convert {these Judaizars for example} can believe in works salvation {along with teaching it} and still be a true convert?

Paul seems to say that the teachings of the Judaizers were far enough afield to be considered a false gospel that would put someone under a divine curse for teaching it (cf. 1:6-9).

That said, the overall tone of the letter is that the Galatians, who were being led astray by the Judaizers, were not past the point of no return.

I may be getting ahead of myself but are the "certain came from James" in Gal 2:12 the same crowd as these "Judaizars" in chap. 1?

You are getting ahead, but that's fine; I'm sure we've all read the book and so there aren't "spoilers."

I think Paul's phrase "the circumcision party" in v. 12 is telling; he makes a distinction between them and the "Jews," (2:13) who were led astray with Peter by the "certain men" from James. They seem to be the instigators.

That said, I could also point out Acts 15:24: "some persons have gone out from us . . . although we gave them no instructions." They were "from James," but were not authorized by him to teach what they did, as evidenced by James signing his name to a letter refuting their teaching.

 

[Ransom]

So Paul's apostleship is being challenged. Since things were confirmed in the eyes of two or more witnesses, why does he go to his own defense alone? Why not list the people who could confirm his defense?

And Christ Himself giving initial marching orders to Paul? Not according to Acts 13:

Acts 13 was not Paul's first meeting with the apostles in Jerusalem. This appears to be:

And when he had come to Jerusalem, he attempted to join the disciples. And they were all afraid of him, for they did not believe that he was a disciple. But Barnabas took him and brought him to the apostles and declared to them how on the road he had seen the Lord, who spoke to him, and how at Damascus he had preached boldly in the name of Jesus. So he went in and out among them at Jerusalem, preaching boldly in the name of the Lord.  (Acts 9:26-28)

So he didn't go alone. How would Barnabas know what Paul had done in Damascus? Clearly, he was one of the "disciples" who were there with him, and may have helped him escape (v. 25).

 

[Smellin Coffee]

So Paul's apostleship is being challenged. Since things were confirmed in the eyes of two or more witnesses, why does he go to his own defense alone? Why not list the people who could confirm his defense?

And Christ Himself giving initial marching orders to Paul? Not according to Acts 13:

Acts 13 was not Paul's first meeting with the apostles in Jerusalem. This appears to be:

And when he had come to Jerusalem, he attempted to join the disciples. And they were all afraid of him, for they did not believe that he was a disciple. But Barnabas took him and brought him to the apostles and declared to them how on the road he had seen the Lord, who spoke to him, and how at Damascus he had preached boldly in the name of Jesus. So he went in and out among them at Jerusalem, preaching boldly in the name of the Lord.  (Acts 9:26-28)

So he didn't go alone. How would Barnabas know what Paul had done in Damascus? Clearly, he was one of the "disciples" who were there with him, and may have helped him escape (v. 25).

Your quote was:

Paul was no ordinary missionary. He wasn't sent first by men, and he didn't receive his commission from men; rather, he had a direct revelation from Christ himself, who gave him his marching orders.  Paul had not witnessed the passion of Jesus like the Twelve had, but he had had a direct experience of the risen Christ himself.

I didn't say Paul hadn't previously met the disciples, nor did I say he wasn't in service (as stated in Acts 13). My point was his initial "marching orders" was given by the leadership/church in Antioch and not from Jesus.

This isn't in context with your point, but I've wondered where the magical light was when it came to the disciples. Why would the light on the Damascus Road send Paul away from the very people who 1. Ministered with Jesus directly, 2. taught the doctrine that was adhered to by the Jerusalem Christians in Acts 2? And why didn't the light convince any of the 12 of his apparent testimony? Why would they have been afraid having been released by a real angel (Acts 5)?

The apostles left the Sanhedrin, rejoicing because they had been counted worthy of suffering disgrace for the Name.

Yet they were scared to meet Saul...

 

[Ransom]

I didn't say Paul hadn't previously met the disciples, nor did I say he wasn't in service (as stated in Acts 13). My point was his initial "marching orders" was given by the leadership/church in Antioch and not from Jesus.

And falling to the ground he heard a voice saying to him, "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?" And he said, "Who are you, Lord?" And he said, ?I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. But rise and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do." . . .

But the Lord said to [Ananias], "Go, for he is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before the Gentiles and kings and the children of Israel. For I will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name." So Ananias departed and entered the house. And laying his hands on him he said, "Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus who appeared to you on the road by which you came has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit." (Acts 9:4-6, 15-17)

So Jesus appeared to Paul and told him to go to Ananias. Meanwhile, Jesus appeared to Ananias and told him Paul was his chosen messenger. No reason to doubt that Ananias told Paul what had transpired while Paul was blind. In fact, given that Paul immediately began to preach Christ in Damascus (9:20-22), I would infer that he knew what his "marching orders" were and who had given them.

Paul doesn't go to Antioch until Acts 11:26, which in all likelihood was years later, anywhere from three to seventeen years or more.

 

[Ransom]

As I said earlier, Paul dispenses with the thanksgiving part of the customary letter opening, and gets right to the reason he is writing:

I am astonished that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ and are turning to a different gospel - not that there is another one (Galatians 1:6-7): Paul hasn't got into the meat of the Judaizer controversy yet, but since we've read the letter, we know from chapter 2 onward that is the meat of his message.  Adding circumcision to faith, however little that act may be, is the dividing line between the true Gospel and a "different" one, meaning a false one. If the Gospel is not salvation by faith alone, it is no Gospel at all.

but there are some who trouble you and want to distort the gospel of Christ (7): Again he reiterates: the message of the Judaizers is a distortion, and the people who are bringing it to the Galatians are bringing trouble, not truth.

But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed. (8-9): Paul guards the Gospel very closely, and he is so upset that there is someone perverting it for the Galatians that he pronounces a curse upon them. In Greek the word "accursed" is anathema.  With respect to condemnation, these are the proverbial "strongest possible terms."  Essentially he is saying that anyone who preaches a false gospel is in danger of hell. To ensure that his point is made, he repeats it.

The moral of the story? We cannot afford, even for a second, to compromise the integrity of the Gospel. The cost is too high, not only in terms of the souls of those to whom we are witnessing, but our own as well. As James said: "you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness" (James 3:1). Those who teach false doctrine will be held accountable for those whom it leads astray.

 

[Ransom]

For am I now seeking the approval of man, or of God? Or am I trying to please man? (Galatians 1:10): Again we need to read a bit between the lines. It appears that one of the criticisms against Paul was that he was teaching some sort of feel-good message or telling people what they wanted to hear: a Gospel that pleased the ears of his listeners.  Of course, he has just pronounced an anathema on the Judaizers who contradicted his Gospel, so I can't help hearing sarcasm in these rhetorical questions.

If I were still trying to please man, I would not be a servant of Christ. (10): As Jesus said, you can't serve two masters. Since Paul is a servant of Christ, he does what pleases Christ. If he were the servant of men and wanting to please men, then he would indeed be preaching a message that felt good to them, not dropping curses on them.

When I began studying Galatians back in 2001, the prevailing secular worldview was a postmodern one, in which one of the cardinal sins was to be critical of what someone else thinks or does.  We were to seek understanding rather than pass judgment or insist that we could know the truth.  In the intervening years, it seems to me, we've moved from postmodernism to whatever follows postmodernism, and the prevailing morality has swung from the postmodern version of relativism to a new kind of authoritarian absolutism. I think this is what we see, for example, when the new campus leftists demand so-called "safe spaces" where their views are free from judgment, and conversely they seek to ban opposing views from the public square.  Postmodernism and post-postmodernism are similar in this respect: they want to be free from judgment. They only want to hear what pleases them.

But lest we point the finger only at the secular left, remember that this kind of attitude is present within the church as well.  A generation ago, the late Robert Schuller criticized the preaching of sin and judgment because it would drive people away from the church.  A little closer to home, Joel Osteen also avoids talking much about sin; in his theology, sinners fall short, not of God's glory, but of his best for their life.  Whether coming from Schuller's positive-thinking perspective or Osteen's prosperity gospel, the conclusion is the same: We don't need to warn people about sin because it's a turn-off.

Even closer to home, I'll bet you've had someone shy away from a theological controversy because "doctrine divides," or words to that effect.  "We should focus on what unites us rather than what separates us."  In other words, seek understanding rather than clarity about truth.  Peter and John understood the folly of this when the Sanhedrin ordered them to stop preaching Jesus: they replied, "Whether it is right in the sight of God to listen to you rather than to God, you must judge, for we cannot but speak of what we have seen and heard" (Acts 4:19-20).  They couldn't heed the unlawful command of the Sanhedrin and be servants of Christ. Neither can we.

 

[Ransom]

Since we don't know the content of the letter that provoked Paul's response to the Galatians, we need to read between the lines.  Clearly the Judaizers were challenging Paul's apostolic authority. This makes sense: if Paul had come through Galatia preaching the unity of all Christians believers, Jew and Gentile alike, and he was teaching that Gentiles could be saved without adopting the trappings of Judaism (particularly circumcision), then it stands to reason that they would need to discredit Paul. Perhaps they did so by attempting to drive a wedge between him and the Twelve, who continued to minister to the Jews in Jerusalem. They may also have tried to discredit him by claiming his Gospel was not authentic because he never personally walked with Jesus (again, unlike the Twelve). Or perhaps he had different, ulterior motives.

To this, Paul now begins to defend his own apostleship.

For I would have you know, brothers, that the gospel that was preached by me is not man's gospel. For I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ (Galatians 1:11-12): Paul tells us four things about his Gospel.

First, it is not man's gospel.  It does not have a human origin.

Second and third, he did not receive it from any man, nor was [he] taught it.  I find the distinction between these two points subtle, but I think that Jamieson and Faussett probably have the right idea: the latter implies the labour of learning, and the former does not.  In other words, Paul did not receive his Gospel from men, either by being handed it and told to preach it, or by studying and learning it on his own.

Fourth, he received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ.  The Gospel Paul preached was not given to him by human impulse; rather, it was of direct divine origin.

This is the thumbnail version of Paul's credentials.  In the next few verses, he defends them in more detail using a number of proofs.

 

[Ransom]

For you have heard of my former life in Judaism (Galatians 1:13): Paul's first proof is his former life. He describes his past life to the Philippians: "circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; 6 as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law,[c] blameless" (Philippians 3:5-6).

By birth, Paul was a Benjamite. The first king of Israel, Saul, was also of the tribe of Benjamin. Paul's Hebrew name was Saul.  His pedigree was prestigious.

By education, Paul was a Pharisee, and hence affiliated with Israel's spiritual leadership. He had been educated by Gamaliel, one of the most famous Pharisees of all time. While Gamaliel was notable on his own merits, his grandfather was Hillel the Elder, probably the most famous Pharisee of all time and one of the most influential figures in Jewish thought.

how I persecuted the church of God violently and tried to destroy it (13): By zeal, Paul was unmatched. He was a notorious persecutor of Christians on behalf of the Sanhedrin. The first thing the Bible tells us about Paul is that he aided and abetted in the stoning of Stephen, of whose death he approved (Acts 8:1).  He was "ravaging the church" (Acts 8:3) and "breathing threats and murder" against Christians (9:1).

And I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my own age among my people, so extremely zealous was I for the traditions of my fathers (1:14): Paul was certainly "a Hebrew of Hebrews" (Philippians 3:5). He was ambitious and sought to out-Jewish his Jewish contemporaries, and I suppose we can see his fervent attacks on Christians as the most significant symptom of his zeal.  He was not born or educated into Christianity and, of all people, his conversion to Christianity would seem the most unlikely.

Of course, we know what happened to him nonetheless.

 

[benutils]

By birth, Paul was a Benjamite. The first king of Israel, Saul, was also of the tribe of Benjamin. Paul's Hebrew name was Saul.  His pedigree was prestigious.

Gen 49:27  Benjamin shall ravin as a wolf: in the morning he shall devour the prey, and at night he shall divide the spoil.

 

[Ransom]

Paul's second proof is his conversion. He writes:

But when he who had set me apart before I was born (Galatians 1:15): Paul's conversion wasn't his own choice. Indeed, as I argued in the previous post, it was nigh impossible that he, of all people, could have become a Christian by his own volition.  However, what is impossible with men is not impossible with God (Mark 10:27).  Paul literally didn't stand a chance.  Even as he was on his way to Damascus to do more damage to the church, God put his plan for Paul, which had been conceived before Paul was born, into effect.

and who called me by his grace (15): Paul's conversion didn't happen because Paul deserved it. By Paul's own account, it was quite the opposite.  Because of his persecution of the church, Paul wrote that he was "the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle" (1 Corinthians 15:9). Even at the end of his life he called himself the "foremost" of sinners (1 Timothy 1:15).  But he said to underscore the goodness of God: while he may have been the chief of sinners, Jesus saves sinners, and Jesus had saved him.  Paul's conversion was not by merit, but by God's grace.

was pleased to reveal his Son to me (16): Paul's conversion pleased God; that is, it gave God pleasure to save Paul.  Ephesians 1:5 and 9 tell us that our predestination, adoption, redemption, and forgiveness were granted to us according to God's "good pleasure" or "kind intention."

in order that I might preach him among the Gentiles (16): Paul's conversion on the Damascus road was accomplished at God's initiative, in God's timing, and for God's purpose.  That purpose was for Paul to spread the Gospel amongst the Gentiles: "he is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before the Gentiles and kings and the children of Israel" (Acts 9:15).  It was because of what God had done for him, and not because he had been persuaded by human reason.

 

[Ransom]

Gen 49:27  Benjamin shall ravin as a wolf: in the morning he shall devour the prey, and at night he shall divide the spoil.

Sorry, but merely quoting a Bible verse, without an explanation of its relevance to the topic at hand, doesn't seem productive.

 

[benutils]

Gen 49:27  Benjamin shall ravin as a wolf: in the morning he shall devour the prey, and at night he shall divide the spoil.

Sorry, but merely quoting a Bible verse, without an explanation of its relevance to the topic at hand, doesn't seem productive.

Its overly simplistic to believe Paul found value in being from a tribe that included the first king of Israel. I posted the verse to show an uncertain prophecy engulfed the descendant of Benjamin.