Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians

Latin Text from public domain Migne Editors, Patrologiae Cursus Completus.

Translated into English using ChatGPT.

Table of Contents Prologue Book One 1:1 1:2 1:3 1:4 1:6 1:8 1:10 1:11-12 1:13 1:15 1:16 1:17 1:18 1:19 1:20 1:21 1:22-24 2:1-2 2:3-5 2:6 2:7-8 2:10 2:11-13 2:14 2:15 2:16 2:17-18 2:19 2:20 2:21 3:1 3:2 3:3 3:4 3:5 3:6 3:7 3:8-9 Book Two 3:11-12 3:13 3:14 3:15-18 3:19-20 3:21-23 3:24-26 3:27-28 3:29 4:1-2 4:3 4:4 4:6 4:7 4:8-9 4:10-11 4:12 4:13 4:14 4:15-16 4:17-18 4:19 4:20 4:21 4:22-23 4:24 4:25-26 4:27 4:28 4:29-31 5:1 5:2 5:3 5:4 5:5 5:6 Book Three 5:7 5:8 5:9 5:9 5:10 5:11 5:12 5:13 5:14 5:15 5:16 5:17 5:18 5:19-21 5:22 5:24 5:25 5:26 6:1 6:2 6:3 6:4 6:5 6:6 6:7 6:8 6:9 6:10 6:11 6:12 6:14 6:15 6:16 6:17 6:18

Prologue

It has been only a few days since I finished interpreting Paul's letter to Philemon and moved on to the Galatians, skipping many in between. And suddenly, I received letters from Rome, informing me that the venerable old woman Albina has been reunited with the Lord's presence, and the holy Marcella has been left without her mother's companionship. Now more than ever, I, Paula and Eustochium, beseech your solace. And since that cannot be done for now, due to the vast distances of the sea and land, I wish to at least heal the wound by immersing myself in the Scriptures. Indeed, I know his ardor, I know the faith which he always has in his heart, surpassing his gender, forgetting his humanity, and crossing the red sea of this age with the thunderous timpani of divine writings. Certainly, when I was in Rome, he never saw me in such a hurry that he did not ask something about the Scriptures. Nor did he consider whatever answer I gave as correct in the Pythagorean manner; nor was my authority without a preconceived reason valued by him. But he examined everything and weighed all things with a discerning mind, so that I felt that I had not so much a disciple as a judge. Therefore, I think that what would be pleasing to them in their absence and beneficial to you who are present, I will undertake the unfinished task before our Latin writers and also a few Greeks, as the honor of the matter demanded. Not that I am unaware of Gaius Marius Victorinus, who taught rhetoric in Rome when I was a boy, having published Commentaries on the Apostle; but because he, being occupied with the learning of secular literature, completely ignored the holy Scriptures: and no one can, no matter how eloquent, speak well of him, if he is ignorant of that. So, why then, am I foolish or reckless, who promise what he could not accomplish? No, quite the opposite, in fact, I seem to be more cautious and timid, feeling the weakness of my own abilities, I have followed Origen's Commentaries. For that man wrote, specifically, five volumes on Paul's letter to the Galatians, and completed the tenth book of his Stromata with a commentary in verse on its explanation. He also composed various treatises and excerpts, which alone could be sufficient. I pass over Didymus, my own guide, and Laodicea (Apollinarius) who recently left the Church, and the ancient heretic Alexander, and also Eusebius of Emesa, and Theodore of Heraclea, who themselves left behind some commentaries on this matter. From these, if I were to select even a few things, something would be produced that would not be completely scorned. Therefore, to confess simply, I read all of these and, piling many things in my mind, I dictated them with a notary, either mine or someone else's, occasionally not preserving the order, the language, or even the memory of the ideas. The main point of this letter is to remind you that the same subject matter is found in Paul's letter to the Galatians and his letter to the Romans. However, the difference between them is that in the former he uses a deeper and more profound argument, while here, writing to those about whom he says, 'O foolish Galatians,' and 'You foolish people,' he chastises rather than instructs. He speaks in a way that even fools can understand, using common expressions to convey common ideas, and using his authority to call back those whom reason cannot persuade. Indeed, there is not a single discourse of the Apostles, whether in their Epistles or in person, in which they do not struggle to teach that the burdens of the old Law have been set aside, and all those things which preceded in types and figures, that is, the rest of the Sabbath, the injury of circumcision, the recurrence of the Kalends and the three annual solemnities, the scrupulosity of foods, and the need to cleanse oneself again on a daily basis, by the sudden arrival of the grace of the Gospel, which is not fulfilled by the blood of victims, but by the faith of the believing soul. But elsewhere, on the other hand, and as another actor had presented this question to himself, it was discussed and almost examined closely. However, in these two, as I said, Letters, the cessation of the old law and the introduction of the new law are specifically contained. But this is peculiar to the Galatians, that he does not write to those who believed in Christ from the Jews and thought that paternal ceremonies should be observed, but to those who received the faith of the Gospel from the Gentiles and again fell back, some of whom were deterred by authority, asserting that Peter and James and all the churches of Judea had mixed the Gospel of Christ with the old law. Moreover, he would do one thing in Judea and another thing among the nations. And it would be in vain for them to believe in the Crucified if they thought that what the leaders of the Apostles observed should be neglected. Therefore, he proceeds cautiously between the two, so as not to betray the grace of the Gospel under the weight and authority of the elders, nor to do an injustice to his predecessors, while being an advocate of grace. But he also advances indirectly and, as it were, stealthily through hidden tunnels, in order to teach Peter that he should do what he was entrusted with concerning the circumcision, so that, by not suddenly departing from the ancient way of life, the Cross would not cause a scandal, and that having been entrusted with the preaching of the Gentiles, it would be fair for him to defend what he had formerly simulated for the sake of dispensation. Not understanding at all, the Bataneotes and that wicked Porphyrius, in the first book of his work against us, objected that Peter was criticized by Paul for not walking in a straight path for evangelizing: wanting to stain him with the mark of error, and to accuse him of impudence and of falsely inventing a common doctrine, while the leaders of the Churches disagree among themselves. We happen to come across these things lightly in what sense they were said, and we will explain them more fully in their proper places. But now it is time to set forth the words of the Apostle himself, let us unfold each individual thing.

Book One

Book One

1:1

(Chapter 1, Verse 1) Paul, an apostle not from men nor by man but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead. He does not propose himself as an apostle arrogantly, as some think, but necessarily, neither from men nor by man. Instead, he does so through Jesus Christ and God the Father, in order to confound those who were belittling Paul outside of the twelve apostles and claiming that he suddenly emerged from somewhere or was ordained by the elders, with this authority. However, it can also be understood indirectly as being said to Peter and the others, that the Gospel was not handed down to him by the apostles, but by Jesus Christ himself, who had chosen those apostles. But all of this is prepared so that no one who disputes the burdens of the Law for the sake of the Gospel may be able to object: 'but Peter said this,' 'but the apostles decreed this,' 'but your predecessors determined something else.' Indeed, he makes this clearer in the following, now seemingly in hidden speech, by citing that nothing contributed by those who seem to be something is relevant to him, and that he himself resisted Peter to his face, saying that he was not compelled by any necessity to yield to the hypocrisy of the Jews. But if it seems rash to some that he spoke against the apostles, even though secretly, who had gone to Jerusalem in order to confer with them about the Gospel, lest perhaps he had run in vain or had run in vain, let us transfer that understanding there: Even to this day, the apostles are sent by the Jewish patriarchs, from whom I also believe that the Galatians, led astray, began to observe the Law, or certainly other Jews who believed in Christ had gone to Galatia, who asserted that Peter, too, was the leader of the apostles, and that James, the Lord's brother, observed the ceremonies of the Law. Therefore, in order to distinguish between those who are sent by men and those who are sent by Christ, he took the following beginning: Paul, an apostle, not from men, nor through man. But apostle, which properly is a Hebrew word, means one who is sent, which also signifies Silas (or Silai), to whom a name was given by being sent. The Hebrews say that among themselves there are certain prophets and holy men who are both prophets and apostles, and others who are only prophets. Finally, Moses, to whom it is said, 'And I will send you to Pharaoh' (Exod. III, 10, 11); and he responds, 'Provide someone else whom you will send.' And Isaiah, to whom God speaks, 'Whom shall I send, and who will go to this people?' (Isai. VI, 8) ? There were also apostles and prophets. Therefore, we can understand that John the Baptist is also to be called a prophet and apostle, since the Scripture says, 'There was a man sent from God, whose name was John' (John I, 6). And in the Epistle to the Hebrews (Heb. III), Paul, according to his usual custom, did not put his own name or the title of Apostle before it, because he was going to speak about Christ: Therefore, having a high priest and an apostle of our confession, Jesus; it was not fitting that where Christ was to be called an apostle, Paul should also be called an apostle. There are, however, four kinds of apostles. One, which is neither from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father; another, which is indeed from God, but through man; a third, which is from man, not from God; and a fourth, which is neither from God, nor through man, nor from man, but from itself. The first category can include Isaiah, the other prophets, and the apostle Paul himself, who was sent not by humans or through a human, but by God the Father and Christ. In the second category is Jesus, the son of Nun, who was indeed appointed by God as an apostle, but through a human, Moses. The third category is when someone is ordained by the favor and zeal of the people. As we see now, many are being appointed to the priesthood not by the judgment of God, but by the favor of the redeemed crowd. The fourth [sign] is [the sign] of false prophets and false apostles, about whom the apostle [Paul] says: 'Such pseudo-apostles are workers of iniquity, transforming themselves into apostles of Christ, who say, "Thus says the Lord," and the Lord did not send them' (2 Corinthians 11:13). But not such [was] the apostle Paul, who was sent not by men nor through man, but by God the Father through Jesus Christ. From this it is approved that the heresies of Ebion and Photinus should also be refuted, [namely] that our Lord Jesus Christ is God, since the apostle, being sent by Christ to preach the Gospel, denies that he was sent by man. In this place, other heresies arise, which claim that Christ's flesh is pretended and assert that Christ is God, not man. There is also a new heresy that declares a divided dispensation of Christ. Thus, among the shipwrecks of so many false teachings, if one confesses Christ as a man, the Ebionites and Photinus creep in; if one contends that he is God, the Manicheans and Marcion, authors of a new doctrine, bubble up. In the community, they hear that Christ is both God and man. Not that there is another God and another man, but rather the one who was always God deemed it worthy to become man for our salvation. It should also be known that in the Apostle of Marcion it is not written that Christ is explained by God the Father, but rather is raised up by himself, as it is written: Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up (John II, 19). And elsewhere: No one takes my soul from me; but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again (Ibid., X, 18).

1:2

(Vers. 2.) And all the brothers who are with me, to the churches of Galatia. In other Epistles, Sosthenes and Silvanus, and sometimes even Timothy, are mentioned at the beginning. In this one, however, because the authority of many was necessary, the name of all the brothers is assumed. They themselves perhaps were also of the circumcision, and were not held in contempt by the Galatians. For it is of great importance to correct the people, to have the agreement and consensus of many in one matter. But when he says 'to the churches of Galatia,' it should be noted that here he writes not only to one church of one city, but to the churches of the whole province, and he calls them churches, which he later accuses of being corrupt by error. From this it is to be understood that the Church can be said in two ways: the one which has no spot or wrinkle and truly is the body of Christ, and the one which gathers in the name of Christ without full and perfect virtues (Ephesians 5). The wise are called in two ways, both those who are full of perfect virtue and those who are just beginning and are in progress. Concerning the perfect, it is said: 'I will send to you wise men' (Luke 11:49). Concerning the foolish: 'Reprove a wise man, and he will love thee' (Proverbs 8:9). For he who is full and complete in virtue does not need correction. This sense can be understood in regard to the other virtues as well, namely that the courageous and prudent, pious, chaste, just, and temperate are sometimes understood correctly, sometimes incorrectly.

1:3

(Verse 3) Grace to you and peace from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ. Not as in the other Epistles, he puts the grace of God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ, and peace, through which without merit of works, and sins were granted to us previously, and peace was granted after forgiveness: but wisely he now argues the cause against those who were prevented by the Law, and thought they could be justified by works, so that they would know that they should continue in grace, in what they had begun.

1:4

(Verse 4) He gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen. Neither did the Son give himself for our sins without the will of the Father, nor did the Father deliver the Son without the Son's will; but this is the will of the Son, to fulfill the will of the Father, as he himself speaks in the psalm: 'I desired to do your will, O my God' (Psalm 40:8). But the Son gave Himself, in order to overthrow the injustice that was in us with justice itself. Wisdom offered itself in order to conquer ignorance. Holiness and strength presented themselves in order to eliminate impurity and weakness. And in this way, not only in the future age according to the promised hope in which we believe, but also here in the present age, He has freed us: while we have died together with Christ, we are transformed into a new way of thinking, and we are not of this world, from which we are rightly not loved. The question is how the present age is called evil. For heretics often take advantage of this, asserting that one is the creator of light and the future age, another of darkness and the present. But we say, that it is not so much the age itself, which runs day and night, years and months, that is called evil, but rather the things that happen in the age: how it is said to be sufficient for its own evil (Matthew VI): and the days of Jacob are said to be few and evil (Genesis XLVII). Not that the period of time in which Jacob lived was bad, but that the things he endured through various trials tested him. Finally, during the time he served for his wives and struggled with many difficulties (Gen. XXIX), Esau was at rest, and so the same period of time was good for some and bad for others; and it would not be written in Ecclesiastes: Do not say that my former days (were better) than these (Eccles. VII, 11), unless in comparison to the bad. Where John says: The whole world is set in evil (1 John 5:19). Not that the world itself is evil, but that evil things happen in the world because of humans. Let us eat and drink, they say, for tomorrow we will die (Isaiah 22:17). And the Apostle himself says: Redeeming the time, because the days are evil (Ephesians 5:16). Even the fields and forests are defamed, when they are full of robberies, not because the earth and woods sin, but because they have also drawn infamy to the places of murder. We detest both the sword by which human blood is shed and the cup in which poison has been mixed, not the sword or the cup themselves, but those who have misused them. Thus, this world, which is a span of time, is not inherently good or evil, but is called such by those who are in it. Therefore, the delusions and fables of Valentinius, who invented thirty aeons based on the mention of ages in the Scriptures, are to be despised. He claimed that they are beings and that he produced as many aeons as the Aeneas's sow produced litters, using squares and octads, decades and duodecades. Also to be sought is what is the difference between saeculum and saeculum saeculi, or saecula saeculorum, and where it is placed for a brief span of time, where it is placed for eternity: because in Hebrew saeculum, that is, Olam (), where the letter Vav is added, signifies eternity, but when it is written without Vav it signifies the fiftieth year, which they call Jubilee. For this reason, that Hebrew who, because of his wife and children, loving his Lord, willingly subjects himself to perpetual servitude, is commanded to serve forever (Exod. XXI), that is, until the fiftieth year. Both the Moabites and the Ammonites (Deuteronomy XXIII) are not allowed to enter the Church of the Lord until the fifteenth generation and even forever: because every hard condition of the Jubilee was solved by His coming. Some say that the same sense exists in the ages of ages as in the holy of holies, in the heavens of heavens, in the works of works, in the Songs of Songs: and they have the same difference as the heavens have from those who belong to the heavens, and as the holy things which are holier than the comparison of the holy things, and as the works which are better than the comparison of the works, and as the Songs which excel among all the Songs: in the same way, they say, the ages have the same relationship to the comparison of ages. Therefore, they have determined that the present age should be counted from the time when the heavens and the earth were created, and it will continue until the end of the world, when Christ will judge all things. They also recall the past and advance to a higher level, debating about past and future ages, whether they have been good or bad, or will be in the future. They delve into such deep questions that they have even written books and countless volumes on this subject. But as for the conclusion of the prologue of Paul in the Hebrew language: Amen (), the Seventy translated it as γένοιτο, that is, let it be done. Aquila rendered it as πεπιστωμένος, truly or faithfully. This is also constantly embraced in the Gospel by the Savior, affirming his own words by Amen.

1:6

(Verse 6) I am amazed that you are so quickly shifting away from him who called you into the grace of Christ Jesus, to a different gospel which is not another. There are some who are confusing you and want to pervert the gospel of Christ. We read about the word 'translation' first in Genesis (Gen. 5), where Enoch was translated by God and was not found. And in the books of Kings afterwards (1 Kings 21), when Ahab turned his wife Jezebel from the worship of God to the worship of idols, to do all that the Amorites did, whom the Lord destroyed before the face of the children of Israel. But since there are two translations, one is from God, the other from the devil. Whoever is translated by God is not found by his enemies: nor can the deceiver ambush him. For I think that this signifies and is not found. But whoever is translated by the devil, in this he is translated because he appears to be, but is not. Moreover, the wise men of the world call those who are translated from one teaching to another, translated, like that Dionysius (whose opinion was that pain is not evil: after being overwhelmed by misfortunes and pain of torment, he began to affirm that pain is the greatest of all evils) was called Transposed by them, or Translated, because departing from his previous decree, he fell into the opposite. And so Paul marvels, first because they have been transferred from the freedom of the Gospel to the servitude of legal works. Secondly, because they have been transferred so quickly: for it is not easy to be transferred away from someone's guilt, and to be transferred quickly; just as in martyrdom, not the same punishment is inflicted on one who immediately jumps to denial without struggle and torture, and on one who, between stakes, ropes, and fires, distorted and compelled, denies what he believed. The preaching of the Gospel was still recent, not much time had passed since the Apostle had led the Galatians from idols to Christ. He wonders how quickly they have turned away from Him, to whom they had recently become Christians. And the place itself is remarkable, which can be read in its proper order: I wonder that you are so quickly transferring yourselves from Christ Jesus, who called you by his grace, saying: I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance (Mark 2:17). For by grace you have been saved, through faith; and this is not of yourselves, it is the gift of God. (Ephesians 2:8) But, he says, you have been transferred to another Gospel, which is not another: because everything that is false does not stand, and what is contrary to the truth does not exist, like this: 'Do not give, O Lord, your scepter to those who are not.' (Esther 14:12) And the things that were not, God called into being, in order to make what is not. But if this is said about those who believed in the same God and had the same Scriptures, that they have been transferred to another Gospel, which is not the Gospel, what should we think about Marcion and other heretics, who reject the Creator and falsely pretend to be followers of another God, Christ? Those who do not adhere to the interpretation of the law and letter, or engage in the battle between flesh and spirit, fall and crumble, but they are in discord with the entire authority of the Church. But beautifully he says: Unless there are some who trouble you and want to pervert the Gospel of Christ. They want, he says, to change, pervert, and trouble the Gospel of Christ: but they are not able. For it is the nature of this Gospel that it cannot be anything other than true. Everyone who interprets the Gospel with a different spirit and mind than what is written, disturbs and perverts the Gospel of Christ, turning what is in front into what is behind, and what is behind into what is in front. If someone follows only the letter, they put the later things in the face. If someone relies on Jewish interpretations, they send behind those things which are established in their nature in the face. Moreover, it is appropriately said that the word 'translation' is adapted to the Galatians: for Galatia in our language means 'translation'.

1:8

(Verse 8) 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. This statement can also be understood hyperbolically, not that either an apostle or an angel could preach differently than they had once said: but even if it were possible for both apostles and angels to be changed, one must not deviate from what had once been accepted, especially since the apostle himself demonstrates the steadfastness of his faith elsewhere, saying: I know that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord (Rom. 8:38). I speak the truth, I do not lie, with my conscience bearing witness (Rom. IX, 1). Indeed, these words are not those of one who can ever depart from the Christian faith and love. However, those who do not want this to be understood hypothetically, but truly: that is, that even apostles and angels can be turned to worse things, they oppose it with what even Paul himself knew, that he could stumble if he acted too lazily, saying: But I discipline my body and bring it into subjection, lest, when preaching to others, I myself should become disqualified (I Cor. IX, 27). Angels also are mutable, who have not preserved their principality; but leaving their own habitation, are reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day (Jude, VI). ||The nature of God alone is immutable, of whom it is written: But thou art always the selfsame (Psalm 101: 28). And of himself: For I am the Lord your God, and I change not (Malachi 3: 6). Lucifer has fallen, who once shone brightly; and the one who was once sent to all nations has been crushed on the earth. In this place, the very learned man Tertullian elegantly writes against Apelles and his virgin Philumena, whom a certain angel, possessed by a diabolical and perverse spirit, claimed to be. This angel, according to the prophecy of the Holy Spirit foretold by the Apostle, was cursed long before the birth of Apelles. Furthermore, ἀνάθεμα, a word proper to the Jews, is used both in the book of Joshua (Joshua 6:7) and in the book of Numbers (Numbers 21), when the Lord commanded that everything in Jericho and the detestable Midianites be devoted to destruction and to anathema. Let us question those who assert that Christ and the Apostle Paul, the beloved of God and hitherto unknown, are either the son or the servant who knows not how to curse and does not know how to condemn anyone: how does their Apostle now, in the language of the Jews, that is, of the Creator, use it, and wish to destroy either an angel or an apostle, when he himself is not accustomed to avenge? Moreover, what he added, as we have foretold, and now I say again, shows that he, being careful of this very thing from the beginning, had denounced anathema to those who would preach otherwise, and now that it has been preached, he enforces the anathema which he had foretold before. Therefore, they accused him of doing one thing in Judea and teaching another, and they pronounced a curse on the angel, whom it was even known to be greater than his predecessors, the apostles, so that the authority of Peter and John would not be considered great, since it was not allowed for him who had taught them before, nor for the angel to preach differently than they had learned once. Therefore, he mentioned himself and the angel by name, but the others without a name. If anyone, he said, were to proclaim the gospel to you without doing harm to your predecessors; and yet, he would secretly reveal their names.

1:10

(Verse 10.) For now I advise men or God: or do I seek to please men? If I were still pleasing men, I would not be a servant of Christ. Let us not think that we are taught by the Apostle to despise the judgments of men by his example, who in another place said: Knowing therefore, the fear of the Lord, we persuade men: but we are made manifest to God (2 Corinthians 5:11); and that: Be without offense to the Jews, and to the Gentiles, and to the Church of God: as I also please all in all things, not seeking what is profitable to myself, but what is profitable to many, that they may be saved (1 Corinthians 10). But if it is possible, that we may please both God and men at the same time, it is necessary to please men. But if we do not please men in any other way than if we displease God: we ought to please God rather than men. Otherwise, he himself brings forward the reason why he is pleasing to all through all things: Not seeking, he says, what is useful to me, but what is useful to many, so that they may be saved. But whoever, out of that charity which does not seek its own things, but those that are others', pleases everyone so that they may be saved: certainly he first pleases God, to whom the salvation of men is a care. However, it also has a word, which is specifically added here, either to please people temporarily or to displease them: so that he who does not please at the moment because of the truth of the Gospel, may have pleased formerly for the salvation of many. Paul had pleased the Jews at one time, when he was an emulator of paternal traditions, having lived blamelessly according to the law, and he had such enthusiasm and faith in the ceremonies of the ancestors that he even became involved in the killing of Stephen, and he went to Damascus to bind those who had deserted the law (Acts 9). But after he was transferred to the vessel of election from a persecutor, and began to preach the faith which he had once attacked, he began to displease the Jews, whom he had previously pleased. This is therefore what he says: Am I seeking to please the Jews, by displeasing whom I pleased God? For if I were still pleasing them, I would not be a servant of Christ. For I would affirm the law, and destroy the grace of the Gospel. But now, I am not even brought to the pretense of observing the law, because I cannot please both God and the Jews at the same time. For whoever endeavors to persuade others with a word taken from human usage, with what he himself possesses and has once imbibed, and in many passages of the Scriptures it is read, from which this is one: The persuasion is not from him who called you (Gal. 5:8). And also in the Acts of the Apostles: Therefore many Jews came to him in the inn, to whom he explained, testifying about the kingdom of God and persuading them about Jesus, from the Law of Moses and the Prophets until evening. And all of this happened because it had been spread (or slandered) about him that he secretly observed the Law and had mixed with those who were practicing Judaism in Jerusalem.

1:11-12

(Verse 11, 12.) For I make known to you, brothers, the Gospel that was preached by me: that it is not according to man, nor did I receive it from man, nor was I taught it, but through the revelation of Jesus Christ. From this passage, the teachings of Ebion and Photinus are refuted: that God is Christ, and not only man. For if the Gospel of Paul is not according to man, nor did he receive it from man, nor was he taught it, but through the revelation of Jesus Christ; Jesus Christ, who revealed the Gospel to Paul, is certainly not a mere man. But if he is not a man, therefore he is God. Not that we deny that he assumed humanity; but only that we refuse mere humanity. The question is whether the whole Church of God has received the Gospel, or just individual people: for how many of us have learned the revelation of Christ and known it not from a human preacher? To which we will respond, those who can say: Do you seek proof of Christ speaking in me (2 Cor. 13:3)? And: I no longer live, but Christ lives in me (Galatians 2:20), teaching not so much themselves, but God who speaks to the saints: I said, 'You are gods, and all of you are sons of the Most High' (Psalm 82:6); and immediately about sinners: But you will die like men, and fall like one of the princes. Therefore, when Paul and Peter, who do not die like men or fall like one of the princes, speak of them being gods, it is evident. But those who are gods, they transmit the Gospel of God, and not of man. Marcion and Basilides and other heretical pests do not have the Gospel of God; because they do not have the Holy Spirit, without whom the human Gospel is not possible to be taught. Nor can we consider the Gospel to be in the words of the Scriptures, but in the meaning: not in the surface, but in the core; not in the leaves of words, but in the root of reason. It is said in the prophet about God: His words are good with him (Micah 2:7). Then the Scriptures are useful to those who listen, since they are not spoken without Christ, nor proclaimed without the Father, nor are they revealed without the Spirit by the one who preaches. Otherwise, both the devil, who speaks about the Scriptures, and all heresies, according to Ezekiel (Chapter XIII), make for themselves pillows that they place under the elbow of all ages. Even I, who am speaking, if I have Christ in me, do not have the Gospel of man; but if I am a sinner, God says to me: O sinner, why do you declare my justice and assume my covenant on your lips? But you have hated discipline and cast my words behind you (Ps. XLIX, 16, 17), and so on that follows. There is great danger in speaking in the Church, lest by a perverse interpretation, the Gospel of Christ becomes the gospel of man, or worse, of the devil. However, there is a difference between receiving and learning, in that the one receives the Gospel to whom it is first taught and is led to faith, to believe what is written. But he learns who understands the things that are represented in it by enigmas and parables, when they are explained and expounded: and he understands them not through the revelation of man, but through Christ, who revealed them to Paul, or through Paul, in whom Christ speaks. The very word 'revelation' itself, that is, 'unveiling,' properly belongs to the Scriptures, and was not used by any of the wise men of the world among the Greeks. Therefore, they seem to me, just as in other words that the Seventy translators translated from Hebrew into Greek, to have made a great effort also in this one to express the peculiarity of a foreign language by inventing new words for new things: and the word 'to sound' means when something that is hidden and covered is shown and brought forth into the light, by removing the covering from above. To make this clearer, take the example of Moses. When he spoke with God, his face was revealed and uncovered (Exodus 33, 34), that is, without a veil. But when he spoke to the people, they could not look at his face, so he put a veil on (Numbers 4). Also, in front of the Ark of the Covenant, there was a veil. When this veil was pulled back, the things that had been hidden were revealed, or, to use the words itself, they were uncovered. So if those who are accustomed to reading the eloquent works of the present age start mocking us for the novelty and cheapness of our language, let us send them to Cicero's books, which are renowned for their philosophical inquiries; and let them see how compelled he was by necessity to produce such monstrous words that the ears of a Latin man have never heard: and this even when he was translating from Greek, a language that is close to ours. What do those who attempt to express the peculiarities of Hebrew difficulties endure? And yet there are much fewer things in such great volumes of Scriptures that sound new, than those that he has collected in a small work. But, as we said at the beginning when we were explaining: Paul the apostle did not receive his mission from men or through a man: in this place, it can be understood indirectly of Peter and his predecessors: that it may not be objected to on account of anyone's law or authority, who holds Christ alone as the teacher of the Gospel. Moreover, it signifies that revelation, when on his journey to Damascus, he deserved to hear the voice of Christ: and with blinded eyes, he beheld the true light of the world.

1:13

(Verse 13.) For you have heard of my previous conduct in Judaism, how I persecuted the church of God beyond measure and tried to destroy it; and I advanced in Judaism beyond many of my contemporaries in my own nation, being more exceedingly zealous for the traditions of my fathers. This account is highly beneficial to the Galatians, as it shows how Paul, once a destroyer of the church and a fervent defender of Judaism, suddenly converted to the faith of Christ. And it was at this time, when the crucifixion was first announced in the world; when the new doctrine was being expelled from the boundaries of both the Gentiles and the Jews. For they could say: If he, who from a young age was instructed in the teachings of the Pharisees, and surpassed all his contemporaries in the Jewish tradition, now defends the Church which he once fiercely persecuted; and desires the grace and novelty of Christ more than the oldness of the Law, to the envy of all: what should we who have begun to be Christian from the Gentiles do? Moreover, he aptly added: I pursued the Church of God beyond measure, so that from here also admiration might arise, that not every person who lightly persecuted the Church, but he who overcame the others in persecution, turned to the faith. And wisely, while narrating something else, he interjects that he served not so much the Law of God, as the paternal, that is, the traditions of the Pharisees; who teach the doctrines and commandments of men (Matt. XV; Mark VII); and they reject the Law of God in order to establish their own traditions. However, what a beautiful observation and weight of words: 'You have heard,' he says, 'of my former life in Judaism, how I persecuted the church of God violently and tried to destroy it. 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.' And he says, not the Church of Christ, as he then thought (or was thought): which he considered contemptible, which he persecuted: but as he now believes, the Church of God: either signifying that Christ himself is God, or that the Church is of the same God who was once the giver of the Law. And I made progress, he says, in Judaism beyond many of my contemporaries in my race: being a more zealous follower of my ancestral traditions. Again, he calls it progress not of the Law of God, but of Judaism. Not above all, but above most, not above the elders, but above the contemporaries, so that he might apply his zeal to the Law and avoid boasting. However, by mentioning the traditions of the fathers instead of the commandments of the Lord, and by identifying himself as a Pharisee among the Pharisees, he showed that he had indeed a zeal for God but not according to knowledge. But until this day, those who understand the Scriptures in a Jewish sense persecute the Church of Christ and plunder it, corrupted not by the study of the Law of God but by human traditions.

1:15

(Verse 15) But when it pleased Him who separated me from my mother's womb, and called me by His grace, to reveal His Son in me, that I might preach Him among the Gentiles, I did not immediately confer with flesh and blood, nor did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were apostles before me; but I went to Arabia, and returned again to Damascus. Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to see Peter, and remained with him fifteen days. But I saw none of the other apostles except James, the Lord's brother. (Now concerning the things which I write to you, indeed, before God, I do not lie.) Afterward I went into the regions of Syria and Cilicia. And I was unknown by face to the churches of Judea which were in Christ. But they were hearing only, "He who formerly persecuted us now preaches the faith which he once tried to destroy." And they glorified God in me. But I make known to you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached by me is not according to man. For I neither received it from man, nor was I taught it, but it came through the revelation of Jesus Christ. David sings against sinners: For behold, I was conceived in iniquities, and my mother conceived me in sins (Ps. 50:7). And in another place: Sinners are estranged from the womb (Ps. 57:4). And even before the children were born, God loved Jacob but hated Esau (Malachi 1:1, 2). Heretics find a place where they claim there are different natures, namely spiritual, animal, and earthly, and that one is saved, another perishes, and another exists between the two, so that neither the righteous would be chosen before doing anything good, nor would the sinner be hated before committing a sin, unless there were different natures of those who perish and those who are saved. To which it can be simply answered: this happens from God's foreknowledge, that he loves whom he knows will be just before they are born from the womb, and hates whom he knows will be a sinner before they sin; not that in God there is injustice in love and hatred, but that he must not have them otherwise, knowing either that they will be sinners or that they will be just: we as humans can only judge based on the present, but He to whom the future is already made known can pass judgment on the end of things, not on their beginnings. And indeed, these things have been said in a simpler manner: and without a deeper discussion, they can please the reader in some way. Moreover, those who try to assert that God is unjust, after what we have previously stated, have strayed from the womb, and they also bring forth the other things that follow: They have gone astray from the womb, they have uttered falsehoods. And they say, how is it that sinners have immediately gone astray from the womb and have uttered falsehoods, when they could not even have speech or understanding? But what is this justice of the foreknowledge of God, to love and guard one before they are born, and to detest another? And the causes of this matter refer to a previous life, that each person is assigned to good or evil angels according to their merit, immediately from their first birth. And that whole passage about Jacob and Esau, which we mention now, is discussed in such a way in the letter to the Romans (Rom. IX), that it cannot be answered without sweat and Chrysippus' hellebore. However, it is not the same for him to reveal his Son in me, as if he were to say, to reveal his Son to me. For whoever something is revealed, to him it can be revealed, which was not in him before. But in whom it is revealed, that is revealed which was in him before, and later revealed. It is similar to what is said in the Gospel: Among you stands one whom you do not know (John 1:26). And elsewhere: He was the true light, which enlightens every person coming into the world (ibid., 9). From which it becomes clear that the knowledge of God is inherent in all of nature, and no one is born without Christ, and does not have the seeds of wisdom, justice, and other virtues within them. Hence, many without faith and the Gospel of Christ, either wisely do certain things, or piously, such as obeying their parents, extending help to the needy, not oppressing their neighbors, not plundering others, and therefore become more susceptible to the judgment of God because, having within them the principles of virtues and the seeds of God, they do not believe in Him without whom they cannot exist. It is possible to take it in another way in the letter of Paul, Sons of God revealed: that, when he preached, he was acknowledged by the Gentiles, whom they previously did not know.

1:16

(Verse 16) Immediately, I did not consult with flesh and blood. Or, as it is better in Greek: I did not confer with flesh and blood. I know that many consider this statement to be about the apostles. For even Porphyry objects that after the revelation of Christ, he did not deign to go to men and confer with them: lest, of course, he be instructed by flesh and blood after the teaching of God. But far be it from me to think that Peter, John, and James are flesh and blood; which cannot possess the kingdom of God (1 Corinthians 1). If the spiritual apostles are flesh and blood, what do we think of the earthly ones? Paul did not associate himself with flesh and blood after the revelation of Christ, because he did not want to cast pearls before swine or give what is holy to dogs (Matthew 7). See what is written about sinners: My spirit will not remain in these people, for they are flesh (Genesis 6). With those who were flesh and blood, who did not reveal the Son of God to Peter either (Matthew 16), the Apostle did not share the Gospel that had been revealed to him, but gradually turned them from flesh and blood to spirit. And only then did he entrust them with the hidden sacraments of the Gospel. Let someone say: If immediately he did not communicate the Gospel with flesh and blood, nevertheless it is understood that later he will communicate with flesh and blood: and this understanding, by which the apostles are excused, cannot stand, lest flesh and blood be [involved], since nevertheless he who did not communicate with flesh and blood in the beginning, later, as I said, will communicate with flesh and blood. This preposition constrains us, that we may distinguish thus, lest immediately or continuously, we unite with flesh and blood; but that we may adhere to the previous statements, and it may be read: But when it pleased him who separated me from the womb of my mother. And then: That he might reveal his Son in me. And finally: That I might preach him among the Gentiles immediately: that I have not conferred with flesh and blood; but rather it should be understood in this sense: that he who is immediately sent to proclaim the Gospel to the Gentiles after the revelation of Christ, has not remained, nor has he extended the time by going to the apostles and comparing the Lord's revelation with men: but he has gone to Arabia, and then returned to Damascus, and after three years he preached the Gospel; and only then, coming to Jerusalem, did he see Peter, John, and James.

1:17

(Verse 17.) Nor did I go to Jerusalem to the apostles before me. If he had mentioned the apostles, I did not confer with flesh and blood. So why was it necessary to repeat the same thing by saying, Nor did I go to Jerusalem to the apostles before me? Therefore, we must maintain the meaning that we explained above.

But I went into Arabia and then returned to Damascus. It does not seem to fit with the order of the story, as recounted by Luke in the Acts of the Apostles (Acts IX), that after Paul spoke boldly about the Gospel of Christ for many days in Damascus, plots were made against him and he was lowered in a basket through the wall at night, and he came to Jerusalem trying to join the disciples. But when they avoided him and were afraid to approach him, he was brought to the apostles by Barnabas and he told them how he had seen the Lord on the road and had acted confidently in the name of the Lord (some versions add Jesus) while in Damascus. He was, he said, with them, going in and out in Jerusalem, boldly acting in the name of the Lord. He also spoke and debated with the Greeks, but they sought to kill him. When the brothers learned of this, they brought him down to Caesarea and sent him off to Tarsus. But he says that he first went to Arabia, and then returned to Damascus after three years, and went to Jerusalem, saw Peter, and stayed with him for fifteen days, and did not see anyone else except James, the brother of the Lord. In order for them to be believed as true (since doubtful things could appear questionable in the absence of witnesses), he confirms under oath, saying: “The things that I tell you are true, behold, I say them before God, for I do not lie.” Therefore, we can conclude that Paul, according to the account of Luke, went to Jerusalem not to learn something from the apostles who came before him, but to avoid the onslaught of persecution that had been incited against him in Damascus because of the Gospel of Christ. And so he came to Jerusalem as if he had come to any other city. Then, when he had immediately withdrawn on account of the ambush, he came to Arabia or Damascus; and then, after three years, he returned to see Peter in Jerusalem. Or certainly, this is how it happened: Immediately after he was baptized and strengthened by receiving food, he stayed with the disciples in Damascus for a few days; and while all the Jews in the synagogues were amazed, he preached continuously that Jesus was the Son of God. Then he went to Arabia, and returned from Arabia to Damascus, where he spent three years. These many days are attested by the Scripture, which says: When many days had passed, the Jews plotted to kill him (Acts 9:23). However, there were plots made against Saul, and they were guarding the gates day and night in order to kill him. So, his disciples took him at night and lowered him down the wall in a basket. When he arrived in Jerusalem, he tried to join the disciples. But Luke mentions that he passed through Arabia because perhaps he had not done anything deserving of apostleship in Arabia. And he chose to give a concise account of the things that seemed worthy of the Gospel of Christ. Nor should we attribute this to the laziness of the Apostle, if he stayed in Arabia in vain (or: remained): but rather that it was some dispensation and command of God that he should keep silent. For we also read that after this Paul went out with Silas, and the Holy Spirit prohibited him from speaking the word in Asia (Acts 16). In another passage: But I went to Arabia; and again, I returned to Damascus. What benefit is this account to me, if I read that Paul immediately went to Arabia after the revelation of Christ, and immediately returned from Arabia to Damascus, without knowing what he did there, or what usefulness his going and returning had? Give me the opportunity for a deeper understanding in this same letter the Apostle himself, while discussing Abraham, Hagar, and Sarah, says: These things, he says, are spoken in allegory. For these are the two covenants: one indeed from Mount Sinai, which brings forth into slavery, and that is Hagar. For Sinai is a mountain in Arabia, which is joined to the present Jerusalem (Gal. IV, 24, 25). And he teaches that the old Testament, that is, the son of the servant girl, was established in Arabia (which translates to humble and western). So immediately, as soon as Paul believed, he turned to the Law, the Prophets, and the sacraments of the old Testament which were already placed in the west, and he sought in them the Christ whom he had been instructed to preach to the Gentiles. And having found Him, he did not linger there any longer; but he returned to Damascus, that is, to the blood and passion of Christ. And from there, strengthened by prophetic reading, he went on to Jerusalem, the place of the vision and peace: not so much to learn something from the apostles as to compare the Gospel that he had taught with them.

1:18

(Verse 18.) Then, after three years, I came to Jerusalem to see Peter. Not to look at his eyes, cheeks, and face, to see if he was thin or fat, if he had a hooked or straight nose, and if he covered his forehead with hair or (as Clement reports in his Periods) had baldness on his head. And I don't think it was the gravity of the Apostolic office that wanted to see something human in Peter after such a long three-year preparation. But she looked at him with these eyes, with which she seems to see him even now in her Letters. With his own eyes, Paul saw Peter, whom now by the wise and learned, Paul himself is seen. And if someone does not see this, let them join these facts with their superior understanding: that the apostles did not confer anything upon themselves. For even though Paul was told to go to Jerusalem, it was for the purpose of seeing the apostle, not for the purpose of learning, because he himself had the same author of preaching; but rather to show honor to the apostle who was before him.


And I stayed with him for fifteen days. He did not lack for great instruction, as he had prepared himself so much time to see Peter. And although it may seem excessive to some, it is also fitting to observe the numbers that are in the Scriptures: nevertheless, I think it is not without reason that the fifteen days Paul spent with Peter signify complete knowledge and perfected doctrine. For there are fifteen songs in the Psalter, and fifteen steps by which the righteous ascend to sing to God, and stand in his courts. Moreover, Ezechias, having been granted fifteen years of life, deserves to receive a sign in the degrees (Isa. XXXVIII): and the solemnities of God begin on the fifteenth day (Exod. XII). Also, (because we follow a double understanding) therefore he adds fifteen days, to show that there was not a long time in which he could have learned anything from Peter; so that everything may be referred back to that meaning from which he began: that he was not taught by man, but by God.

1:19

(Verse 19) But I saw none of the other apostles, except James the Lord's brother. I remember that while I was in Rome, I published a book on the perpetual virginity of Saint Mary under the urging of the brothers. In this matter, I had to argue for a long time about those who are called the brothers of the Lord. Therefore, we should be satisfied with whatever we have written. Now let it suffice that, because of his outstanding character and incomparable faith and wisdom, he was called the Lord's brother, not in an ordinary sense. And he was the first to preside over the Church, which was the first to be gathered to Christ from among the Jews. Indeed, the other apostles are also called brothers of the Lord, as in the Gospel: 'Go, tell my brethren: I go to my Father, and your Father; to my God, and your God' (John 20:17). And in the psalm: 'I will declare Your name to my brethren; in the midst of the church will I praise You' (Psalm 22:22). But especially here this person is called brother, to whom the Lord had entrusted the sons of his mother as he went to the Father. And just as Job and the other patriarchs were indeed called servants of God, but Moses had something extraordinary, so that it was written about him: 'But not as Moses, my servant' (Hebrews 3:5), likewise the blessed James is specially called the brother of the Lord (as we said before). But why, except for the twelve, some are called apostles is this: all who had seen the Lord, and then preached about Him, were called apostles, as it is written to the Corinthians: 'He appeared to Cephas, then to the eleven.' After that, He appeared to more than five hundred brethren at once, many of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then He appeared to James, then to all the apostles (I Cor. XV, 5 seqq.). But gradually, as time went on, and elsewhere from those whom the Lord had chosen, the apostles were ordained; as he declares in his letter to the Philippians, saying: But I thought it necessary to send back to you Epaphroditus, my brother and fellow worker and fellow soldier, who is also your apostle and minister to my need (Philippians 2:25). And concerning such, it is written to the Corinthians: whether apostles of the churches, the glory of God (2 Corinthians 8:23). Silas and Judas were also named apostles by the apostles. Therefore, he greatly erred who believed that James, the brother of John, mentioned in the Gospel, was an apostle. It is well known that James, after Stephen, shed his blood for Christ according to the faith of the Acts of the Apostles (Acts 12). However, this James was the first bishop of Jerusalem, also known as James the Just. He was a man of such great holiness and reputation among the people that they eagerly sought to touch the fringe of his garment. And he himself, after being cast down from the temple by the Jews, had Simon as his successor, whom they also relate was crucified as the Lord. He denies that he met any of the other apostles, aside from those mentioned, so as not to give rise to hidden contradictions: even if you were not taught by Peter, you had other apostles as teachers. However, he did not see them, not because he regarded them with contempt, but because they had been scattered throughout the whole world for the preaching of the Gospel.

1:20

(Verse 20) But what I write to you: behold before God, because I do not lie. Whether to be taken simply, so it is: What I write to you is true, and I confirm it with God as a witness, that they are not tainted by any art of words or any falsehood. Or to be understood more deeply, so it is read: What I write to you is before God, that is, worthy of God's sight. But why worthy of God's sight? Because, of course, I do not lie. And just as the eyes of the Lord are upon the righteous (Psalm 33), but he turns his face away from the sight of the wicked, so now the things which are written are before the Lord, with me not lying who writes; they would not be before the Lord if I were lying. However, not only can this be understood concerning the things which he is now writing to the Galatians, but also generally concerning all these Epistles: that the things he writes are not false and his heart and words are not in disagreement.

1:21

(Verse. 21.) Then I came to the regions of Syria and Cilicia. After the vision in Jerusalem, I went to Syria, which is called the exalted and lofty city. And from there I went to Cilicia, which I desired to embrace in the faith of Christ, preaching to it the call to repentance: for Cilicia in fact means assumption, or lamentable calling.

1:22-24

(Verses 22-24.) But I was unknown by face to the churches of Judea, which were in Christ Jesus. They only heard it said: He who once persecuted us now preaches the faith which he once tried to destroy. And they glorified God in me. The churches of Judea had only heard of me by reputation. And among them, they saw me more as a persecutor than as an apostle. But in Syria and Cilicia, Arabia and Damascus, they might have recognized me by sight as well: because I, as the Apostle to the Gentiles, preached the gospel of Christ not to the Jews, but to the Gentiles. But the whole point of what he does is this: to show that he could never have been glorious before those very people whom he had previously persecuted unless his preaching had also been proven by their judgment, even by those who had known him before as evil. And he returns secretly to his purpose, affirming that he spent such a short time in Judea that even those who believed were unaware of his appearance. From this he shows that he did not have Peter, James, or John as his teachers, but Christ, who revealed the Gospel to him. At the same time, it should be noted that while it was said above that the Church was under attack, here faith is: there men, here things; so that now (or then) it could be more opportune: He preaches the faith, which he once attacked. For they could not make a similar sound about the Church.

2:1-2

(Chapter 2 - Verses 1, 2) Then after fourteen years, I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, taking Titus along also. I went up by revelation, and I discussed with them the gospel that I preach to the Gentiles, but privately with those who seemed to be influential, so that I might not be running in vain or have run in vain. This matter arose because of false brothers secretly brought in, who slipped in to spy out our freedom that we have in Christ Jesus, so that they might bring us into slavery. And to speak more truthfully, the Greek word ἀνεθέμην conveys something different than what is understood among us, namely that we compare what we know with a friend and place it in their lap and conscience, so that, with equal counsel, what we know may either be approved or disapproved. Therefore, after fourteen years, he went up to Jerusalem. And he who had previously gone only to see Peter and stayed with him for fifteen days, now says that he went there to confer with the apostles about the Gospel. And he took along Barnabas, who was circumcised, and Titus, who was uncircumcised among the Gentiles, so that every word may be established by the testimony of two or three witnesses (Deut. 19:15). But it is one thing to compare, another to learn. Among those who compare, there is equality; between the teacher and the learner, the one who learns is lesser. At the beginning of faith, he saw the apostles during their journey. After seventeen years (as he himself says), he speaks fully with them and humbles himself: and lest he might be running or might have run in vain, he inquires. For a twofold reason, so that the humility of Paul, who, as a teacher, had already surpassed the apostles who came before him in the whole world of the Gentiles, might be shown: and so that the Galatians may not say that they rejected his Gospel, also condemning those who presided over the Churches in Judea. Moreover, it also teaches that for the sake of the faith of Christ and the liberty of the Gospel, he dared to lead Titus, an uncircumcised man, to those same individuals who knew more about him, who accused him of breaking the Law, destroying Moses, and completely doing away with circumcision. And in the midst of such a great multitude of Jews and his enemies, who desired to shed his blood out of zeal for the Law, neither he nor Titus gave way to fear, but stood firm in necessity. They were able to obtain forgiveness, either in terms of position or authority of the elders, or in terms of the number of churches that believed in Christ from the Jews, or in terms of time, so as not to endure such great envy at the same time. Some say that after fourteen years he went up to Jerusalem, when a dispute arose among the believers in Antioch regarding the observance or omission of the Law, as recorded in the Acts of the Apostles. It was decided to go to Jerusalem and wait for the judgment of the elders, when Paul and Barnabas themselves were sent. And this is what is written in the Latin codices: We yielded to subjection for a time, so that the truth of the Gospel would persist among you. That is why, clearly, Paul and Barnabas were sent to Jerusalem as if it were doubtful, in order to confirm by the judgment of the elders that the grace of the Gospel had also been given to the believers, and that there would be no further doubt about the omission of circumcision. For it had been commanded by the letters of the apostles that the yoke of the Law should be removed from those who believed in Christ from the Gentiles. However, it can be understood that when he says, 'I conferred with them the Gospel that I preach to the Gentiles,' he means separately to those who seemed important, so that I might not run or have run in vain, and thus it can be understood that he shared with the apostles in secret the grace of Gospel freedom and the abolishment of the old Law, because of the multitude of believing Jews who were not yet able to hear about the fulfillment and end of the Law, and who, in the absence of Paul, had falsely boasted in Jerusalem that he was going on a pointless or fruitless journey, thinking that the old Law should not be followed. Not because Paul feared that he had preached a false Gospel among the Gentiles for seventeen years; but to show his predecessors that he was not running or had run in vain, as they had thought in their ignorance.

2:3-5

(Vers. 3-5.) But not even Titus, who was with me, though he was a Gentile, was compelled to be circumcised. Yet because of false brothers secretly brought in—who slipped in to spy out our freedom that we have in Christ Jesus, so that they might bring us into slavery— to them we did not yield in submission even for a moment, so that the truth of the gospel might be preserved for you. But even Titus, who was with me, was not compelled to be circumcised, although he was a Gentile. This matter arose because of false brothers secretly brought in, who slipped in to spy out our freedom that we have in Christ Jesus, so that they might bring us into slavery. But what is this truth of the Gospel, to give in to the hypocrisy of the Jews; and to consider as scybala what you once esteemed, and to despise as losses, and to observe and esteem as something, when they are nothing? But it strongly opposes the meaning of the Epistle itself, to call the Galatians back to circumcision. This is the main theme throughout his discourse, to teach that he is a Hebrew among the Hebrews, once observing all the works of the Law, circumcised on the eighth day according to the Law of the Pharisees: nevertheless, for the grace of Christ, to completely despise everything. For when he went to Jerusalem, and the false brethren, who believed in circumcision, wanted to compel him to circumcise Titus; neither Titus, nor did he give in to violence, so that they would safeguard the truth of the Gospel. But if he says that he was compelled by necessity to circumcise Titus: how does he recall the Galatians from circumcision, from which neither Titus, who was with him from the Gentiles, could excuse himself in Jerusalem? Therefore, according to the Greek manuscripts, it should be read, 'To whom we did not yield in subjection, not even for an hour,' so that it may be understood subsequently: so that the truth of the Gospel may remain with you. But if the testimony of the Latin exemplars is pleasing to anyone, we must understand it according to the higher sense: that the purpose was not for Titus to be circumcised, but to go to Jerusalem. For this reason, Paul and Barnabas submitted to going to Jerusalem, due to the sedition caused by the Law of Antioch. This was done so that the truth of the Gospel would be confirmed by the letter of the apostles and remain among the Galatians, which was not in the literal sense, but in the spiritual sense. It was not in the carnal understanding, but in spiritual intelligence, and not in overt Judaism, but in hidden understanding. It is worth knowing that the conjunction 'autem,' which is placed in this position, is superfluous if it is read without any purpose to respond to it and if it concludes the previous statement. However, it serves to maintain the order of reading and the sense of the passage. So, Titus, who was with me, being a Gentile, was not compelled to be circumcised. And immediately after, it explains the reason why he was being urged to undergo circumcision against his will. 'Because of the false brothers secretly brought in, who slipped in to spy out our freedom that we have in Christ Jesus, so that they might bring us into slavery.' But when they were serving as ministers and wished to drag us into the servitude of the Law from the freedom of Christ, we did not even yield to them for a moment, so that we might not give any occasion to them to accuse us. And we did this primarily because of the ecclesiastical peace, so that we could excuse ourselves from necessity, and we did all of this so that you would not have any opportunity to depart from the grace of the Gospel. Therefore, if we, while in Jerusalem, among so many Jews who were falsely claiming to be brothers and those who were exerting influence over us to some extent, could not be compelled by force or reason to observe the circumcision that we knew was abolished, then you, coming from the Gentiles, you in Galatia, you to whom no violence can be done, voluntarily abandoning the grace, have transcended the antiquity of the already abolished Law.

2:6

(Verse 6) But from those who seemed to be something—whatever they were,it makes no difference to me; God shows personal favoritism to no man—for those who seemed to be something added nothing to me. But on the contrary, when they saw that the gospel for the uncircumcised had been committed to me, as the gospel for the circumcised was to Peter (for He who worked effectively in Peter for the apostleship to the circumcised also worked effectively in me toward the Gentiles), and when James, Cephas, and John, who seemed to be pillars, perceived the grace that had been given to me, they gave me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship, that we should go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised. They desired only that we should remember the poor, the very thing which I also was eager to do. But when Peter had come to Antioch, I withstood him to his face, because he was to be blamed; for before certain men came from James, he would eat with the Gentiles; but when they came, he withdrew and separated himself, fearing those who were of the circumcision. And the rest of the Jews also played the hypocrite with him, so that even Barnabas was carried away with their hypocrisy. But when I saw that they were not straightforward about the truth of the gospel, I said to Peter before them all, “If you, being a Jew, live in the manner of Gentiles and not as the Jews, why do you compel Gentiles to live as Jews? For God does not show favoritism. He doesn't play favorites. In fact, He has no favorites. It makes no difference who you are or where you're from—if you want God and are ready to do what He says, the door is open. The Message He sent to the children of Israel—that through Jesus Christ everything is being put together again—well, He's doing it everywhere, among everyone. And thus, cautiously and gradually, Peter walks a middle path between praise and rebuke, so that he may defer to his predecessor the apostle, and yet boldly oppose him to his face, compelled by truth.

For those who seemed important, contributed nothing to me. He himself, however, conferred with them earlier and recounted many things to them that he had accomplished among the nations: they contributed nothing to him, but only confirmed what he had said, giving the right hand of fellowship, and they strengthened the gospel of me and of Paul. Again, it must be noted that the word 'conferred' itself is in Greek, which we discussed earlier.

2:7-8

(Vers. 7, 8.) But on the contrary, when they saw that I had been entrusted with the gospel for the uncircumcised, just as Peter had been entrusted with the gospel for the circumcised (for he who worked through Peter for his apostolic ministry to the circumcised worked also through me for mine to the Gentiles), and when James and Cephas and John, who seemed to be pillars, perceived the grace that was given to me, they gave the right hand of fellowship to Barnabas and me, that we should go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised. Ὑπέρβατον est, et multis quae in medio sunt interjecta sublatis, sic breviter legi potest: Mihi enim qui videbantur esse nihil contulerunt: sed econtra dexteras dederunt mihi et Barnabae, societatis. Aut certe ille absque jactatione sui, occultus est sensus: Mihi qui videbantur esse aliquid, nihil contulerunt; sed econtra a me eis collatum est, dum fiunt in Evangelii gratia firmiores. Totum autem quod dicit, hoc est: unus atque idem mihi Evangelium praeputii, et Petro circumcisionis credidit. He sent me to the Gentiles, and he appointed him in Judea. Neither could the Gentiles, who were no longer young and could not benefit from the pain of circumcision, abstain from the foods they had always been accustomed to and that God had created for them to use; nor could those who believed and were circumcised from the Jews, and who, by custom, thought they had more than the other Gentiles, easily despise the things in which they boasted. Therefore, by the providence of God, one apostle was given to the circumcised, who seemed to acquiesce to the shadows of the Law, while another was given to those who were uncircumcised, who did not consider the grace of the Gospel to be slavery, but rather free faith. Lest any impediment to faith arise under any occasion: and because of circumcision or uncircumcision, one would not believe in Christ. And we do not say this because Peter, who himself also testified that no man is common in the Acts of the Apostles (Acts 10), and is taught in that vessel, which he saw sent from heaven with four corners, that it makes no difference whether someone is a Jew or a Gentile, as if he had forgotten the things that came before, concerning the grace of the Gospel, he considered the Law to be observed. But rather, in order to also pretend to keep the Law himself, gradually leading the Jews away from their ancient way of life. For they could not suddenly and contemptuously cast aside so much labor of observance, and the most careful conduct of their former life, as if it were mere refuse and loss. Hence we may clearly understand why Paul and Barnabas, who were in society with Peter, James, and John, received the right hand of fellowship from them. It was not to prevent the gospel of Christ being thought different among those who hitherto observed various rites, or who held diverse opinions, but to establish a common bond both between those who were circumcised and those who were not. Paul wisely maintained this, when he said, 'For He that wrought effectually in Peter to the apostleship of the circumcision, the same was mighty in me toward the Gentiles; and recognizing the favor conferred upon Peter, he thus explains it, that it might be understood how, in receiving circumcision, he did it in part, in order that he might profit those who had believed in him among the Jews, and keep them in the faith and gospel of Christ.' He also understands that if that person were to act without fault and observe the time when it is not allowed, so as not to lose those entrusted to him, he would have to do more for the truth of the Gospel, namely, what was entrusted to him in secret, so that the nations, discouraged by the burden and difficulty of the Law, would not turn away from the faith and belief in Christ. A hidden question arises here: So what? If Peter were to find [people] from the Gentiles, would he not lead them to the faith? But if Paul had found any from the circumcision, did he not invite them to the baptism of Christ? This is resolved in the following way: that we say that it was commanded for each group, the Jews and the Gentiles, that those who defended the Law would have someone to follow, and those who preferred grace over the Law would have a teacher and guide. But in general, their purpose was to gather the Church of Christ from all the nations. For we read that the Gentile Cornelius was baptized by the holy Peter, and that Paul often preached Christ in the synagogues of the Jews. Peter, John, and James, who seemed to be pillars (Acts X, XIII, XVII). Three times before we have read about the Apostles, but after them were the others who seemed to be something. They made no difference to me, those who seemed important. So I was anxious to know what this meant, those who seemed important, but now he has relieved me of all doubts by adding, who seemed to be pillars. Therefore, the pillars of the Church are the apostles, especially Peter, James, and John, among whom two of them deserve to ascend the mountain with the Lord, one of whom introduces the Savior speaking in the Apocalypse: 'To him who overcomes, I will make him a pillar in the temple of my God' (Rev. 3:12), teaching all believing ones who overcome the adversary that they can become pillars of the Church. Writing to Timothy, Paul says: 'So that you may know how one ought to behave in the household of God, which is the Church of the living God, the pillar and support of the truth' (1 Tim. 3:15). And we are instructed by him and the other apostles, all the believers, and even the Church itself is also called the pillar in the Scriptures. And there is no difference whether it is said about the body or the members, since the body is divided into members and the members are the body. Therefore, Peter, James, and John, who seemed to be pillars, gave the right hand of fellowship to Paul and Barnabas; but Titus, who was with them, did not receive the right hand. For he had not yet reached such a measure, that the merchandises of Christ could be believed to him in equal measure with the elders, and hold the same place of negotiation that Barnabas held, and Paul.

2:10

(Verse 10.) So that we might be mindful of the poor, I was also concerned to do this very thing. The holy poor, to whom the care is especially entrusted by the apostles Paul and Barnabas, are those who, as Jewish believers, were bringing the prices of their possessions to be given to the needy at the feet of the apostles, either because they were renouncing the Law, their fellow Jews, and their kinsmen, or because they were being considered as traitors and sacrilegious for believing in the crucified man. Of this ministry, the holy apostle Paul worked with great effort, as his Epistles testify, writing to the Corinthians and the Thessalonians, and to all the churches of the Gentiles, to prepare this gift to be carried to Jerusalem by himself or by those who pleased him. Therefore, he confidently says now that he was also eager to do this very thing. However, the poor can also be received in another way, about whom it is said in the Gospel: Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven (Matthew 5:3). They truly deserve to be remembered, these apostles. And also those poor ones, about whom it is written in Solomon: The redemption of a man's soul, his own wealth (Prov. XIII, 8). But the poor cannot endure a threat. For he cannot hear the terror of future punishments, poor in faith, poor in grace, lacking spiritual riches, nor knowledge of the Scriptures, which are valued as gold and silver and precious stones. Therefore, since the healthy do not need a doctor, but those who are sick, it is fitting for the apostles, too, to gather in the sharing of hands, so that they would not reject the poor or despise sinners; but always remember them, just as Paul remembers that person in Corinth, whom he had saddened for a time in his previous letter, so that, as the body labors through penance, the spirit would be saved (1 Cor. 5); in the second letter, so that he would not be consumed by greater sadness, he called him back to the Church. And he asked everyone to confirm their love for him and to give to their brother as he had given to each of them, fulfilling the covenant he had made in Jerusalem to always remember the poor.

2:11-13

(Verse 11 onwards) But when Peter came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood condemned. For before certain men came from James, he was eating with the Gentiles. But when they came, he withdrew and separated himself, fearing those of the circumcision. And the rest of the Jews acted hypocritically along with him, so that even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy. When I saw that they were not walking straight, according to the truth of the gospel, I said to Peter in the presence of all, 'If you, who are a Jew, live like the Gentiles and not like the Jews, how can you compel the Gentiles to live like Jews?' We are Jews by nature, and not Gentile sinners, but we know that a person is not justified by the works of the law, but through faith in Jesus Christ. Therefore, when the apostle Paul saw that the grace of Christ was in danger, he employed a new battle tactic of the old warrior, to correct the dispensation of Peter, by which he desired the salvation of the Jews, with a new dispensation of contradiction, and to resist him to his face. Not arguing against his intention, but rather publicly contradicting him, so that by Paul's argument and resistance, those who had believed from the Gentiles would be saved. Now if anyone thinks that Paul truly resisted the apostle Peter and boldly did wrong to his predecessor for the sake of the truth of the Gospel, that person's argument will not stand. For even Paul became a Jew to the Jews in order to gain the Jews, and he will be held guilty of the same hypocrisy when he shaved his head in Cenchreae and offered a sacrifice in Jerusalem (Acts 18), and when he circumcised Timothy (Ibid., 16), and practiced foot-washing, which are clearly ceremonial practices of the Jews. Therefore, if the one who was sent to preach to the Gentiles did not think it necessary to say: 'Be without offense to the Jews and to the Church of God' (1 Corinthians 10:32); how can I please everyone in all things, not seeking my own profit, but the profit of many, so that they may be saved? And he did certain things that were contrary to the freedom of the Gospel, so as not to scandalize the Jews. With what authority, with what audacity does he dare to reprehend this in Peter, who was an apostle of the circumcision, when he himself, the apostle of the Gentiles, is accused of committing the same? But as we have already said, he yielded to the public opinion, to Peter and the rest, so that the hypocrisy of observing the Law, which was harming those who had believed from the Gentiles, would be corrected by the hypocrisy of correction, and both peoples would be saved, both those who praise circumcision follow Peter; and those who do not want to be circumcised, preach Paul's freedom. But what he said was blameworthy, therefore he moderated the fasting; so that we understand that he was not so blameworthy to Paul, as he separated himself from those brothers with whom he had eaten before. But a useful simulation, and one to be adopted in time, let us teach an example of King Jehu of Israel, who could not kill the priests of Baal unless he pretended to want to worship the idol, saying: 'Gather (or 'gather together') for me all the priests of Baal: for if Ahab served Baal in few things, I will serve him in many.' (4 Kings 10:18). And David, when he changed his appearance before Abimelech, and who dismissed him and went away. (1 Kings 21) And it is not surprising, even though righteous men, nevertheless, pretend for a time, for their own and others’ salvation, when our Lord Himself, not having sin nor the flesh of sin, assumed the pretense of sinful flesh, so that, condemning sin in the flesh, He would make us the righteousness of God in Himself. Certainly, Paul had read in the Gospel the Lord commanding: But if your brother sins against you, go and correct him between you and him alone. If your brother sins against you, rebuke him; and if he repents, forgive him. (Luke 17:3) And in what way, when he even commanded this to be done to the least of the brothers, did he dare to rebuke the greatest of the apostles so boldly and steadfastly in public; unless it had pleased Peter to be rebuked in this way, and Paul had not done him any harm, about whom he had said before: I went to Jerusalem to see Peter, and I stayed with him for fifteen days: but I saw none of the other apostles. And again: For he who worked in Peter for the apostleship of the circumcision. And below: Peter and James and John, who seemed to be pillars, and the others whom he praises in his praises. Many times, when I was a young man in Rome, I would engage in debates on fictitious lawsuits and exercise myself in true competitions. I would run to the courts of the judges, and I would see the most eloquent orators contending with each other with such bitterness that they would often neglect their duties and turn to personal insults, biting each other with jokes. If they do this, so that they may not incur any suspicion of prevarication, and deceive the surrounding people, what do we think the great pillars of the Church, Peter and Paul, and the vessels of wisdom, ought to have done among the dissenting Jews and Gentiles? Unless it was for the purpose of making their pretended contention the peace of the believers, and the faith of the Church might be established by a holy dispute among them. There are some who think that Cephas, whom Paul writes that he confronted to his face, is not the apostle Peter, but another one of the seventy disciples called by that name. They say that Peter could not have avoided the company of the Gentiles, as he had also baptized the centurion Cornelius. And when he went up to Jerusalem, those who were of the circumcision argued against him, saying: Why did you go to men uncircumcised and eat with them? After recounting the vision, he concluded his response with these words: Therefore, if God gave them the same gift as he gave us when we believed in the Lord Jesus Christ, who was I to hinder God? When they heard this, they fell silent and glorified God, saying, 'So then, even to the Gentiles God has granted repentance unto life.' Especially since the writer of the history, Luke, makes no mention of this disagreement; nor does he ever say that Peter was in Antioch with Paul, and that Porphyry was blaspheming; but if it is believed that Peter erred or that Paul insolently refuted the chief of the apostles, first it must be answered that we do not know the name of some other Cephas, unless it is the one who is called both Cephas and Peter in the Gospel, in Paul's other Epistles, and also in this very passage. Not that Peter signifies one thing and Cephas another, but that as we call the rock in Latin and Greek, so the Hebrews and Syrians, because of the similarity of their languages, name it Cephas. Moreover, the entire argument of the epistle, which is indirectly mentioned concerning Peter, James, and John, contradicts this interpretation. It is not surprising that Luke has remained silent on this matter, considering that he has omitted many other things that Paul claims to have endured, by the liberty of a historian, and it is not necessarily contradictory if one deemed worthy of recounting what another left out among other things for a different reason. Lastly, we have learned that Peter was the first bishop of the Church of Antioch, and then transferred to Rome, which Luke completely omitted. Finally, if we are to create another person called Cephas because of Porphyry's blasphemy, so that Peter is not thought to have erred, countless divine Scriptures will have to be erased, which he condemns because he does not understand. But also against Porphyry, we will fight in another way if Christ commands it: now let us continue with the rest.

2:14

(Verse 14.) But when I saw that they were not walking straight towards the truth of the Gospel, I said to Peter in front of everyone. Just as those who pretend to limp with healthy steps do not have a fault in their feet, but there is some reason why they limp, so Peter, knowing that circumcision and uncircumcision mean nothing, but the observance of God's commandments does, used to eat with the Gentiles, but for a time he withdrew from them, lest he should make the Jews lose faith in Christ. And so Paul, using the same tactic as Peter had pretended, confronted him to his face and spoke openly in front of everyone; not so much to accuse Peter, but rather to correct those for whose sake Peter had pretended, or even to remove pride from the Jews and despair from the Gentiles. But if someone does not like this interpretation, in which neither Peter is shown to have sinned nor Paul to have boldly accused him, they must explain in what way Paul criticizes this in the other case, which he himself committed.


If you, being a Jew, live as a Gentile and not as a Jew, how do you force the Gentiles to live as Jews? Peter is strongly convinced by an unbreakable argument, or rather, through Peter, those who were compelling him to engage in disputes: If, Peter, you being a Jew by nature, born a Jew and observing all the precepts of the Law, now know that these things have no inherent usefulness but are examples and images of things to come, and if you, eating with those who are from the Gentiles, do not live in a superstitious manner as you did before, but now live freely and impartially; how then can you compel those who believed from the Gentiles to Judaize, now separating yourself from them and considering them unclean? For if those from whom you separate are unclean, and yet you do separate, it follows that you compel them to be circumcised and become Jews; while you yourself, being born a Jew, live like a Gentile. And he joyfully shows the reason why he disputed against him: namely, because he was compelling the Gentiles to judaize through his own hypocrisy, as they desired to imitate him.

2:15

(Verse 15) We are by nature Jews, and not sinners from the Gentiles. At this point, heretics sneak in, who, inventing ridiculous and foolish things, say that the spiritual nature cannot sin, nor can the earthly nature do anything just. Let us ask them why branches of the good olive tree were broken off and why branches from a wild olive tree were grafted onto the root of the good olive tree, if nothing can fall from good or rise from evil. Or how was Paul persecuting the Church before he became an Apostle if he was of a spiritual nature? Or how did he become an Apostle afterwards if he was generated from earthly sediment? But if they contend that He was not of earthly origin, let us set down His own words: 'We were by nature children of wrath, like the others' (Ephesians II, 3). The Jew by nature is one who is of the race of Abraham and was circumcised by his parents on the eighth day. Not the Jew by nature, who later became one from the Gentiles. But to sum up the whole argument in a few words, this is the sense that is being expressed: 'We', that is, 'I and you, Peter' (for He mixed in His own person, lest it might seem that He was doing injury to them), when we were, He says, Jews by nature, doing the things that were commanded by the Law, and not sinners from among the Gentiles, who either generally, because they serve idols, are sinners, or those whom we now consider unclean, knowing that we cannot be saved by the work of the Law, but by faith in Christ, we believed in Christ, so that what the Law did not give us, faith bestowed on us in Christ.' But if, departing from the Law in which we could not be saved, we turn to faith, in which circumcision of the flesh is not sought but rather devotion of a pure heart, and now by turning away from the Gentiles we do this, so that whoever is not circumcised may be unclean; therefore, faith in Christ, in which we thought we were saved before, is more a minister of sin than of justice, which removes circumcision, and whoever does not have it is unclean. But far be it from me to seek revenge, now that I know that what I once destroyed and considered as useless to me. Once I departed from the Law, I died to the Law in order to live in Christ, and I was crucified with Him, and I was reborn as a new man, relying more on faith than on flesh, and with Christ I departed from the world. What I once embraced, I hold fast. Christ did not die for me in vain: in Him I believed in vain, if I could be saved without faith in Him in the old Law.

2:16

(Verse 16). However, knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the Law, but through faith in Jesus Christ, we also have believed in Christ Jesus, so that we may be justified by faith in Christ and not by the works of the Law. Some say: if what Paul affirms is true, that no one is justified by the works of the Law, but by faith in Jesus Christ, then the patriarchs, prophets, and saints who lived before the coming of Christ were imperfect. Those whom we ought to admonish are those who have not attained to justice, who believe that they can be justified by works alone. But the saints, who have been justified by the faith of Christ since ancient times. For Abraham saw the day of Christ and rejoiced. And Moses esteemed the greater riches as a treasure of the Egyptians, as an insult to Christ. For he looked to the reward. And Isaiah saw the glory of Christ, as John the Evangelist recounts, and Judas speaks generally of all: I want to remind you, knowing everything once: that Jesus, saving the people from the land of Egypt, destroyed them secondly, those who did not believe. Where the works of the Law are not so much condemned, as those who trust that they can be justified by works alone, the Savior also spoke to his disciples, Unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven (Matt. 5:20). It is necessary to gather (or consider) at this place how many precepts there are in the Law, which no one is able to fulfill. And on the other hand, it must be said that some of the Law is also done by those who are ignorant of it. But this is why his workers are not justified, because they are done without the faith of Christ. For example, not sleeping with a woman as a man sleeps, not committing adultery, not stealing, but rather honoring father and mother, and doing the other things that are commanded. But if they bring us examples of holy men: that they, being versed in the Law, have committed the things that were of the Law, we will say: Because the just Law is not laid down for the law-abiding and the obedient, but for the unjust and the disobedient, the impious and the sinners, the polluted and the unclean (1 Timothy 1). But as for one who is taught by God, it is not necessary for him to be taught about charity, as Paul says: But as for charity, I have no need to write to you: for you yourselves are taught by God to love one another (IV Thess. IV, 9).

2:17-18

(Vers. 17, 18.) Therefore, by the works of the Law, all flesh will not be justified. But if we seek to be justified in Christ, we ourselves have also been found to be sinners, is Christ then a minister of sin? Certainly not! For if the things that I destroyed, I build again, I make myself a transgressor. That flesh, of which it is written, 'All flesh is grass, and all its glory is like the flower of the field' (Isaiah 40:6), will not be justified by the works of the Law. But that flesh of Jesus Christ is justified by faith, of which it is said in the sacrament of the resurrection: All flesh shall see the salvation of God (Luke 3:6). But also according to a lower understanding, not all flesh was justified by the Law, but only those men who were in Palestine. Now, however, all flesh is justified by the faith of Jesus Christ, while his Church is founded throughout the whole world.

2:19

(Verse 19) For I through the law am dead to the law, that I might live unto God. To die to the law, is to die to the law as a rule of justification. Who dies to the law, lives to God. Before his conversion, the apostle found experience answer to the word of the Lord. The commandment, which was ordained to life, he found to be unto death. The same enlightening Spirit gives a sight of the hateful nature of sin, and the deceitfulness of the heart. Therefore it is said in Hosea: 'From me is your fruit found' (Hosea 14:9). To whom the mystical interpretation is well applied: 'Who is a wise man and understands these things, and a prudent man and knows them?' Therefore, by the spiritual law, one dies to the law of the letter and lives to God, since he is not without the law of God, but is under the law of Christ. But whoever dies to the law because of sins, although he is dead, it cannot be said of him that he lives to God. But there is another spiritual law beyond the law of the letter, as the Apostle elsewhere teaches, saying: Therefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good (Rom. VII, 12). And Ezekiel speaks in the person of God: I brought them out, that is, the people of Judah, from the land of Egypt: and I led them into the desert: and I gave them my commandments, and showed them my justifications: which if a man do, he shall live in them (Ezek. XX, 10). But about that law which works wrath, to which even the Apostle is dead, afterward he says: And I gave them commands that are not good, and justifications in which they will not live (Ibid., 25). The same is also signified in the Psalter: Because I did not know literature, I will enter into the strength of the Lord (Ps. LXX, 51).

I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. (Galatians 2:20)

2:20

(Verse 20.) But I no longer live; Christ lives in me. The person who once lived under the law no longer lives, for they persecuted the Church. But Christ lives in them, providing wisdom, strength, speech, peace, joy, and other virtues. The one who does not possess these virtues cannot say, 'Christ lives in me.' And all of this is said in opposition to Peter, directed at Peter.

But as for now, I live in the flesh. To be in the flesh is one thing, and to live in the flesh is another. For those who are in the flesh cannot please God (Rom. VIII, 8, 9). Therefore, it is said to those who live well: However, you are not in the flesh.

I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me. He speaks about God to the Romans, that he did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us. Now, about Christ, that he gave himself up: 'He loved me,' he says, 'and gave himself for me.' In the Gospel, where the apostles are listed, it is stated: 'And Judas Iscariot ((also Scariot)), who betrayed him' (Luke 6:16). Again, in the same Gospel: 'Look, the one who will betray me is approaching' (Matthew 26:46). But the Scriptures mention the high priests and elders of the people, who condemned Jesus to death and, binding him, led him and delivered him to Pilate the governor (ibid., XXVII, and Mark XV). And afterwards about Pilate: He released Barabbas to them, but Jesus, after being flogged, he handed over to them to crucify (John XIX). Therefore, the Father handed over the Son, and the Son himself handed over, and Judas and the priests handed him over to the rulers, and finally, having been handed over to him, Pilate himself delivered him. But the Father handed over, in order to save the lost world: Jesus himself handed himself over, in order to do the will of the Father and his own: However, Judas and the priests and the elders of the people, and Pilate, delivered him, ignorant of life unto death. And when she also handed herself over for our salvation, blessed and very happy is he who, with Christ living in him, can say through every thought and action: I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me and delivered himself for me.

2:21

(Verse 21.) I do not reject the grace of God; for if justice is through the Law, then Christ died in vain. He rejects the grace of God, both the one who lives under the Law after the Gospel, and the one who becomes defiled by sins after baptism. But he who can say with the Apostle: His grace in me was not in vain (1 Cor. XV, 10), he also speaks confidently of this: I do not reject the grace of God. What follows, however, is very necessary against those who think that the precepts of the Law must be observed after the faith of Christ. For it must be said to them: If righteousness comes through the law, then Christ died for nothing. Or certainly they should teach how Christ did not die for nothing if works justify. But even though they may be dull, they will not dare to say that Christ died without cause. Therefore, in regard to the participle of the syllogism that is proposed here, that is: If righteousness comes through the law, then Christ died for nothing, we must accept what is consequentially inferred and cannot be denied: but Christ did not die for nothing; and conclude: Therefore, righteousness does not come through the law. So far he has been against Peter, but now he is turning towards the Galatians.

3:1

(Chapter III - Verse 1) O foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you? This place can be understood in two ways. Either the foolish Galatians are called so because they have come from greater things to lesser things, having begun in the spirit and are now being consumed in the flesh. Or it is because each province has its own peculiarities. The Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, lazy gluttons, truly spoken of by the poet Epimenides, confirmed by the Apostle. The vain Moors and the fierce Dalmatians are struck by the Latin historian. Timid Phrygians, all poets tear apart. They say that more talented people are born in Athens, and philosophers boast about it. Cicero criticizes the Greeks, calling them either frivolous or cruel barbarians before Caesar. And for Flaccus, he says: 'Ingeniousness is innate, he says, and educated vanity.' The true Israel, with a heavy heart and a stiff neck, accuses all the Scriptures. Therefore, I think that the Apostle Paul also rebuked the Galatians for their regional customs. Although some, inserting profound questions as if under the guise of avoiding heresy, which introduces diverse natures, may say that even the Tyrians and Sidonians, Moabites and Ammonites, and Idumaeans, Babylonians and Egyptians, and all the Nations mentioned in the Scriptures, have certain languages for preceding reasons, and deservedly for their prior actions, so that the justice of God may not come into doubt: since it is asserted that every nation has either good or evil, which another does not have. We will pursue those declining heights: either accusing them of foolishness, saying that they cannot judge the spirit of the Law and the letter; or blaming the fault of the nation, that they are unteachable and foolish, and slower to wisdom. But what follows - 'Who bewitched you?' (1 Corinthians 11) - we should explain according to Paul (who, although unskilled in speech, is not lacking in knowledge): not that he knows that there is a bewitching power, which is commonly believed to be harmful; but he uses the word as a trite expression, and as in other things, so also in this place, he takes up the phrase of everyday conversation. We read in Proverbs: The gift of the envious tortures the eyes. The envious person among us is more significantly called a fascinator in Greek, and in the Wisdom of Solomon it is written: The fascination of wickedness obscures good things (Wis. 4:22). With these examples we are taught that the envious person is tormented by the happiness of others, or that someone in whom there is some good is harmed by another person who fascinates, that is, envies. It is said that the fascinus properly harms infants, young children, and those who have not yet firmly set foot. Where and some of the Gentiles:

I do not know who bewitches the tender eyes of my lambs. (Virgil. Eclog. 3.) Whether this is true or not, God knows: because it is possible that even demons may serve this sin; and they may turn away from the good works anyone has learned or achieved in the work of God. Now this is in question, because we consider this example to be taken from the opinion of the common people: just as it is said that a tender age can be harmed by a spell, so too it seems that the Galatians, who were recently born and raised in the faith of Christ, and nourished by milk and not solid food (1 Corinthians 3), have been harmed by some sort of spell, and the spirit of the Holy One has made them vomit the food of faith, causing a nausea in their spirit. But if someone contradicts, let him explain how the ideas of the Titans' valley in the Books of Kings (2 Kings 23), the sirens and centaurs in Isaiah (Chap. 34), Arcturus and Orion, and the Pleiades in Job (Chap. 9), and the like, which are certainly terms borrowed from the myths of the Gentiles, have been taken from common opinion. Let us therefore ask Marcion, who rejects the prophets, how he interprets what follows.


Before whose eyes Jesus Christ was proclaimed, among you he was crucified. For Christ was rightly proclaimed to us, from whose gallows and suffering, slaps and whips, the chorus of all the prophets foretold: that his cross was not only from the Gospel, in which he is said to be crucified; but long before he deigned to descend to the earth and take on the form of a crucified man, we have known. And it is no small praise of the Galatians that they have believed in the Crucified One, as it was proclaimed to them before: namely, by reading the prophets and knowing all the sacraments of the old Law, they have come to believe in the way and order. It is read in some codices: Who bewitched you to not believe the truth? But because this is not found in the exemplars of Adamantius, we have omitted it.

3:2

(Version 2.) This is the only thing I want to learn from you: did you receive the Spirit by works of the Law or by hearing with faith? Indeed, are there many things that can force you to prefer the Gospel to the Law: but because you are foolish and cannot hear those things, I speak to you in simple terms, and I ask about what is obvious: Did you receive the Holy Spirit by works of the Law, by observing the Sabbath, circumcision, and the superstition of new moons, or by hearing with faith, through which you believed from the Gentiles? But if it cannot be denied, it is evident that the Holy Spirit and the virtues that followed the received Spirit at the beginning of faith were given not by the works of the Law, but by the faith of Christ. It is clear that you have begun from better things and fallen into worse. However, let us consider carefully, because he did not say, 'I want to learn from you whether you received the Spirit from works,' but he added, 'from the works of the Law.' For he knew that even Cornelius the centurion had received the Spirit from works (Acts 10), but not from the works of the Law, which he did not know. But if, on the contrary, it is said: therefore, the Spirit can be received without hearing faith. We will respond that indeed the Spirit is received, but through the hearing of faith and the natural law, which speaks in our hearts, the good things to be done and the evils to be avoided: through which we have already mentioned that even Abraham, Moses, and the other justified saints have received it, and the observation of works and the righteousness of the Law can furthermore increase it, not the carnal law, which has passed, but the spiritual law, for the Law is spiritual. Nor indeed do we destroy the works of the Law because we prefer faith (Rom. III), nor do we say, according to some, Let us do evil, so that good may come (whose condemnation is just), but we give preference to grace over slavery. And we say that what the Jews do out of fear, we do out of charity. They are slaves, we are children: they are compelled to do good, we willingly embrace it. Therefore, it is not from the faith of Christ that the license to sin arises; rather, the desire for good works is increased by the love of faith, as we do good not because we fear judgment but because we know that they please the one in whom we believe. Let someone inquire, if faith comes only from hearing, how can those who are born deaf become Christians? Indeed, one can understand God the Father from the magnitude and beauty of creation, and the Creator is consequently recognized from His works. But the birth, cross, death, and resurrection of Christ cannot be known except through hearing. Therefore, either deaf people are not Christians, or if they are Christians, it is false what is said elsewhere by the Apostle: 'So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.' To which, he who is content with a simple response, says, that he did not speak generally; faith comes from hearing; but faith comes from hearing, which can be understood both in part and in whole: namely, the faith of those who hear, who believe. However, whoever attempts to satisfy this doubt, will first try to assert that even the deaf can learn the Gospel through nods, daily conversation, and, so to speak, gestures of the whole body; then also that the word of God, to whom nothing is deaf, speaks more to those ears, about whom he himself says in the Gospel: He who has ears to hear, let him hear (Luke 8:8). And in the Apocalypse: He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the Churches (Rev. II, 11). And Isaiah: The Lord has given me an ear (Isa. VI, 33 and 35). This is another man, to whom God speaks in secret, who cries out in the heart of the believer: Abba, Father (Rom. VIII, 15): and (as we have often explained) just as the body has all its members and senses, so the soul also has all its senses and members, including ears: whoever has them will not greatly need the ears of the body to know the Gospel of Christ. Moreover, also consider this, that here the Holy Spirit is understood without any addition, whom we obtain as a gift from God, and not from man: of which it is written elsewhere: The Spirit is incorruptible in all things (Wis. 12:1). And: The Spirit himself gives testimony to our spirit (Rom. 8:16). And in another place: No one knows the things that are in man, except the spirit of man that is in him (1 Cor. 2:11). And in Daniel: Bless the Lord, spirits and souls of the righteous (Dan. 3:86).

3:3

(Verse 3.) So foolish are you, that having begun in the Spirit, you are now being perfected in the flesh? If the Galatians received the Holy Spirit, how were they foolish? But it is immediately resolved, that although they did receive the Spirit, they were deprived of it when they were being perfected in the flesh. Hence they suffered so much in vain. In order to avoid this happening to themselves after sin, David prays, saying: Do not take your Holy Spirit from me (Ps. 50:13). Pay careful attention to the fact that those who follow the Scriptures literally are said to be perfected in the flesh. Therefore, what is written to the Corinthians, 'Living in the flesh, we do not wage war according to the flesh' (2 Cor. X, 3), can be better understood as meaning that those who humbly adhere to the Old Testament are said to wage war in the flesh. However, those who follow the spiritual understanding, though they are in the flesh because they have the same letter as the Jews, do not wage war according to the flesh but transcend from the flesh to the spirit. When you see someone who was the first to believe among the Gentiles, and extends his hand to the plow of Christ, having been preceded by a wise teacher, in such a way as to proceed from the path of the Law to the Gospel, so that he may understand all those things that are written there, about the Sabbath, about unleavened bread, about circumcision, about sacrifices, in a worthy manner for God, and afterwards, after the reading of the Gospel, be persuaded by a Jewish person or a fellow Jew, so that he may abandon the shadows and cloudy allegories and interpret the Scriptures as they are written: can you say of this person: 'Are you so foolish, that after beginning with the Spirit, you are now being perfected by the flesh?'

3:4

(Verse 4) You have suffered so much without cause, if indeed without cause. Let us consider the unfortunate Jews, how they live among other nations in such superstition and the labor of observance, saying, do not touch, do not taste, do not handle, and we will prove that what is said is true: You have suffered so much without cause. But the judgment is not immediately applied to them, and there is doubt if indeed without cause, because this is said of those who can turn from the Law to the Gospel. However, this can be understood better in the following way: that the Galatians, believing in the Crucified One, have endured many reproaches from both the Jews and the Gentiles, and have endured considerable persecutions. These persecutions are in vain criticized, if they depart from the grace of Christ, for which they have endured so much. At the same time, there is the hope that whoever labors for the faith of Christ and afterward falls into sin, just as it is said that he suffered the former without cause while sinning, likewise does not lose it if he returns to the original faith and the former zeal. Otherwise: If you think that circumcision should be followed after grace, then all that you have suffered while living without circumcision up until the present time has been in vain. But it seems to me that you have not endured these things without purpose, for I know that the Law is no longer valid after the Gospel. Or at least this way: It would not be a small loss if, by following circumcision, you had lost so much of the previous effort of faith. But now, in addition to this loss, there is also the punishment of transgression, so that you have suffered in the past without cause and will suffer in the future as well. Some people understand it more forcibly as follows: Consider the former freedom of grace and the present burdens of observation in the Law, and you will see how many things you have done in vain: although the fruit of this error is not completely to be despaired of, since you have been led to this by the zeal of God. For ignorance can be forgiven to those who, if they are converted to better things, teach that the knowledge in you has fluctuated, not the zeal.

3:5

(Verse 5.) So then, does he who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you do so by works of the law, or by hearing with faith? Not that the works of the Law should be despised, and without them a simple faith should be sought; but that the works themselves may be adorned by the faith of Christ. For that saying of the wise man is well known, 'The just shall live by faith, not by righteousness.' At the same time it is shown that the Galatians, after receiving the Holy Spirit by faith, had the gifts of virtues, that is, prophecy, kinds of tongues, healings, and other things that are enumerated in the spiritual gifts to the Corinthians (1 Cor. VII). And yet, after so many (because perhaps they did not have the grace of discerning spirits), they were ensnared by false teachers. It should also be noted that they claim to work miracles in those who do not hold the truth of the Gospel: just as in those who, not following the Lord, were performing miracles in His name, with John in particular complaining: Teacher, we saw someone driving out demons in Your name, and we tried to stop him because he does not accompany us (Mark 9:37). Against heretics who believe that the proof of their faith consists in performing some miracle. Those who eat and drink in the name of the Lord (for they also have a sacrilegious altar) and boast of having performed many signs, calling upon the Savior, will deserve to hear on the day of judgment: 'I never knew you, depart from me, you workers of iniquity' (Matthew 7:23).

3:6

(Verse 6.) Just as Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness. From this place until where it is written: Those who are of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham, Marcion erased from his Apostle. But what profit was there in embracing this, when the other things he left behind, his insanities, are opposed to it? Yet Abraham believed God, going out from his country into a land he did not know (Gen. 12 ff.): trusting that Sarah, who was ninety years old and barren, would give birth; and hearing the promise of God that his offspring would be called through Isaac, he offered Isaac as a sacrifice, and yet did not doubt the promise of the Lord. The faith is rightly considered to contribute to justice, the one who, having gone beyond the works of the Law, has deserved God not out of fear, but out of love.

3:7

(V.7) So you know, those who are of faith, these are the children of Abraham. He discusses more fully in the letter to the Romans that faith was reckoned to Abraham as righteousness, not in circumcision but in uncircumcision (Rom. 4). And carefully observing, he teaches that those who believed with this mindset are the children of Abraham, just as Abraham believed when he was uncircumcised, who rejoiced to see the day of the Lord, and saw it and was glad (John 8). And it is also said to the unbelieving Jews: If you were children of Abraham, you would do the works of Abraham (Ibid. 39). But what other works was the Lord seeking from them at that time when these things were said, except faith in the Son of God, whom the Father had sent to speak: Whoever believes in me, does not believe in me, but in him who sent me (John XII, 44)? And in another place, when they were clapping and boasting about their ancient and noble lineage, the response is given: And do not say, 'We have Abraham as our father.' For God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones (Matth. III, 9). By these stones, no one doubts that the hardened hearts of the Gentiles are signified, which were later softened and received the seal of faith. Enumerate the virtues of Abraham in which he pleased God before circumcision, diligent reader, and wherever you find them in a similar work, say that they are the children of Abraham, justified in the foreskin, who received circumcision not because of the merit of works, but as a sign of prior faith. For indeed Christ was to be born from his seed (in whom the blessing of all nations was promised, and from Abraham until Christ many centuries were to pass), God foreseen that the children of beloved Abraham might mix with other nations, and gradually his family would become uncertain, he marked the Israelite flock with a certain circumcision seal, so that they would be distinguished by this sign while living among the Egyptians, Assyrians, Babylonians, and Chaldeans. Finally, for forty years in the desert, no one was circumcised: for they alone lived without the mixture of another nation. As soon as the people crossed the banks of the Jordan and poured themselves into the land of Palestine, the circumcision, necessary for the future mix of nations, guarded against error. And that which is written a second time about the circumcised people (Joshua 5) signifies that the circumcision ceased in the desert, which was reasonably practiced in Egypt; and that believers are to be cleansed by the spiritual circumcision of the Lord Jesus Christ.

3:8-9

(Verse 8, 9.) But the Scripture, foreseeing that by faith God would justify the Gentiles, foretold to Abraham that all nations would be blessed in him. So then, those who are of faith are blessed with faithful Abraham. Not that the Scripture itself, namely the ink and the parchment, which are insensible, can foreknow the future; but rather the Holy Spirit and the senses, hidden in the letter, have foretold things to come many centuries later. Moreover, the example taken from Genesis is contained in its own volume: 'And in your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed' (Gen. XXVI, 4). The apostle interpreted this concerning Christ, saying: 'It is not written of seeds, as if in many; but as in one, and in your seed, which is Christ.' However, we must observe in all the almost testimonies (as taken from the old books in the new Testament), which the evangelists or apostles believed in memory; and having only explained the meaning, they often changed the order, and sometimes removed or added words. But there is no doubt that all nations were blessed in Isaac and Jacob, or in the twelve patriarchs, and others who descended from the lineage of Abraham; but in Christ Jesus, through whom all nations praise God, and a new name is blessed on the earth. However, the apostle can also be understood to have drawn an example of the seed from another passage in Genesis, where it is written: 'And (no doubt Abraham) God brought him outside and said to him: Look up at the sky and count the stars, if you are able to count them.' And he said to him: Thus shall your seed be; and Abraham believed God, and it was reputed to him unto justice (Gen. XV, 5, 6) . Therefore, whoever believes, shall be blessed with faithful Abraham, who is said to have believed in God first, for his remarkable faith in him. Just as Enos is said to have hoped in the Lord God, the principal hope in God, and above all the others, is written to have called upon the Lord God (Gen. IV, 26) . Not that Abel, about whom the Lord says: The voice of your brother's blood cries to me (Ibid. IV, 10) ; and the others afterwards, did not hope to call upon God; but each one may be called upon from the part that he has, to the greatest extent possible.

Book Two

Book Two

In the first book of the Commentaries on the Galatians, when I was discussing the customs of the Gentiles, I left unfinished the task of explaining who the Galatians are, from where and how they came. Whether they were natives who were defeated or newcomers who settled in the land they now inhabit. And whether they lost their language through intermarriage, or if they learned a new one without losing their own. Marcus Varro, a most diligent investigator of all antiquities, and others who have imitated him, have recorded many things concerning this people which are worthy of remembrance. But because it is our intention not to admit uncircumcised men into the temple of God (and to be frank, many years have passed since we stopped reading these things), we will quote the words of our Lactantius from the third volume to Probus about this people: “The Gauls,” he says, “were anciently called Galatians because of the whiteness of their bodies; and the Sibyl also calls them this. The poet meant to signify this when he said: ‘Then their milky necks are adorned with gold’ (Virgil, book VIII, Aeneid.) He could have said ‘white.’ From here, of course, Galatia became a province, into which the Gauls once came and mixed with the Greeks. Hence why that region was first called Gallograecia, and later Galatia. It is not surprising that he said this about the Gauls, and that he mentioned how the western peoples settled in the eastern part of the world, with the easternmost being opposite Greece. The Phocaeans founded Massilia, whom Varro says are trilingual because they speak Greek, Latin, and Gaulish. The city of Rhodes, founded by Rhodian colonists, gave its name to the river Rhodanus. I omit the founders of Carthage, the Tyrians, and the city of Agenor; I pass over Thebes of Bacchus, which he founded in Africa: that city is now called Thebestis. I leave that part of Libya which is full of Greek cities. I cross over to Spain: did not the Greeks, who sailed from the island of Zacynthus, found Saguntum? And is not the city of Tartessus, now called Carteia, reported to have been founded by Greek colonists? The mountains of Hispania, Calpe, Idrus, Pyrenees: also the islands of Aphrodisia and Gymnesia, which are called the Balearic Islands, do they not demonstrate indications of the Greek language? Italy itself, once occupied by Greek peoples, was formerly called Magna Graecia. It is certain that Romans, descended from the Trojan hero Aeneas, cannot be denied. From this, it follows that both in the West, Greeks often exhibit sharp wit, and in the East, they smell of barbaric dullness. And we do not say this because things that are different from each other do not arise from neighboring places, but because in large part even other things that are not similar are called by the same name. Therefore, it is not surprising that the stupid and slower to understand are called Galatians; since Hilary, a Gaul himself born in Pictavis on the Rhone, in his Hymn of the Hymns, calls the Galatians unteachable in Latin eloquence. And what is now abundant in orators, relates not so much to the carefulness of the region as to the clamor of the rhetoricians: especially since Aquitania boasts itself as of Greek origin, and the Galatians came not from that part of the world but from the more savage Gauls. Do you want to know, O Paula and Eustochium, how the Apostle has distinguished each province by its characteristics? To this day, the same traces of either virtues or errors are preserved. The faith of the Roman people is praised (Rom. I). Where else is there such enthusiasm and frequency in flocking to churches and the tombs of martyrs? Where else does the Amen resound like the thunder of heaven, shaking empty temples of idols? Not that the Romans have a different faith from that of all the churches of Christ, but because their devotion is greater and their simplicity in believing. Again, they are accused of ease and pride. Ease, as stated there: I beg you, brothers, to watch out for those who cause dissensions and obstacles, contrary to the doctrine that you have learned; and avoid them: for such people do not serve Christ the Lord, but their own appetite; and seduce the hearts of the innocent with sweet words and blessings. For your obedience has been made known to all. I rejoice, therefore, in you; and I want you to be wise in good and innocent in evil (Rom. 16:17ff). But concerning pride: Do not be high-minded, but fear (Rom. 2:20, 25). And: I do not want you to be ignorant, brothers, of this mystery, so that you may not be wise in your own eyes. And in the following: For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of themselves more highly than they ought to think, but to think soberly (Rom. 12:3). And more explicitly: Rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep. Perceive the same things together. Not being wise in lofty things, but agreeing with the humble. Do not be wise in your own estimation (Ibid., XV, 16). He also notes to the Corinthians that their women should have their heads covered and men should grow their hair (I Cor. X): and they should eat indiscriminately in the temples ((Al. time)) (II Cor. X, 20); and being inflated with worldly wisdom, they deny the resurrection of the flesh. These things cannot be doubted, which if anyone has seen, it is clear (I Cor. IV). The Macedonians are praised for their charity, hospitality, and the welcoming of brethren. Therefore, it is written to them: But concerning brotherly love, you have no need for anyone to write to you. For you yourselves have been taught by God to love one another. Indeed, you do this toward all the brethren in all Macedonia (I Thess. IV, 9). However, they are criticized for going around from house to house idly: and for expecting others' food while desiring to please each one individually, and running here and there to report what is happening with each individual. For it follows: We ask you, brothers, to excel still more and to make it your ambition to lead a quiet life: to attend to your own business, and to work with your own hands, as we commanded you, so that you may behave properly in the presence of outsiders, and not be dependent on anyone (1 Thessalonians, 4:11). And so that no one may think it is a teaching of a teacher rather than a warning to the people, he emphasizes and repeats the same in his second letter to them, saying: For even when we were with you, we gave you this command: If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat. For we have heard that some among you walk in idleness, not busy at work, but busybodies. Now such persons we command and encourage in the Lord Jesus Christ to do their work quietly and to earn their own living. As for you, brothers, do not grow weary in doing good. If anyone does not obey what we say in this letter, take note of that person, and have nothing to do with him, that he may be ashamed. Do not regard him as an enemy, but warn him as a brother. Now may the Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times in every way. The Lord be with you all. I, Paul, write this greeting with my own hand. This is the sign of genuineness in every letter of mine; it is the way I write. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. (2 Thessalonians 3:10-17) He knows with me who saw Ancyra, the metropolis city of Galatia, how many times it has been torn apart by schisms, how many times it has been corrupted by variations of doctrines. I omit the Cataphrygians, Ophites, Borborites, and Manichaeans; for these are already known as the names of human calamity. Who has ever heard of the Passalorynchitae, and the Ascodrobi, and the Artotyrites, and other names that are more like monsters than deities in any part of the Roman world? The traces of ancient foolishness remain until today. One thing we infer and promise at the beginning is that the Galatians, apart from the Greek language, which the whole East speaks, have almost the same language as the Treviri, and it doesn't matter if they have corrupted it in some way, since even the Africans have changed the Phoenician language to some extent, and even Latin itself changes with regions and over time. But let us now return to the matter at hand.


For whoever is of the works of the Law, is under a curse. For it is written: Cursed is everyone who does not continue in all things that are written in the book of the Law, to do them. I have this custom, that whenever something is taken from the Old Testament by the Apostles, I resort to the original books, and diligently examine how they are written in their places. Therefore, I found in Deuteronomy this very thing in the Septuagint interpreters, as it is placed: Cursed is every man who does not continue in all the words of this Law, to do them. And all the people shall say, Amen. But in Aquila it is written this way: Cursed is the one who does not establish the words of this Law to do them, and all the people shall say, 'Indeed.' Symmachus wrote it this way: Cursed is the one who does not confirm the words of this Law to do them, and all the people shall say, 'Amen.' Theodotion translated it this way: Cursed is the one who does not raise up the words of this Law to do them, and all the people shall say, 'Amen.' From this we understand that, like in other cases, the Apostle placed more importance on the meaning of the testimony rather than the exact words. And it is uncertain whether the Seventy Interpreters added 'every man' and 'in all things,' or if it was so in the old Hebrew and was later deleted by the Jews. But this suspicion is stimulated in me by the fact that the word 'omnis' and 'in omnibus,' as if necessary to their own meaning, are used by the Apostle, a man of Hebrew expertise and most knowledgeable in the Law, to prove that all those who are under the works of the Law are under a curse. He would never have used these words unless they were found in the Hebrew volumes. For this reason, in examining the Hebrew volumes of the Samaritans, I found 'Chol,' which translates to 'omnis' or 'omnibus,' and it agrees with the Septuagint interpreters. Therefore, the Jews took that in vain, lest they be seen to be under a curse if they could not fully accomplish all that is written; since the letters of an earlier nation also testify to this being the case. But because no one can fulfill the Law and do all that is commanded, the Apostle also testifies elsewhere, saying: For what was impossible by the Law, in which it was weakened by the flesh, God, sending His Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh (Rom. VIII). But if this is true, they may object to us: Therefore Moses, and Isaiah, and the other prophets who were under the works of the Law, are under a curse? He will not fear to consent, who has read the Apostle saying: Because Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the Law, made a curse for us; and to answer that in each one's time a curse was made for the people. By not immediately attributing this to the righteous men, it will seem to detract from the Saviour, as if he had nothing outstanding and excellent, being made a curse for us, when others have also been made a curse for others. For no one, even if they themselves have become a curse, has freed anyone from the curse, except the Lord Jesus Christ alone, who, with his precious blood, redeemed both us all and them themselves, I mean Moses and Aaron, and all the prophets and patriarchs, from the curse of the Law. And do not think that this is said from my own understanding, Scripture is the witness: that Christ, by the grace of God, or as it is read in some copies, without God, died for all (II Cor. V). But if He paid the Ransom for all, for Moses, and for all the prophets, from whom none could cancel the ancient manuscript of debts that stood against us, and nailed it to the Cross (Col. 2). All have sinned and are in need of the glory (that is, grace) of God (Rom. 3:23). Ecclesiastes also affirms this sentiment: There is no righteous man on earth who always does good and never sins (Eccles. 7:21). Finally, even the later statement of the Apostles clearly teaches that neither Moses nor any illustrious man from ancient times could be justified before God by the Law. For it follows:

3:11-12

(Vers. 11, 12.) But since no one is justified before God by the law, it is clear that the righteous shall live by faith. The law is not of faith, but the one who does them shall live by them. An example that proves the righteous live by faith and not by works is taken from Habakkuk, as the Seventy interpreters have rendered it: But the righteous shall live by my faith (Hab. II, 4). Aquila and Theodotion: But the righteous shall live by his faith, that is, by God's faith. Therefore, it must be considered that when it is said that a man or a person lives by faith, it is not to give occasion for the despising of virtuous works, but rather, that the just person lives by faith. So, whoever is faithful and lives by faith can only come to faith or live in it if they have first become just and ascended to faith through the purity of life as if by certain steps. Therefore, it is possible for someone to be just and yet not live without the faith of Christ. If someone reading is troubled, let them take the words of Paul, in which he says about himself: According to the righteousness which is in the Law, blameless (Philippians 3:6). Therefore, Paul was at that time righteous in the Law, but he could not yet live, because he did not have Christ speaking in him: I am the life (John 11:25). Believing in Him, he began to live. Let us also do something similar to this which is said, the righteous lives by faith; and let us say: the chaste lives by faith, the wise lives by faith, the strong lives by faith, and let us bring forth a similar sentence against those who, not believing in Christ, consider themselves to be strong, wise, temperate, or righteous: so that they may know that no one can live without Christ, without whom all virtue is faulty. The present testimony can be read as follows: the just person lives by faith, as is inferred afterwards. But when he says, 'The law is not of faith, but he who does it shall live in it,' it is very clear that not just any life is being spoken of, but rather one that is referred to something. For the just person lives by faith, and it is not added 'in them' or 'in those.' But the one who lives in the law and does it, lives in them, that is, in those things that he has done, which he considered to be good. He receives the reward of his labor, only those works that he has done, whether it be the length of his life (as the Jews believe) or its decline, which is the punishment by which the transgressor of the law is killed. However, we cannot consider these words to be those of the Apostles, but of the prophet Ezekiel, who said: 'I led them into the wilderness and gave them my commandments and showed them my statutes, which if a man does, he shall live by them.' (Ezek. 20:10-11).' And when he said that those who walked in the commandments and statutes would live, he added: 'I also gave them statutes that were not good and ordinances by which they could not live' (ibid., 25). What a consideration in these words! Where he said: I gave them precepts and justifications in which they could live, he did not add goods. But where he placed, in which they could not live, he added: And I gave them precepts that are not good, and justifications in which they will not live. But these things are explained more fully in Ezekiel: now let us return to the order of the Letter.

3:13

(Verse 13.) Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law, becoming cursed for us. In this passage, Marcion sneaks in the power of the Creator, whom he slanders as bloody, cruel, and a punisher (or judge), asserting that we are redeemed through Christ, who is the Son of another good God. If he understood the difference between buying and redeeming (because one who buys buys someone else's, but one who redeems properly buys what was his own and ceased to be his), he would never twist the simple words of Scripture to the detriment of his own dogma. Therefore, Christ redeemed us from the curse of the Law, which was established for sinners, whom He Himself reproaches through the prophet, saying: Behold, you are sold for your sins, and I have dismissed your mother for your iniquities (Isa. 50:1). And the apostle repeats this very thing, saying: But I am carnal, sold under sin (Rom. 7:14). The curses of the Law which are written in Leviticus and Deuteronomy are not fulfilled by the authority of God, but by the prophetic spirit, they are announced to those who were going to sin, the things that were going to happen to them. But if the apostles wanted to restrict us by their testimony, saying: Whoever of the works of the Law there are, they are under a curse, for it is written: Cursed is everyone who does not remain in all the things that are written in the book of the Law, to do them (Deut. XXVII, 26), and to assert that all those who were under the Law were cursed, let us ask him whether those who are under the Gospel of Christ and do not follow his commandments are cursed or not. If he speaks evil, he will have in the Gospel what we have in the Law. If he denies the cursed, therefore the precepts of the Gospel will be in vain, and those who fulfill them will be without reward. Both are solved in this way: just as Christ Jesus freed us from the curse of the Law, by becoming a curse for us, so he also delivers us from the curse of the Gospel which is imposed on those who do not fulfill its precepts, by becoming a curse for us himself, knowing not to withhold even the smallest portion of talent, and to demand the last quarter (Matthew 5 and Mark 12).

3:14

(Verse 14) Because it is written: Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree, so that the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles in Christ Jesus, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith. Before we discuss the meaning and words of the Apostle, it seems fitting to briefly respond to the testimony of Deuteronomy, from which the Apostle drew these words (Deut. 21:22-23), and to compare it to other editions. Therefore, the Seventy interpreters translated this passage as follows: But if there is any sin and deserving of death, and he is put to death, you shall hang him on a tree, his body shall not remain overnight on the tree, but you shall surely bury him that day; for cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree, and you shall not defile your land which the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance. Aquila: And when there is a sin in a man deserving the judgment of death, and he is killed, and you hang him on a tree, his dead body shall not remain on the tree overnight, but you shall bury him on the same day, for a hanged man is cursed by God; so you shall not defile your land, which the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance. Symmachus: But if a man commits a sin deserving the judgment of death, and he is killed, and you hang him on a tree, his dead body shall not remain on the tree overnight, but you shall bury him on the same day, for he is hanged as a blasphemer against God; so you shall not defile your land, which the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance. Theodotio: And because there will be sin in a man, deserving of the judgment of death, and he will die, and you shall hang him on a tree, his dead body shall not remain overnight on the tree, but you shall surely bury him on the same day, for a hanged man is cursed by God; so you shall not defile your land which the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance. Furthermore, Adama, which means earth or soil, is called in the Hebrew language. In the place where Aquila and Theodotio likewise translated it, saying, "for a hanged man is cursed by God," it is written in Hebrew as Chi Calalath Eloim Thalui. These words were interpreted by Ebion, the half-Christian and half-Jewish heresiarch, as meaning 'because it is an insult to God to be hanged.' I remember finding in the debate between Jason and Papiscus, which was written in Greek, the phrase 'the blasphemy of God who is hanged.' A Hebrew who taught me Scripture to some extent told me that it can also be read as 'because contemptuously God was hanged.' We have collected these things for this reason, because it is a very famous question, and we are often accused by the Jews of infamy, that our Savior and Lord was cursed by God. First of all, it must be understood that not everyone who hangs on a tree is cursed by God, but only those who have sinned and have been sentenced to death for their crime and been lifted up on a cross. He is not cursed because he was crucified, but because he has fallen into such guilt that he deserved to be crucified. Then it should be added, that lower down, the cause of the crucifixion is more fully explained, as Scripture testifies, because he was crucified for the blasphemy and curse against God. This was translated more clearly by Symmachus, who said: because he was suspended for the blasphemy against God. Finally, let us ask them, if Ananias, Azarias, and Misael, who refused to worship the idol of Nebuchadnezzar, were suspended on a tree (Dan. III); and also Eleazar, a ninety-year-old man, and the glorious mother with her seven sons under the reign of Antiochus, should they be considered cursed (II Mach. VII) or most worthy of all blessings? Certainly, if Haman had prepared the cross for Mordecai (Esther VII), I think that Mordecai would have ascended it not as a cursed man, but as a holy man. These and similar things prove that he is cursed who commits a worthy crime on the gallows: not he who is crucified by the injustice of judges, the power of enemies, the outcry of the crowd, the envy of virtues, or the anger of the king. And Naboth, formerly known as Nabutham, was condemned to death by the whole city of Jezrael upon Jezebel's letters (3 Kings 21); but his blood is avenged in the figure of Christ, many centuries later, as the Lord declares to Osec: Call his name Jezrael, because in a little while I will avenge the blood of Jezrael upon the house of Jeu. (Hosea 1:4). These things are against the Jews. However, in order to return to our discussion, I do not know why the Apostle, in that which is written: Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree (Deuteronomy 21:2), would remove or add anything. For if he was following the authority of the Seventy Interpreters, he ought, as they had published, to have added the name of God. But if he thought fit to follow the Hebrew, written in Hebrew letters, only that which he read for most true, and which is not found in the Hebrew language from the sawn tree, he ought not to assume. Hence it appears to me that either the ancient books of the Hebrews were different from those which we have now: or the Apostle (as I have said before) retained the sense of the Scriptures, but not the words: or, what is most to be accounted of, after the Passion of Christ, some one added the name of God to the Hebrew and to our copies, to bring disgrace upon us, who believe that Christ was cursed of God. Therefore, I proceed with bold foot into this contest, that I may challenge the books, saying that nowhere is it written that anyone is cursed by God, and wherever a curse is placed, God's name is never attached. 'Cursed are you among all beasts,' it is said to the serpent. And to Adam: 'Cursed is the earth in your works.' And to Cain: 'Cursed are you upon the earth.' And elsewhere: 'Cursed be Canaan, a servant he will be to his brethren.' And also in another place: Cursed be their fury, for it is bold, and their wrath, for it is hard (Gen. XLIX, 7). It is too long if I were to enumerate all the curses, which are written in Leviticus, Deuteronomy, and Joshua, and yet in none of them is the name of God added, to the extent that even Satan himself, when he promised concerning Job that if he were severely afflicted, he would blaspheme, indicated this from the better side, saying: Unless you bless him to his face (Job I, 11). And in the Books of Kings, Naboth (or Nabutham) is reported to have been stoned because he blessed God and the king (3 Kings 21). But nothing should move us that Christ was made a curse for us, because it was God himself who is said to have made him a curse, he who (as Christ did not know sin) made him sin for us, and the Savior, from the fullness of the Father, emptied himself, taking the form of a servant (Philippians 2): he died and the wisdom of God is called foolishness, so that what was foolish in the sight of God might become wiser to men (1 Corinthians 1). And in the sixty-eighth psalm, it says of Him: 'O God, you know my foolishness, and my sins are not hidden from you.' (Psalm 68:7) Therefore, the Lord's injury is our glory. He died so that we may live. He descended into hell so that we may ascend to heaven. He became foolishness so that we may become wise. He emptied Himself of the fullness and form of God, taking on the form of a servant, so that the fullness of divinity may dwell in us and we may become servants of the Lord. He hung on the wood, so that the sin which we committed on the wood of the knowledge of good and evil might be erased, hung on the wood. His cross turned bitter waters into sweet taste, and the lost axe, immersed in the deep, lifted up when thrown into the waters of the Jordan (2 Kings 6). In the end, he became a curse, yes, a curse: so that the blessings that were promised to Abraham might be transferred to the nations, with him as the author and forerunner, and the promise of the Spirit might be fulfilled through faith in him: which we ought to receive in two ways, either in spiritual gifts of virtues, or in the spiritual understanding of the Scriptures (1 Corinthians 9).

3:15-18

(V. 15 seqq.) Brothers, I speak in human terms: yet no one rejects or adds to a man's covenant, which has been confirmed. The promises were made to Abraham and to his seed. It does not say, 'and to seeds,' referring to many, but referring to one, 'and to your seed,' who is Christ. Now I say this: the covenant, which was confirmed by God, the law, which came four hundred and thirty years later, does not invalidate the promise, so as to abolish it. For if the inheritance is based on the law, it is no longer based on a promise. But God gave to Abraham a promise. The Apostle, who became all things to all people in order to gain everyone, is a debtor to Greeks and Barbarians, to the wise and the foolish, even to the Galatians whom he had just called foolish. For he did not use the same arguments with them as he did with the Romans, but simpler ones; things that even fools could understand and almost from the street corner. And so that it would not seem that he did it out of ignorance and not skill, he appeases the wise reader beforehand, and he tempers what he is going to say with a preface: Brothers, I speak as a human being. For what I am about to say, I do not speak according to God: I do not speak according to hidden wisdom, and those who can eat solid food, but according to those who are nourished by the tender milk of the stomach, and are unable to bear great things. (1 Corinthians 5). Therefore, to the Corinthians, among whom fornication was heard, and such fornication that even among the Gentiles, he says: I speak, and not the Lord. (1 Corinthians 7:12). And to the same in the second [letter]: What I am saying, I do not speak according to the Lord, but as if in foolishness (II Cor. XI, 17). Some think that when he is about to discuss examples from the testament of a man and the death of the testator and other things of human similarity, he said: Brothers, I say according to man: although it seems to me, and for this reason indeed that they think, but especially because of what follows being stated (or promised), namely: He does not say 'and to seeds' as if in many, but as if in one, and to your seed, which is Christ. While traversing all the scriptures in meaning and memory, I have never found the seed of writing in the plural number, but whether in a positive or negative sense, it is always in the singular number. Furthermore, the following is inferred: But I say that this testament is confirmed by God, if anyone diligently compares the Hebrew volumes and other editions with the translation of the Septuagint interpreters, they will find where the testament is written, not to sound like testament, but a covenant, which is called 'Berith' in the Hebrew language. Therefore, it is clear that the Apostle did what he promised, and he did not use hidden meanings to the Galatians, but rather everyday and lowly things that could displease the prudent (I speak in human terms unless I add this). To calculate the years from the time when the Lord spoke to Abraham, saying, 'And in your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed' (Genesis 22:18), until the lawgiver Moses: whether they are four hundred and thirty, or how the Lord promises to Abraham in Genesis that his descendants shall come out of the land of bondage after four hundred years. For it is not a small matter, and sought after by many, I do not know if it was invented by someone else. Also, that which is read in the same book about Thamar and her two little ones (Genesis 38), that is, that the first one called Zara extended his hand, and the midwife tied a scarlet thread on it, and then, as he pulled his hand back inside, the hand of the one named Phares was extended in its place. It is fitting that this demonstrates how Israel, in the work of the Law, extended his hand and contracted it, polluted by the blood of the prophets and of the Savior himself. But afterwards, the people of the Gentiles burst forth, because of whom it is often said to have been destroyed, and the middle wall that had been between the Jews and the Gentiles was broken down, so that there would be one flock and one shepherd, and there would be glory, and honor, and peace to everyone who does good, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. However, the simple meaning that is hidden in this passage has this force, that the Apostle teaches that the promises that were made to Abraham cannot be destroyed by the Law, which was given afterwards, and that the later things cannot take priority over the earlier ones, since the promises were given to Abraham four hundred and thirty years before, so that all nations would be blessed in him. But the observation is, that whoever had done it, would live in it, after four hundred and thirty years Moses gave it on Mount Sinai. On the contrary, this could be said: Why then was it necessary to give the Law after so much time of promise, when even with the Law given, the suspicion of a broken promise could arise, and the Law given would not be profitable while the promise remained? The Apostle, foreseeing this question, poses and explains it to himself in the following, saying:

3:19-20

(Verse 19, 20.) What then? The law was added because of transgressions until the seed should come to whom the promise was made; ordained by angels in the hand of a mediator. Now a mediator is not a mediator of one, but God is one. Is the law then against the promises of God? Certainly not! For if there had been a law given which could have given life, truly righteousness would have been by the law. But the Scripture has confined all under sin, that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe. For indeed the law was not given for the righteous but for the lawless and disobedient, for the ungodly and sinners (I Tim. II, 9): and to go deeper, after the idolatry to which they were enslaved in Egypt, so that they forgot the God of their fathers, and subsequently said, 'These are your gods, O Israel, who brought you out of the land of Egypt'; the ritual of worshiping God and the punishment of sinners was established by the hand of the mediator Christ Jesus, for all things were made through him, and without him nothing was made: not only the heavens, earth, sea, and all that we see, but also those things which were imposed on the stubborn people as the yoke of the Law through Moses (John I). And it is written to Timothy: For there is one God, and one mediator of God and men, the man Christ Jesus (I Tim. II, 5). After He deigned to be born for our salvation from the Virgin’s womb, He is called mediator of God and men, being a separate person. But before He assumed a human body, and when He was with the Father in the beginning, He is called the Word of God made flesh, to all the holy ones to whom the word of God was made, namely Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and later Moses and all the Prophets, whom Scripture relates, without the addition of man whom He had not yet assumed, He is called only mediator. But when he says: The law was ordained by angels, this is to be understood, that in every Old Testament, where an angel is first seen and afterwards introduced as speaking as God: The angel indeed among the many ministers who may have been seen truly, but it is in this mediator that he speaks who says: I am the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob (Exodus 3:6). And it is not surprising if God speaks in angels, since He also speaks through angels who are in human beings, as Zechariah says. And the angel who was speaking with me said (Zech. II, 3); and afterwards adding: Thus saith the Lord almighty. For the angel who was said to be in the prophet did not dare to speak in his own person: Thus saith the Lord almighty. The hand of the mediator, we must understand, is the power and might of him. He, being one with the Father according to his Godhood, is understood to be distinct from him according to his office as mediator. But since the order of the reading is confused and disordered by a hyperbaton, it seems that it should be rendered to us thus: The Law was given through angels into the hand of the mediator, ordained by angels because of transgressions, until the seed should come to whom the promise was made. But there is no doubt that the seed signifies Christ, who is also proven to be the son of Abraham from the beginning of Matthew, as Scripture testifies: The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.

3:21-23

(v21 onwards) So is the law against the promises of God? Certainly not! For if there had been a law given which could have given life, truly righteousness would have been by the law. But the Scripture has confined all under sin, that the promise by faith in Jesus Christ might be given to those who believe. But before faith came, we were kept under guard by the law, kept for the faith which would afterward be revealed. Therefore the law was our tutor to bring us to Christ, that we might be justified by faith. But after faith has come, we are no longer under a tutor. Therefore, it should not be understood that the promise is excluded because what followed seems to abolish what came before; but rather, it is clear that it is given for the preservation of the promise, not for its overthrow, because it was not able to give life or to bestow what the first promise had pledged. For if a law had been given that could give life and bring about what the promise had promised, then the promise would truly be regarded as excluded by the law. Now, however, on account of the transgressions, as we have said above, it more strongly argues against those sinners to whom, after the promise had been made, custody, and, so to speak, imprisonment, had been given, so that because they had not wanted to await the promised ones while innocent through the freedom of the will, they were hindered by legal chains, and, reduced to the servitude of commandments, they might be guarded until the coming of the future faith in Christ, which would bring an end to the promise. Nor should it be thought that Scripture is the author of sin because it is said to have concluded all things under sin, since the commandment which is prescribed by law rather shows and condemns sin than is the cause of sin. In the same way, a judge is not the author of crime by condemning wicked men, but he concludes them and pronounces his sentence by the authority of his judgment, so that he may afterwards absolve the guilty if he wishes by the forgiveness of the penalty.

3:24-26

(Verse 24 onwards) Therefore the Law was our guardian until Christ came, so that we might be justified by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian. For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. The guardian is assigned to young children to restrain their unruly behavior and keep their hearts inclined towards vice, while their young minds are educated in studies and prepared, through fear of punishment, for the higher disciplines of philosophy and governing the republic. However, the pedagogue is not a teacher and father, nor does the one who is being educated by the pedagogue expect an inheritance and knowledge; but the pedagogue keeps the son's property, and will withdraw from him once he reaches the lawful age to take possession of the inheritance. Furthermore, the very name 'pedagogue' signifies this, and it is derived from the fact that he leads and guides the children. Therefore, even the Law of Moses, given to a disobedient people, was a type of a strict pedagogue, in order to watch over them and prepare them for the future faith, which came when we believed in Christ. Now we are no longer under a pedagogue; the guardians and trustees depart from us, and as we enter the proper age, we are called true sons of God, whom the abolished Law did not generate, but rather it is the mother, Faith, who is in Christ Jesus. But if someone, after the completion of the time of their age, when they are already called an heir and free and a son, wishes to be under a pedagogue, let them know that they cannot live by the laws of children. For where can that be fulfilled now: Three times a year all your males shall appear in the sight of the Lord your God (Exod. XXIII, 17), with Jerusalem overturned and the temple scattered to ashes? Where are the atoning sacrifices for sin? Where is the eternal fire of holocausts to the image of the heavenly stars, with the altar completely destroyed? But as for what punishment can be decreed for the wicked, Scripture says: Remove this evil from among you (Deut. XIII, 5), serving the Jews and the Roman rulers? And so it will be, that they will not live under a father or under a guardian: for the law cannot be fulfilled after the succession of faith, and while faith seeks the role of a guardian, it is not bound.

3:27-28

(Verse 27, 28.) For whoever has been baptized in Christ has clothed themselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus. And how we are born as children of God through faith in Christ Jesus, he demonstrates by saying: For whoever has been baptized in Christ has clothed themselves with Christ. And that Christ is our clothing is proven not only in this passage, but also in another by the urging of Paul himself: Clothe yourselves with the Lord Jesus Christ (Rom. XIII, 14). Therefore, if those who have been baptized in Christ have put on Christ, it is clear that those who have not put on Christ have not been baptized in Christ. For it was said to those who were considered faithful and had received the baptism of Christ: Put on the Lord Jesus Christ. If anyone takes only the physical and visible water as a cleansing, they have not put on the Lord Jesus Christ. For even Simon, from the Acts of the Apostles, had received the cleansing of water; but because he did not have the Holy Spirit, he was not clothed with Christ (Acts 8). And heretics or hypocrites, and those who live sordidly, indeed seem to receive baptism, but I do not know whether they have the garment of Christ. Therefore, let us consider lest someone be found among us who, because he does not have the garment of Christ, is accused of not being baptized in Christ. However, when someone has once put on Christ and has been sent into the fire, becoming white with the burning ardor of the Holy Spirit, it is not understood whether it is gold or silver. As long as heat possesses matter in this way, it has a single fiery color, and all diversity of race, condition, and bodies disappears under this covering. For he is not a Jew, nor a Greek. We must understand the Greek as being a Gentile, because 'Ἕλλην' means both Greek and Gentile. Neither is a Jew better because he is circumcised, nor is a Gentile worse because he has a foreskin; but he is better or worse based on the quality of his faith, whether he is a Jew or a Greek. Greetings also to the free, for they are not separated by status but by faith. For a slave can be better than a free person in faith, and a free person can be surpassed by a slave in the quality of faith. Likewise, male and female are separated by the strength and weakness of their bodies. However, faith is considered a devotion of the mind, and it often happens that a woman becomes the cause of salvation for a man, and a man precedes a woman in religion. But when things are like this, and all the diversity of gender, status, and bodies is taken away by the baptism of Christ and his garment, we are all one in Christ Jesus: just as the Father and the Son are one in themselves, so may we be one in them.

3:29

(Verse 29.) But if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to the promise. For the promises were made to Abraham and to his offspring. It does not say, “And to offsprings,” referring to many, but referring to one, “And to your offspring,” who is Christ. This is what I mean: the law, which came 430 years afterward, does not annul a covenant previously ratified by God, so as to make the promise void. For if the inheritance comes by the law, it no longer comes by promise; but God gave it to Abraham by a promise. However, as often as we, who have believed in him after receiving the message of the Savior, receive the nobility of the lineage of Abraham, to whom the promise was made, then we must spiritually receive the seed of faith and preaching. Furthermore, it should also be considered that when it speaks of the Lord, it pluralizes the promises made to Abraham and his offspring, that is, Christ Jesus. But when it speaks of those who are the offspring of Abraham through Christ, it designates the promise in the singular, as in the present passage: Therefore, you are the offspring of Abraham, heirs according to the promise. For it was fitting that what was said in the plural in Christ should be attributed to many individuals in the singular. It follows:

4:1-2

(Chapter IV - 1, 2) However, I say that as long as the heir is a child, he is no different from a slave, even though he is the Lord of all, but he is under guardians and managers until the appointed time by the father. This little heir, who is no different from a slave even though he is the Lord of all, is under guardians and managers until the appointed time by the father, represents the whole human race until the coming of Christ, and, to say more, until the end of the world. For just as all die in the first Adam, not yet born, so also all those who were born before the coming of Christ are made alive in the second Adam. And so it happens that we too served the Law in the fathers, and they are saved by grace in their children. This understanding is in agreement with the Catholic Church, which affirms the one providence of the Old and New Testament and does not distinguish in time those whom it has joined together in condition. We are all built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Jesus Christ himself as the chief cornerstone. In him, the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. Through him, we are also being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit. (Ephesians 2:20-22) Truly, in Christ, we are all one bread, and we have come together in unity on the earth. And just as we are founded upon the prophets, so too did the patriarchs stand upon the foundation of the apostles. Moreover, the prophets can also be understood as tutors and actors, whose words we were daily instructed by in anticipation of the coming of the Savior, just as the Law was expounded by the pedagogue Moses; and the angels of the little ones who daily behold the face of the Father and intercede for them. Concerning whom it is said: 'The angels of the Lord will encamp around those who fear Him, and will deliver them' (Ps. 34:7). Both priests and rulers can be understood, who were once seen as dominating the people, now providing a form. And rightly are they called under tutors and actors, who, having the spirit of fear, have not yet deserved the spirit of liberty and adoption. For the age of infancy fears sins, fears the tutor, does not trust that it is free, even though by nature it is a mistress. And according to both interpretations, whether we called tutors and actors or prophets or angels, this child is under actors and tutors until the appointed time of the perfect man is fulfilled. But the legitimate time, as in Roman law, is terminated by a period of twenty-five years, so it is considered the coming of Christ to the perfection of the human race. As soon as he comes, and we all grow into perfect men, the pedagogue and tutor depart from us. Then we will enjoy the authority of the Lord and the possession of the inheritance, in which before we were considered somewhat estranged.

4:3

(Verse 3.) And so we too, when we were little, were enslaved under the elements of this world. He called the elements of the world, the same ones he had mentioned before as tutors and guardians: because we were not yet able to receive the coming of the Son of God, we were being trained in the midst of them. Some think that these are angels who govern the four elements of the world: namely, earth, water, fire, and air: and it is necessary that before anyone believes in Christ, they be governed by these arbitrators. The elements of the world are the sky and the earth, and that which is within them is commonly called: the sun, the moon, the seas, the forests, and the mountains, which the wise men of Greece and the barbarian nations, as well as the Romans, worship as gods, the sink of all superstitions. When Christ comes, we are set free, understanding that these are creatures, not divine beings. Others interpret the elements of the world as the Law of Moses and the words of the prophets, through which we receive the fear of God, which is the beginning of wisdom. Finally, the Apostle writes in his letter to the Hebrews to those who should already be perfect but have neglected the truth and are still clinging to the principles of teachings: 'For when by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God' (Hebrews 5:12). On the contrary, it can be objected to us that the Apostle Paul, writing to the Colossians, called the principles of the world something different: 'See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ' (Colossians 2:8). But from what he added, according to the tradition of men and empty deceit, he shows that not the same elements are named for the Colossians as for the Galatians. For from these elements, once the fullness of time has come, we are redeemed and, advancing to greater things, receive the adoption of sons. But from those elements, nothing such is said to follow; but the elements are simply understood as letters. Therefore, as we said, the Law of Moses and the prophets can be understood as elements of letters, because they are joined by syllables and names for the benefit not so much of themselves as of something else, so that we are able to read a discourse composed, in which the meaning and order of words are considered more than the principles of letters. But as for the Law and the prophets, we have interpreted them as the elements of the world, which the world commonly accepts for those who are in the world, as Paul himself says: 'God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself.' And in the Gospel: 'And the world was made through Him, and the world did not receive Him.' Some also wander more freely in this matter: for example, they inquire whether the Law possesses the shadow of future goods in another world, about which the Savior says: 'I am not of this world,' so that we may first be like little children, and, being placed under the elements of the initiations, may gradually advance to the highest point, and receive the place of adoption which we once lost.

4:4

(Verse 4.) But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. Pay close attention to the fact that it does not say 'made through a woman,' which the heresies of Marcion and others assert, pretending that Christ's flesh was imaginary. Rather, it says 'born of a woman,' so that he may be believed to have been born not just through her, but from her. And the fact that the holy and blessed Mother of the Lord is called a woman and not a Virgin is also written in the Gospel according to Matthew: when Joseph is called her husband (Luke 2), and when the Lord Himself rebukes her as a woman (John 2). For it was not necessary to always speak cautiously and timidly of the Virgin, when the word 'woman' signifies the sex more than the union with a man. And according to the understanding of Greek, both γυνὴ can be interpreted as both 'wife' and 'woman'. But to pass over all else: just as he was made under the law, in order to redeem those who were under the law, so he wanted to be born of a woman for the sake of those who were born of a woman. For he also received baptism in the river Jordan, as though repenting, when he was free from sins, so that he could teach others that they should be cleansed through baptism and be born again as the new children of the Spirit. Not understanding at all, John the Baptist was prohibiting him from approaching the bath, saying: I owe to be baptized by you (Matt. III, 14). And immediately the sacrament is taught: Without hesitation: for thus it befits us to fulfill all righteousness, so that he who came for the salvation of men would not pass over anything concerning the conduct of men. Let someone ask and say: If he became under the Law for this reason, to redeem those who were under the Law, which indeed would have been impossible to redeem those who were under the Law unless he himself had become under the Law: or if he became without the Law, in order to redeem those who were not under the Law; or if he did not become without the Law, he does not redeem those who were not under the Law. But if it was possible to redeem those who were without the Law, so that he himself would not be without the Law, then he was made superfluous under the Law, in order to redeem those who were under the Law. He will solve this question briefly, if anyone uses that example: and he was considered with those who were without the Law. For although it may have been poorly edited in the Latin codices due to the simplicity of the interpreters, 'And he was reckoned with the transgressors' (Luke 22:37) means something different among the Greeks, which is written here, and something different 'unjust', which is found in the Latin volumes. Anomos is called that person who is without law, and is bound by no right. Unjust is also referred to as iniquitous or unjust. Hence the Apostle himself says in another place: 'When I was not, he says, without the Law of God; but I was in the Law of Christ' (I Cor. IX): and certainly in this testimony, 'anomos' is written in Greek; and the one who interprets it here correctly could have interpreted the same word there in a similar way, if ambiguity had not deceived him. But someone will examine the word itself more sharply and will say that those who were first on God's side and then ceased to be are called redeemed; but those who were not under the Law are not so much redeemed as bought. Hence, in the letter to the Corinthians, where fornication was heard of, and such fornication that not even among the Gentiles (Ibid. V), it is written: You were bought at a price, not redeemed: for they had not been under the Law. Therefore, we receive the adoption of the children of God: and having been redeemed by Christ, we cease to be under the servitude of the elements of the world and the power of guardians. Just as we have shown the difference between redeeming and buying, let us also consider what the difference is between receiving and accepting the adoption of children.

4:6

(Verse 6.) But because you are sons of God, God has sent the spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying out, Abba, Father. Clearly the Apostle Paul mentions three spirits, the Spirit of the Son of God, as in this present place, God has sent the Spirit of His Son into our hearts (Rom. VIII, 14). And the Spirit of God, as in that place: For as many as are led by the Spirit of God, these are sons of God. And the Holy Spirit, as in that place: Your bodies are the temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you (I Cor. VI, 19). That the Holy Spirit is distinct from the Son of God is clearly and convincingly confirmed in the Gospel: Whoever speaks a word against the Son of man will be forgiven. But whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit, neither in this age nor in the age to come will be forgiven (Luke 12:10). This is because many, due to their lack of knowledge of the Scriptures (as Firmianus also states in the eighth letter to Demetrianus), assert that the Holy Spirit is often referred to as the Father and sometimes as the Son. And while we believe clearly in the Trinity, removing the third person, they do not want to be his substance, but his name. But in order not to take too long (for this is not a dialogue, but a commentary), I will briefly show the three spirits named in the fiftieth psalm, as the prophet says: Create a clean heart in me, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Do not cast me away from your presence, and do not take your Holy Spirit from me. Give me the joy of your salvation, and strengthen me with your principal spirit. He calls the principal spirit Father, because the Son is from the Father, and not the Father from the Son. But the spirit of righteousness, truth, and justice signifies Christ the Lord: for the Father has given all judgment to the Son (John V, 22), as David says: O God, give your judgment to the king, and your power to the son of the king (Psalm LXXI, 1). Moreover, he calls the Holy Spirit by its explicit name. These things, although they differ in terms and persons, are associated by substance and nature: and the same Spirit, due to the fellowship of nature, is now called the Father, now the Son. However, the argument by which he endeavors to assert that we are no longer under the Law, but under the grace of the Lord Jesus, concludes with such a purpose. He had said above that we should receive the adoption of sons: now he proves that we are children of God by the Spirit whom we have in us. For never, he says, would we dare to say: Our Father who art in heaven: Hallowed be thy name, unless from the consciousness of the Spirit dwelling within us, and with a great voice of senses and teachings crying out: Abba, Father (Rom. VIII, 15). Abba is a Hebrew word, signifying the same as Father. And Scripture preserves this custom in several places, putting the Hebrew word in its own interpretation. Aser, riches. Tabitha, Dorcas (Acts IX): and in Genesis, Mesech, a slave (Gen. XV), and so on and so forth. However, since Abba Father is said in both Hebrew and Syriac language, and our Lord in the Gospel commands that only God should be called Father (Matt. XXIII), I do not know by what license we either call others by this name in monasteries, or consent to be called by it. And certainly, he himself commanded this when he said there should be no swearing (Matt. V). If we do not swear, we should not even mention anyone's father. If we interpret the father differently, we will be forced to have different opinions about swearing. It should also be noted that in the Scriptures, a shout is not understood as a loud voice, but as an expression of knowledge and the magnitude of teachings. For in Exodus, the Lord responded to Moses: Why do you cry out to me (Exodus 14:15)? when Moses' voice did not go before him. However, Scripture called it a shout when his heart was deeply moved and he groaned for the people with tears. Therefore, just as one who has the Spirit of the Son of God is a son of God, so in reverse, one who does not have the Spirit of the Son of God cannot be called a son of God.

4:7

(Verse 7) So then, you are no longer a slave but a son. And if a son, then an heir through Christ. And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, 'Abba! Father!' So you are no longer a slave, but a son, and if a son, then an heir through God. Ask of me and I will give you the nations for your inheritance, and the ends of the earth for your possession (Psalm 2:7-8). But what we say in this place, we should also observe in other cases, that in the whole human race, discussions should be conducted in the singular number. For all believers, we are one in Christ Jesus, and members of his body, and brought into a perfect man, who is our head, for the head of the man is Christ (1 Corinthians 11:2).

4:8-9

(Verse 8, 9) But at that time, not knowing God, you served those who by nature are not gods. But now, knowing God, or rather being known by God, how are you turning again to the weak and impoverished elemental forces, to which you desire to be enslaved again? He reproves the Galatians for having turned from the worship of idols to the true faith of God, and asks how they, after abandoning the idols which are not gods by nature, and knowing God, or rather being known by Him, and even receiving the Spirit of adoption, can return as it were to their earlier state of infancy, desiring to be under tutors and guardians, and enslaved again to weak and impoverished elemental forces, which were given to the weak and impoverished people in the desert because they could not bear greater things. However, the same elements that he now called weak and needy, he placed only above the elements of the world. And where the elements of the world are mentioned, there it is not added, weak and needy. Hence again, where they are called weak, world, as we said above, is a silent name. Therefore, I think as long as someone is little and has not fulfilled the appointed time by the father, so that he may be called a son and heir, he is under the elements of the world, namely the Law of Moses. But when he returned to the Law, which he owed to his son after his freedom, desiring to be circumcised and to follow the whole letter of Jewish superstition, then those things which had previously been the elements of the world for him are also called weak and needy beginnings. For they are so useless to their worshippers that they are not even able to provide them with what they had previously bestowed, Jerusalem, with the temple and altar destroyed. Let someone respond and say: If the laws and commandments written in the Law are weak and needy elements, and those who have come to know God, or rather, have been known by Him, should not observe the Law (so that they do not begin to worship not so much the God by whom they have been known, but rather those who are not gods by nature), then did Moses and the prophets observe the Law, and yet did not come to know God, nor were they known by Him? Or if they did come to know God, they certainly did not fulfill the commands of the Law. To say that both are dangerous: either they did not do what the Law commands, and thus they have come to know God, or they do not know God while they keep the weak and poor elements of the Law. And this can be resolved by saying that they, like Paul, became a Jew to the Jews in order to win Jews over (1 Corinthians 9), and according to a vow he had taken, he shaved his head in Cenchrea (Acts 18), and in Jerusalem he practiced barefoot and baldness in the temple to appease the jealousy of those who had been taught about him, because he was accused of acting against the Law of Moses and God's prophets. In this way, holy men also did the things that the Law required, but they followed the spirit of the Law more than the letter. Those who, like Abraham, desired to see the day of Christ and rejoiced when the veil was lifted, were made weak to make the weak people strong, so that they could separate them from the idols to which they had become accustomed in Egypt, as if they themselves were under the Law. For it is absurd to think that Moses and the other speakers of God were in such a condition that we should not believe them, and that the appointed time came from the Father, and that they were redeemed from legal bondage, and obtained the adoption of sons, and inherited with Christ. For whatever wisdom God bestowed on the entire human race like a beloved Son, He has also generously bestowed the same wisdom to each of the saints in their own order and dispensation. Heretics find an opportunity to criticize the Creator by calling the Law of Moses weak and inadequate, because He created the world and established the Law. To them, we will respond with what we have already said, that those who return to those weak and inadequate elements after the grace of the Gospel are truly weak and inadequate themselves. But before the appointed time came from the Father, the elements were called not so much weak and needy as the world. Finally, before the Gospel of Christ spread throughout the whole world, they had their own brightness with the commands of the Law. But after the greater light of the grace of the Gospel shone forth, and the sun of justice revealed itself to the whole world, the light of the stars was hidden and their rays grew dim, so that the Apostle says elsewhere: For that which was glorified had no glory in this part, by reason of the excellent glory (2 Corinthians 3). What he is now saying in other words, in order to say that the Law of Moses, which was rich, wealthy, and glorious before the Gospel, became weak, poor, diminished, and destroyed after the advent of Christ, who was greater than Solomon, the temple, and Jonah. For what is written, 'He must increase, but I must decrease' (John 3:30): I believe this is said not so much by John as by the representative of the Law, because the lesser always yield to the greater, and the perfect is always preferred to the beginnings. But indeed, we will confirm the weak and meager elements, the traditions of the Jews, and the letter of low intelligence, which are not good justifications and not good precepts. For truly, the strong and rich understanding of the Law is spiritual, so that it should not be called a mere element, or rather, it should be compared to the future age and the life in Christ Jesus, in which the angels and heavenly powers now live. But in comparison to the Jewish mind, it is called not so much the beginning as the fulfillment. And when he says, 'Now that you know God, or rather are known by Him,' he shows that after the worship of idols, the Galatians understood God, or rather were considered worthy of knowing Him. Not because God, the Creator of all things, is ignorant of anything; but because it is said that they alone know who have changed error for piety. The Lord knows those who are His (II Tim. II, 19). And the Savior in the Gospel: I am the good shepherd, and I know mine, and mine know me (John X, 14). On the other hand, to the wicked: I do not know you, depart from me, workers of iniquity (Luke XIII, 27). And to the foolish virgins: I do not know you, (Matth. XXV, 12).

4:10-11

(Verses 10, 11.) Observing days, and months, and seasons, and years, I fear for you, lest perhaps I have labored in vain among you. Whoever does not worship the Father in spirit and truth, does not know the Sabbath rest that is reserved for the holy ones, about which God speaks: 'If they shall enter into my rest' (Psalm 94:11); and does not remember those times, of which it is written: 'Remember the days of old' (Isaiah 46:9). And elsewhere: 'I remembered the days of old, and I had in mind the eternal years' (Psalm 76:6). He observes the Jewish days, and months, and seasons, and years. Days, such as the Sabbath, the new moon, and from the tenth day of the first month until the fourteenth, when the literal lamb of the sacrifice is reserved, and from the fourteenth until the twenty-first of the same month, when unleavened bread is eaten, not in sincerity and truth, but in the old leaven of malice and wickedness of the Pharisees. He also celebrates the seven weeks, which the Jewish custom calculates after the unleavened bread, the days of the Israelite Pentecost. And also the sound of trumpets on the seventh day of the first month. Similarly, on the tenth day of the same month, they observe a day of expiation and fasting, as well as the custom of setting up booths, in the Jewish manner. They also observe the months, those who observe the first and seventh month, not understanding the mystery of truth. They also honor the seasons, who come to Jerusalem three times a year, thinking they fulfill the Lord's command, saying: Three times in the year you shall hold a feast for me, the feast of unleavened bread and the feast of the first fruits of the harvest, and the feast of the ingathering at the end of the year (Exodus 23:14ff.). And elsewhere: In three times of the year your male shall appear in the sight of the Lord your God (Ibid. XVII). But what he says, 'and years,' I think is said concerning the seventh year of remission, and the fiftieth, which they call Jubilee. The Apostle explains this passage more fully in his letter to the Colossians, saying: Therefore let no one pass judgment on you in questions of food and drink or with regard to a festival or a new moon or a Sabbath. These are a shadow of the things to come (Coloss. II, 16). He placed a part of the festival to be celebrated for the distinction of perpetual festivity, so that we have not a brief, and, as it were, a certain portion of the whole body, but the entire space of our life in perpetual celebration in Christ. And in order to connect the later with the earlier, he immediately adds and says: If you have died with Christ from the elements of this world, why do you still decree as if living in this world? You shall not touch, nor taste, nor handle, which are all things destined to perish with the using, according to the commandments and doctrines of men. Let no one judge you in matters of observing days, months, seasons, and years. We also incur a similar crime by observing the fourth day of the Sabbath, and Preparation Day, and the Lord's Day, and the fasting of Lent, and the celebration of Easter, and the joy of Pentecost, and the different times established in honor of the martyrs according to the custom of each region. To which, one who responds simply will say: the Jewish observance days are not the same as ours. For we do not celebrate the Passover of unleavened bread, but of the resurrection and the cross. Nor do we count seven weeks in Pentecost according to the custom of Israel, but we honor the coming of the Holy Spirit. And so that the disorderly gathering of the people would not diminish faith in Christ, certain days were established so that we all would come together as one. Not so much that day on which we meet is more famous, but that on whichever day we should meet, mutual joy should arise out of sight (or even out of aspect). However, whoever attempts to answer the opposite question more sharply affirms that all days are equal, not only the Friday on which Christ was crucified and the Sunday on which He rose, but that every day is holy and every day we partake of the flesh of the Lord. However, fasts and gatherings among days have been established by wise men for those who are more occupied with the world than with God, and they cannot, no, they do not want to gather together in the Church during the whole time of their lives, and to offer the sacrifice of their prayers to God before human actions. For how many people are there who at least practice these few things that have been established, either the times of prayer or the times of fasting? Therefore, just as it is permissible for us to fast at all times, or to pray at all times, and to continuously celebrate the Lord's day with the reception of the Lord's body, so it is not permissible for the Jews to sacrifice a lamb at all times, to celebrate Pentecost, to set up tabernacles, and to fast daily. However, with caution and moderation, he balanced the authority of the Apostle and the gentleness of the holy man, saying: I fear lest I have labored in vain among you. For if he had wanted to condemn them abruptly, he would certainly have said: I fear you: for I have labored without cause in you. But now, seeing that they have zeal for God, but not according to knowledge, he did not entirely despair of their salvation, who had been deceived by a godly error, nor did he leave them blameless, lest he give occasion both to them to persist in error, and to others to make a similar mistake. I fear you, he said, for what you are. I fear for you. The teacher labors without cause, when he himself challenges the students to greater things, and they, having fallen back, return to lesser and lower things.

4:12

(Verse 12) Be as I am, for I am also as you are. What he says is such, as I became weak to you who are weak, and I could not speak to you as spiritual, but as carnal and as little ones in Christ, and because you were not yet able to eat solid food, I fed you with only milk, not wanting you to remain in infancy forever, but gradually leading you to adolescence and youth, so that you could receive solid food. Thus, you should also be as I am, to have a more perfect understanding, leaving behind milk and moving on to stronger food, and to greater nourishment. But he speaks as if he were an imitator of the Savior, who did not consider equality with God as something to be seized, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant; he was found in appearance as a man, so that we might become gods from humans, and no longer die; but rising with Christ, we are called his friends and brothers, and to be his disciples as the master, and servants as the Lord. But it can also be understood this way: I beseech you, he says, brothers, that you imitate me, who, without complaint, lived by the Law, considering everything as rubbish and garbage, so that I may gain Christ. For indeed I myself, like you now are, was held fast by the same strict observances and I persecuted and ravaged the Church of Christ because it did not follow these things.

4:13

(Verse 13) Brothers, I beseech you, you have not harmed me. But you know that because of the weakness of the flesh, I preached the Gospel to you long ago. Connect the following sentence to the previous one, so that it may be made clearer, this is the order we propose: I beseech you, brothers, be like me, because I am also like you. Similar to this is that: We beseech for Christ, be reconciled to God (II Cor. 5:20). And also elsewhere: I beseech, first of all, that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made (I Tim. 2:1). Peter's words also say: I ask you, as a fellow elder and a witness of Christ's sufferings (1 Peter 5:1). These words indeed provoke us to humility and shake off the arrogance of bishops, who, as if stationed on some lofty pedestal, barely deign to see mortals and speak to their own subordinates. Let them learn from the Apostle that the wandering and foolish Galatians are called brothers. Let them learn from the gentle words of the reprover saying: I beseech you (1 Corinthians 11). But what he begs is that they may become his imitators, just as he is of Christ; indeed, that he may follow the present place, there is nothing great that he demands: just as he himself became less for them, from greater: so may they ascend from lesser to greater. You have not harmed me, he says. A disciple harms his master if he squanders his teachings and efforts through his negligence. The Galatians had not harmed the Apostle, as they were still keeping his Gospel and commands up to the present time. But certainly, in this way: When I first announced the Gospel to you; and because of the weakness of your flesh, because you were not able to receive the greater sacraments, I preached to you like little children, and I pretended to be weak myself, so that I might gain you who are weak: did you not receive me as an angel, as Christ Jesus? Therefore, since you did not harm me at all during that time, and you thought of me, for your sake, as humble and lowly, similar to the Son of God: how am I now being harmed by you, who provoke me to do greater things, by losing my labor and that dispensation, in which I pretended to be little, with a useless work, are you mourning? But because of the weakness of the flesh, not their own, but of those who hear, Paul announces to the Galatians: those who were unable to subject the flesh to the word of God, but as fleshly beings, received nothing of spiritual understanding. So that it may be made more evident, let us provide an example. Through the weakness of the flesh, he teaches, who says: If they cannot contain themselves, let them marry. And: If a woman's husband dies, she is free to marry whomever she wishes, only in the Lord (I Cor. VII, 9, 39). Certainly, it does not teach through the weakness of the flesh when it says these things: You are released from your wife, do not seek a wife. And: It is time, that even those who have wives should be as if they do not have (Ibid. 27, 29). For certain precepts are given for the spiritual, others for the carnal. And there is something that is commanded according to authority, and something else that is commanded according to indulgence.

4:14

(Verse 14.) And you did not despise or reject your temptation, which was in my flesh, but you received me as an angel of God, as Christ Jesus. It is a perplexing passage and requires careful attention. Indeed, I have preached to you like little ones and infants through the weakness of your flesh, starting from the least and speaking almost stammeringly. This arrangement and the feigned appearance of a weak proclamation were my doing, but your temptation was whether you would be pleased and consider great those things which, considering their nature, were smaller, and which I presented to you as humble. Indeed, you, who not taking them as small things but as great things, were so amazed that you received me, who was speaking them, as an angel and, if I may say more, as the Son of God. Therefore, your temptation, by which I was testing you in the announcement of my fleshly speech, was not despised or trivial; rather, it had more dignity than I estimated. And this place can be explained in this way: when I came to you, I did not come in the speech of wisdom, but as a humble and despised man, not bringing anything great, but the Crucified. Therefore, when you saw me in a body subject to weaknesses, promising heavenly kingdoms, you did not mock or consider me worthy of contempt. For you understood the lowliness of my flesh and the lowly state of my appearance, which was made for your temptation. Or perhaps you despised me, who was regarded as miserable by the unbelievers; but on the contrary, you received him who was humble, lowly, and despised, as if he were an angel, and more than an angel. Certainly, we can suspect that the Apostle, at the time when he first came to the Galatians, was sick; and though his body was weak, he did not cease, nor did he silence his voice, from preaching the Gospel that he had begun. For it is reported that he often suffered from a severe headache: and this was the angel of Satan, who was assigned to him, to strike him in the flesh, so that he would not be exalted. This weakness and illness of his body was a temptation among those to whom the Gospel was preached: whether they would despise him, who promised sublime things, when they saw him subject to bodily weaknesses. And also it can be said that, at the beginning of his coming to the Galatians, he endured insults, persecutions, and bodily afflictions from those who opposed the Gospel: and this was perhaps the greatest temptation for the Galatians, seeing the Apostle of Christ being beaten. But what he says, that you received me as an angel, as Christ Jesus: and by saying that Christ is greater than the angel, he shows that the one whom the Psalmist sang about as being a little lower than the angels according to the order of the flesh, is now revealed to be greater, and his words in the beginning were so powerful that they were thought to be those of angels and of Christ.

4:15-16

(Verse 15,16.) So where is your happiness then? I testify to you: if it were possible, you would gouge out your eyes and give them to me. So have I become your enemy by telling you the truth? Blessed is the one who walks on the path of virtues, but only if they have reached the virtues. It is not enough to have turned away from vices, unless you embrace the best. For the beginnings of good pursuits are not as commendable as the ends. For just as in a vineyard there are many stages of grapes until the winepress, and first it is necessary for the vine to bud on the vines, to promise hope in the blossoms; then, after the flower has fallen off, for the form of future clusters to be deformed, and gradually swelling, for the grape to give birth, so that it may sweat sweet musts when pressed in the winepresses. Similarly, in learning, there are individual stages of blessings, so that one may hear the word of God, conceive it, let it grow in the womb of their soul, and reach childbirth. So that when he has given birth to him, she may nourish him with milk, and throughout infancy, childhood, adolescence, and youth, she may lead him to perfect manhood. Therefore, since each, as we have said, has happiness according to their progress: if the end, and so to speak, the final touch is lacking to the work, the entire effort will be in vain; and it will be said: Where, then, is your happiness? Although, he says, at that time when you received the Gospel according to the flesh, I would call you blessed because you were fervent in your beginnings: nevertheless, now that I do not see the pinnacle of the building placed, and almost no foundation even laid, I am compelled to say: Where, then, is your happiness, which I used to praise you as blessed for? Truly, I myself also confess it, that when I was preaching to you in lowly terms, and was assailed by persecutions, you loved me in the beginning: And you would have plucked out your own eyes, if it were possible (but hyperbole must be understood in what he says), and have given them to me: You wished indeed to be blind for my sake, through the inexpressible charity you bore me, that more light of the Gospel might arise in my heart, and my advantage might increase by your loss: And this during that time, when I was preaching to you as it were to babes and sucklings, either from the infirmity of your flesh, because I announced to you things lowly and humble, or from the wrongs offered to me in my flesh, I seemed unworthy of your faith. But now because I have begun to challenge you to greater studies from the elements and syllables and childish reading, so that you may hold books in your hands, so that you may learn the words of full erudition and understanding, you resist, you get angry, you find the perfection of learning to be burdensome; and to such an extent have your feelings turned towards others, that you, who had received me as if I were an angel and Christ, to whom you wanted to entrust your eyes, now consider me an enemy, because I announce to you the full truth. But he elegantly concluded his statement, saying: So have I become your enemy by telling you the truth? to show that at the beginning of his preaching, it was not so much the truth, but rather the shadow and image of truth. Similar to this is that famous saying of the Roman poet (Terence in Andria I, 1):

Obedience begets friends, but truth begets hatred. But see how much better this is than that; for the Apostle tempered and made special this sentiment when he directed it specifically to the Galatians. However, the person he denounced, claiming to have a general principle and to hold it against everyone, greatly erred. For obedience, without truth, is not so much obedience as flattery and assentation: which it is clear should be called secret enmities rather than friendships. However, at the same time, we must also consider that today, as long as they remain small and infants and in whose hearts Christ never grows, they do not progress in age, wisdom, and grace before God and men, as we explain according to the literal sense of Scripture, we are praised, suspected, admired. But when we begin to challenge them a little so that they may advance to greater things, our opponents become enemies of our preachers; and they would rather follow the Jews than the apostles, who, departing from the doctrine and traditions of the Pharisees, entered into Christ Himself, the propitiation and perfection of the Law: and they do not deign to receive the divine word, which commands the teachers of the Church to ascend to higher doctrines, and to elevate their voice with all their might, without fearing the noise of barking dogs, saying: 'Go up to a high mountain, you who evangelize Zion.' Exalt your voice in strength, you who bring good news to Jerusalem. Exalt, do not be afraid. (Isaiah XL, 9).

4:17-18

(Verse 17, 18.) They imitate you, but not in a good way: rather, they want to exclude you so that you may imitate them. But always imitate the good in what is good, and not only when I am present with you. Those imitate well who, when they see that others have gratitude, gifts, virtues, desire to possess those themselves: and they strive to imitate their faith, life, and industry through which they have earned those things, so that they may also attain those things which are worthy of good emulation. Of these things, the Apostle also says: Envy spiritual gifts, but especially that you may prophesy. And further: So also you, since you are eager for spiritual gifts, seek to excel for the edification of the church. And again: Therefore, brethren, desire earnestly to prophesy, and do not forbid speaking in tongues. But those who envy do not do so well, for they do not desire to be better themselves in order to imitate those who are worthy of envy, but rather they want to make them worse and backwards with perverse envy. For example, let it be said: a Christian is someone who reads Moses and the prophets; he knows that everything in the shadow and the image preceded that people; but that the scriptures were written for us on whom the ends of the ages have come. He understands circumcision not so much of the foreskin, but of the ears and the heart. He has risen with Christ: he seeks the things that are above. He is freed from the burden and slavery of the Law, of not touching, not tasting, not handling, which commands: if someone wants to persuade him with the words of the Scriptures, that he should receive them not through a figure of speech, but as they are written in a literal sense, so that he may become a Jew openly, not secretly, he imitates him not well: but he quickly rushes to pull him back as he moves towards greater things; so that he may rather imitate him who goes backward: or indeed he does not advance him much further."+ "\n" +"Liberated from the burden and slavery of the Law, of not touching, not tasting, not handling, which commanded, being able to read the scriptures in their literal sense, an individual who is a Christian demonstrates the true meaning of these commandments. They understand that the Old Testament accounts serve as types and foreshadows of Christ and that the observance of these commandments no longer holds the same significance as it did for the Jewish people. They are no longer bound by the strict regulations of the Law but are free to seek the things above and live according to the spirit of the New Covenant. Therefore he speaks to the Galatians who had been led astray by the advocates of the Law, urging them to imitate the advocates of the Law, when rather the Galatians should have imitated them. For it is natural for the greater to be made from the lesser, not the lesser from the greater, and he says: 'Imitate what is good in what is good,' that is, do not imitate the advocates of Jewish observance, but imitate those things which are good. For just as someone who imitates someone else in riches, power, or dignity, not only imitates good things, but also imitates things that should be avoided; so likewise, you in turn, imitate what is good in what is good: seeking spiritual things more than carnal things; so that you may not teach them to be Jews, but to be Christians. But do this always, so that you may be able to reach the end of a good work with a persevering step. For I emulated good in you when I was with you, but after I left, you lost everything that I had handed over to you, from a secure station and a trustworthy port, and you were carried away again in the high waves. And it is not surprising that, with the Apostle departing, the Galatians were changed from a chosen vessel and one in which Christ the Lord spoke: for even now we see the same thing happening in the churches. For whenever a doctor happens in the Church, adorned with eloquence of speech and with a virtuous life, who, like some sort of spur, incites those who hear him to virtues, we see all people hasten, fervor, and run about concerning almsgiving, fasting, chastity, receiving the poor, burials, and other similar things. But when he has departed, they gradually wither away, and with food removed, they grow thin, pale, weak, and death follows all those things which were previously flourishing. Therefore, because the harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few (Matthew 9:37), let us pray to the Lord of the harvest to send laborers to reap the ears of the Christian people, which are prepared for the future wheat in the Church, to gather and carry them into the barns so that they may not perish. This is about that zeal and perverse emulation, of which it is also said elsewhere: Do not emulate the wicked (Psalm 37:1), and here: They emulate you, but not for good. But we find another kind of zeal, with which the sons of Jacob were zealous for their brother Joseph (Gen. XXXVII seqq.); and Mary and Aaron were zealous for their friend the Lord Moses (Num. XII). Neither Joseph nor Moses were incited to zeal in order to be better than others, but because they were grieved that they were better. This kind of zeal is akin to envy. It would be long if I wished to enumerate all the kinds of zeal, whether good or bad, found in the treasure of the Scriptures. We read of the righteous zeal of Phinehas (Num. XXV), Elijah (III Kings XIX), Matthias (I Macc. II), and the Apostle Judas (but not the traitor), who received the name Zealot for his outstanding virtue of zeal (Acts I). But we also read of the evil zeal, like that of Cain towards Abel (Gen. IV), and others towards one another. And there is the zeal of a man, of whom it is written: 'And if the spirit of jealousy comes upon him' (Num. V). Perhaps this is the middle kind of zeal, which cannot be taken on either the good or the bad side; rather, it is called zealotry between the two. Otherwise: Seeing that those who were from circumcision, the Galatians from the Gentiles, were abundantly filled with the virtues of the Holy Spirit, but indeed did not speak in tongues, did not have the gifts of healings; did not have the gift of prophecy, they eagerly desired to incite them with the stings of zeal, to transfer them to the burdens of the Law, so that they would begin to become like them.

4:19

(Verse 19.) My dear children, whom I am in labor pains until Christ is formed in you. Just as childbirth involves many difficulties and pain as the offspring are brought forth from the womb, the curse is declared first, saying: 'In pain you will bring forth children' (Gen. III, 16). Therefore, Paul wants to show the concern of teachers for their disciples, the emotions they suffer, so that their followers do not fall away from salvation. He says: 'My dear children, whom I am in labor pains for again.' For in another place, he had said as a father: 'Even if you had ten thousand guardians in Christ, you do not have many fathers' (I Cor. IV, 15). Now, he speaks as a mother in Christ, so that they may recognize the anxiety and devotion of a parent in both of them. Moses said this to the people: Did I conceive all this people in my womb? Who among us is so concerned for the salvation of his disciples that he is tormented not for a few hours, or for a day or two, but throughout his entire life, until Christ is formed in them? The example of a pregnant woman who takes in and forms the seeds in herself should be carefully considered, so that we can understand what is being said. Nature is not to be blushed at, but to be revered. For just as in the womb of a woman the first formless semen is ejaculated, so that it may adhere to its furrows and bottom as if to a certain glue: of which the prophet, remembering the beginning of himself, says: Your eyes saw my unformed substance (Ps. 138:16): then, for nine months, with the blood restrained, the future human is coagulated, formed, nourished and distinguished; so that after it has throbbed in the womb, it is established in the light at the appointed time, and is born with such difficulties as to not perish afterwards, but to be nurtured: in the same way, the seed of the word of Christ, when it falls upon an attentive soul, grows through its stages, and, to pass over many things (for we can easily transfer a physical description to spiritual understanding), it remains uncertain until she who conceived gives birth. The end of learning is not immediately accomplished, but then it is the beginning of another work, just as diligent nourishment and studies lead an infantile infancy to the full age of Christ. And just as in marriage, often the semen of the husband is the cause that children are not conceived, sometimes the sterile wife does not retain the semen, and frequently neither is capable of procreation, and on the contrary both are fecund: so also in those who sow the word of God, this fourfold division is observed, so that indeed it fulfills its duty as a teacher, but the hearer is sterile: either the hearer is of good nature, but through the ignorance of the teacher, the seed of the word perishes, or the one being taught is so crazy, as the one who commands; and it rarely happens that the master and disciple agree with each other, it is clear that the teacher teaches only as much as the student can absorb: or the student can only receive as much as the teacher can provide. But now we are all judges. We do not know which psalm it is, which part of prophecy, which chapter of the Law, and we interpret with boldness in speaking what we do not understand at all. It does not pertain to us for Christ to be formed in the people: that each person, returning to his own house, may have the seed of the word of God, which, when he conceives it, he may be able to say with the prophet: 'From your fear, O Lord, we have conceived and brought forth, we have made children of your salvation upon the earth' (Isaiah 26:17-18). Tales in apostolos transeunt, et a Salvatore merentur (( Al. merebantur)) audire: Quicumque fecerit voluntatem Patris mei, ipse est frater meus, et soror, et mater (Matt. XXII, 50) : diversitate profectuum, in diversis nominibus ostensa (( Al. ostendente)). Formatur quoque Christus in corde credentium, cum omnia illis sacramenta panduntur, et ea quae obscura videbantur, perspicua fiunt. Sed et illud est intuendum, quod qui per peccatum quodammodo homo esse desierat, per poenitentiam concipitur a magistro, et rursum in eo Christi formatio repromittitur. This is against the Novatians, who do not want those who have once committed sins to be reformed.

4:20

(Verse 20.) However, I wish to be with you soon and change my voice, for I am confused among you. The divine scripture builds and is read; but it is much more beneficial if it is translated from letters into voice, so that the one who taught through the letter may instruct those who are present. Indeed, the living voice has great power: a voice that resonates from its author's mouth, which is uttered and distinguished with the same pronunciation it was generated in the author's heart. Therefore, knowing that the Apostle has greater power in the spoken word that is done in the present, he desires to exchange the Epistolary voice, which is comprehended in letters, into presence: and because this was more expedient for those who had been corrupted in error, he wanted to bring them back to the truth while they were still alive with his speech. And the reason for this was because he was confused among them, which is more properly said in Greek. For I am perplexed, not so much by the confusion, which is called αἰσχύνη or σύγχυσις among them, as by the sense of need and poverty. Therefore, this is the meaning: I wish I could be present with you now and speak the voice of letters myself, because I am in need of you. For I do not have the fruits that teachers usually have from their students, and without cause the seed of teachings has been sown, I am compelled to suffer poverty among you, so that I may be able to burst forth with the voice of Jeremiah: I have not profited, nor has anyone profited me (Jerem. XXIII, 23). This passage can be interpreted in another way: Paul the apostle, who became a Jew to the Jews in order to gain Jews for himself (I Cor. IX), and to those who were under the Law, as if he himself were under the Law, and to the weak, as if he were weak, in order to gain the weak. According to the condition of those whom he desired to save, he changed his voice and transformed himself into the likeness of actors (indeed, he became a spectacle to the world, and to angels, and to men (I Cor. IV)), assuming different forms and voices. Not because it was what it pretended to be, but because it only appeared to be what it benefited others. He sees that the Galatians need different teaching, a different way of salvation, not the one by which they were first brought to the faith of Christ from Gentile customs. And he is forced to say: I wish I could be with you now and change my tone, because I am confused about you. No, he says, I don't see that I am of any benefit if I speak the same things that I spoke before, because I am ignorant of what I should do, and torn apart and confused, I am torn to pieces and destroyed. And in the same way that doctors, when they see that the force of their art is not sufficient for a cure, pass on to another remedy, and experiment with many things until they arrive at a cure, so I, because I am confused among you and distracted here and there by ignorance, would like to speak the voice of letters directly from my mouth, so that I myself might firmly rebuke you; since a letter cannot express the voice of one who rebukes; it is not able to echo the clamor of one who is angry, nor to explain the pain of the heart with the points of a pen. However, it can also be understood more simply: I have used gentle words with you, saying: Brothers, I beseech you. And: My little children, of whom I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you; but I am gentle and mild, who have spoken to you as a father, with that love by which I do not allow my children to perish and wander forever. I wish I could be present now if the bonds of my confession did not bind me, and change a gentle voice into words of rebuke. Nor is it insincerity, if now I flatter, now I become angry; love urges me on, pain urges me on, to speak with different emotions. For I do not know into which words I should first burst forth, and with what remedy I should heal you, because I am confused by you.

4:21

(Verse 21) Tell me, those of you who desire to be under the Law, have you not heard the Law? It should be noted that the Law mentioned here refers to the history of Genesis, not as people commonly think, what should be done or avoided, but rather the entire narrative of Abraham and his wives and children, referred to as the Law (John 15). We also read in another place that the prophets are also called the Law. Therefore, one who truly understands the Law is one who, according to Paul, examines not just its surface, but its essence. He who follows only the external appearance, like the Galatians, does not obey the Law.

4:22-23

(Verse 22, 23.) For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by a slave woman and one by a free woman. But the son of the slave was born according to the flesh, while the son of the free woman was born through the promise. It is of great difficulty to demonstrate that only Isaac, who was born of Sarah, was generated through the promise, and not also Ishmael, who was born of the Egyptian slave Hagar. For the Scripture refers that when Hagar, fleeing from Sarah, who was mistreating her, came to her in the desert, an angel appeared to her and instructed her to submit to her mistress's authority. This same angel also spoke these words: "I will surely multiply your offspring exceedingly, so that they will not be counted for multitude" (Genesis 16:10). And afterwards concerning Ishmael (of which surely no one doubted the words of the promise): He will be a rustic man, his hand against everyone, and everyone's hand against him, and he will dwell opposite the face of all his brothers. But it can be answered that the promise of an angel is of less authority than that of God himself. For just as a star, when the sun rises, does not shine: so the words of angels are obscured, and vanish, and are considered as nothing in comparison to the promise of God. Indeed, this response seems to have some importance; but it is immediately countered by the authority of the following Scripture. For it is written: And Abraham said to God: May Ismael live in your sight (Ibid., XVII, 18 seqq.); and God answered him as follows: Behold, your wife Sara shall bear you a son, and you shall name him Isaac, and I will establish my covenant with him, as an everlasting covenant, and with his descendants after him. And regarding Ismael: Behold, I have heard you, and behold, I have blessed him, and I will multiply him, and increase him greatly. Twelve nations will he beget, and I will make him into a great nation. But my covenant I will establish with Isaac, whom Sarah will bear to you at this time next year. From these statements of God it is evident that Ishmael was also born according to the promise. But this is how it is resolved: the promise is properly fulfilled in the giving of the covenant, and it is different to bless, increase, and multiply greatly, which is written concerning Ishmael. It is different to make someone an heir through the covenant, which is said regarding Isaac: I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant, and with his descendants after him. And in the following: But my covenant I will establish with Isaac, whom Sarah shall bear to you (Gen., XVII, 19). And how different are gifts from assets: different are bequests from inheritance (for we read that gifts were given to the sons of Abraham by his concubines, but the inheritance of all his assets was left to the son of Sarah); so, as we have said, blessings and bequests are different from a covenant. But this can also be said of Ishmael, after his conception, whether by an angel or by God speaking. But concerning Isaac, before he was conceived in Sarah's womb, God had promised. These things, however, let them be said as much as the modesty of our intelligence allows. But if anyone can find something greater, how is it that Ishmael, who was born of a slave woman, is not the son of the promise, but Isaac, who was born of a free woman: he should rather be heard. And if anything, says the Apostle, you think differently, and God has revealed this to you. Now, briefly, we must strive for higher things, so that we may say that each one of us is born first, not according to the promise, as long as he is instructed by the simple words of the Scriptures and still delights in Jewish explanations: but when he surpasses to higher things and understands the spiritual law, then he is generated from the promise: and, to speak more clearly, every day those who do the works of Abraham are born from Abraham. But those who have the spirit of slavery, again in fear, are born of the Egyptian servant girl; but those who have received the spirit of adoption, are free through Sarah: by this freedom we are given by Christ. The Lord speaks to the Jews who still preferred to be the sons of the servant girl: If you remain in my word, you will truly be my disciples, and you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free (John 8:31-32). So, those ignorant of the mystery that was being spoken, say: We are descendants of Abraham, and we have never been slaves to anyone: how can you say that we will be set free? Jesus answered them: Amen, amen I say to you, whoever commits sin is the slave of sin. But a slave does not remain in the house forever; but the son remains forever. If therefore we are the servants of sin, Agar has begotten us, the Egyptian: if sin reigns not in our mortal body, we are the sons of God indeed.

4:24

(Verse 24.) These things are spoken in allegory. Allegory properly belongs to the art of grammar, and we learn in elementary schools how it differs from metaphor or other figures of speech. One thing is presented in words, another thing is signified in meaning. The books of orators (Sup. in allegories) and poets are full of them. The divine scripture is also, to a considerable extent, woven together by this. Which understanding the Apostle Paul (who also had some contact with secular literature) used the very word "figure" in order to call it allegory, as it is said among his own people: in order to show, namely, the misuse of this Greek expression in a more meaningful way. But Paul, although not perfectly, knew secular literature, as his own words attest: "One of them, a prophet of their own, said, 'Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, lazy gluttons.'" (Titus 1:12). This is a heroic verse of the poet Epimenides, which both Plato and other ancient writers mention. Also, when he was speaking in the Areopagus in Athens, he added this: "For we are indeed his offspring" as certain of your poets have said. (Acts 17:28). This hemistich is attributed to Aratus, who wrote about the sky and the stars. Also this: Bad company corrupts good morals (1 Cor. XV, 33); it is written in trimeter iambic from Menander's comedy. From these and other examples, it is evident that Paul was not ignorant of secular literature, and what he called allegory here, he called spiritual understanding elsewhere. Like here: For we know that the Law is spiritual (Rom. VII, 14), meaning allegory, or allegorically expressed. And elsewhere: All ate the same spiritual food and drank the same spiritual drink. They drank from the spiritual rock that followed them, and the rock was Christ (I Cor. X, 34). That the manna here, and the sudden gushing forth of the spring, and the rock itself that followed, must be understood allegorically, no one doubts. I know what objection can be made on the other side: Brothers, if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness (Gal. 6, 1). And in another place: But the spiritual man judges all things; yet he himself is judged by no one (1 Corinthians 2:15); so that, what we said above may be clearly understood as a spiritual word. But we call him a spiritual man, who, understanding all the sacraments of the Scriptures, interprets them in a sublime manner, and seeing Christ in the divine books, admits nothing of the Jewish tradition in them.

4:25-26

(Verses 25, 26.) For this is Hagar arising from Mount Sinai, in servitude, which is Agar. For Sinai is a mountain in Arabia, which corresponds to the present Jerusalem, and is in servitude with her children. But the Jerusalem above is free, which is the mother of us all. For it is written: Rejoice, barren one who does not bear, break forth and shout, you who do not travail, for many are the children of the desolate, more numerous than those of the one who has a husband. She did not conceive for a long time, before Christ was born of the Virgin, and she was barren: not yet with the laughter of the world did Isaac, born of the chosen father, resound with the voice of sublime teachings. For Abraham, also interpreted in our language as the chosen father, is referred to with resounding sound. But Hagar, which is interpreted as sojourning, that is, inhabiting, or pilgrimage, or stay, gives birth to Ishmael, who only hears God's commandments and does not become a rustic, bloodthirsty man, roaming the desert. He is an enemy to all his brothers born of a free woman and resists them with a hostile face. It is not surprising that the old Testament, which was established and written on Mount Sinai, which is in Arabia and is adjacent to the now existing Jerusalem, is not eternal: since the inhabitance is different from perpetual possession, and the name of Mount Sinai signifies temptation, and Arabia signifies decline: and on the contrary, the Jerusalem that is above, which is the free and mother of all saints, demonstrates that the present Jerusalem is below, and immersed in lowliness and humility. There are those who understand the two Testaments and other things in different ways: some interpret the divine Scripture, both the old and the new, according to the diversity of their own sense and judgment, either as a slave or as a free woman, and those who still serve the letter and have the spirit of fear in servitude, wish to be born of Hagar the Egyptian; but those who ascend to higher things and wish to understand allegorically what is written, are the children of Sarah, which in our language is translated as 'princess', in the feminine gender. And they claim this because of that necessity (or, let Al. claim it): that it would be unfair to consider Moses and all the prophets as being born from a slave woman, and indeed, any of the Gentiles as being born from a free woman. Hence, it is better that not only regarding those who are in the Church, according to the diversity of intellects as we said above, we consider some as slaves and others as free: but also regarding the same man, as long as he follows the story, we consider him the son of a slave woman; but when Jesus opens the Scriptures, his heart is set on fire and in the breaking of the bread, he sees Him whom he did not see before (Luke 24): then also Sara's son is called his. Marcion and Manichaeus did not want to remove this passage, in which the Apostle said, 'These things are allegorical,' and the rest that follow, from their own book, thinking that it would be left against us. This is because the Law should be understood differently than it is written, even though it is to be understood allegorically (which we also confess, and Paul teaches). It is not to be understood according to the will of the reader, but according to the authority of the one who wrote it. And by this very fact, they who seemed to want to preserve it against us, are destroyed. For Moses, the servant of the creator God, wrote spiritual things, as the Apostle also teaches, whom they themselves assert to be the preacher of another Christ and a better God.

4:27

(Verse 27.) For it is written: rejoice, O you barren one, who does not bear; break forth and cry out, you who are not in labor; for the children of the desolate one will be more than those of the one who has a husband. (Isaiah 54:1.) The Synagogue had a husband, the Law; and according to the prophecy of Anna, she who was once barren in children was fertile. (1 Samuel 1.) But the Church, barren without Christ, without any conversation with the bridegroom, lay for a long time in the desert. But after she received the book of divorce into her hands, and turned all the ornaments of the husband into the idol's adornment: then the husband, with the previous belt decaying, wove another belt for his loins from the Gentiles: as soon as she was joined to the husband, she conceived and bore a child. And the Lord cries out through the prophet: 'If a nation is born at once' (Isaiah XLIX, 54): when in one day in the Acts of the Apostles three thousand, and five thousand men believed (Acts III, etc.) I do not think it necessary to speak about the multitude of Christians and the paucity of Jews, when the banners of the cross shine throughout the whole world, and a Jew appears scarce and remarkable in cities.

4:28

(Verse 28.) But we, brethren, are children of promise according to Isaac. It is of no difficulty of understanding that the Apostle and those like him are said to be children of promise according to Isaac. But because Origen, explaining this passage, thus presents the example of the Apostle: But you, brethren, are children of promise according to Isaac, it is asked how he now calls the Galatians, whom he had called foolish and said had begun in the Spirit, to finish in the flesh, children of promise according to Isaac? Therefore, we say that the Apostle calls them children of the promise according to Isaac, because he does not completely despair of their salvation, and he believes that they will return to the spirit with which they had started, and become children of freedom. Even though they were born according to the flesh, they are children of the slave woman.

4:29-31

(Vers. 29-31.) But as then he that was born according to the flesh persecuted him that was born according to the spirit, even so it is now. But what saith the scripture? Cast out the bondwoman and her son: for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the freewoman. So then, brethren, we are not children of the bondwoman, but of the free. In this liberty Christ hath made us free. I do not think it impossible to find where Ishmael persecuted Isaac; but only this, that when the son of the Egyptian, who was elder, played with Isaac, Sara was indignant, and said to Abraham: Cast out the bondwoman and her son: for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with my son Isaac. (Gen. XXI, 10). And certainly, a simple game among children is unworthy of expulsion and abandonment. But the Apostle, like a Hebrew among Hebrews, and instructed at the feet of the teacher Gamaliel, who once restrained the raging Pharisees against the Lord by council, understood from the words of Sarah saying: for the son of the maidservant will not inherit with my son Isaac, that that simple game was not. But because perhaps Ishmael, as the older one, and at that time already circumcised when he could understand and feel what he suffered, claimed for himself the right of the firstborn, the Scripture called the quarrel of the little ones a game. Unable to bear these words, Sarah, not enduring the custom of the firstborn claiming the rights of a slave woman's son from a young age, burst out in a voice: Cast out the slave woman and her son, for the son of the slave woman shall not inherit with my son Isaac. When this seemed harsh to Abraham (for greater things are always due to the firstborn), not only did Ishmael cease to be the firstborn, but he did not even receive an equal portion with his younger brother: God, who wanted the free woman to be inside and the slave woman to be expelled, confirms Sarah's words and speaks to Abraham: Let it not be harsh in your sight concerning the boy and the slave woman. Everything that Sara tells you, listen to her voice: for it is through Isaac that you will have descendants. Just as in the past, the older brother Ishmael persecuted the infant Isaac, claiming the privilege of circumcision and the rights of the firstborn; so now, according to the flesh, Israel (formerly Ishmael) rises up against the younger brother, the Christian people from the nations. Let us consider the foolishness of the Jews, who killed the Lord, persecuted the prophets and apostles, and opposed the will of God; and we will see much greater persecutions, as History also teaches us, stirred up by the Jews against the Christians than by the Gentiles. Do we marvel at the Jews? Even today, those who are born again in Christ and live spiritually are persecuted by those who still live in the flesh. And as they rise with Christ, they seek the things that are above, not the things that are below. Let them do what they want: let them persecute Isaac with Ishmael; let them cast out the bondwoman and her Egyptian mother. They will not inherit the promise, which only those who are born of the promise will obtain. And elegantly also, he who is born according to the flesh persecutes the spiritual. For the spiritual does not pursue the carnal; but forgives him as to a country brother: he knows that he can improve over time. And if at any time he sees the Egyptian son angry, he remembers the one father who created light, cattle, and mosquitoes: and in a great house, there are not only golden and silver vessels; but also wooden and earthen vessels. Therefore, let us say with the Apostle Paul: We are not slaves of the son, but free (2 Timothy 2); and being renewed in Christ, let us hear the words of the Lord speaking to the Jews: If you abide in my word, you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free (John 8:31, 32). The Apostle, liberated by this freedom, used to say: 'For although I am free from all, he who sins is a slave of sin' (I Cor. IX, 19). He, knowing himself free from all vices, from every desire and error, rightly rejoiced in the freedom of Christ saying: 'We are not slaves, but free: in this freedom Christ has set us free' (John VIII, 34).

5:1

(Chapter 5, Verse 1) Stand fast, and be not held again under the yoke of bondage. And from this it is shown that he who cleaves to the yoke of servitude does not stand. And because he who has been granted freedom by Christ has been under the yoke as long as he has had the spirit of servitude in fear, and has followed the beginnings of the Law. But when he says, stand, he exhorts firm and stable faith in Christ, so that the churches of Galatia may remain rooted in the Savior. About this, and in another place, the righteous one speaks: 'He has set my feet upon a rock' (Ps. 39:3), because it is upon Christ. So that the teachings may not be carried about by every wind and may be carried off in different directions (Eph. 4). Hence it is also said to those who are standing: 'And let anyone who stands take heed lest he fall' (1 Cor. 10:12). And in another place: 'Stand firm, act like men, be strong' (Ibid. 16:13), so that they may stand with Him whom Stephen, persevering in martyrdom, saw standing at the right hand of the Father (Acts 7), and also the one who spoke to Moses: 'But you, stand with me' (Exod. 34:2). But he calls the yoke of servitude a harsh, difficult, laborious law, which consumes its cultivators with heavy work day and night. Just as Peter says in the Acts of the Apostles: Why do you attempt to impose a heavy yoke upon the neck of the brothers, which neither we nor our fathers were able to bear (Acts 15:10)? But what he has added, do not burden yourselves again, not that the Galatians were keeping the Law before; but so that the heavy yoke of idolatry, by which the Egyptian people were oppressed and plunged like lead into the Red Sea (Exodus 15), may not be repeated. According to the sense of which he had said above, How do you turn again to weak and needy elements, which you desire again to serve, observing days, and months, and times, and years? For the Galatians, who, after the preaching of Paul the Apostle, had forsaken the idols and at once ascended to the grace of the Gospel, did not return to the servitude of the Jewish Law, which they had never known before: but wishing to observe times, to be circumcised in the flesh, and to offer corporeal sacrifices, they were in a certain way returning to the same worship to which they had previously served in idolatry. For both the Egyptian priests and the Ishmaelites and the Midianites are said to not have a foreskin. However, if only we did not know that the nations observe days, months, and years, so that we may never have any mixed festivities with them.

5:2

(Verse 2.) Behold, I, Paul, say to you: if you are circumcised, Christ will be of no benefit to you. In the Gospel, the Savior speaks to his disciples. Whoever listens to you, listens to me; whoever welcomes you, welcomes me (Luke 10:16). And the Apostle testifies, saying: I live, yet not I, but Christ lives in me (Galatians 2:20); and elsewhere: Do you seek a proof of Christ speaking in me? (2 Corinthians 13:3) From which it is clearly proven what he now says: Behold, I Paul say to you, not as if only Paul's words are to be received, but the Lord's. For when he had already stated in his first letter to the Corinthians: Now to the married I command, yet not I but the Lord (I Cor. 7:10); and immediately added: But to the rest I, not the Lord, say (Ibid., 12), so that his authority would not be considered insignificant: I think, he says, that I also have the spirit of God, so that by speaking in the spirit and in Christ, he who imitates the prophets would not be considered contemptible, saying: Thus says the Lord Almighty. But something greater will be made of what was said: Behold, I Paul say to you: if you are circumcised, Christ profits you nothing, if joined with the law, in which it says: Paul, an apostle not from men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ, and the rest: so that hearing, they are moved not so much by the authority of the sender as by that of the one who sends. Someone may say: The opposite of what is written in this passage is what is written to the Romans: Circumcision indeed profits, if you keep the law (Rom. II, 25); and below: What, then, is greater for the Jew, or what is the advantage of circumcision? By all means, it is first because the words of God were entrusted to them (Ibid., 1, 2). For if Christ is of no benefit to those who are circumcised, how does circumcision benefit those who keep the Law? This question is solved by this response, namely, that the Epistle written to the Romans is addressed to those who believed from both the Jews and the Gentiles, and Paul did this so that neither group would be offended, so that each people would possess their own privilege, and so that the Gentiles would not be circumcised and the circumcised would not have to be uncircumcised. But when he wrote to the Galatians, he used a different argument. For they were not of circumcision, but from the Gentiles who believed. And circumcision could not profit them who would return to the elements of the Law after the grace of the Gospel. And in the Acts of the Apostles (Acts XV) it narrates the story: when certain men arose from circumcision and asserted that those who believed from the Gentiles must be circumcised and keep the law of Moses, the elders who were in Jerusalem and the apostles gathered together and determined by letters that no yoke of the Law should be imposed on them, nor should they observe any longer except to keep themselves from idols, and from blood, and from fornication, or as it is written in some manuscripts, and from what is strangled. And so that there be no doubt, that circumcision is of no use, but rather, on account of those who believed from the Jews, he tempered his judgment on circumcision to the Romans, gradually descending to the later letters of the Epistles, he showed that neither circumcision nor uncircumcision have any value, saying: Circumcision therefore is nothing, and uncircumcision is nothing, but the observation of God's commandments (I Cor. VII, 19). For circumcision is nothing to such an extent that it profited nothing even to the Israelite house boasting of circumcision, as the prophet says: All the uncircumcised nations in flesh, but the house of Israel in uncircumcision of the heart (Ezech. XLIV, 9), and Melchisedec, who was uncircumcised, blessed Abraham who was circumcised. For as it says: If you are circumcised (Gen. XLIV); it is such, as if he wanted to say, if you are circumcised in the flesh. Which in another place he does not call circumcision, but mutilation, saying: See mutilation. For we are the circumcision, who serve God in the spirit, and boast in Christ Jesus, and have no confidence in the flesh (Philippians III, 2, 3). He does not have confidence in the flesh, who expects all benefit from Christ, and does not sow in the flesh, so as to reap corruption from the flesh; but in the spirit, from which eternal life is generated. A more subtle thought must be considered: If you are circumcised, Christ is of no benefit to you. Not only does circumcision itself not profit those who are circumcised, but even if they seem to have other virtues apart from circumcision in Christ, they will perish completely after having faith in Christ and being circumcised. So what then? Did circumcision profit Timothy nothing? By all means greatly. For he was not circumcised in order to consider that he could obtain any advantage from circumcision itself, but rather to benefit others. A Jew became a Jew in order to convert the Jews to the faith of Christ through their circumcision. However, circumcision is not profitable, since it is considered to bring something of its own usefulness.

5:3

(Verse 3.) However, I testify to every man who circumcises himself that he is obligated to keep the entire Law. God, who first commanded circumcision to Abraham and then through Moses in the Law, established not only circumcision but also many other observances: the celebration of feast days in Jerusalem, the offering of burnt sacrifices morning and evening, the sacrifice of the Passover lamb in one designated place, the rest of the land during the seventh year, the fiftieth year of jubilee, and other things that can easily be extracted from the Scriptures by each individual reader. Therefore, we will refute Ebion and his followers, who believe that those who have believed in Christ after the Gospel must be circumcised, so that they may either undergo circumcision and perform the other things that are commanded in the Law; or if it is impossible to do all these things, then let circumcision, which is omitted along with the other ceremonial ordinances, cease. But if they respond that we are only obliged to do what is possible (for God does not require of us what we cannot do, but what we can fulfill), we will tell them that it is not the will of the same God to observe the Law and to abandon those who observe the Law. But how does He make guilty those who, even if they want to, cannot fulfill the whole Law because it has been interrupted? We on the other hand follow the spiritual law, which says: You shall not muzzle an ox when it is treading out the grain (Deut. 25:4), and understand with the Apostle: Does God take care for oxen? (1 Tim. 10:18; 1 Cor. 9:9). But surely He says it for our sake, and to observe the delicate sabbaths (Isa. 58:13), not so that our ox and donkey and other lowly animals may rejoice on the sabbath; but rather for those humans and animals about whom it is written: In your hand is the welfare of humans and animals, O Lord (Ps. 36:7). Reasonable and spiritual men, but also animals, those who are of slower wit, are educated by the spiritual things to observe the Lord's sabbaths. And it is not contrary to what has been said above: If you are circumcised, Christ profits you nothing. And what follows: I testify to every man circumcising himself that he is a debtor to do the whole law, to this that is inferred by us. For the hearers of the law are not justified with God, but the doers of the law will be justified. Because he who is the author of the Law can say, 'We are not circumcision'; and, 'In secret, a Jew'; and we know that the Law is spiritual. But whoever follows the letter that cuts and kills is not a maker of the Law, but truly an enemy of the Law, especially after the Savior's coming, who removes the veil from the hearts of those who turn to him, so that we, beholding the unveiled face, may be transformed from the oldness of the letter into the newness of the spirit.

5:4

(Verse 4) You have fallen away from Christ: you who are justified by the Law have fallen from grace. Just as no one can serve two masters (Matt. 6), so it is difficult to fulfill both the shadow and the truth of the Law. The shadow is in the old Law, until the day dawns and the shadows are removed; the truth is in the Gospel of Christ. For grace and truth came through Jesus Christ (John 1:17). Therefore, anyone who thinks they can be justified by observing the Law loses the grace of Christ and loses the Gospel they held. And when they lose grace, they are deprived of faith in Christ and rely on their own works. For you have been severed from Christ (κατηργήθητε), not as it has been falsely interpreted in Latin as 'Evacuati estis a Christo', but in Christ's words. By [not adhering to] Christ's work, it is understood more clearly that what he had commanded above all about circumcision, saying: if you are circumcised, Christ profits you nothing, now he comprehends generally about the whole Law, that those who believe themselves to be justified in any observance of the Law do not profit in Christ's work.

5:5

(Verse 5.) For we by the Spirit wait for the hope of righteousness through faith. He places the Spirit, to distinguish it from the letter. But the hope of righteousness is to be understood as Christ, because he is the truth, patience, hope, righteousness, and all virtues, whose coming we await according to the judgment of all, and not now with patience, but with righteousness he will come to give to each according to his works. The presence of this God the Apostle and those who are like him, anticipating, say: Thy kingdom come (Matt. 6:10), that when the Son shall have delivered up the kingdom to God and the Father, and shall have been made subject to him in all things, then the head shall be subjected to the body, and God will be all in all (1 Cor. 15). Because he who is now in part, through each individual, will then begin to be the whole through all.

5:6

(Ver. 6.) For in Christ Jesus, neither circumcision avails anything, nor uncircumcision, but faith which works by charity. For those who wish to live in Christ Jesus, virtues are to be desired, vices are to be avoided. But the things that are in between virtues and vices, neither to be avoided nor desired, such as circumcision and uncircumcision, and other similar things. Certainly, circumcision is beneficial if you keep the Law. Therefore, it was useful for those who lived under the Law, not because they were circumcised, but because the words of God were entrusted to them, which, when they turned into actions, were not foreign to salvation. And let it not move us that Sephora, taking up a stone, circumcised her son, and the angel prevented her husband from suffocating him (Exodus IV), or as it is otherwise said in Hebrew, because now circumcision is not beneficial at all, as it has testified in Christ Jesus, since the time when the Gospel has spread throughout the whole world, the injury of circumcision is unnecessary. It was valid then, like the rest of the Law, when physical blessings were promised to those who observed the Law; namely, if they fulfilled it, they would be blessed in the city, blessed in the field, have full barns, and many other things contained in the promises (Deuteronomy XXVIII). But we, in Christ Jesus, want to be strong and strengthened, that is, in true circumcision, and not in Jewish circumcision. For neither is he a Jew who is openly a Jew, nor is circumcision openly in the flesh, but he is a Jew who is hidden, and circumcision of the heart in the spirit, not in the letter (Rom. II, 28, 29). Therefore, the circumcision of the flesh is of no avail in Christ, but the circumcision of the heart and of the ears, which removes that reproach of the Jews: Behold, your ears are uncircumcised, and you cannot hear (Exod. VI, 12). The circumcision of the lips is beneficial, as Moses himself testified in Scripture: 'But I myself have foreskin on my lips.' It provides many benefits, and in matters of sexual desire, circumcision is defiled by unchastity. Therefore, in Christ Jesus, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value, for they are placed in the middle, that is, between vices and virtues; but faith, which works through love, is what matters, just as the faith that was reckoned to Abraham as righteousness is confirmed, and every work of faith is placed in love, based on the whole Law and the Prophets, which depend on love. Indeed, in these two commandments: 'You shall love your God' and 'you shall love your neighbor,' the Savior asserted that the Law and the Prophets consist. And Paul in another place: 'For you shall not commit adultery, you shall not steal, you shall not covet,' and if there is any other commandment, it is summed up in this saying: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself' (Rom. XIII, 9). Therefore, if every commandment is summed up in what has been said: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself,' and faith works through love, it is clear that the work of faith through love contains the fullness of all the commandments. However, according to the apostle James, faith without works is dead (James 2:26): likewise, without faith, even if good works are present, they are considered dead. Therefore, those who do not believe in Christ but have good morals, what else do they possess besides the works of virtues? Let that example of faith which operates through charity be attributed to that prostitute from the Gospel, who, when she had washed the feet of the Lord while reclining at the table in the Pharisee's house, with her tears, wiped them with her hair, anointed them with ointment, and when the Pharisee murmured, the Lord presented a parable of a debtor who owed fifty and five hundred denarii, and added: For this reason, I tell you: her many sins are forgiven, for she loved much (Luke 7:47, 50). And turning to the woman, he said: Your faith has saved you, go in peace. For it has been clearly demonstrated in this place that this woman had faith through charity, which was very powerful in Christ. For who can say that circumcision in Christ is of no value, when it was known to have been valuable at one time? Did anyone ever doubt whether circumcision was circumcision? But if we consider the many Christians, that is, those of us who have been grafted onto the root of the good olive tree (Rom. 11), rejoicing against the broken branches of the Jewish people, and saying that the uncircumcised is more valuable, in which Abraham pleased God, and faith was reckoned to him for righteousness, than circumcision, which was given as a sign of faith and did not benefit those who had it, we will also see this usurpation of some now carefully excluded.

Book Three

Book Three

We, Paula and Eustochium, publish this third volume addressed to the Galatians, not unaware of our own weakness and the small stream of our abilities, barely making a murmuring sound. For now even in the churches these things are sought after, and the simplicity and purity of the apostolic words have been abandoned, as if one were going to the Athenaeum and to lecture halls, in order to arouse the applause of those present, so that a deceitful rhetorical speech might proceed like a certain harlot into the public eye, seeking not so much to educate the people as to win the favor of the people and, by the manner of a sweetly singing psaltery and pipe, to soothe the senses of the listeners. So that truly may be fitted to our times that saying of the prophet Ezechiel, with the Lord speaking to him: 'And you will become for them as a voice of a sweetly singing harp and well-tuned: and they will hear your words and not do them.' (Ezek. 33:32). But what should I do? Should I remain silent? Yet it is written: You shall not appear before your Lord empty. And Isaiah (as it is found in Hebrew manuscripts) laments: Woe is me, wretched that I am, for I have kept silent. Should I speak? But the harshness of Hebrew pronunciation has marred all the elegance of speech and the beauty of Latin eloquence. For you yourselves know that more than fifteen years have passed since I last held in my hands any work by Tullius, any by Maro, any by any author of the pagan literature. And if by chance something from those works still echoes in our conversation, it is as if we recall an ancient dream through the fog of memory. But what progress I have made through tireless study of that language, I leave to the judgment of others: what I have lost in my own, I know. In addition to this, because of the weakness of my eyes and my whole body, I do not write with my own hand: nor can I compensate for the slowness of my speech with labor and diligence: which they also say of Virgil, that he portrayed his books by licking them like bear cubs: but with a scribe summoned, or immediately saying whatever comes to mind: or if I want to think a little bit, intending to produce something better, then that man reproaches me in silence, he clenches his hand, wrinkles his forehead, and with his whole body language he declares that he is useless to assist. However, although the speech is of good nature and cleverly arranged, and adorned with the flower of words; nevertheless, unless it has been refined and polished by the hand of its author, it is not shining, it does not have a mixed gravity with the elegance; but it more betrays, rather than adorns, like the wealth of country bumpkins. What is the purpose of this? Clearly, so that both you and others (who may wish to read) may receive the answer that I am not writing a panegyric or controversy, but a commentary, that is, my intention is not to be praised for my words, but that what has been well said by someone else may be understood as it was said. It is the task of my office to discuss obscure matters, to illuminate what is clear, and to dwell in doubts. Hence the work of many commentators is called an explanation. If anyone seeks eloquence or takes pleasure in declamations, they have in both languages Demosthenes and Cicero, Polemon and Quintilian. The Church of Christ is not gathered from the Academy or the Lyceum, but from the common people. Hence the Apostle says: 'Consider your calling, brothers and sisters, that not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble are called; but God has chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to confound the strong, and God has chosen the ignoble things of the world, and the things which are despised, and the things which are nothing, to bring to nothing the things that are.' (I Corinthians 1:26-28). For since, by the order, variety, and constancy of creatures, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the folly of preaching to save those who believe. For Jews demand signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men. Therefore, the Apostle himself also spoke to the Corinthians: And when I came to you, brethren, I did not come with superiority of speech or of wisdom, proclaiming to you the testimony of the Lord. For I determined to know nothing among you except Jesus Christ, and Him crucified (I Cor. II, 1, 2). And lest it be thought that he who said these things was a foolish preacher, with a foreboding mind, which could be opposed, he overturned it. But he says, 'God's wisdom is spoken in mystery, which is hidden: which no ruler of this age has known. How many people now read Aristotle? How much do they know about Plato, either his books or his name? Only a few old men remember them in their idle moments in the corners. But the whole world speaks of our farmers and fishermen, the entire universe resounds. Therefore, in simple language, their simple words must be explained. I say words, not meanings. But if, while you pray, I am able to have the same spirit in explaining their letters as they had in dictating them, then you will see how great was the magnitude and breadth of true wisdom in them, as much as there was arrogance and vanity in the learned men of the world. In short, I reveal to you the secret of my mind: I do not want the one who will understand the Apostle through me to have difficulty understanding my writings or to seek another interpreter to understand. But now it is time to pursue the rest.

5:7

(Verse 7.) You were running well. Who hindered you from obeying the truth? The Latin translator, in his interpretation, put 'not obeying the truth', which is written in Greek as 'τῇ ἀληθείᾳ μὴ πείθεσθαι'. He interpreted it in the previous place as 'not believing the truth', which we noted in its proper place because it is not found in ancient manuscripts, although the Greek copies have been confused by this error. The meaning of the passage is: You were worshiping the Father in spirit and truth, and you were receiving from the fullness of Christ, knowing that the law was given only to the people through Moses and not made as well. But grace and truth came through Jesus Christ, not only given but also accomplished. So, since you were running so well, serving the truth rather than the images, why do you, hindered by a distorted teacher, follow the shadow of the Law and abandon the truth of the Gospel? It follows.

You have not reached a consensus with anyone. But since we have not found this written either in Greek books or in those who have commented on the Apostle, it seems that it should be disregarded.

5:8

(Verse 8) Your persuasion is not from the one who called you. In the Latin manuscripts, I found it written as follows: Your persuasion is from God, who called you. Indeed, I think that 'from the one' was originally written and gradually, due to similarity, 'from God' became more frequent, because it is 'from the one.' But even so, the meaning cannot stand, as he had just accused them of not obeying the truth, showing that it is within their power to obey or not to obey, now on the contrary he asserts that their persuasion and obedience come not so much from those who are called, as from the one who calls. Therefore it is better and truer to read as follows: Your persuasion is not from the one who called you. For one thing is the work of God, another is the work of men. The work of God is to call; the work of men is either to believe or not to believe. And wherever the free will of man is affirmed from the Scriptures, there is quoted the passage: If you will and hear me (Exod. XIX, 5). And again: And now, Israel, what does the LORD your God ask of you? (Deut. X, 12), which is especially confirmed from this place. But those who think themselves simpler and believe that they should defer to God, so that even our belief is in His power, have removed a part of the prayer and have rendered a sense contrary to the Apostle. So, whether for good or for ill, neither God nor the devil is the cause, because our belief is not from Him who called us, but from us, who either consent or do not consent to the calling. Otherwise: This belief which you now follow is not from God who called you in the beginning, but from those who have troubled you afterwards.

5:9

(Verse 9.) A little yeast leavens the whole batch of dough. It is incorrectly translated in our codices: A little yeast corrupts the whole lump, and the translator has conveyed the sense of the interpreter rather than the words of the Apostle. However, Paul himself uses this same statement to the Corinthians: where he commands that the one who had his father's wife be removed from their midst, and be handed over to destruction and affliction of the flesh through fasting and sickness, so that the spirit may be saved on the day of the Lord Jesus Christ (some manuscripts add: our Lord). He says indeed: Not good is your boasting. Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump? (I Cor. 5:5, 6, and following)? Or (as we have now corrected) leavens the whole mixture? And immediately he adds: Purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new mixture, as you are unleavened. For Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us. Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. But now, according to this same sentiment, He teaches that the spiritual bread of the Church, which came down from heaven, should not be violated by Jewish interpretation; and the Lord Himself commanded the same to His disciples, that they should beware of the leaven of the Pharisees (John VI). And the evangelist, making this more clear, added: But He had spoken to them concerning the doctrine of the Pharisees (Matthew XVI). Moreover, what is this other doctrine of the Pharisees, if not the observance of the Law according to the flesh? Therefore, this is the meaning: Do not think lightly of men who come from Judea and teach another doctrine, for they despise danger. A spark is a small thing, and when it is barely seen, it is not noticed; but if it catches hold of tinder and finds any small bit of fuel, it consumes walls, cities, vast forests, and regions. Likewise, the yeast in this parable in the Gospel (Luke 13) seems small and insignificant; but when it is mixed with flour, it corrupts the whole mass with its power, affecting everything that is mixed in. Similarly, a perverse teaching, starting from one foolish person, finds only two or three listeners at first; but gradually, like cancer spreading in the body, it contaminates the entire flock, as the common saying goes, the scabies of one animal infects the whole herd. Therefore, as soon as a spark appears, it must be extinguished, and the leaven must be removed from the vicinity of the dough, the rotten flesh must be cut away, and the scabrous animal must be driven away from the sheepfold, so that the whole house, mass, body, and livestock do not burn, decay, rot, and perish. Arius was a spark in Alexandria; but because he was not immediately suppressed, the flame of his spread throughout the entire world.

5:9

(Verse 9.) I trust in you in the Lord, that you will understand nothing else. Not by conjecture, as some would have it, but by the prophetic spirit, Paul declares that the Galatians will return to the way of truth they had lost (I Cor. XII). For indeed, he who encouraged others to emulate the charisms, especially prophecy, himself spoke with the same abundant grace: For we know in part, and we prophesy in part (Ibid., XIII, 9). Therefore, foreseeing in spirit that they would believe nothing else except what they were taught through the Epistle, he said: I have confidence in you, in the Lord, that you will understand nothing else. For even the addition of the name of the Lord signifies the same thing. For if he had estimated this through conjecture, he could have said: I have confidence in you. But now, adding in the Lord, with a certain divine confidence in spirit, which he had known would come to pass, he prophesied.

5:10

(Verse 10) But whoever disturbs you will bear judgment, whoever he may be. Secretly, they say, he attacks Peter, to whom he himself writes that he resisted him to his face, because he did not walk uprightly according to the truth of the Gospel. But neither did Paul speak with such insolent cursing against the leader of the Church (Galatians 2), nor did Peter deserve to be accused as the disturber of the Church. Therefore, it must be concluded that someone else is being referred to, who either was with the Apostles, or came from Judea, or believed of the Pharisees, or is certainly highly esteemed among the Galatians, so that he bears judgment upon the disturbed Church, whoever he may be. But he was referring to judgment, that is, what he said in other words: Each person will bear their own burden. And I think in the Scriptures, burden can be understood in both a good and a bad sense, that is, both for those oppressed by grave sins, and for those who sustain the light burdens of virtues. Concerning sins, the penitent speaks in the psalm: My iniquities have risen above my head, like a heavy burden they weigh me down (Psalm 38:5). Concerning virtues and the doctrine of virtues, the Savior says: For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light (Matthew XI, 30). And that doctrine is also understood as a burden, is clear in the Gospel. For the Pharisees impose heavy burdens, which cannot be carried, and they place them on the shoulders of others, but they themselves are unwilling to touch them with one finger (Ibid., XXIII). How grave it is to disturb someone's tranquility and to agitate calm hearts with certain disturbances, the words of the Savior to the apostles testify, saying: Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid (John XIV). For it is expedient that he who disturbs and scandalizes someone in the Church should have a millstone hung around his neck and be thrown into the sea, rather than he should scandalize one of these little ones who are shown by the Savior (Luke 17). Therefore, the Galatians were troubled between the spirit and the letter, circumcision and incision, hidden and manifest Judaism, not knowing what to do. However, it can be understood more briefly as follows: Whoever is the one who leads you back to the doctrine of the Pharisees and desires to be circumcised in the flesh, though he may be eloquent and boast in the knowledge of the Law, I say nothing more except this (which you cannot deny) that he will be judged for this work and will receive reward for his labor.

5:11

(Verse 11.) But if I still preach circumcision, why am I still being persecuted? In that case, the offense of the cross has been abolished (or, as it is better expressed in Greek, ceased). We read in the Acts of the Apostles, and the apostle Paul himself frequently mentions in his Epistles, that he endured frequent persecutions from the Jews because he taught that those who believed in Christ from the Gentiles should not be circumcised. Therefore, concerning those mentioned above, he says: Whoever disturbs you will bear judgment, whoever he may be, in order to deceive the Galatians. They also added this: Not only Peter, James, John, and the other apostles in Judea observe circumcision and other precepts of the Law, but even Paul himself, who taught you differently than the truth of the matter, circumcised Timothy and often became a Jew among the Jews, compelled by the truth. Wanting now to remove the opinion about the minds of the Galatians, Paul says: But I, brothers, if I preach circumcision, why am I still persecuted? In saying this, all the hatred of the Jews is against me, and the madness with which they rage against me is for no other reason than that I teach that the Gentiles should not be circumcised and that they should not keep the burdens of the law, which are now superfluous and abolished. However, if I am persecuted, it is evident that I am not preaching circumcision, which I destroy. For I suffer not so much persecution from the Jews because I preach the crucified, and say that Jesus is the Christ, whom the Law and the Prophets foretold, as because I teach that the Law is complete. But that the cross is a stumbling-block to the Jews and folly to the Gentiles, our Lord Himself shows, Who is called a stone of offense and a rock of scandal; for no other reason, I think, than because when the preaching has advanced with full sails to the hearers, as soon as it comes to the cross, it strikes against it and can by no means proceed further in an unimpeded course. But this Cross, which is a scandal to the Jews and foolishness to the Gentiles, is to us who believe, power and wisdom. For Christ is the power of God and the wisdom of God (1 Corinthians 1:24), so that what was called foolishness by the world might become wiser than the wisdom of men in the sight of God. And what was considered weakness and a stumbling block, became stronger than the power of men in the sight of God. But even though, he says, the scandal of Christ's Cross remains, I will endure persecution, which I would not endure if the scandal did not remain. It is in vain, indeed, that some boast of preaching circumcision, which I endure persecution for opposing.

5:12

(Verse 12.) I wish that those who trouble you may be cut off. It is asked how Paul, his disciple, said: Bless those who curse you. And he himself speaking: Bless and do not curse (Rom. XII, 14). And in another place: Neither shall the revilers possess the kingdom of God (I Cor. XV): now if he has cursed them, who trouble the Galatian churches, and with a wishful prayer he has cursed: I wish that those who trouble you may be cut off. For the passion of castration is so detestable that both the one who inflicts it against someone's will is punished by the public laws, and the one who castrates himself is considered infamous. For as they say, this is true: Christ lives in me (II Cor. XIII, 3); and this: Do you seek a proof of Christ speaking in me? Surely the voice of curse cannot be understood of him who says: Learn from me, for I am humble, and meek, and gentle in heart (Matth. XI, 29). And it is believed to be more of a Jewish fury, and a certain unrestrained madness that could not be restrained, than to have imitated him who, like a lamb before his shearer, did not open his mouth, and did not curse those who cursed him (Isaiah 53). However, he delivered himself to death as one condemned. But to those who will defend Paul, they will say this: the words he spoke were not so much words of fury against his adversaries, but of love for the Churches of God. For he saw indeed the whole province, which he himself had led through his own blood and dangers from idolatry to the faith of Christ, suddenly troubled by a sudden persuasion and apostolic grief, and as a grieving father, he could not hold himself: he changed his voice and grew angry with those whom he had charmed, so that he might at least retain them by reproach whom he could not retain by kindness. And no wonder if the Apostle, as a man and still enclosed in a frail vessel, seeing another law captivating him in his body and leading him in the law of sin, spoke this once, in which we frequently see holy men falling. But this can also be said (although it may seem superfluous to some) that Paul did not so much curse them as he prayed for them, that they may lose those parts of their body through which they were compelled to sin. And as it is said in the Gospel: it is better for someone to enter the kingdom of heaven without an eye, without a hand, without a foot, or any other part of the body, than to go into hell completely (Matthew XV): so now he wishes for them to lose one part of their body rather than be perpetually damned by the fire within the entire body. We have shown how this argument can be answered when it is made by the pagans. Now let's bring it forth against the heretics, namely Marcion, and Valentinus, and all those who attack the Old Testament. We must show how those who criticize the Creator as bloodthirsty, a stern warrior, and a mere judge can reconcile this with the Apostle of the good God. And certainly, I think there is no sentence in the Old Law as cruel, as bloody, as the one that says, 'May those who disturb you be cut off.' They cannot say that the Apostle prayed for the enemies of Christ, who were disturbing his Churches. Nor can it be called an expression of love, because it is evident from the weight of the words themselves that it is full of arrogance and indignation. Therefore, whatever excuses they may bring forward on behalf of the Apostle, we will not defend this according to the Old Law.

5:13

(V. 13.) For you were called to freedom, brothers: only do not use your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh (understood); because that is not found in Greek, the Latin translator added it. This passage is very obscure, so it was decided to transfer it word for word from the tenth book of the Stromata. Not that each part cannot be explained in its own place and meaning; but in order to separate it from the previous matter and make it one difficult body: and if they are understood in a way that is consistent, they seem to contradict each other and be full of abruptness. Therefore, these are the words of Origen: 'The place is difficult: and so it seems to us it must be discussed. The book is one that follows a higher meaning and the truth, and it despises the preceding types and figures and the letter: therefore, one should not look down upon the minor matters and give an opportunity to those who cannot perceive things in a more sublime manner, to completely despair of themselves. For though they may be weak and be called carnal in comparison to the spirit, they are still of Christ's flesh.' For if you understand the mystery of charity serving the weaker ones, do something for the weak: lest your brother perish in his own knowledge, for whom Christ died. Therefore, pay careful attention to whether this sense is woven into the following. You, brothers, have been called to freedom: perhaps because not everyone was able to receive the call to freedom. For this reason, you now hear: Only do not use freedom as an opportunity for the flesh. For through love it is fitting to serve the lesser to the greater: because whoever wants to be greater, will be the servant of all (Matthew XX; Mark X). Therefore, let not the spiritual person wound the flesh of Christ, nor give them occasion to bite and devour each other. Therefore, the one who walks in the Spirit and follows the words of the Scriptures, should not fulfill the desires of their flesh. But if we understand simply what is said: Walk in the Spirit and you will not fulfill the desires of the flesh, as many believe, against the argument and hypothesis of the whole Epistle, Paul suddenly bursts forth into this: For if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the Law. And since up until now some part of his discourse has cohered, if we once again follow a simple understanding, he suddenly transfers us to disorderly precepts, speaking about flesh and spirit, that is: The works of the flesh are obvious and those [works] too. And on the contrary: But the fruit of the Spirit is charity, and the rest. But neither should we despair of consistency in these [teachings]; for the history of divine books contains the works of the flesh, not very helpful to those who understand it in this way, as it is written. For who will not be taught to serve luxury, and to regard fornication as nothing: when he reads that Judah went to a prostitute (Gen. 28); and that the patriarchs had many wives together? How can he not be provoked to idolatry, who believes that the blood of bulls and the other Levitical sacrifices indicate no more than what is written? And that enmities, as Scripture openly declares, are taught, and from this passage it is proved: O daughter of Babylon, miserable, blessed is he who will repay you for what you have done to us. Blessed is he who holds and dashes your little ones against the rock (Ps. CXXXVI, 8, 9). And also: In the morning I would slay all the sinners of the earth (Ps. C, 8), and similar things to these: namely, about quarrels, envy, anger, fights, and dissensions. Indeed, historical examples more often provoke us rather than prevent us from such things (if we don't understand anything deeper). Many consider that heresies have arisen more from a carnal understanding of Scripture rather than from the work of our flesh. Moreover, we learn about envy and drunkenness through the letter of the Law. Noah becomes drunk after the flood, and the patriarchs feast with Joseph in Egypt (Gen. IX and XLIII). But even banquets are written about in the book of the Kings; David dances and plays the tambourines before the Ark of the Covenant of God (1 Kings VI), and similar things. It is asked how the simple divine discourse of Scripture, which is called flesh, incites us to witchcraft and dark arts, unless we transcend to the same spirit of Scripture. I think this means that Daniel, along with three boys, were found to be wiser than the magicians, enchanters, and astrologers of Babylon and the Chaldeans. Moses was also educated in all the wisdom and knowledge of the Egyptians. Therefore, it is the cause of many evils if someone remains in the flesh of Scripture. Those who do so will not inherit the kingdom of God. Let us therefore seek the spirit and fruits of Scripture, which are not said to be hidden. For indeed, with much labor and sweat, and with worthy devotion, the fruits of the spirit are found in the Scriptures. Where I think that Paul spoke carefully and cautiously about the senses of Scripture: But the works of the flesh are manifest (Galatians 5:19). But he did not put the spiritual ones there as he did the carnal ones; the fruit of the spirit is clear: But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, and the rest (ibid., 22). Therefore, if we set aside the types and move on to the truth of Scripture and the spirit, immediately the first love is revealed to us, and as we progress to joy, we reach peace, through which we obtain patience. But who is not educated in compassion and goodness, when even those things which are considered sad by some, such as punishments, battles, the destruction of nations, and threats to the people through the prophets, are understood to be more remedies than punishments? For the Lord will not be angry forever. (Isaiah 57) Therefore, when these things have been made clear to us, we will have a more reasonable faith, and temperance will accompany corrected morals, followed by self-control and chastity: and after all these things, the Law will begin to be for us. So far to Origins. To which we can add, that we may say that those called from legal servitude to the liberty of the Gospel (of whom it is said above: Stand, and do not again be burdened with the yoke of servitude) are also now warned, that while embracing the light yoke of Christ and the pleasant precepts of the Gospel, they by no means think it is allowed for them to use this very liberty of living as an opportunity for the flesh: that is, to live according to the flesh, to be circumcised according to the flesh; but rather to walk according to the Spirit, to be circumcised in spirit, and, aiming at higher things of the Spirit, to abandon the humbleness of the letter. But it can also be understood in another way. Someone may ask: If I have ceased to be under the Law, and have been called to freedom from slavery, then I ought to live in a manner that is fitting for freedom, not being bound by any commandments, but rather doing whatever pleases and is suggested by one's own will, following it. To this, the Apostle responded: indeed we have been called to freedom in the Spirit, but in such a way that this freedom does not serve the flesh. Let us not think that everything is allowed to us, everything is expedient for us: on the contrary, let us serve one another through love, now that we have become free, having ceased to be servants of the Law, so that the multifarious precepts of the Law may be summed up in one chapter of love.

5:14

(Verse 14) But serve one another through love; for the whole law is fulfilled in one statement: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' When he was free from all, he made himself a servant of all for the sake of love, so that he might gain more (I Cor. XIII). He rightly exhorts others to serve him through love, which does not seek its own, but that of the neighbor. For whoever wants to be first, shall be the servant of all (Mark, X, 44): just as the Savior, being in the form of God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking on the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of a human. He humbled himself, becoming obedient unto death, even death on a cross (Philippians II): so likewise, whatever we appeared to do under the necessity of the Law, let us now know that it should be done more through love, for us who are free. But love is the only good, so that all the law is summed up in it. The Apostle also enumerates the goods of charity in another place, saying: Love is not jealous, does not act improperly (I Cor. XIII, 7, 8). After listing many other qualities, he concludes: Love hopes for all things, endures all things, love never fails. And the Savior in the Gospel, as a sign of his disciples, says that they should love their neighbors (Matthew XX). I think that this is not only suitable for humans but also for angels. In other words, the same thing is said: What you do not want to be done to you, do not do to others, and what you want others to do to you, do the same to them. (Ibid., VII, 12). I do not want my wife to be adulterated, I do not want my property to be plundered, I do not want to be falsely oppressed by testimony, and to summarize everything in a brief statement, I do not deserve to have anything unjust done to me. If I do these same things through charity working in me, either for another or willingly, the whole law is fulfilled. And it is not difficult to teach how all the precepts, 'You shall not kill,' 'You shall not commit adultery,' 'You shall not steal,' 'You shall not bear false witness,' and the like, are held together by the observance of charity. It is difficult, however, to show how the sacrifices also, which are commanded in Leviticus, and the distinction between clean and unclean foods, as well as the cycle of annual solemnities, are recapitulated in one precept of charity. Unless someone moved to that place, to assert that the Law is spiritual, and that we serve the heavenly things with images and examples, before the true Pontiff arrives: who, having once offered himself as a victim, redeemed us with his own blood, all of that variety and difficulty of the ancient Law is completed in his love for mankind. Indeed, the Father loved the world so much that he gave his beloved and only Son for us. But he who once lived by the Spirit, mortified the works of the flesh, and was chosen by the Savior, is no longer called a servant, but a friend. And he is no longer under the Law, which was established for the impious, the sinners, the rebellious, and the wicked. But now, when we do all things that are more difficult or even a little bit, we only do not do this, which is easier to do and without which everything we do is in vain. The body feels the injury of fasting, the flesh is weakened by abstinence, alms are sought through effort, and blood is shed in martyrdom, although the faith burns, it is not poured out without pain and fear. All these things are what people do: love alone without work is possible. And because only a pure heart makes the world, it is conquered in us by the devil, so that we do not see God with a pure mind. For when I am sitting and speaking against my brother, and I put a stumbling block in front of the son of my mother (Ps. XLIX, 20), when I am tormented by someone else's happiness, and I make another's good my own evil, is not this what follows fulfilled in me: If you bite and devour each other, watch out that you do not consume each other? Charity is a rare possession. Who wants to be cursed by Christ himself for his brothers, following the apostle? Who mourns with mourners, rejoices with those who rejoice, and is wounded by another's wound? Who is destroyed by his brother's death? We are all more lovers of ourselves than lovers of God. See how great the good of charity is. If we have done martyrdom in such a way that we desire our remains to be honored by men: if we, following the opinion of the crowd, have shed our blood fearlessly, and have given our substance all the way to our own poverty, to this work not so much a reward as a punishment is owed: and the torments of betrayal are more so than the crown of victory.

5:15

(Verse 15) But if you bite and devour one another, be careful that you are not consumed by one another. This can be understood simply as not tearing each other down, not seeking revenge with curses, not wanting to cause sorrow to the sorrowful, and being like animals, biting and being bitten, leading to destruction and consumption. However, it is better to understand this in the context of the entire letter and according to reason, rather than suddenly breaking into extraordinary commands. Let us refer everything to circumcision and observance of the Law. If others, he says, disturb you, but you are also disturbed. If you read the whole old Scripture, understand it in the way it is written: Eye for eye, tooth for tooth (Deut. XIX, 21), and anger desires revenge, but revenge imposes pain: which the Law not only does not prohibit, but even commands, restoring justice in talion, it follows that the stripped should strip, and the wounded should wound again, and the consumed should bite back, and what seems to be justice should be consumption, not avenging one, but consuming both.

5:16

(Verse 16) But I say: Walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. And this is to be understood in two ways according to what was said before: first, that those who have mortified the works of the flesh by the spirit, have sown in the spirit, so that they may reap eternal life from the spirit, whenever they feel the pleasures of the flesh tempting them, not to fulfill their desires (which, if fulfilled, seems pleasing for a time), but to restrain them by the spirit; and second, according to the opinion of the Historian (Sallust): to live more by the control of the mind and the service of the body. And moreover, the reason is that the Law is spiritual (Rom. VII), not for those who are Jews in a visible sense, but for those who are Jews in a hidden sense, and circumcision of the heart is in the spirit, not in the letter, and we say that they walk in the spirit and do not fulfill the desire of the flesh, those who spiritually leave Egypt and drink the spiritual food and drink from the spiritual rock, who are not judged in eating or drinking or in a part of a festive day, or of a new moon, or of the Sabbath, but walk in all things spiritually, not fulfilling the desires of the carnal law, or the desires of the letter, but reaping the fruits of spiritual intelligence. A third interpretation has also been given in this place by some, but it does not differ much from the second interpretation. They assert that the desire of the flesh is present in those who are young in Christ, while the journey of the spirit is for mature men, and it signifies the seriousness of the spirit, that is, walking on the way as perfect men, and not fulfilling the desires of the young.

5:17

(Verse 17.) For the flesh desires against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh. These indeed are opposed to one another, so that you may not do the things that you wish. The flesh takes pleasure in present and short-lived things, while the spirit is concerned with eternal and future things. In the midst of this conflict, the soul stands, having in its power both good and evil, to will and not to will, but not having the very will and not will itself as perpetual: because it is possible that, when it has consented to the flesh and has done its works, it may, by repentance, unite itself to the spirit and perform its works. This is therefore what he says: These things oppose each other, that is, flesh and spirit, so that you do not do whatever you want. Not because we have our own judgment, by which we agree either with the flesh or with the spirit, but because what we do is not properly ours, but the work itself is attributed to either the flesh or the spirit. It is a great labor and dispute to find some middle ground, having shown the works of the flesh and the spirit, which seem to pertain to neither the flesh nor the spirit. We are called carnal when we give ourselves entirely to pleasure. We are called spiritual when we follow the Holy Spirit, that is, when we are instructed and taught by Him. I consider philosophers to be animalistic, as they believe that their own thoughts are wisdom, about which it is rightly said: But the natural man does not receive what belongs to the Spirit. For it is foolishness to him. To make this clearer, let us consider some examples: Flesh, earth, soul, gold, spirit, fire. As long as gold is in the earth, it loses its name, and is called by the earth with which it is mixed. But when separated from the soil, it takes on both the appearance and the name of gold, yet it is not yet proven. However, if it is heated by fire and purified, then it receives the splendor of gold and the dignity of its adornment. In the same way, the soul, existing between earth and fire, that is, between flesh and spirit, when it surrenders to the flesh, is called flesh; when it belongs to the spirit, it is called spirit. But if he believes in his own thought and thinks that he can find truth without the grace of the Holy Spirit, he is marked as a base metal, by the animal nature of man. This place can be better explained as a single series and body, connecting and not disagreeing with itself. Brothers, you have been called from the servitude of the Law to the freedom of the Gospel. But I beg you, do not abuse your freedom as a license, and do not think that everything that is allowed is beneficial to you, and do not provide opportunity for the flesh and for indulgence. Rather, learn that this liberty is greater than servitude, so that what before the Law forced from the unwilling, now you may serve one another through charity. For indeed, all that burden of the Law and its many precepts have not been so much abolished by the grace of the Gospel as they have been condensed into one short command of charity, that we may love our neighbor as ourselves. For whoever loves their neighbor fulfills the whole law (Matthew 22), giving them good and not causing harm. But if love ceases, and there is no charity, through which the whole law is fulfilled, there will be a kind of public robbery among men, as they rage against each other, devouring and devouring themselves. But you, brothers, according to the spiritual law, must live, so that you do not fulfill the desires of the flesh. For the flesh fears cold, rejects hunger, weakens through sleeplessness, flames with lust, and desires soft and pleasant things. On the other hand, the spirit desires the things that are contrary to the flesh and that can weaken it. And so it happens that, not because you have ceased to be under the slavery of the Law, you think you are free: but know rather that you are retained by the law of nature, because even if the law does not command, and nature has ceased, your will, namely your actions, are not immediately followed, but you are often compelled to do them, the flesh resisting against the spirit, which you do not want to do. From which, brothers, I beseech you, not to give your freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but rather to serve the Spirit, so that you may begin to do those things which you desire, and owe nothing to the law, that is, not to be under the flesh. For you will be able to truly have the freedom of the law abolished in the Gospel, when the flesh no longer compels you to do what you do not desire, but serving the Spirit, you have taught yourselves not to be under the Law. And because we have begun to explain this passage with a twofold understanding above, what we have omitted must be addressed. The flesh desires against the spirit, that is, a carnal understanding of the stories and scriptures, which resists allegory and spiritual teaching. But the spirit desires against the flesh, that is, it opposes higher things to lower things, the eternal to the fleeting, and truth to shadows. And the carnal understanding of scripture, which cannot be fulfilled (for we are not able to do everything that is written), shows us that we are not in control of fulfilling the law, even if we want to follow the letter, impossibility does not permit it.

5:18

(Ver. 18.) But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the Law. The spirit referred to here is not the one about which the Apostle speaks elsewhere: The Spirit itself testifies with our spirit that we are children of God (Rom. VIII, 16), that is, it does not signify the spirit of man that is in him, but the Holy Spirit. By following Him, we become spiritual, and we cease to be under the Law. It should be noted that this spirit is not referred to with an article or any addition, as we read in other cases, the spirit of gentleness and the spirit of faith, but it is simply called the Spirit: this distinction seems to have some significance, which is more observed in Greek than in our language (since we don't have articles at all). It is asked in this place whether whoever is led by the Spirit is not under the Law, whether Moses and the prophets, being inspired by the Spirit, lived under the Law, which the Apostle denies, or whether, having the Spirit, they were not under the Law, which the Apostle affirms here, or whether, while living under the Law, they did not have the Spirit, which it is wicked to believe about such men. To this we will respond briefly: It is not the same thing to be under the Law and to be as if under the Law, just as it is not the same in the likeness of sinful flesh and in being sinful flesh. And the true serpent does not sound the same. And the likeness of the brazen serpent, which Moses hung up in the desert (Num. XXI). Therefore, the holy prophets and Moses, walking in the Spirit and living in the Spirit, did not live under the Law, but as if under the Law, so that they seemed to be under the Law; but they profited those who were under the Law and provoked them from the humility of the letter to the height of the spirit. For even Paul, who became a Jew to the Jews and all things to all people, that he might gain all (I Cor. IX): he did not say he became under the Law, but became as if under the Law, to show that he kept not the truth of the Law, but the likeness. It seems to us that we have solved the proposed question. But what shall we do with that passage of Paul, which says: 'When the fullness of time came, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the Law, in order to redeem those who were under the Law' (Galatians 4:4-5)? For if Christ was under the Law, and not merely as under the Law, the whole preceding argument will be in vain. But this objection will be solved in its proper place. For the very reason why he was made under the Law, in order to redeem those who were under the Law, was surely that, while being free from the Law, he submitted to it willingly; and much freer was Paul, who testified that he was not under the Law, but as if under the Law. And in order to descend into the filth and abyss of death for us, who were praying and saying: Who will deliver me from this body of death? (Rom. VII, 14). In this way, He also willed to be born of a woman and to be under the Law, in order to save those who were born of a woman and under the Law. And surely He was not born of a woman, that is, of a married woman, but of a virgin. However, she was incorrectly called a virgin woman, because those who did not know her to be a virgin. And so, because of those who thought that the holy Mary had a husband, the woman is considered to be a virgin; thus, because of those who believed that Christ was under the Law, not knowing that he had become like those who were under the Law, he himself is said to have become under the Law.

5:19-21

(Verses 19-21.) The works of the flesh are evident, which are: fornication, impurity, debauchery, idolatry, witchcraft, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, anger, selfish ambition, dissension, factions, envy, drunkenness, orgies, and things like these. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. Now when we explained about the flesh and the spirit earlier, we said there are three possible interpretations: that there are those who are carnal, who are like infants and unable to receive solid food in Christ and the nourishment of mature age; or that there are those who are carnal, who follow only the Jewish way and the literal interpretation of the history; or that, according to the simple sense, flesh and spirit coexist in the makeup of a person, and, according to the difference in substance, they are either the works of the flesh or of the spirit. Now therefore, the works of the flesh which are mentioned here, namely fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, and other things which follow, seem to me to pertain more to the simple understanding of the flesh and spirit than to the flesh of the Law, and to be referred to little ones in Christ, although it is expressed in that place where we translated the word from the tenth of Origen's Stromate word for word, what can also be thought about them. But what he says: But the works of the flesh are evident, or shows that they are known to everyone: because they are inherently known to be evil and to be avoided, to the extent that even those who do them, desire to hide what they do. Certainly, these things are clear only to those who believe in Christ. For many of the pagans boast in their own shame and believe that if they have fulfilled their pleasure, they have achieved some kind of victory over vices. But it is also elegantly stated that He accomplished works in the flesh and fruits in the spirit: for vices end and perish within themselves, while virtues sprout and abound in abundance. And let us not think that the soul has no function if vices are attributed to the flesh and virtues to the spirit. Because the soul (as we have said above) is placed in a certain middle part and is joined to the flesh, and it is said about it: My spirit will not remain in these men, because they are flesh (Gen. VI, 3); or it is united to the spirit and passes into the name of spirit. For he who is joined to the Lord is one spirit (I Cor. VI, 17). Therefore, the first work of the flesh is fornication. He clearly stated this in the beginning, so that we do not have doubt about the middle parts. For whatever a man does, is outside the body; but he who commits fornication, sins in his own body. And we are not our own: for we are bought with a price, let us glorify and bear God in our body. In this is a fornicator of greater crime: because he takes away the members of Christ and makes them the members of a harlot. For there shall be two in one flesh. He who is not faithful, nor believes in Christ, makes his members the members of a harlot; he who believes and commits fornication, makes his members the members of a harlot. On the contrary, an unbeliever in fornication either does violence to himself or builds a temple to an idol, I do not know. For indeed, through vices or even the greatest demons are cultivated. This one thing I know: that whoever commits fornication after the faith of Christ violates the temple of God. According to the works of the flesh, it is called uncleanness, and it is followed by lust. For as in the old Law concerning unspeakable crimes that are done in secret, and it is most disgraceful to even mention them (lest both the mouth of the speaker and the ears of the hearers be defiled), the Scripture has generally included them, saying: 'Make the children of Israel be reverent and worthy of respect, free from all uncleanness' (Lev. XV, 31). So in this place, it has named the other extraordinary pleasures, as well as the very works of marriage, if they are not done reverently and with modesty, as if under the eyes of God, so that only to their own children will they serve, uncleanness and lust. Fourth, in the catalog of the works of the flesh, idolatry holds a place. For whoever once allows themselves to indulge in luxury and pleasure does not look towards the Creator. Moreover, all idolatry, revelry, gluttony, catering to the desires of the belly, and those things that lie beneath the belly, are enjoyed. And lest it should happen that sorcery and the practices of evil were not seen as prohibited in the new Testament, they are also mentioned among the works of the flesh. For often it happens that both loving and being loved occurs through the use of magical arts. Enmity, which arises after the infliction of harm, declares who is guilty, as a clear evidence of the crime. For as much as it lies within us, we ought to have no enemies, but rather be at peace with all. However, if by speaking the truth, we earn enemies, it is not so much that we are their enemies, as they are enemies of the truth. For what is said in Genesis to Abraham, 'I will be an enemy to your enemies and I will oppose those who oppose you', should be understood as not so much Abraham being their enemy, but rather they being enemies of Abraham's virtues and religion, through which he worshipped and revered God after trampling upon the idols and having come to know God. Moreover, what is commanded to the people of Israel, that they be enemies with Madian forever, and perpetuate the discord to future generations (Num. XXXI), it is said as if to those who were under the control of a tutor and deserved to be punished in another way: 'You shall have hatred for your enemy' (Matth. V, 43). Or certainly not so much of persons as of manners, there has been a disagreement made: just as God wisely placed enmity between the serpent and the woman, so that their friendship would be useless to man, through which he was cast out of paradise, in the same way in the lives of the Israelites and the Madianites, there is more dissimilarity than that they are two condemned nations. In the seventh place among the works of the flesh, contention holds a certain quasi-sacred and prominent position among the number of vices. However, it is not fitting for the servant of the Lord to engage in quarrels, but rather to be gentle towards all, a teacher, patient, instructing with gentleness even those who argue against him (2 Timothy 2:24-25). After contention, the eighth place is filled by emulation, which is more significantly and notably referred to by the Greek word ζῆλος. Indeed, I do not know who among us lacks that particular evil. For they were jealous, even Joseph's brothers: and Mary, Aaron the prophet of God and priest, were deceived by such a passion against Moses (Gen. XXXVII, Num. XII): to the extent that the one of whom the Scripture narrated, saying: But Miriam the prophetess took a timbrel (Exod. XV. 20), etc., afterwards having been cast out of the camp, she became defiled with the stain of leprosy, and marked out a longer repentance by a seven-day separation (Num. XII). Then anger follows, which does not accomplish the justice of God (James 1), and it is a kind of madness. Between irritability and anger, there is this difference: that the irritable person is always angry, while the angry person is only temporarily provoked. And I do not know who can possess the kingdom of God: for the one who is angry is separated from the kingdom (Matthew 5). Moreover, the quarrels, which the Greeks signify as something different, they call ἐριθείας (since rixa is called μάχη) are prohibited from the kingdom of God. But contention is when someone is always ready to contradict, delights in the anger of others, and engages in quarrels like a woman, provoking the one who disagrees. This is called 'φιλονεικία' among the Greeks. There are also divisions of the flesh: when someone, with the same feeling and opinion, says 'I am of Paul,' 'and I of Apollos,' 'and I of Cephas,' 'and I of Christ' (1 Corinthians 1:12). And this same dissension is found within households: between husband and wife, father and son, brother and brother, master and servant, soldier and comrade, craftsman and fellow craftsman. Sometimes it happens that even in the explanations of Scriptures there arises dissension, from which heresies also, which are now put forth in the work of the flesh, bubble up. For if the wisdom of the flesh is hostile to God (Rom. VIII) (but all doctrines of falsehood that are contrary to God are hostile), consequently, heresies are also hostile to God and are attributed to the works of the flesh. Αἵρεσις, however, means choice in Greek: namely, each person chooses for themselves the discipline that they believe is better. Therefore, whoever understands Scripture in a way contrary to the meaning demanded by the Holy Spirit by whom it was written, even though they may not have departed from the Church, they can be called a heretic and they are focused on the works of the flesh, choosing what worsens. Envy follows heresies, which we cannot think is the same as zeal. Because zeal can be understood in a good sense, when someone strives to imitate those things that are better. Envy, however, is tormented by the happiness of others, and it is divided into two passions: either when someone sees himself as something in which he does not want another to be, or when he sees another as better and is upset that he is not like that person. A certain person, skillfully translating a Greek verse, composed an elegiac meter about envy, saying:

There is nothing more unjust than envy: it immediately gnaws at the author himself and torments his soul. Blessed Cyprian wrote a very excellent book on Zeal and Envy: whoever reads it will not hesitate to include envy among the works of the flesh. However, there is a difference between an envious person and a person who is envied: the envious person envies someone who is more fortunate. The envied person, on the other hand, is the one who suffers envy from someone else. Intoxication holds the fourteenth place among the works of the flesh. Indeed, the drunken will not inherit the kingdom of God. And the Lord said to the disciples: Take heed, lest your hearts be weighed down with carousing, drunkenness, and cares of this life (Luke 21:34). Wine confuses a man's senses: his feet stumble, his mind wavers, his desire is kindled. Hence the Apostle cries out: And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery (Ephesians 5:18). Everyone has the power to decide for themselves. I follow the Apostle: in wine there is debauchery, in wine there is drunkenness. But drunkenness and excess are counted among the works of the flesh, and he cannot deny it who is overcome by these passions. And though some may criticize me in that book, which I wrote about the preservation of virginity, for saying that young women should avoid wine as if it were poison, I do not regret my opinion. For in that work, wine is more of a curse than a creation of God for us, and we allowed the virgin, who was fervent with the heat of her own youth, the indulgence of drinking a little more so that she would not drink too little and suffer harm. Moreover, we knew that wine is consecrated into the blood of Christ, and it was commanded to Timothy to drink wine. However, drunkenness can occur from both wine and other types of alcoholic beverages that are made in different ways; from which it is also said about the holy ones: He shall not drink wine or strong drink (Luke 1:15). Strong drink is interpreted as drunkenness. And so that no one, not drinking wine, would think that he should drink something else, the cause is excluded; since everything that can cause intoxication is equally removed with wine. The fifteenth, which is also the last, of the works of the flesh, is revelry. For the people ate and drank, and they rose up to play (Exod. XXXII, 6). Drunkenness is always accompanied by debauchery. Indeed, a certain noble and eloquent orator, when describing a person awakened from sleep while intoxicated, said: “Neither awakened could he sleep, nor intoxicated could he stay awake.” With this sentiment, he expressed that in a way, the person was neither alive nor dead. It would be lengthy to repeat all the works of the flesh and to make a list of vices. Therefore, he concluded everything in his speech, saying these and similar things. Oh, if only we could avoid these things as easily as we understand them. I foretell to you, as I have foretold before: those who do such things will not inherit the kingdom of God. Where he had previously said: Sin shall not reign, he said, in your mortal body, to obey its desires (Rom. VI, 12). All these things have sin, in which we have perhaps lingered too much in distinguishing them. Therefore, in the soul in which sin reigns, the kingdom of God cannot reign. For what participation is there between righteousness and iniquity? What communication is there between light and darkness? What agreement is there between Christ and Belial (II Cor. VI, 14, 15)? And we think that we will attain the kingdom of God if we are free from fornication, idolatry, and sorceries. Behold, enmities, strife, anger, quarrels, dissensions, drunkenness, and other things that we consider small, they exclude us from the kingdom of God. It does not matter whether one person or many are excluded from happiness, since they are all similarly excluded. In Latin codices, adultery, impurity, and murder are also written in this catalogue of vices. But it should be known that no more than fifteen acts of the flesh are named, about which we have already discussed.

5:22

(Verse 22) But the fruit of the Spirit is charity, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith, gentleness, self-control. Against such things there is no law. And what other should hold the chief place among the fruit of the Spirit, if not charity, without which the other virtues are not considered to be virtues, and from which all good things are born? Indeed, both in the Law and in the Gospel, it holds the first place: You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength; and you shall love your neighbor as yourself (Deut. 6:5; Matt. 22:37). How abundantly charity is filled with goods, and above we have briefly expressed, and now it may suffice to have said too little: that love seeks not what is its own, but what is another's. And although someone through their own fault may be an enemy to the one who loves them, and they may strive to stir up turmoil in their tranquility through waves of hatred, nevertheless that person is never disturbed: they never consider a creature of God worthy of hatred. For charity covers a multitude of sins. Moreover, what is said by Salvatore: A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit (Matt, VII, 18), I believe is pronounced not so much about men as about the fruits of the flesh and the spirit: because neither can the spirit ever produce those vices that are enumerated in the works of the flesh; nor can the flesh overflow with those fruits that arise from the spirit. However, it can happen through the negligence of the possessor that the spirit, which dwells in a person, does not have its fruits; and conversely, the flesh, with its works mortified, ceases to sin. However, they do not always proceed to the point where the neglected tree produces the works of the flesh, and the cultivated tree bears spiritual fruits. In the second place of spiritual fruits, joy is placed: which the Stoics also, who distinguish more subtly, consider to be something different from happiness. For they say that joy is the exultation of the soul over things that are worthy of rejoicing: But they say that happiness is the unrestrained exultation of the soul, which knows no moderation, and even rejoices in things that are mixed with vice. Others in this region place their delight in pleasure: not the kind that excites the body to lust, titillates the senses, or caresses with sweet affection; but another kind, which without moderation and any charm of joy, exalts its voice in laughter. If this is true, and the distinction between their words is not deceiving and deceived, let us consider whether perhaps it is said for this reason: 'The wicked do not rejoice,' says the Lord (Isaiah 57:21). However, it should also be noted that after love, joy follows. For someone who loves another, always rejoices in their happiness. And if they see them deceived by some error and fallen into the slippery slope of sin, they will indeed feel sorrow and hasten to rescue them, but they cannot change joy into sadness, knowing that no rational creature can perish eternally before God. The third fruit of the spirit is peace, from which Solomon himself, who preceded Christ as a type, received his name. And the Psalmist sings about the Church: His place has become peaceful (Psalm 75:2). And in the eight blessings of the Gospel it is written: Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God (Matthew 5:9). It is also sung in the first psalm of degrees: With those who hate peace, I was peaceful (Psalm 120:6). And we should not seek peace only in that, as if we are not quarreling about anything else: but then the peace of Christ, that is, our inheritance, is with us, if our tranquil mind is not disturbed by any passions. After peace comes longanimity, or patience: for both can be interpreted as long-suffering. Opposed to this is pusillanimity, of which it is written: 'The pusillanimous is exceedingly foolish; but he who is patient and endures all things is a wise man' (Ecclus, VII). And when a man is called very wise, he is also called longanimous, as it is written in Proverbs: 'A long-animous man is much in prudence' (Prov. XIV, 29). Benignity or kindness, because in Greek it signifies both, is a gentle virtue, soft, tranquil, and fit for the companionship of all good things; it invites to familiarity, it charms by its discourse, it is regulated by good manners. Finally, the Stoics define it as follows: Kindness is a virtue that is inclined to do good voluntarily. Goodness is not very different from kindness, because it also seems inclined to do good. But it differs in that goodness can be more serious and characterized by stern manners while still doing and providing what is required. However, it may not be pleasant to be around and attract everyone with its sweetness. The followers of Zeno also define it as follows: Goodness is a virtue that is beneficial, that is, a virtue from which utility arises, or a virtue for its own sake, or an emotion that is the source of utilities.


Among the fruits of the Spirit, faith holds the seventh and most sacred place, which is also placed elsewhere among the three: hope, faith, and charity. It is not surprising that hope is not mentioned in this list, since it is in faith that what is hoped for is found. Thus, the Apostle, writing to the Hebrews, defines it: Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen (Hebrews 11:1). For what we hope for is coming but is not yet present, and through faith we possess it, hoping to hold onto what we believe. It is also asked how faith is placed in charity. The one who loves never considers themselves to be hurt: they suspect nothing except what they love and are loved by. But when love is far away, faith also departs. After faith, gentleness is counted, which is opposed to anger, quarrels, and disagreements. It is never provoked by its opposite, truly like a good tree of the Spirit, producing good fruits. Through this, the servant of God Moses deserved to receive the testimony of Scripture, which said: Moses was meek, more than all men on earth (Num. XII, 3). Above the earth, he said. Above those who saw God face to face, it could not be: for we are often compelled by the weakness of the flesh to do many things. Regarding David also, although many think that he prophesied about our Lord, which we also do not deny, the Holy Spirit sings in a figure of the coming one: Remember, O Lord, David, and all his meekness (Ps. 104:1). Whose meekness was most evident against Saul, Absalom, and Shimei (1 Samuel 24; 2 Samuel 15)? When one person wanted to kill him, another was plotting rebellion, and yet another was throwing stones at him and shouting: 'Leave, leave, wicked man!' (Ibid., XVI, 7). The highest level of self-control is found in the fruits of the spirit. This not only applies to chastity, but also to eating and drinking, and to anger and disturbances of the mind, and to the desire to gossip. The difference between moderation and self-control is that moderation is for those who have reached perfection and complete virtue, of whom the Savior says: 'Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth' (Matthew 5:4). And about himself: Learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart (Matth. XI, 29). Continence, however, is truly a virtue on the way, but has not yet reached the goal: because desires still arise in the mind of one who restrains himself, and they defile the mind's ruler, although they do not overcome him, nor drag the one who thinks into action. But not only in desires and desire is continence necessary, but also in the three remaining disturbances, namely, pain, joy, and fear. Against the fruits of such a spirit, there is no law. For the law is not laid down for the just, but for the unjust and disobedient, for the godless and sinful (1 Timothy 1:9). The law tells me: You shall not commit adultery, you shall not kill, you shall not bear false witness, you shall not steal, you shall not covet, you shall not swear falsely (Exodus 20:12 ff): if I do not do all these things, with the fruit of the Spirit reigning in me through charity, the precepts of the law are unnecessary for me. Finally, the wise men of the world have such an opinion about philosophy that what public laws compel people to do out of necessity, philosophy persuades them to do willingly.

5:24

(Ver. 24.) But those who belong to Christ have crucified the flesh with its vices and desires. Origen, connecting this passage with the previous ones, reads it as follows: There is no law against those who have crucified the flesh of Christ with its vices and desires, so that it does not mean, as it sounds in Latin, that they who belong to Christ say that they have crucified their own flesh with vices and desires; but Christ's flesh crucified by them with vices and desires. And he asks how in those who have the fruits of the Spirit, and against whom the Law ceased to be, the crucifixion of the flesh of the Lord is put in praise, when it is stated in Hebrews with condemnation: Crucifying again in themselves the Son of God, and making a show (Heb. VI, 6). As for 'crucifying again,' a better compound word in Greek is ἀνασταυροῦντες, which we can interpret as 'recrucifying.' First, therefore, it must be noted that crucifying is one thing, and re-crucifying is another. Furthermore, re-crucifying the Son of God is not the same as crucifying the flesh of Christ with vices and desires. For the flesh of Christ is not primarily and properly the Son of God, but Jesus Christ, who, when he was in the beginning with the Father, the Word of God was made flesh and emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, in order to crucify the flesh and strip off principalities and powers, triumphing over them in the cross, so that the words of the Apostle might be fulfilled: What is dead to sin is dead once (Rom. VI, 10). Therefore, if our bodies are the members of Christ, then our flesh is also the flesh of Christ, which we crucify, mortifying through it on earth, fornication, uncleanness, passion, evil desire, and greed. And now it is spoken of us in praise, who have crucified the flesh of Christ Jesus with vices and lusts, and always carry about in our body the mortification of Jesus, so that His life may also be revealed in our flesh. However, it is no small amount of labor to live in the present age, so that the life of Jesus may now be manifested in our flesh. For in this way, our mortal bodies will be made alive through the Spirit dwelling in us. Where the Latin interpreter placed vices, in Greek they are read as παθήματα, that is, passions. And because passion can signify both pain and other needs of the body, the Apostle cautiously introduced desires: so that he would not appear to deny the nature of the body in spiritual men, but vices. And let it be understood in this way, if we follow the Vulgate edition, as we read: But those who belong to Christ have crucified the flesh with its vices and desires; so that we may say, not that they have crucified the flesh of Christ, but their own. I have almost forgotten the second interpretation. For I have foretold that everything that follows is to be referred to the Law and circumcision. Therefore, the meaning is as follows: Those in whom there is the fruit of the Spirit, charity, joy, and the rest, have crucified the bodily understanding of Scripture, which is now called the flesh of Christ, with his passions and desires, which generate the nourishment of vices for infants and sucklings. He crucified the flesh of Christ, who does not wage war according to the flesh of history, but follows the spirit of allegory that precedes.

5:25

(Verse 25.) If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit. Let us use this testimony against those who do not want to understand the Scriptures spiritually. But who is the one who lives by the Spirit, if not our hidden self, who sometimes tends to live according to the flesh? But when he lives by the Spirit, he walks by the Spirit. When he desires to walk in the flesh, he is alive but dead. The perfect man in Christ always lives in the Spirit: he obeys the Spirit, he never lives in the flesh. And on the contrary: He who gives himself entirely to the flesh and devotes himself to passions never lives in the spirit. Among these there are those whom we cannot call spiritual or carnal; but those who fluctuate between virtues and vices, sometimes being drawn back to better things and being spiritual, sometimes being tripped up by the slippery slope of the flesh and being carnal.

5:26

(Verse 26.) We will not become empty glory-seekers, provoking one another, envying one another. The Greek word κενόδοξοι, translated by the Latin interpreter through a circuit of three words, expresses how many definitions and meanings glory has, as well as the countless books by philosophers and the two volumes written by Cicero on the subject. However, because we strive not to discuss the etymology of words but the sense of Scripture, we will therefore connect this passage with the previous ones: If we live by the Spirit, let us also walk by the Spirit, not by the Law, but by serving one another in love. We should not argue about the interpretation of Scripture and say, 'Circumcision is better,' no, but 'uncircumcision.' History should be disregarded, and allegory should be followed, rather allegory is empty and shadowy, and fixed on no truth roots. Thus it happens that envy is born among individuals. For they want to exclude you, saying that you should imitate them, not desiring to teach the truth of the Law, but to win. But so that we do not completely omit the word of glory untouched, leaving their foolishness to the philosophers, let us retract something from the Scriptures. The opinion of the crowd, and the praise sought by favor of men, sounds like the name of glory, where it is said: But all their works they do for to be seen of men (Matt. XXIII, 5). And elsewhere: How can ye believe, which receive honour one of another (John V, 44)? Furthermore, in a positive sense in the same place: and seek not the glory that comes from the only God. From which we understand that the same word sometimes signifies virtue, sometimes vice. If I seek glory from men, it is vice; if from God, it is virtue, who also encourages us to true glory, saying: But I receive not testimony from men (John V, 34), and They that honour me, I will honour (1 Sam. II, 30). The glory in divine Scriptures signifies something else, when it presents itself to the gaze of humans as more majestic and divine. The glory of the Lord was seen in the tabernacle and in the temple built by Solomon (1 Kings 8), and on the face of Moses when he did not realize that his face was glorified (Exodus 40). About this glory of the face, I think the Apostle also says: But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as by the Spirit of the Lord (2 Corinthians 3:18). And the Savior himself, called the brightness of glory and figure of the substance of God (Heb. I). Stephen also saw the glory of God, and Jesus standing at his right hand (Acts VII). But in order that we may also presume the liberty of inventing names for ourselves, since new things require new names (as someone has said), it has been said here: Let us not become desirous of empty or vain glory; let us assert that those who desire the glory of God and the praise worthy of their virtue, and who display something more divine in their appearance, are eager for full glory. And in many places. Our people have transferred majesty for glory. Now for a long time, I desire to burst forth into words, but I am held back by the fear of speaking. Nevertheless, I will speak, and I will not remain silent about my passion, a passion almost common, not about wealth, not about power, not about beauty and the attractiveness of bodies; for these things are clearly called the works of the flesh. If almsgiving is done for praise, the glory is empty: a long speech, followed by paleness from fasting. The words are not mine, but belong to the Savior in the Gospel (Matthew 6). Chastity itself also often seeks human applause in marriage, widowhood, and virgins. And what I have long feared to say, but must be said, even martyrdom, if it is done for the sake of admiration and praise from brethren, is in vain. Let the Apostle speak, let the vessel of election speak: If I give my body to be burned, but have not charity, it profits me nothing (1 Corinthians 13:3). He who said: I know a man in Christ, fourteen years ago (whether in the body, I do not know; or whether out of the body, I do not know, God knows), was caught up to the third heaven (2 Corinthians 12:2). And after a little while: Caught up into paradise, he heard secret words, which it is not permitted for a man to speak: to him, I say, who exerted himself more than all, so that the greatness of the revelations would not exalt him, a thorn in the flesh was given to him, an angel of Satan, who slapped him, so that he would not be exalted. And indeed, three times he asked the Lord to depart from him; but it was said to him: My grace is sufficient for you: for power is made perfect in weakness. What work of God is so necessary as to read the Scriptures, to preach in the Church, to desire priesthood, to minister before the altar of the Lord? But even these, unless someone guards his heart with all diligence, arise from the desire for praise. You may see many (as even Cicero says) inscribe their books with titles about despising glory, and for the sake of glory, note the titles of their own names. We interpret the Scriptures: often we translate the style: what is worthy of reading, we write; and unless they are done for the cause of Christ, but for the memory of future generations and the reputation among people, all the labor will be in vain: and we will be like a resounding cymbal and a clanging cymbal (1 Corinthians 13). You may see many people arguing about the Scriptures: making the word of God a sports bench: they provoke each other, and if they are defeated, they envy: for they are eager for empty glory. I know from the Latin manuscripts in that testimony which we have set forth above: If I deliver my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing; but because of the similarity of the word, which in Greek is θερμανθήσομαι and θαυμασθήσομαι, only a part of a letter distinguishes it, an error has crept in among our people. But even among the Greeks themselves there are different copies.

6:1

(Chapter VI - Verse 1) Brothers, even if a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself, lest you too be tempted. Knowing that Paul was a servant of God, who did not desire the death of a sinner but their repentance (Ezekiel 18:23, 33). And except for the Trinity, every creature, though it may not sin, is still capable of sinning. Therefore, he also encourages those who are spiritual to reach out a helping hand to one who is falling, being mindful of their own fear of sin. And beautifully preoccupying in the offense, he calls him a man who can die: showing the fragility of his condition from his very name; so that he may be worthy of forgiveness, who, like a man deceived by error and immersed in a whirlpool, is unable to lift himself up without help and assistance. However, a man is not added to the spiritual realm, but he is commanded as if by God, to instruct a man preoccupied in the offense: or (as is better expressed in Greek) to perfect in the spirit of gentleness. However, the one who is being perfected does not lack everything, but something. In fact, if he has not erred with many sins, but has been preoccupied with some fault, let him apply the spirit of gentleness and meekness in correcting the spiritual sinner, so that he does not desire to correct the wandering one in a rigid, angry, and sad manner; but let him provoke him, promising salvation and forgiveness. Let him bring forth the testimony of Christ: that he invites those burdened by the weight of the law and sins to his gentle and light yoke, so that they may learn that he is humble and meek, and find rest for their souls (Matthew 11). Let us use this testimony against heretics: who, inventing various nature myths, say that a spiritual tree is good and never produces bad fruits. Behold the Apostle, whose authority they themselves also follow, says that those who are spiritual can sin if they are puffed up with the pride of their heart and fall. This we also confess; and that earthly beings can become spiritual if they turn to better things. Can what is written to the Corinthians be opposed to us: What do you want? Shall I come to you with a rod, or in charity, and the spirit of meekness (I Cor. IV, 21)? For if there, he says that he comes to sinners not in the spirit of meekness, but with a rod: how does he here not employ a rod, but the spirit of meekness, with those who have been prevented from sinning in any way? But there, it is said to those who, after sinning, not feeling their own error, were unwilling to be subject to their superiors and corrected by penance. But when the understanding sinner acknowledges his wound and gives himself to the physician to be healed, there the rod is not necessary, but the spirit of gentleness. And it may be questioned whether someone should instruct the sinner in the spirit of gentleness for this reason: that he should consider himself so as not to be tempted. Therefore, the righteous person, who is sure in his own mind and knows that he cannot stumble, should not instruct the sinner in the spirit of gentleness? To this, we will say that even if the righteous person has overcome, knowing how great a struggle he has won, he will offer more forgiveness to the one who sins. For even the Savior was tempted, in all things like us, without sin: so that he can sympathize and commiserate with our weaknesses, having experienced them himself, and to show how difficult it is to achieve victory in the flesh. If a virgin remains until old age, forgive those who were once deceived by the heat of youth, knowing the difficulties they have overcome. If someone, for the confession of Christ's name, witnessed another denying him in torment, let them sympathize with the wounds of the denier, and marvel not so much at their defeat, but at their own victory. Also, pay attention to the caution of the writer, for he did not say, 'Considering yourself, lest you fall,' but rather, 'lest you be tempted also.' To conquer or to be conquered is sometimes within our power; however, to be tempted is within the power of the one tempting. For if the Savior was tempted, who can be confident that they will pass through the storms of this life without being tempted? Those who believe that Paul spoke according to humility, and not truly, say this not out of ignorance of the language but rather of the knowledge of this matter. For he should have spoken in order, saying: You, who are spiritual, instruct such in the spirit of gentleness, considering yourselves, lest you also be tempted; and not to place the plural number into the singular. Therefore, the Hebrew among the Hebrews, and one who was very learned in the vernacular language, was unable to express profound meanings in a foreign language; nor did he greatly care about the words, since he had the meaning in safety. These things according to simple understanding. Furthermore, in order to continue the order of the second exposition, this passage about the end of the Epistle to the Romans must be explained. For there, when he was writing about the food and observances of the Jews, and those who despised the precepts of the Law according to the letter, he described the strong and perfect: but he also recounted the weak and little ones who were still being led by old customs, and saw that there was a dispute between the spiritual and the carnal. He warned the spiritual not to despise the carnal, and said: Receive the weak in faith, not for the purpose of argumentation of opinions. For another believes he may eat all things: but he that is weak, let him eat herbs. Let not him that eateth, despise him that eateth not: and he that eateth not, let him not judge him that eateth. For God hath taken him to him. Who art thou that judgest another man's servant? To his own lord he standeth or falleth. And he shall stand: for God is able to make him stand. And another judgeth every day a day: let every man abound in his own sense. He that regardeth the day, regardeth it unto the Lord. And he that eateth, eateth unto the Lord: for he giveth thanks to God. And he that eateth not, eateth not unto the Lord and giveth thanks to God. For whether we live, we live unto the Lord: or whether we die, we die unto the Lord. Therefore, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord's. For unto this end Christ died and rose again: that he might be Lord both of the dead and of the living. But thou, why dost thou judge thy brother? Or thou, why dost thou despise thy brother? For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ. For it is written: As I live, saith the Lord, every knee shall bow to me and every tongue shall confess to God. Therefore, every one of us shall render account to God for himself. And again: But we must bear the weaknesses of the weak, and not please ourselves. Let each one of you please his neighbor for his good, to build him up. (Romans 15:1-2).

6:2

(Vers. 2.) Carry one another's burdens, and thus fulfill the law of Christ. For sin is a burden, and the Psalmist testifies, saying: My iniquities have risen above my head, like a heavy burden weighing me down (Psalm 38:5). And Zechariah, in a vision, saw a weighty lead covering of iniquity (Zechariah 5). The Savior took this burden upon Himself for us, teaching us by His example what we ought to do. For indeed he carries our iniquities, and he grieves for us, and he invites those who are burdened by the weight of sins and the Law to the light burden of virtue, saying: My yoke is easy, and my burden is light. Therefore, whoever does not despair of his brother's salvation, but extends a hand to the one who prays, and as much as he can, weeps with the one who weeps, is weak with the weak, and judges his own sins as those of others, such a person fulfills the law of Christ through charity. What is the law of Christ? This is my commandment, that you love one another (John 13:34). What is the law of the Son of God? Love one another, as I have loved you. How did the Son of God love us? Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends (John 15:13). Whoever does not have compassion, nor is clothed with the bowels of mercy and tears, although he may be spiritual, will not fulfill the law of Christ. But let us also connect this place with the previous ones. For we follow a twofold understanding. If someone is weak in faith and is still nourished with the milk of infancy, they cannot so quickly transition from legal observance to the spiritual sacraments: you who are stronger, bear their burdens, lest your knowledge cause your brother to stumble, for whom Christ died. Also bear the need of your brother, who aids the burdened poor with the weight of destitution, and makes friends for himself with unjust money (Luke 16), whom Christ addresses after his resurrection: Come to me, blessed of my Father: possess the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry, and you gave me something to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave me something to drink (Matthew 25:34, 35). According to this meaning, Paul, teaching Timothy in another Epistle, added: Command those who are rich in this present world not to be conceited or to put their hope in wealth, which is so uncertain, but to put their hope in God, who richly provides us with everything for our enjoyment. Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share. In this way they will lay up treasure for themselves as a firm foundation for the coming age, so that they may take hold of the life that is truly life (1 Timothy 6:17-19). He who grasps true life, surely the one who speaks: I am the life (John 14:6), fulfills the law of Christ, which aims at life.

6:3

(Verse 3) For if anyone thinks that they are something when they are nothing, they deceive themselves. If anyone does not want to bear the burdens of others, and is merciless, satisfied only with their own work and virtue, not seeking what is of others but what is their own, that is, a lover only of themselves and not of God, they deceive themselves. However, it can be read and distinguished in two ways: Either, if anyone thinks that they are something when they are nothing, or in this way: If anyone thinks that they are something, as we will explain later, when they are nothing, they deceive themselves. And this difference resonates more in Greek than in Latin. The first sense of this distinction is: Whoever considers themselves to be something, and is nothing, deceives themselves. The second sense is deeper, and is more pleasing to us: If someone considers themselves to be something, in that they think they are something, not out of kindness towards their neighbor, but out of their own work and effort, judging themselves only by their own virtue, this person, out of this very arrogance, becomes nothing, and deceives themselves: which is better expressed in Greek as φρεναπατᾷ, which means, they deceive their own mind: for which the Latin interpreter has used the phrase, they deceive themselves. But he deceives his own mind, who thinks himself wise, and according to Isaiah, he is wise in himself and understands in his own sight (Isa. V). The understanding of this passage is connected to circumcision and the Law: Whoever is spiritual and does not have mercy on his neighbor, despising the humble because he himself is higher, deceives himself, not knowing that this is the law of the spirit, that we should love one another.

6:4

(Verse 4) But let each one test his own work, and then his reason to boast will be in himself alone and not in his neighbor. The meaning is this: You, who consider yourself spiritual and stronger in the weakness of others, should not focus on the weakness of the one who is falling but on your own strength. For it is not because someone else cannot perfectly transition from Judaism to Christianity that you are a perfect Christian; rather, if your own conscience does not bother you, you have reason to boast in yourself and not in someone else. An athlete is not strong because they have defeated the weak and overpowered the feeble limbs of their opponent, but if they are strong in their own strength, not in the weakness of others. It can be understood another way: one who has a conscience of good work and considers themselves should not boast about it to others, pour out their own praise to the world, share it with everyone, and seek glory from the favor of others. Rather, they should have glory within themselves and say: But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. He who seeks glory from another, is neither crucified with the world, nor is he himself crucified with Christ. He has indeed received his reward, that which he sought from men.

6:5

For each one will bear his own burden. It seems to contradict what was said before, where it says: Bear one another's burdens: for if each one bears his own burden, he will not be able to bear another's burdens. But it must be understood that there he commanded that we, as sinners in this life, bear one another's burdens and help each other in this present age. But here he is speaking about the judgment of the Lord upon us, which is not based on comparing one person's sin to another's, but rather according to our own work, whether we are judged as sinners or as saints, each one receiving according to his own work. Although we are being taught by this little saying, there is a new doctrine that is hidden: while we are in this present age, whether by prayers or by counsels, we are able to help one another. But when we come before the judgement seat of Christ, neither Job, nor Daniel, nor Noah will be able to pray for anyone, but each person will carry their own work (Ezekiel 14).

6:6

(V. 6.) But let the one who is being catechized communicate the word to the one who catechizes in all good things. Marcion interpreted this passage in such a way that he thought believers and catechumens should pray together and the teacher should communicate with the disciples in prayer; he was especially delighted that it follows in all good things. Certainly, if the discussion had been about prayer, it should not have been instructed to the one who is being catechized, but to the one who catechizes, that is, not to the disciple, but to the teacher. Then, also, the other things that follow, do not agree with his explanation: Whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. And: But let us not tire of doing good: for in due season we will reap, not slacking off. Therefore, this is the sense: Because previously he had instructed them in spiritual matters, to instruct those who were preoccupied with some offense in the spirit of gentleness, and to bear one another's burdens, fulfilling the law of Christ: now, on the contrary, he instructs those who are still weaker, and disciples, and carnal, that just as they themselves harvest spiritual things from their teachers, they should also provide carnal things to their teachers: those who devote themselves entirely to the study of divine knowledge should be supported by the necessities of this life; and let what is written about the manna come to pass: He who gathered much had nothing left over, and he who gathered little had no lack (2 Corinthians 8:15). But in the present place, according to the custom of the common people, he called food and clothing, and other things that people count among goods, good. For we are content with having food and clothing (1 Timothy 6:8). And it is not surprising that Paul referred to those things that are necessary for the body as goods: since even our Savior said to those who had not yet reached the summit of virtue, but were still walking humbly and were asking for faith to be added to them: If therefore you, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good things to those who ask him (Matthew 7:11)! I think that Job, when he spoke to his wife, as if he were speaking to one of the foolish women, with regard to her, who thought in this way, spoke about material wealth: 'If we have received good things from the hand of the Lord (Job 2:10): and again about hardships and pressures, and temptations that bring victory: Why do we not endure evil? For surely, good and evil are not placed in wealth and pressures, but in virtues and vices, as the righteous man says in the psalm: 'Who is the man who desires life, who desires to see good days?' Restrain your tongue from evil, and your lips from speaking deceit. Turn away from evil and do good (Psalm 34:13-14 and 37:27). Properly, evil is said to be that which should be avoided, and good is said to be that which we should do. Also, in the Gospel, the rich man who did not have knowledge of good and evil rightly considered the abundance of his fields as good, saying: 'Soul, you have many goods laid up for many years; take your ease, eat, drink, and be merry' (Luke 12:19). And the one who was lying in purple and indulging in luxury heard in the underworld from Abraham: You received good things in your life (Luke 16:25). Also, we must pay attention to the fact that this could possibly be understood as the disciples being given the command to communicate the word to those who instruct them, to be obedient, docile, and accommodating. However, this applies only to those things that are good, spiritual, and not corrupted by heretical or Judaic perversity.

6:7

(Verse 7.) Do not be deceived, God is not mocked. Whatever a person sows, that will he also reap. By foreseeing with the Spirit, those who are being taught are able to provide for the needs and expenses of their teachers and to claim poverty, saying, 'My field has withered this year due to drought, my vineyard has been destroyed by hail, the taxes that could have been paid have been seized.' I do not have what is required to give. Therefore, do not be deceived, God is not mocked. He knows, he says, your hearts, he is not ignorant of your abilities. A plausible excuse can appease a person, but it cannot deceive God. And at the same time, he encourages them to do what is commanded, mentioning seed, so that they do not think it is lost, as they will receive it back with interest. He also teaches the Corinthians the principle of giving and receiving, using a similar example: Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows in blessings will also reap blessings. Each person should give as he has decided in his heart, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver (I Corinthians 9:6-7).

6:8

(Verse 8) For he who sows in his flesh will reap corruption from the flesh. But he who sows in the Spirit will reap eternal life from the Spirit. Everything we speak, do, and think is sown in two fields, the flesh and the Spirit. If the things that are spoken, done, and thought are good, sown in the Spirit, they will abound with the fruits of eternal life. But if they are evil, taken from the field of the flesh, they will produce for us a harvest of corruption. Another interpretation: Whoever understands the law carnally also expects carnal rewards, which are corrupted in the present age. But whoever is a spiritual listener, sows in the spirit, and will reap eternal life from the spirit. Let us also note the consistency of the discourse and connect it with the previous statements: the person who is called a seed sower in the spirit, when they begin to reap eternal life, they may cease to be a human. Cassianus, who introduces the supposed flesh of Christ, considers every sexual union between a male and a female to be unclean, and is the most fervent heresiarch of the Encratites. He uses the following argument against us under the pretext of the present testimony: 'If anyone sows in the flesh, they will reap corruption from the flesh; but they sow in the flesh who are joined to a woman; therefore, those who use a wife and sow in her flesh will reap corruption from the flesh.' He will be answered, first, that he did not say that Paul, who sows in the flesh, but in his own flesh. However, no one lies with himself, and sows in his own flesh. Then, in order to observe this which we have noted, in his own flesh, let it be granted to him additionally, that those who eat and drink, and sleep and do something for the refreshment of the body, sow in the flesh according to that, and reap corruption from it. But if he resorts to this, to say that those who, whether they drink, or eat, or sleep, in the name of the Lord nonetheless do everything with reason, do not sow in the flesh but in the spirit; and we will respond similarly to him, that those who also follow God’s first commandment, doing things with reason: Increase and multiply, and fill the earth (Gen. I, 22), sow not in the flesh but in the spirit. Therefore, this syllogism is futile and fallacious, first deceiving the listener with a sophism. However, upon careful examination, it is easily dissolved: For we cannot say that Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and other holy men who were born from the promise, as well as the precursor of the Lord himself, sprouted from the corrupt seed, because he was born in the flesh. It is also worth noting that the one who sows in the flesh is identified with his own flesh, but the one who sows in the spirit is called simply in the spirit. For whoever sows good things, does not sow something of his own, but sows in the spirit of God, from which eternal life will be reaped.

6:9

(Verse 9) But let us not grow weary in doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up. He encourages those who expect the reward of good works in this life, not knowing that just as there is a different time for sowing and for harvesting in a seed, so in the present life, there is sowing of works (which are either in the spirit or in the flesh) but the harvest is the future judgment. And depending on the quality or diversity of the sowing, it will make different measures for us, a hundredfold, sixtyfold, and thirtyfold, which no one can harvest lacking. For whoever perseveres until the end, will be saved (Matt. X, 22). As it is also commanded in another place: Do not fall away (Isai. V). But what is it, that while sinners increase daily in evil deeds, we grow weary in doing good?

6:10

(V. 10) Therefore, while we have time, let us do good to all, especially to those who belong to the family of faith. It is the time of sowing, as we have said, the present time, and the lifespan we are running. In this life, we are allowed to sow what we desire; when this life passes, the time for action is taken away. Thus, the Savior says: Work while it is day; night is coming when no one can work (John 9:4). The word of God has risen for us, the true sun, and the beasts have returned to their dens. Let us proceed as humans to our task, and let us labor until evening, as it is mystically sung in the psalm: You have set darkness, and it is night. The wild animals themselves will pass by, roaring lion cubs, to snatch and seek food from God. The sun rises, and they are gathered, and they sleep in their dens. Man goes out to his work, and to his labor until evening. (Ps. 103, 20-23). Whether we are sick or healthy, humble or powerful, poor or rich, unknown or honored, hungry or satisfied, let us do everything in the name of the Lord with patience and equanimity, and that which is written will be fulfilled in us: For those who love the Lord, all things work together for good. Anger itself and desire, and the harm that desires vengeance, if I restrain myself; if for the sake of God I hold my tongue; if, at every prick of disturbance and the incentives of vice, I recall the sight of God watching over me, they become opportunities for triumph. Let us not say in giving alms: 'This person is a friend, that person I do not know; this one deserves to receive, that one should be despised.' Let us imitate our Father, who makes His sun rise upon the good and the evil, and causes rain to fall upon the just and unjust (Matt. V). The fountain of goodness is open to all. The servant and the free, the commoner and the king, the rich and the poor all likewise drink from it. When a lamp is lit in a house, it shines equally for everyone. But if the reins of generosity are loosened for all indiscriminately, how much more so for members of the household of faith and for Christians, who have the same Father and are called by his name as their master! Moreover, it seems to me that this passage can be connected to the previous ones, in which he calls the members of the household of faith 'masters,' to whom he had ordered all good things to be ministered by their listeners. The course of this life is short. This very thing that I speak, that I say, that I write, that I correct, that I reread, from my time either grows or diminishes for me. Titus, son of Vespasian, who, after the revenge for the blood of Domitian, having overthrown Jerusalem, entered Rome as conqueror, is said to have been of such goodness, that one evening, late, while he was remembering, at dinner, that he had done nothing good that day, he said to his friends: Today, I have lost the day. We think that we do not lose for ourselves the hour, the day, the moments, the time, the ages, when we speak idle words, for which we will have to give an account on the day of judgment (Matt. XII)? But if he said and did this naturally without Law, without the Gospel, without the Savior, and the doctrine of the apostles: what should we do, in whose condemnation Juno holds all, and Vesta holds the virgins, and other idols? Blessed John the evangelist, while he was staying in Ephesus until his extreme old age, and was barely brought to the church among the hands of the disciples, and could not join words into more sentences, he used to say nothing else in each collection but this: Little children, love one another. Finally, the disciples and brothers who were present, tired of hearing the same things always, said: Master, why do you always speak like this? He responded with a worthy sentence from John: Because it is the commandment of the Lord, and if it is done alone, it is enough. This is why the present commandment of the Apostles is: Let us do good to all, especially to the household of faith.

6:11

(Verse 11) See with what letters I have written to you with my own hand. Those who wanted the Galatians to be circumcised had spread the rumor that Paul was doing one thing and preaching something else, and by his own actions, he was destroying the message. They claimed that anyone who asserted that the Law was abolished would themselves be found to be within the Law. Paul was unable to personally refute this belief with everyone present because he was restrained by the chains he bore for the sake of Christ's martyrdom. Therefore, he represents himself through letters. And so that no suspicion of forged letters should arise, he himself wrote by his own hand from this place to the end, showing that the previous [letters] were written by someone else. And he also demonstrates that letters were sent in his name by false teachers, writing to the Thessalonians: But we ask you, brothers, through the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our gathering together with him, not to be quickly shaken from your senses, nor be alarmed, either by spirit, or by word, or by letter supposedly from us, as if the day of the Lord is imminent, so that no one deceives you in any way (2 Thessalonians 2, 1 seqq.). And in order to dispel any suspicion of falsehood about the entire letter that he was sending, he subscribed with his own hand at the end, saying: My greeting in the hand of Paul, which is the sign in every letter; this is how I write. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with all of you (2 Thess. 3:17-18). He also marked with his own hand the letters he dictated to the Colossians, saying: My greeting in the hand of Paul; remember my chains. And wherever he knew that false teachers were present, who could spread new doctrines through the authority of the Apostles, he subscribed the letter with his own hand. Finally, writing to the Corinthians, among whom there were schisms and heresies, with each one saying, 'I am of Paul,' and 'I am of Apollos,' and 'I am of Cephas' (I Cor. 1:12), he signed his letter with this annotation: My greeting [is] in the hand of Paul: If anyone does not love the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be anathema. Maranatha, and so on. Therefore, desiring to remove any occasion for false teachers who had corrupted the Galatians from the truth of the Gospel, he completed the end of the letter with the annotation of his hand, saying: See with what letters I have written to you; not that the letters were large (for this indeed signifies 'great' in Greek), but that his hand was known to them by distinct traces, so that while they recognize the tops of the letters, they might suppose that they were seeing the very person who had written [the letter]. In this place, a man most learned in our times, I wonder how he spoke such a ridiculous thing. Paul, he says, was a Hebrew and did not know Greek letters. And because necessity demanded it, that he himself would subscribe the letter by his own hand, contrary to the usual curving paths of the letters, he barely expressed with large points: also showing in this his signs of love towards the Galatians, that for their sake he would even attempt that which he could not. Paul, the great writer, wrote a letter, because there was great meaning in his words, and it was written with the Holy Spirit, not with ink or pen. But what he added, with my hand, let us understand in his works. For this reason, it is often written in the prophets: The word of God that was made in the hand of Jeremiah, or Haggai, so that we also know through this similarity that the word of God was made in the hand of Paul. Paul writes great letters not only to the Galatians back then, but also to everyone today, and although the tips with which his letters are written are small, the letters themselves are great, because there is great meaning in them.

6:12

(Verse 12) Whoever wants to please in the flesh, these compel you to be circumcised, only so that they may not suffer persecution for the cross of Christ. He shows above where he has subscribed with his own hand: now he repeats what he has written. Gaius Caesar, and Octavian Augustus, and Tiberius, successor of Augustus, had promulgated laws that the Jews who were scattered throughout the entire Roman Empire should live according to their own customs and perform their ancestral ceremonies. Therefore, whoever was circumcised, even if they believed in Christ, was considered a Jew by the Gentiles. But those who claimed that they were not Jews because they were uncircumcised, were subject to persecution by both the Gentiles and the Jews. Now, those who had deceived the Galatians wanted to avoid these persecutions, so they were persuading the disciples to be circumcised for their own protection. The Apostle calls this confidence in the flesh, because they were proposing circumcision in persecution to both the Gentiles whom they feared and the Jews whom they wanted to please. Neither the Jews could persecute them, nor the Gentiles, whom they ((wanted)) to see and circumcise, and to keep the precepts of the Law themselves.

For neither those who are circumcised keep the Law, but they wish to have you circumcised so that they may boast in your flesh. For the law cannot be fulfilled, he says, because of the weakness of the flesh. Therefore, the Jews keep the precepts and teachings of men more than the commandments of God, neither fulfilling the bodily Law, for it is indeed impossible, nor the spiritual Law, which they do not understand. Therefore, this is all that they strive for, that they do, that they exert themselves, so that they may boast among the Jews of the injury to your flesh, and boast of their Gentiles circumcised by their teaching. But they do all of this in order to please the Jews, and the envy of the conquered Law may subside.

6:14

(Verse 14.) 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. For neither circumcision counts for anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation. And as for all who walk by this rule, peace and mercy be upon them, and upon the Israel of God. But that world is crucified to the just one, of whom the Savior says: I have conquered the world (John 16:33). And: Do not love the world. And: You have not received the spirit of the world. To whom the world is crucified, to him the world is also dead: and now the end of the world has come to him, and he is worthy of the new heaven and the new earth, and the new Testament, he sings a new song, and receives a new name written in a book, which no one knows except the one who receives it. It is asked how now Paul says: But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world. (Galatians 6:14). And in another place concerning others: That in this boasting I may not be put to shame. (2 Corinthians 9:4). And again: But he said to me: My grace is sufficient for thee; for power is made perfect in weakness. (2 Corinthians 12:9). And in another place: But though I should have a mind to glory, I shall not be foolish; for I will say the truth. But I forbear, lest any man should think of me above that which he seeth in me or any thing he heareth from me. (2 Corinthians 12:6). And so on, such as are written in this manner. But it must be known that all that boasting related to the cross, let the glory be to the cross: and whatever worthy is accomplished in virtues, let it be done because of the Lord's passion.

6:15

(v. 15) For neither circumcision is anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature. As faithful and unfaithful, when there is one in substance, are divided into two according to the diversity of understanding, the Apostle saying: Stripping yourselves of the old man with his works, and putting on the new, who is renewed unto knowledge according to the image of the Creator (Colossians 3:9-10): in the same way, the world, although it is one in substance, is made different according to the understanding. Sinners, the old world is: holy, new. For when the world has been crucified with the holy, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision is to it: not Jew, nor Gentile: but a new creature, into which the body of our humility is transformed, conformed to the body of the glory of Christ: For the old things have passed away, behold all things have become new (II Cor. V). And as the glory of the sun is different from the glory of the moon, and the glory of the stars: for star differs from star in glory: so also is the resurrection of the dead (I Cor. XV, 41, 42). About this, Daniel agrees with the same voice, saying: Many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake: some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt (Dan. XII, 2); and: Those who are wise shall shine like the brightness of the sky. And concerning the righteous: Many shall be like the stars forever. For neither circumcision counts for anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creation without these parts of the body, which can be cut. So we also who love God, and the things that are prepared for us, which eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man, what things God hath prepared for them that love him (1 Corinthians 2), when we shall be transformed in the body of the humility of Christ, into the body of the glory of the Lord Jesus Christ, shall have that kind of body that neither a Jew can oppose nor a Gentile preserve with circumcision. Not that it is anything else in substance, but that it is different in glory. For it is necessary for this mortal to put on immortality, and for this corruptible body to be clothed with incorruption (I Cor. XV, 53). This is similar to what the blessed evangelist John said: Beloved, we are now children of God, and it has not yet been revealed what we shall be. We know that when it is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is (I John III, 2). Therefore, since that body of the glory of Jesus Christ, which had the marks of the nails after the resurrection and entered through closed doors, has not yet been revealed, let us who have already been raised up with Christ in baptism, as new-born men, not serve circumcision or uncircumcision, but believe that we are already what we shall be in the future.

6:16

(Verse 16.) And whoever follows this rule, peace and mercy be upon them, and upon the Israel of God. All things are directed according to the standard; and whether they be right or wrong, when the rule is applied, they are judged. So too the teaching of God is like a standard of speech, which judges between what is just and unjust: whoever follows it will have peace within themselves that surpasses all understanding; and after peace, mercy, which is foremost in the Israel of God. But the true Israel is called, in distinction from those who ceased to be God's Israel. For they say they are Jews, and they are not; but they lie, being of the synagogue of Satan. And do not be surprised, if, in imitation of spiritual Israel, carnal Israel neither has peace nor mercy, of whom it is also written to the Corinthians: See Israel according to the flesh (I Cor. X, 18); since also in imitation of God and the Lord, there are many gods and many lords, whether in heaven or on earth. Beautifully, however, in one discourse, in order to conclude the letter according to the proposed argument, he called Israel the people of God; so that all the things that have been said above, not apart from the cause, but from the cause debated, may be taught.

6:17

(Verse 17.) From now on, let no one bother me. Not as if he has failed in teaching; but so that even a farmer will have this labor, if the little plants he has planted wither; and a shepherd will have worry, if the sheep he has gathered are torn apart. Therefore, it is better read in Greek, 'From now on, let no one present me with labor;' lest of course I have the need to work among you again. It is better for the teacher to excel in labor, who lives and feels differently than the teacher who has taught and done otherwise. He can also preempt their argument, if anyone should wish to contradict thereafter, by mentioning that he has addressed the issue of women covering their heads and men not covering theirs among the Corinthians, saying: But if any man seem to be contentious, we have no such custom, neither the Church of God (I Cor. XI, 16): that is, we have expressed what seemed fitting and just to us; but if anyone refuses to accept the truth, let them consider what answer to make and on what grounds to oppose, knowing that they are not worthy of a response, as they are more inclined to argue than to learn.


But I bear the marks of the Lord Jesus in my body. For whoever is circumcised after the coming of Christ does not bear the marks of the Lord Jesus; but he has glory in his shame. But those who endure wounds beyond measure, who are frequently beaten with rods in prisons, who once were stoned, and who have other things written in the catalog of boasting, they bear the marks of the Lord Jesus in their body. And perhaps he who afflicts his own body and subjects himself to servitude, lest while preaching to others he himself should become reprobate, bears the marks of the Lord Jesus in his body (1 Corinthians 9). The apostles rejoiced because they had been considered worthy to suffer dishonor for the name of Jesus (Acts 5).

6:18

(Verse 18) The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit, brothers. Amen. There is no dissension, no bondage to the Law, no quarrel, no dispute, but rather may the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. Not at all with the flesh, not at all with the soul; whether because you have become spiritual, or because even those things that are lesser are included in the principal. For the soul and the flesh are subject to the spirit. Regarding this, both the Ecclesiastes and Paul speak: 'The spirit will return to the one who gave it' (Eccl. XII, 7). And Paul in another place: 'The Spirit himself bears witness with our spirit' (Rom. VIII, 16). But this grace of the Lord Jesus is not with everyone, but with those who deserve to be called brothers by the apostle, faithful brothers, and true brothers, which the Hebrew word Amen signifies. For Amen, the Septuagint interpreters have translated as 'let it be'; Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotius have faithfully and truly interpreted it. And how God confirms his words in the Old Testament through a certain custom of swearing, saying, 'As I live,' says the Lord (Num. XIV, 28); he also swears by the saints: 'As your soul lives'; so too our Savior in the Gospel demonstrates by the word 'Amen' that what he speaks is true. And indeed, 'Amen' signifies the consent of the hearer and is a seal of truth, as the first letter to the Corinthians also teaches us, in which Paul says: 'But if you bless with the Spirit, who supplies the place of the untaught?' How can someone say 'Amen' to your blessing if they do not understand what you are saying? (I Cor. XIV, 16) This shows that an ignorant person cannot respond truthfully to what is being said unless they understand what is being taught.