The place and date are both uncertain. The words, "I marvel that ye are so quickly removing from Him that called you" (i. 6), suggest that it was written not long after the conversion of the Galatians. But we cannot place it, as some writers have done, before 1 and 2 Thessalonians. Its style is allied with that of 1 and 2 Corinthians and Romans. It must be earlier than Romans, as it is like a rough model of that Epistle. If written soon before Romans, it was probably composed at Corinth early in A.D. 56. It may, however, have been written as early as A.D. 52, before St. Paul's third missionary journey.
[Sidenote: Character and Contents.]
The Epistle is intended to recall the Galatians to St. Paul's true gospel. In order to do this, he vindicates his own apostolic authority to preach it, and expounds its great principle—justification by faith, and not by observance of the Jewish law.
After a salutation, without the congratulations which the apostle ordinarily offers, St. Paul expresses his astonishment at their perversion, and vehemently asserts that if any one dares to preach a gospel other than that which the Galatians first received, let him be anathema (i. 1-10). The history of St. Paul's reception of the gospel is then set out. It came to him by revelation of Jesus Christ: this is at once the demonstration of its unique authority, and the decisive fact which settles the relation of St. Paul to the other apostles. He did {154} not receive from them the gospel he preached, and, to emphasize this, St. Paul counts up the various opportunities he had of intercourse with them, and says what use he made of each (i. 11-ii. 10). The best illustration of the independence of his position is the attitude which he adopted towards St. Peter, the prince of the apostles, when at Antioch he deceitfully took the same sort of line with respect to Jewish ceremonial that the Galatians are taking now (ii. 11-13).[2] St. Paul describes the speech he made in opposition to St. Peter, but while he is dictating it, he is carried away by an orator's enthusiasm: he forgets that he is telling the story only of an old debate, and at some points we cannot confidently distinguish the rebuke to St. Peter from the exhortation to the Galatians (ii. 14-21).
Then, still as if he were making a speech, the apostle proceeds to argue as he does later in the Epistle to the Romans. He recalls to the "bewitched" Galatians the happy memories of the days when they first heard of Christ—the out-pouring of the Spirit, the first sharp persecution endured so well. Did not all this happen when they were under the gospel of Faith (iii. 2-5)? The true sons of Abraham are those who accept the gospel (iii. 6-9). On the other hand, the people who still desire to be under the Law can only avoid being under a curse by keeping the whole Law—and this is impossible (iii. 10). God's will is plain: He has said, "The righteous shall live by faith" (iii. 11, 12). Moreover, whatever claim the Law had on us is now discharged by the satisfaction made by Christ (iii. 13, 14). Now St. Paul goes on to show that the promise made by God to Abraham binds Him still. Just as no subsequent transaction can nullify a Greek "covenant," i.e. will, so the Law cannot nullify the earlier promise of God (iii. 15-18).[3] Then he compares the promise made to {155} Abraham with the Law. The latter was a contract, a mutual agreement between two parties involving mutual obligations; if the Jews did not keep the Law, God was not bound to bless them. But in the case of the promise, there is no suggestion of contract. Then, lest his readers should suppose that there was an inconsistency in the fact that God was the Author of both the Law and the promise, St. Paul adds an explanation (iii. 19-22). The Law would have been contrary to the promise if it had been intended to produce the same result as the promise by another method. But, on the contrary, the Law was added as a parenthesis in order to make known transgressions, and with the result that it increased them (iii. 19). Scripture shut up all mankind in the fold of sin, that they might look forward to the reign of faith as the only means of escape. To emphasize further the contrast between the Law and the promise, St. Paul asserts that the Law did not come direct from God to man. It came, as Jewish traditions said, from God and the angels to Moses, the mediator, and from him to the Hebrews. The Law had a mediator, therefore it involved two parties—God and the Hebrew people. But there was no such mediator in the case of the promise. God spoke directly to Abraham. And God in the Person of Christ spoke directly to mankind. Thus the promises are greater and more gracious than the Law. It is important to observe that the argument implies the Divinity of Christ.
Before Faith came, the Law played the part of a Greek "tutor," i.e. a trusted servant who attended a child. He took the child to the house where he was taught, and kept him from harm and mischief. And we, if we wish to be still under the Law, shall be as foolish as a grown-up son who wishes to be under a steward and a guardian. We must leave the mere rudiments of religion now that we have reached a stage at which we have been taught that God is indeed our Father (iii. 23-iv. 11).
St. Paul supports this conclusion from his arguments by a {156} touching appeal, in which he gratefully recalls the kindness he received from the Galatians when he came to them in all the weakness and distress of fever (iv. 12-20). Then he interprets for them the story of Hagar, probably in answer to a reference in a letter which they had sent him (iv. 21-v. 1). The Jew is in bondage like Hagar's child, the Christian is free like Sarah's child.
After this we have another appeal, a medley of exhortation, warning, denunciation, and pathetic entreaty: the apostle, himself so appreciative of great ideas, tries to make the unaspiring Galatians understand that they are called to the perfect freedom which is the service of God (v. 2-26). The Epistle closes with some plain words which the apostle wrote with his own hand in large characters so as to emphasize them for his readers. The motive of the Judaizers is boldly labelled. Then, as if there had been a question of his own humility, he associates himself with the crucified Christ, for whose sake he bears in his flesh the eloquent marks of the Roman rods and the stones of the Jews. It was the cruel custom in Asia Minor, a custom not yet extinct, for masters to wound their slaves with marks which made it impossible for them to escape recognition. And so St. Paul glories in the pitiful scars on his body, because they prove Whose he is and Whom he serves.
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