“Paul, an apostle—not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead—”
Galatians 1:1, ESV
“Paul, an apostle, (not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised him from the dead;)”
Galatians 1:1, KJV
- Galatians 1:1 Meaning – Introduction
- Galatians 1:1 Meaning – Paul, an Apostle not of men, neither by men
- Galatians 1:1 Meaning – Who raised Him from the dead.
Galatians 1:1 Meaning – Introduction
Not only this exordium, but, so to speak, the whole Epistle, is full of a vehement and lofty spirit.
For always to address one’s disciples with mildness, even when they needed severity, would be to play the corrupter and enemy, not the teacher.
Wherefore our Lord too, who generally spoke gently to His disciples, here and there uses sterner language, and at one time pronounces a blessing, at another a rebuke.
Thus, having said to Peter, Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona, and having promised to lay the foundation of the Church upon his confession, shortly afterwards He says, Get thee behind Me, Satan: thou art an offence unto Me.
Again, on another occasion, Are ye also yet without understanding?
And what awe He inspired them with appears from John’s saying, that, when they beheld Him conversing with the Samaritan woman, though they reminded Him to take food, no one ventured to say, Why talkest Thou, or what seekest Thou, with her?
Thus taught, and walking in the steps of his Master, Paul had varied his discourse according to the need of his disciples, at one time using knife and cautery, at another applying mild remedies.
To the Corinthians he says, What will ye? shall I come unto you with a rod, or in love, and in the spirit of meekness? but to the Galatians, 0 foolish Galatians.
Which reproof he gives not once only, but a second time, and towards the conclusion he says with a reproachful allusion to them, Let no man trouble me; then he sooths them again with the words, My little children, of whom I travail in birth again: and so in many other instances.
Now that this Epistle breathes an indignant spirit, is obvious to every one on the first perusal; but I must explain the cause of his anger against his disciples.
Slight and unimportant it could not be, or he would not have used such vehemence.
For to be exasperated by chance matters is the part of the little-minded, morose, and peevish; just as it is that of the indolent and sluggish to shrink from reproof in weighty ones.
This was not Paul’s character: what then was the offence which roused him? it was grave and momentous, one which had estranged them all from Christ, as he himself says further on, Behold, I Paul say unto you, that if ye be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing; and again, Whosoever of you are justified by the Law, ye are fallen from grace.
What this is, must be explained more clearly.
Some of the Jews who believed, yet were filled with the prepossessions of Judaism, intoxicated by vain-glory, and desirous of obtaining for themselves the dignity of teachers, came to the Galatians, and taught them that the observance of circumcision, sabbaths, and new-moons, was necessary, and that the endeavour of Paul to abolish it was not to be borne.
For, said they, Peter and James and John, the chiefs of the Apostles and the companions of Christ, forbad it not.
Now in fact on this point they did not deliver positive doctrine, but condescended to the weakness of the Jewish believers, which condescension Paul had no need of when preaching to the Gentiles; but when he was in Judæa, he employed it himself also.
But these deceivers, by withholding the causes both of Paul’s condescension and that of his brethren, misled the simpler ones.
They said that he was not to be tolerated, for he appeared but yesterday, while Peter and his colleagues were from the first,—that he was a disciple of the Apostles, but they of Christ,—that he was single, but they were many, and pillars of the Church.
They accused him too of acting a part; saying, that this very man who forbids circumcision observes the rite elsewhere, and preaches differently to you and to others.
Thus Paul saw the whole Galatian people in a state of excitement, a flame kindled against their Church, and the edifice shaken and tottering to its fall.
Filled with the mixed feelings of just anger and despondency, which he has expressed in the words, I desire to be present with you now, and to change my voice, he writes the Epistle as an answer to these charges.
This is his aim from the very commencement, for the underminers of his reputation had said, This man is the last of all the Apostles, and has been taught by them.
Wherefore he begins thus, Paul, an Apostle not of men, neither by men.
Chrysostom, John – Commentary on the epistle to the Galatians (407)
Galatians 1:1 Meaning – Paul, an Apostle not of men, neither by men
For these deceivers, as I was saying before, had said that Peter, James, and John, were both first called, and held a primacy among the disciples, and had also received their doctrines from Christ Himself; and that it was therefore fitting to obey them rather than this man; and that they forbad not circumcision nor the observance of the Law.
By this and similar language, derogatory to Paul, and exalting the honour of the other Apostles, though not spoken for the sake of praising them, but of deceiving the Galatians, they induced them to adhere unseasonably to the Law.
Hence the propriety of his commencement.
As they disparaged his doctrine, and said it came from men, while Peter came from Christ, he immediately addresses himself to this point, and declares himself an Apostle not of men, neither by men.
It was Ananias who baptized him, but it was not he who delivered him from error and initiated him into the faith; Christ Himself sent from on high that wondrous voice, whereby He inclosed him in His net.
Peter and his brother, John and his brother, He called when walking by the sea-side, but Paul after His ascension into heaven.
And as these did not require a second call, but straightway left their nets and all that they had, and followed Him, so this man at his first vocation pressed vigorously forward, waging, as soon as he was baptized, an implacable war with the Jews.
In this respect he chiefly excelled the other Apostles, as he says, I laboured more abundantly than they all; at present, however, he makes no such claim, but is content to be placed on a level with them.
Indeed his great object was,—not to establish any superiority for himself, but,—to overthrow the foundation of their error.
The not being from men belongs to preaching generally, for the Gospel’s root and origin is divine, but the not being by men is peculiar to that of the Apostles; for He called them not by men’s agency, but by His own.
But why does he not speak of his vocation rather than his apostolate, and say, Paul called not by man? Here lies the whole question; for they said that the office of a teacher had been committed to him by men, by the Apostles, whom therefore it behoved him to obey.
But that it was not entrusted to him by men, Luke declares in the words, As they ministered to the Lord, and fasted, the Holy Ghost said, Separate me Barnabas and Saul.
From this passage it is manifest that the power of the Son and Spirit is one, for, being commissioned by the Spirit, he says that he was sent by Christ.
This appears in another place, from his ascription of the things of God to the Spirit, in the words which he addresses to the elders at Miletus: Take heed therefore unto yourselves, and to all the flock, over the which the Holy Ghost hath made you pastors and overseers.
Vet in another Epistle he says, And God hath set some in the Church, first Apostles, secondarily prophets, thirdly pastors and teachers.
Thus he ascribes indifferently the things of the Spirit to God, and those of God to the Spirit.
Here too he stops the mouths of heretics, by the words by Jesus Christ and God the Father; for, inasmuch as they said this term “by” was applied to the Son as importing inferiority, he ascribes it to the Father, thus teaching us not to prescribe laws to the ineffable Nature, nor define the degrees of Godhead which belong to the Father and the Son.
To the words by Jesus Christ he has added, and God the Father; for if at the mention of the Father alone he had introduced the phrase by whom, they might have argued sophistically that it was peculiarly applicable to the Father, in that the acts of the Son were to be referred to Him.
But he leaves no opening for this cavil, by mentioning at once both the Son and the Father, and making his language apply to both.
This he does, not in order to ascribe the acts of the Son to the Father, but to shew that the expression implies no distinction of Essence.
Further, what can now be said by those, who have gathered a notion of inferiority from the Baptismal formula,—from our being baptized into the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit?
For if the Son be inferior because he is here named after the Father, (where the Apostle beginning at Christ proceeds to mention the Father,) what will they say— but let us not even utter such a blasphemy, let us not swerve from the truth in our contention with them; rather let us preserve, rave they never so often, the due measures of reverence.
Since then it would be the height of madness and impiety to argue that the Son was greater than the Father because Christ was first named, so dare we not hold that the Son is inferior to the Father, because He is placed after Him.
Chrysostom, John – Commentary on the epistle to the Galatians (407)
Galatians 1:1 Meaning – Who raised Him from the dead.
Wherefore is it, O Paul, that, wishing to bring these Judaizers to the faith, you introduce none of those great and illustrious topics which occur in your Epistle to the Philippians, as, Who, being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God, or which you declared in that to the Hebrews, the brightness of His glory, and the express image of His person; or again, what in the opening of his Gospel the son of thunder sounded forth, In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God; or what Jesus Himself oftentimes declared to the Jews, that His power and authority was equal to the Fathers?
Wherefore is it that you omit all these, and make mention of the economy of His Incarnation, bringing forward His cross and dying?
Yea, would Paul answer, had this discourse been addressed to those who had unworthy conceptions of Christ, it would have been well to mention these things; but, inasmuch as the disturbance comes from those who fear to incur punishment should they abandon the Law, he therefore doth mention that whereby all need of the Law is excluded, I mean the benefit conferred on all through the Cross and the Resurrection.
To have said that in the beginning was the Wordy and that He was in the form of God, and made Himself equal with God, and the like, would have declared the divinity of the Word, but would have contributed nothing to the matter in hand.
Whereas it was highly pertinent thereto to say, Who raised Him from the dead, for our chiefest benefit was thus brought to remembrance, and men in general are less interested by discourses concerning the majesty of God, than by those which set forth His mercy towards mankind.
Wherefore, omitting the former topic, he discourses of the benefits which had been conferred on us.
But here the heretics insultingly exclaim, “Lo, the Father raises the Son!”
For when once infected, they are willfully deaf to all sublimer doctrines; and taking by itself and insisting on what is of a less exalted nature, and expressed in less exalted terms, on account of the Son’s humanity, or in honour of the Father, or for some other temporary purpose, they outrage, I will not say the Scripture, but themselves.
I would fain ask such persons, why they say this? do they hope to prove the Son weak and powerless to raise one body, when faith in Him enabled the very shadows of those who believed in Him to effect the resurrection of the dead?
If then believers in Him, though mortal, yet by the very shadow of their earthly bodies, and by the garments which had touched these bodies, could raise the dead, is it not a stretch of folly, a manifest insanity, to affirm, that He could not raise Himself?
Hast thou not heard His saying, Destroy this Temple, and in three days I will raise it up? and again, I have power to lay down my life, and I have power to take it again?
Wherefore then is the Father said to have raised Him up, as also to have done other things which the Son Himself did?
It is in honour of the Father, and in compassion to the weakness of the hearers.
Chrysostom, John – Commentary on the epistle to the Galatians (407)
