Fragments on Galatians

The Proclamation to the Gentiles§1

1Regarding the proclamation to the nations, having received it, some from the circumcised community, departing, were persuading the nations to Judaize; and first concerning this it appears that a search has happened in Antioch, that the apostles wrote not to be under the law, but to abstain from things sacrificed to idols and from blood and from things strangled and from fornication; for so it seemed to the Holy Spirit. And this disease prevailed among the Galatians, in agreement with those having willed to Judaize. And they were persuaded by those perverting the truth, saying, that the rest of the apostles do not forbid those willing to keep the law.

Galatians 1:4 shows that neither Moses died for the sake of the world, nor any other of the prophets. Therefore one must not be defeated by the one who did not save, but by the one who died for us. Galatians 1:6–7 He says, 'Into a different gospel, which is not another gospel'; for your gospel and that of the apostles is willed to be outside of you by the law. Galatians 1:8–10 'Let him be an angel, why then also we?; when we were proclaiming, by the power of the Holy Spirit we proclaimed'; and the Holy Spirit does not change his mind. If therefore we say other things, we have abandoned the things of the Spirit. Let the preacher be an anathema, then, setting aside the proclamation. From what you received. 'I did not proclaim, he says, but you did not receive, but also I proclaimed, and you received.' 'Neither do I repent having proclaimed, and you have observed what you received.' 'For now am I persuading men or God?; or am I seeking to please men?; if I were still pleasing men, I would not have been a slave of Christ.'

Intending to remind them of his own gospel, he anticipates the objection so that they may not think that he heals by submitting; for he strikes by rebuking. Having said 'if still', he showed that he once pleased men. What, indeed, pleased him? From whom the faithful ones to Damascus received letters to afflict. If therefore, he says, he were still pleasing the Jews, he would not have believed in Christ. Galatians 1:13 'What need is there of a turning in Judaism, but that he might show that he does not serve beforehand but in truth'; for not having hated the law did he run away from grace—for he was persecuting it—but having found the perfect, he departed from the law. Now he shows that he has more than that concerning Peter; for those did not zeal for the sake of Judaism, disobeying Christianity, as I do. Do not therefore think that having hated the law I came into grace—for they were persecuting the law—but I found the perfect, and I will not abolish the law by the perfect grace. Galatians 1:16 He says this not slandering the apostles, but that I did not run in step with fleshly flesh. Galatians 2:16 'For if no one is justified from works, bearing the toil, but from faith, where the benefit of ease and the benefit of righteousness is great, how does he say it is not necessary having made the law sufficient for grace?;' he says not to be justified from works of the law, but not from commandments; for the commandment justifies the one obeying, but the work was the difficult thing. Galatians 2:18 The word is against Peter: 'You destroyed those things by doctrine which were sent from you to the...'

The Law versus Grace and the Power of Baptism§2

2To Antioch and to the whole inhabited world. Therefore, it is improper to teach these things to others, from whose care he has turned away and has settled on his own doctrine.

The law of bodily things has the work and the enjoyment: eat this and do not eat that, keep the Sabbath, circumcision (Gal 2:19–21). Grace does not wish to be pleased in you through these things. I have been crucified with these, he says. What need have I of law? I live no longer, but Christ lives in me. What I was living to myself, I was under law. But since Christ lives in me—he who is no longer under law but is in the heavens at the right hand of the Father—he does not negate the one living in me. But what I now live in the flesh, I live in faith. For I believe into the Son of God. And if the Son of God, whom I believe, is at the right hand of the Father, I live as a citizen in the heavens; but the law had the observances for those on earth. Therefore, I am not subject to law.

the law was more burdensome, and this was called a ministry of death (Gal 3:19–22). How then was it added because of transgressions, he says? In a short word, it is this: before the law, the mind of men, along with the flesh, served sin and cherished evil; when the law was given, the mind was disciplined, but the flesh was still held captive. Therefore, since the one ignorant of sin, knowing it was sin, treated impiety as piety and attended to it more eagerly, but the one having known that it is evil, this one indeed gains the conscience that it transgresses, and desires to obey God. Because of this, the law was given, which is able to vivify, instead of 'if the law had been given, it would not have been given,' he says, according to the promises of God, but it was not even able to hold fast.

Even if the law provided nothing else, but provided the knowing of God (Gal 3:23). And the knowing of God made ready for the reception of grace.

Not the observance of the law, he says, makes those who believed better than the Gentiles than the Jews, but the power of baptism, providing to clothe oneself with Christ, makes the grace common to all together: barbarians, Greeks, Jews, female, male (Gal 3:27–28). And the female and the male were not merely mixed—insofar as one sought through the word toward what was set before him—but if baptism brings the male and the female differing into one grace, how much more the Greek and the Jew.

Now he wishes to show that after the grace has come, even if someone seems to keep the Sabbath, new moons, and feasts according to the law, just as if a Gentile, being a worshiper of idols, were worshipping the elemental things, he is serving otherwise (Gal 4:8–10). And not

The Nature of Allegory and Prophecy§3

3He keeps the law; for it has ceased. And regarding the weak elements, having said this, he did not accuse them of being evil, but of being unable to grow rich and pious.

Do not think, he says, that I have some other kind of grief toward you and because of this I am rebuking you (Gal 4:12); for the passion of pain constantly forces the form of the word to change, now to rebuke and now to exhort, and sometimes to accuse and sometimes to lament. Therefore, here he teaches as what is written, that he writes through fatherly affection—for 'I have not been wronged by you,' he says—but also for healing, because I was most worthy.

What then is the blessedness? Instead of 'no one' (Gal 4:15–18). Or thus: to keep the law or to live by faith? And since he said that those desire not you, but are zealous for you, so that they might have perfection for themselves by not keeping the law, but are zealous for you, he proceeded to say that I say these things not out of envy toward them; for it would have been better if they also had been perfected by using faith, and it would have been an unhindered thing for them to be zealous for and to imitate us. And you therefore do such things which make you become zealous ones, so that all may imitate you, and not when I come, being ashamed of you, you become such people, but even in my absence you correct yourselves.

Now he used the text by name, not by the power of allegory (Gal 4:23–24). For allegory does not consist in spoken words, but introduces something else appearing from the sequence of the meanings according to the substance, such as 'Love me from the mouth of loves' in the Song of Songs; for there neither love nor hair nor belly nor thighs nor anything else is literally, but others are introduced through others, and this is the principal kind of allegory. Here also the history is confessed, and it has been demonstrated that it is a type of what is to come. The prophecy through works is now called allegory. For of the prophecies, some are through words only, such as 'Behold, the virgin shall conceive in the womb,' others are through works only, such as Moses lifting up the serpent in the wilderness, and others are both through works and through words, such as that which was said toward Jeremiah, 'Take a new girdle and put it on; then bury it beside the Euphrates, and as it leaks and is worn out through time, take it,' he says, 'from there.' For until this point the prophecy is through works, but what follows is both through words; for in this way I also girded the sons of Israel and in this way I helped them, and in this way I lead them away to Babylon as captives, and having been made mad and destroyed there, I bring them back and restore them. Now then, the prophecy through...

Allegorical Interpretation of Law and Promise§4

4He named the prophecy of works an allegory. In Galatians 4:25, he did not simply refer to Mount Sinai, but also noted that the Ishmaelites' desert extends all the way to it. At Sinai the law was given for the slavery of offspring, and from Mount Sinai the tablets that were given were carried among Israel, and often having been moved from place to place, they were finally established in Jerusalem. Because of this he brought it forward; it corresponds to the present Jerusalem, which slaves alongside its children. Where there is the promise of land, and possession, and marriage, and human things, slavery follows; but where there is deliverance from earthly cares and from bonds, and in the heavens is the citizenship, from that citizenship comes freedom.

In Galatians 5:17, he asks why one who pulls away through the law remembers sin. Because the law commanded luxury, and because of this desire is divided and, being uncontainable toward sin, leads onward. For this reason, when there was a memory of the law, there was also a memory of sin. For in the letter to the Romans, mentioning the law, he also brought forward the correction through the Lord, for those living according to the flesh are unable to please God. And why was luxury and eating permitted? Because the abstention from the acknowledged evils would not have progressed, unless eating and drinking were given to them. For the lawgiver knew that it is impossible to restrain pleasures while living in luxury. Finally, he wished to discipline the mind, so that it might know what is good and what is bad and what is pious; for he foresaw that he who adds to what is lacking in the law was to come, I mean, not to walk according to the flesh, as Paul says.

In Galatians 6:7–8, he showed from this that many were consuming things unseasonably, providing nothing to those who keep the law and are being exhorted, and providing nothing to those who preach the teaching of Paul. Therefore he says: he who sows into his flesh; for he who is subject to the law lives in fleshly things. He who therefore, providing these things to the one teaching this, sows into the flesh, sows only.

In Galatians 6:14–15, so that it might not be thought that he is making a substitute for circumcision, and giving a pretext of circumcision and condemnation to the opponents, he most beautifully brought forward the last thing, that neither circumcision avails nor uncircumcision, but he said a new creation. Concerning which elsewhere: if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. If it is new, he says, a creation, let him not become under the law; for he who lives according to the law lives in the world, but he who lives in Christ is a citizen in the heavens. Therefore the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.