Paul, an apostle, (not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ, and God the Father, who raised him from the dead;)
All Commentaries on Galatians 1:1 Go To Galatians 1
John Chrysostom
AD 407
The exordium is full of a vehement and lofty spirit, and not the exordium only, but also, so to speak, the whole Epistle. For always to address one's disciples with mildness, even when they need severity is not the part of a teacher but it would be the part of a corrupter and enemy. Wherefore our Lord too, though He 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 are you, Simon Barjona, Matthew 16:17 and having promised to lay the foundation of the Church upon his confession, shortly afterwards He says, Get behind Me, Satan: you are a stumbling block unto Me. Matthew 16:23 Again, on another occasion, Are you also even yet without understanding? Matthew 15:16 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, What seekest Thou, or why do you speak with her? John 4:27 Thus taught, and walking in the steps of his Master, Paul has 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 you? Shall I come unto you with a rod, or in love, and in a spirit of meekness? 1 Corinthians 6:21 but to the Galatians, O foolish Galatians. Galatians 3:1 And not once only, but a second time, also he has employed this reproof, and towards the conclusion he says with a reproachful allusion to them, Let no man trouble me; Galatians 6:17 but he soothes them again with the words, My little children, of whom I am again in travail: Galatians 4:19 and so in many other instances.
Now that this Epistle breathes an indignant spirit, is obvious to every one even on the first perusal; but I must explain the cause of his anger against the disciples. Slight and unimportant it could not be, or he would not have used such vehemence. For to be exasperated by common matters is the part of the little- minded, morose, and peevish; just as it is that of the more redolent and sluggish to lose heart in weighty ones. Such a one was not Paul. What then was the offense which roused him? It was grave and momentous, one which was estranging them all from Christ, as he himself says further on, Behold, I Paul say unto you, that if you receive circumcision, Christ will profit you nothing; Galatians 5:2 and again, You who would be justified by the Law, you are fallen away from Grace. Galatians 5:4 What then is this? For it must be explained more clearly. Some of the Jews who believed, being held down by the preposessions of Judaism, and at the same time 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 Paul in abolishing these things was not to be borne. For, said they, Peter and James and John, the chiefs of the Apostles and the companions of Christ, forbade them not. Now in fact they did not forbid these things, but this was not by way of delivering positive doctrine, but in condescension 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, saying 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 one way to you and another way to others.
Since Paul then 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 could wish to be present with you now, and to change my voice, Galatians 4:20) 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, The others were disciples of Christ but this man of the Apostles. Wherefore he begins thus, Paul, an Apostle not from men, neither through man. For, these deceivers, as I was saying before, had said that this man was the last of all the Apostles and was taught by them, for 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 and by depreciating Paul, and exalting the honor 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, saying it came from men, while that of Peter came from Christ, he immediately addresses himself to this point, declaring himself an apostle not from men, neither through man. It was Ananias who baptized him, but it was not he who delivered him from the way of error and initiated him into the faith; but Christ Himself sent from on high that wondrous voice, whereby He inclosed him in his net. For Peter and his brother, and John and his brother, He called when walking by the seaside, Matthew 4:18 but Paul after His ascension into heaven. Acts 9:3-4 And just 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 labored more abundantly than they all; 1 Corinthians 15:10 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 has reference to all alike for the Gospel's root and origin is divine, but the not being through man is peculiar to 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? Because here lay the whole question; for they said that the office of a teacher had been committed to him by men, namely by the Apostles, whom therefore it behooved 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. Acts 13:2
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 commissioned 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 unto yourselves, and to all the flock, in the which the Holy Ghost has made you bishops. Acts 20:28 Yet in another Epistle he says, And God has set some in the Church, first Apostles, secondly prophets, thirdly teachers. 1 Corinthians 12:28 Thus he ascribes indifferently the things of the Spirit to God, and the things of God to the Spirit. Here too he stops the mouths of heretics, by the words through Jesus Christ and God the Father; for, inasmuch as they said this term through was applied to the Son as importing inferiority, see what he does. 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 Son. For to the words through Jesus Christ he has added, and God the Father; for if at the mention of the Father alone he had introduced the phrase through 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 as referring the acts of the Son to the Father, but to show 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 named after the Father, what will they say seeing that, in the passage before us, the Apostle beginning from Christ proceeds to mention the Father?— 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, even if they rave ten thousand times, 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 we dare not hold that the Son is inferior to the Father, because He is placed after Him in the Baptismal formula.
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, counted it not a prize to be on an equality with God, Philippians 2:6 or which you afterwards declared in that to the Hebrews, the effulgence of his glory, and the very image of His substance; Hebrews 1:3 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; John 1:1. or what Jesus Himself oftentimes declared to the Jews, that His power and authority was equal to the Father's? John 5:19-27, etc. Do you omit all these, and make mention of the economy of His Incarnation only, bringing forward His cross and dying? Yes, would Paul answer. For had this discourse been addressed to those who had unworthy conceptions of Christ, it would have been well to mention those things; but, inasmuch as the disturbance comes from persons who fear to incur punishment should they abandon the Law, he therefore mentions 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 Word, 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 add, 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 the benefits which come to 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 wilfully 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, either on account of the Son's humanity, or in honor 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? Nay, verily, faith in Him enabled the very shadows of those who believed in Him to effect the resurrection of the dead. Acts 5:15 Then believers in Him, though mortal, yet by the very shadows of their earthly bodies, and by the garments which had touched these bodies, could raise the dead, but He could not raise Himself? Is not this manifest madness, a great stretch of folly? Have you not heard His saying, Destroy this Temple, and in three days I will raise it up? John 2:19 and again, I have power to lay down my life, and I have power to take it again? John 10:18 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 honor of the Father, and in compassion to the weakness of the hearers.
