Who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God our Father:
All Commentaries on Galatians 1:4 Go To Galatians 1
Cornelius a Lapide
AD 1637
Who gave Himself.—to be an expiatory victim for an atonement, and to the death of the Cross, that He might pay the price of our redemption.
For our sins. "Righteousness Himself," says S. Jerome, "gave Himself, that He might destroy the unrighteousness in us; Wisdom gave Himself to undo our foolishness; Holiness and Fortitude offered Himself, that He might blot out our uncleanness and weakness."
From this present evil world. Why does he call the world evil? The Manichæans reply: Because the world is material, it is evil and the creation of the devil. But this is a foolish reply. The evil world is worldly and carnal life and conversation, such as this world lives, and such as it invites us to; and worldly men are such as by hook or by crook hunt after the goods of this world only—riches, honours, and pleasures. The figure of speech here is a metonymy; the world is put for those who are in, or who are coming into the world. "The whole world lieth in wickedness. Not that the world itself is evil, but that things in the world become evil through men. So says the Apostle himself: Redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Sylvan glades become of evil report when they are filled with sins; not that the soil and the trees sin, but because the very places gain notoriety for murder. So the world (seculum, i.e, a period of time, in itself neither good nor evil) is called good or evil through the actions of those who are in it" (S. Jerome in 1 John 5:19).
Note that the word here rendered evil in the Greek, πονηÏου̃, is rendered by S. Jerome bad, by Augustine great, by Erasmus crafty or miserable or full of toils, by Vatablus wearisome, especially on account of sins committed in this present life, which affords so many occasions of sin; whereas the future world, to which Christ is leading us, is free from sin and is altogether pure. Valentinus evolved from his own consciousness his own æons or worlds, declaring them to be animated beings, and the parents by quadrads, ogdoads, decads, and dodecads, of as many worlds as the son of Æneas had pigs (S. Jerome).
