Have you suffered so many things in vain? if it be yet in vain.
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Ambrosiaster
AD 400
At that time believers were subject to reproach from others, whether at home or abroad, being pointed out as guilty of treason. Hence the Galatians, who had likewise suffered a great deal, were more perverse than those who had been spared, because they had lost the merit of their suffering by their resubmission to the law.
Have ye suffered so many things in vain? Why should unbelievers persecute you in vain, i.e, without cause, if you are returning to Moses?
If it be yet in vain. Which it will be, unless you return to your former mind, and stand firm in the faith of Christ.
Lest he should seem to despair needlessly, he has corrected his own reprimand by saying “if indeed it is in vain.” For they could be corrected. If so, what they have suffered will not be without meaning. The meaning they will have will be perseverance in faith, the prize and the confirmation of promises derived from faith in Christ. .
Such a subtle comment requires patience to understand. It both negatively reprimands and positively admonishes. He reprimands them by saying “You have suffered so much in vain.” At the same time he admonishes them by saying “you have suffered so much,” aware that they withstood many things with fortitude when they received faith. .
If yet in vain: i.e. I have still good hopes, that what you have already suffered by persecutions and self-denials, since your conversion, will not be in vain; as they would be, if you sought to be justified by the works and ceremonies of the law of Moses, and not by the faith and law of Christ, by which only you can be truly sanctified. (Witham)
St. Jerome, St. Augustine, and others, suppose that the power of working miracles still remained in the Galatians, notwithstanding what had passed; but St. Chrysostom and several others, explain it of a power they had formerly possessed. (Calmet)
This remark is far more piercing than the former, for the remembrance of their miracles would not be so powerful as the exhibition of their contests and endurance of sufferings for Christ's sake. All that you have endured, says he, these men would strip you of, and would rob you of your crown. Then, lest he should dismay and unnerve, he proceeds not to a formal judgment, but subjoins, if it be indeed in vain; if you have but a mind to shake off drowsiness and recover yourselves, he says, it is not in vain. Where then be those who would cut off repentance ? Here were men who had received the Spirit, worked miracles, become confessors, encountered a thousand perils and persecutions for Christ's sake, and after so many achievements had fallen from grace; nevertheless he says, if you have the purpose, you may recover yourselves.
