Ver. 2. keep your eyes open upon (_blepete_), +the "dogs,"+ the men who would _excommunicate_ all who hold not with their half-Christian Pharisaism and its legal burthens, but who are themselves thus self-excluded from the covenant blessing. +Beware of the evil workmen+, the teachers whose watchword is "works, works, works," a weary round of observances and would-be merits, but who are sorry _work-men_ indeed, spoiling the whole structure of "Heaven's easy, artless, unencumber'd plan." +Beware of the concision+, the apostles of a mere physical wounding, which, as enjoined according to their principles, is nothing better than a mutilation (_katatome_), a parody of what circumcision was meant to be, as the sacrament of a preparatory dispensation now terminated in its
Ver. 3. fulfilment. +For+ not they but +we are the circumcision+, the true Israel of the true covenant, sealed and purified by our God; +we who by God's Spirit worship+,[4] doing priestly service in a spiritual temple[5] in a life, love, and power, which is ours by the presence in us of the Holy Ghost, the promise of the Father; +and who exult+, not in tribal, national, ceremonial prerogatives, but +in Christ Jesus+, our refuge and our crown, our righteousness and glory, with an exultation infinitely warmer than the legalist's can be, and meanwhile pure, for its source is altogether not ourselves; +and who+, in Him, +not in the flesh+,[6] not in self and its workings, +are confident+ (for confident we are, but it is a "confidence in self-despair," the confidence of those who have been driven by self-discovery to Christ alone).[7] I speak with a general reference, of all true disciples; but let me instance myself as a case peculiarly in point. I speak thus,
Ver. 4. +though having+ (_echon_), I, myself (_ego_), from _their_ view-point, +confidence even in flesh+. +Whoever else thinks of confiding in flesh+, of building a legal standing-place on his privilege and merit, +I+ may do so +more+ than he; for I have reached the _ne plus ultra_ in that
Ver. 5. direction. +As for circumcision+,[8] I was an +eight-day+ child; no proselyte, operated upon in later life, but a son of the Covenant; descended +from Israel's race+, one of the progeny of him who was a prince with God (Gen. xxxii. 28); +of Benjamin's tribe+, the tribe which gave the first God-chosen king to the nation, and which remained "faithful among the faithless" to the house of David at a later day; +Hebrew+ offspring +of Hebrew ancestors+,[9] child of a home in which, immemorially, the old manners and the old speech were cherished; _in respect of the law,[10] a Pharisee_--the votary of religious precision, elaborate devotion, exclusive privilege, and energetic prose-
Ver. 6, lytism; +in respect of zeal+, intense and perfectly sincere, +persecuting the Church; in respect of the righteousness which+ resides +in the Law+, as its terms are understood by the Pharisee, +found+ (_genomenos_) +blameless+.[11] Such was my position. I possessed an ideal pedigree; full sacramental position from the first; domestic traditions pure and strict; an absolute personal devotion to the cause of my creed; the most rigorous observance of its rules; the most energetic
Ver. 7. efforts to maintain and extend its power. +But the kind of things which+ (_hatina_) +I felt+ (_moi en_) so many _gains,[12] these things I have come to consider_ (_hegemai_, perfect), +because of our+ (_ton_) +Christ+ (discovered at last in His glory, as the slain and risen Jesus), just one +loss+, one +deprivation+; not merely a worthless thing, but a ruinous one; a robbery of the true Blessing
Ver. 8. from my soul. +Aye more, I actually+ (_kai_) now +consider all things+, from all points of view, all possessions, all ambitions, +to be+ similarly +loss+, deprivation, +because of the surpassingness of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord+, because of the immeasurable betterness of a spirit-sight of what HE is, in Himself, and as my own; +because of whom+--on account of what He now was to me--+I suffered deprivation+ (_exemiothen_) +of my all+ (_ta panta_), in the crisis of my change; +and I consider it+ only +refuse+,[13] rubbish, that +I may gain+[14] (in a blessed exchange of profit against loss, the loss of what I thought my "gains") +Christ+, nothing less than HIM, my boundless Wealth (_ploutos_