* This explanation is adopted by Sieffert, Meyer, and Weizsacker. The expositors generally admit that no doubt on Paul’s part is implied (so Winer, Alford, Lipsius, Ellicott, Lightfoot), but mostly insist on the first sense of uh mos. The difficulty of reconciling these two positions, which is clearly recognised by Ellicott, is evaded by referring rpéxw and @dpapoy to the opin- ions of others. So Ellicott: ‘If others deemed Paul’s past and present course fruitless, it really must, in that respect, have amounted to a loss of past and present labour.”’
96 WORD STUDIES IN THE NEW TESTAMENT. [Cu. IL
ing for Paul to take an uncircumcised Gentile with him to the conference at Jerusalem.
Was compelled to be circumcised (jvayxdacOn trepitpmn- Ojvat). That is, no constraint was applied by the Jerusalem church and its authorities for the circumcision of Titus. The statement is not that such an attempt was pressed but successfully resisted, but that circumcision was not insisted on by the church. The pressure in that direction came from “the false brethren” described in the next verse.
4. The false brethren (rods yevdaddAgous). Only here and 2 Cor. xi. 26. Christians in name only; Judaisers; anti-Paulinists. The article marks them as a well-known class.
Unawares brought in (7apecod«tous). N.T.° Lit. brought in by the side, and so insidiously, tllegally. Vulg. subintro- ductos. °LXX. Strabo (xvii. 1) uses it as an epithet of Ptolemy, “the sneak.” Comp. rapeod£fovew shall privily bring in, 2 Pet. ii. 1; and wapecedincar crept in privily, Jude 4. Brought in, not from Jerusalem into the church at Antioch, nor into the Pauline churches generally, but into the Christian brotherhood to which they did not rightfully belong.
Who (ofrives). The double relative introduces the explan- ation of the two preceding epithets: false brethren, privily brought in, since they came in privily to spy out our liberty.
Came in privily (rapeoprOovr). Lit. came in beside. Only here and Rom. v. 20, where it implies nothing evil or secret, but merely something subsidiary. The aorist has a pluper- fect sense, indicating the earlier intrusion of these persons into the Christian community.
To spy out (xatacxorfjoat). N.T.°. In LXX, of spying out a territory, 2 Sam. x. 3; 1 Chron. xix. 8.
Cu. II] THE EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS. 97
Liberty (é\evdepiav). Freedom from Mosaism through justification by faith.
Bring us into bondage (xatadovrdcovew). Only here and 2 Cor. xi. 20. Bring us into subjection to Jewish ordin- ances. ‘The compound verb indicates abject subjection.
5. We gave place by subjection (elEauev tH brorayn). We, Paul and Barnabas. Gave place or yielded, N. T.°.. By the subjection which was demanded of us. The noun only in Paul and the Pastorals, and always in the sense of self- subjection. Comp. 2 Cor. ix. 13; 1 Tim. ii. 11; iii. 4.
6. Render the passage as follows : “ But to be something from (at the hands of) those who were of repute, whatever they were, matters nothing to me (God accepteth not man’s person), for those who were of repute imparted nothing to me.”
To be something (eivai 71). Comp. ch. vi. 3; Acts v. 36; 2 Cor. xii. 11. To be in good standing as an evangelist or apostle, approved and commissioned by high authorities.
From those who were of repute (ad trav doxovvTar). From, at the hands of; as receiving my indorsement or com- mission from them. Comp. ch.i.1. Of repute, see on ver. 2.
Whatsoever they were (ozrofoz rroré oav). Tloré in N.T. is invariably temporal, and points here to the preéminence which these apostles had formerly, up to the time of Paul’s visit, enjoyed, because of their personal connection with Jesus. *
Maketh no matter to me (ovd€v pou duapéper}. Paul does not say, as A. V. and Rey., that the standing and repute of
* Others, as Meyer, Ellicott, Sieffert, take word as strengthening the indef- inite sense of éroto like the Latin cunqgue. ‘' Whatever in the world they: were.’’ This sense of roré occurs in Class. but not in N. T.