The Pulpit Commentary — Galatians — Section 276

must be meant than a mere completing of Paul always to have for its subject an im- the sentenc,e by ndding to the mention of personal agont (Winer, • Gmm. N. T.,' § 38, "circnmcisi0n" the mention of its opposite. 6); and such an agent is said '••p-y,,uOa., in It is ckitr t.hat there were those who ima- tho sense always of "proving, artino- out, gined thnt uncircumcision mado a favour- its vitality and power," rmd never of simply 1tble difference in men's religious condition, " doing" such and such thing~. It is no- just 11s tl.Jere were others, like these Gala- where followed by an accusative. It is thus tinn renctionaries, who imagined that cir- distinguished from lp-yd.(oµ.a.,, which either cmmcision did. That there were persons to is followed by au acousative of the work he found in the Church who held the former done or is used tlbsolutely of" doing work " view is put beyond doubt by the exhorta- as in llfatt. xxi. 28; Rom. iv. 4, 5; l cdr. tion, " Let him not become uncircumcised," iv. 12. The apostle, therefo1·e, by tho words, which immediately precedes 1 Cor. vii. 19, wlcrT,s a,• O:yd1r71s- 'e.11ep-yovµ.l1111, means, not now under review with the passage imme- " faith through .love doing works of bene- diately before us; with reference to which ficence," but "faith evincing its vitality exhortation comp. I Mace. i. 15; Josephus, a11d power through the love which it begets 'Ant.,' xii. 5. l. It was in no such wnys, in us;" "foith by love operative and in- the aposlle tells them, that the Di\·ine fluential." Love is not contemplated as a approval was to be either gained or secured ; separate acting of the Spirit, added on to and only mischief would result from enter- faith as it were by an extrinsic effort of the ing upon them. (3) The antithetic affirma- soul, but as a product of faith itself, by tion of what really is effectual for our which faith, exerts its own internal energy. 6piritual well-being varies in the three The apostle's meaning becomes clearer if passages ; but it is natural to infer that we consider the object on which the justify- that which in all three is declared to be the ing faith of the Christie.n .fastens. This thing of ntal importance, either is at bottom the apostle describes in this Epistl,;, .as one and the same thing, or at least neces- Christ, "who gave himself for oµr sins;" sarily involves it. "Faith operative through "who loved me and gave himself for me" love" must be identical with, or involve, (eh. i. 4; ii. 20). When this minvellous "the keeping of the commandments of exhibition of Divine compassiou and love is God," and " a new creature." A close exa- through fe.ith in very deed caught Right of mination of the first of these three sentences and realized, it naturally becomes a truth- v.ill show that it is so. The participle /11ep• power, exercising over the m11-n an influence -yovµ.•VTJ cannot be a passive, e.s Estius imperative and supreme. , This was the maintained; who even asserted a passive apostle's own experience; so much so that he sense for the verb ivep-yiiuOa., in all the seems to struggle with language while com- eight other passages in which it is found pelling it to describe the intensity of self- (Rom. -vii. 5 ; 2 Cor. i. 6; iv. 12; Eph. iii. devotion with which it animated him. In 20; Col. i. 29; I Tbess. ii. 13 ; 2 Tbess. ii. this Epistle we may cite the passages oh. ii. 7; J as. v. lG). In perhaps not oue of these 20; vi. 14. And in other Epistles he writes passages is a passive meaning probable; in a similar strain. Let it suffice to cite ,vbile in some of them, a& Epb. iii. 20; Col. 2 Cor. v. 14, 15: "The love of Christ con- i. 29; 1 Thess. ii. 13, it is palpably in- straineth us; because we thus judge, that admissible. In the case before us, if a p11.s- one died for all, therefore o.11 died;. and ho sive sense were admitted, we shonld have died for all, that they which livi; should no the expression, " faith wrought in us by longer live unto themselves, but unto him, Jove;" an account of the genesis of faith who for their sakes died and rose again; " which must be judged to be in the strictest o.dding, in ver.17, "Wherefore if any man is sense of tile word preposterous. Faith does in Christ, he is a new creature ; ... o.11 things indeed grow and become perfected through are of God, who reconciled us to himself JOVE:; but it is not in the first instance through Christ"-words which show what wrought in us by love, except indeed it be be meant by the "new creature" mentioned God's love to us (Eph. ii. 4). lu those pas- below, eh. vi. 15. Thus the apostle evinces ~ages of the New Testament in which tile how in his own case faith through lovo be- verb ,11ep-ye,11 occurs in the active voice came operative and influential. Christ's (Matt. xiv. 2; Mark vi. 14; eh. ii. 8, twice; love to himself, on being realized by him, 1 Car. xii. 6, 11 ; Eph. i. 11, 20; ii. 2; awakened in his soul a sentiment of grateful Phil ii. 13), the subject of the verb is a affection to hie Uede!lmer, which was so persone.l agent, or one which, as in Matt. strong and influential as thenceforward to xiv. 2 and Mark vi. 4, is probably spoken of sway and regulate the whole of his life. '1.'o us such. It is most commonly followed byan complote, however, our estimate of the aocneative of the thing wrought, which, apostle's view of this matter, we must not however, is sometimes left to the reader to forget to tako account of the words "bl the supply. The middle voice >1ppears in St. Spirit" in the preceding verse. 'fbe Spirit OIJ, V, 1-26.J THE EPISTU; 'fO 'l'llE GALA'lIANS. 21-3