The Pulpit Commentary — Galatians — Section 344

of nn, so also from all the worrv and distrei!s !lave been made IMI the filth of the 'World, ot bondage to ceremonial 'prescriptions. the o:ff'scouring of all thinge." The whole And this group of truths, as well e.e those context of thoeo words in the Oorintbianll· relating to man's reconciliation with God, (vers. 0-13) is here compreased into the he felt it to be his mission, even perhaps single clause, "I have been crucified unto \u own most especial mil!eion, boldly and the world." "The world;" the term de• m1nkly to proclaim; not only to rejoioe in notes unregenerate mankind ta.ken in con• them on hie own behalf, but to hold them nection with that entire system of habits of forth to the view of others, as, replete with life and of feeling in whioh man, ae un• blessing to all msnldnd ; to glorify &nd quickeued by the Spirit of. God, :finds his \'aunt them. Hie motive at present in thus sphere a.nd home. As the apostle ie speaking vehemently protesting his own rejoicing in of his own personal experience, we· must the cross of Christ was doubtless to rouse understand him as referring in pe.rtidular to into fresh activity the slumbering sympathy e.J.I those circumstances of civil, social, and with those feelings which h&d probsbly in religious being which ·had· once surrounded some degree once animated his Galstian him, the honoured Jew and Pharisee. These, converts. Therefore it is that he writes, he enumerates. at length·.in Phil.dii.·5, 6. "the cross of owr Lord Jesus Christ," in- To these we might a.dd, though, U would, stead of "the cross of my Lord," which it perhaps, have hardly oocurred to Paul's own would else have been in this case natural mind to add it, the ordinary poeseBBion of to him to se.y, as he does in Phil. iii. 8, "for worldly comforts a.nd immuuity from want the excellency ot the knowledge of Christ and suffering. AU, .he proceedil·:in that Jesus my Lord," snd according to the tone passage to sa.y, he had" forfeited" (l(,,,,,,ri,8',11 of eh. ii. 20 of this Epistle. This " our " Phil. iii 8). Nor did he look-back upon, hints to the Galatians that they have as . his loss with regret : "I do count them as much reason as he bas to glory in the cross d=g (rr,cl,!3a1v1.)." Thia twofold description, as redeeming God's people alike from sin "I forfeited all things," and " I do. count and from the Law. By whom (or, 'IDhereby) them a.11 a.s dung," is here summarized in the world ii crn~ed Dllto me, and I Dllto the phra.ee, "the world is a. crucified object the world (U oi iµol ,co<Tp.os irrra6;,o,-ra.,, to me." The world. further, thus de- «a-yr/, 1<0<T/Uf' [Receptus, "'P «o<T/L'f]) ; tkrO'll{Jh. scribed as crucified to him, included in par- which the tlJorld ka8 been m-ucifted ,mt.o me, ticular the entire system of J swish cere- and I unto the world. The omission of "'P monialism, so fa.r a.a it existed apart from before 1<0<T/LC/-, which is now generally a.greed the vitalizing influence of the_ Spirit of God. in, adds to the tereenese of the sentence. The The "nature.I ma.n ( lj,ux1,cbs livBpc.nros) " sets article is wanting before «O<T/Los elsewhere, great store by religious ceremonia.liem ; it is as 2 Cor. v. 19 ; Phil. ii. 15 ; Col ii. 20 ; to him, in fact, bis, religion. The apostle 1 Tim. iii. 16. The construing of the pe.s- ha.s himself felt it to be so. But hie een • uge which te.klls the relative oi'i ae reciting timent now is the very opposite : he a.coounts •• our Lord Jesus Christ," loses eight of the it a dead, lifeless thing; nay, even loath- image which is now the one most prominent some a.nd abhorred, when ever in the eme,llesi to the apostle's view : this surely is not degree placed even by a. Christian Jew in Christ himself, but his cross; ae in I Cor. the category of Christie.nly obedience, That ii 2 the apostle determinea the more genera.I he did regnrd snob religions ceremonialism term, "Jesue Christ," by the more specific e.e belonging to the "world," from which as one, "and him crucified." The reference in Christ he had become dissevered, is plain, of the rela. tive is to be determined, here a.a both from eh. iv. 3, "in bondage under the often elsewhere, not by the mere propinquity rudiments of the world," a.nd from Col. ii. of words in the sentence, but by the near- 20, "why, as though living in the world, do ness of objects to the writer's mind at the ye subject yourself to ordinances, Handle moment. In language of singular intensity not," etc. That this particular ingredient the apostle bespeaks the all-involving trans- in the whole system recited a.s "the world" formation which, through the cross of Christ, was a.t this moment present to the apostle's his own life ha.d undergone. The world, mind, appears from hie singling out circum- he ea.ye, had become to him a thing cru- cision for mention in the next verse. ·While, cified : not only a dead thing, ceasing to however, this was a part ot the "crucified interest or attract lii.m, but a.leo a. vile, ac- world" just now prominent to his view, this cu,raed thing, i,omething be loathed a.nd term comprised to hie consciousness much despised. And conversely, he himself had beside; namely, the entire mass of ungod- booome a crucified thing unto the world; liness and vice which appertains to "the not only had he ceased to preaent to the course, or age, of this world " ( a.lcli11 'Tau world ought tba.t could interest or a.ttra.ct ,co<T,,au .,-06-rov, Eph. ii. 2), from which alcl,11 it, but a.oo become to it a thing ecouted and the Christian is by the do.Hy tro.neforming 11,bhorred; 118 he sa.y1 1 Cor. iv. 13, "We of his character to be removed (BQm, xii. ~), Ott, "1, 1-18.) 'ttllll ;li':PISTLE 'tO THE GALATtANS. 811