CHAPTER III. ] COMMENTARY ON GALATIANS. hesays not, "Who loved us," but, "Who loved me." And besides the Evangelist says, " God so loved the world ;" (John iii : 16.) and Paul himself, " He that spared not His own Son, but delivered Him up, not for Paul only, but, "for us all ;" (Rom. viii : 32.) and again, "that He might purify unto himself a people for his own possession, ( Tit. ii : 14.) But consider ing the desperate condition of human nature, and the ineffably tender solicitude of Christ, in what He delivered us from, and what He freely gave us, and kindled by the yearning of affec tion towards Him, he thus expresses himself. Thus the Prophets often appropriate to them selves Him who is God of all, as in the words, " O God, thou art my God, early will I seek Thee." (Psalm Ixiii : i.) Moreover, this lan guage teaches that each individual justly owes as a great debt of gratitude to Christ, as if He had come for his sake alone, for He would not have grudged this His condescension though but for one, so that the measure of His love to each is as great as to the whole world. Truly the Sacrifice was offered for all mankind, 1 and was sufficient to save all, but those who enjoy the blessing are the believing only. Nevertheless it did not deter Him from His so great condescen sion, that not all would come ; but He acted after the pattern of the supper in the Gospel, which He prepared for all, (Luke xiv : 16.) yet when the guests came not,, instead of with drawing the viands, He called in others. So too He did not despise that sheep, though one only,whichhadstrayed from the ninety and nine. (Mat. xviii : 12.) This too in like manner St. Paul intimates, when he says, speaking about ! the Jews, "For what if some were without , faith, shall their want of faith make of none effect the faithfulness of God? God forbid : yea let God be found true, but every man a | liar." (Rom. iii: 3, 4.) When He so loved thee as to give Himself up to bring thee who wast without hope to a life so great and blessed, canst thou, thus gifted, have recourse to things gone by? His reasoning being completed, he concludes with a vehment asseveration, saying, Ver. 21. "I do not make void the grace of God." 3 Let those, who even now Judaize and adhere to the Law, listen to this, for it applies to them. Ver. 21. "For if righteousness is through the Law, then Christ died for naught." What can be more heinous than this sin ? 4 what more fit to put one to shame than these words ? Christ s death is a plain proof of the inability of the Law to justify us ; and if it does justify, then is His death superfluous. Yet how could it be reasonable to say that has been done heedlessly and in vain which is so awful, so sur passing human reason, a mystery so ineffable, with which Patriarchs travailed, which Proph ets foretold, which Angels gazed on with con sternation, which all men confess as the summit of the Divine tenderness ? Reflecting how utterly out of place it would be if they should say that so great and high a deed had been done superfluously, (for this is what their con duct came to,) he even uses violent language against them, as we find in the words which follow. CHAPTER III VERSE I. " foolish Galatians,2 who did bewitch you, before whose eyes Jesus Christ was openly set forth, cruci fied ? " HERE he passes to another subject ; in the former chapters he had shown himselfnot to be an Apostle of men, nor by men, nor in want of Apostolic instruction. Now, having established his authority as a teacher, he proceeds to dis- 1 ["Chrysostomteachesth.it God foreordained all men to holiness and salvation and that Christ died for all and is both willing and able to save all, but not against their will." Schaft, / roleg. p. 20. G. A.] a [" Paul addresses himself again directly to the Galatians with r expression of indignant surprise at their relapse into Judaism and passes from the historical to the doctrinal part of the h-pis- tle, from the apology of his apostolic authority to the defense his apostolic teaching." Schaff in Pop. Cont.G, A.] course more confidently, and draws a compari son between faith and the Law. At the outset he said, "I marvel that ye are so quickly removing; " (Gal. i : 6.) but here, " O foolish Galatians;" then, his indignation was in its a ["Negative side of the life which Paul (from ver. 19) has de scribed as his own. By this negative, with the grave reason assigned for it in the latter part of the verse, the perverse conduct of Peter is completely condemned." Meyer. G. A.] 4 ["This blasphemous inference gives the finishing stroke to the false Judaizing gospel. "This collision between Peter and Paul furnished material to the Ebionites for an attack upon Paul, to the Gnostics for an attack upon the Jewish apostles and to Porphyry for an attack upon Christianity itself fas well as to Baur and the Tubingen school for an attack in modern times from a different standpoint]. But Christianity has surveyed all these attacks and gains new strength from every conflict." Schaff. G. A.]