Epistle of the Apostle Paul to the Galatians.

The Epistle to the Galatians by the Apostle Paul is a book of the New Testament that Paul addressed to the Christian community of Galatia that he established during his missionary journey.

Galatia is a region of Asia Minor, originally inhabited by the Greeks, but then assimilated by the Gauls (Celtic tribes). In 26, Galatia became a Roman province. It was a prosperous province, so these lands attracted Jews - immigrants from Judea.

Read the Epistle to the Galatians.

On the website you can read or listen to Paul's Epistle to the Galatians chapter by chapter.

There are 6 chapters in total:

The topics discussed in this letter are similar to Romans.

Compositionally, the Epistle of the Apostle Paul to the Galatians can be divided into:

Preface. Greetings and introduction by Pavel. The author outlines the main themes of the message.
Protective part. The Apostle defends his Apostolic dignity from the attacks of false teachers.

Paul responds to the following accusations against him:

Paul never saw Jesus Christ.
Paul learned the gospel doctrine from the other apostles.
Paul composed his own doctrine about the uselessness of the Law of Moses.
When meeting with other Apostles, Paul deliberately did not show his differences with the apostolic teachings.
Doctrinal part. Paul's discussions about the Old and New Testaments, about the Mosaic Law.
Moral part. Revealing the foundations of Christian morality.
Conclusion. Further instructions. Apostolic blessing.

Authorship, time and place of writing of the Epistle to the Galatians.

The fact that the authorship belongs to the Holy Apostle Paul was almost never doubted by anyone, unlike the time of writing. Some researchers believe that the Epistle to the Galatians is the very first letter of Paul and it was written in Antioch around 48. Others are sure that the Epistle was written no earlier than 56, when the apostle was in Ephesus. We share this point of view, since the test of the Epistle contains references to Paul's first and second visits to Galatia. The Epistle to the Galatians, unlike, say, the Epistle to the Romans, was written by Paul in his own hand.

There is no doubt that the Apostle Paul himself laid the foundation for Christian communities in the cities of Galatia. You can read about this in the Acts of the Apostles, as well as in the text of the Epistle to the Galatians. The text suggests that Paul spent more time in Galatia than he originally planned due to some “sickness of the flesh.” Paul's long stay in Galatia allowed him to persuade a large number of local residents to believe in Christ.

Archimandrite Iannuariy (Ivliev)

Series: Conversations on the Epistles of the Apostle Paul

Topic: Epistle to the Galatians

Text typed by: Lyudmila Zotova

Editing: Olga Surovegina

Lectures:

Conversation 1. Introduction. Epistle to the Galatians, 1, 1-10
Conversation 2. Epistle to the Galatians, 1, 11 – 2, 13
Conversation 3. Epistle to the Galatians, 2, 14 – 3, 4
Conversation 4. Epistle to the Galatians, 3, 5 – 16
Conversation 5. Epistle to the Galatians, 3, 17 – 29
Conversation 6. Epistle to the Galatians, 4, 1 – 11
Conversation 7. Epistle to the Galatians, 4, 12 – 31
Conversation 8. Epistle to the Galatians, 5, 1 – 12
Conversation 9. Epistle to the Galatians, 5, 13 – 24
Conversation 10. Epistle to the Galatians, 5, 25 – 6, 18

Hello, dear radio listeners! We begin with you the 58th conversation about the Holy Scriptures. Today I am glad to begin a new topic of our conversations, namely: an analysis of the Epistle to the Galatians of the Holy Apostle Paul.

The Epistle to the Galatians is one of the most remarkable works of Christian writing. It can be said that the Epistle to the Galatians is the basis on which the beautiful structure of Christian theology is based, and this message was of enormous importance for the thought of the ancient Church and played an important role in the life of the Western Church on the border of the Middle Ages and Modern times. The Epistle to the Galatians discusses a very important topic - the topic of changing religious milestones, replacing old religions with a completely new religion, replacing paganism and Judaism with Christianity, changing the religions of the Law - the laws of nature or the Law of Moses - with the religion of freedom in Christ. This is a very difficult topic. Very difficult and very interesting, so we will analyze this little message in some detail.

The famous researcher of the Holy Scriptures of the New Testament, professor of the St. Petersburg Theological Academy, pre-revolutionary, Nikolai Nikanorovich Glubokovsky called the Epistle to the Galatians “the Gospel of Christian freedom.” Yes, it is freedom in Christ that we are talking about here. How to understand this - freedom in Christ - we will talk about this later. And today we will discuss with you isagogical questions.

Let me remind you that one of the first steps to studying a sacred text is called isagogy, that is, an introduction to a particular text. We need to answer the questions: who, where, when, why, for what reason, for what purpose wrote this message. Well, no one ever doubted that this message was written by the Apostle Paul, because the message was known to everyone since the end of the 1st century, and commentary on this message and mention of this message appear in the works of numerous Christian authors, starting from the 2nd century. The message was of enormous importance, as I already said, both in antiquity and in the 16th century, for example. Martin Luther, when he commented on the Holy Scriptures... You remember that Luther was the founder of the Reformation, that reform in the Catholic Church that turned into a colossal movement that caused a whole storm in the West. And Luther, as the main reformer, wrote commentaries on the Epistle to the Galatians, which grew into a large book, and considered the Epistle to the Galatians as a banner of the Reformation against the Roman Catholic Church. But this is Luther's opinion. And when Luther translated the Holy Scriptures from Hebrew and Greek into German (this was a feat, a real literary and theological feat on his part), then the Epistle to the Galatians, if my memory serves me right, was the first text that he translated into German . Well, in the original, of course, the Epistle to the Galatians, like all the other letters of the Apostle Paul, is written in Greek.

So, who, where, when and why wrote this message. Well, who is the Apostle Paul. But as for where and when, we cannot answer these questions with absolute accuracy. Well, there are discussions about this among biblical scholars. But, most likely (most likely), this Epistle was written during the third missionary journey of the Apostle Paul. This journey lasted several years and took place in the mid-fifties of the 1st century. Then the apostle, having visited some of the churches he had previously founded, stopped for a long time in the city of Ephesus. It is the capital of the Roman province of Asia. This province was located on the territory of today's Turkey, on the shores of the Aegean Sea, that is, the eastern coast of today's Turkey. The city of Ephesus does not currently exist; there are its remains and ruins. And there, in this Ephesus, the Apostle Paul lived for a long time, for about three years, and wrote, in particular, the first Epistle to the Corinthians, which we have already talked about. Apparently, this is where he writes the Epistle to the Galatians. So, most likely, this is the city of Ephesus, the mid-fifties, after both letters to the Corinthians were written. You see, we are going in chronological order, or trying to do so.

Who are the Galatians? Here the question is also quite complicated. The fact is that the Galatians, clearly, were such a people. The word "Galatians" is cognate with the word "Gauls" and cognate with the word "Celts". Those of you who are interested in ancient history know that modern France was once called Gaul. And it was not inhabited by the French. The words “French” and “France” come from the word “franc”. This is one of the Germanic tribes - the Franks. So, the Germans appeared there quite late. And the indigenous, ancient population of this area were the Gauls - one of the Celtic, not Germanic, but Celtic tribes. Well, you know that in Europe various groups of tribes were replaced during the migration of peoples. There were some tribes whose history we don’t even know: this goes back somewhere deep into antiquity, perhaps to the Ice Age. But then here’s a story that we already know quite well, this is the history of the Celtic tribes: this is a whole large group of peoples and tribes that populated almost all of Europe. These Celts have survived to this day. Maybe one of you can list for me what Celtic peoples exist in the world today. Let me remind you that these are, first of all, Irish, residents of Ireland. Well, they are, of course, scattered all over the world now. These are the Scots. Everyone also knows who they are in the north of Great Britain, the island of Britain. Then, these are the Welsh - the population of Wales, this is the southwest of the island of Britain. Well, then the inhabitants of the Brittany peninsula: this peninsula is located in today's France. Bretons live there. These are also Celtic people. Well, and some small tribes, people, on the islands between Great Britain and France, there, on the Isle of Man, let’s say. Here, these are the main Celtic peoples who have remained since ancient times with their own special languages. But once upon a time, the Germanic tribes, moving from the east from the Black Sea steppes, began to gradually push the Celts back, displacing them from their homes, and the Celtic peoples were dispersed and partially assimilated with the Germans. And so one of the Celtic tribes from the territory of today's Switzerland, Helvetia, along the Danube, along this river, moved to the Black Sea. Then they crossed the Thracian valley (today's Bulgaria), and also crossed the Bosporus Strait, and crossed into today's Turkey to the peninsula of Asia Minor (or Anatolia), and reached the north of this peninsula, founding their state, the kingdom of Galatia, inhabited by the Galatians - one of the displaced Celtic tribes from central Europe.

This kingdom or this kingdom did not last very long and eventually it was annexed to the Roman Empire. And this country of Galatia, together with some other small surrounding countries, such as Lycaonia, Pisidia, formed a province of the Roman Empire, which also had the name Galatia. So, Galatia is a large province that includes several countries and peoples. And Galatia was the name given to the actual country inhabited by the Galatians, that is, the north of this province. And the capital of both the country of Galatia and the Roman province of Galatia was the city of Ancyra - today's Ankara or, as it used to be called, Angora. Yes, remember, there were such Angora cats, Angora rabbits - that’s where it all comes from. Now, we have dealt with these Galatians. The Galatians, it must be said, were considered a very barbaric and savage tribe in the Roman Empire. There were all sorts of jokes about them, just as we sometimes had jokes about some scrappers, that is, Pskovites, or, there, about the Chukchi, as a good-natured joke. Also, in ancient times they told jokes about the Galatians. When the Apostle Paul in the Epistle to the Galatians at the beginning of the 3rd chapter writes “Oh, foolish Galatians” (but in Greek it sounds even brighter; to put it mildly, brighter), this could make the readers smile, because the Galatians were really considered very stupid people. Well, that's true, by the way.

So, the Apostle Paul visited Galatia during his second missionary journey, that is, at the very beginning of the fifties of the 1st century. We do not know the details of Apostle Paul’s visit to the country of Galatia, we only know that he founded churches there, apparently in some central cities. And subsequently he hardly even visited these places and tried to maintain contact through some intermediaries. Leaving one or another Church, leaving it, the Apostle Paul appointed his people there, some kind of elders, responsible, authorized, and then maintained contact with them. But while living in the city of Ephesus (we will argue that it was the mid-fifties, and Paul was in Ephesus), the apostle learned that some ill-wishers (his ill-wishers) from Jerusalem had come to Galatia and introduced themselves there as envoys of the Jerusalem Church, sent by the highest apostles , such as Peter, John, James, although it is unlikely that they expressed the opinion of the apostles. And these people who arrived from Jerusalem, equipped with some kind of credentials and letters of recommendation, created a sensation in Galatia. The Apostle Paul always had no shortage of ill-wishers. The fact is that Paul truly preached the universality of the new Christian religion. Jesus Christ, he said, came as the new Adam to save all people. To save not for their deeds, because everything we do comes from God, but to save people according to their faith. Just as Abraham was once recognized by God as righteous because he believed God, so now we can consider ourselves children of Abraham when we believe God for Jesus Christ. Or we believe in Jesus Christ, Whom God the Father sent to us. It is precisely this faith that is the saving principle that the Apostle Paul affirms in people.

While those who arrived from Jerusalem were very conservative. These are the so-called Judaizing Christians. They did not deny the saving role of Jesus Christ as the Messiah, the Savior. But, they said, Paul is preaching to you a salvation that is too cheap, a Gospel that is too cheap. What is it: believe and you will be saved? No! Jesus Christ came to save the chosen people, the children of Abraham, the descendants of Abraham. First you must become a son of Abraham, a descendant of Abraham, that is, become a Jew, take on the burden of the Law, try to fulfill this Law (and this is very difficult to do) and only then turn to Christ. Christ came to the Jews, they said, and you, Galatians, are pagans. You're not even circumcised. You have not taken upon yourself the Law of Moses. Yes, you may not even know anything about this Law. What kind of Christ is there for you? There is no salvation for you. You first become Jews, and then Christ, perhaps, will save you. He will also look at whether you are good Jews, whether you observe the legal regulations correctly, whether you observe, say, the Sabbath regulations? And so on. And Pavel, they said, well, what is Pavel? First of all, he's not even an apostle. There are twelve apostles, recognized by all. Who is Pavel? It is generally unknown who. Secondly, what Paul preaches is not at all what the other apostles preach, they said. Third, Paul behaves disgracefully. He communicates with people with whom, generally speaking, a true descendant of Abraham is not allowed to communicate: he communicates with pagans, that is, with the unclean from the Jewish point of view, from the legal point of view. This is all unbearable.

And it must be said that this strict preaching of the Judaizers from Jerusalem had its effect. The fact is that people are very prone, very prone to irresponsibility. Remember, Dostoevsky at the end of his novel The Brothers Karamazov has a chapter about the Grand Inquisitor. (Now I even forgot whether “The Brothers Karamazov” or “Demons”, but this is not so important). Dostoevsky has a passage about the Grand Inquisitor. Dostoevsky's thought is as follows. Jesus Christ appears in medieval Europe, well, more precisely in Europe of the 16th century, let’s say, and He is persecuted by the Inquisition. The Inquisitor explains to Him why he is persecuting Jesus Christ and is ready to execute him. Yes, because Christ brought people freedom, for which people are completely unprepared. This is too heavy a burden. The fact is that freedom requires a person to be responsible for his actions. And then, when freedom is reduced, a person becomes less responsible. If you have religious instructions - pray then, fast then, do this, fold your fingers like this, stand like this, bow like this - and then you will be saved, as the law says, then to a person this seems wonderful. All that is required of him, in fact, is to fulfill more or less well these instructions that are given to him. Nothing is given to him at the mercy of his own free will. This life of subordination seems to a person, more often, much simpler. Although this is a slave life, it is not a free life, but it is simpler. It is simpler than a life of freedom and responsibility. We often see this even in everyday examples. After all, military service is, of course, hard. It's heavy. But military service does not require much responsibility. The officer, say, who gives orders below, has a little more responsibility. And we know that many are waiting for demobilization from the army, and some still remain because life in the world seems more difficult to them. We also know from history many cases when people agreed to remain in prison because, upon leaving prison, they are faced with many difficulties that require decisions, willpower and responsibility from them. That is why such sermons as the preaching of, say, Islam with its Sharia or the preaching of Judaism can make an impression on people no less, and often more, than the preaching of freedom in Christ.

So, why all this long speech? Yes, to the point that the Galatians began to submit to these opponents of the Apostle Paul who came from Jerusalem and deviated from the truth of the Gospel. Paul was terribly upset by this, and he immediately wrote a letter to the Galatians, full of love, care and, at the same time, grief for the Galatians, a desire to show them the true path of salvation and reject the false paths that they were not only ready to accept, but had already accepted . Insofar as the opponents of the Apostle Paul reproached him for many things and in their preaching did not disdain direct slander and insults (behind the scenes, of course) against the absent Paul, the apostle, who heard these rumors, has to defend and justify himself, willy-nilly. The first two chapters of our Message are devoted to this. Well, starting from the 3rd chapter and further, to the 6th chapter, there are very serious theological reflections about the true Gospel.

We remember that each letter of the Apostle Paul consists of four parts. The first part is the so-called prescript or address, an inscription consisting of, in fact, the address - who is writing, to whom he is writing - and a blessing. The second part is the so-called proemium. The proemium consists of a prayer of thanksgiving to God the Father for the condition of the addressee to whom the apostle is addressing. The third part is the message itself, this is the main part. Well, the fourth is a postscript or eschatocol, completion, conclusion, final greetings and blessing. So, the Epistle to the Galatians is, perhaps, the only epistle that, in its structure, is slightly different from the other epistles of the Apostle Paul. There is a rather long prescript here, that is, an address with a greeting, and then the main part begins immediately. There is no thanks to God for the addressee, this second part, the proemium, is not in the Epistle to the Galatians. And why? Yes, because the Apostle Paul has nothing to thank for: the Galatians have already retreated or are about to retreat from the gospel truth. And this saddens the Apostle Paul, but does not make him happy at all. Therefore, the Epistle dispenses with the prayer of thanksgiving.

Well, let us now read with you the very beginning of this Message. This is the 1st chapter from the 1st to the 5th verse: extended address or prescript. So, the prescript always consists of the following parts: who writes, to whom he writes, and a blessing. Who writes: “Paul is an apostle, chosen not by men or through man, but by Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised Him from the dead, and all the brothers who are with me.” But you see, it’s not just like in other epistles: there, “Paul to the Church of such and such.” And here it is “Paul”, and then he claims to be an apostle. Because his apostleship was being questioned. And he says that he is an apostle from God himself, he was sent. We have it written “chosen not by men.” You see, the word “chosen” is in italics in most printed texts. This means it was added by translators. Here it is not “chosen”, but “sent”. The fact is that the word “apostolos” means “sent”, “messenger” in Greek. So, if we translated correctly, it would be as follows: “Paul is the apostle, sent not from men, not from some people, and not through some person (it stands there without an article, that is, indefinite - not through some that of man), but through Jesus Christ and from God the Father.” But what is the idea? If we send, if some state sends an ambassador, an envoy to another state, then how does this happen? This envoy is sent, say, from the Russian state through the minister or ministry of foreign affairs. Yes? Here Paul writes that I was sent not from men or through any man, but through Jesus Christ from God the Father Himself.

Here, this is the answer. Already here, in the prescript, there is an answer to those people who reproached Paul for being a man who came from nowhere and was sent by whom. Paul says: no, from God the Father through Jesus Christ. And God the Father raised Jesus Christ from the dead. Well, of course, according to humanity, He was resurrected by Divine power. As a rule, Paul always mentions specifically those people who are present with him. Here he does not specifically mention names, but simply writes: “and all the brothers who are with me.” That is, his Message is not of a private, personal nature (although we will see a lot of personal things in this Message), but it is like a conciliar Message, sent on behalf of not only Paul, but the entire Church.

To whom? "To the Churches of Galatia." Do you remember how, for example, Paul writes to the Thessalonians? “The Church of Thessalonians in God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ...” Benevolently reminding that this Church is precisely Christian in God the Father and the Lord. And here it’s simple: “To the Churches of Galatia.” Because Paul is no longer sure whether these Churches are in God, whether they are in Christ Jesus? No, of course, he knows that his work was not in vain, that these people are Christians, and will listen to him, and everything will be fine. But for the sake of such a pedagogical goal, for didactic reasons, Paul still writes strictly, simply: “To the churches of Galatia.” But he wishes for them, as he usually wishes for everyone: “grace and peace to you from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.” Well, I remind you that grace is the highest good from which all other benefits given to people from God originate. Grace is an undeserved gift from God. And this grace can take all sorts of forms, in particular, the form of peace. Well, peace is generally a Jewish greeting, a Semitic greeting to people. They wish each other “shalom” (“peace”) or “salaam” (also means “peace” in Arabic). This is the highest good of man - peace. This is only in Russian “peace” as in “peace”. Or in Greek ειρήνη is “peace, tranquility.” So it just happened that when they translated the Holy Scripture from Hebrew into Greek, they could not find an adequate word for the concept of “shalom.” Perhaps it would be better to translate the word “good” or “highest good.” But it just so happened that they translated it with the word “peace.” But we must always remember that behind this welcoming word “peace” there is an idea of the highest good. We would say about saving a person. Well, “grace” is a word in Greek χάρις, very similar to the Greek greeting χαῖρε, “rejoice.” This is a common Greek greeting, here transformed in a Christian way, somewhat modified, although retaining its original root, understandable to the Greek, meaning “heavenly gift.”

So: “Grant to you from heaven and salvation (one might say so) from God the Father and our Lord Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for our sins in order to deliver us from this present evil age according to the will of our God and Father. To him be glory forever and ever. Amen". You see that the address is already degenerating, as it were, or rising, better to say, to a prayerful blessing to God and Jesus Christ, Who delivers us from the present evil age. Evil – in the sense of evil. Evil age. Evil world. To give us the future century, the coming one, full of goodness and light.

And then the Apostle Paul, bypassing his usual thanksgiving to God, goes straight to the main part and opens it with a solemn proclamation of anathema. This is very surprising. But Paul is extremely upset by the situation in the Galatian Church. So this is how the message opens. This is from the 6th to the 10th verse: “I am amazed that you are so quickly turning away from Him who called you by the grace of Christ to another gospel, which, however, is not another, but there are only people who are confusing you and want to change the gospel of Christ.” So, judging by the words of the Apostle Paul, the Galatians are already moving to a different Gospel. The word "evangelism" means "Gospel", ευαγγέλιο in Greek, right? So, from God, from the One who called, and God always calls, through Christ, through the grace of Christ - they leave and come to a different Gospel, which is preached by these Judaizing agitators. However, Paul writes, there is no other Gospel, but there are only certain people who confuse and want, as we have translated, to transform, or better yet, in Russian, to pervert the Gospel of Christ.

Verse 8: “But even if we or an angel from heaven preached to you a gospel other than what we preached to you, let him be accursed.” The word anathema, ανάθεμα, is a Greek word, but it has an interesting history. The original meaning of this word is “laying on.” This refers to the sacrificial laying on the altar, on the throne. This word has a very good, sacred meaning. But what does it mean that an object or sacrifice is placed on the throne? This means that from now on this object becomes untouchable, it belongs to God. And God Himself disposes of it. Later, already in the time of the Apostle Paul, this word retained the meaning of untouchability and belonging to God, but this word lost the sacred meaning of holiness. This is no longer a sacrifice brought to the altar, but, say, a person who is expelled from the Church, expelled from the Church, and from now on one cannot have church communion with him. This doesn't mean you can't have human interaction. You cannot have church fellowship. And, at the same time, he can no longer be condemned; he already belongs to the court of God, and not to our court. Here is this anathematized man. Here Paul writes that “even if I or the Angel himself from heaven (well, an exaggeration, of course) began to preach to you something different...” Incorrect translation, in Slavic more precisely: “If we or an angel from heaven preaches to you more than that We preached the gospel to you.” What does the word “more” mean? A Slavic word that means: moreover, that we preached the gospel. "... let him be anathema." And what can be preached more, more than what Paul preached? Yes, this is what the Judaizers did. Paul said that “you are saved by faith.” By faith in God, who raised Jesus Christ who died and was crucified for you. And the Judaizers said: Yes, you are saved by this faith in Christ. But first you must become Jews, sons of Abraham, that is, take on the burden of the Law. That is, they added something to the Gospel of Christ. That is, they evangelized more than what Paul evangelized or preached.

But here Paul repeats in verse 9 for the second time: “As we said before, so now I say again: whoever preaches the gospel to you” (again, not that!) “more than what you received, let him be accursed.” That is, “...more than that which you have received, let him be anathema.” Remember that the truth in the Old Testament is established by two consonant testimonies. And if you don’t agree, then with a third piece of evidence. It's the same here. Paul repeats the same testimony twice to show that it is true: in verse 8 for the first time and in verse 9 for the second time. And verse 10: “Do I now seek favor from men, or from God? Do I try to please people? The fact is that the apostle’s opponents said that his preaching was a preaching of people-pleasing. We, they said, preach to you the Law of Moses, which is difficult to fulfill. Rescue is a difficult matter! Try to fulfill the Law for the sake of your salvation - you will see how difficult it is. And Paul says to you: well, you believed - and that’s it! But they misunderstood faith, first of all. And they completely misunderstood salvation in Christ. But, they said, Paul preaches too cheap salvation to you: believe it, they say, and that’s all. Paul says: is he seeking favor from people or from God, if he speaks so strictly that every Judaizing agitator is anathema, for he preaches a greater gospel than Paul preached. This means that he does not seek favor from people, but does it out of fear of God. He doesn't please people. “If I were still pleasing people, I would not be a servant of Christ.” Paul considers himself a servant of one Master, a slave of one Master, who is Jesus Christ. A man cannot serve two masters. He pleases only Christ. When did he ever please people? Yes, when he was a Pharisee. That’s when he was mistaken in the fact that he was pleasing God, but in fact he was pleasing people. Remember all the reproaches of the Lord Jesus Christ against the Pharisees? He told them that they were people-pleasers or, rather, hypocrites. Because, pretending that they please God, in reality they did all this for glory among people, for show. Pavel was once like that. He was a very vain, ambitious young man who sought to win the favor of God through the favor of people who would praise him for his Pharisaic righteousness. But this has long been left behind. After he met Jesus Christ on the way to Damascus, from now on he completely belongs to Jesus Christ, and does not intend to please people in any way.

Today we will stop at this, because a slightly different topic will follow. So, I remind you that today we completed the 58th conversation with you about the Holy Scriptures and began the analysis of the Epistle to the Galatians of the Holy Apostle Paul. We finished our analysis with chapter 1, verse 10.

I wish you all the best from our Lord Jesus Christ. Until our next meeting on air!

Material provided by radio "Grad Petrov"

Galatians: Interpretation

The Epistle to the Galatians is directed against what is commonly called “Judeo-Christianity,” which called for observance of the Mosaic Law in general and in particular for the performance of various rites of the Old Testament Jewish religion (circumcision, etc.). The author in his message is trying to convey the idea that newly converted believers from pagan circles and Jewish believers are equal in the eyes of God. The author says that true salvation is determined only by faith.

Paul's opponents considered his reading of religion to be fundamentally incorrect and explained his desire to “dismiss” the Old Testament foundations only as attempts to gain love among the converted pagans. Many Galatians adopted the ideas of the Judaizing heretics. In the Epistle, the Apostle Paul convinces the Galatians of their error, denouncing the seducers.

Theologically, Galatians is important as an affirmation of love for one's neighbor and the sharing of the fruits of the flesh and the spirit.

In the autobiographical part of the work, Paul defends himself against the attacks of false teachers by saying that he received his knowledge of the Gospel teaching not from Jesus, but from the other Apostles. Paul talks about how he was initiated into all the mysteries of Christian teaching by the Lord Himself in multiple appearances. He also says that at the Apostolic Council in Jerusalem it was decided that it was not obligatory for Christians to observe the rites of the Mosaic Law, and that Paul’s gospel received the approval of the elder Apostles at the council. The apostles recognized that Paul was entrusted with the gospel to the uncircumcised, just as Peter was entrusted with the gospel to the circumcised.

History of writing

It is assumed that the message was originally written in Greek, but its original has not reached us. The oldest papyrus containing the text of the Apostle's address dates back to 200, but it lacks some verses. Of the most ancient manuscripts, the copy of the writings of the Apostle, dating from the 4th-5th centuries, is best known.

Useful materials

Church historians determine the time of creation of the message differently:

according to the first version, this may be the earliest known letter of St. Paul, created in 48 in Antioch;
according to other sources, the saint’s writings appeared in 56 or 58 in Ephesus or even Rome.

There is also no consensus about who the Galatians are to whom the Apostle is addressing. At least it is clear that these are residents of the Galatia region of Asia Minor.

Many authors (mostly Protestant theologians) believe that these are the Celtic tribes of the north of the peninsula. They subsequently moved further north and were known as the Gauls (ancestors of the modern French).
According to other historians, including the authors of recent studies, the message is addressed to the founded St. Paul to the communities of southern Galatia. These are the cities of Derbe, Lystra, and Iconium mentioned in the Acts of the Apostles. Their population was multinational.