Galatians, Volume 41

Richard N. Longenecker, Bruce M. Metzger, David Allen Hubbard, Glenn W. Barker, John D. W. Watts, James W. Watts, Ralph P. Martin, Lynn Allan Losie, Bruce M. Metzger, David Allen Hubbard, Glenn W. Barker, John D. W. Watts, James W. Watts, Ralph P. Martin, Lynn Allan Losie

• Publisher: Zondervan Academic
• Year: 2017
• Print ISBN: 9780310521945
• eBook ISBN: 9780310586333
• Subtopic: Biblical Commentary

Over 2 million copies sold in The Word Biblical Commentary series.

This commentary series delivers the best in biblical scholarship from the leading scholars of our day who share a commitment to Scripture as divine revelation.

It emphasizes a thorough analysis of textual, linguistic, structural, and theological evidence, resulting in judicious and balanced insight into the meanings of the text in the framework of biblical theology. These widely acclaimed commentaries serve as exceptional resources for the professional theologian and instructor, the seminary or university student, the working minister, and everyone concerned with building theological understanding from a solid base of biblical scholarship.

Overview of Commentary Organization:

• Introduction—covers issues pertaining to the whole book, including context, date, authorship, composition, interpretive issues, purpose, and theology.
• Pericope Bibliography—a helpful resource containing the most important works that pertain to each particular pericope.
• Translation—the author’s own translation of the biblical text, reflecting the end result of exegesis and attending to Hebrew and Greek idiomatic usage of words, phrases, and tenses, yet in reasonably good English.
• Notes—the author’s notes to the translation that address any textual variants, grammatical forms, syntactical constructions, basic meanings of words, and problems of translation.
• Form/Structure/Setting—a discussion of redaction, genre, sources, and tradition as they concern the origin of the pericope, its canonical form, and its relation to the biblical and extra-biblical contexts in order to illuminate the structure and character of the pericope. Rhetorical or compositional features important to understanding the passage are also introduced here.
• Comment—verse-by-verse interpretation of the text and dialogue with other interpreters, engaging with current opinion and scholarly research.
• Explanation—brings together all the results of the discussion in previous sections to expose the meaning and intention of the text at several levels: (1) within the context of the book itself; (2) its meaning in the OT or NT; (3) its place in the entire canon; (4) theological relevance to broader OT or NT issues.
• General Bibliography—occurring at the end of each volume, this extensive bibliography contains all sources used anywhere in the commentary.

I. Salutation (1:1–5)

Bibliography

Barrett, C. K. The Signs of an Apostle. ———. “Shaliahi and Apostle.” In Donum Gentilicium. FS D. Daube, ed. C. K. Barrett, E. Bammel, and W. D. Davies. London: Oxford University Press, 1978. 88–102. Bauckham, R. J. “Barnabas in Galatians.” JSNT 2 (1979) 61–70. Berger, K. “Apostelbrief und apostolische Rede: Zum Formular frühchristlicher Briefe.” ZNW 65 (1974) 190–231. Burton, E. deW. “Αἰών and Αἰώνιος” and “Ἐνεστως.” In Galatians, 426–33. Deissmann, A. Light from the Ancient East, 224–46. Doty, W. G. Letters in Primitive Christianity. Fridrichsen, A. The Apostle and His Message. Friedrich, G. “Lohmeyers These über ‘Das paulinische Briefpräskript’ kritisch beleuchtet.” ZNW 46 (1955) 272–74. Lightfoot, J. B. “The Name and Office of an Apostle.” In Galatians (1890), 92–101. Lohmeyer, E. “Probleme paulinischer Theologie: I. Briefliche Grussüberschriften.” ZNW 26 (1927) 158–73. Lohse, E. “Ursprung und Prägung des christlichen Apostolats.” TZ 9 (1953) 259–75. Rengstorf, K. H. “ἀπόστολος.” TDNT 1:407–45. Schmithals, W. The Office of Apostle in the Early Church. Schnider, F., and Stenger, W. Studien zum neutestamentlichen Briefformular.

Translation

1Paul, an apostle—not from men nor through any man, but through Jesus Christ and [from] God the Father,a who raised him from the dead—2and all the brothers with me.

To the churches of Galatia.

3Grace and peace to you from God ourb Father and the Lord Jesus Christ, 4who gave himself forc our sins in order that he might rescue us from the present evil age, according to the will of our God and Father, 5to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

Notes

a. Marcion omitted καὶ θεοῦ πατρός, “and [from] God the Father” (and so probably read αὑτόν, “himself,” for αὐτόν, “him”).

b. Instead of πατρὸς ἡμῶν καὶ κυρίου, “our Father and the Lord” (as in

A; 33 81 et al.), P⁴⁶ P^51vid B D G H Byzantine vg syr cop^sa read πατρὸς καὶ κυρίου ἡμῶν, “our Father and Lord.” There is some evidence for the text without any personal pronoun: πατρὸς καὶ κυρίου, “Father and Lord,” 1877 Pelag Chrys Aug; less evidence for two personal pronouns: πατρὸς ἡμῶν καὶ κυρίου ἡμῶν, “our Father and our Lord,” cop^bo eth.

c. Instead of ὑπέρ, “for” (as in P⁵¹ B H 33 TR), P^46vid

^* A D G et al. read περί, “for.”

Form/Structure/Setting

Greek letters began with a formulaic salutation or prescript: “A to B,” or at times “To B from A,” with the greeting χαίρειν (lit. “rejoice”; colloquially, “greetings,” “welcome,” “hello”). So in line with the conventions of his day, Paul begins his Galatian letter with his name (v 1), an identification of his addressees (v 2), and a greeting (v 3). He also refers to those who join him in sending the letter (v 2), expands the greeting by the insertion of what appears to be an early Christian confession (v 4), and adds a doxology (v 5). More importantly, Paul goes beyond the epistolary conventions of his day by pouring into his salutation (1) affirmations regarding his apostleship (v 1) and Christ’s salvific work (v 4), and (2) allusions to God the Father’s activity and will (vv 1b, 4b) and his converts’ salvation (v 4)—thereby highlighting at the very beginning the central themes of his letter. In the process, two rather typical Pauline methodological features appear: (1) that of “going off at a word” (cf. the elaborations on “apostle,” “God the Father,” and “the Lord Jesus Christ”) and (2) that of chiasmus (cf. “not from men nor through any man, but through Jesus Christ and [from] God the Father”).

Comment

1 Παῦλος, “Paul,” is a Greek name that means “little.” As a Jew of the tribe of Benjamin (cf. Phil 3:5), he proudly bore the name of Israel’s first king, the Benjamite Saul. As a Roman citizen (cf. Acts 16:37–38; 25:10–12), he would have had three names: a clan or family nomen, preceded by a personal praenomen and followed by a more commonly used cognomen. Greeks and other provincials who gained Roman citizenship kept their Greek names as cognomens, to which they added Roman nomens and praenomens—usually those of the ones to whom they owed their citizenship. Neither Paul’s nomen nor his praenomen appears in the NT. As a Jewish Christian missioner to Gentiles, he seems to have used only his Greek name Paul, which, as a Roman cognomen, would have been acceptable to both Greeks and Romans without bringing in any nuance as to status.

ἀπόστολος, “apostle,” is the term Paul uses in Galatians, as well as in all his letters, to epitomize his consciousness of having been commissioned by God to proclaim with authority the message of salvation in Jesus Christ. In the NT the noun ἀπόστολος connotes personal, delegated authority; it speaks of being commissioned to represent another. It is used broadly of anyone sent by another (cf. John 13:16, “an ἀπόστολος is not greater than the one who sent him”), of Christian brothers sent from Ephesus to Corinth (cf. 2 Cor 8:23, “They are ἀπόστολοι of the churches”), of Epaphroditus sent by the Philippian church to Paul (cf. Phil 2:25, “he is your ἀπόστολον”), and even of Jesus sent by God (cf. Heb 3:1, “the ἀπόστολον and high priest whom we confess”). More narrowly, it is used of a group of believers in Jesus who had some special function (e.g., Luke 11:49; Acts 14:4, 14; Rom 16:7; Gal 1:19; Eph 3:5; Rev 18:20), with particular reference to the twelve disciples (Matt 10:2; Mark 3:14 [

B et al.]; Luke 6:13; 9:10; 17:5; 22:14; Acts 1:2, 26; passim). This narrower usage is how the term is usually used in its approximately seventy-six occurrences in the NT, and that is how Paul uses it of himself in all his letters: one with personal, delegated authority from God to proclaim accurately the Christian gospel.

This is not, however, the way in which ἀπόστολος was commonly understood by either Greeks or Hellenistic Jews of the day. Classical Greek writers usually used the term in an impersonal way, most often to refer to a naval expedition for military purposes—even, at times, of the boat used to transport such an expedition. Josephus’ one clear use of ἀπόστολος in Ant. 17.300 (the occurrence in Ant. 1.146 is textually uncertain) carries the verbal sense of “to send out” (πρεσβεία is the noun in this passage for “delegation”). In fact, there are only a few references in all the extant Greek and Jewish Greek writings from the fifth century B.C. through the second century A.D. where the term means, or could be taken to mean, something like “envoy,” “messenger,” or “delegate,” and so to signal the idea of personal, delegated authority (cf. Herodotus 1.21; 5.38; Corpus Hermeticum 6.11–12; POxy 1259.10; SbGu 7241.48; 3 Kgdms 14:6 LXX^A; Isa l8:2 Symm.).

Karl Rengstorf has pointed out that though the NT’s use of ἀπόστολος cannot be readily paralleled in the Greek and Hellenistic Jewish writings of the day, it is comparable to the Jewish institution of the Šālîaḥ as found in the Talmud (TDNT 1:414–20). For in these codifications,

(šālîaḥ) has an assured place as a noun meaning “envoy” or “messenger” and carries the notion of delegated authority—as in, for example, the oft-repeated dictum: “A man’s Šālîaḥ is as the man himself” (m. Ber. 5.5; b. Ned. 72b; b. Nazir 12b; b. Qidd. 43a; b. B. Qam. 113b; b. B. Meṣ. 96a; passim). According to rabbinic sources, a man could appoint a šālīaḥ to enter into an engagement of marriage for him (m. Qidd. 2.1; b. Qidd. 43a), to serve a notice of divorce for him (m. Giṭ. 3.6; 4.1; b. Giṭ. 21a-23b), to perform ceremonial rituals on his behalf (e.g., the heave offering, m. Ter. 4.4), to act as his agent in economic matters (b. B. Qam. 102a, b), and so on. In fact, the authority of the sender was thought of as so tied up with the šālîaḥ that even if the šālîaḥ committed a sacrilege, so long as he did not exceed the bounds of his commission, it was the sender and not the šālîaḥ who was held responsible (m. Meg. 6.1–2; b. Ketub. 98b).

Rengstorf further argues (1) that the Jewish institution of the šālîaḥ served as the model for Jesus in calling his disciples and sending them out on his behalf (TDNT 1:424–37), and (2) that it was on the basis of Jesus’ usage that the early Christian church used this concept for its own purposes and translated

by the relatively rare Greek term ἀπόστολος, probably first at Syrian Antioch (TDNT 1:420–24, 437–45). And Rengstorf has largely carried the day for the linguistic relation of ἀπόστολος to

(cf. 3 Kgdms 14:6 LXX^A, where the passive participle

is treated as a noun and translated ἀπόστολος) and for an early date for the origin of the šālîaḥ institution in Judaism.

There are, however, certain significant differences between the rabbinic idea of a šālîaḥ and the Christian concept of an apostle. In the first place, the appointment of an agent in Judaism was always a temporary matter; when the task was completed, his commission was over. The rabbis did not think of a šālîaḥ as having a life-long calling, as is taken for granted of an apostle in the narrower sense of that term in the NT. More importantly, the šālîaḥ was not viewed in a religious context or as a religious office, except in the sense that law and religion were inseparably intertwined in Judaism. The term, however, was never used of missionaries, proselytizers, or prophets. So while the concept of the šālîaḥ in Second Temple Judaism provides to some extent a reasonable background for the use of the term ἀπόστολος in the NT, it falls short of fully explicating that background or adequately highlighting some of the most important features of an apostle in early Christianity. For such matters, we must look as well to ideas that developed within Israel’s religion having to do with a prophet (cf. Comment on 1:15–16) and to Jesus’ reconstruction of both the šālîaḥ concept and traditional prophetology.

Playing on the inadequacy of the Jewish šālîaḥ concept to explain fully the NT’s use of ἀπόστολος, Walter Schmithals has argued for a gnostic origin of the term (see his The Office of Apostle in the Early Church). In support, he cites various patristic references that use ἀπόστολος of the gnostic teachers (e.g., Origen, Comm. on John 2.8; Eusebius, EcclHist; 4.22 and 23.12; Tertullian, De Praesc. Haer. 30; Ps. Clem. Hom. 11.35). In none of these passages, however, is it directly said that the Gnostics used the term in designation of themselves. Rather, every reference can be read as a Christian use of the expression “false apost...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• Editorial Preface
• Author’s Preface
• Abbreviations
• Commentary Bibliography
• General Bibliography
• Introduction
• I. Salutation (1:1–5)
• II. Rebuke Section (1:6–4:11)
• III. Request Section (4:12–6:10)
• IV. Subscription (6:11–18)
• Indexes