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Gal_4:15. Of what nature, then, was your self-congratulation? A sorrowful question! for the earnestness with which the Galatians had then congratulated themselves on the apostle’s account, contrasting so sadly with their present circumstances, compelled him to infer that that congratulation was nothing but an effervescent, fleeting, and fickle excitement. Hence the reading ποῦ οὖν (see the critical notes) is a gloss in substance correct; comp. Rom_3:27. Others explain it: On what was your self-congratulation grounded? Why did you pronounce yourselves so happy? So Bengel, Koppe, Winer, Matthias, and Schott.[196] In this case qualis would have to be taken in the peculiar sense: how caused, which, however, would require to be distinctly suggested by the context. Others still, as Erasmus, Luther, Beza, Piscator, Calovius, Wolf, and including Baumgarten-Crusius, Hilgenfeld, Reiche, Wieseler, interpret: “How great (comp. Eph_1:14) therefore was your congratulation! how very happy you pronounced yourselves!” But then the ὥστε in Gal_4:16 would be deprived of its logical reference, which, according to our interpretation, is contained in τίς οὖν ὁ μακαρ . ὑμ . And the words would, in fact, contain merely a superfluous and feeble exclamation.
The μακαρισμός (comp. Rom_4:6; Rom_4:9), with which ὑμῶν stands as the genitive of the subject (comp. Plat. Rep. p. 590 D), and not as the genitive of the object (Matthias),—for the object is obvious of itself,—refers to the circumstance that they had congratulated themselves, not that they had been congratulated by Paul and others (Jerome, Theodoret, Theophylact, Oecumenius), or even that they (the Galatians) had congratulated the apostle (Estius, Locke, Michaelis). See the sequel. The word, synonymous with εὐδαιμονισμός , is never equivalent to μακαριότης (Erasmus, Luther, Piscator, Homberg, Calovius, comp. Olsh.).
μαρτυρῶ γὰρ ὑμῖν κ . τ . λ .] justification of the expression just used, ὁ μακαρισμὸς ὑμῶν .
τοὺς ὀφθαλμοὺς κ . τ . λ .] A description of the overwhelming love, which was ready for any sacrifice. Such proverbial modes of expression, based upon the high value and indispensableness of the eyes (Pro_7:2; Psa_17:8; Zec_2:8; Mat_18:9; and comp. Vulpius and Doering, ad Catull. i. 3. 5), are current in all languages. Nevertheless, Lomler (in the Annal. d. gesammt. theol. Lit. 1831, p. 276), Rückert, and Schott have explained the passage quite literally: that Paul had some malady of the eyes, and here states that, if it had been possible, the Galatians would have given him their own sound eyes. But considering the currency of the proverbial sense, how arbitrarily is this view hazarded, seeing that nowhere else do we find a trace of any malady of the eyes in the apostle![197] Rückert and Schott, indeed, found specially on εἰ δυνατόν , and maintain that, to express the meaning of the ordinary view, Paul must have written: “if it had been necessary.” But in any case the idea was a purely imaginary one, and as a matter of fact practically impossible ( ἀδύνατον ); if Paul, therefore, had said: “if it had been necessary,” he would at any rate have expressed himself unsuitably. Besides, εἰ δυνατόν expresses the self-sacrificing love in a yet far stronger degree. And, if Paul had not spoken proverbially, the whole assurance would have been so hyperbolical, that he certainly could not have stood sponsor for it with the earnest μαρτυρῶ ὑμῖν .
ἐξορύξ .] the standing word for the extirpation of the eyes. See Jdg_16:21; 1Sa_11:2; Herod. viii. 116; Joseph. Antt. vi. 5. 1; Wetstein, in loc.
ἐδώκατέ μοι ] namely, as property, as a love-pledge of the most joyful self-sacrificing devotedness, not for use (Hofmann, following older expositors),—a view which, if we do not explain it of a disease of the eyes in the apostle’s case, leads to a monstrous idea. Without ἄν (see the critical notes) the matter is expressed as more indubitable, the condition contained in the protasis being rhetorically disregarded. See Hermann, ad Soph. El. 902; de part, ἄν , p. 70 ff.; Bremi, ad Lys. Exc. IV. p. 439 f.; Stallbaum, ad Plat. Symp. p. 198 C; Buttmann in the Stud. u. Krit. 1858, p. 490. But Ellendt (Lex. Soph. I. p. 125) well remarks, “Sed cavendum, ne in discrimine utriusque generis, quod pertenue est, constituendo argutemur.”
[196] Schott, in opposition to the context, and all the more strangely seeing that he does not even read ἦν , but merely supplies it, lays stress upon this ἦν : “illo tempore, nunc non item;” comp. Oecumenius.
[197] Lomler and Schott trace back the alleged disease of the eyes to the blindness at Damascus, and identify it with the σκόλοψ (2Co_12:7). The latter idea is just as mistaken as the former. For the σκόλοψ was, in the apostle’s view, an operation of Satan, whereas the blindness at Damascus arose from the effulgence of the celestial Christ. And this blindness, as it had arisen supernaturally, was also supernaturally removed (Act_9:17-18). That a chronic malady of the eyes should have been left behind, would be entirely opposed to the analogy of the N.T. miracles of healing, of which a complete cure was always the characteristic.