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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadCambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges - Galatians 1:23 - 1:23
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23. ἀκούοντες. Presumably from members of the Church at Jerusalem in particular (thus suggesting that his preaching was not contradictory to that of the elder Apostles), as well as from other Christian travellers.
ὅτι. Recitative, Rom 3:8.
ὁ διώκων. Timeless, 1Th 2:12 (where, however, see Milligan), Gal 5:24.
εὐαγγελίζεται τήν πίστιν. Cf. Gal 1:8; Gal 1:16. It is difficult to decide what exactly was in the mind of the speakers. (1) Did they use it in an objective sense, as a synonym of “the Gospel,” the good news brought, which could be received only by faith? This is the usage, apparently, in Act 6:7; Act 13:8, Jud 1:3; Jud 1:20 and sometimes in the Pastoral Epp., e.g. 1Ti 4:1. In this case the ἥν following regards this, so to say, external and objective possession, as laid waste together with those who accept it. Similarly, we say that the Christian faith was stamped out in the greater part of Japan for three hundred years, when the Christians there were, as it was supposed, all extirpated. (2) Or were they thinking of the characteristic of believers, faith subjective in contrast to works? Compare Eph 3:17, and 1Th 3:6, the personal faith of the Thessalonians, the good news of which Timothy carried to St Paul. In favour of this is the fact that πίστις is usually subjective in St Paul’s Epp., but seeing that he argues so much in favour of faith, as contrasted with works, we cannot lay stress on any merely numerical comparison of the senses in which it is used. In this case the ἥν regards the subjective faith of believers as injured together with its possessors.
On the whole the former seems to be the more probable.
ἥν ποτε ἐπόρθει, Gal 1:13. Cf. ταύτην τὴν ὁδὸν ἐδίωξα (Act 22:4).