Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadCambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges - Galatians 2:11 - 2:11
(Show All Books | Show All Chapters)
This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
11–14. My independence of Cephas personally and of Barnabas
(Gal 2:11) Let me now show you both my independence in rebuking even Cephas and my insistence on the true character of the Gospel. Cephas once came to Antioch, and on that occasion I withstood him to his face, because he was condemned by his own actions. (Gal 2:12) For before certain messengers from James came he used to eat with the Gentiles, but when they came he began withdrawing and separating himself, being afraid of both them and others there who were by origin Jews. (Gal 2:13) This was really hypocrisy, because his convictions remained unchanged, and he was afraid to express them, and even the rest of the Jewish believers in Antioch became hypocrites with him, so that even Barnabas was carried away with their hypocrisy. (Gal 2:14) I stood alone. But when I saw that they were not walking with straight steps in accordance with the Gospel in its integrity, I said to Peter in the presence of all, Thou art a Jew by race and yet usually livest like a Gentile, how dost thou now (by this action of thine in withdrawing from Gentiles, insisting as it does on the grave importance of the Jewish Law) put this moral pressure upon Gentile believers to practise Judaism?