Galatians 1:17

Galatians 1:17. Neither went I up to Jerusalem. The usual term, as Jerusalem was not only the religious capital of the Jews, [1] but situated on a high hill so that travellers from the east and the west, the north and the south, have to ascend.

[1] In England and Scotland people ‘go up to London,' no matter from what part of the country.

To those who were apostles before me. The Twelve, including perhaps also James (comp. Galatians 1:19), who, although not one of them, was enjoying an almost apostolic authority as a brother of Jesus and as the head of the congregation in Jerusalem. Paul concedes to the other Apostles no other preference but the priority of call. He knew and declared in all humility that by the grace of God he labored more in word and deed than they all (1 Corinthians 15:10; 2 Corinthians 11:5; 2 Corinthians 11:23).

But I went away (or, departed) into Arabia. This visit is not mentioned in the Acts (Acts 9:23), probably because it had no public importance, but belonged to the inner and private history of Paul. ‘It is,' as Lightfoot says, ‘a mysterious pause, a moment of suspense in the Apostle's history, a breathless calm which ushers in the tumultuous storm of his active missionary life.' After the great moral revolution which shook his body and soul, he needed repose and time of preparation for his apostleship by prayer, meditation, and the renewed study of the Old Testament, in the light of its fulfilment in the person and work of Jesus of Nazareth. [1] This retreat took the place of the three years' preparation of the older Apostles in the school of Christ. The precise locality is a matter of conjecture and dispute, as ‘Arabia' has an indefinite meaning. Some seek it not far from Damascus which is surrounded by desert and is called ‘the Eye of the Desert' Others give the journey a deeper significance by extending it to the Sinaitic Peninsula, which is certainly meant by ‘Arabia' in Galatians 4:25; and this would more easily explain the typical allusion to Mount Sinai in the fourth chapter. ‘Here, surrounded by the children of the desert, the descendants of Hagar the bondwoman, he read the true meaning and power of the law' (Lightfoot). Here Paul could commune with the spirit of Moses the lawgiver, and Elijah the prophet, as Christ had communed with them on the Mount of Transfiguration; here he could study face to face ‘the ministration of death and condemnation,' as he calls the old covenant, on the spot of its birth, and by contrast also ‘the ministration of the spirit and righteousness' (2 Corinthians 3:7-9). There is no spot on earth where one may receive a stronger and deeper impression of the terrible majesty of God's law, which threatens death to the transgressor, than on Mount Sinai and the awful panorama of desolation and death which surrounds it. To quote from my own experience: ‘Such a sight of terrific grandeur and awful majesty I never saw before, nor expect to see again in this world. At the same time I felt more than ever before the contrast between the old and new dispensations: the severity and terror of the law, and the sweetness and loveliness of the gospel' (Schaff, Through Bible Lands, p. 172).

[1] Chrysostom entirely misses the meaning of this journey to Arabia by making it an active mission tour, saying: ‘See how fervent was his soul; he was eager to occupy lands yet untitled: he forthwith attacked a barbarous and savage people, choosing a life of conflict and much toil.' There is no trace of Christianity in Arabia at so early a time. Hence Jerome (probably following Origen) understood Arabia allegorically for the Old Testament: ‘In the law and the prophets Paul sought Christ, and having found Him there he re-turned to Damascus, and then went to Jerusalem, the place of vision and peace.'

And returned again onto Damascus. The place of his conversion, one of the oldest and most interesting cities in the world, known in the days of Abraham (Genesis 14:15; Genesis 15:2), conquered by David (2 Samuel 8:5-6), and after various fortunes by the Romans, at the time of Paul's conversion (A. D. 37) under the temporary rule of Aretas, king of Arabia Petraea (2 Corinthians 11:32). It is a paradise of beauty and fertility in the midst of a vast desert. It lies 113 miles northeast of Jerusalem, at the base of the Anti-Lebanon mountains, and is well watered by the Barada (Abana) and El A'way (Pharpar; 2 Kings 5:12). This second visit to Damascus must fall within the ‘many days' (a period of indefinite length) mentioned Acts 9:23, and was terminated by the attempt of the Jews on his life (Acts 9:24-25; 2 Corinthians 11:32). A window is still shown in the wall of Damascus, as the traditional scene of Paul's escape.