VI. (1-5) Be charitable to the fallen, for you, too, may fall yourselves. Sympathise with each other. Indulge in no delusions as to your own superiority. Look each to his own work, and see that that is sound. He will find enough to do without entering into idle comparisons with others. Galatians 6... [ Continue Reading ]
BRETHREN. — The unfortunate conventional use of this word rather tends to weaken our sense of the delicacy and earnestness of this appeal. IF A MAN BE OVERTAKEN. — _If a man be even stirprised,_ or _detected;_ not only _caught,_ but _caught red-handed,_ in the very act, before he can escape. A spec... [ Continue Reading ]
BEAR YO ONE ANOTHER’S BURDENS. — Take them upon yourselves by kindly sympathy. Our Lord Himself was said to “bear” the physical infirmities of those whom He healed. (Matthew 8:17 : “He bare our sicknesses.”) SO FULFIL. — The reading here is somewhat doubtful, and the balance of authorities interesti... [ Continue Reading ]
HE DECEIVETH HIMSELF. — A peculiar word, perhaps coined by St. Paul: _puts himself under an hallucination;_ persuades himself of the existence of that which has no reality.... [ Continue Reading ]
PROVE. — _Test,_ or _examine,_ by reference to an objective standard. The word is used specially of the assaying of metals. REJOICING IN HIMSELF ALONE, AND NOT IN ANOTHER. — Rather, _he shall have his ground of boasting with reference to himself alone, and not with reference to his neighbour._ He w... [ Continue Reading ]
The best antidote for such false estimates of self is severe self-criticism. Let a man judge his own work, not by comparison with others, but by the ideal standard, then he will see what it is worth and how much he has to boast of. His boasting will be at least real, and not based upon any delusive... [ Continue Reading ]
EVERY MAN SHALL BEAR HIS OWN BURDEN. — The word for “burden” here is different from that which had been used above, though its meaning is very much the same. The distinction would be sufficiently represented if we were to translate in the one case _burden,_ in the other _load._ The context, however,... [ Continue Reading ]
HIM THAT IS TAUGHT IN THE WORD. — He who receives instruction in the truths of the gospel. Even at this early date there seems to have been a more or less organised system of instruction in the Church. Teaching was regarded as a separate function, though those who took part in it do not seem as yet... [ Continue Reading ]
(6-10) Special exhortation to liberality in the support of teachers, grounded upon the fact that we shall all receive, in the harvest at the end of the world, according as we have sown during the time of our probation here. The self-indulgent will find the flesh that he has indulged fall to dissolut... [ Continue Reading ]
BE NOT DECEIVED; GOD IS NOT MOCKED. — It is all very well for you to make large professions to which you do not act up. These may deceive others, but do not let them deceive yourselves. Do not think that God will allow you thus to mock Him. It might seem, perhaps, as if the language of this warning... [ Continue Reading ]
HE THAT SOWETH TO HIS FLESH. — The seed sown is a man’s actions here on earth. If the object of those actions is merely self-indulgence, they are, as it were, sown in a field the owner of which is the flesh (_i.e.,_ the lower, carnal self). The flesh alone benefits by them, and for it alone are they... [ Continue Reading ]
AND. — Rather, _But._ There is something of a stress on “well-doing,” which continues the idea of “sowing to the Spirit” in the verse before: “But in well-doing, &c.” BE WEARY. — Rather, _let us not be faint-hearted; lose heart. _... [ Continue Reading ]
AS WE HAVE THEREFORE OPPORTUNITY. — “Therefore” is emphatic, and should come first. It introduces a summary conclusion from the preceding argument. _Therefore_ (or, _so then_)_, as we have opportunity;_ wherever an opportunity offers. THEM WHO ARE OF THE HOUSEHOLD OF FAITH. — It would seem, on the w... [ Continue Reading ]
YE SEE. — Rather, _See._ The Apostle calls the attention of his readers to the handwriting of these concluding paragraphs. HOW LARGE A LETTER. — Rather, _in what large letters: i.e.,_ characters. The exact significance of these words is somewhat enigmatic, and can only be matter of conjecture. Two p... [ Continue Reading ]
(11-18) Concluding section of the Epistle, written in the Apostle’s own hand. These Judaising teachers only wish to have you circumcised as a matter of outside show, in order to disguise their own professed Christianity from their fellow Jews, and so escape persecution. They show that they really ca... [ Continue Reading ]
TO MAKE A FAIR SHEW IN THE FLESH. — To obtain a reputation for religiousness in externals, like the hypocrites, who “love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the streets, that they may be seen of men” (Matthew 6:5). The object of the Judaisers was by this means to keep in with t... [ Continue Reading ]
Their insincerity is shown by the fact that they are not really careful to observe the Law. What they do is only to serve as a blind, that they may be able to point to your mutilated flesh as the visible sign of their success in gaining proselytes. THEY THEMSELVES WHO ARE CIRCUMCISED. — The express... [ Continue Reading ]
GOD FORBID THAT I SHOULD GLORY. — There is a stress upon the pronoun “I,” which, in the Greek, stands first, in emphatic contrast to the party who had been the subjects of the last verse. They make their boast in a mere external; but for me — far be it from me to make my boast in anything but the cr... [ Continue Reading ]
IN CHRIST JESUS. — These words are omitted by the Vatican MS. and by the best editors. They would seem to have come in from the parallel passage in Galatians 5:6. NEITHER CIRCUMCISION... — We have had almost the same words in Galatians 5:6 and in 1 Corinthians 7:19. It is interesting to note the di... [ Continue Reading ]
ACCORDING TO THIS RULE. — The word for “rule” is the same that afterwards received a special application in the phrase, “Canon of Scripture.” It meant originally a carpenter’s rule, or the line that a carpenter works by — hence, a rule or standard; and, from that, the list of books coming up to a ce... [ Continue Reading ]
The Apostle has done. He will not dally with these vexatious attacks upon himself and his authority any more. He dismisses them with an appeal which ought to be final. He points to the scars of wounds which he had received in his Master’s service. The branding-irons of Christ, he says, have imprinte... [ Continue Reading ]
WITH YOUR SPIRIT. — The grace of God works especially on the “spirit,” or highest part, of man. [The subscription, as it stands in our Bibles, appears for the first time in MSS. dating from about the beginning of the ninth century, though before this the Epistle had been described as written from R... [ Continue Reading ]