Galatians 1:13

Gal_1:13

For ye have heard of my conversation in time past.

My conversation in time past

I. An humbling and painful recollection. We should study the true uses of the past. The past is rightly used when it--

1. Deepens our sense of guilt.

2. Illustrates the greatness of Divine mercy.

3. Inspires us with courage in relation to the future.

II. An humbling and painful recollection relieved by the highest consideration.

1. Not a self-recovery or development,

2. but the inward revelation of Christ.

III. An humbling and painful recollection succeeded by a holy and sublime vocation. The fact that God calls converted sinners to preach His gospel.

1. Pats the minister into moral sympathy with his hearers.

2. Exemplifies the power of God to execute His purposes.

3. Stimulates the study of Divine things.

Application: The text--

1. Appeals to the worst of men.

2. Explains the vehemence and urgency of an earnest ministry.

3. Exalts and illustrates the gospel of Christ. (J. Parker, D. D.)

Pauls former life

I. As a persecutor. Consider--

1. The wasting.

(1) How can the Church be wasted? Not in its inward estate, which stands in election, faith, justification; glory; but in respect of mens bodies, public assemblies, religious exercises.

(2) Why does God suffer it to be wasted? Judgment begins at the house of God. Painful operations are often needful to health.

2. The waster.

(1) Sin, when it takes place, gives a man no rest till it has brought him to a height of wickedness.

(2) Therefore avoid the beginning of evil.

II. As a religionist.

1. He profited exceedingly. Observe

(1) that there should be holy emulation in religion,

(2) but modest pretensions an excellence.

2. He was exceedingly jealous

(1) about the law and unwritten traditions,

(2) but not according to knowledge.

III. Whence learn--

1. To addict and set ourselves earnestly to maintain the truth.

2. To be angry when God is dishonoured and His Word disobeyed.

3. Not to give liberty to the best of our natural affections, as zeal, but to rule them.

4. To estimate unwritten traditions at their proper worth. (W. Perkins.)

Persecutor and minister

A minister once preaching a charity sermon in the west of England, began as follows: Many years have elapsed since I was within these walls. On that occasion there came three young men with the intention not only of scoffing at the minister, but with stones in their pockets for the purpose of assaulting him. After a few words one of them said with an oath, Let us be at him now; but the second replied, No; stop till we hear what he makes of this point. The minister went on, when the second said, We have heard enough; now throw, But the third interfered, remarking, He is not so foolish as I expected; let us hear him out. The preacher concluded without having been interrupted. Now mark me--of these three young men one was executed for forgery; the second lies under sentence of death for murder; the third, through the infinite mercy of God, now addresses you. Listen to him.

The value in controversy of practical experience of the opposite side

Paul knew the joints in his opponents armour, and shows at the outset that he knew not only the opinions of the Judaisers, but the spiritual atmosphere in which they had been educated. Such a controversialist the enemy cannot afford to despise, for the battle is half won before it has commenced. It is often very annoying to a young man to be told by a mature Christian, I thought as sceptically as you do, and spoke as rashly, believing that I was going to turn the orthodox world upside down; but I have got beyond those days, and am now a wiser man, as I trust you will be. Yet this is frequently the only way of meeting the case. The young man retires within himself, looks at rash utterances in the light of cool reflection, finds that truth and novelty are not synonymous, and is at least silent, which is a great gain to himself and to those around him. (S. Pearson, M. A.)

Pauls antecedents a qualification for his work

It has often happened that the destroyer of a creed or system has been bred and trained in the bosom of the system which he was destined to shake or destroy. Sakya Mouni had been brought up in Brahminism; Luther had taken the vows of an Augustinian; Pascal had been trained as a Jesuit; Spinoza was a Jew; Wesley and Whitefield were clergymen of the Church of England. It was not otherwise with St. Paul. The victorious enemy of heathen philosophy and worship had passed his boyhood amid the heathen surroundings of a philosophic city. The deadly antagonist of Judaic exclusiveness was by birth a Hebrew of the Hebrews. The dealer of the death-wound to the spirit of Pharisaism was a Pharisee, a son of Pharisees, a scholar of Gamaliel, had been taught according to the perfect manner of the law of his fathers, and had lived after the most straightest sect of the Jewish service. (F. W. Farrar.)

Early persecution of Christians

Oh! said Caesar, we will soon root up this Christianity. Off with their heads! The different governors hastened one after another of the disciples to death; but, the more they persecuted them, the more they multiplied. The pro-consuls had orders to destroy Christians; the more they hunted them, the more Christians there were, until, at last, men pressed to the judgment-seat, and asked to be permitted to die for Christ. They invented torments; they dragged saints at the heels of wild horses; they laid them upon red-hot gridirons; they pulled off the skin from their flesh piece by piece; they were sawn asunder; they were wrapped up in skins, and daubed with pitch, and set in Neros gardens at night to burn; they were left to rot in dungeons; they were made a spectacle to all men in the amphitheatre; the bears hugged them to death; the lions tore them to pieces; the wild bulls tossed them upon their horns: and yet Christianity spread. All the swords of the legionaries which had put to rout the armies of all nations, and had overcome the invincible Gaul and the savage Briton, could not withstand the feebleness of Christianity; for the weakness of God is mightier than men. (C. H. Spurgeon.)

The two parts of St. Pauls life

There are questions which it is interesting to suggest, even when they can never receive a perfect and satisfactory answer. One of these questions may be asked respecting St. Paul: What was the relation in which his former life stood to the great fact of his conversion? He himself, in looking back upon the times in which he persecuted the Church of God, thought of them chiefly as an increasing evidence of the mercy of God, which was afterwards extended to him. It Seemed so strange to have been what he had been, and to be what he was. Nor does our own conception of him, in relation to his former self, commonly reach beyond this contrast of the old and new man; the persecutor and the preacher of the gospel; the young man at whose feet the witnesses against Stephen laid down their clothes; and the same Paul disputing against the Grecians, full of visions and revelations of the Lord, on whom in later life came daily the care of all the Churches. Yet we cannot but admit also the possibility, or rather the probable truth, of another point of view. If there were any among the contemporaries of St. Paul who had known him in youth and in age, they would have seen similarities such as escape us in the character of the apostle at different periods of his life. The zealot against the gospel might have seemed to them transfigured into the opponent of the law; they would have found something in common in the Pharisee of the Pharisees, brought up at the feet of Gamaliel, and the man who had a vow on his last journey to Jerusalem. And when they heard the narrative of his conversion from his own lips, they might have remarked that to one of his temperament only could such an event have happened, and would have noted many superficial resemblances which showed him to be the same man, while the great inward change which had overflowed upon the world was hid from their eyes. The gifts of God to man have ever some reference to natural disposition. He who becomes the servant of God does not thereby cease to be himself. Often the transition is greater in appearance than in reality, from its very suddenness. There is a kind of rebellion against self and nature and God, which, through the mercy of God to the soul, seems almost necessarily to lead to reaction. Persons have been worse than their fellow-men in outward appearance, and yet there was within them the spirit of a child waiting to return home to their fathers house. A change passes over them which we may figure to ourselves, not only as the new man taking the place of the old, but as the inner man taking the place of the outer. So fearfully and wonderfully are we made, that the very contrast to what we are has often an inexpressible power over us. It seems sometimes as if the same religious education had tended to contrary results; in one case to a devout life, in another to a reaction against it; sometimes to one form of faith, at other times to another … Perhaps we shall not be far wrong in concluding, that those who have undergone great religious changes have been of a fervid, imaginative cast of mind; looking for more in this world than it was capable of yielding; easily touched by the remembrance of the past, or inspired by some ideal of the future. When with this has been combined a zeal for the good of their fellow-men, they have become the heralds and champions of the religious movements of the world. The change has begun within, but has overflowed without them, When thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren, is the order of nature and of grace. In secret they brood over their own state; weary and profitless, their soul fainteth within them. The religion they profess is a religion not of life to them, but of death; they lose their interest in the world, and are cut off from the communion of their fellow-men. While they are musing, the fire kindles, and at the last--they speak with their tongue. Then pours forth irrepressibly the pent-up stream--unto all and upon all their fellow-men; the intense flame of inward enthusiasm warms and lights up the world. First, they are the evidence to others; then, again, others are the evidence to them. All religious leaders cannot be reduced to a single type of character; yet in all, perhaps, two characteristics may be observed;

(1) great self-reflection;

(2) intense sympathy with other men.

Such men have generally appeared at favourable conjunctures of circumstances, when the old was about to vanish away, and the new to appear. The world has yearned towards them, and they towards the world. They have uttered what all men were feeling; they have interpreted the age to itself. Often such men have been brought up in the faith which they afterwards oppose, and a part of their power has consisted in their acquaintance with the enemy. They see other men like themselves formerly, wandering out of the way in the idols temple, amid a burdensome ceremonial, with prayers and sacrifices unable to free the soul. They lead them by the way themselves came to the home of Christ … Great men are sometimes said to possess the power of command, but not the power of entering into the feelings of others. They have no fear of their fellows, but neither are they always capable of immediately impressing them or of perceiving the impression which their words or actions make upon them. Often they live in a kind of solitude on which other men do not venture to intrude; putting forth their strength on particular occasions, careless or abstracted about the daily concerns of life. Such was not the greatness of St. Paul; not only in the sense in which he says that he could do all things through Christ, but in a more earthly and human one was it true, that his strength was his weakness, and his weakness his strength. His dependence on others was in part, also, the source of his influence over them. His natural character was the type of that communion of the Spirit which he preached; the meanness of appearance which he attributes to himself, the image of that contrast which the gospel presents to human greatness. Glorying and humiliation, life and death, a vision of angels strengthening him, the thorn in the flesh rebuking him, the greatest tenderness not without sternness, sorrows above measure, consolations above measure, are some of the contradictions which were reconciled in the same man. The centre in which things so strange met and moved was the Cross of Christ, whose marks in his body he bore; what was behind of whose afflictions he rejoiced to fill up. Let us look once more, a little closer, at that visage marred in his Masters service. A poor decrepit being, afflicted, perhaps, with palsy, certainly with some bodily defect,--led out of prison between Roman soldiers, probably at times faltering in his speech, the creature, as he seemed to spectators, of nervous sensibility; yearning, almost with a sort of fondness, to save the souls of those whom he saw around him,--spoke a few eloquent words in the cause of Christian truth, at which kings were awed, telling the tale of his own conversion with such simple pathos, that after ages have hardly heard the like. (B. Jowett, M. A.)

Early life of St. Paul

The Apostle Paul was probably born in the later years of Herod, or early in the short reign of Archelaus, when, under the sway of the emperor Augustus, the Roman world was at peace, and when the wickedness of the imperial despotism had not yet fully developed itself. The pirates who had infested the Eastern Mediterranean had been sternly suppressed. The Jewish people were still enjoying everywhere ample toleration under the Roman rule, and a Jewish family like St. Pauls, settled at Tarsus in Cilicia, would have been in sufficiently comfortable circumstances. For Tarsus was a free city of the Empire; that is to say, it was governed by its own magistrates, and was exempted from the annoyance of a Roman garrison; but it was not a colony like Philippi in Macedonia, and the freedom of Rome, which St. Paul says he had at his birth, would probably have been earned by some services rendered by his father during the civil wars to some one of the contending parties in the State. It is at least probable from the expression, a Hebrew of the Hebrews, which he applies ¢o himself, that his parents were originally emigrants from Palestine. We know that they were of the tribe of Benjamin, and that they were strict members of the Pharisee sect. Probably his father was engaged in the Mediterranean trade. To his mother, it is a remarkable circumstance, there is not one reference in his writings, He had a sister whose son lived in later years at Jerusalem, and who would have been his playmate at Tarsus. The Talmud says that s fathers duty toward his boy is to circumcise him, to teach him the law, and to teach him a trade. We know from the Epistle to the Philippians that the first of these precepts was accurately complied with on the eighth day after the childs birth. The second would probably have been obeyed by sending the boy, not to one of the Greek schools in which Tarsus abounded, but to a Jewish school attached to one of the synagogues, where, after the age of five, he would have learnt the Hebrew Scriptures,--at ten those floating maxims of the great Jewish doctors which were afterwards collected in the Mishna, so as, at thirteen, to become what was called a Subject of the Precept, after a ceremony which was a kind of shadow of Christian confirmation. The third requirement was complied with by setting him to make tents out of the hair-cloth supplied by the goats which abounded on the slopes of the neighbouring mountains of the Taurus, and which was a chief article in the trade of the port--tents which to this day, according to Beaufort, are used largely by the peasantry of south-eastern Asia Minor during the harvesttime. At or soon after thirteen the little Saul would have been sent from home, probably in a trading vessel bound from the port of Tarsus for Caesarea, on his way to Jerusalem. Already, as a boy, the Holy City must have possessed for him an interest surpassing any which could be raised by any other place on earth. Every great festival would have been followed by the return of one or more of his countrymen to Tarsus, full of the inspiration of the sacred sights, full of the splendour of the new temple, full of the fame and learning of the great doctors of the law. Especially he would have heard much of the two rival schools of Hillel and Shammai, of which the former exalted tradition above the letter of the law, while the latter preferred the law to tradition when they clashed. Of these the school of Hillel was much the more influential, and when St. Paul was a boy or a young man its one great ornament was Gamaliel, who was evidently one of those men whose candour, wisdom, and consistent elevation of character would have secured him influence in any society, or in any age of the world. It was at the feet of Gamaliel, St. Paul tells us, he was brought up; and this expression at the feet of Gamaliel exactly recalls to us the manner in which the Rabbinical Assemblies of the Wise, as they were termed, were held. The teacher sat on a raised platform,--the pupils on low seats, or on the floor beneath. At this period of St. Pauls life we are, to a certain extent, in the region of conjecture; but it is, upon the whole, scarcely doubtful that he would have returned to Tarsus in the prime of manhood, before he reappeared in Jerusalem as a member of the synagogue which was connected with, or maintained by, the Jews in Cilicia. This visit would have completed his acquaintance with the language, and to a certain limited extent with the literature, of Greece. At this time in his life, too, St. Paul would probably have become familiar with that large section of the Jews of the dispersion whose centre was Alexandria, who in everything but religion were nearly Greeks, whose religion was taking more and more of the Greek dress every day This education was moulding and developing a character which may be described by one single word--intensity. There was much besides. There was sensitiveness; there was impetuosity; there was courage; there was independence; but, in all that he did, Paul of Tarsus, before his conversion as well as after it, threw his whole energy, whether of thought or resolution, into his work. (Canon Liddon.)

Confession of former wrongdoing

I man may make his past sins known out of pride, but also out of humility. Whoever does not boast himself of the same, but humbles himself therefore before God, and willingly bears the shame of them before men, not relying upon himself, makes a good confession, but one not needful to be uttered before every man, as sometimes it would bring more scandal than benefit. (Quesnel.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Gal 1:13-14. For ye have heard of my conversation in time past — As if he said, To convince you that I received the knowledge of the gospel by immediate revelation from Christ, I appeal to my behaviour, both before and after I was made an apostle; in the Jewish religion — Εν τω Ιουδαισμω, in Judaism. The expression is well chosen; and, as L’Enfant justly observes, is not intended by the apostle of the religion originally taught by Moses, and contained in his writings and those of the prophets, but, as is evident from the latter part of the next verse, of that which was practised among the Jews at this time, and consisted in a great degree in observing the traditions of the fathers, and the commandments of men. How that beyond measure — Καθ’ υπερβολην, exceedingly, and with the most insatiable rage; I persecuted the church of God — Whether considered as individual believers, or as persons united in religious societies and congregations; and wasted it — Ravaged it with all the fury of a beast of prey. So the word επορθουν, here used, signifies. And profited — Made proficiency in the knowledge and practice of Judaism; above many of my equals — Many of the same age with myself; in mine own nation — Or who were of the same standing in the study of the law; being more exceedingly zealous of the unwritten traditions of my fathers — Over and above the doctrines and precepts written in the law. These were what the evangelists and our Lord called the traditions of men, and their own traditions, (Mar 7:8-9,) to show that they were mere human inventions. “It was the characteristic of a Pharisee to hold these traditions as of equal authority with the precepts of the law. Nay, in many cases, they gave them the preference. Hence our Lord told them, Mar 7:9, Full well ye reject the commandments of God, that ye may keep your own traditions. The apostle mentions his knowledge of the traditions of the fathers, and his zeal for them, as things absolutely necessary to salvation, to convince the Galatians that his preaching justification without the works of the law, could be attributed to nothing but the force of truth communicated to him by revelation.” — Macknight.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

For ye have heard (hjkousate gar). This "for" introduces the whole statement which follows down to the end of the chapter; for the entire section is written with the view of substantiating the assertion in ver. 12, that he had not received the gospel which he preached from man, but solely through illumination imparted immediately from heaven. "Ye have heard," i.e. have been told; as Act_11:1; Joh_4:1, and often. "I amonly stating what ye have already been apprised of, when I tell you of," etc. That the aorist tense of the Greek word does not limit the expression to any one communication, such e.g. as one made by the apostle himself, is shown by the use of this very aorist in blurt, 5:21, 33, etc.; Luk_4:23; Joh_12:34; Eph_3:2 Eph_4:21; 2Ti_1:13; Jam_5:11. The apostle appears to have been himself in the habit of frequentlytelling the wondrous story of what he once had been and of the change wrought upon him. We have instances of his doing this in fill detail in his speech from the stairs, and in his defence before Agrippa, (Act_22:1-16 Act_22:26) and with less fulness in Php_3:4-8; 1Co_15:8, 1Co_15:9. It is therefore quite supposable that he had himself said as much also in Galatia. We observe, however, that the apostle does not say, "heard from me," as he might have done if he had himself been their informant: and, further, that the effect of the words, "ye have heard," does not, in point of construction at least, of necessity extend beyond the fourteenth verse. We are therefore at liberty to surmise that what he here refers to as having been told them relates simply to his life before his conversion; and that tile accounts which they had received of it bad come through unfriendly informants. These may have been either unbelieving Jews or Judaizing Christians, who wished by these statements to disparage the apostle"s character as one who, if he really was not dishonest, was at all events capable of passing from one extreme of sentiments to their direct opposite with the utmost suddenness and levity, and therefore was not a man entitled to be regarded with confidence. Of my conversation in time past in the Jews" religion (thn ejmhn pote ejn tw jIoudai"smw) of my manner of life formerly in Judaism. "The manner in which I once behaved myself as devoted to Judaism." The pote belongs to the action denoted in the verbal noun ajnastrofhn, like hJ thv Troiav alwsiv toteron, cited by Meyer from Plato ("Legg.," 3:685, D). jAnastrofh, conversatio, which occurs repeatedly in the New Testament, is generally rendered "conversation" in Authorized Version (1Pe_1:18 1Pe_4:12; Heb_13:7) "Judaism" means "the religious life of a Jew," which distinctively was Mosaism. It occurs in RAPC 2Ma 2:21 14:38 4Ma 4:16. Ignatius ("Ad Magn.," 8) speaks of "not living according to Judaism," as in ibid., 10, he uses the word "Christianism." St. Paul has the verb "Judaize" below, lion Gal_2:14. On the objective accusative ajnastrofhn as defined by the following clause, "how that," etc., see note on eujagge in ver. 11. How that beyond measure I persecuted the Church of God (oti kaq uJperbolhwkon than tou Qeou); how that beyond measure I was persecuting the Church of God. The imperfect "was persecuting," as well as the following, "was making havoc and was advancing," points to what he was doing when God interposed in the manner described in vers. 15, 16. Compare the use of the aorist ejdiwxa in 1Co_15:9, Where no such simultaneity required to be indicated. "Beyond measure" or "superlatively" (kaq" uJperbolhn) was, at least about this time, a favorite phrase with St. Paul. A less eager pen might have written "exceedingly" (sfodra). Cf. Rom_7:13; 1Co_12:31; 2Co_1:8 2Co_4:7, 17 12:7. "Of God." This is added to the Chinch" with pathos of strong self-condemnation, as it is also in 1Co_15:9. The apostle feels now that his violence against the Church was a kindof sacrilege. The sentiment is an echo of Christ"s words to him," Why persecutest thou me?" And wasted it (kairqoun aujthn); and making havoc of it. The Greek verb (porqein) used again in this relation below, ver. 23, is similarly employed also in Act_9:21, "made havoc of those who called upon this Name." The verb properly denotes "devastate," "harry;" and in classical Greek is used with reference to towns, countries, and the like, being applied to persons only in the poetical style (Liddell and Scott) In the New Testament it is used only in relation to Soul"s persecution, apparently marking its deadly effectiveness as well as Saul"s determination if possible to extirpate the faith and its adherents. The expugnabam of the Vulgate would seem a fair equivalent.

Vers. 13, 14.

A retrospect of his career as a Jew.

This would be the best proof that he had not received his gospel from man.

I HIS ENMITY TO THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. "I was beyond measure persecuting the Church of God, and destroying it." His past career was notorious. "He persecuted unto death", (Act_22:4) "beyond measure by no feeble or spasmodic effort, limited to one spot, but by a persistent scheme of violence wrought with a fierce energy that knew no weariness. He could not then have been learning the gospel of the very saints he was hunting to death; there could he no possible association between the persecutor and his victims that would allow of his learning the gospel. On the contrary, at this time he cherished the strongest prejudices and the fiercest hatred against Christianity.

II HIS INTENSE ZEAL FOR THE JEWISH RELIGION. He could appeal to the Galatians themselves as having once heard "of his conversation in time past in Judaism," and how he "was making progress in Judaism above many of his contemporaries in his own nation, being more exceedingly zealous of the traditions of his fathers.

1. His zeal was manifest in his earnest study of Judaism. He studied it under Gamaliel, with the best advantages of instruction, and he excelled many of the young Pharisees of his own age in the ardour and in the results of his studies. He could not have made progress without study.

2. It was still more manifest in his extraordinary devotion to the traditions of his fathers. This was the natural token of an enthusiastic Pharisaism. "He was a Pharisee, and the son of a Pharisee". (Act_23:6)

(1) The traditions in question were not the Mosaic Law, but the interpretations of that Law, which found their true place afterwards in the Mishna. They were, in a word, "the traditions of the elders," which our Lord so severely condemned. They were traditions, strong in the letter, weak in the spirit, strict in trifles, lax in weighty matters. They made void the Law on some of the plainest questions of duty. So is it with Roman Catholics in the matter of their traditions, which are either opposed to Scripture or unnecessary additions to it.

(2) It is not unnatural to find unconverted men very zealous for ancestral traditions; more concerned, in fact, that they should be found to come from the Fathers than from God. Zeal of this sort is often strong in proportion to its ignorance of the truth. The zeal of his countrymen the apostle readily concedes, but charges it with being "a zeal not according to knowledge". (Rom_10:2) It is in such an atmosphere that the persecutor is bred.

(3) Zeal is not religion: Good intentions will never make anything really good with God. Zeal can never make the false true, nor justify any in persecuting the truth. Christians ought to imitate the zeal of false teachers, and to manifest its pureness by jealousy for God"s honour, by abundance of labours, and by ardent love to Christ.

III A BELIEVER OUGHT NOT TO BE ASHAMED TO CONFESS HIS SINS. The apostle makes an almost remorseful confession of his crimes against the Church of God. Once and again the dark recollection of ", his mad violence against the saints comes up in the midst of his grateful remembrances of God"s forgiving mercy. But all that wild persecution only too clearly proved how little he was indebted to apostle or saint for the gospel he gave to the Galatians.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

CRITICAL AND EXPLANATORY NOTES

Gal_1:14. Exceedingly zealous of the traditions of my fathers.—St. Paul seems to have belonged to the extreme party of the Pharisees (Act_22:3; Act_23:7; Act_26:5; Php_3:5-6), whose pride it was to call themselves “zealots of the law, zealots of God.” A portion of these extreme partisans, forming into a separate sect under Judas of Galilee, took the name of zealots par excellence, and distinguished themselves by their furious opposition to the Romans.

MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Gal_1:13-14

A Zealous Ritualist—

I. Is conspicuous for his adherence to religious formalities.—“For ye have heard of my conversation in time past in the Jews’ religion” (Gal_1:13)—of my manner of life formerly in Judaism. Saul of Tarsus was a full-blown ritualist, and a master-leader in the art, setting the pattern to all his contemporaries. He did not play at forms and ceremonies. Their observance was to him a matter of life and death. An intense nature like his could do nothing by halves. The listlessness and pictorial parade of modern ritualism he would have denounced with withering scorn. Religious formality has for some minds an irresistible fascination. It appeals to the instinct of worship which is latent in all, and to the love of æstheticism which is shared by most in varying degrees. The votary deludes himself into the belief that signs and symbols represent certain great truths; but the truths soon fade away into the background, and he is in turn deluded in regarding the outward ceremonies as everything. Formality is the tendency of the mind to rest in the mere externals of religion to the neglect of the inner life of religion itself. It is the folly of valuing a tree for its bark instead of its goodly timber, of choosing a book for its ornate binding irrespective of its literary genius, of admiring the finished architecture of a building regardless of its accommodation or the character of its inmates. “There are two ways of destroying Christianity,” says D’Aubigné; “one is to deny it, the other is to displace it.” Formality seeks to displace it. Ritualism may be of use in the infantile stage, either of the world or the individual. It is a reversion to the petrifaction of ancient crudities. A robust and growing spiritual manhood is superior to its aids.

II. Violently opposes the representatives of genuine piety.—“How that beyond measure I persecuted the Church of God, and wasted it” (Gal_1:13). Animated by extravagant zeal for the religion of his forefathers, the bigoted Pharisee became the deadliest enemy of the Church of Christ in its infant days. Indifferent to personal peril or to the feelings of the oppressed, he prosecuted his work of destruction with savage energy. He was a type of the Jewish fanatics who afterwards thirsted and plotted for his life, and the forerunner of the cruel zealots of the Inquisition and the Star Chamber in later times. The curse of ritualism is excessive intolerance. Blinded and puffed up with its unwarrantable assumptions, it loses sight of the essential elements of true religion. It sees nothing good in any other system but its own, and employs all methods that it dare, to compel universal conformity. It admits no rival. It alone is right; everything else is wrong, and all kinds of means are justifiable in crushing the heresy that presumes to deny its supreme claims. “Christ and Ritualism,” says Horatius Bonar, “are opposed to each other, as light is to darkness. The cross and the crucifix cannot agree. Either ritualism will banish Christ or Christ will banish ritualism.”

III. Is distinguished by his ardent study and defence of traditional religionism.—“And profited in the Jews’ religion above many my equals in mine own nation, being more exceedingly zealous of the traditions of my fathers” (Gal_1:14). The apostle had studied the Mosaic law under the ablest tutors of his day. He knew Judaism by heart, and won a distinguished reputation for learning and for his strict adherence to the minutest details of traditional legalism. He was one of the ablest champions of the Mosaic system. The zealous ritualist spends his days and nights in studying, not the word of God, but the sayings of men and the rules of the Church handed down by the traditions of past generations. Divine revelation is ignored, and human authority unduly exalted. His studies are misdirected, and his zeal misspent. He is wasting his energy in defending a lifeless organism. No man can honestly and prayerfully study God’s word and catch its meaning, and remain a mere ritualist.

Lessons.—

1. Ritualism, is the worship of external forms.

2. It breeds a spirit of intolerance and persecution.

3. It supplants true religion.

GERM NOTES ON THE VERSES

Gal_1:13-14. Mistaken Zeal—

I. May create a reputation for religious devotion.—“Ye have heard of my conversation in time past in the Jews’ religion” (Gal_1:13).

II. Breeds the spirit of violent persecution.—“How that beyond measure I persecuted the Church of God, and wasted it” (Gal_1:13).

III. Makes one ambitious for superiority.—“Profited … above many my equals, … being more exceedingly zealous of the traditions of my fathers” (Gal_1:14).

IV. Is neither good nor wise.

V. Stores up a retrospect of bitter and humiliating regret.

Review of a Misspent Life.—

1. A sincere convert will not shun to make confession of his wicked life, not omitting anything which may tend to a just aggravation of it, not in a boasting manner, but that the freedom of God’s grace may be commended.

2. That the Scriptures were indited by the Spirit of God, and the penmen not actuated with human policy, appears from this, with other evidences in the Scripture itself, that they concealed not their own faults, but blazed them to the world when the glory of God did so require.

3. Though the Church of God, as to the inward estate, cannot be utterly wasted, neither can the outward state be so far decayed as to cease to be, yet the Lord may so far give way to the rage of persecutors that the outward face and beauty of the Church may be totally marred, the members partly killed, partly scattered, the public ordinances suppressed, and the public assemblies interrupted.

4. The life and way of some engaged in a false religion may be so blameless and, according to the dictates of their deluded conscience, so strict, as that it may be a copy unto those who profess the true religion and a reproof for their palpable negligence.

5. As our affections of love, joy, hatred, anger, and grief are by nature so corrupt that even the choicest of them, if not brought in subjection to the word by the Spirit, will lay forth themselves upon forbidden and unlawful objects, so our zeal and fervency of spirit will bend itself more toward the maintenance of error than of truth. Error is the birth of our own invention; so is not truth.—Fergusson.

True and False Zeal.

I. Zeal is a certain fervency of spirit arising out of a mixture of love and anger, causing men earnestly to maintain the worship of God and all things pertaining thereto, and moving them to grief and anger when God is in any way dishonoured.

II. Paul was zealous for the outward observance of the law and for Pharisaical unwritten traditions.

III. He himself condemns his zeal because it was against the word, and tended to maintain unwritten traditions, and justification by the works of the law, out of Christ. What Paul did in his religion we are to do in the profession of the gospel.

1. We are to addict and set ourselves earnestly to maintain the truth of the gospel.

2. We are to be angry in ourselves and grieved when God is dishonoured and His word disobeyed.

3. We are not to give liberty to the best of our natural affections as to zeal, but mortify and rule them by the word.—Perkins.

The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.

1:13-14 To prove that his message did not come from human reason (1:11), Paul describes what he was like before he encountered Christ: He was a highly successful Jew (see Acts 8:1-3; 22:1-5; 26:4-5; Phil 3:4-7). His antagonism to God’s church and strict adherence to Judaism demonstrated his faith in the law before Christ confronted him (Gal 1:15-16).

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Gal 1:13. Ἠκούσατε, ye have heard) before I came to you.—ποτὲ, in time past) when Paul was no way desirous of promoting the cause of the Gospel.—ἐπόρθουν, I wasted) This word denotes what is quite the opposite of edification [the building up of the Church].

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Gal_1:13. Now begins the historical proof that he was indebted for his gospel to the ἀποκάλυψις he had mentioned, and not to human communication and instruction. In the first place, in Gal_1:13-14, he calls to their remembrance his well-known conduct whilst a Jew; for, as a persecutor of the Christians and a Pharisaic zealot, he could not but be the less fitted for human instruction in the gospel, which must, on the contrary, have come to him in that superhuman mode.

ἠκούσατε] emphatically prefixed, indicates that what is contained in Gal_1:13-14, is something already well known to his readers, which therefore required only to be recalled, not to be proved.

τὴν ἐμὴν ἀναστροφήν ποτε ἐν τῷ Ἰουδαϊσμῷ] my previous course of life in Judaism, how I formerly behaved myself as a Jew. Ἰουδαϊσμός is not Judaistic zeal and activity (Matthies, when I was still out and out a Jew; comp. Schott), but just simply Judaism, as his national religious condition: see 2Ma_2:21; 2Ma_8:1; 2Ma_14:38; 4Ma_4:26. It forms the historical contrast to the present Χριστιανισμός of the apostle. Comp. Ignat. ad Magnes. 8, 10, Philad. 6.

ἀναστροφή in the sense of course of life, behaviour, is found, in addition to the N.T. (Eph_4:22; 1Ti_4:12, et al.) and the Apocrypha (Tob_4:14; 2Ma_5:8), only in later Greek, such as Polyb. iv. 82. 1. See Wetstein.

ποτε ἐν τῷ Ἰουδ.] a definition of time attached to τὴν ἐμὴν ἀναστροφήν, in which the repetition of τήν was not necessary. Comp. Plat. Legg. iii. p. 685 D, ἡ τῆς Τροίας ἅλωσις τὸ δεύτερον. Soph. O. R. 1043, τοῦ τυράννου τῆσδε γῆς πάλαι ποτέ. Php_1:26. Comp. also on 1Co_8:7 and on 2Co_11:23

ὅτι καθʼ ὑπερβολὴν κ.τ.λ.] a more precise definition of the object of ἠκούσατε, that I, namely, beyond measure persecuted, etc. On καθʼ ὑπερβολήν, the sense of which bears a superlative relation to σφόδρα, comp. Rom_7:13; 1Co_12:31; 2Co_1:8; 2Co_4:17; Bernhardy, p. 241.

τοῦ Θεοῦ] added in the painful consciousness of the wickedness and guilt of such doings. Comp. 1Co_15:9; 1Ti_1:13

ἐπόρθουν] is not to be understood de conatu (Chrysostom, Theodoret, Theophylact, Menochius, and others); Paul was then actually engaged in the work of destruction (Act_22:4, comp. Act_9:1, Act_26:10-11), and therefore it is not to be understood (with Beza, Piscator, Estius, Winer, Usteri, and Schott) merely as vastavi, depopulatus sum (Hom. Od. xiv. 264, ἀγροὺς πόρθεον, et al.). Paul wished to be not a mere devastator, not a mere disturber (see Luthers translation), but a destroyer[26] of the church; and as such he was active (Hom. Il. iv. 308, πόλιας καὶ τείχεʼ ἐπόρθουν, et al.). Moreover, in the classic authors also πορθεῖν and ΠΈΡΘΕΙΝ are applied not only to things, but also to men (comp. Act_9:21) in the sense of bringing to ruin and the like. See Heindorf, ad Plat. Prot. p. 340 A; Lobeck, ad Soph. Aj. 1187; Jacobs, Del. epigr. i. 80.

[26] [Nicht bloss Verstörer, sondern Zerstörer.]

Meyer — Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament — English translation by Peter Christie, edited by Frederick Crombie (T&T Clark, 1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Gal 1:13 . Ἠκούσατε . The Galatians had no doubt heard from Paul himself of his former persecution of the Church. How frequently it formed the topic of his addresses to Jewish hearers may be gathered from his defence of himself at Jerusalem in Act 22 , and before Agrippa in Act 26 Ἰουδαϊσμῷ . The rendering of this word in our versions, Jewish religion , is unfortunate: it implies a definite separation between the two religions which did not then exist, for Christians were still habitual worshippers in the synagogue; and it puts this view into the mouth of Paul, who steadfastly persisted in identifying the faith of Christ with the national religion. The word Ἰουδαϊζειν denotes the adoption of Jewish habits, language, or policy ( cf. Gal 2:14 ). So here Ἰουδαϊσμός denotes Jewish partisanship, and accurately describes the bitter party spirit which prompted Saul to take the lead in the martyrdom of Stephen and the persecution of the Church. Incidentally the partisanship was based on a false view of religion, for the narrow intolerance of the Scribes and Pharisees was a prevailing curse of Jewish society at the time; but Ἰουδαϊσμός expresses the party spirit, not the religion. Still more alien to the spirit of Paul is the language attributed to him in the next verse, I profited in the Jews’ religion (A.V.): for it indicates satisfaction at the success of his Jewish career, whereas he never ceased to regard it with lifelong remorse. His real assertion here is that he advanced beyond his fellows in sectarian prejudice and persecuting zeal a statement borne out by the history of the persecution. ποτε . This adverb is obviously attached to the preceding substantive ἀναστροφήν .

The imperfects ἐδίωκον … describe the course of action continuously pursued by Saul down to his conversion. ἐπόρθουν . This term is likewise applied in Act 9:21 to the havoc wrought by Saul in the Church.

The Expositor's Greek Testament, edited by W. Robertson Nicoll (1897–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

13, 14. The Gospel was no product of my previous life

(Gal 1:13) For you heard (when I first came among you) of my mode of life once in the religion of the Jews, that I used to persecute excessively the true Church of God, and used to lay it waste, (Gal 1:14) and was making progress in the religion of the Jews beyond many of my contemporaries among the Jews, being all the time exceedingly zealous for the traditional teaching handed down to me by my fathers.

13. ἠκούσατε γὰρ, “as we might say: For you, who know my former life, may well believe that it was by nothing short of a miracle I was converted. I will tell you the whole tale, and you will see how unlikely I was to have received the Gospel from the word of others” (Jowett).

“Ye heard,” hardly from Jews, astonished at my conversion; but probably from me and those with me when I preached to you first (Gal 1:8).

τὴν ἐμὴν ἀναστροφήν. The verb ἀναστρέφω presents nearly the same metaphor as περιπατεῖν, but neither it nor its substantive is ever hallowed to mean the religious life as such. It is “the going up and down among men in the various intercourse of life” (Hort on 1Pe 1:15); our “mode of life,” “converse”; not “behaviour,” which has only an external connotation. Polybius (IV. 82. 1) has a suggestive parallel to our passage: ὁ δὲ Φίλιππος … ἐκεῖ τὸ λοιπὸν μέρος τοῦ χειμῶνος διέτριβε, κατά τε τὴυ λοιπὴν ἀναστροφὴν καὶ κατὰ τὰς πράξεις τεθανμασμένος ὑπὲρ τὴν ἡλικίαν κ.τ.λ. See reff. to the Inscriptions in Deissmann (Bible Studies, pp. 88, 194, Licht vom Osten, p. 226).

ποτε. Its position is “due to the verb included in ἀναστροφήν. As St Paul would have said ἀνεστρεφόμην ποτἐ, he allows himself to write τὴν ἐμὴν ἀναστροφήν ποτε” (Ellicott).

ἐν τῷ Ἰουδαϊσμῷ, Gal 1:14, 2Ma 2:21; 2Ma 8:1; 2Ma 14:38 bis; 4Ma 4:26[46]. Judaism as a religion of faith and custom. Cf. Ἰονδαΐζειν Gal 2:14[47], Ἰονδαϊκῶς Gal 2:14, Ἰουδαϊκός Tit 1:14[48]. For the contrast between Ἰουδαϊσμός and Χριστιανισμός see also Ignat. ad Magn. §§ 8, 10.

[46] Is affixed it means that all the passages are mentioned where the word occurs in the Greek Bible.

[47] Is affixed to a word it means that all the passages are mentioned where that word occurs in the New Testament.

[48] Is affixed to a word it means that all the passages are mentioned where that word occurs in the New Testament.

ὄτι καθ ̓ ὑπερβολὴν. Peculiar to the 3rd group of St Paul’s Epp.

ἐδίωκον. Observe the three imperfects ἐδίωκον, ἐπόρθουν, προέκοπτον, descriptive of the long continuance of his “mode of life.”

τὴν ἐκκλησίαν τοῦ θεοῦ. Cf. Gal 1:2 note. The exact phrase occurs elsewhere in the N.T. only in 1Co 1:2 (= 2Co 1:1), 1Co 10:32, 1Co 11:22, 1Co 15:9 and in St Paul’s speech, Act 20:28. Compare also 1Ti 3:5; 1Ti 3:15, and the plural 1Co 11:16; 1Co 11:22; 1Th 2:14; 2Th 1:4. Observe the tacit assumption that the Ἰονδαῖοι do not form ἡ ἐκκλησία τοῦ θεοῦ (contrast the use of ἡ ἐκκλησία in Act 7:38), although in 1Th 2:14 his addition of ἐν Χριστῷ Ἰησοῦ implies that there might be ἐκκλησίαι τοῦ θεοῦ not in Christ.

καὶ ἐπόρθουν αὐτήν, Gal 1:23, Act 9:21[49]. Cf. 4Ma 4:23 of Antiochus Epiphanes ὡς ἐπόρθησεν αὐτούς, δόγμα ἔθετο, ὅπως εἴ τινες αὐτῶν φάνοιεν τῷ πατρίῳ πολιτευόμενοι νόμῳ, θάνοιεν.

[49] Is affixed to a word it means that all the passages are mentioned where that word occurs in the New Testament.

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

He proveth that he was extraordinarily taught of Christ himself, by the history of his former life, which the Galatians themselves know well enough: for saith he, it is well known in what school I was brought up, even from a child, to wit, amongst the deadly enemies of the Gospel. And no man may cavil and say that I was a scholar of the Pharisees in name only and not in deed, no man is ignorant, how that I excelled in Pharisaism, and was suddenly made of a Pharisee, an Apostle of the Gentiles, so that I had no space to be instructed of men.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

heard--even before I came among you.

conversation--"my former way of life."

Jews' religion--The term, "Hebrew," expresses the language; "Jew," the nationality, as distinguished from the Gentiles; "Israelite," the highest title, the religious privileges, as a member of the theocracy.

the church--Here singular, marking its unity, though constituted of many particular churches, under the one Head, Christ.

of God--added to mark the greatness of his sinful alienation from God (Co1 15:19).

wasted--laid it waste: the opposite of "building it up."

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Verse 13. Ye have heard of my conversation] τηνεμην αναστροφην. My manner of life; the mode in which I conducted myself.

Beyond measure I persecuted the Church] For proofs of this the reader is referred to Ac 9:1-2 (note); Ac 22:4 (note), and the notes there. The apostle tells them that they had heard this, because, being Jews, they were acquainted with what had taken place in Judea, relative to these important transactions.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

13. For ye have heard of my conversation. The whole of this narrative was added as a part of his argument. He relates that, during his whole life, he had such an abhorrence of the gospel, that he was a mortal enemy of it, and a destroyer of the name of Christianity. Hence we infer that his conversion was divine. And indeed he calls them as witnesses of a matter not at all doubtful, so as to place beyond controversy what he is about to say.

His equals were those of his own age; for a comparison with older persons would have been unsuitable. When he speaks of the traditions of the fathers, he means, not those additions by which the law of God had been corrupted, but the law of God itself, in which he had been educated from his childhood, and which he had received through the hands of his parents and ancestors. Having been strongly attached to the customs of his fathers, it would have been no easy matter to tear him from them, had not the Lord drawn him by a miracle.

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

(13) Ye have heard.—Rather, ye heard. It was indeed notorious; but the Apostle may be referring to the fact that he himself usually (see Act_22:3-21; Act_26:4-20; 1Co_15:8-10) brought his own career and experiences into his preaching, so that they may have heard it from his own lips.

My conversation . . . in the Jews’ religion.—How I behaved in the days of my Judaism. The phrase “Jews’ religion” (literally, Judaism) is not used with any sense of disparagement.

Wasted it.—The same word is translated “destroyed” in Act_9:21 : “Is not this he that destroyed them which called on this name?”

(13, 14) Proof that the doctrine of the Apostle is derived from God and not from man, in that it could not be accounted for by his antecedents and education, all of which told against, rather than for, a Christian belief of any kind.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

13. Nothing short of a miracle could account for the change which had taken place in the life and aims of St Paul (comp. Php_3:4-10). It was not likely that a man with such antecedents should have accepted the Gospel with its consequences on merely human testimony.

ye have heard] Rather, Ye heard from myself when I was with you, and (perhaps) from my colleagues.

my conversation] i.e. my manner of life, as Eph_4:22; Heb_13:7; Jas_3:13, &c. In Php_1:27; Php_3:20 the same English word represents a different word in the original, and refers to civil and political duties and privileges, rather than those which are personal and social.

the Jews’ religion] One word in the original, which does not occur elsewhere in the N. T. except in Gal_1:14. From the use of the corresponding verb, we may regard it as referring not to the religion revealed to the Jews in the writings of Moses and the prophets, but that which was its actual development in St Paul’s day, when the word of God had been overlaid and ‘made of none effect’ by the traditions of the Scribes and Pharisees, and the puerile conceits of the Rabbinic expositors.

I persecuted the church of God] The same sad confession is made 1Co_15:9. There is solemnity in the addition of the words “of God”. The identical expression occurs in the Sept. version of Neh_13:1.

wasted it] was laying waste, was sweeping it away, exterminating it.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

For ye have heard of my conversation in time past,.... His manner and course of life, in his state of unregeneracy, how diametrically opposite his education and behaviour, his principles and practices, were to the Gospel; which show that he had not received it, nor was he taught it of men. This they might have heard of, either from himself, when he first preached among them, who was very free to acknowledge his former sins and errors; or from the Jews, who were scattered abroad in the several countries; and it may be, from them, who were forced to fly to strange cities, and perhaps to some in Galatia, on account of his persecution: now his life and conversation, before his conversion, were spent

in the Jews' religion; or "in Judaism". He was born of Jewish parents, had a Jewish education, was brought up under a Jewish doctor, in all the peculiarities of the Jewish religion, and so could have received no hints, not in a notional way, of the truths of the Gospel; which he might have done, had he been born of Christian parents, and had had a Christian education: besides, he was brought up in the religion of the Jews, not as it was founded and established by God, but as it was corrupted by them; who had lost the true sense of the oracles of God committed to them, the true use of sacrifices, and the end of the law; had added to it a load of human traditions; placed all religion in bare doing, and taught that justification and salvation lay in the observance of the law of Moses, and the traditions of the elders: add to this, that he was brought up in the sect of the Jewish religion, Pharisaism, which was the straitest sect of it, and the most averse to Christ and his Gospel; so that he could never receive it, or have any disposition to it from hence; so far from it, that he appeals to the Galatians, as what they must have heard,

how that beyond measure I persecuted the church of God; which he now knew, and believed to be the church of God; though then he did not, but rather a synagogue of Satan; and this he mentions, as an aggravation of his sin, under a sense of which he was humbled all his days: when he is said to persecute it "beyond measure", the meaning is not, as if there were any lawful measure, or due bounds of persecution, but that he persecuted the saints in a most violent and outrageous manner, beyond all others that were concerned with him: the church of God at Jerusalem is particularly designed, and the members of it, the disciples of Christ; whom he hated, and committed to prison, and breathed out threatenings and slaughter against, and destroyed: wherefore it follows, and wasted it; or destroyed it; as much as in him lay, he sought to do it, though he was not able to effect it entirely; he made havoc of it, dispersed its members, caused them to flee to strange cities, persecuted them to death, gave his voice against them to have them punished and put to death: such an aversion had he to the followers of Christ, and the Christian doctrine.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

13 For ye have heard of my conversation in time past in the Jews’ religion, how that beyond measure I persecuted the church of God, and wasted it:

Ver. 13. And wasted it] επορθουν. As an enemy’s country with fire and sword. Mars is styled πτολιπορθος. (Homer.)

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

For ye have heard of my conversation - My conduct, my mode of life, my deportment; see the note at 2Co 1:12. Probably Paul had himself made them acquainted with the events of his early years. The reason why he refers to this is, to show them that he had not derived his knowledge of the Christian religion from any instruction which he had received in his early years, or any acquaintance which he had formed with the apostles. At first, Paul had been decidedly opposed to the Lord Jesus, and had been converted only by God’s wonderful grace.

In the Jews’ religion - In the belief and practice of Judaism; that is, as it was understood in the time when he was educated. It was not merely in the religion of Moses, but it was in that religion as understood and practiced by the Jews in his time, when opposition to Christianity constituted a very material part of it. In that religion Paul proceeds to show that he had been more distinguished than most persons of his time.

How that beyond measure - In the highest possible degree; beyond all limits or bounds; exceedingly. The phrase which Paul uses here (καθ ̓ ὑπερβολὴν kath' huperbolēn), by hyperbole, is one which he frequently employs to denote anything that is excessive, or that cannot be expressed by ordinary language; see the Greek text in Rom 7:13; 1Co 12:31; 2Co 1:8; 2Co 4:7, 2Co 4:17.

I persecuted the church - See Act 8:3; Act 9:1 ff.

And wasted it - Destroyed it. The word which is used here, means properly to waste or destroy, as when a city or country is ravaged by an army or by wild beasts. His purpose was utterly to root out and destroy the Christian religion.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

It will be no difficult thing for you to believe, that I had never preached the gospel without a Divine revelation of the truth of it, if you do but reflect upon my former conversation; for you cannot but have heard, that I was born a Jew, educated in the Jewish religion, and was a zealous defender of it, so as I persecuted the Christians beyond measure. This unmeasurable persecution is expressed by Luke more particularly, Act 8:3; He made havoc of the church, entering into every house, and haling men and women, committed them to prison; and Act 9:1; He breathed out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord, &c. He wasted the church like an enemy that useth fire and sword, and all means to destroy. The word here used is επορθουν, which signifies to make a devastation; the word used in Act 8:3 is ελυμαινετο both words signify the most ruinating hostile actions. And this he saith was his conversation, or constant practice, so as they might reasonably think that something more than human had made a change in him, that he should now be a preacher of that doctrine, which he had before so abominated as that his whole business was to root out those that professed it.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

13. Ye have heard—Rather, ye heard; that is, ye heard it from me, narrated in my preaching to you. See note, Act_22:1. Paul, by showing how he was converted, and from what deep anti-Christianity, shows men how they are to be converted. This is experimental religion.

Conversation—The word implies the entire mode of life.

Jews’ religion—Literally, Judaism.

Persecuted—Pursued as a chasing warrior.

Wasted—Devastated, usually spoken of ravaging or devastating a country or city. He paints his own sin in vivid words, prompted by deep penitence.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

I Persecuted the church of God - That is, the believers in Christ.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

VERSES 13, 14. For ye have heard of my conversation in time past in the Jews’ religion, how that beyond measure I persecuted the church of God, and wasted it: And profited in the Jews’ religion above many my equals in mine own nation.

This passage does not contain doctrine. Paul adduces his own case for an example. "I have," he says, "at one time defended the traditions of the Pharisees more fiercely than any of your false apostles. Now, if the righteousness of the Law had been worth anything I would never have forsaken it. So carefully did I live up to the Law that I excelled many of my companions. So zealous was I in defense of the Law that I wasted the church of God."

Martin Luther — Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians (1535), English translation by Theodore Graebner (Zondervan, 1939) — public domain (U.S. copyright not renewed). Text from a community e-Sword module.

Jews’ religion

The new dispensation of grace having come in, the Mosaic system, if still persisted in, becomes a mere "Jews’ religion."

The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Here the apostle offers several arguments to satisfy the Galatians, that both his commission to preach the gospel, and also the gospel which he preached to them, were not from man, but our Lord Jesus Christ. And the first argument to prove it, as a convictive evidence of it, was his bitter enmity against the Christian religion, and his mighty zeal for the Jewish religion, in which he was educated and brought up: All which he mentions as a thing publicly known, leaving them to infer from thence, that so great and sudden a change could not be the effect of human persuasion, but divine revelation; In time past I persecuted the church of God, and wasted it.

Where note, that although our apostle did not shun to make an open confession of his wicked life, before his conversion, that he might thereby make evident, that his conversion was immediately from God, yet he makes an open confession only of his open sins, such as they had heard of in time past, without discovering his secret sins, which had been kept from the knowledge of the world, the divulging whereof would but have multiplied scandals and stumbling-blocks unto others. To confess our secret sins to God, is safe; to confess our open sins to the world, is sufficient.

Observe farther, the commendable proficiency which St. Paul made in the Jewish religion, wherein he was educated, I profited in the Jews’ religion above many my equals. He was also a zealous maintainer of the Jewish customs, and unwritten traditions, being more exceedingly zealous of the traditions of my fathers. From St. Paul’s example we may infer, that it is a special duty incumbent upon all persons to make religion the matter of their choice; and having espoused it, to be the more serious and zealous in it; to labour to advance and grow both in the knowlege and in the practice of it; and that to a degree of eminecy, excelling and outstripping others: I profited in the Jewish religion above many my equals, or contemporaries.

William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

For ye have heard of my manner of life in time past in the Jews' religion, how that beyond measure I persecuted the church of God, and made havoc of it:

J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

13, 14. Ye have heard of my manner of life. While he was still a Jew. In order to show that his gospel did not come from man, he cites his history, of which they knew something. I persecuted the church of God. See Acts 9:21. He made a determined effort to destroy Christianity. Compare Acts 22:4; 26:10, 11.

B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.

former life

"behavior at one time" or "prior life" or "earlier life"

I advanced

This metaphor pictures Paul as being ahead of other Jews his age in their goal to be perfect Jews.

those who were my own age

"the Jewish people who are the same age as I am"

my fathers

"my ancestors"

translationWords

Judaism

persecute

church

zeal

tradition

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

13-2:21.] Historical working out of this proof: and first (vv. 13, 14) by reminding them of his former life in Judaism, during which he certainly received no instruction in the Gospel from men.

13. ἠκούσ.] ye heard, viz. when I was among you: from myself: not as E. V., ‘ye have heard.’ γάρ binds the narrative to the former verses, as in the opening of a mathematical proof.

ἀναστρ.] Wetst. cites Polyb. iv. 82. 1, κατά τε τὴν λοιπὴν ἀναστροφὴν καὶ τὰς πράξεις τεθαυμασμένος ὑπὲρ τὴν ἡλικίαν. This meaning of the word seems (Mey.) to belong to post-classical Greek. There is no article before nor after ποτε, perhaps because the whole, ἀναστ.-ποτε-ἐν-τῷ-Ἰουδ., is taken as one, q.d. τὸν ἐμόν ποτε Ἰουδαϊσμόν: or better, as Donaldson in Ellicott, “the position of ποτε is due to the verb included in ἀναστροφήν. As St. Paul would have said ἀνεστρεφόμην ποτε, he allows himself to write τὴν ἐμ. ἀναστροφήν ποτε.” Mey. cites as a parallel construction, ἡ τῆς Τροίας ἅλωσις τὸ δεύτερον, Plato, Legg. iii. 685 d.

τ. ἐκκλ. τ. θεοῦ] for solemnity, to set himself in contrast to the Gospel, and shew how alien he then was from it (1Co 15:9).

ἐπόρθ.] τουτέστι, σβέσαι ἐπεχείρει τ. ἐκκλησίαν, καταστρέψαι κ. καθελεῖν, ἀφανίσαι· τοῦτο γὰρ πορθοῦντος ἔργον. Chrys. But more than the mere attempt is to be understood: he was verily destroying the Church of God, as far as in him lay. Nor must we think of merely laying waste; the verb applies to men, not only to cities and lands, cf. Act 9:21,—κεῖνος γὰρ ἔπερσεν ἀνθρώπους, Soph. Aj. 1177, and σὲ παρακαλῶ, μὴ ἡμῖν ὁ Πρωταγόρας τὸν Σιμωνίδην ἐκπέρσῃ, Plato, Protag., p. 340.

Henry Alford, The Greek Testament (1849–1861) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

13. Ἠκούσατε γὰρ τὴν ἐμὴν ἀναστροφήν ποτε ἐν τῷ Ἰουδαϊσμῷ, “For ye have heard of my manner of life formerly in the religion of the Jews.” With this sentence Paul introduces the evidence which his own career furnished that he had not received the gospel from man or by instruction. The force of γάρ in the present sentence extends in effect into, if not through, the second chapter. The argument is cumulative in character. Its first step is to the effect that he was not, previous to his conversion, under Christian influence at all, but was, on the contrary, a violent opposer of the Christian church. From whom the Galatians had heard (ἠκούσατε) the story of his pre-Christian life Paul does not say; most probably it was from himself. If so, this reflects in an interesting way his probable habit of making use of his own experience in presenting the gospel. Cf. Acts, chap. 22, and esp. chap. 26. On the tense of ἠκούσατε, see BMT 46, 52.

Ἀναστροφή, meaning in classical writers “return,” etc., first appears in the second century BC in the sense “manner of life,” “conduct” (Polyb. 4. 82:1), which sense it also has in the very few instances in which it is found in the Apocr.: Tob. 4:14, 2 Mac. 3:23 (it is not found in the Lxx, canonical books, and though it stands in the Roman edition at 2 Mac. 5:3 it is without the support of either of the uncials which contain the passage, viz. AV.); this is also its regular meaning in N. T. (Eph 4:22, 1Ti 4:12, Heb 13:7, Jas 3:13, 1Pe 1:15, 1Pe 1:18, 1Pe 1:2:12, 1Pe 1:3:1, 1Pe 1:2, 1Pe 1:16, 2Pe 2:7, 2Pe 3:11).

On the position of ποτέ see Butt. p. 91, and cf. Php 4:10, 1Co 9:7; also (cited by Sief. ad loc.), Plato, Legg. III 685 D, ἡ τῆς Τροίας ἅλωσις τὸ δεύτερον, “the capture of Troy the second time”; Soph. O. T. 1043, τοῦ τυράννου τῆσδε γῆς πάλαι ποτέ, “the long-ago ruler of this land.”

Ἰουδαϊσμός, “the Jews’ religion,” occurs in N. T. only in this and the following verse; for exx. outside N. T. see 2 Mac. 2:21, 8:1, 14:38 bis 4 Mac. 4:26. In the passages in Mac. it denotes the Jewish religion in contrast with the Hellenism which the Syrian kings were endeavouring to force upon the Jews; here, of course, the prevalent Judaism with its rejection of Jesus in contrast with the faith of the followers of Jesus as the Messiah. The very use of the term in this way is significant of the apostle’s conception of the relation between his former and his present faith, indicating that he held the latter, and had presented it to the Galatians, not as a type of Judaism, but as an independent religion distinct from that of the Jews. Though the word Christianity was probably not yet in use, the fact was in existence.

ὅτι καθʼ ὑπερβολὴν ἐδίωκον τὴν ἐκκλησίαν τοῦ θεοῦ καὶ ἐπόρθουν αὐτήν, “that beyond measure I persecuted the church of God and ravaged it.” This whole clause and the following one are epexegetic of τὴν ἐμὴν ἀναστροφήν, not, however, defining in full the content of that phrase, but setting forth that element of it which the apostle has in mind as bearing on his argument. That he stood thus in intense hostility to the church is evidence that he was not of those who through the influence of association with Christians, and as a result of instruction (cf. οὔτε ἐδιδάχθην, v. 12) were led to receive the gospel.

The word ὐπερβολή and the specific phrase καθʼ ὑπερβολήν are classical, but are used in N. T. only by Paul. The phrase occurs in Rom 7:13, 1Co 12:31, 2Co 1:8, 2Co 4:17, always in the sense “exceeding(ly),” “superior.”

The imperfects, ἐδίωκον and ἐπόρθουν, representing the actions denoted by them as in progress, bring out clearly the continuance of the persecuting activity. The latter verb, meaning in itself not simply “to injure,” but “to destroy,” “to ruin,” has here, as commonly in the progressive tenses, a conative force. See L.&S. s. v. and BMT 23, and compare on πείθω and ἤρεσκον in v. 10. διώκω, used from Homer down, meaning “to pursue,” frequently carries the associated idea of hostile purpose, and so comes in classical writers to mean “to prosecute” (ὁ διώκων is “the prosecutor,” ὁ φεύγων, “the defendant”), and in the Lxx (Jer 17:18) and N. T. “to persecute” (Rom 12:14, 1Co 4:12 et freq.). πορθέω, used from Homer down as a military term, meaning “to destroy,” “to ravage” (cities), and from Æschylus, of violence to persons, is not found in the Lxx (canonical books) or Apocr., but occurs in 4 Mac. 4:23, 11:4 of persons. In N. T. it is found in this epistle here and v. 23 and in Act 9:21, always of Paul.

On ἐκκλησία in N. T. see detached note, p. 417. Two facts are notable about the expression employed here, ἡ ἐκκλησία τοῦ θεοῦ: (1) the use of the singular to denote not a local body but the Christian community at large. Cf. the different use of the word in vv. 2, 22, 1Co 1:2, 2Co 1:1; and for the evidence that the phrase has this œcumenical meaning here, see the detached note referred to above. (2) the characterisation of this community as the church of God. The first of these facts shows that Paul had not only formed the conception of churches as local assemblies and communities of Christians (vv. 2, 22), but had already united these local communities in his thought into one entity—the church. The second fact shows that this body already stood in his mind as the chosen people of God, and indicates how fully, in his thought, the Christian church had succeeded to the position once occupied by Israel. Paul’s employment of this phrase in this particular place was probably due to his sense of the wrongfulness of his persecution as directed against the church of God. Cf. 1Co 15:9. Incidentally it may be noticed that inasmuch as the church which Paul persecuted was a Jewish church, not only in that it was composed of Jews, but probably mainly of those who still observed the Jewish law, his characterisation of it as the church of God shows how far he was from denying the legitimacy of Jewish Christianity in itself. Cf. also 1Th 2:14, and see Introd., pp. lxii f.

International Critical Commentary — older volumes (1896–1929), various authors — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Conversation [αναστροφην] . Better, manner of life. See on 1Pe 1:15.

In the Jews ' religion [εν τω ιουδαισμω] . Only here and verse 14. Lit. in Judaism. It signifies his national religious condition. In LXX, 2 Macc. 2 21; 8 2; 14 38; 4 Macc. 4 26.

Beyond measure [καθ υπερβολην] . P?. Lit. according to excess. The noun primarily means a casting beyond, thence superiority, excellency. See 2Co 4:7, 17. It is transliterated in hyperbole. For similar phrases comp. 1Co 2:1; Act 19:20; Act 3:17; Act 25:23.

Wasted [επορθουν] . Better, laid waste. In Class. applied not only to things - cities, walls, fields, etc. - but also to persons. So Act 9:21.

Marvin R. Vincent, Word Studies in the New Testament (1887–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.