2 Corinthians 13 · Robertson's Word Pictures
1The third time I am coming (triton erchoma). Either the third that he had planned to come or that he had been twice. The warning is made by quoting De 19:15 .
2As when I was present the second time (os paron to deuteron). This translation assumes the second visit as already made. It is a natural way to take the Greek os paron. But os with paron can also mean "as if present" the second time (Authorized Version). Probably "as when" is the more natural rendering, but the other cannot be ruled entirely out in view of 1:15-23.
If I come again (ean eltho eis to palin). Condition of third class. The use of palin of itself suits the idea that Paul had not yet made the second visit as it means simply "again" or "back," but in Mt 26:44 we find palin ek tritou (again a third time) and so it is not decisive.
3A proof of Christ (dokimen tou Christou). He will give it to them. "I will not spare." He will show that Christ speaks "in me" (en emo).
4But we shall live with him through the power of God (alla zesomen sun auto ek dunameos theou). So real is Paul's sense of his union with Christ.
5Unless indeed ye be reprobate (e met adokimo este). Paul challenged his opposers in Corinth to try (peirazete) themselves, to test (dokimazete) themselves, whether they were "in the faith" (en te piste), a much more vital matter for them than trying to prove Paul a heretic. Such tests can be made, unless, alas, they are "reprobate" (adokimo, the very adjective that Paul held up before himself as a dreadful outcome to be avoided, 1Co 9:27 ).
6That ye shall know (ot epignosesthe). Such a testing of themselves will give them full knowledge that Paul is not
reprobate (adokimos). The best way for vacillating Christians to stop it is to draw close to Christ.
7Though we be as reprobate (emeis de os adokimo omen). Literally, "And that" (ina de). Paul wishes them to do no wrong (kakon meden). He has no desire to exercise his apostolic authority and "appear approved" (dokimo phanomen, second aorist passive subjunctive of phaino). He had far rather see them do "the noble thing" (to kalon) even if it should make him appear disapproved after all that he has said.
8Against the truth (kata tes aletheias). He means in the long run. We can hinder and hold down the truth by evil deeds (Ro 1:18 ), but in the end the truth wins.
9For we rejoice (chairomen gar). Paul had far rather be weak in the sense of failing to exercise his apostolic power because they did the noble thing. He is no Jonah who lamented when Ninevah repented.
Your perfecting (umon katartisin). Late word from katartizo, to fit, to equip (see verb in verse 11). In Plutarch, only here in N.T.
10That I may not when present deal sharply (ina paron apotomos chresoma). Late adverb from apotomos, curt, cut off. In N.T. only here and Tit 1:13 .
12With a holy kiss (en agio philemat). In the Jewish synagogues where the sexes were separated, men kissed men, the women, women. This apparently was the Christian custom also. It is still observed in the Coptic and the Russian churches. It was dropped because of charges made against the Christians by the pagans. In England in 1250 Archbishop Walter of York introduced a "pax-board" which was first kissed by the clergy and then passed around. Think of the germ theory of disease and that kissing tablet!
13The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost, be with you all (e charis tou Kuriou Iesou Christou ka e agape tou theou ka e koinonia tou agiou pneumatos meta panton umon). This benediction is the most complete of them all. It presents the persons of the Trinity in full form. From 2Th 3:17 it appears that Paul wrote the greeting or benediction with his own hand. We know from Ro 15:19 that Paul went round about unto Illyricum before, apparently, he came on to Corinth. When he did arrive (Ac 20:1-3 ) the troubles from the Judaizers had disappeared. Probably the leaders left after the coming of Titus and the brethren with this Epistle. The reading of it in the church would make a stir of no small proportions. But it did the work.
THE EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS
PROBABLE DATE A.D. 56 OR 57
BY WAY OF INTRODUCTION
It is a pity that we are not able to visualize more clearly the time and place of writing this powerful polemic against the Judaizers who were trying to draw away from the evangelical gospel the churches of Galatia. The data are not clear as in the Thessalonian and Corinthian Epistles. There are many things that can be said, but few are decisive. One is that the Epistle was written about seventeen years after Paul's conversion, adding the three years of Ga 1:18 and the fourteen of 2:1, though not insisting on the full number in either case. Unfortunately we do not know the precise year of his conversion. It was somewhere between A.D. 31 and 36. Another thing that is clear is that the Epistle was written after the Conference in Jerusalem over the Judaizing controversy to which Paul refers in Ga 2:1-10 and after the subsequent visit of Peter to Antioch (Ga 2:11-14 ). The natural interpretation of Ac 15:1-33 is to understand it as the historical narrative of the public meetings of which Paul gives an inside view in Gal 2:1-10 . Not all scholars agree to this view, but the weight of the argument is for it. If so, that rules out the contention of Ramsay and others that Galatians is the earliest of Paul's Epistles. It was written then after that Conference which took place about A.D. 49. It seems clear also that it was written after the Epistles to the Thessalonians (A.D. 50-51) which were sent from Corinth.
Did Paul mean by Galatia the Roman province as he usually does or does he make an ethnographic use of the term and mean the real Celts of North Galatia? Luke uses geographical terms in either sense. Certainly Paul preached in South Galatia in his first mission tour. See Ac 16:6 for the discussion about the language there as bearing on his going into North Galatia. By "the churches of Galatia" Paul can mean the whole of Galatia or either South or North Galatia. The various items mentioned, like the illness that led to his preaching (Ga 4:13 ), "the first time" or "formerly" ( 4:13), "so quickly" ( 1:6), are not conclusive as to time or place. If Paul means only the South Galatian Churches (Pisidia, Lycaonia, Phrygia), then the Epistle, even if two visits had been made, could come some time after the second tour of Ac 16:1f. . The place could be Philippi, Corinth, Ephesus, Antioch. Even so room must be made for the seventeen years after his conversion plus the interval thereafter (some twenty years in all). If Paul includes North Galatia, the time would be more easily handled (the twenty years required from A.D. 31 to 36 to A.D. 51 to 57) and the place could be Ephesus, Philippi, or Corinth. Special treatises on the date of Galatians have been written by Askwith (1899), Round (1906), Steinmann (1908), Weber (1900)
Lightfoot held that the similarity of Galatians to Romans (written from Corinth spring of A.D. 56 or 57) naturally argues for the same general period and place. It is a possible hypothesis that, when Paul reached Corinth late autumn or early winter of A.D. 55 or 56 (Ac 20:1f. ), he received alarming reports of the damage wrought by the Judaizers in Galatia. He had won his fight against them in Corinth (I and II Corinthians). So now he hurls this thunderbolt at them from Corinth and later, in a calmer mood, sends the fuller discussion to the church in Rome. This hypothesis is adopted here, but with full recognition of the fact that it is only hypothesis. The language and the topics and the treatment are the same that we find in Romans. Galatians thus fits in precisely between II Corinthians and Romans. It is a flaming torch in the Judaizing controversy. This Epistle was the battlecry of Martin Luther in the Reformation. Today it has served as a bulwark against the wild criticism that has sought to remove the Pauline Epistles from the realm of historical study. Paul is all ablaze in this Epistle with indignation as he faces the men who are undermining his work in Galatia.
SOME COMMENTARIES
(Only a few out of a vast number)
Adeney (1911), Bacon (1909), Beet (1885), Bousset (1907), Baljon (1889), Burton (1920), Ellicott (new ed. 1884), Emmet (1912), Findlay (1888), Girdlestone (1913), Hovey (1887), Lagrange (1918), Lietzmann (1910), Lightfoot (eleventh ed., 1905), Lipsius (1902), Martin Luther (1535; tr. 1575), MacGregor (1914), Mackenzie (1912), Ramsay (1900), Rendall (1903), Sieffert (Meyer Komm., 9 ed. 1899), Watkins (1914), Williams (1910), Windisch (2 aufl. 1926), Wood (1887), Zahn (2 aufl. 1907).
Galatians 1