The Great Commentary of Cornelius a Lapide: the Epistle to the Galatians
Jerome, however, refers the word immediately to the preceding clause, thus : “ To reveal him immediately in the Gentiles I conferred not with flesh and blood ” “ Since I was ordered by God immediately to preach to the Gentiles, I immediately obeyed, so that I took no counsel with any man. Afterwards, however, I did confer with Peter, James, and John.” The first explanation, however, is better. Or it may be rendered : I did not see, I did not cling to my earthly parents and relations, but, loving them, I followed the call of God (Augustine and Œcumenius).
Morally, he follows S. Paul’s example who is called by God to the apostleship, to religion, to evangelical perfection, to heroic works, and does not yield to flesh and blood, but at once departs to gain that to which he feels himself called. S. Jerome writes to Heliodorus : “ O delicate soldier , what do you in your father’s house ? Where is the rampart , the fosse , the winter spent under tents ? Call to mind the day of your enlistment, when you were buried with Christ in baptism , when you took your military oath that for His name you would spare neither father nor mother. Lo ! the adversary is trying to slay Christ in your breast Lo ! the camp of the enemy is thirsting for the donative which you received when you started on your warfare. What , though a little grandson hang on your neck ; though your mother , with dishevelled hair and garments rent, bare the breasts which suckled you; though your father lie on the threshold: go forth, trampling on his body, and with dry eyes hasten to the banner of the Cross. Filial piety demands that in this you be cruel. . . . The love of God and the fear of hell will easily break your fetters. If they believe in Christ, let them assist me who am about to fight for His name. If they do not, let the dead bury their dead.”
Again, he writes to that noble widow, Furia : “ The father will be sorrowful, but Christ will rejoice ; the family will mourn, but there will be joy among the angels. Let your father do what he will with your goods. It is not he for whom you were born, but Christ, for whom you have been born again, who has redeemed you at a great price, even His own blood, of whom you have to think. Beware of nurses and bearers and venomous animals of that sort, who seek to fill their bellies with your husks. They advise not what is for your good but their own.”
S. Bernard too, preaching on the text, “ Lo, we have left all,” says : “ How many does the accursed wisdom of the world overcome, and extinguish the fire kindled in them, which the Lord had wished to see burn fiercely ! Do nothing, it says, in a hurry : take plenty of time to think over it; it is an important step that you are proposing to take ; you had better try first what you can do, and consult your friends, lest you come afterwards to be sorry for your action. This wisdom of the world is earthly, sensual, devilish, the foe of salvation, the destroyer of life, the mother of lust, and abominable unto the Lord.”
Ver. 17. — Neither went I up to Jerusalem. But Acts ix. 26 represents Paul as flying directly after his conversion from Damascus to Jerusalem. Jerome and Lorinus, when commenting on that passage, say that he went to Jerusalem directly after his conversion, because compelled to seek safety in flight, not that he might see Peter and confer with him about the Gospel, for this latter is all that is denied here. Baronius replies differently, that Paul is not said directly after his conversion to have gone to Jerusalem, but after many days, i.e., after three years, spent partly in Arabia, partly in Damascus. After that he came to see Peter, as is said here (ver. 18), and afterwards went into the regions of Syria and Cilicia (ver. 21). With this agrees Acts ix. 30, where it is said that the brethren brought him down to Cæsarea and sent him forth to Tarsus , which is the metropolis of Cilicia. If this be the true explanation, then S. Luke, in Acts ix., passes over the journey of Paul into Arabia, because in it nothing calling for mention had happened.
Both explanations are tenable. But the fear of the Apostles and the sponsorship of Barnabas (Acts ix. 26, 27) favour the former. It is not likely that the miraculous conversion of Paul could for three years have remained unknown to the Apostles and the rest of the faithful at Jerusalem. If this be correct, then we must, with S. Chrysostom, marvel at the grace of God which so suddenly changed so bitter a persecutor as S. Paul was into a public teacher and a disputer with the Jews.
Ver. 18. — Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to see Peter . Chrysostom and Theophylact remark on the distinction between ἰδεῖν and the word ἱστορῆσαι , used here. This latter is used of those who visit and go round splendid cities, like Rome, and carefully inspect its monuments, its Pontiff, its Cardinals, its clergy, and holy men. I came to Jerusalem, says S. Paul, to see Peter, not to learn anything from him (though Erasmus thinks that ἱστορῆσαι connotes this), for I had been taught from above, but merely to see and pay my respect to the chief of the Apostles (Theodoret, Chrysostom, Ambrose, Jerome). In Gal. ii. 2 Paul gives another reason for his visit.
S. Chrysostom writes : “ Peter was the chief and the mouth of the Apostles , and therefore Paul went up to see him especially ” ( Horn . in Joan . 87). And S. Jerome on this passage: “ Paul came to see Peter— not to gaze on his eyes , cheeks , and countenance — to see if he was fat or lean , if he had a hooked or a straight nose , whether he had hair on his head , or was (as Clement relates) bald headed . Nor is it to be supposed consistent with apostolical dignity , that after such a preparation of three years he should wish to see anything in Peter that was merely human . Paul saw Cephas with those same eyes with which he himself is seen still by those who have power to see him . If this does not seem clear to any one , let him compare this sentence with the one before , in which it is said that the Apostles conferred nothing on him . For he went to Jerusalem , that he might see an Apostle , not to learn anything from him— for both had the same authority for their preaching — but to do honour to one who was an Apostle before him.” From this it is clear that Paul did not see Peter that he might be taught by him, as Erasmus and Vatablus think. For this is contradicted by Gal ii. 6 : “ They added nothing to me,” and by Gal. i. 11, 12, where he expressly says that he had been taught not by man but by God.
Ver. 19. — But other of the apostles saw I none save James the Lord’s brother. I.e., a cousin or relation of Christ’s, for the Hebrews call cousins brothers. S. Jerome adds that S. James was called the Lord’s brother before all the Apostles, even those related to Christ, on account of his lofty character, his incomparable faith and wisdom, which made him seem like a brother to Christ. For the same reason he was surnamed the Just. Secondly, S. Jerome says that Christ, when going to His Father, commended to James, as to a , the eldest children of His mother, i.e., those in Judaea who believed on Him; for this James, the son of Alphaeus, the son of Mary, wife of Cleophas, one of the twelve Apostles, was the first Bishop of Jerusalem. This is why, in the First Council of Jerusalem, he was the first after Peter to pronounce judgment (Acts xv. 13). A Canonical Epistle of his is extant.
S. Jerome hints both here and in his book on Ecclesiastical Writers, when writing of James, that this James was not of the twelve Apostles, but was called an Apostle, only because he had seen Christ and preached Him. In this case we have three of the name of James — the brother of John, slain by Herod ; the son of Alphaeus, both of whom were Apostles ; and this brother of the Lord. But since this brother of the Lord is called an Apostle, and there is no cogent reason for distinguishing him from James the Apostle and son of Alphaeus, when, indeed, there are many reasons why we should identify them, the first opinion seems the better one.
Ver. 20. — Before God I lie not. Vatablus paraphrases this verse : “What I write unto you, behold I write before God — I lie not ;” and Theophylact agrees with him. But Ambrose and Augustine think that before God is a formal oath — I call God to witness. The Apostle asserts that he had not seen the other Apostles so strenuously that no one might be able to say that he had visited them in secret, and had not been taught by God (Jerome).
Ver. 22. — And was unknown by face. The Christians in Judaea had not seen my face. He says this, says Chrysostom, to prove that he had not taught in Judaea, nor preached circumcision and the Old Law, as the Judaisers alleged he had done.
Which were in Christ — in His faith and religion; which were Christians. See my canon 37.