this momentous crisis in the history of his most influential Church (viii. 6; xii. 18; 1 Cor. xvi. 12).

In his disappointment at not finding Titus, he had no heart to embrace the opportunity of preaching at Troas, and had proceeded to Macedonia (ii. 12-13), where Titus at length joined him (vii. 5-6). It was after getting Titus' report, bringing him great relief of mind in the midst of his severe trials and heavy responsibilities (vii. 4-16; xi. 28), that he appears to have written this epistle,-which he sent by the hands of Titus and "the brother whose praise in the gospel is spread through all the churches" (viii. 6, 16-18).

A difficulty has been raised about the expression in xiii. 1, "This is the third time I am coming to you." Some think the apostle had paid a second visit to Corinth, from Ephesus, prior to the writing of his first epistle. But another explanation is to be found in the importance attaching to the visit he had intended to pay on his way to Macedonia (i. 15). The confidence of the Corinthians in him had been shaken by the disappointment he had caused them; and he wished to impress upon them the reality of his intention, although he had been unable to fulfil it. No doubt he would have been more strictly accurate if he had expressed himself as in xii. 14, "Behold, this is the third time I am ready to come to you."

Its Character and Contents.-If 1 Cor. may be said to be our great instructor regarding the inner life of the Church, the second epistle is our chief source of information regarding the personality of the apostle himself. It is an outpouring of personal feeling almost from beginning to end, expressing itself in many dif ferent moods and with a great variety of style. It is well described by Erasmus when he says that "at one time the apostle wells up gently like some limpid spring, and by and by thunders down like a torrent with a mighty crash, carrying everything before it; now he flows placidly and smoothly, now spreads out far and wide, as if expanding into a lake, then disappears, and

suddenly reappears in a different place." But although the least systematic of Paul's writings, it contains many passages of priceless worth, for the comfort and edification of the Church.

The apostle had learned from Titus that his first letter had served its purpose and that the interests of Church discipline had been secured. But the same messenger

had informed him that fresh cause for anxiety had arisen in the rapid growth of a party hostile to his influence, who were seeking to trade upon the disaffection which had been caused among his converts by his failure to visit them according to promise (i. 16-17).

Traces of such opposition are discernible even in the first epistle (1 Cor. i. 12; ix. 1-6); but it had been greatly stimulated by the intrigues and false pretensions of rival teachers from Jerusalem, who had brought letters of commendation with them, and were using Peter's name, and even that of Christ, for party purposes (ii. 17; iii. I-2 ; V. I2; X 7-I2, 18; xi. 3-5, I2-15, 22-23).

To defeat the efforts of these Judaising teachers and to refute the charges and insinuations which they were bringing against him was the main object of this epistle. By doing so the apostle hoped to obviate the necessity for any sharp dealing after he arrived at Corinth (xii. 20-21; xiii. 10).

In i.-vii. Paul seeks to conciliate the affection of his converts by giving them an account of his sufferings and of the anxiety he had felt on their behalf. He explains that his delay in visiting them had not been owing to any fickleness of purpose on his part, but to a desire for the restoration of peace and purity before he came among them. He gives a frank exposition of his views and feelings, his trials and supports, as a minister of Christ, making glad and thankful acknowledgment of the kind reception they had given to his deputy, and of the full amends they had made in the important case of Church discipline about which he had written to them. In viii.-ix. he exhorts them to a prompt and liberal fulfilment of their promise to contribute for the relief of

the needy brethren at Jerusalem,-a promise of which he had boasted to the churches at Macedonia in order to stimulate their generosity. In this connection

he sets forth more fully than anywhere else in his writings the motives and dispositions which should actuate Christians in the discharge of this duty of pecuniary liberality.

At this point there is a sudden change in the apostle's tone; and the remainder of the epistle (x.-xiii.) is devoted to a vindication of his character as an apostle. He enumerates his many claims to the respect and obedience of his converts, and closes with an impressive salutation, followed by the form of Benediction which has now become so general in the Church: "The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost, be with you all.”

That the epistle succeeded in regaining, or rather in retaining, for the apostle the general confidence of his Corinthian converts, may be inferred from the veneration in which his memory was held amongst them a few years after his death. Of this veneration we find unmistakable tokens in the epistle of Clement to the Corinthians, written towards the close of the first century.

CHAPTER XII

66 THE EPISTLE OF PAUL TO THE GALATIANS "

WHO wrote it.-This is another epistle whose

genuineness is scarcely disputed. Its main topic -the relation of Christians to the ceremonial law of the Jews-would lead us to fix its composition at a period anterior to the destruction of Jerusalem, when the question was practically set at rest.

Its character and style are inconsistent with the idea of forgery. (1) The picture which it gives of the state of the Galatian Church is too lifelike, and the play of feeling it exhibits on the part of the apostle is too subtle for the inventive power of an age so little skilled in that kind of fiction. (2) Its representation of facts, as regards the relations of Paul with the other apostles, is too candid to have been got up in the interests of Church unity, and on the other hand is too moderate in its tone to have been framed in the interests of any known party in the Church. (3) A comparison of the personal and historical allusions in the epistle with statements in the Book of Acts and some of the other epistles ascribed to Paul, shows a substantial harmony, along with an occasional diversity that betokens independence—the epistle furnishing details of many incidents in Paul's life that are only mentioned in a general way by the author of the Book of Acts.1 (4) There is in several respects a

1 For proofs of independence, cf. i. 15-18, Acts ix. 19-26; ii. 1-10, Acts xv. 1-21; ii. 11-14 (which has nothing corresponding to it in

strong resemblance between this epistle and those to the Corinthians and the Romans (see p. 74).

With regard to external evidence there are the usual echoes and reflections in the Apostolic Fathers and the apologetic writers of the first two centuries; while many direct quotations are to be found in the writings of the Fathers about the end of the second century. The epistle is also included in the Canons and Versions of the second century.

To whom written. "Unto the churches of Galatia." In the time of the apostle, Galatia might either be understood to refer to the recently created Roman province of that name in Asia Minor, or be used in the older and more popular sense, to designate a broad strip of country in that province, about two hundred miles long, running from south-west to north-east. It is in this latter sense that the term "Galatia" is usually understood here, in accordance with the usage in the Book of Acts.* It was inhabited by a mixed race of Phrygians, Greeks, Celts, Romans, and Jews, who had successively obtained a footing in it by different means and with varying degrees of success. Of these elements of the population it was the Celtic invaders from Western Europe that had made their influence most strongly felt. They found their way into the country in the third century B.C.; and after them and the Greek immigrants who were there before them the country was called Gallo-Græcia. So deep and lasting was their influence, that even in the end of the fourth century A.D. Jerome was able to trace a strong resemblance between the language of Galatia and that spoken on the banks of the Moselle and the Rhine; and modern travellers have been struck with the fair hair and blue eyes that mark an affinity between the pastoral tribes of Galatia and the peasantry of Western France.

Acts, although corroborated in some of its circumstances by xi. 25, 26; xiv. 26, xv. 1-24, xxi. 18-25). For fulness of detail in this epistle see ii.; i. 17-19, Acts ix. 25-28, xxii. 18; iv. 13-14, cf. 2 Cor. xii. 7-9; vi. 1, cf. 2 Cor. ii. 6-8; vi. 11, cf. Rom. xvi. 22, 2 Thess. iii. 17.

* See Note A, p. 76.