Galatians 4:8 - Exposition

Howbeit ( ἀλλά ); a strongly adversative conjunction, belonging to the whole sentence comprised in this and the next verse, which are closely welded together by the particles μὲν and δέ . In contravention of God's work of grace just described, they were renouncing their sonship and making themselves slaves afresh. Then ( τότε μέν ). The μέν , with its balancing δέ , here, as often is the case, unites together sentences not in their main substance strictly adverse to each other, but only in subordinate details contrasted, of which we have an exemplary instance in Romans 8:17 , κληρονόμους μὲν θεοῦ συγκληρονόμους δὲ χριστοῦ . In such cases we have often no resource in English but to leave the μὲν untranslated, as our Authorized Version commonly does; "indeed" or "truly," for example, would be more or less misleading. The truth is, the apostle in these two verses is heaping reproach upon the Galatian Judaizers; first, in this verse, for their former (guilty) ignorance of God and their idolatries, and then, in the next verse, for their slighting that blessed friendship with God which they owed only to his preventing grace. In dealing with Gentile Christians the apostle repeatedly is found referring to their former heathenism, for the purpose of enforcing humility or abashing presumption, as for example in Romans 11:17-25 ; Romans 15:8 , Romans 15:9 ; 1 Corinthians 12:2 ; Ephesians 2:11-13 , Ephesians 2:17 . In the case of the Galatians his indignation prompts him to use a degree of outspoken severity which he was generally disposed to forbear employing. The "then" is not defined, as English readers might perhaps misconstrue the Authorized Version as intending, by the following clause, "not knowing God," which in that version is "when ye knew not God"—a construction of the words which the use of the participle would hardly warrant; rather the time referred to by the adverb is the time of which he has before been speaking, when God's people were under the pedagogy of the Law. This, though when compared with Christ's liberty a state of bondage, was, however (the apostle feels), a position of high advancement as compared with that of heathen idolaters. These last were " far off," while the Israelites were " nigh " (compare the passages just now referred to). During that time of legal pedagogy the Galatians and their forefathers, all in the apostle's view forming one class, were wallowing in the mire of heathenism. When ye knew not God ( οὐκ εἰδότες θεόν ); ye knew not God and , etc. "Knowing not God" describes the condition of heathens also in 1 Thessalonians 4:5 ," Not in the passion of lust, even as the Gentiles which know not ( τὰ μὴ εἰδότα ) God;" 2 Thessalonians 1:8 , "Rendering vengeance to them that know not ( τοῖς μὴ εἰδόσιν ) God." Both of these passages favour the view that the apostle does not in the least intend in the present clause to excuse the idolatries which he goes on to speak of, but rather to describe a condition of godlessness which, as being positive rather than merely negative, inferred utter pravity and guiltiness. He uses οὐκ with the participle here, in place of the μὴ in the two passages c ited from the Thessalonians , as intending to state an historical fact viewed absolutely—a sense which is made clear in English by substituting an indicative verb for the participle. Ye did service unto ( ἐδουλεύσατε ); served ; devoted yourselves to. The verb is, perhaps, used here in that milder sense in which it frequently occurs; as in Matthew 6:24 ; Luke 15:29 ; Luke 16:13 ; Acts 20:19 ; Romans 7:6 , Romans 7:25 ; Romans 14:18 ; 1 Thessalonians 1:9 . The Revised Version, however, gives "were in bondage to" in the present instance, but "serve" in the passages now cited. The aorist, instead of an imperfect, describes the form of religious life which they then led as a whole. Them which by nature are no gods ( τοῖς φύσει μὴ οὗσι θεοῖς ). The Textus Receptus has τοῖς μὴ φύσει οὖσι θεοῖς , which would apparently mean "which arc not gods by nature, but only in your imagination;" like "There be that are called gods," in 1 Corinthians 8:5 —Zeus, Apollo, Here, etc., mere figments of imagination. The more approved reading suggests rather the idea that the objects they worshipped might not be non-existent, but were certainly not of a Divine nature; "by nature," that is, in the kind of being to which they belong ( Ephesians 2:3 ; Wis. 13:1, μάταιοι φύσει ). The question may be asked—If they were not gods, what then were they? The apostle would probably have answered, "Demons;" for thus he writes to the Corinthians ( 1 Corinthians 10:20 ): "The things which the Gentiles sacrifice they sacrifice to devils ( δαιμονίοις ), and not to God." Alford renders, "to gods which by nature exist not," etc.; but the more obvious sense of οὖσιν is that of a copula merely").