GALATIANS

¹Cf. E. D. Burton, The Epistle to the Galatians (“The International Critical Commentary,” ed. S. R. Driver, A. Plummer, C. A. Briggs; Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1921), pp. lxv-lxxi.

²Ibid., p. lxxi.

³Cf. Ibid., pp. xliv-liii.

⁴Gal. 4:13; cf. Burton's argument that this does not conclusively prove two visits, but does strongly suggest it, Ibid., p. xlv.

⁵Acts 18:11. The return visit to the churches on the first journey would not have allowed time for the apostasy to develop (Acts 14:21-25).

⁶Cf. J. B. Lightfoot's detailed analysis of this similarity as well as with the Corinthian letters, Saint Paul's Epistle to the Galatians (London: Macmillan and Co., 1892), pp. 45-56.

⁷Cf. the date of Romans in William Sanday and Arthur C. Headlam, The Epistle to the Romans (“The International Critical Commentary”; New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1920), pp. xxxvi-xxxvii.

⁸Gal. 1:6. Cf. Lightfoot's argument that this is not significant, op. cit., pp. 41-43.

⁹The early civilization west of the Rhine River was generally called “Celtic” by the early Greek classical writers, but by New Testament times was called “Galatian” by the Greeks and “Gallic” by the Romans. Modern philologists prefer the term “Celtic.” Cf. Lightfoot, op. cit., pp. 1-17, for an excellent summary of this civilization.

¹⁰Burton designates the geographical limits of their region as follows: “a territory somewhat north and east of centre, bounded on the north by Bithynia and Paphlagonia, on the east by Pontus, on the south by Cappadocia and Lycaonia, and on the west by Phrygia, and traversed by the rivers Halys and Sangarius,” op. cit., p. xix.

¹¹Cf. Burton, op. cit., p. xix.

¹²Burton designates the geographical limits of the Roman province of Galatia as the district described above “and the adjacent portions of Lycaonia, Pisidia, and Phrygia” (op. cit., p. xxi). Lightfoot suggests that Isauria was also included (op. cit., p. 7).

¹³It is particularly significant that these people possessed quick apprehension, and an impressionable mind that craved knowledge; but were also inconstant, quarrelsome, treacherous, unstable, and easily disheartened by failure. Their religion (native) was basically superstitious, passionate, and ritualistic, with a slavish obedience to priestly authority. Cf. the excellent summary of the racial characteristics of the Celts in Lightfoot, op. cit., pp. 14-17.

¹⁴Cf. the excellent summary of the history of opinion on this question by Burton, op. cit., pp. xxiv-xxv. It is of interest to note that in the ancient Church it was assumed that Paul referred to the northern territory of the Celtic migrants. The “South-Galatia Theory” was not proposed until near the end of the eighteenth century.

¹⁵Burton argues that “Phrygian” probably is a noun and not an adjective (op. cit., p. xxxviii).

¹⁶“In contrast to Luke's mixed usage, cf. Burton, op. cit., pp. xxv-xxix.

¹⁷Burton states that the Lycaonian people were no less warmhearted and fickle than the Celts (op. cit., p. xlii).

¹⁸The Jerusalem Council was probably held in A.D. 48 or 49 (cf. Acts 15; Gal. 2:1-10).

¹⁹William F. Arndt and F. Wilbur Gingrich, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1957)