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PARALLEL BIBLE - Galatians 2:21


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King James Bible - Galatians 2:21

I do not frustrate the grace of God: for if righteousness come by the law, then Christ is dead in vain.

World English Bible

I don't make void the grace of God. For if righteousness is through the law, then Christ died for nothing!"

Douay-Rheims - Galatians 2:21

I cast not away the grace of God. For if justice be by the law, then Christ died in vain.

Webster's Bible Translation

I do not frustrate the grace of God: for if righteousness is attainable by the law, then Christ hath died in vain.

Greek Textus Receptus


ουκ
3756 αθετω 114 5719 την 3588 χαριν 5485 του 3588 θεου 2316 ει 1487 γαρ 1063 δια 1223 νομου 3551 δικαιοσυνη 1343 αρα 686 χριστος 5547 δωρεαν 1432 απεθανεν 599 5627

Treasury of Scriptural Knowledge

VERSE (21) -
:18 Ps 33:10 Mr 7:9 *marg:

SEV Biblia, Chapter 2:21

No desecho la gracia de Dios; porque si por la ley fuese la justicia, entonces por dems muri Cristo.

Clarke's Bible Commentary - Galatians 2:21

Verse 21. I do not frustrate] ouk aqetw? I do not contemn,
despise, or render useless, the grace of God-the doctrine of Christ crucified; which I must do if I preach the necessity of observing the law.

For if righteousness] If justification and salvation come by an observance of the law, then Christ is dead in vain; his death is useless if an observance of the law can save us; but no observance of the law can save us, and therefore there was an absolute necessity for the death of Christ.

1. THE account of the prevarication of Pet. in the preceding chapter teaches us a most useful lesson. Let him who assuredly standeth take heed lest he fall. No person in a state of probation is infallible; a man may fall into sin every moment; and he will, if he do not walk with God. Worldly prudence and fleshly wisdom would have concealed this account of the prevarication of Peter; but God tells truth. This the fountain of it; and from him we are to expect not only nothing but the truth, but also the whole truth. If the Gospel were not of God we had never heard of the denial and prevarication of Peter, nor of the contention between Paul and Barnabas. And these accounts are recorded, not that men may justify or excuse their own delinquencies by them, but that they may avoid them; for he must be inexcusable who, with these histories before his eyes, ever denies his Master, or acts the part of a hypocrite. Had the apostles acted in concert to impose a forgery on the world as a Divine revelation, the imposture would have now come out. The falling out of the parties would have led to a discovery of the cheat. This relation, therefore, is an additional evidence of the truth of the Gospel.

2. On, I through the law am dead to the law, &c., pious Quesnel makes the following useful reflections: "The ceremonial law, which is no more than a type and shadow of him, destroys itself by showing us Jesus Christ, who is the truth and the substance. The moral law, by leaving us under our own inability under sin and the curse, makes us perceive the necessity of the law of the heart, and of a saviour to give it. The law is for the old man, as to its terrible and servile part; and it was crucified and died with Christ upon the cross as well as the old man. The new man, and the new law, require a new sacrifice. What need has he of other sacrifices who has Jesus Christ? They in whom this sacrifice lives, do themselves live to God alone; but none can live to him except by faith; and this life of faith consists in dying with Christ to the things of the present world, and in expecting, as co-heirs with him, the blessings of the eternal world. And who can work all this in us but only he who lives in us? That man has arrived to a high degree of mortification, who can say Christ liveth in me, and I am crucified to the world. Such a one must have renounced not only earthly things, but his own self also." 3. Is there, or can there be, any well grounded hope of eternal life but what comes through the Gospel? In vain has the ingenuity of man tortured itself for more than 5000 years, to find out some method of mending the human heart: none has been discovered that even promised any thing likely to be effectual. The Gospel of Christ not only mends but completely cures and new makes infected nature. Who is duly apprised of the infinite excellency and importance of the Gospel? What was the world before its appearance? What would it be were this light extinguished? Blessed Lord! let neither infidelity nor false doctrine rise up to obscure this heavenly splendour!


John Gill's Bible Commentary

Ver. 21. I do not frustrate the grace of God , etc..] Or cast it away, as the Vulgate Latin version reads it; or deny it, as the Syriac and Arabic; or despise, reject, and make it void, as other versions; meaning either the grace of the Son of God in giving himself for him, just mentioned by him; or the particular doctrine of grace, justification, he is speaking of, as proceeding from the grace of God, upon the foot of the righteousness of Christ; or the whole Gospel, all and each of which would be denied, despised, rejected, made null and void, be in vain, fallen and departed from, should justification be sought for by the works of the law: but this the apostle did not do, and therefore did not frustrate the grace of God: which to do would be to act the most ungenerous and ungrateful part to God, and Christ, and to that love and grace which are so largely displayed in the free justification of a sinner. For if righteousness come by the law ; if a justifying righteousness is to be attained unto by the works of the law, or men can be justified by their obedience to it, then Christ is dead in vain ; there was no necessity for his dying: he died without any true reason, or just cause; he died to bring in a righteousness which might have been brought in without his death, and so his blood and life might have been spared, his sufferings and death being entirely unnecessary; which to say is to cast contempt upon the wisdom, love, and grace of God in this matter, and to offer the greatest indignity to the person, character, sufferings, and death of Christ. Wherefore it may be strongly concluded, that there is no righteousness by the law of works, nor to be attained that way, otherwise Christ had never died; and that justification is solely and alone by his righteousness.

Matthew Henry Commentary

Verses 20, 21 - Here, in his own person, the
apostle describes the spiritual or hidde life of a believer. The old man is crucified, Ro 6:6, but the new ma is living; sin is mortified, and grace is quickened. He has the comforts and the triumphs of grace; yet that grace is not from himself but from another. Believers see themselves living in a state of dependence on Christ. Hence it is, that though he lives in the flesh yet he does not live after the flesh. Those who have true faith, liv by that faith; and faith fastens upon Christ's giving himself for us He loved me, and gave himself for me. As if the apostle said, The Lor saw me fleeing from him more and more. Such wickedness, error, an ignorance were in my will and understanding, that it was not possibl for me to be ransomed by any other means than by such a price. Conside well this price. Here notice the false faith of many. And their profession is accordingly; they have the form of godliness without the power of it. They think they believe the articles of faith aright, but they are deceived. For to believe in Christ crucified, is not only to believe that he was crucified, but also to believe that I am crucifie with him. And this is to know Christ crucified. Hence we learn what is the nature of grace. God's grace cannot stand with man's merit. Grac is no grace unless it is freely given every way. The more simply the believer relies on Christ for every thing, the more devotedly does he walk before Him in all his ordinances and commandments. Christ live and reigns in him, and he lives here on earth by faith in the Son of God, which works by love, causes obedience, and changes into his holy image. Thus he neither abuses the grace of God, nor makes it in vain __________________________________________________________________


Greek Textus Receptus


ουκ
3756 αθετω 114 5719 την 3588 χαριν 5485 του 3588 θεου 2316 ει 1487 γαρ 1063 δια 1223 νομου 3551 δικαιοσυνη 1343 αρα 686 χριστος 5547 δωρεαν 1432 απεθανεν 599 5627

Vincent's NT Word Studies

21. Frustrate (aqetw). Annul or invalidate. Comp.
Mark vii. 9; 1 Corinthians i. 19; Gal. iii. 15.

The grace of God (thn carin tou qeou). Cariv is, primarily, that which gives joy (cara). Its higher, Christian meaning is based on the emphasis of freeness in a gift or favor. It is the free, spontaneous, absolute loving kindness of God toward men. Hence often in contrast with the ideas of debt, law, works, sin. Sometimes for the gift of grace, the benefaction, as 1 Cor. xvi. 3; 2 Cor. viii. 6, 19; 1 Pet. i. 10, 13. So here: the gracious gift of God in the offering of Christ.

Is dead (apeqanen). More correctly, died; pointing to the historical incident.

In vain (dwrean). Groundlessly, without cause. See on 2 Thessalonians iii. 8. The sense here is not common. It is not found in Class., and in N.T. only John xv. 25. In LXX, see Psalm xxxiv. 7, 19; cviii. 3; cxviii. 161; 1 Samuel xix. 5; Sir. xx. 23; xxix. 6. Comp. Ignatius, Trall. 5. Paul says: "I do not invalidate the grace of God in the offering of Christ, as one does who seeks to reestablish the law as a means of justification; for if righteousness comes through the law, there was no occasion for Christ to die."

ADDITIONAL NOTE ON VERSES 14-21.

The course of thought in Paul's address to Peter is difficult to follow. It will help to simplify it if the reader will keep it before him that the whole passage is to be interpreted in the light of Peter's false attitude - as a remonstrance against a particular state of things.

The line of remonstrance is as follows. If you, Peter, being a Jew, do not live as a Jew, but as a Gentile, as you did when you ate with Gentiles, why do you, by your example in withdrawing from Gentile tables, constrain Gentile Christians to live as Jews, observing the separative ordinances of the Jewish law? This course is plainly inconsistent.

Even you and I, born Jews, and not Gentiles - sinners - denied the obligation of these ordinances by the act of believing on Jesus Christ. In professing this faith we committed ourselves to the principle that no one can be justified by the works of the law.

But it may be said that we were in no better case by thus abandoning the law and legal righteousness, since, in the very effort to be justified through Christ, we were shown to be sinners, and therefore in the same category with the Gentiles. Does it not then follow that Christ is proved to be a minister of sin in requiring us to abandon the law as a means of justification?

No. God forbid. It is true that, in seeking to be justified in Christ, we stood revealed as sinners, for it was Christ who showed us that we could not be justified by the works of the law; that all our legal strictness only left us sinners. But the inference is false that Christ is thereby shown to be a minister of sin.

For to say that Christ is a minister of sin, is to say that I, at his bidding, became a transgressor by abandoning the law, that the law is the only true standard and medium of righteousness. If I reassert the obligation of the law after denying that obligation, I thereby assert that I transgressed in abandoning it, and that Christ, who prompted and demanded this transgression, is a minister of sin.

But this I deny. The law is not the true standard and medium of righteousness. I did not transgress in abandoning it. Christ is not a minister of sin. For it was the law itself which compelled me to abandon the law. The law crucified Christ and thereby declared him accursed. In virtue of my moral fellowship with Christ, I was (ethically) crucified with him. The act of the law forced me to break with the law. Through the law I died to the law. Thus I came under a new principle of life. I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. If I should declare that righteousness is through the law, by reasserting the obligation of the law as you, Peter, have done, I should annul the grace of God as exhibited in the death of Christ: for in that case, Christ's death would be superfluous and useless. But I do not annul the grace of God.


Robertson's NT Word Studies

2:21 {I do not make void the grace of God} (ouk aqetw ten carin tou qeou). Common word in LXX and Polybius and on, to make ineffective (a privative and tiqemi, to place or put). Some critic would charge him with that after his claim to such a close mystic union with Christ. {qen Christ died for nought} (ara cristos dwrean apeqanen). Condition of first class, assumed as true. If one man apart from grace can win his own righteousness, any man can and should. Hence (ara, accordingly) Christ died gratuitously (dwrean), unnecessarily. Adverbial accusative of dwrea, a gift. this verse is a complete answer to those who say that the heathen (or any mere moralist) are saved by doing the best that they know and can. No one, apart from Jesus, ever did the best that he knew or could. To be saved by law (dia nomou) one has to keep all the law that he knows. That no one ever did.


CHAPTERS: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6
VERSES: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21

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