Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to Galatians · About this commentary
Who Has Bewitched You
Galatians 3:1-3
1 Foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you not to obey the truth, before whose eyes Jesus Christ was openly portrayed among you as crucified? · WEB
The argument turns from Paul's history to the Galatians' own, and the first question is one they can answer from memory.
The address is blunt: foolish Galatians. And the verb that follows suggests something worse than a mistake — bewitched, the word for casting the evil eye, an influence that works on someone rather than persuading them.
The reproach in verse 1 turns on what they had already seen. Jesus Christ was openly portrayed among you as crucified — the verb is used of a public notice posted where everyone reads it. The cross had not been a subtlety they missed; it had been placarded.
Then verse 2, and it is the letter's most effective argument because it requires no theology to settle. Did you receive the Spirit by the works of the law, or by hearing of faith?
They had received the Spirit — not in dispute, a fact both sides grant Galatians 3:5 — and it had happened before anyone raised circumcision. The question is historical rather than doctrinal, and the Galatians are the witnesses.
Verse 3 draws the conclusion as a second question, and the two verbs are chosen for direction. Having begun in the Spirit, are you now completed in the flesh? Beginning and completing belong together; nobody starts by one means and finishes by another. The word for flesh is the one the letter uses of circumcision itself Galatians 6:13.
What is being proposed to them is not advancement. It is a change of engine mid-course.
settled What this mark means