Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to Galatians · About this commentary
For Freedom Christ Set Us Free
Galatians 5:1-4
1 Stand firm therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free, and don’t be entangled again with a yoke of bondage. · WEB
Freedom is named as the purpose rather than a by-product, and then the cost of the alternative is stated in three escalating sentences.
Stand firm therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free. The construction is almost tautological on purpose — freed for freedom — and it makes liberty the aim of the act rather than a side effect of it.
The two verbs are worth separating. Stand firm is a military word for holding a position, and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage uses the image of an animal put back under harness. The again is the same charge as chapter 4 Galatians 4:9.
Then verse 2, and Paul signs it: behold, I, Paul, tell you. What follows is the sharpest thing in the letter. If you receive circumcision, Christ will profit you nothing.
The claim is not that circumcision harms in itself — the same letter says twice that it amounts to nothing either way Galatians 5:6 Galatians 6:15. What is fatal is receiving it as the thing that completes one's standing. Taken that way it is no addition to Christ but a substitute, and a substitute yields nothing.
Verse 3 gives the logic: a man who takes on the system as a means of righteousness is a debtor to do the whole law. Nobody buys a portion. The curse of chapter 3 attached to any discontinuance in all things written Galatians 3:10, and that is the account being opened.
Verse 4 states the result in two clauses that are hard to soften: you are alienated from Christ, and you have fallen away from grace. The second verb is the one for slipping out of something one was held in.
settled What this mark means