Galatians 1:22 - Printer Friendly

ESV: And I was still unknown in person to the churches of Judea that are in Christ.

NIV: I was personally unknown to the churches of Judea that are in Christ.

NASB: I was still unknown by sight to the churches of Judea which are in Christ;

CSB: I remained personally unknown to the Judean churches that are in Christ.

NLT: And still the churches in Christ that are in Judea didn’t know me personally.

KJV: And was unknown by face unto the churches of Judaea which were in Christ:

NKJV: And I was unknown by face to the churches of Judea which were in Christ.

The Judaizers were questioning Paul's legitimacy as an apostle, apparently suggesting he had merely been trained by the other apostles. If that were the case, Paul could not rightly call himself an apostle. An apostle, in New Testament terms, mostly referred to someone who had spent time in Jesus' company and who had been sent by Christ to do a specific work.

Paul has shared his story of coming to Christ. God had revealed His Son to Paul. The Lord had, indeed, sent Paul to preach to the Gentiles. After his conversion, Paul had spent three years off on his own followed by one brief stint in Jerusalem with Peter and Jesus' brother James. He had then gone to Syria and Cilicia, nowhere near Jerusalem and Judea.

That's why he says in this verse that he was an "unknown person" in that region. His point is that he learned all he knew about the gospel of Jesus while he was away from the other apostles. Those great truths were revealed to him by Christ.

Galatians 1:11–24 begins with Paul's statement that he did not receive the gospel which he taught to the Galatians from any man-made religion, nor training from other people. He received it from Christ Himself. God revealed His Son Jesus to Paul, by His grace, even after Paul spent years as a Pharisee trying to destroy the Christian church. After Christ commissioned Paul to preach the good news to the Gentiles, he went off by himself for a few years and came to know the gospel through Christ directly.

Paul begins his letter to the Galatian churches abruptly, compared to his other writings. He has heard they are deserting the gospel which he preached and they believed: the good news that Jesus died to fully pay for all our sins on the cross. The Judaizers taught that these Gentiles must also follow the law of Moses to be saved and openly questioned Paul's authority. Paul makes the case that he has been made an apostle by Christ, who appeared to him and revealed the truth to him apart from the other apostles.

Galatians 1 begins one of the most-loved books about God's grace in all of Scripture. This and the following chapter detail Paul's biography, as he makes the case that he has been made an apostle by Christ and therefore his message is trustworthy. Chapters 3 and 4 go into depth about exactly what the gospel of God's grace is and why it is true. In chapters 5 and 6, Paul teaches about how Christians should live in the world as people who have received the grace of God through faith in Christ.

Galatians is sometimes called “a short Romans” for its similar themes of justification and sanctification through faith. A group of Christians known as “Judaizers” were preaching a gospel of legalism, rather than grace. Paul’s main purpose in writing the letter to the Galatians was to reiterate the true nature of the gospel: we are justified (made righteous) and sanctified (made more Christlike) through our faith in Jesus Christ alone. This letter was probably written shortly before the church elders in Jerusalem issued their official refutation of the Judaizers, commonly called the Jerusalem Council.

Accessed 5/19/2024 2:32:01 PM