3:1 You 8 foolish Galatians! Who has cast a spell 9 on you? Before your eyes Jesus Christ was vividly portrayed 10 as crucified!
5:7 You were running well; who prevented you from obeying 11 the truth?
2:1 For I want you to know how great a struggle I have for you, 21 and for those in Laodicea, and for those who have not met me face to face. 22
10:26 For if we deliberately keep on sinning after receiving the knowledge of the truth, no further sacrifice for sins is left for us, 25
10:1 For the law possesses a shadow of the good things to come but not the reality itself, and is therefore completely unable, by the same sacrifices offered continually, year after year, to perfect those who come to worship. 26
2:1 Therefore we must pay closer attention to what we have heard, so that we do not drift away.
1 tn Or “the truth will release you.” The translation “set you free” or “release you” (unlike the more traditional “make you free”) conveys more the idea that the hearers were currently in a state of slavery from which they needed to be freed. The following context supports precisely this idea.
2 tn Grk “slaves, nor did we…” Because of the length and complexity of the Greek sentence, οὐδέ (oude) was translated as “But…even” and a new sentence started in the translation at the beginning of v. 5.
3 tn Or “we did not cave in to their demands.”
4 tn Grk “even for an hour” (an idiom for a very short period of time).
5 sn In order that the truth of the gospel would remain with you. Paul evidently viewed the demands of the so-called “false brothers” as a departure from the truth contained in the gospel he preached. This was a very serious charge (see Gal 1:8).
6 sn Cephas. This individual is generally identified with the Apostle Peter (L&N 93.211).
7 tn Here ἀναγκάζεις (anankazei") has been translated as a conative present (see ExSyn 534).
8 tn Grk “O” (an interjection used both in address and emotion). In context the following section is highly charged emotionally.
9 tn Or “deceived”; the verb βασκαίνω (baskainw) can be understood literally here in the sense of bewitching by black magic, but could also be understood figuratively to refer to an act of deception (see L&N 53.98 and 88.159).
10 tn Or “publicly placarded,” “set forth in a public proclamation” (BDAG 867 s.v. προγράφω 2).
11 tn Or “following.” BDAG 792 s.v. πείθω 3.b states, “obey, follow w. dat. of the pers. or thing…Gal 3:1 v.l.; 5:7.”
12 tn Col 1:3-8 form one long sentence in the Greek text and have been divided at the end of v. 4 and v. 6 and within v. 6 for clarity, in keeping with the tendency in contemporary English toward shorter sentences. Thus the phrase “Your faith and love have arisen from the hope” is literally “because of the hope.” The perfect tense “have arisen” was chosen in the English to reflect the fact that the recipients of the letter had acquired this hope at conversion in the past, but that it still remains and motivates them to trust in Christ and to love one another.
13 tn BDAG 113 s.v. ἀπόκειμαι 2 renders ἀποκειμένην (apokeimenhn) with the expression “reserved” in this verse.
14 tn The term “the gospel” (τοῦ εὐαγγελίου, tou euangeliou) is in apposition to “the word of truth” (τῷ λόγῳ τῆς ἀληθείας, tw logw th" alhqeia") as indicated in the translation.
15 tn Grk “and faithful.” The construction in Greek (as well as Paul’s style) suggests that the saints are identical to the faithful; hence, the καί (kai) is best left untranslated (cf. Eph 1:1). See ExSyn 281-82.
16 tn Grk “brothers,” but the Greek word may be used for “brothers and sisters” or “fellow Christians” as here (cf. BDAG 18 s.v. ἀδελφός 1, where considerable nonbiblical evidence for the plural ἀδελφοί [adelfoi] meaning “brothers and sisters” is cited).
17 tn Or “Grace to you and peace.”
18 tc Most witnesses, including some important ones (א A C F G I [P] 075 Ï it bo), read “and the Lord Jesus Christ” at the end of this verse, no doubt to conform the wording to the typical Pauline salutation. However, excellent and early witnesses (B D K L Ψ 33 81 1175 1505 1739 1881 al sa) lack this phrase. Since the omission is inexplicable as arising from the longer reading (otherwise, these
19 tn The article τοῖς (tois) with παραπτώμασιν (paraptwmasin) is functioning as a possessive pronoun (ExSyn 215).
20 tn The word “nevertheless,” though not in the Greek text, was supplied in the translation to bring out the force of the concessive participle ὄντας (ontas).
21 tn Or “I want you to know how hard I am working for you…”
22 tn Grk “as many as have not seen my face in the flesh.”
23 tn BDAG 812 s.v. πιθανολογία states, “persuasive speech, art of persuasion (so Pla., Theaet. 162e) in an unfavorable sense in its only occurrence in our lit. ἐν πιθανολογίᾳ by specious arguments Col 2:4 (cp. PLips 40 III, 7 διὰ πιθανολογίας).”
24 sn Paul’s point is that even though the arguments seem to make sense (sound reasonable), they are in the end false. Paul is not here arguing against the study of philosophy or serious thinking per se, but is arguing against the uncritical adoption of a philosophy that is at odds with a proper view of Christ and the ethics of the Christian life.
25 tn Grk “is left,” with “for us” implied by the first half of the verse.
26 tn Grk “those who approach.”