Speaking about the new life, the life of the Kingdom, Paul contrasts it with what he calls "works of the Torah"...
Speaking about the new life, the life of the Kingdom, Paul contrasts it with what he calls "works of the Torah" ("works of the Law," v. 16). It would seem that the works of the Torah should be the main occupation of those who seek to fulfill the commandments. But the matter, as can be seen, was not quite like that. In the time of Christ and Paul, works of the Torah were often understood as roughly what we today call religious duties. Formally, all of them were connected, of course, with the need to fulfill one or another norm of the Torah, but in fact many of them had long since ceased to have any relation to it, being based solely on tradition, often only loosely connected with the Torah. The fulfillment of these religious duties turned, in circles of religiously active people, such as the Pharisees, into a kind of religious sport, in which successes and achievements were valued very highly. After all, according to the opinion generally accepted in the religious environment, the reward for those who succeeded was the Kingdom, toward which religious activists sometimes strove with complete sincerity, though at times without a very clear idea of what that Kingdom was, the one they were so eager to reach.
Paul, as can be seen, understands perfectly well that no successes in religious life have any relation to solving the main task: they cannot bring anyone closer to the Kingdom. The apostle never tires of reminding us that a sinful person is not able to follow the Torah to the end, that for this he will have to die; otherwise sin will never leave him, and no religion has the power to change anything here (vv. 19-21). The former, natural life must disappear in order to give way to another, new life, the life of the Kingdom, by which the risen Christ lives. But this is a difficult path, and fallen human nature begins quite naturally to look for easier paths, turning among other things to religion. For Paul, all such attempts are nothing other than a desire to return to the former, sinful life, refusing the path to which the Savior calls His faithful ones (vv. 17-18). It is a refusal of the Kingdom for the sake of human opinions, human concepts, and human religiosity. It is a refusal that never passes without a trace for those who have refused.
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2:11 But - The argument here comes to the height.Paul reproves Peter himself. So far was he from receiving his doctrine from man, or from being inferior to the chief of the apostles. When Peter - Afterwards, Came to Antioch - Then the chief of all the Gentile churches. I withstood himto the face, because he was to be blamed - For fear of man, Gal 2:12; for dissimulation, Gal 2:13; and for not walkinguprightly. Gal 2:14.
2:13 And the other believing Jews - Who were at Antioch. Dissembled with him, so that even Barnabas was carried away with their dissimulation - Was borne away, as with a torrent, into the same ill practice.
2:14 I said to Cephas before them all - See Paul single against Peter and all the Jews! If thou being a Jew, yet livest, in thy ordinary conversation, after the manner of the gentiles - Not observing the ceremonial law, which thou knowest to be now abolished. Why compellest thou the gentiles - By withdrawing thyself and all the ministers from them; eitherto judaize, to keep the ceremonial law, or to be excluded from church communion ?
2:15 We - St. Paul, to spare St. Peter, drops the first person singular, and speaks in the plural number. Gal 2:18, he speaks in the first person singular again by a figure; and without a figure, Gal 2:19, etc Who are Jews by nature - By birth, not proselytes only. And not sinners of the gentiles - That is, not sinful Gentiles; not such gross, enormous, abandoned sinners, as the heathens generally were.
2:16 Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law - Not even of the moral, much less the ceremonial, law. But by the faith of Jesus Christ - That is, by faith in him. The name Jesus was first known by the gentiles; the name Christ by the Jews. And they are not always placed promiscuously; but generally in a more solemn way of speaking, the Apostle says, Christ Jesus; in a more familiar, Jesus Christ. Even we - And how much more must the Gentiles, who have still less pretence to depend on their own works!Have believed - Knowing there is no other way. Because - Considering the demands of the law, and the fate of human nature, it is evident, that by the works of the law - By such an obedience as it requires. Shall no flesh living - No human creature, Jew or Gentile, be justified. Hitherto St. Paul had been considering that single question, "Are Christians obliged to observe the ceremonial law? But he here insensibly goes farther, and, by citing this scripture, shows that what he spoke directly of the ceremonial, included also the moral, law. For David undoubtedly did so, when he said, Psa 143:2, the place here referred to, "In thy sight shall no man living be justified;" which the Apostle likewise explains, Rom 3:19-20, in such a manner as can agree to none but the moral law.
2:17 But if while we seek to be justified by Christ, we ourselves are still found sinners - If we continue in sin, will it therefore follow, that Christ is the minister or countenancer of sin?
2:18 By no means. For if I build again - By my sinful practice.The things which I destroyed - By my preaching, I only make myself - Or show myself, not Christ, to be a transgressor; the whole blame lies on me, not him or his gospel. As if he had said, The objection were just, if the gospel promised justification to men continuing in sin.But it does not. Therefore if any who profess the gospel do not live according to it, they are sinners, it is certain, but not justified, and so the gospel is clear.
2:19 For I through the law - Applied by the Spirit to my heart, and deeply convincing me of my utter sinfulness and helplessness. Am dead to the law - To all hope of justification from it. That I may live to God - Not continue in sin. For this very end am I, in this sense, freed from the law, that I may be freed from sin.
2:20 The Apostle goes on to describe how he is freed from sin;how far he is from continuing therein. I am crucified with Christ - Made conformable to his death; "the body of sin is destroyed." Rom 6:6.And I - As to my corrupt nature. Live no longer - Being dead to sin.But Christ liveth in me - Is a fountain of life in my inmost soul, from which all my tempers, words, and actions flow. And the life that I now live in the flesh - Even in this mortal body, I live by faith in the Son of God - I derive every moment from that supernatural principle; from a divine evidence and conviction, that "he loved me, and delivered up himself for me."
2:21 Meantime I do not make void - In seeking to be justified by my own works. The grace of God - The free love of God in Christ Jesus. But they do, who seek justification by the law. For if righteousness is by the law - If men might be justified by their obedience to the law, moral or ceremonial. Then Christ died in vain - Without any necessity for it, since men might have been saved without his death; might by their own obedience have been both discharged from condemnation, and entitled to eternal life.