Jerome

(Chapter 1, Verse 1) Paul, an apostle not from men nor by man but through Jesus Christ and God the Father, who raised him from the dead. He does not propose himself as an apostle arrogantly, as some think, but necessarily, neither from men nor by man. Instead, he does so through Jesus Christ and God the Father, in order to confound those who were belittling Paul outside of the twelve apostles and claiming that he suddenly emerged from somewhere or was ordained by the elders, with this authority. However, it can also be understood indirectly as being said to Peter and the others, that the Gospel was not handed down to him by the apostles, but by Jesus Christ himself, who had chosen those apostles. But all of this is prepared so that no one who disputes the burdens of the Law for the sake of the Gospel may be able to object: 'but Peter said this,' 'but the apostles decreed this,' 'but your predecessors determined something else.' Indeed, he makes this clearer in the following, now seemingly in hidden speech, by citing that nothing contributed by those who seem to be something is relevant to him, and that he himself resisted Peter to his face, saying that he was not compelled by any necessity to yield to the hypocrisy of the Jews. But if it seems rash to some that he spoke against the apostles, even though secretly, who had gone to Jerusalem in order to confer with them about the Gospel, lest perhaps he had run in vain or had run in vain, let us transfer that understanding there: Even to this day, the apostles are sent by the Jewish patriarchs, from whom I also believe that the Galatians, led astray, began to observe the Law, or certainly other Jews who believed in Christ had gone to Galatia, who asserted that Peter, too, was the leader of the apostles, and that James, the Lord's brother, observed the ceremonies of the Law. Therefore, in order to distinguish between those who are sent by men and those who are sent by Christ, he took the following beginning: Paul, an apostle, not from men, nor through man. But apostle, which properly is a Hebrew word, means one who is sent, which also signifies Silas (or Silai), to whom a name was given by being sent. The Hebrews say that among themselves there are certain prophets and holy men who are both prophets and apostles, and others who are only prophets. Finally, Moses, to whom it is said, 'And I will send you to Pharaoh' (Exod. III, 10, 11); and he responds, 'Provide someone else whom you will send.' And Isaiah, to whom God speaks, 'Whom shall I send, and who will go to this people?' (Isai. VI, 8) ? There were also apostles and prophets. Therefore, we can understand that John the Baptist is also to be called a prophet and apostle, since the Scripture says, 'There was a man sent from God, whose name was John' (John I, 6). And in the Epistle to the Hebrews (Heb. III), Paul, according to his usual custom, did not put his own name or the title of Apostle before it, because he was going to speak about Christ: Therefore, having a high priest and an apostle of our confession, Jesus; it was not fitting that where Christ was to be called an apostle, Paul should also be called an apostle. There are, however, four kinds of apostles. One, which is neither from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ and God the Father; another, which is indeed from God, but through man; a third, which is from man, not from God; and a fourth, which is neither from God, nor through man, nor from man, but from itself. The first category can include Isaiah, the other prophets, and the apostle Paul himself, who was sent not by humans or through a human, but by God the Father and Christ. In the second category is Jesus, the son of Nun, who was indeed appointed by God as an apostle, but through a human, Moses. The third category is when someone is ordained by the favor and zeal of the people. As we see now, many are being appointed to the priesthood not by the judgment of God, but by the favor of the redeemed crowd. The fourth [sign] is [the sign] of false prophets and false apostles, about whom the apostle [Paul] says: 'Such pseudo-apostles are workers of iniquity, transforming themselves into apostles of Christ, who say, "Thus says the Lord," and the Lord did not send them' (2 Corinthians 11:13). But not such [was] the apostle Paul, who was sent not by men nor through man, but by God the Father through Jesus Christ. From this it is approved that the heresies of Ebion and Photinus should also be refuted, [namely] that our Lord Jesus Christ is God, since the apostle, being sent by Christ to preach the Gospel, denies that he was sent by man. In this place, other heresies arise, which claim that Christ's flesh is pretended and assert that Christ is God, not man. There is also a new heresy that declares a divided dispensation of Christ. Thus, among the shipwrecks of so many false teachings, if one confesses Christ as a man, the Ebionites and Photinus creep in; if one contends that he is God, the Manicheans and Marcion, authors of a new doctrine, bubble up. In the community, they hear that Christ is both God and man. Not that there is another God and another man, but rather the one who was always God deemed it worthy to become man for our salvation. It should also be known that in the Apostle of Marcion it is not written that Christ is explained by God the Father, but rather is raised up by himself, as it is written: Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up (John II, 19). And elsewhere: No one takes my soul from me; but I lay it down of myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again (Ibid., X, 18).

(Vers. 2.) And all the brothers who are with me, to the churches of Galatia. In other Epistles, Sosthenes and Silvanus, and sometimes even Timothy, are mentioned at the beginning. In this one, however, because the authority of many was necessary, the name of all the brothers is assumed. They themselves perhaps were also of the circumcision, and were not held in contempt by the Galatians. For it is of great importance to correct the people, to have the agreement and consensus of many in one matter. But when he says 'to the churches of Galatia,' it should be noted that here he writes not only to one church of one city, but to the churches of the whole province, and he calls them churches, which he later accuses of being corrupt by error. From this it is to be understood that the Church can be said in two ways: the one which has no spot or wrinkle and truly is the body of Christ, and the one which gathers in the name of Christ without full and perfect virtues (Ephesians 5). The wise are called in two ways, both those who are full of perfect virtue and those who are just beginning and are in progress. Concerning the perfect, it is said: 'I will send to you wise men' (Luke 11:49). Concerning the foolish: 'Reprove a wise man, and he will love thee' (Proverbs 8:9). For he who is full and complete in virtue does not need correction. This sense can be understood in regard to the other virtues as well, namely that the courageous and prudent, pious, chaste, just, and temperate are sometimes understood correctly, sometimes incorrectly.

(Verse 4) He gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil world, according to the will of God and our Father, to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen. Neither did the Son give himself for our sins without the will of the Father, nor did the Father deliver the Son without the Son's will; but this is the will of the Son, to fulfill the will of the Father, as he himself speaks in the psalm: 'I desired to do your will, O my God' (Psalm 40:8). But the Son gave Himself, in order to overthrow the injustice that was in us with justice itself. Wisdom offered itself in order to conquer ignorance. Holiness and strength presented themselves in order to eliminate impurity and weakness. And in this way, not only in the future age according to the promised hope in which we believe, but also here in the present age, He has freed us: while we have died together with Christ, we are transformed into a new way of thinking, and we are not of this world, from which we are rightly not loved. The question is how the present age is called evil. For heretics often take advantage of this, asserting that one is the creator of light and the future age, another of darkness and the present. But we say, that it is not so much the age itself, which runs day and night, years and months, that is called evil, but rather the things that happen in the age: how it is said to be sufficient for its own evil (Matthew VI): and the days of Jacob are said to be few and evil (Genesis XLVII). Not that the period of time in which Jacob lived was bad, but that the things he endured through various trials tested him. Finally, during the time he served for his wives and struggled with many difficulties (Gen. XXIX), Esau was at rest, and so the same period of time was good for some and bad for others; and it would not be written in Ecclesiastes: Do not say that my former days (were better) than these (Eccles. VII, 11), unless in comparison to the bad. Where John says: The whole world is set in evil (1 John 5:19). Not that the world itself is evil, but that evil things happen in the world because of humans. Let us eat and drink, they say, for tomorrow we will die (Isaiah 22:17). And the Apostle himself says: Redeeming the time, because the days are evil (Ephesians 5:16). Even the fields and forests are defamed, when they are full of robberies, not because the earth and woods sin, but because they have also drawn infamy to the places of murder. We detest both the sword by which human blood is shed and the cup in which poison has been mixed, not the sword or the cup themselves, but those who have misused them. Thus, this world, which is a span of time, is not inherently good or evil, but is called such by those who are in it. Therefore, the delusions and fables of Valentinius, who invented thirty aeons based on the mention of ages in the Scriptures, are to be despised. He claimed that they are beings and that he produced as many aeons as the Aeneas's sow produced litters, using squares and octads, decades and duodecades. Also to be sought is what is the difference between saeculum and saeculum saeculi, or saecula saeculorum, and where it is placed for a brief span of time, where it is placed for eternity: because in Hebrew saeculum, that is, Olam (), where the letter Vav is added, signifies eternity, but when it is written without Vav it signifies the fiftieth year, which they call Jubilee. For this reason, that Hebrew who, because of his wife and children, loving his Lord, willingly subjects himself to perpetual servitude, is commanded to serve forever (Exod. XXI), that is, until the fiftieth year. Both the Moabites and the Ammonites (Deuteronomy XXIII) are not allowed to enter the Church of the Lord until the fifteenth generation and even forever: because every hard condition of the Jubilee was solved by His coming. Some say that the same sense exists in the ages of ages as in the holy of holies, in the heavens of heavens, in the works of works, in the Songs of Songs: and they have the same difference as the heavens have from those who belong to the heavens, and as the holy things which are holier than the comparison of the holy things, and as the works which are better than the comparison of the works, and as the Songs which excel among all the Songs: in the same way, they say, the ages have the same relationship to the comparison of ages. Therefore, they have determined that the present age should be counted from the time when the heavens and the earth were created, and it will continue until the end of the world, when Christ will judge all things. They also recall the past and advance to a higher level, debating about past and future ages, whether they have been good or bad, or will be in the future. They delve into such deep questions that they have even written books and countless volumes on this subject. But as for the conclusion of the prologue of Paul in the Hebrew language: Amen (), the Seventy translated it as γένοιτο, that is, let it be done. Aquila rendered it as πεπιστωμένος, truly or faithfully. This is also constantly embraced in the Gospel by the Savior, affirming his own words by Amen.

(Verse 6) I am amazed that you are so quickly shifting away from him who called you into the grace of Christ Jesus, to a different gospel which is not another. There are some who are confusing you and want to pervert the gospel of Christ. We read about the word 'translation' first in Genesis (Gen. 5), where Enoch was translated by God and was not found. And in the books of Kings afterwards (1 Kings 21), when Ahab turned his wife Jezebel from the worship of God to the worship of idols, to do all that the Amorites did, whom the Lord destroyed before the face of the children of Israel. But since there are two translations, one is from God, the other from the devil. Whoever is translated by God is not found by his enemies: nor can the deceiver ambush him. For I think that this signifies and is not found. But whoever is translated by the devil, in this he is translated because he appears to be, but is not. Moreover, the wise men of the world call those who are translated from one teaching to another, translated, like that Dionysius (whose opinion was that pain is not evil: after being overwhelmed by misfortunes and pain of torment, he began to affirm that pain is the greatest of all evils) was called Transposed by them, or Translated, because departing from his previous decree, he fell into the opposite. And so Paul marvels, first because they have been transferred from the freedom of the Gospel to the servitude of legal works. Secondly, because they have been transferred so quickly: for it is not easy to be transferred away from someone's guilt, and to be transferred quickly; just as in martyrdom, not the same punishment is inflicted on one who immediately jumps to denial without struggle and torture, and on one who, between stakes, ropes, and fires, distorted and compelled, denies what he believed. The preaching of the Gospel was still recent, not much time had passed since the Apostle had led the Galatians from idols to Christ. He wonders how quickly they have turned away from Him, to whom they had recently become Christians. And the place itself is remarkable, which can be read in its proper order: I wonder that you are so quickly transferring yourselves from Christ Jesus, who called you by his grace, saying: I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance (Mark 2:17). For by grace you have been saved, through faith; and this is not of yourselves, it is the gift of God. (Ephesians 2:8) But, he says, you have been transferred to another Gospel, which is not another: because everything that is false does not stand, and what is contrary to the truth does not exist, like this: 'Do not give, O Lord, your scepter to those who are not.' (Esther 14:12) And the things that were not, God called into being, in order to make what is not. But if this is said about those who believed in the same God and had the same Scriptures, that they have been transferred to another Gospel, which is not the Gospel, what should we think about Marcion and other heretics, who reject the Creator and falsely pretend to be followers of another God, Christ? Those who do not adhere to the interpretation of the law and letter, or engage in the battle between flesh and spirit, fall and crumble, but they are in discord with the entire authority of the Church. But beautifully he says: Unless there are some who trouble you and want to pervert the Gospel of Christ. They want, he says, to change, pervert, and trouble the Gospel of Christ: but they are not able. For it is the nature of this Gospel that it cannot be anything other than true. Everyone who interprets the Gospel with a different spirit and mind than what is written, disturbs and perverts the Gospel of Christ, turning what is in front into what is behind, and what is behind into what is in front. If someone follows only the letter, they put the later things in the face. If someone relies on Jewish interpretations, they send behind those things which are established in their nature in the face. Moreover, it is appropriately said that the word 'translation' is adapted to the Galatians: for Galatia in our language means 'translation'.

(Verse 8) But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you a gospel contrary to the one we preached to you, let him be accursed. As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed. This statement can also be understood hyperbolically, not that either an apostle or an angel could preach differently than they had once said: but even if it were possible for both apostles and angels to be changed, one must not deviate from what had once been accepted, especially since the apostle himself demonstrates the steadfastness of his faith elsewhere, saying: I know that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord (Rom. 8:38). I speak the truth, I do not lie, with my conscience bearing witness (Rom. IX, 1). Indeed, these words are not those of one who can ever depart from the Christian faith and love. However, those who do not want this to be understood hypothetically, but truly: that is, that even apostles and angels can be turned to worse things, they oppose it with what even Paul himself knew, that he could stumble if he acted too lazily, saying: But I discipline my body and bring it into subjection, lest, when preaching to others, I myself should become disqualified (I Cor. IX, 27). Angels also are mutable, who have not preserved their principality; but leaving their own habitation, are reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day (Jude, VI). ||The nature of God alone is immutable, of whom it is written: But thou art always the selfsame (Psalm 101: 28). And of himself: For I am the Lord your God, and I change not (Malachi 3: 6). Lucifer has fallen, who once shone brightly; and the one who was once sent to all nations has been crushed on the earth. In this place, the very learned man Tertullian elegantly writes against Apelles and his virgin Philumena, whom a certain angel, possessed by a diabolical and perverse spirit, claimed to be. This angel, according to the prophecy of the Holy Spirit foretold by the Apostle, was cursed long before the birth of Apelles. Furthermore, ἀνάθεμα, a word proper to the Jews, is used both in the book of Joshua (Joshua 6:7) and in the book of Numbers (Numbers 21), when the Lord commanded that everything in Jericho and the detestable Midianites be devoted to destruction and to anathema. Let us question those who assert that Christ and the Apostle Paul, the beloved of God and hitherto unknown, are either the son or the servant who knows not how to curse and does not know how to condemn anyone: how does their Apostle now, in the language of the Jews, that is, of the Creator, use it, and wish to destroy either an angel or an apostle, when he himself is not accustomed to avenge? Moreover, what he added, as we have foretold, and now I say again, shows that he, being careful of this very thing from the beginning, had denounced anathema to those who would preach otherwise, and now that it has been preached, he enforces the anathema which he had foretold before. Therefore, they accused him of doing one thing in Judea and teaching another, and they pronounced a curse on the angel, whom it was even known to be greater than his predecessors, the apostles, so that the authority of Peter and John would not be considered great, since it was not allowed for him who had taught them before, nor for the angel to preach differently than they had learned once. Therefore, he mentioned himself and the angel by name, but the others without a name. If anyone, he said, were to proclaim the gospel to you without doing harm to your predecessors; and yet, he would secretly reveal their names.

(Verse 10.) For now I advise men or God: or do I seek to please men? If I were still pleasing men, I would not be a servant of Christ. Let us not think that we are taught by the Apostle to despise the judgments of men by his example, who in another place said: Knowing therefore, the fear of the Lord, we persuade men: but we are made manifest to God (2 Corinthians 5:11); and that: Be without offense to the Jews, and to the Gentiles, and to the Church of God: as I also please all in all things, not seeking what is profitable to myself, but what is profitable to many, that they may be saved (1 Corinthians 10). But if it is possible, that we may please both God and men at the same time, it is necessary to please men. But if we do not please men in any other way than if we displease God: we ought to please God rather than men. Otherwise, he himself brings forward the reason why he is pleasing to all through all things: Not seeking, he says, what is useful to me, but what is useful to many, so that they may be saved. But whoever, out of that charity which does not seek its own things, but those that are others', pleases everyone so that they may be saved: certainly he first pleases God, to whom the salvation of men is a care. However, it also has a word, which is specifically added here, either to please people temporarily or to displease them: so that he who does not please at the moment because of the truth of the Gospel, may have pleased formerly for the salvation of many. Paul had pleased the Jews at one time, when he was an emulator of paternal traditions, having lived blamelessly according to the law, and he had such enthusiasm and faith in the ceremonies of the ancestors that he even became involved in the killing of Stephen, and he went to Damascus to bind those who had deserted the law (Acts 9). But after he was transferred to the vessel of election from a persecutor, and began to preach the faith which he had once attacked, he began to displease the Jews, whom he had previously pleased. This is therefore what he says: Am I seeking to please the Jews, by displeasing whom I pleased God? For if I were still pleasing them, I would not be a servant of Christ. For I would affirm the law, and destroy the grace of the Gospel. But now, I am not even brought to the pretense of observing the law, because I cannot please both God and the Jews at the same time. For whoever endeavors to persuade others with a word taken from human usage, with what he himself possesses and has once imbibed, and in many passages of the Scriptures it is read, from which this is one: The persuasion is not from him who called you (Gal. 5:8). And also in the Acts of the Apostles: Therefore many Jews came to him in the inn, to whom he explained, testifying about the kingdom of God and persuading them about Jesus, from the Law of Moses and the Prophets until evening. And all of this happened because it had been spread (or slandered) about him that he secretly observed the Law and had mixed with those who were practicing Judaism in Jerusalem.

(Verse 11, 12.) For I make known to you, brothers, the Gospel that was preached by me: that it is not according to man, nor did I receive it from man, nor was I taught it, but through the revelation of Jesus Christ. From this passage, the teachings of Ebion and Photinus are refuted: that God is Christ, and not only man. For if the Gospel of Paul is not according to man, nor did he receive it from man, nor was he taught it, but through the revelation of Jesus Christ; Jesus Christ, who revealed the Gospel to Paul, is certainly not a mere man. But if he is not a man, therefore he is God. Not that we deny that he assumed humanity; but only that we refuse mere humanity. The question is whether the whole Church of God has received the Gospel, or just individual people: for how many of us have learned the revelation of Christ and known it not from a human preacher? To which we will respond, those who can say: Do you seek proof of Christ speaking in me (2 Cor. 13:3)? And: I no longer live, but Christ lives in me (Galatians 2:20), teaching not so much themselves, but God who speaks to the saints: I said, 'You are gods, and all of you are sons of the Most High' (Psalm 82:6); and immediately about sinners: But you will die like men, and fall like one of the princes. Therefore, when Paul and Peter, who do not die like men or fall like one of the princes, speak of them being gods, it is evident. But those who are gods, they transmit the Gospel of God, and not of man. Marcion and Basilides and other heretical pests do not have the Gospel of God; because they do not have the Holy Spirit, without whom the human Gospel is not possible to be taught. Nor can we consider the Gospel to be in the words of the Scriptures, but in the meaning: not in the surface, but in the core; not in the leaves of words, but in the root of reason. It is said in the prophet about God: His words are good with him (Micah 2:7). Then the Scriptures are useful to those who listen, since they are not spoken without Christ, nor proclaimed without the Father, nor are they revealed without the Spirit by the one who preaches. Otherwise, both the devil, who speaks about the Scriptures, and all heresies, according to Ezekiel (Chapter XIII), make for themselves pillows that they place under the elbow of all ages. Even I, who am speaking, if I have Christ in me, do not have the Gospel of man; but if I am a sinner, God says to me: O sinner, why do you declare my justice and assume my covenant on your lips? But you have hated discipline and cast my words behind you (Ps. XLIX, 16, 17), and so on that follows. There is great danger in speaking in the Church, lest by a perverse interpretation, the Gospel of Christ becomes the gospel of man, or worse, of the devil. However, there is a difference between receiving and learning, in that the one receives the Gospel to whom it is first taught and is led to faith, to believe what is written. But he learns who understands the things that are represented in it by enigmas and parables, when they are explained and expounded: and he understands them not through the revelation of man, but through Christ, who revealed them to Paul, or through Paul, in whom Christ speaks. The very word 'revelation' itself, that is, 'unveiling,' properly belongs to the Scriptures, and was not used by any of the wise men of the world among the Greeks. Therefore, they seem to me, just as in other words that the Seventy translators translated from Hebrew into Greek, to have made a great effort also in this one to express the peculiarity of a foreign language by inventing new words for new things: and the word 'to sound' means when something that is hidden and covered is shown and brought forth into the light, by removing the covering from above. To make this clearer, take the example of Moses. When he spoke with God, his face was revealed and uncovered (Exodus 33, 34), that is, without a veil. But when he spoke to the people, they could not look at his face, so he put a veil on (Numbers 4). Also, in front of the Ark of the Covenant, there was a veil. When this veil was pulled back, the things that had been hidden were revealed, or, to use the words itself, they were uncovered. So if those who are accustomed to reading the eloquent works of the present age start mocking us for the novelty and cheapness of our language, let us send them to Cicero's books, which are renowned for their philosophical inquiries; and let them see how compelled he was by necessity to produce such monstrous words that the ears of a Latin man have never heard: and this even when he was translating from Greek, a language that is close to ours. What do those who attempt to express the peculiarities of Hebrew difficulties endure? And yet there are much fewer things in such great volumes of Scriptures that sound new, than those that he has collected in a small work. But, as we said at the beginning when we were explaining: Paul the apostle did not receive his mission from men or through a man: in this place, it can be understood indirectly of Peter and his predecessors: that it may not be objected to on account of anyone's law or authority, who holds Christ alone as the teacher of the Gospel. Moreover, it signifies that revelation, when on his journey to Damascus, he deserved to hear the voice of Christ: and with blinded eyes, he beheld the true light of the world.

(Verse 13.) For you have heard of my previous conduct in Judaism, how I persecuted the church of God beyond measure and tried to destroy it; and I advanced in Judaism beyond many of my contemporaries in my own nation, being more exceedingly zealous for the traditions of my fathers. This account is highly beneficial to the Galatians, as it shows how Paul, once a destroyer of the church and a fervent defender of Judaism, suddenly converted to the faith of Christ. And it was at this time, when the crucifixion was first announced in the world; when the new doctrine was being expelled from the boundaries of both the Gentiles and the Jews. For they could say: If he, who from a young age was instructed in the teachings of the Pharisees, and surpassed all his contemporaries in the Jewish tradition, now defends the Church which he once fiercely persecuted; and desires the grace and novelty of Christ more than the oldness of the Law, to the envy of all: what should we who have begun to be Christian from the Gentiles do? Moreover, he aptly added: I pursued the Church of God beyond measure, so that from here also admiration might arise, that not every person who lightly persecuted the Church, but he who overcame the others in persecution, turned to the faith. And wisely, while narrating something else, he interjects that he served not so much the Law of God, as the paternal, that is, the traditions of the Pharisees; who teach the doctrines and commandments of men (Matt. XV; Mark VII); and they reject the Law of God in order to establish their own traditions. However, what a beautiful observation and weight of words: 'You have heard,' he says, 'of my former life in Judaism, how I persecuted the church of God violently and tried to destroy it. And I was advancing in Judaism beyond many of my own age among my people, so extremely zealous was I for the traditions of my fathers.' And he says, not the Church of Christ, as he then thought (or was thought): which he considered contemptible, which he persecuted: but as he now believes, the Church of God: either signifying that Christ himself is God, or that the Church is of the same God who was once the giver of the Law. And I made progress, he says, in Judaism beyond many of my contemporaries in my race: being a more zealous follower of my ancestral traditions. Again, he calls it progress not of the Law of God, but of Judaism. Not above all, but above most, not above the elders, but above the contemporaries, so that he might apply his zeal to the Law and avoid boasting. However, by mentioning the traditions of the fathers instead of the commandments of the Lord, and by identifying himself as a Pharisee among the Pharisees, he showed that he had indeed a zeal for God but not according to knowledge. But until this day, those who understand the Scriptures in a Jewish sense persecute the Church of Christ and plunder it, corrupted not by the study of the Law of God but by human traditions.

(Verse 15) But when it pleased Him who separated me from my mother's womb, and called me by His grace, to reveal His Son in me, that I might preach Him among the Gentiles, I did not immediately confer with flesh and blood, nor did I go up to Jerusalem to those who were apostles before me; but I went to Arabia, and returned again to Damascus. Then after three years I went up to Jerusalem to see Peter, and remained with him fifteen days. But I saw none of the other apostles except James, the Lord's brother. (Now concerning the things which I write to you, indeed, before God, I do not lie.) Afterward I went into the regions of Syria and Cilicia. And I was unknown by face to the churches of Judea which were in Christ. But they were hearing only, "He who formerly persecuted us now preaches the faith which he once tried to destroy." And they glorified God in me. But I make known to you, brethren, that the gospel which was preached by me is not according to man. For I neither received it from man, nor was I taught it, but it came through the revelation of Jesus Christ. David sings against sinners: For behold, I was conceived in iniquities, and my mother conceived me in sins (Ps. 50:7). And in another place: Sinners are estranged from the womb (Ps. 57:4). And even before the children were born, God loved Jacob but hated Esau (Malachi 1:1, 2). Heretics find a place where they claim there are different natures, namely spiritual, animal, and earthly, and that one is saved, another perishes, and another exists between the two, so that neither the righteous would be chosen before doing anything good, nor would the sinner be hated before committing a sin, unless there were different natures of those who perish and those who are saved. To which it can be simply answered: this happens from God's foreknowledge, that he loves whom he knows will be just before they are born from the womb, and hates whom he knows will be a sinner before they sin; not that in God there is injustice in love and hatred, but that he must not have them otherwise, knowing either that they will be sinners or that they will be just: we as humans can only judge based on the present, but He to whom the future is already made known can pass judgment on the end of things, not on their beginnings. And indeed, these things have been said in a simpler manner: and without a deeper discussion, they can please the reader in some way. Moreover, those who try to assert that God is unjust, after what we have previously stated, have strayed from the womb, and they also bring forth the other things that follow: They have gone astray from the womb, they have uttered falsehoods. And they say, how is it that sinners have immediately gone astray from the womb and have uttered falsehoods, when they could not even have speech or understanding? But what is this justice of the foreknowledge of God, to love and guard one before they are born, and to detest another? And the causes of this matter refer to a previous life, that each person is assigned to good or evil angels according to their merit, immediately from their first birth. And that whole passage about Jacob and Esau, which we mention now, is discussed in such a way in the letter to the Romans (Rom. IX), that it cannot be answered without sweat and Chrysippus' hellebore. However, it is not the same for him to reveal his Son in me, as if he were to say, to reveal his Son to me. For whoever something is revealed, to him it can be revealed, which was not in him before. But in whom it is revealed, that is revealed which was in him before, and later revealed. It is similar to what is said in the Gospel: Among you stands one whom you do not know (John 1:26). And elsewhere: He was the true light, which enlightens every person coming into the world (ibid., 9). From which it becomes clear that the knowledge of God is inherent in all of nature, and no one is born without Christ, and does not have the seeds of wisdom, justice, and other virtues within them. Hence, many without faith and the Gospel of Christ, either wisely do certain things, or piously, such as obeying their parents, extending help to the needy, not oppressing their neighbors, not plundering others, and therefore become more susceptible to the judgment of God because, having within them the principles of virtues and the seeds of God, they do not believe in Him without whom they cannot exist. It is possible to take it in another way in the letter of Paul, Sons of God revealed: that, when he preached, he was acknowledged by the Gentiles, whom they previously did not know.