The Latin Text of Augustine's Commentary on Galatians

Abstract

Abstract Here translated into English for the first time, Augustine's Commentary on Galatians is his only complete, formal commentary on any book of the Bible, and it offers unique insights into his understanding of Paul and of his own task as a biblical interpreter. In addition to an English translation with facing Latin text, the present volume provides a comprehensive introduction, copious notes, appendices, a bibliography, and four indices. Since Galatians is the only book of the Bible commented upon by all the ancient Latin commentators—including Jerome, Pelagius, Ambrosiaster, and Marius Victorinus, as well as Augustine—it provides a basis for comparing them and for identifying Augustine's special concerns and emphases. Although Augustine's Commentary contains implicit polemic (against Manicheism and Donatism, for example), it is not essentially a polemical commentary but rather a pastoral commentary intended to aid Augustine in his endeavour to lead, strengthen, and unify the Catholic community at Hippo in North Africa. This pastoral purpose flows naturally from Augustine's dual role as parish priest and spiritual director of his own monastic community. One of the most important ways Christians build community is by correcting one another. Augustine reads Galatians as a model of Christian correction for three main reasons: first, Paul wrote his letter to correct the Galatians; second, in the letter, Paul recounts how he once corrected Peter at Antioch; and third, Paul concludes his letter with instructions on how the Galatians should correct one another. Augustine believes that Christian correction should always be given and received in a spirit of humility and love—the very spirit that Jesus exemplified, commended, and bestowed as a gift.Augustine's Commentary has crucial links to other works he wrote at the time, especially his monastic Rule and De Doctrina Christiana. Augustine's emphasis on Galatians as a pastoral letter designed to preserve and strengthen Christian unity links the Commentary to his monastic Rule, while his method and sources link it to, and indeed pave the way for, the theory of biblical interpretation set forth in De Doctrina Christiana.