Charles Ellicott Commentary Galatians 3:4

"Did ye suffer so many things in vain? if it be indeed in vain." — Galatians 3:4 (ASV)

Suffered so many things.—The Galatians, like other churches, were subjected to much persecution when they first embraced Christianity. The persecutors were probably their own Jewish countrymen, whose jealousy and rage they had braved in the name of the gospel as preached by St. Paul. Now they were abandoning that very gospel for the principles of those who had persecuted them. Conduct could not be more fickle and “foolish.”

If it be yet in vain.—If it be indeed in vain. The Apostle cannot quite bring himself to believe that it is, and he adds this delicate qualification parenthetically, to show the Galatians that, much as appearances may be against them, he will not give up the hope that a lingering spark of their first joyous conviction, in the strength of which they had undergone persecution, still remained.