John Calvin Commentary Galatians 6:13

"For not even they who receive circumcision do themselves keep the law; but they desire to have you circumcised, that they may glory in your flesh." — Galatians 6:13 (ASV)

For neither they who hold by circumcision keep the law. The old version and Erasmus translate this as: who are circumcised. But Paul appears to me to refer to teachers only; for this reason, I would prefer to translate the words as those who hold by circumcision, which would not include all circumcised persons, and therefore would avoid ambiguity.

The meaning is, “It is not from a strong attachment to the law that they bind you with the yoke of ceremonies, for even with their own circumcision, they do not keep the law. It is no doubt under the pretext of the law that they require you to be circumcised; but, though they have themselves been circumcised, they do not perform what they command others.”

Indeed, when he says that they do not keep the law, it is doubtful whether he refers to the whole law or only to ceremonies. Some understand him as saying that the law is an intolerable burden, and therefore they do not satisfy its demands. But he rather insinuates against them a charge of insincerity because, except when it suited their own designs, they found themselves at liberty to despise the law.

Even now, this disease rages everywhere with virulence. You will find many who are prompted more by ambition than by conscience to defend the tyranny of the papal system. I speak of our courtly apostles, who are attracted by the smell of a kitchen, and who pronounce, with an air of authority, that the decrees of the holy Church of Rome must be observed with reverence.

And what is their own practice all this time! They pay no more regard to any decisions of the Roman see than to the braying of an ass, but they take care to avoid personal risk. In short, Paul had the same kind of controversy with those impostors as we now have with hypocritical professors of the gospel, who hold out to us a monstrous union between Christ and the Pope.

Paul therefore declares that they are not acting the part of honest men, and that they have no other object in requiring circumcision than to boast to the Jews of the converts they have made. Such is the meaning of the words, that they may glory in your flesh. “They wish to triumph over you and to gratify their own desire for applause by offering up your mutilated flesh to the false zealots of the law as a token of peace and harmony.”