WITHOUT JESUS CHRIST YOU ARE NOTHING

By Fr. Felix (African Times Guest Writer)

Having concluded gracefully with ‘Finally, my

brothers and sisters, rejoice in the Lord’, Paul

suddenly launches out again into an attack on

those who supported circumcision.

He turns their own weapons on themselves,

calling them ‘dogs’, the contemptuous term

used by Jews for gentiles, and ‘mutilators’,

using the word for cutting off rather than

cutting round.

He then proclaims his entitlement to be called a

Jew by every imaginable criterion, and

nevertheless rejects them all in favour of

knowing Christ. Compared to knowing Christ,

these privileges count not as assets but as

losses.

This tirade must be aimed at those who

disputed his right to speak as a Jew. We must

suppose either that Paul is harking back to the

controversy in Galatia or that the same

protagonists of circumcision were now making

their presence felt also in Philippi.

It is not difficult to imagine the state of mind of

those brought up in Judaism who were weak in

faith in Christ, and were content to stick to the

old ways, holding that they were all reaching

their fulfilment in Christ, whereas Paul views

the Law as no more than a temporary guide and

guardian, to be discarded now that the

fulfilment has come.

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