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Galatians 5

1For freedom Christ set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not be held again in a yoke of slavery.

2Look, I, Paul, tell you that if you let yourselves be circumcised, Christ will benefit you nothing. 3Again I testify to every person who receives circumcision that he is obligated to do the whole law. 4You who seek to be declared righteous by the law have been severed from Christ; you have fallen from grace. 5For through the Spirit, by faith, we eagerly await the hope of righteousness. 6For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any force, but faith working through love.

7You were running well. Who cut in on you and kept you from obeying the truth? 8This persuasion is not from the one who calls you. 9A little leaven leavens the whole batch of dough. 10I am confident about you in the Lord that you will take no other view. But the one troubling you will bear the judgment, whoever that may be. 11But I, brothers, if I still proclaim circumcision, why am I still persecuted? Then the stumbling block of the cross has been removed. 12I wish those who unsettle you would even castrate themselves!

13For you were called to freedom, brothers. Only do not turn freedom into an opportunity for the flesh, but through love be slaves to one another. 14For the whole law is fulfilled in one saying: “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” 15But if you bite and devour one another, watch out that you are not consumed by one another.

16But I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will certainly not carry out the desire of the flesh. 17For the flesh desires against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh, for these oppose one another, so that you do not do whatever you want. 18But if you are led by the Spirit, you are not under the law. 19Now the deeds of the flesh are evident: sexual immorality, impurity, shameless conduct, 20idolatry, sorcery, hostilities, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, selfish ambitions, divisions, factions, 21envy, drunkenness, revelries, and things like these. I warn you about these things, just as I warned you before, that those who practice such things will not inherit God's kingdom.

22But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, 23gentleness, self-control. Against such things there is no law. 24And those who belong to Christ have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires. 25If we live by the Spirit, let us also keep in step with the Spirit. 26Let us not become conceited, provoking one another, envying one another.

Translation notes 7

5:1–4 — Freedom and circumcision. Paul's warning addresses accepting circumcision in the dispute over standing under the law. “Seek to be” in verse 4 makes explicit the attempted basis of righteousness; the Greek literally says “are declared righteous by the law.” The strong statements about Christ and grace remain, without an added explanation from a later account of salvation.

5:5–6 — Hope and faith. “The hope of righteousness” can mean the righteousness awaited or the hope grounded in righteousness. “Faith working through love” takes the participle as faith expressing itself in action; “faith made effective through love” is another possible construal.

5:7–12 — Running, leaven, and castration. The racing and fermentation images remain. A stumbling block is an obstacle that causes a fall; here it concerns the offense of the cross. Verse 12 is a deliberately harsh wish that the circumcision agitators go further and castrate themselves. A figurative cutting themselves off from the community has been proposed, but the bodily sense fits the immediate circumcision polemic better.

5:13–15 — Freedom and slavery. “Be slaves to one another” preserves Paul's deliberate reversal: freedom leads to loving service. The flesh is not a name for the body as inherently evil. The biting and devouring image describes the community destroying itself through conflict.

5:16–18 — Opposing desires. The Spirit is understood as God's Spirit. The final clause of verse 17 describes the restraint produced by the conflict; Paul does not specify here that every desire of the person is good or that every failure is unavoidable.

5:19–21 — The list of deeds. “Shameless conduct” describes unrestrained indecency. “Sorcery” concerns magical practices, not the modern practice of pharmacy. “Factions” is not limited to doctrinal heresy. Some textual traditions add “adultery” at verse 19 and “murders” at verse 21; those words are absent from the Greek base followed here.

5:22–25 — Fruit and faithfulness. “Fruit” is singular in Greek. “Faithfulness” is the same noun otherwise commonly rendered “faith”; reliability fits this list, though faith or trust remains possible. Verse 24 follows the shorter “Christ,” where other Greek editions read “Christ Jesus.” Walking in verse 16 and keeping in step in verse 25 translate different verbs.