The Letter to the Galatians was written before Acts 15 Church Council.

Excerpt: Galatians was written after the great disagreement between the believers in Antioch (Acts 15:2; Gal 2), but before the Church Council in Jerusalem in Acts 15; therefore somewhere in AD48-50.  The letter to the Galatians, therefore, represents Paul’s argument before the Church Council, and the Church Council decision substantially made an end to the dispute in the letter to the Galatians. 

SUMMARY

Both Galatians and Acts 15 mention a visit by Paul to Jerusalem and a dispute between Paul and other Jewish Christians in Antioch, but the two cities are mentioned in reverse sequences:

The visit to Jerusalem in the letter to the Galatians was a private meeting with a small number of important people, while the visit to Jerusalem in Acts resulted in a large public meeting with a formal church council decision.  For this and other reasons, these were two different visits to Jerusalem.

But the two disputes in Antioch are the same.  Both were caused by men that came from the church headquarters in Jerusalem and taught that, unless you (Gentile Christians) are circumcised, you cannot be saved.

On this basis a threefold sequence is proposed:

      1. First an informal visit to the leaders in Jerusalem,
      2. Followed by the public dispute in Antioch,
      3. which was resolved through a formal Council decision in Jerusalem.

Since the letter to the Galatians does not mention the Jerusalem decision, it must have been written before that decision, therefore somewhere in AD48-50.

PURPOSE OF THIS ARTICLE

To prepare for a discussion of the early development of the church, this page reconciles events in Jerusalem and Antioch, described in Acts, with the events in the same cities, described in Galatians.  This will help to determine where the letter to the Galatians fits into the early development of the church.

DATES

See here for a table with dates for key events in the early church.  As indicated by this table, chronologists do not always exactly agree on the dates, but they more or less agree.  For that reason, the dates in this article are all approximated.

LETTER TO THE GALATIANS

The letter to the Galatians mentions:

  • A visit by Paul and Barnabas to Jerusalem (Gal 2:1-10)
  • Followed by a dispute between Paul and other Jewish Christians in Antioch (Gal 2:11-24)

ACTS OF THE APOSTLES

Acts mentions the two cities in the opposite sequence:

      • First a dispute between Paul and other Christians in Antioch (Gal 15:1-2)
      • Followed by a visit by Paul and Barnabas to Jerusalem (Gal 15:4-30)

TWO DIFFERENT VISITS TO JERUSALEM

Some argue that Paul’s visit to Jerusalem in Galatians 2:1-10 is the same as his visit to Jerusalem in Acts 15.  There are similarities, such as:

      • The key issue in both visits is whether Gentile Christians must be circumcised (Gal 2:3; Acts 15:5).
      • In both Barnabas went with Paul (Gal 2:1; Acts 15:2).

DIFFERENCES

However, the details of the two visits are too different to refer to the same visit:

      • In the letter to the Galatians, Paul took Titus along as an example of the work he does under the Gentiles (Gal 2:1, 3), but there is no mention of Titus in Acts 15.
      • According to Galatians, Paul went to Jerusalem “because of a revelation” (Gal 2:2), but in Acts, it was because of a decision of the brethren in Antioch (Acts 15:2).
      • In Galatians, Paul visited “those who were of reputation” “in private” (Gal 2:2). According to Acts, “they were received by the church and the apostles and the elders” (Acts 15:4), and the entire church council, consisting of the “apostles and the elders” (Acts 15:6, 22) decided the matter.
      • Galatians indicates that “those who were of high reputation” (Gal 2:6, 9) simply “gave to me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship” (Gal 2:9). In Acts there was a formal church council decision, where-after leading men from the Jerusalem church were chosen to go with Paul and Barnabas with a formal letter explaining the decision “to the brethren in Antioch and Syria and Cilicia who are from the Gentiles” (Acts 15:23).

OTHER INDICATIONS

Further indications that the visit to Jerusalem in Gal 2:1-10 cannot be the council decision in Acts 15, include:

    • If the visit to Jerusalem in Gal 2:1-10 was the same as in Acts 15, then the council decision was taken before the incident in Antioch in Gal 2:11-24 and therefore before the letter to the Galatians was written. But this is very unlikely because Paul would then have mentioned the Jerusalem decision in the letter to the Galatians because the entire purpose of Galatians is to argue against the circumcision of Gentiles.
    • If Gal 2:1-10 was the same as the Acts 15 church council meeting, then James would not have sent men afterward to Antioch to preach the circumcision of Gentiles (Gal 2:12).  Also, Peter and the other Jews would not have responded in Antioch the way they did (Gal 2:12-13).

It is therefore proposed that these two visits to Jerusalem were not the same.

ONLY ONE DISPUTE IN ANTIOCH

It is rather proposed that the two disputes in Antioch (Gal 2:11-21; Acts 15:1-2) are the same.  Both disputes were caused by “men (that) came down from Judea” (Acts 15:1) (“from James” Gal 2:10) and taught “Unless you are circumcised according to the custom of Moses, you cannot be saved” (Acts 15:1) (“the party of the circumcision” – Gal 2:12).

SEQUENCE OF EVENTS

On that basis the following sequence of events is proposed:

      1. Knowing that a dispute would burst out in the open, the Spirit first led Paul to informally visitthose who were of reputation” (Gal 2:2) in Jerusalem (Gal 2:1-10).
      2. This is followed by the dispute in Antioch, described in both Galatians 2:11-24 and Acts 15:1-2.
      3. This is followed by the more formal visit to Jerusalem, to resolve the dispute through a formal Council decision (Acts 15:4-30)

WHEN WAT THE LETTER TO THE GALATIANS WRITTEN?

We are now able to date Galatians relative to these three events.  Since Galatians mentions the dispute in Antioch but does not mention the Jerusalem decision, and since that decision is critical for the topic in Galatians, namely whether Gentile Christians must be circumcised and live like Jews, it is proposed that Galatians was written by Paul while on his way to Jerusalem after the Antioch incident.  Since the Jerusalem council decision is dated to AD48-50 (about 20 years after Christ’s death) it means that Galatians was written during those same years.  It would make Galatians the earliest of Paul’s letters.

This conclusion corroborates with the information in Gal 2:1-10, namely that the first visit to Jerusalem was “after an interval of fourteen years” (Gal 2:1). The key event mentioned in the previous chapter is Paul’s Damascus-conversion (Gal 1:16) in AD35. It is, therefore, possible that the first visit to Jerusalem in Gal 2:1-10 was “fourteen years” after AD35, which will bring it to AD49.  On the assumption that the Antioch-dispute and the Jerusalem church council decision happened within a year or two after the first visit, the Jerusalem council meeting could have been in AD50.

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