THE PAROUSIA

By James Stuart Russell

THE PAROUSIA IN THE EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS.

We find no direct allusion to the Parousia in the Epistle to the Galatians. It contributes, however, indirectly to the elucidation of the subject, by furnishing an illustration of the early appearance and rapid growth of that defection from the faith predicted by our Lord, and designated by St. Paul ‘the apostasy,’ or ‘falling away,’ which was a sign and precursor of the Parousia. (See Matt. 24:12; 2 Thess. 2:3; 1 Tim. 4; 2 Tim. 3, 4:3, 4) The plague had already broken out in the churches of Galatia, and we see in this epistle how earnestly the apostle endeavoured to check its progress, vehemently protesting against this perversion of the Gospel, and denouncing its originators and propagandists as enemies of the cross of Christ. The evil arose from the arts of the Judaising teachers, who were everywhere the inveterate opponents of St. Paul, and who seem to have been possessed with the same spirit of proselytism which distinguished the Pharisees, who ‘compasses sea and land to make one proselyte.’ In this manifestation of the predicted apostasy we have a marked indication of the approach of the ‘last times,’ or ‘the end of the age.’

‘THIS PRESENT EVIL AGE, OR ÆON.’

Gal. 1:4—‘Who gave himself for our sins, that he might deliver us from this present evil world.’

The apostle here speaks of the existing state of things as evil, and of the Lord Jesus Christ as the deliverer therefrom. The word age [aiwn] does not of course refer to the material world, the earth; but to the moral world, or age. It is equivalent to the phrase so often occurring in the gospels, ‘this wicked generation’. Matt. 12:45, etc. ‘The present evil age’ is regarded as passing away, and about to be succeeded by a new order, the aiwn o mellwn. (Heb. 2:5)(1)

THE TWO JERUSALEMS—THE OLD AND THE NEW.

Gal. 4:25, 26—‘For this Agar is mount Sinai in Arabia, and answereth to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children. But the Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all.’

It is not our intention at present to do more than simply take note of this remarkable contrast between the two cities, the new and the old Jerusalem. We purposely refrain at this stage from entering upon symbols and their significance, until the whole subject comes before us in the Book of Revelation.

In the meantime the reader is requested to note well the contrasts here presented. The Jerusalem which now is, and the Jerusalem which is to be; the earthly Jerusalem, and the heavenly Jerusalem; the Jerusalem which is in bondage, and the Jerusalem which is free; the Jerusalem which is beneath, and the Jerusalem which is above, the Jerusalem which is the mother of slaves; and the Jerusalem which is our mother. We shall yet find this contrast of no little use in determining the meaning of some of the symbols in the Apocalypse.

Footnotes

1. Locke has the following note on this passage:—‘That He might take us out of this present evil world, or age, so the Greek words signify. Whereby it cannot be thought that St. Paul meant that Christians were to be immediately removed into the other world. Therefore enestwv aiwn must signify something else than present world in the ordinary import of those words in English. Aiwn outov, 1 Cor. 2:6, 8, and in other places, plainly signifies the Jewish nation under the Mosaical constitution; and it suits very well with the apostle’s design in this epistle that it should do so here. God has in this world but one kingdom and one people. The nation of the Jews were the kingdom and people of God whilst the law stood. And this kingdom of God under the Mosaical constitution was called aiwn outov, this age, or, as it is commonly translated, this world, to which aiwn enestwv, the present world, or age, here answers. But the kingdom of God which was to be under the Messiah, wherein the economy and constitution of the Jewish Church, and the nation itself, that in opposition to Christ adhered to it, was to be laid aside, is in the New Testament called aiwn mellwn, the world, or age, to come; so that Christ’s taking them out of the present world, may, without any violence to the words, be understood to signify His setting them free from the Mosaical constitution.’—Paraphrase and Notes on Galatians. This explanation, though it comes near the truth, scarcely gives the full meaning of the phrase.