Once more Paul asks a question which logically follows from his previous statements. If there is such a distinction between the Law and the promise, and if there is such a clear superiority of the promise over the Law, then does this mean that the Law is against God’s promises? This rhetorical question is immediately answered with a strong negative statement. The presence of this statement makes it possible in a number of languages to retain the rhetorical question. However, in some languages one may need to transform the question itself into a positive statement, for example, “The Law is certainly not against God’s promises.” This statement can then be followed by a further strong negative, “No, indeed.”
It may, however, be difficult in some languages to speak of a law being “against promises.” One can, however, often say “Does this mean that what the Law says is against what God has promised?”, or “… that the words of the Law are against the promises of God?”
Against means “contrary to.” Is against must be expressed in some languages as “say the opposite,” “speak against,” or “say something different from,” for example, “Do the words of the Law say something different from what God has promised?” This question may be introduced in some languages as “Is it true that the words of the Law are against God’s promises?”
For the plural form of “promises,” see verse 16. The expected answer, in the light of everything Paul has said so far, is in the affirmative. But Paul answers in the negative: No, not at all! (Phillips “certainly not”; Jerusalem Bible “of course not”; New American Bible “unthinkable!”; New English Bible “no, never!”). For this expression, see 2.17.
Paul is able to give a negative answer to this question because he not only allows that the Law has a function, but that function is even related to the fulfillment of God’s promise. Already he has said that the Law functions as showing what wrongdoing is (verse 19), and later he takes up other functions of the Law: as teacher (verses 23-25) and as guardian (4.1 ff.). But the function of the Law is not the same as the function of the promise. The function of the promise is to bring life. If the Law could do that, then it would be competing with the promise. But the Law cannot bring life, because it was not given for such a purpose.
Some interpreters understand law in the clause for if mankind had received a law to refer to the Torah or the Jewish law (New American Bible, Jerusalem Bible “if the Law we were given”). However, since in the Greek “law” is not preceded by the article, many exegetes have argued that Paul is here referring to any law, and particularly, as the context shows, any divine law (compare Phillips, Revised Standard Version, Knox). The expression if mankind had received a law may need to be made more specific in a number of languages, for example, “If God had given mankind a law.” However, it is essential to pay careful attention to the rendering of a law, for if this is to be understood in the sense of any divine law rather than merely any specific regulation, then it is perhaps necessary to use in some languages a phrase which would be essentially equivalent to “some special kind of law” or “some set of laws.”
Most translations simply render the expression bring life in the way Good News Translation does, without making the meaning of “life” clear in this passage. Basically there are two possible ways of interpreting the expression to bring life:
(1) “Life” may be interpreted as “eternal life,” “spiritual life,” or “moral life,” as opposed to physical existence. This kind of life is made possible by man being in a right relationship with God. What Paul is saying, then, is: If there is a law that could put men right with God, then eternal life could be achieved through law. In this sense one may often translate as “could cause men really to live,” or “could cause men to share the life that comes from God” (as a reference to “spiritual life”).
(2) “Life” may be interpreted simply as a state brought about by a right relationship with God. Previously, Paul has used “to live” as synonymous with “to be put right with God” (see verse 12), and here he may be doing the same thing. If this is the case, then “to bring life” could be understood as another way of saying “to be put right with God.”
Be put right with God is one word in the Greek, literally, “righteousness.” Many commentators and translators understand this to have the same meaning as its verb form “to justify” (compare Jerusalem Bible) and primarily refers to right relationship with God, acceptance by God. Another possible translation is “God would accept people in a right relationship to himself.”
The phrase by obeying it must often be expressed as “by doing what the law says people must do.” However, in this context the term “law” must refer back specifically to law mentioned in the beginning of this same sentence. If, for example, one has used at the beginning of the verse “a certain set of laws,” then at the end of the verse one may refer to “such a set of laws.”
Quoted with permission from Arichea, Daniel C. and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on Paul’s Letter to the Galatians. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1976. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .