Galatians 2:10Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

What, then, do these words mean? "In the work of preaching," he says, "we divided the world between us. I took the Gentiles, and they took the Jews, as was pleasing to God. But in care for the poor among the Jews, I also gave them help. Therefore, if there had been disagreement and strife between us, they would not have accepted my participation." Who, then, are these poor? Many of the believing Jews in Palestine, who had lost all their possessions and were persecuted everywhere. He points to this in the Epistle to the Hebrews when he says, "You accepted the plundering of your possessions with joy" (Heb 10:34). He points to the same thing in the Epistle to the Thessalonians, when he praises their courage: "You became imitators of the churches of God in Christ Jesus which are in Judea.

Having divided the work of preaching among ourselves, he says, we remembered the poor without division. For in Jerusalem many of the believers had been deprived of their possessions by unbelieving Jews and were in difficulty regarding necessary food. The Greeks did not show such fierce enmity against believers from among them as the Jews did toward Christians from the Hebrews. Therefore Paul shows special zeal in caring for them, as he himself testifies that he was eager to do this very thing. For he collected alms everywhere from his disciples and delivered them himself.

They gave us only the command that we should care for the poor among the Gentiles, which we indeed did. But we also cared for the poor who were in Jerusalem. I was eager to do this because the enemies of the Cross had no concern to supply what was lacking among those Gentiles beloved by Christ.

When Paul and Barnabas discussed these questions with John, Peter, and James, the gospel was received and confirmed in the form in which Paul handed it down. The only thing they heard unwillingly was the reasoning that works do not bring salvation. Yet they insisted only that the poor should be remembered. Thus they were in agreement with Paul: if we do something for the poor, no hope of salvation lies in that. But to what do they exhort us? That we remember the poor. This does not mean that we direct all our activity toward this. It means that we share with the one who does not have what we ourselves can have. The poor must only be remembered. We must not direct toward them the care, anxiety, and whole strength that is called to the acquisition of salvation.

"Only that we should remember the poor." Almsgiving was to serve as a means of communion between Christians from the Gentiles and Christians from the Jews.

That St. Paul treated the above-mentioned "men of reputation" with full respect and valued their opinion as truly apostolic is shown by the words of verses 9 and 10. "When James, Cephas, and John, who were reputed to be pillars, perceived the grace given to me, they gave to me and Barnabas the right hand of fellowship, that we should go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised. Only they asked us to remember the poor, which very thing I was eager to do." These words contain a direct answer or rebuke to those slanderous opponents of St. Paul. They strove with all their might to establish the opinion that he could not and should not be considered a true apostle, and that the foremost apostles supposedly regarded him in the same way. "On the contrary," says St. Paul, "they gave me the right hand," and so forth.

Aid to the poor Palestinian Christians was set before Paul as a condition of living communion. Their need was great after their property had been plundered by persecutors (Heb 10:34). Also, for all young Christians, almsgiving could be a living bond with the mother of the Churches, the Church of Jerusalem. It is known that Paul received this commandment heartily. Both orally and in writing, he exhorted his new converts to help the poor in Jerusalem (1 Cor 16:13; Rom 15:25). According to Bishop Theophan, the Apostle mentions aid to the poor perhaps to show that this matter, a very delicate one, was compelled by the commandment laid upon him by the apostles. It was not some superfluous, self-willed ordinance personally invented by him.

Only with this condition: that the churches enjoying peace and abundance should give help to the churches suffering distress and poverty.

By the poor here are meant those among the believing Jews who had fallen into poverty because of persecutions, deprivations, and ruin inflicted by unbelievers upon believers. Extreme need compelled them to establish such a commandment in common. Not all the believers had been ruined, and among them there were people of means who were ready to help. Yet the number of the poor and impoverished was surely so great that local Christian resources were insufficient to support them. The Gentiles, who suffered less ruin from their own people than the Jews did, were better supplied. Without burdening themselves, they could give help to the poor Jews, and they gladly did this through the exhortations and arrangements of St. Paul.