Time and Place of Writing

From the course of the Apostolic labors of the holy Paul it is evident that the Epistle to the Galatians was written by him during his stay in Ephesus and falls in the years that according to chronology correspond to this time. For, accepting as true that the first preaching to them mentioned by the holy Paul (Gal. 4:13) necessarily presupposes also a second one, we must conclude that the Epistle was written after both. From the Book of Acts we know that the second visit to the Galatian churches was during the third preaching journey of the holy Paul, when he was heading toward Ephesus. From this it follows that the Epistle could not have been written before the time when the holy Paul, having been a second time in the Galatian churches, moved to Ephesus. That the writing of the Epistle should not be attributed to any later time during the stay of the holy Paul in Ephesus is evident from the fact that the holy Paul calls the change in the Galatians something that happened very quickly. “I marvel,” he says, “that you are so quickly turning away” (Gal. 1:6). This “quickly” is not after the first visit to the Galatians, when they converted to faith, but after the second, when he was strengthening them in faith. It is as if saying to them: How long ago was I with you? Everything was well with you; I saw you as zealous in the good way (Gal. 4:18). And suddenly I hear that you have turned aside into crooked ways. I am amazed at this. If, therefore, the Epistle is written quickly after his last stay with the Galatians, then it cannot possibly be supposed that it was written after the Apostle left Ephesus, where he stayed for three years (Acts 20:31). For this would not be soon, even if we suppose, as some do, that this was soon after the holy Paul’s departure from Ephesus to Macedonia or to Corinth, where he stayed for three months (Acts 20:1-3).

Now count the years. In Corinth the holy Paul was for the first time after the year 52; for he met there Aquila and Priscilla, who had been banished from Rome by a decree issued in that year. And he stayed there for a year and a half; and then one year should be allowed for the return journey from there, a visit to Jerusalem and Antioch, and then again, on the third journey, for the passage through the previously founded churches in Lycaonia, Phrygia, and Galatia. The arrival of the holy Paul in Ephesus falls thus in the year 55; and the writing of the Epistle—between the years 55 and 58. Let us suppose a year after his arrival there: it will be 56. To this same year we shall arrive if we reckon according to the visits to Jerusalem mentioned in the Epistle itself by the holy Paul: “after three years” (Gal. 1:18) and “after fourteen years” (Gal. 2:1), counting both from the time of the conversion of the holy Paul. From the Ascension of the Lord to the conversion of the holy Paul all should be reckoned as three or four years, to accommodate the events mentioned in Acts up to this time and to give time for the holy Paul to study under Gamaliel—which could not have begun before the Ascension of the Lord; for if he had been in Jerusalem during the final events of the earthly life of the Lord, he could not have failed to know of them and, if he knew, would not have restrained himself from mentioning them somewhere in the Epistles. His conversion will be in the years 37–38. Add 14 years, it will be 51–52, the time of the Jerusalem Council. After the Council—the second journey, through Asia Minor, to Macedonia and Greece; to Corinth will fall the years 53–54. To the return from there and the third journey to Ephesus another year. Arrival in Ephesus will be in the year 55; and the writing of the Epistle in 56.