But when God
This phrase introduces a divine intervention in Paul's life. The Greek word for "God" here is "Theos," which signifies the supreme deity, the Creator of the universe. In the context of Paul's letter, this highlights the sovereignty and initiative of God in the process of salvation and calling. It underscores that it is God who orchestrates the events of our lives according to His divine purpose and timing.

who set me apart from my mother’s womb
The phrase "set me apart" comes from the Greek word "aphorizo," meaning to mark off by boundaries or to separate. This indicates that Paul's calling was not a random event but a predetermined plan by God. The reference to "my mother’s womb" emphasizes the idea of predestination, suggesting that God's purpose for Paul was established even before his birth. This echoes the calling of prophets like Jeremiah (Jeremiah 1:5), reinforcing the notion that God has a specific plan for each individual.

and called me by His grace
The word "called" is derived from the Greek "kaleo," which means to invite or summon. This calling is not based on human merit but solely on "His grace"—the unmerited favor of God. The concept of grace, "charis" in Greek, is central to Paul's theology, emphasizing that salvation and calling are gifts from God, not earned by works. This reflects the transformative power of God's grace in Paul's life, turning a persecutor of the church into an apostle.

was pleased
The Greek word "eudokeo" is used here, meaning to think well of or to take delight in. This indicates that God's actions are not only purposeful but also pleasing to Him. It suggests that God's plans are carried out with intentionality and joy. This phrase reassures believers that God's will is both good and pleasing, and that His purposes in our lives are executed with divine satisfaction and love.

(15) In pursuance of his main argument, the Apostle lays stress upon the fact that his very conversion and mission to the Gentiles had been first predestinated in the divine counsels, and afterwards carried out through divine interposition: it was throughout the work of God, and not of man.

Pleased.--The word specially used of the free will and pleasure of God, determined absolutely by itself, and by no external cause.

God.--The word should be printed in italics. It is wanting in the true text, but is left to be supplied by the reader.

Separated me.--Set me apart, marked me off from the rest of mankind, for this special object (i.e., the Apostleship of the Gentiles). (Comp. Romans 1:1, and Note there.)

From my mother's womb.--A comparison of other passages where this phrase is used seems to make it clear that the sense is rather "from the moment of my birth" than "from before my birth." (See Psalm 22:10; Isaiah 49:1; Isaiah 49:5; Matthew 19:12; Acts 3:2; Acts 14:8.) From the moment that he became a living and conscious human being he was marked out in the purpose of God for his future mission. . . .

Verse 15. - But when it pleased God (ὅτε δὲ αὐδόκησεν ὁ Θεός); and when it was the good pleasure of God. The Authorized Version and the Revised Version have "but when." To determine the exact force here of the conjunction δέ, we must consider how the sentence it introduces stands related to what precedes. The main underlying thought of vers. 13, 14 was that the habit of the apostle's mind before his conversion was such as wholly to preclude the notion of his having known the gospel up to that hour. The main thought pervading vers. 15-17, and indeed pursued to the end of the chapter, is that, after he had received from God himself the knowledge of the gospel, he had had no occasion to have recourse to any mortal man, apostle or other, for the purpose of further instruction therein. It follows that the conjunction connecting the two sentences is not adversative, as it would, of course, be taken if God's dealings with him, described in vers. 15, 16, were the main point of this new paragraph, but is simply the sign of the writer's passing on to another thought - not one contrasted with the preceding, but merely additional. As examples of the use of δὲ as continuative and not adversative, comp. Luke 12:11, 16; Luke 13:6, 10; Luke 15:11; Acts 9:8, 10; Acts 12:10, 13; Romans 2:3; 1 Corinthians 16:15, 17. It may be represented in English by "and" or "and again." In the reading of the Greek text it is not certain whether we ought not to omit the word "God" (ὁ Θεός). If it is a gloss which has crept into the text, it is unquestionably a just gloss. Similar omissions of the Divine Name, as Bishop Lightfoot observes, are frequent in St. Paul (see ch. 1:6; 2:8; Romans 8:11; Philippians 1:6). The verb εὐδοκεῖν properly exprcsses complacency; as e.g. Matthew 3:17, "In whom I am well pleased;" and often. And this notion may be commonly traced in its use even when followed, as here, by an infinitive. Thus in 1 Thessalonians 2:8, "It would have been a pleasure to us to impart," etc.; in 1 Thessalonians 3:1, "It was painful to us to be left alone, but under the circumstances we gladly chose to be so." When applied, as here, to God, the notion of the pleasure which he takes in acts of beneficence must not be lost sight of; "Was graciously pleased;" comp. Luke 12:32, "It is your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom." In Ephesians 1:5 the noun "good pleasure" points to the act of "predestination" spoken of as (if we may venture so to speak of God) a volition of his heart and not of merely his regulative wisdom. The apostle seems led to use the word here by the complacency and joy which he himself felt in having been made the recipient of this "revelation;" those sentiments of his own bosom are, to his view, a reflection of the Divine complacency in imparting it. At the same time, the reader must be conscious of the deep sense, in fact the supremely prevailing sense, which the apostle has just here, that the imparting of the revelation spoken of was the fruit solely of a Divine volition triumphing over extreme wickedness and infatuation on his own part. Compare, in this respect also, the passage Ephesians 1:5, just cited. It is this feeling which prompts the introduction of the deeply emotional parenthesis consisting of the two next clauses of the verse. Who separated me from my mother's womb (ὁ ἀφορίσας με ἐκ κοιλίας μητρός μου); who set me apart from my mother's womb. The verb ἀφορίζω, set apart, separate, which is found used in other relations in Leviticus 20:26 (LXX.); Matthew 13:49; Matthew 25:32; Acts 19:9; Galatians 2:12, is employed here with an implied reference to a specific office or work. Such a reference is explicitly added in Acts 13:2," Separate me Barnabas and Saul for the work whereunto I have called them;" and in Romans 1:1, "Separated unto the gospel of God." There is this distinction, however, between the "setting apart" of the present passage and that of Acts 13:2, that, whereas in the latter it was one actually realized, here it is in the Divine predestination only, which last seems to be nearly the sense of the words, "whereunto I have called them," in the Acts. In Romans 1:1 the verb probably includes both senses. "From my mother's womb" means "from the time that I was as yet unborn;" not perhaps exactly "ever since my birth," as Judges 16:17; Matthew 19:12; Acts 3:2; Acts 14:8; comp. rather Luke 1:15, as illustrated by ver. 41. The addition of these words is designed to mark the purely arbitrary character of this predestination. Comp. Romans 9:11, "The children being not yet born, neither having done anything good or bad, that the purpose of God according to election might stand." Viewed thus, the clause appears as an utterance of adoring humility on the part of the apostle, combined, however, with the strongest possible assertion of the Divine origin of his mission. A similar statement of God's arbitrary selection of a particular human being for a particular function is found in Isaiah 49:1, "The Lord hath called me from the womb; from the bowels of my mother hath he made mention of my name; "ibid., ver. 5, "That formed me from the womb to be his servant;" and again, with yet more striking resemblance, in Jeremiah 1:5, "Before I formed thee in the belly I knew thee; and before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations (προφήτην εἰς ἔθνη)." It is difficult not to believe that this conviction of the apostle concerning himself as an object of God's predestinating purpose, and perhaps even the form of its expression - for compare the words in the next verse, "That I might preach him among the Gentiles (ἔθνεσιν)" - was very mainly derived from the Lord's words to Jeremiah, applied by the Spirit to his own particular case (comp. Acts 9:15). The apostle feels that all the while that he had been pursuing that career of persecuting impiety and passionate Pharisaism, the Almighty had kept his eye upon him as his predestined apostle, and been waiting for the fitting hour when to summon him forth to his work. And called me by his grace (καὶ καλέσας με διὰ τῆς χάριτος αὐτοῦ). As the "setting apart" mentioned in the previous clause unquestionably was a "setting apart" for the apostolic office, it might seen convenient to understand the "calling" likewise as a calling to be an apostle. So most probably we are to take the words κλητὸς ἀπόστολος in Romans 1:1 as meaning "called to be an apostle;" and in Hebrews 5:4 the verb "called" is used of one called to be a priest. But the prevailing sense of "being called," in St. Paul's writings, refers to the bringing of the soul to Christ and into his kingdom; and in this definite reference the apostle uses the verb no less than twenty-four times, three of them in this Epistle (2 Corinthians 1:6; 5:8, 13). And this, the regular use of the term, is quite in place here. It was quite natural that the writer, after so vividly portraying his former life when unregenerate, should now distinctly advert to the moral transformation which by Divine grace he had been the subject cf. The word "grace" denotes God's freely expanding unmerited goodness, not as existing in himself, but as energizing upon men. This is made clear by the introduction of the preposition (διὰ) "through" or "by." It is that "grace whose "reigning" power the apostle so exultingly extols in Romans 5:15-21 (comp. Ephesians 2:5, "By grace have ye been saved"). The notion of mercy shown to the utterly undeserving is a prominent element of the word, connected as it is here with the description of the writer's former wickedness (comp. the use of the verb "obtained mercy (ἠλεήθην)" in 1 Timothy 1:13, 16). This clause, together with the preceding one, is not to be taken as a part of the historical statement in conjunction with the next verse, as if tracing the successive steps of the transaction, but as a periphrastic designation of Almighty God adapted to the circumstances of the case. The one article prefixed in the Greek to the two combined clauses shows this. We need not, therefore, perplex ourselves to determine the relation in point of time which the Divine acts here indicated bear to that described in the verse which follows. The tone of the verse is in a measure apologetic, rebutting the prejudice which, we may be sure, did in the view of many accrue to the writer from what he once had been. Thus: "Nevertheless, God had all along, even kern the dawn of his being, set him apart to be his apostle; God, by a marvellous exercise of goodness, had called him forth out of that evil state to be his own: unworthy, no doubt, he had proved himself to be of such mercy; but what God's grace had made him, that he was; for who should dare to contravene his hand (comp. 1 Corinthians 15:8-10)?"

Parallel Commentaries ...


But
δὲ (de)
Conjunction
Strong's 1161: A primary particle; but, and, etc.

when
Ὅτε (Hote)
Adverb
Strong's 3753: When, at which time. From hos and te; at which too, i.e. When.

God,
θεὸς (theos)
Noun - Nominative Masculine Singular
Strong's 2316: A deity, especially the supreme Divinity; figuratively, a magistrate; by Hebraism, very.

who
ὁ (ho)
Article - Nominative Masculine Singular
Strong's 3588: The, the definite article. Including the feminine he, and the neuter to in all their inflections; the definite article; the.

set me apart
ἀφορίσας (aphorisas)
Verb - Aorist Participle Active - Nominative Masculine Singular
Strong's 873: To rail off, separate, place apart. From apo and horizo; to set off by boundary, i.e. limit, exclude, appoint, etc.

from
ἐκ (ek)
Preposition
Strong's 1537: From out, out from among, from, suggesting from the interior outwards. A primary preposition denoting origin, from, out.

my
μου (mou)
Personal / Possessive Pronoun - Genitive 1st Person Singular
Strong's 1473: I, the first-person pronoun. A primary pronoun of the first person I.

mother’s
μητρός (mētros)
Noun - Genitive Feminine Singular
Strong's 3384: A mother. Apparently a primary word; a 'mother'.

womb
κοιλίας (koilias)
Noun - Genitive Feminine Singular
Strong's 2836: From koilos; a cavity, i.e. the abdomen; by implication, the matrix; figuratively, the heart.

and
καὶ (kai)
Conjunction
Strong's 2532: And, even, also, namely.

called [me]
καλέσας (kalesas)
Verb - Aorist Participle Active - Nominative Masculine Singular
Strong's 2564: (a) I call, summon, invite, (b) I call, name. Akin to the base of keleuo; to 'call'.

by
διὰ (dia)
Preposition
Strong's 1223: A primary preposition denoting the channel of an act; through.

His
αὐτοῦ (autou)
Personal / Possessive Pronoun - Genitive Masculine 3rd Person Singular
Strong's 846: He, she, it, they, them, same. From the particle au; the reflexive pronoun self, used of the third person, and of the other persons.

grace,
χάριτος (charitos)
Noun - Genitive Feminine Singular
Strong's 5485: From chairo; graciousness, of manner or act.

was pleased
εὐδόκησεν (eudokēsen)
Verb - Aorist Indicative Active - 3rd Person Singular
Strong's 2106: To be well-pleased, think it good, be resolved. From eu and dokeo; to think well of, i.e. Approve; specially, to approbate.


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NT Letters: Galatians 1:15 But when it was the good pleasure (Gal. Ga)