(3) "Because of an infirmity of the flesh" (physical weakness), is the truer rendering of ver. 13; and "your temptation in my flesh" the genuine reading of ver. 14, restored by the Revisers. Sickness had arrested the Apostle's course during his second missionary tour, and detained him in the Galatic country. So that he had not only "been with" the Galatians "in weakness," as afterwards when during the same journey he preached at Corinth (1 Cor. ii. 3); but actually "_because of_ weakness." His infirmities gave him occasion to minister there, when he had intended to pass them by.
Paul had no thought of evangelizing Galatia; another goal was in view. It was patent to them--indeed he confessed as much at the time--that if he had been able to proceed, he would not have lingered in their country. This was certainly an unpromising introduction. And the Apostle's state of health made it at that time a trial for any one to listen to him. There was something in the nature of his malady to excite contempt, even loathing for his person. "That which tried you in my flesh, ye did not _despise_, nor _spit out_:" such is Paul's vivid phrase. How few men would have humility enough to refer to a circumstance of this kind; or could do so without loss of dignity. He felt that the condition of the messenger might well have moved this Galatian people to derision, rather than to reverence for his message.
At the best Paul's appearance and address were none of the most prepossessing.[121] The "ugly little Jew" M. Renan calls him, repeating the taunts of his Corinthian contemners. His sickness in Galatia, connected, it would appear, with some constitutional weakness, from which he suffered greatly during his second and third missionary tours, assumed a humiliating as well as a painful form. Yet this "thorn in the flesh," a bitter trial assuredly to himself,[122] had proved at once a trial and a blessing to his unintended hearers in Galatia.
[121] 1 Cor. ii. 3; 2 Cor. iv. 7; x. 1, 10; xi. 6.
[122] Comp. 2 Cor. xii. 7-10, referring apparently to the first outbreak of this mysterious affliction.
(4) So far from taking offence at Paul's unfortunate condition, they welcomed him with enthusiasm. They "blessed themselves" that he had come (ver. 15). They said one to another, "How fortunate we are in having this good man amongst us! What a happy thing for us that Paul's sickness obliged him to stay and give us the opportunity of hearing his good news!" Such was their former "gratulation." The regard they conceived for the sick Apostle was unbounded. "For I bear you witness," he says, "that, if possible, you would have _dug out your eyes_ and given them me!"