Galatians 5:20

THE MESSAGE

Parallel Translations

Easy-to-Read Version
worshiping false gods, taking part in witchcraft, hating people, causing trouble, being jealous, angry or selfish, causing people to argue and divide into separate groups,

Revised Standard Version
idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, anger, selfishness, dissension, party spirit,

Tyndale New Testament (1525)
ydolatrye witchecraft hatred variaunce zele wrath stryfe sedicion sectes

Hebrew Names Version
idolatry, sorcery, hatred, strife, jealousies, outbursts of anger, rivalries, divisions, heresies,

New American Standard Bible
idolatry, witchcraft, hostilities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions,

New Century Version
worshiping gods, doing witchcraft, hating, making trouble, being jealous, being angry, being selfish, making people angry with each other, causing divisions among people,

Update Bible Version
idolatry, witchcraft, enmities, strife, jealousy, wraths, factions, divisions, parties,

Webster's Bible Translation
Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies,

English Standard Version
idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, rivalries, dissensions, divisions,

World English Bible
idolatry, sorcery, hatred, strife, jealousies, outbursts of anger, rivalries, divisions, heresies,

Wesley's New Testament (1755)
uncleanness, lasciviousness, Idolatry, witchcraft, enmities, contentions,

Weymouth's New Testament
enmity, strife, jealousy, outbursts of passion, intrigues, dissensions, factions, envyings;

Wycliffe Bible (1395)
witchecraftis, enmytees, striuyngis, indignaciouns, wraththis, chidingis, discenciouns, sectis, enuyes,

English Revised Version
idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousies, wraths, factions, divisions, heresies,

Berean Standard Bible
idolatry and sorcery; hatred, discord, jealousy, and rage; rivalries, divisions, factions,

Contemporary English Version
They worship idols, practice witchcraft, hate others, and are hard to get along with. People become jealous, angry, and selfish. They not only argue and cause trouble, but they are

Amplified Bible
idolatry, sorcery, hostility, strife, jealousy, fits of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions [that promote heresies],

American Standard Version
idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousies, wraths, factions, divisions, parties,

Bible in Basic English
Worship of images, use of strange powers, hates, fighting, desire for what another has, angry feelings, attempts to get the better of others, divisions, false teachings,

Complete Jewish Bible
involvement with the occult and with drugs; in feuding, fighting, becoming jealous and getting angry; in selfish ambition, factionalism, intrigue

Darby Translation
idolatry, sorcery, hatred, strifes, jealousies, angers, contentions, disputes, schools of opinion,

International Standard Version
idolatry, witchcraft,sorcery">[fn] hatred, rivalry, jealously, outbursts of anger, quarrels, conflicts, factions,

Etheridge Translation
the worship of idols, sorcery, enmity, contention, ambition, wrath, calumny, divisions, rendings,

Murdock Translation
idol-worship, magic, malice, contention, rivalry, wrath, strife, divisions, discords,

King James Version (1611)
Idolatrie, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies,

New Living Translation
idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division,

New Life Bible
worshiping false gods, witchcraft, hating, fighting, being jealous, being angry, arguing, dividing into little groups and thinking the other groups are wrong, false teaching,

New Revised Standard
idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, anger, quarrels, dissensions, factions,

Geneva Bible (1587)
Idolatrie, witchcraft, hatred, debate, emulations, wrath, contentions, seditions, heresies,

George Lamsa Translation
Idolatry, witchcraft, enmity, strife, jealousy, anger, stubbornness, seditions, heresies,

J.B. Rotherham Emphasized Bible
idolatry, enchantment, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of wrath, factions, divisions, parties,

Douay-Rheims Bible
Idolatry, witchcrafts, enmities, contentions, emulations, wraths, quarrels, dissensions, sects,

Bishop's Bible (1568)
Worshippyng of images, witchcrafte, hatred, variaunce, zeale, wrath, strife, seditions, sectes,

Good News Translation
in worship of idols and witchcraft. People become enemies and they fight; they become jealous, angry, and ambitious. They separate into parties and groups;

Christian Standard Bible®
idolatry, sorcery, hatreds, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambitions, dissensions, factions,

King James Version
Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies,

Lexham English Bible
idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, factions,

Literal Translation
idolatry, sorcery, enmities, fightings, jealousies, angers, rivalries, divisions, heresies,

Young's Literal Translation
idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, strifes, emulations, wraths, rivalries, dissensions, sects,

Miles Coverdale Bible (1535)
Idolatrye, witchcraft, hatred, variaunce, zele, wrath, stryfe, sedicion, sectes,

Mace New Testament (1729)
brutality, idolatry, poisoning, enmities, quarrels, emulations, animosities, strife, seditions, factions, envyings,

New English Translation
idolatry, sorcery, hostilities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish rivalries, dissensions, factions,

New King James Version
idolatry, sorcery, hatred, contentions, jealousies, outbursts of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies,

Simplified Cowboy Version
worshiping things other than God, witchcraft, getting mad all the time, picking fights, being jealous, throwin' fits, thinking only of yourself, blaming others for everything, picking sides,

New American Standard Bible (1995)
idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions,

Legacy Standard Bible
idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions,

Contextual Overview

¹³It is absolutely clear that God has called you to a free life. Just make sure that you don't use this freedom as an excuse to do whatever you want to do and destroy your freedom. Rather, use your freedom to serve one another in love; that's how freedom grows. For everything we know about God's Word is summed up in a single sentence: Love others as you love yourself. That's an act of true freedom. If you bite and ravage each other, watch out—in no time at all you will be annihilating each other, and where will your precious freedom be then? ¹⁶My counsel is this: Live freely, animated and motivated by God's Spirit. Then you won't feed the compulsions of selfishness. For there is a root of sinful self-interest in us that is at odds with a free spirit, just as the free spirit is incompatible with selfishness. These two ways of life are antithetical, so that you cannot live at times one way and at times another way according to how you feel on any given day. Why don't you choose to be led by the Spirit and so escape the erratic compulsions of a law-dominated existence? ¹⁹It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time: repetitive, loveless, cheap sex; a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness; trinket gods; magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or be loved; divided homes and divided lives; small-minded and lopsided pursuits; the vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly parodies of community. I could go on. This isn't the first time I have warned you, you know. If you use your freedom this way, you will not inherit God's kingdom. ²²But what happens when we live God's way? He brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard—things like affection for others, exuberance about life, serenity. We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitments, not needing to force our way in life, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely. Legalism is helpless in bringing this about; it only gets in the way. Among those who belong to Christ, everything connected with getting our own way and mindlessly responding to what everyone else calls necessities is killed off for good—crucified. Since this is the kind of life we have chosen, the life of the Spirit, let us make sure that we do not just hold it as an idea in our heads or a sentiment in our hearts, but work out its implications in every detail of our lives. That means we will not compare ourselves with each other as if one of us were better and another worse. We have far more interesting things to do with our lives. Each of us is an original. ²⁴The Life of Freedom Christ has set us free to live a free life. So take your stand! Never again let anyone put a harness of slavery on you. I am emphatic about this. The moment any one of you submits to circumcision or any other rule-keeping system, at that same moment Christ's hard-won gift of freedom is squandered. I repeat my warning: The person who accepts the ways of circumcision trades all the advantages of the free life in Christ for the obligations of the slave life of the law. I suspect you would never intend this, but this is what happens. When you attempt to live by your own religious plans and projects, you are cut off from Christ, you fall out of grace. Meanwhile we expectantly wait for a satisfying relationship with the Spirit. For in Christ, neither our most conscientious religion nor disregard of religion amounts to anything. What matters is something far more interior: faith expressed in love. You were running superbly! Who cut in on you, deflecting you from the true course of obedience? This detour doesn't come from the One who called you into the race in the first place. And please don't toss this off as insignificant. It only takes a minute amount of yeast, you know, to permeate an entire loaf of bread. Deep down, the Master has given me confidence that you will not defect. But the one who is upsetting you, whoever he is, will bear the divine judgment. As for the rumor that I continue to preach the ways of circumcision (as I did in those pre-Damascus Road days), that is absurd. Why would I still be persecuted, then? If I were preaching that old message, no one would be offended if I mentioned the Cross now and then—it would be so watered-down it wouldn't matter one way or the other. Why don't these agitators, obsessive as they are about circumcision, go all the way and castrate themselves! It is absolutely clear that God has called you to a free life. Just make sure that you don't use this freedom as an excuse to do whatever you want to do and destroy your freedom. Rather, use your freedom to serve one another in love; that's how freedom grows. For everything we know about God's Word is summed up in a single sentence: Love others as you love yourself. That's an act of true freedom. If you bite and ravage each other, watch out—in no time at all you will be annihilating each other, and where will your precious freedom be then? My counsel is this: Live freely, animated and motivated by God's Spirit. Then you won't feed the compulsions of selfishness. For there is a root of sinful self-interest in us that is at odds with a free spirit, just as the free spirit is incompatible with selfishness. These two ways of life are antithetical, so that you cannot live at times one way and at times another way according to how you feel on any given day. Why don't you choose to be led by the Spirit and so escape the erratic compulsions of a law-dominated existence? It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time: repetitive, loveless, cheap sex; a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness; trinket gods; magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or be loved; divided homes and divided lives; small-minded and lopsided pursuits; the vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly parodies of community. I could go on. This isn't the first time I have warned you, you know. If you use your freedom this way, you will not inherit God's kingdom. But what happens when we live God's way? He brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard—things like affection for others, exuberance about life, serenity. We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitments, not needing to force our way in life, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely. Legalism is helpless in bringing this about; it only gets in the way. Among those who belong to Christ, everything connected with getting our own way and mindlessly responding to what everyone else calls necessities is killed off for good—crucified. ²⁵Since this is the kind of life we have chosen, the life of the Spirit, let us make sure that we do not just hold it as an idea in our heads or a sentiment in our hearts, but work out its implications in every detail of our lives. That means we will not compare ourselves with each other as if one of us were better and another worse. We have far more interesting things to do with our lives. Each of us is an original.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

witchcraft: Ezekiel 22:18, Deuteronomy 18:10, 1 Samuel 15:23, 1 Chronicles 10:13, 1 Chronicles 10:14, 2 Chronicles 33:6, Acts 8:9-11, Acts 16:16-19

heresies: 2 Corinthians 11:19, Titus 3:10, 2 Peter 2:1

Reciprocal: Genesis 13:7 - a strife Exodus 22:18 - General Leviticus 19:18 - not avenge Leviticus 19:31 - General 2 Samuel 19:43 - our advice Psalms 31:20 - the strife Luke 9:46 - General Luke 21:34 - surfeiting John 3:26 - he that Acts 24:14 - heresy 1 Corinthians 1:11 - that there 1 Corinthians 11:19 - heresies Galatians 5:24 - crucified Ephesians 4:31 - wrath Philippians 2:3 - nothing Colossians 2:18 - fleshly Colossians 3:8 - anger 1 Timothy 6:4 - words James 1:19 - slow to wrath James 3:16 - where

Gill's Notes on the Bible

Idolatry,.... Which some understand of covetousness, which is so called; but rather it means the worshipping of other gods, or of graven images:

witchcraft; any real or pretended league and association with the devil, seeking to converse with familiar spirits, to gain unlawful knowledge, or to do hurt to fellow creatures; which, as it is doing honour to Satan, detracts from the glory of God, and rightly follows idolatry; conjuration, soothsaying, necromancy, and all kind of magic are included and condemned hereby:

hatred: internal hatred of any man's person, even of our very enemies, is forbidden; in the original text it is "enmities": as the carnal mind is nothing else but enmity against God and Christ, against law and Gospel, and all good men, and everything that is good:

variance, or "contentions"; fighting and quarrelling, by words scandalous and reproachful, what we commonly call scolding:

emulations or "zeals"; not good, but bad: a boiling and rising up of the spirits and passions, at the honour and happiness of another:

wrath or "wraths" violent emotions of the mind, moving to revenge, and seeking the hurt and mischief of others:

strife or "strifes"; perpetual contradictions and cavilings, either expressed by words, or working in the mind; for this strife may be in a man's heart, according to James 3:14

seditions or "divisions": schisms and factions, dissensions in things domestic, civil, and religious:

heresies; bad principles and tenets, relating to doctrine, which are subversive of the fundamentals of the Gospel and the Christian religion; and are the produce of a man's own invention, and the matter of his choice, without any foundation in the word of God; and these are works of the flesh, for they spring from a corrupt and carnal mind, and are propagated with carnal views, as popular applause, worldly advantage, and indulging the lusts of the flesh.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Witchcraft - Pretending to witchcraft. The apostle does not vouch for the actual existence of witchcraft; but he says that what was known as such was a proof of the corrupt nature of man, and was one of the fruits of it. No one can doubt it. It was a system of imposture and falsehood throughout; and nothing is a better demonstration of the depravity of the human heart than an extended and systematized attempt to impose on mankind. The word which is used here (φαρμακεία pharmakeia, whence our word “pharmacy,” from φάρμακον pharmakon, a medicine, poison, magic potion) means, properly, the preparing and giving of medicine. Then it means also poisoning, and also magic art, or enchantment; because in savage nations pharmacy or medicine consisted much in magical incantations. Thence it means sorcery or enchantment, and it is so used uniformly in the New Testament. It is used only in Galatians 5:20; Revelation 9:21; Revelation 18:23; Revelation 21:8. Some have supposed that it means poisoning here, a crime often practiced; but the more correct interpretation is, to refer it to the black art, or to pretensions to witchcraft, and the numerous delusions which have grown out of it, as a striking illustration of the corrupt and depraved nature of man.

Hatred - Greek: “hatreds,” in the plural. Antipathies, and lack of love, producing contentions and strifes.

Variance - Contentions; see the note at Romans 1:29.

Emulations - (ζήλοι zēloi). In a bad sense, meaning heart-burning, or jealousy, or perhaps inordinate ambition. The sense is ardor or zeal in a bad cause, leading to strife, etc.

Wrath - This also is plural in the Greek (θυμοὶ thumoi), meaning passions, “bursts of anger;” see the note at 2 Corinthians 12:20.

Strife - Also plural in the Greek; see the note at 2 Corinthians 12:20

Seditions - See the note at Romans 16:17.

Heresies - See the note at Acts 5:17; 1 Corinthians 11:19.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse 20. Idolatry — Worshipping of idols; frequenting idol festivals; all the rites of Bacchus, Venus, Priapus, c., which were common among the Gentiles.

Witchcraft — φαρμακεια, from φαρμακον, a drug or poison because in all spells and enchantments, whether true or false, drugs were employed. As a drug, φαρμακον, might either be the means of removing an evil, or inflicting one, etymologists have derived it from φερον ακος, bringing ease, or φερον αχος, bringing pain. So spells and incantations were used sometimes for the restoration of the health; at others, for the destruction of an enemy. Sometimes, these φαρμακα were used to procure love; at other times, to produce hatred.

Hatred — εχθραι. Aversions and antipathies, when opposed to brotherly love and kindness.

Variance — ερεις. Contentions, where the principle of hatred proceeds to open acts; hence contests, altercations, lawsuits, and disputes in general.

Emulations — ζηλοι. Envies or emulations; that is strife to excel at the expense of another; lowering others to set up one's self; unholy zeal, fervently adopting a bad cause, or supporting a good one by cruel means. Inquisitions, pretending to support true religion by torturing and burning alive those who both profess and practise it.

Wrath — θυμοι. Turbulent passions, disturbing the harmony of the mind, and producing domestic and civil broils and disquietudes.

Strife — επιθειαι. Disputations, janglings, logomachics, or strife about words.

Seditions — διχοστασιαι. Divisions into separate factions; parties, whether in the Church or state.

Heresies — αιρεσεις. Factions; parties in the Church separating from communion with each other, and setting up altar against altar. The word, which is harmless in itself, is here used in a bad sense. In stead of αιρεσεις the Slavonic has σκανδαλα, scandals, offences or stumbling-blocks.