Father, Paul keeps losing me. Some of the time he is clearly talking about Gentile converts to Jesus, who had been tricked into “overconverting” all the way into Judiasm. Some of the time he is clearly talking about the biological descendents of Jacob, who were literally being kept under the Law of Moses. But this paragraph is mixed up.

Is Paul talking to Gentiles who had personal experience with idol worship? Or could he be talking about the days when the Hebrews lived in Egypt and continued in their idolatry until Moses ground up the ashes of the Golden Calf and made the people drink them?

When Paul says that they desire to be enslaved all over again he could be talking about the things associated with idolatry, but the calendar stuff could be pagan or Mosaic.

Ok let me try this: The believers in the various communities in the region of Galatia were not homogenous. Some were perhaps nearly all biological Jews, others nearly all gentiles, and some very much a mixture. And Paul is writing a letter generally addressed to them all. But Paul up to now has been warning those who came to Jesus from a Gentile background not to go too far, and enter into slavery to Moses. But he is also saying that the Gentiles have been in slavery up to now, just a different kind of slavery. The Jews had been slaves to Mosaic Law. The Gentiles were slaves to the regulations of their idolatries. Is Paul really saying that the Gentiles were basically just going from one kind of slavery to another? That’s it isn’t it?

But that implies something which seems a little strong, even for Paul. When he says the Gentiles want to turn back to “the weak, and worthless/elemental things” he is actually saying that there is no meaningful difference between the regulations of Moses and the regulations of the Greek pantheon. Wow. Well, that is consistent with the general tone of Paul, even if it is hard to reconcile with some of his specific statements about the benefits of the Law. Elsewhere, when Paul seems to belittle the Law of Moses, he does so by saying that it will not make anyone righteous, and that it is ineffective against the sin nature. So when Paul bundles the pagan Laws and the Mosaic Laws together he is declaring both of them to be impotent as a means of salvation, and no one should be enslaved to either. But...Paul would never say that the two were equal. Nothing in human history can equal Moses Law, but it is just a Law, it is not life. And as far as the Galatians were concerned, Paul wanted them to be free, not under any external religious regulation, no matter how good it seemed.