Kehillah in Galatia 4:18

18 Now it is tov ma’od to be zealous in a good thing all the time, and not only during my presence with you.

Kehillah in Galatia 4:18 Meaning and Commentary

Galatians 4:18

But it is good to be zealously affected
A zealous affection when right is very commendable, as the instances of Phinehas, Elijah, John the Baptist, and our Lord Jesus Christ show, and a contrary spirit is very disagreeable. But then it must be expressed

in a good thing;
in a good cause, for God, and the things of Christ; for the Gospel, and the ordinances of it, and for the discipline of God's house, and against immorality and profaneness, errors and heresies: and it should be "always"; not at certain times, and upon some particular accounts, but it should be constant, and always continue; it should be ever the same towards God, Christ, and his ministers:

and not only when I am present with you;
by which the apostle suggests, that while he was with them they were zealously attached to him and truth; but no sooner was he gone from them, but their zealous affection abated, and was fixed on others, which discovered their weakness, fickleness, and inconstancy; whereas he was always the same to them, and bore the same love to them, as the following words show.

Kehillah in Galatia 4:18 In-Context

16 So, then, have I become your oyev (enemy) by telling you HaEmes?

17 They (the mohalim haGoyim) are zealously courting you, but not in a good way; rather, they desire to cut you off and shut you out, in order that you may be zealous for them.

18 Now it is tov ma’od to be zealous in a good thing all the time, and not only during my presence with you.

19 My yeladim, for whom again I suffer chevlei leydah (birth pains) until Moshiach is formed in you,

20 Would that I were present with you just now and could change my tone, because I am baffled by you.