It must have come as a shock to the Galatian Christians to read these words. After all, they had no intention of returning to their former way of life in paganism. On the contrary, they were attempting to make progress in their new spiritual life by learning and observing the Mosaic law, which prohibited pagan idolatry. Yet now Paul is asking them why they are turning back to those weak and miserable principles. Do you wish to be enslaved by them all over again? he asks.

Paul's words all over again raise the alarming possibility that turning to the observance of the Mosaic law after conversion to Christ is actually comparable to taking up a pre-Christian position of pagan worship. Furthermore, Paul's use of the phrase those weak and miserable principles to describe both the Galatian believers' observance of law after their conversion and their pagan religious experience is parallel to his use of "the basic principles of the world" to describe the pre-Christian condition of the Jewish people under the law of Moses (v. 3). The only way to understand Paul's equation of observing the law and pagan worship is to recognize that whenever the observance of law takes the place of Christ as the basis of relating to God, it is as reprehensible as pagan worship.

Pagan religions are weak and miserable principles. They are weak because they do not have the power to overcome the guilt and power of sin; they are miserable, poor and impotent because they cannot impart a new life. In the same way the Mosaic codes are weak and miserable principles. The Mosaic law "declares that the whole world is a prisoner of sin" (3:22), but it is powerless to set anyone free from the chains of sin. And the Mosaic law is not able to impart life (3:21). Therefore to substitute observance of the Mosaic law for complete reliance on Christ is just the same as returning to pagan worship.

An illustration of the weak and miserable principles to which the churches in Galatia were turning is given by Paul in verse 10: You are observing special days and months and seasons and years! Evidently the Jewish calendar had been instituted in the Galatian churches. They were planning to observe the regulations for weekly sabbath days, monthly new moon festivals, annual festivals like Passover, Pentecost and Tabernacles, and the sabbatical years. They must have been led to believe that their observance of these holy days and festivals would draw them closer to God. What foolishness! How could people who have already received adoption as children of God and are praying "Abba, Father" in the Spirit, people who know God and are known by him, start to depend on the observance of holy days for their relationship with God? Isn't this obviously a return to those weak and miserable principles that characterized their lives in paganism?

My Chinese colleagues at Trinity Theological College in Singapore have recently been expressing their concern that some Chinese churches are sounding more Confucian than Christian. Their point is that Chinese Christians are in danger of turning their faith into a version of Confucianism, which was what they followed before their conversion to Christ. In their Confucian background they maintained high moral standards. But they were not able to enter into a personal relationship with God by their moral achievements. In fact, they experienced unresolved guilt for not being able to live up to their own standards. When they first met Christ, they focused on their newfound personal relationship with God the Father, which they enjoyed through faith in Christ by the presence of his Spirit in their lives. But slowly their center of attention changed. They put more and more emphasis on the high moral standards of their Christian faith. They began to lose sight of what God had done for them in Christ and began to concentrate on what they must do to inherit "the good life." They were especially drawn to the Old Testament's legal codes. Then they formulated those moral laws in the familiar terms of their own Chinese cultural background. So my colleagues shake their heads with concern when they say of some fellow believers, "I'm afraid they sound more Confucian than Christian."