Galatians 5:12 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

I would they were even cut off which trouble you.— Who subvert or unsettle you. It by no means agrees with the gentle genius of Christianity to suppose that this Apostle, who understood it so well, and cultivated it so much, should mean by this to intimate that he wished these troublers dead; or that any bodily evil were inflicted upon them by human violence. All arguments, therefore, which are drawn from this text in favour of persecuting principles, must be veryinconclusive: but when we consider the particular circumstances in which these seducing teachers opposed the Apostle, it will appear that they very well deserved that ecclesiastical censure which he here wishes to be pronounced against them. Some, following a different reading, render this verse, They ought to be cut off, and shall in reality be cut off, who trouble you.