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J. Louis Martyn has written by far the most thorough commentary on Galatians at over 600 pages. But it rarely felt long, as Martyn's exegesis was fascinating even though it was not always convincing. Martyn utilizes the comment section in a unique way in what really are excurses (there are 52 total!). From an organizational standpoint this is great because the main comments in the commentary are no longer than Dunn, enabling you to get through the main point relatively quickly and giving you the option to read the sometimes very lengthy excurses or not (they're mostly worth reading). Martyn's commentary is written from a thoroughgoing apocalyptic perspective. At times this helps at times it's a hindrance. Martyn also does more mirror reading than any other commentary on the market coming up with an elaborate reconstruction of the background of Galatians. On chapters 1 and 2 I found it to be brilliant. I think he's less successful after that. Still, though, Martyn has written a great commentary that is the strongest on the market on the first two chapters. Hays has incorporated the best of his insights [Full Review]
J.L. Martyn's AB is too academically-important to ignore if you're doing academic work. I looked at it enough to gain a respect for his command of the letter and the literature on it. His approach is a bit idiosyncratic, but he's not as lone ranger. He's managed to influence Galatians scholarship significantly with this work. This commentary is incredibly detailed, even for an Anchor Yale Bible volume, and will be of a lot less use to someone just preaching or leading a Bible study on Galatians. He tends to side more with the New Perspective than with the traditional Protestant approach (but I believe he is Catholic himself), and he favors the later date and North Galatian location that are usually seen to conflict with Acts (and thus tends to dismiss the historicity of Luke's account in Acts). Carson says he's weak on salvation-historical elements and thinks he hasn't "got to the bottom of Paul's understanding of the relationships between law and grace". His approach emphasizes the corporate, even cosmic, aspects of the gospel so much that there's not much attention given to how the gospel affects individuals. He doesn't have much time for legal/forensic elements to the gospel. [Full Review]
Excellent look at Galatians as from a clearly apocalyptic stand-point. While he may push the theme too far, forcing it in places, it is wonderfully illuminating in other places (particularly in chapter 1 & 2).
