Galatians 4:21

Gal_4:21

Tell me.

The value of a pointed question

The question that prompts us to tell what we know sharpens our knowledge; and, similarly, the question that makes us tell what we are doing may greatly influence our conduct. For many a man drifting on in a course of evil that he has never stopped to define, it would be a good thing if some one by a pointed question could get him to say out, in plain words, just what he is doing. If he would only honestly state it to himself he would shrink from it with horror. But not only for clearing away the haze that obscures an unworthy purpose, but also for removing the fog in which good purposes are sometimes involved, a pointed question may serve us. There are those whose intention to do right and live the highest life is rather nebulous. If some question could be put to them that would lead them to objectify their purpose in language so that they could look at it and understand it, it would be of great service to them. (Washington Gladden.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Gal 4:21-23. Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law — Of Moses, as the rule of your justification; do ye not hear the law? — Regard what it says? how it teaches that Abraham’s children, by faith, who are heirs of the promises, are free from the bondage of the law? “The argument the apostle is going to use being taken from the law of Moses, was urged with much propriety, not only against the Judaizers, who affirmed that obedience to the law of Moses was necessary to men’s salvation, but against those Gentiles also whom the Judaizers had seduced to receive the law. For if the apostle made it evident, from the law of Moses itself, that Abraham’s children, by faith, were free from the bondage of the law, no further argument was necessary to prove that obedience to the law is not necessary to justification.” — Macknight. It is written that Abraham had two sons — Here he illustrates the doctrine of justification by faith, and of the abolition of the legal dispensation, by the history of Abraham’s family, in which it was prefigured. The plain import of what he advances is this: That as in Abraham’s family there were two mothers, and two sorts of children, which were differently treated; so, in the visible church, there are two sorts of professors; some that seek justification by the works of the law, who are in a servile and miserable condition, and shall at last be cast out from the presence of God, and the society of the saints; others that seek justification by faith in Christ, and in the promises of God through him: and these are the free sons of God’s family, and in a happy condition, and shall at last certainly obtain the inheritance of eternal life. The one — Namely, Ishmael, by Hagar, a bond-maid, the other — Namely, Isaac, by Sarah, a free-woman. But there was a great difference between them; for he who was of the bond-woman — That is, Ishmael; was born only after the flesh — In the common order of nature, without any particular promise of God, or any unusual interposition of his power and providence. But he of the free-woman — That is, Isaac; was by promise — Through the strength supernaturally communicated to his parents by the promise, Lo Sarah, thy wife, shall have a son; and, like his mother, being free, was his father’s heir.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

8. Superiority of faith over legalism illustrated by the history of Sarah and Hagar, Gal_4:21 to Gal_5:1.

21. Tell me—As if after an interval since writing the last tenderer paragraph, St. Paul resumes the more severe and imperative strain of Gal_2:1-7.

Desire… under the law—The observers of seasons, as in Gal_4:10.

Hear the law—The Jews did hear the law read to them in the synagogue every sabbath; but Paul demands now whether they will hear it with the earnest ear of the soul. He is going to frame for these legalists an argument after the style and manner of their own legal teachers.

The ensuing allegorical exposition of the Abrahamic history was shaped after a form of composition current in the Jewish schools. The passage has been much attacked by adverse criticism, and even evangelical expositors. It is asked, Was this Old Testament narrative allegory, and not true history? Or, if true history, can we suppose that this combination of events and characters was divinely framed to evolve this lesson deduced by St. Paul?

All these difficulties would have vanished, we think, in a moment if our commentators had noted—what none of them seems to have done—that Paul has merely here put into an allegorical form the very same thought as in logical form he gives in Rom_9:6-10, (where see our notes.) The thought simply is this: That Christianity does, by its very nature, disclose an underlying subsense in the Old Testament; not only in its ritual, but in its history. And an allegory is simply an external surface history under which there lies an internal subsense.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

CRITICAL AND EXPLANATORY NOTES

Gal_4:24. Which things are an allegory.—Under the things spoken of—the two sons, with their contrast of parentage and position—there lies a spiritual meaning.

Gal_4:25. Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children.—Judaism as rejecting the light and liberty of the new dispensation.

Gal_4:26. But Jerusalem which is above is free.—Is the spiritual reality which, veiled under the old dispensation, is comparatively unveiled in the dispensation of grace, and destined to be fully and finally manifested in the reign of glory. Christians are very different in standing to slave-born slaves.

Gal_4:27. The desolate hath many more children than she which hath an husband.—The special purpose of the quotation appears to be to show that the idea of a countless Church, including Gentiles as well as Jews, springing out of spiritual nothingness, was apprehended under the Old Testament as destined for realisation under the New.

Gal_4:30. Cast out the bondwoman and her son.—Even house-room to Judaism is not matter of right, but only by sufferance, and that so long and so far as it leaves the gospel undisturbed in full possession.

MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Gal_4:21-31

The History of Hagar and Sarah allegorical of the Law and the Gospel.

I. The two women represented two different covenants.—

1. Hagar represented Sinai, typical of the law with its slavish exactions and terrible threatenings (Gal_4:22; Gal_4:25). Sinai spoke of bondage and terror. It was a true symbol of the working of the law of Moses, exhibited in the present condition of Judaism. And round the base of Sinai Hagar’s wild sons had found their dwelling. Jerusalem was no longer the mother of freemen. Her sons chafed under the Roman yoke. They were loaded with self-inflicted burdens. The spirit of the nation was that of rebellious, discontented slaves. They were Ishmaelite sons of Abraham, with none of the nobleness, the reverence, the calm and elevated faith of their father. In the Judaism of the apostle’s day the Sinaitic dispensation, uncontrolled by the higher patriarchal and prophetic faith, had worked out its natural result. It gendered to bondage. A system of repression and routine, it had produced men punctual in tithes of mint and anise, but without justice, mercy, or faith; vaunting their liberty while they were servants of corruption. The Pharisee was the typical product of law apart from grace. Under the garb of a freeman he carried the soul of a slave.

2. Sarah represented Jerusalem, typical of the gospel with its higher freedom and larger spiritual fruitfulness (Gal_4:26-28).—Paul has escaped from the prison of legalism, from the confines of Sinai; he has left behind the perishing earthly Jerusalem, and with it the bitterness and gloom of his Pharisaic days. He is a citizen of the heavenly Zion, breathing the air of a divine freedom. The yoke is broken from the neck of the Church of God; the desolation is gone from her heart. Robbed of all outward means, mocked and thrust out as she is by Israel after the flesh, her rejection is a release, an emancipation. Conscious of the spirit of sonship and freedom, looking out on the boundless conquests lying before her in the Gentile world, the Church of the new covenant glories in her tribulations. In Paul is fulfilled the joy of prophet and psalmist, who sang in former days of gloom concerning Israel’s enlargement and world-wide victories (Findlay).

II. The antagonism of their descendants represented the violent and incessant opposition of the law to the gospel.—“As he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit, even so it is now.… Cast out the bondwoman and her son” (Gal_4:29-30). Sooner or later the slave-boy was bound to go. He has no proper birthright, no permanent footing in the house. One day he exceeds his licence, he makes himself intolerable; he must be gone. The Israelitish people showed more than Ishmael’s jealousy toward the infant Church of the Spirit. No weapon of violence or calumny was too base to be used against it. Year by year they became more hardened against spiritual truth, more malignant towards Christianity, and more furious and fanatical in their hatred towards their civil rulers. Ishmael was in the way of Isaac’s safety and prosperity (Ibid.).

III. The gospel bestows a richer inheritance than the law.—“The son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the freewoman.… We are children of the free” (Gal_4:30-31). The two systems were irreconcilable. The law and the gospel cannot coexist and inherit together; the law must disappear before the gospel. The higher absorbs the lower. The Church of the future, the spiritual seed of Abraham gathered out of all nations, has no part in legalism. It embraces blessings of which Mosaism had no conception—“an inheritance incorruptible, and undefiled, and that fadeth not away.”

Lessons.—

1. The law and the gospel differ fundamentally

2. The law imposes intolerable burdens.

3. The gospel abrogates the law by providing a higher spiritual obedience.

GERM NOTES ON THE VERSES

Gal_4:21-31. Legal Bondage and Spiritual Freedom contrasted—

I. In their inception and development (Gal_4:21-27).

II. In their ceaseless antagonism (Gal_4:29).

III. In their inevitable results (Gal_4:28; Gal_4:30-31).

Gal_4:21. A Lesson from the Law—

I. Addressed to those eager for its subjection.—“Ye that desire to be under the law.”

II. Is suggestive of solemn warning.

III. Should be seriously pondered.—“Tell me, do ye not hear the law?”

Gal_4:26. Jerusalem Above.

I. The Church of Christ as she exists in the present world.—“Jerusalem, above and free.”

1. Above; that is, seen in connection with God and the scenes of the heavenly world.—

(1) Her Head is from above.

(2) If we take the Church as a whole, though she is in part on earth, the greater number of her members are in heaven.

(3) Our Jerusalem is above because her members all fix their affections there and thither tend as the great end of their profession.

2. Jerusalem above is free, and so are her children.—From the bondage of seeking salvation by works of law, from the guilt of sin, from its dominion.

II. The filial sentiment with which we ought to regard the Church of Christ.—She is “the mother of us all.” The general idea is, that if we are indeed spiritual, under God, we owe all to the Church. To her God has committed the preservation of His truth. In stormy times she has sheltered her lamps in the recesses of the sanctuary, and in happier times has placed them on high to guide and save. The Spirit of God is in the Church. To her you owe your hallowed fellowships. In the Church it is that God manifests Himself.

III. The animating anticipations we are thus taught to form of the Church as glorified.—Turn to the description given in Rev_21:1. Mark the wall great and high—denoting the perfect, impregnable security of those who dwell there.

2. At the gates are angels—still ushering in the heirs of salvation, and disdaining not to be porters to this glorious city.

3. Mark the foundations, garnished with all manner of precious stones—implying permanency.

4. Mark the circumstance that in the twelve foundations are inscribed the names of the twelve apostles—the whole being the result of their doctrine.

5. The whole city is a temple all filled with the presence and glory of God. No holiest of all is there where every part is most holy. All are filled, sanctified, beatified, by the fully manifested presence of God. He is all in all; all things in and to all.—Richard Watson.

Jerusalem a Type of the Universal Church.

I. God chose Jerusalem above all other places to dwell in. The Church catholic is the company chosen to be the particular people of God.

II. Jerusalem is a city compact in itself by reason of the bond of love and order among the citizens. In like sort the members of the Church catholic are linked together by the bond of one Spirit.

III. In Jerusalem was the sanctuary, a place of God’s presence, where the promise of the seed of the woman was preserved till the coming of the Messias. Now the Church catholic is in the room of the sanctuary, in it we must seek the presence of God and the word of life.

IV. In Jerusalem was the throne of David. In the Church catholic is the throne or sceptre of Christ.

V. The commendation of a city, as Jerusalem, is the subjection and obedience of the citizens. In the Church catholic all believers are citizens, and they yield voluntary obedience and subjection to Christ their King.

VI. As in Jerusalem the names of the citizens were enrolled in a register, so the names of all the members of the Church catholic are enrolled in the Book of Life.

VII. The Church catholic is said to be above:

1. In respect of her beginning.

2. Because she dwells by faith in heaven with Christ.—Perkins.

Gal_4:28. Believers Children of Promise.

I. The character.—

1. Believers are the children of promise by regeneration.

2. By spiritual nourishment.

3. In respect of education.

4. With respect to assimilation, likeness, and conformity.

II. State the comparison.—

1. Isaac was the child of Abraham, not by natural power. Believers are children of Abraham by virtue of promise.

2. Isaac was the fruit of prayer, as well as the child of promise.

3. Isaac’s birth was the joy of his parents. Even so with reference to believers.

4. Isaac was born not after the flesh, but by the promise; not of the bondwoman, but of the free. So believers are not under the law.

5. Isaac was no sooner born but he was mocked by Ishmael; so it is now.

6. Isaac was the heir by promise, though thus persecuted. Even so believers.

III. How the promise hath such virtue for begetting children to God.—

1. As it is the discovery of divine love.

2. The object of faith.

3. The ground of hope.

4. The seed of regeneration.

5. The communication of grace.

6. The chariot of the Spirit.

Inferences.—

1. If believers are children of promise, then boasting is excluded.

2. Then salvation is free.

3. The happiness and dignity of believers—they are the children of God.—Pulpit Assistant.

Gal_4:29. On Persecution.

I. That no privilege of the Church can exempt her from persecution.—

1. From the consideration of the quality of the persons here upon the stage, the one persecuting, the other suffering.

(1) The persecuting—“born after the flesh.” Like Hannibal, they can part with anything but war and contention; they can be without their native country, but not without an enemy. These whet the sword, these make the furnace of persecution seven times hotter than it would be. The flesh is the treasury whence these winds blow that rage and beat down all before them.

(2) The suffering—“born after the Spirit.” Having no security, no policy, no eloquence, no strength, but that which lieth in his innocency and truth, which he carrieth about as a cure, but it is looked upon as a persecution by those who will not be healed. “For he must appear,” said Seneca, “as a fool that he may be wise, as weak that he may be strong, as base and vile that he may be more honourable.” If thou be an Isaac, thou shalt find an Ishmael.

2. From the nature and constitution of the Church which in this world is ever militant.—Persecution is the honour, the prosperity, the flourishing condition, of the Church. When her branches were lopped off she spread the more, when her members were dispersed there were more gathered to her, when they were driven about the world they carried that sweet-smelling savour about them which drew in multitudes to follow them.

3. From the providence and wisdom of God who put this enmity between these two seeds.—God’s method is best. That is method and order with Him which we take to be confusion, and that which we call persecution is His art, His way of making saints. In Abraham’s family Ishmael mocketh and persecuteth Isaac, in the world the synagogue persecuteth the Church, and in the Church one Christian persecuteth another. It was so, it is so, and it will be so to the end of the world.

II. The lessons of persecution.—

1. The persecution of the Church should not create surprise.

2. Not to regard the Church and the world as alike.

3. Build ourselves up in faith so as to be prepared for the fiery trial.

4. Love the truth you profess.

5. Be renewed in spirit.—A. Farindon.

Gal_4:30. Cast out the Bondwoman and her Son.—To cast out is an act of violence, and the true Church evermore hath the suffering part. How shall the Church cast out those of her own house and family?

1. By the vehemency of our prayers that God would either melt their hearts or shorten their hands, either bring them into the right way, or strike off their chariot wheels.

2. By our patience and longsuffering.

3. By our innocency of life and sincerity of conversation.

4. By casting our burden upon the Lord.—Ibid.

The Fate of Unbelievers.

I. All hypocrites, mockers of the grace of God, shall be cast forth of God’s family, though for a time they bear a sway therein. This is the sentence of God. Let us therefore repent of our mocking, and become lovers of the grace of God.

II. The persecution of the people of God shall not be perpetual, for the persecuting bondwoman and her son must be cast out.

III. All justiciary people and persons that look to be saved and justified before God by the law, either in whole or in part, are cast out of the Church of God, and have no part in the kingdom of heaven. The casting out of Hagar and Ishmael is a figure of the rejection of all such.—Perkins.

The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.

Subdivision 2 (Gal 4:21-31; Gal 5:1-6.)

The testimony of the law itself.

1. If they would not listen any more to the gospel or to the one who had spoken to them for Christ, the apostle would appeal now to the very law itself, which undoubtedly they must hear. Zealous law-keepers must hear the law. Here he goes back to Abraham again, and in a manner which, to some who scarcely fully accept the typical character of Old Testament history, would appear strange. Yet to "foolish Galatians" he can use this without questioning their ability to realize, not only the likeness to truth, but the truth itself that is in it. In fact, these typical pictures speak for themselves and are designed to speak. When once we have the key to them, their perfect agreement with the truth can be nothing else than that designed of God to set it forth. Abraham’s two sons thus naturally speak of those two classes of his offspring of which the apostle has been speaking. There is the seed after the flesh; there is the seed after the Spirit, the natural child "and the spiritual child," the child "of faith." It is not hard, therefore, to understand the similitude when he emphasizes the one seed as that by a bondmaid, the other by a free woman. Bondage and freedom have been his theme already. How fully plain does it become when he tells us that he who was of the bondwoman was born after the flesh, in the ordinary course of nature, with nothing necessarily of God in it, and on the other hand he of the free woman was by promise. He has already spoken of this promise, has already connected its "in thee," said of him whose faith was reckoned to him for righteousness, with the faith of those who are the children of promise. These things, he says, not, "are an allegory," exactly, but "are allegorized." They were true things, things which had actually taken place, no question, but which nevertheless had "happened to them," as the apostle says of other things in their history, "for types." They had a divinely intended meaning in them and not merely could be used to show forth such things. These two, then, are the two covenants, the one from the Mount Sinai, the law bringing forth to bondage, which is Hagar; the other, that of promise "Jerusalem which is above," "which is the mother of us all," or "which is our mother." "Jerusalem which is above" naturally carries our thoughts on to that of which John gives us in his Revelation by and by a fuller view. It was the home city, the city of which all the people of God now are children. The apostle speaks of it as having a present reality and a place which faith indeed alone can recognize, but which is none the less real. Paul turns to the prophet here, in order to show us that while, in fact, the barren was not bearing (before the time of Israel’s real travailing and birth, as in a day to come,) there would be, nevertheless, the strange paradox of many more children to her than when she had an husband. This is language which the apostle’s word about the olive-tree in the epistle to the Romans should enable us clearly to understand. The branches are broken off, but yet there are branches in their place which are counted as part of the olive-tree itself. They are, in fact, in a true sense, the fruit of Israel, although Israel has in the meantime lost that fruitful condition, and here we find the children which, in fact, should more rejoice her heart, when looking at things from the divine point of view, than all the generations of the nation in the flesh merely. Here, of course, are the children of promise. Here is the true Isaac, but the opposition between the one born after the flesh and this new spiritual birth is manifest. This very apostle is proof of it even now, but the known opposition everywhere manifest on the part of Israel to Christ and to His people was, of course, the greatest proof. Israel after the flesh was persecuting the children of promise, but what would be the result? The casting out of the bondwoman and her son. God had, in fact, disclaimed the principle of the law, which was the principle of bondage, and if He had now sons that were really of the free woman, children of promise, children that divine grace had made such, there could not be a common recognition of these and of those so totally opposite. "We then," he says, "brethren, are not children of the bondwoman, but of the free." The law could easily, as it were, and naturally, bring forth children to God. How natural it is for men to accept a system of this sort and to be put upon such terms with God. The whole nation of Israel at once and decisively took this ground without a question. On the other hand, the true seed desired of God must be all born by divine power; born slowly, as one may think, long years passing while they seem to be only scanty in number and slow enough to mature, yet, after all, God will have His own. Scorn as Israel might those who now were being by the Spirit of God led to Christ and Christianity, Israel’s casting out was already manifestly at hand, when the very place of their holy house would be dug up by the Roman people and the worship ordained of God for the people in the flesh would no longer be possible to them. Their house was left to them desolate. It was their house, not God’s, but that was the sentence upon it. It would soon be not even their house any longer.

2. The apostle closes with the exhortation to "stand fast therefore in the liberty with which Christ hath made us free" and not to be "entangled again with the yoke of bondage." He is very strong that there could be no profit of Christ to those who put themselves under the law. If they were circumcised, Christ would profit them nothing. A circumcised man was a debtor to do the whole law. This may seem strange from one who, as we know, before this time had himself circumcised Timothy, but the circumstances were entirely different. Timothy was a Jew by his mother’s side, and it was, in that case, such a concession on the part of one not under the law putting himself under it in the very liberty that he had to gain others, as made it a sign, therefore, of liberty instead of bondage. With the Galatians it would be entirely different. They, as Gentiles, were not debtors to the law in any way, and if they put themselves under it, it was to gain from it a spiritual blessing; it was a real addition, therefore, to Christ that they were making, but by this, as we have already seen, they would be "fallen from grace," for grace cannot admit the conditional principle of law without losing all its character. Again, we see also that he has no thought of any one taking up the law as a rule of life simply; it is of justification by it that he speaks, and this was in fact the only question that the law raised; but as Christians in possession of the Spirit, which we have seen to be the sign of their Christianity, they were outside the law, and necessarily in possession of a righteousness which the Spirit of God could seal, a righteousness perfect before God. They only waited in faith for the hope which was connected with this; not for righteousness as a hope, but for the hope of glory attaching to it. Thus, they were beyond any possible need of law; and "in Christ," as he declares, "neither circumcision" availed "anything, nor uncircumcision." A man was quite outside both the Jewish and the Gentile acceptance. God accepted nothing, except as faith, which, as the sign of dependence, drew blessing from Him; and which, in its nature, worked not by the principle of fear, which was that of law, but by love.

F. W. Grant, The Numerical Bible (4th ed., 1903) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Chapter 19

THE STORY OF HAGAR.

Gal_4:21-31 - Gal_5:1

THE Apostle wishes that he could "change his voice" (Gal_4:20). Indeed he has changed it more than once. "Any one who looks closely may see that there is much change and alteration of feeling in what the Apostle has previously written" (Theodorus). Now he will try another tone; he proceeds in fact to address his readers in a style which we find nowhere else in his Epistles. He will tell his "children" a story! Perhaps he may thus succeed better than by graver argument. Their quick fancy will readily apprehend the bearing of the illustration; it may bring home to them the force of his doctrinal contention, and the peril of their own position, as he fears they have not seen them yet. And so, after the pathetic appeal of the last paragraph, and before he delivers his decisive, official protest to the Galatians against their circumcision, he interjects this "allegory" of the two sons of Abraham.

Paul cites the history of the sons of Abraham. No other example would have served his purpose. The controversy between himself and the Judaisers turned on the question, Who are the true heirs of Abraham? {Gal_3:7; Gal_3:16; Gal_3:29} He made faith in Christ, they circumcision and law-keeping, the ground of sonship. So the inheritance was claimed in a double sense. But now, if it should appear that this antithesis existed in principle in the bosom of the patriarchal family, if we should find that there was an elder son of Abrahams flesh opposed to the child of promise, how powerfully will this analogy sustain the Apostles position. Judaism will then be seen to be playing over again the part of Ishmael; and "the Jerusalem that now is" takes the place of Hagar, the slave-mother. The moral situation created by the Judaic controversy had been rehearsed in the family life of Abraham.

"Tell me," the Apostle asks, "you that would fain be subject to the law, do you not know what it relates concerning Abraham? He had two sons, one of free, and the other of servile birth. Do you wish to belong to the line of Ishmael, or Isaac?" In this way Paul resumes the thread of his discourse dropped in Gal_4:7. Faith, he had told his readers, had made them sons of God. They were, in Christ, of Abrahams spiritual seed, heirs of his promise. God had sent His Son to redeem them, and the Spirit of His Son to attest their adoption. But they were not content. They were ambitious of Jewish privileges. The Legalists persuaded them that they must be circumcised and conform to Moses, in order to be Abrahams children in full title. "Very well," the Apostle says, "you may become Abrahams sons in this fashion. Only you must observe that Abraham had two sons. And the Law will make you his sons by Hagar, whose home is Sinai-not Israelites, but Ishmaelites!"

Pauls Galatian allegory has greatly exercised the minds of his critics. The word is one of ill repute in exegesis. Allegory was the instrument of Rabbinical and Alexandrine Scripturists, an infallible device for extracting the predetermined sense from the letter of the sacred text. The "spiritualising" of Christian interpreters has been carried, in many instances, to equal excess of riot. For the honest meaning of the word of God anything and everything has been substituted that lawless fancy and verbal ingenuity could read into it. The most arbitrary and grotesque distortions of the facts of Scripture have passed current under cover of the clause, "which things are an allegory." But Pauls allegory, and that of Philo and the Allegorical school, are very different things, as widely removed as the "words of truth and soberness" from the intoxications of mystical idealism.

With Paul the spiritual sense of Scripture is based on the historical, is in fact the moral content and import thereof; for he sees in history a continuous manifestation of Gods will. With the Allegorists the spiritual sense, arrived at by a priori means, replaces the historical, destroyed to make room for it. The Apostle points out in the story of Hagar a spiritual intent, such as exists in every scene of human life if we had eyes to see it, something other than the literal relation of the facts, but nowise alien from it. Here lies the difference between legitimate and illegitimate allegory. The utmost freedom may be given to this employment of the imagination, so long as it is true to the moral of the narrative which it applies. In principle the Pauline allegory does not differ from the type. In the type the correspondence of the sign and thing signified centres in a single figure or event; in such an allegory as this it is extended to a group of figures and a series of events. But the force of the application depends on the actuality of the original story, which in the illicit allegory is matter of indifference.

"Which things are allegorized"-so the Apostle literally writes in Gal_4:24 -made matters of allegory. The phrase intimates, as Bishop Lightfoot suggests, that the Hagarene episode in Genesis {Gen_16:1-16; Gen_21:1-21} was commonly interpreted in a figurative way. The Galatians had heard from their Jewish teachers specimens of this popular mode of exposition. Paul will employ it too; and will give his own reading of the famous story of Ishmael and Isaac. Philo of Alexandria, the greatest allegorist of the day, has expounded the same history. These eminent interpreters both make Sarah the mother of the spiritual, Hagar of the worldly offspring; both point out how the barren is exalted over the fruitful wife. So far, we may imagine, Paul is moving on the accepted lines of Jewish exegesis. But Philo knows nothing of the correspondence between Isaac and Christ, which lies at the back of the Apostles allegory. And there is this vital difference of method between the two divines, that whereas Pauls comparison is the illustration of a doctrine proved on other grounds-the painting which decorates the house already built (Luther)-with the Alexandrine idealist it forms the substance and staple of his teaching.

Under this allegorical dress the Apostle expounds once more his doctrine, already inculcated, of the difference between the Legal and Christian state. The former constitutes, as he now puts the matter, a bastard sonship like that of Ishmael, conferring only an external and provisional tenure in the Abrahamic inheritance. It is contrasted with the spiritual sonship of the true Israel in the following respects:-It is a state of nature as opposed to grace; of bondage as opposed to freedom; and further, it is temporary and soon to be ended by the Divine decree.

I. "He who is of the maid-servant is after the flesh; but he that is of the free-woman is through promise…Just as then he that was after the flesh persecuted him that was after the Spirit, So now" (Gal_4:23; Gal_4:29). The Apostle sees in the different parentage of Abrahams sons the ground of a radical divergence of character. One was the child of nature, the other was the son of a spiritual faith.

Ishmael was in truth the fruit of unbelief; his birth was due to a natural but impatient misreading of the promise. The patriarchs union with Hagar was ill-assorted and ill-advised. It brought its natural penalty by introducing an alien element into his family, life. The low-bred insolence which the serving-woman, in the prospect of becoming a mother, showed toward the mistress to whom she owed her preferment, gave a foretaste of the unhappy consequences. The promise of posterity made to Abraham with a childless wife, was expressly designed to try his faith; and he had allowed it to be overborne by the reasonings of nature. It was no wonder that the son of the Egyptian slave, born under such conditions, proved to be of a lower type, and had to be finally excluded from the house.

In Ishmaels relation to his father there was nothing but the ordinary play of human motives. "The son of the handmaid was born after the flesh." He was a natural son. But Ishmael was not on that account cut off from the Divine mercies. Nor did his fathers prayer, "O that Ishmael might live before Thee," {Gen_17:18} remain unanswered. A great career was reserved by Divine Providence for his race. The Arabs, the fiery sons of the desert, through him claim descent from Abraham. They have carved their name deeply upon the history and the faith of the world. But sensuousness and lawlessness are everywhere the stamp of the Ishmaelite. With high gifts and some generous qualities, such as attracted to his eldest boy the love of Abraham, their fierce animal passion has been the curse of the sons of Hagar. Mohammedanism is a bastard Judaism; it is the religion of Abraham sensualised. Ishmael stands forth as the type of the carnal man. On outward grounds of flesh and blood he seeks inheritance in the kingdom of God; and with fleshly weapons passionately fights its battles.

To a similar position Judaism, in the Apostles view, had now reduced itself. And to this footing the Galatian Churches would be brought if they yielded to the Judaistic solicitations. To be circumcised would be for them to be born again after the flesh, to link themselves to Abraham in the unspiritual fashion of Hagars son. Ishmael was the first to be circumcised. {Gen_17:23; Gen_17:26} It was to renounce salvation by faith and the renewing of the Holy Spirit. This course could only have one result. The Judaic ritualism they were adopting would bear fruit after its kind, in a worldly, sensuous life. Like Ishmael they would claim kinship with the Church of God on fleshly grounds; and their claims must prove as futile as did his.

The persecution of the Church by Judaism gave proof of the Ishmaelite spirit, the carnal animus by which it was possessed. A religion of externalism naturally becomes repressive. It knows not "the demonstration of the Spirit"; it has "confidence in the flesh." It relies on outward means for the propagation of its faith; and naturally resorts to the secular arm. The Inquisition and the Auto-da-fe are a not unfitting accompaniment of the gorgeous ceremonial of the Mass. Ritualism and priestly autocracy go hand in hand. "So now," says Paul, pointing to Ishmaels "persecution" of the infant Isaac, hinted at in Gen_21:8-10.

The laughter of Hagars boy at Sarahs weaning-feast seems but a slight offence to be visited with the punishment of expulsion; and the incident one beneath the dignity of theological argument. But the principle for which Paul contends is there; and it is the more easily apprehended when exhibited on this homely scale. The family is the germ and the mirror of society. In it are first called into play the motives which determine the course of history, the rise and fall of empires or churches. The gravamen of the charge against Ishmael lies in the last word of Gen_21:9, rendered in the Authorised Version mocking, and by the Revisers playing, after the Septaguint and the Vulgate. This word in the Hebrew is evidently a play on the name Isaac, i.e., laughter, given by Sarah to her boy with genial motherly delight (Gal_4:6-7). Ishmael, now a youth of fourteen, takes up the childs name and turns it, on this public and festive occasion, into ridicule. Such an act was not only an insult to the mistress of the house and the young heir at a most untimely moment, it betrayed a jealousy and contempt on the part of Hagars son towards his half-brother which gravely compromised Isaacs future. "The wild, ungovernable and pugnacious character ascribed to his descendants began to display itself in Ishmael, and to appear in language of provoking insolence; offended at the comparative indifference with which he was treated, he indulged in mockery, especially against Isaac, whose very name furnished him with satirical sneers." Ishmaels jest cost him dear. The indignation of Sarah was reasonable; and Abraham was compelled to recognise in her demand the voice of God (Gal_4:10-12). The two boys, like Esau and Jacob in the next generation, represented opposite principles and ways of life, whose counter-working was to run through the course of future history. Their incompatibility was already manifest.

The Apostles comparison must have been mortifying in the extreme to the Judaists. They are told in plain terms that they are in the position of outcast Ishmael; while uncircumcised Gentiles, without a drop of Abrahams blood in their veins, have received the promise forfeited by their unbelief. Paul could not have put his conclusion in a form more unwelcome to Jewish pride. But without this radical exposure of the legalist position it was impossible for him adequately to vindicate his gospel and defend his Gentile children in the faith.

II. From this contrast of birth "according to flesh" and "through promise" is deduced the opposition between the slave-born and free-born sons. "For these (the slave-mother and the free-woman) are two covenants, one indeed bearing children unto bondage-which is Hagar" (Gal_4:24). The other side of the antithesis is not formally expressed; it is obvious. Sarah the princess, Abrahams true wife, has her counterpart in the original covenant of promise renewed in Christ, and in "the Jerusalem above, which is our mother" (Gal_4:26). Sarah is the typical mother, {Comp. Heb_11:11-12; 1Pe_3:6} as Abraham is the father of the children of faith. In the systoichia, or tabular comparison, which the Apostle draws up after the manner of the schools, Hagar and the Mosaic covenant, Sinai and the Jerusalem that now is stand in one file and "answer to" each other; Sarah and the Abrahamic covenant, Zion and the heavenly Jerusalem succeed in the same order, opposite to them. "Zion" is wanting in the second file; but "Sinai and Zion" form a standing antithesis; {Heb_12:18-22} the second is implied in the first. It was to Zion that the words of Isaiah cited in Gal_4:27 were addressed.

The first clause of Gal_4:25 is best understood in the shorter, marginal reading of the R. V, also preferred by Bishop Lightfoot (το γαρ σινα ορος εστιν k.t.l.). It is a parenthesis-"for mount Sinai is in Arabia"-covenant running on in the mind from Gal_4:24 as the continued subject of ver. 25b: "and it answereth to the present Jerusalem." This is the simplest and most consistent construction of the passage. The interjected geographical reference serves to support the identification of the Sinaitic covenant with Hagar, Arabia being the well-known abode of the Hagarenes. Paul had met them in his wanderings there. Some scholars have attempted to establish a verbal agreement between the name of the slave-mother and that locally given to the Sinaitic range; but this explanation is precarious, and after all unnecessary. There was a real correspondence between place and people on the one hand, as between place and covenant on the other. Sinai formed a visible and imposing link between the race of Ishmael and the Mosaic law-giving. That awful, desolate mountain, whose aspect, as we can imagine, had vividly impressed itself on Pauls memory, {Gal_1:17} spoke to him of bondage and terror. It was a true symbol of the working of the law of Moses, exhibited in the present condition of Judaism. And round the base of Sinai Hagars wild sons had found their dwelling.

Jerusalem was no longer the mother of freemen. The boast, "we are Abrahams sons; we were never in bondage," {Joh_8:33} was anunconscious irony. Her sons chafed under the Roman yoke. They were loaded with self-inflicted legal burdens. Above all, they were, notwithstanding their professed law-keeping, enslaved to sin, in servitude to their pride and evil lusts. The spirit of the nation was that of rebellious, discontented slaves. They were Ishmaelite sons of Abraham, with none of the nobleness, the reverence, the calm and elevated faith of their father. In the Judaism of the Apostles day the Sinaitic dispensation, uncontrolled by the higher patriarchal and prophetic faith, had worked out its natural result. It "gendered to bondage." A system of repression and routine, it had produced men punctual in tithes of mint and anise, but without justice, mercy, or faith; vaunting their liberty while they were "servants of corruption." The law of Moses could not form a "new creature." It left the Ishmael of nature unchanged at heart, a child of the flesh, with whatever robes of outward decorum his nakedness was covered. The Pharisee was the typical product of law apart from grace. Under the garb of a freeman he carried the soul of a slave.

But Gal_4:26 sounds the note of deliverance: "The Jerusalem above is free; and she is our mother!" Paul has escaped from the prison of Legalism, from the confines of Sinai; he has left behind the perishing, earthly Jerusalem, and with it the bitterness and gloom of his Pharisaic days. He is a citizen of the heavenly Zion, breathing the air of a Divine freedom. The yoke is broken from the neck of the Church of God; the desolation is gone from her heart. There come to the Apostles lips the words of the great prophet of the Exile, depicting the deliverance of the spiritual Zion, despised and counted barren, but now to be the mother of a numberless offspring. In Isaiahs song, "Rejoice, thou barren that bearest not" (54.), the laughter of the childless Sarah bursts forth again, to be gloriously renewed in the persecuted Church of Jesus. Robbed of all outward means, mocked and thrust out as she is by Israel after the flesh, her rejection is a release, an emancipation. Conscious of the spirit of sonship and freedom, looking out on the boundless conquests lying before her in the Gentile world, the Church of the New Covenant glories in her tribulations. In Paul is fulfilled the joy of prophet and psalmist, who sang in former days of gloom concerning Israels enlargement and world-wide victories. No legalist could understand words like these. "The veil" was upon his heart "in the reading of the Old Testament." But with "the Spirit of the Lord" comes "liberty." The prophetic inspiration has returned. The voice of rejoicing is heard again in the dwellings of Israel. "If the Son make you free," said Jesus, "ye shall be free indeed." This Epistle proves it.

III. "And the bondman abideth not in the house for ever; the Son abideth for ever". {Joh_8:35} This also the Lord had testified: the Apostle repeats His warning in the terms of this allegory.

Sooner or later the slave-boy was bound to go. He has no proper birthright, no permanent footing in the house. One day he exceeds his license, he makes himself intolerable; he must begone. "What saith the Scripture? Cast out the maidservant and her son; for the son of the maidservant shall not inherit with the son of the freewoman" (Gal_4:30). Paul has pronounced the doom of Judaism. His words echo those of Christ: "Behold your house is left unto you desolate"; {Mat_23:38} they are taken up again in the language of Heb_13:13-14, uttered on the eve of the fall of Jerusalem: "Let us go forth unto Jesus without the camp, bearing His reproach. We have here no continuing city, but we seek that which is to come." On the walls of Jerusalem ichabod was plainly written. Since it "crucified our Lord" it was no longer the Holy City; it was "spiritually Sodom and Egypt", - Egypt, { Rev_11:8} the country of Hagar. Condemning Him, the Jewish nation passed sentence on itself. They were slaves who in blind rage slew their Master when He came to free them.

The Israelitish people showed more than Ishmaels jealousy toward the infant Church of the Spirit. No weapon of violence or calumny was too base to be used against it. The cup of their iniquity was filling fast. They were ripening for the judgment which Christ predicted. {1Th_2:16} Year by year they became more hardened against spiritual truth, more malignant towards Christianity, and more furious and fanatical in their hatred towards their civil rulers. The cause of Judaism was hopelessly lost. In Rom. 9-11, written shortly after this Epistle, Paul assumes this as a settled thing, which he has to account for and to reconcile with Scripture. In the demand of Sarah for the expulsion of her rival, complied with by Abraham against his will, the Apostle reads the secret judgment of the Almighty on the proud city which he himself so ardently loved, but which had crucified his Lord and repented not. "Cut it down," Jesus cried, "why cumbereth it the ground?". {Luk_13:7} The voice of Scripture speaks again: "Cast her out; she and her sons are slaves. They have no place amongst the sons of God." Ishmael was in the way of Isaacs safety and prosperity. And the Judaic ascendency was no less a danger to the Church. The blow which shattered Judaism at once cleared the ground for the outward progress of the gospel and arrested the legalistic reaction which hindered its internal development. The two systems were irreconcilable. It was Pauls merit to have first apprehended this contradiction in its full import. The time had come to apply in all its rigour Christs principle of combat, "He that is not with Me is against Me." It is the same rule of exclusion which Paul announces: "If any man hath not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His". {Rom_8:9} Out of Christ is no salvation. When the day of judgment comes, whether for men or nations, this is the touchstone: Have we, or have we not "the Spirit of Gods Son"? Is our character that of sons of God, or slaves of sin? On the latter falls inevitably the sentence of expulsion. "He will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and them that do iniquity". {Mat_13:41}

This passage signalises the definite breach of Christianity with Judaism. The elder Apostles lingered in the porch of the Temple; the primitive Church clung to the ancient worship. Paul does not blame them for doing so. In their case this was but the survival of a past order, in principle acknowledged to be obsolete. But the Church of the future, the spiritual seed of Abraham gathered out of all nations, had no part in Legalism. The Apostle bends all his efforts to convince his readers of this, to make them sensible of the impassable gulf lying between them and outworn Mosaism. Again he repeats, "We are not children of a maidservant, but of her that is free" (Gal_4:31). The Church of Christ can no more hold fellowship with Judaism than could Isaac with the spiteful, mocking Ishmael. Paul leads the Church across the Rubicon. There is no turning back.

Ver. 1 of chap. 5 (Gal_5:1), is the application of the allegory. It is a triumphant assertion of liberty, a ringing summons to its defence. Its separation from chap. 4 is ill-judged, and runs counter to the ancient divisions of the Epistle. "Christ set us free," Paul declares; "and it was for freedom-not that we might fall under a new servitude. Stand fast therefore; do not let yourselves be made bondmen over again." Bondmen the Galatians had been before, {Gal_4:8} bowing down to false and vile gods. Bondmen they will be again, if they are beguiled by the Legalists to accept the yoke of circumcision, if they take "the Jerusalem that now is" for their mother. They have tasted the joys of freedom; they know what it is to be sons of God, heirs of His kingdom and partakers of His Spirit; why do they stoop from their high estate? Why should Christs freemen put a yoke upon their own neck? Let them only know their happiness and security in Christ, and refuse to be cheated out of the substance of their spiritual blessings by the illusive shadows which the Judaists offer them. Freedom once gained is a prize never to be lost. No care, no vigilance in its preservation can be too great. Such liberty inspires courage and good hope in its defence. "Stand fast therefore. Quit yourselves like men."

How the Galatians responded to the Apostles challenge, we do not know. But it has found an echo in many a heart since. The Lutheran Reformation was an answer to it; so was the Scottish Covenant. The spirit of Christian liberty is eternal. Jerusalem or Rome may strive to imprison it. They might as well seek to bind the winds of heaven. Its home is with God. Its seat is the throne of Christ. It lives by the breath of His Spirit. The earthly powers mock at it, and drive it into the wilderness. They do but assure their own ruin. It leaves the house of the oppressor desolate. Whosoever he be, Judaist or Papist, priest, or king, or demagogue-that makes himself lord of Gods heritage and would despoil His children of the liberties of faith, let him beware lest of him also it be spoken, "Cast out the bondwoman and her son."

William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.

4:21-31 Paul now returns to arguing from Scripture, using the contrast between Hagar and Sarah and between their children. Paul argues for a similar contrast between those who are slaves under the law and those who are free in Christ. • Paul’s argument uses the allegorical techniques of rabbinic Judaism (see study note on 4:24). Having been trained as a rabbi (Acts 22:3), Paul could out-argue the Judaizers using their own methods.

4:21 do you know what the law actually says? They were trying to achieve righteousness by the law, but they did not truly understand its meaning (cp. Luke 24:25-27; 1 Tim 1:7).

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Gal 4:21. Λέγετέ μοι, tell me) He urges them, as if he were present, tell me.—οὐκ ἀκουέτε; do ye not hear?) when it is publicly read. You therefore act, as if you heard nothing of Abraham written in the law. He has recourse to an allegory only by the force of extreme necessity. This is, as it were, a sacred anchor, Gal 4:20.

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Gal_4:21, without any connecting link, leads most energetically (λέγετέ μοι: urget quasi praesens, Bengel) at once in mediam rem. On the λέγετέ μοι, so earnestly intensifying the question, comp. Bergler, ad Aristoph. Acharn. 318.

οἱ ὑπὸ νόμον κ.τ.λ.] Ye who wish to be under the law. This refers to the Judaistically inclined readers, who, partly Gentiles and partly Jewish Christians, led astray by the false teachers (Gal_1:7), supposed that in faith they had not enough for salvation, and desired to be subject to the law (Gal_4:9), towards which they had already made a considerable beginning (Gal_4:10). Chrysostom aptly remarks: καλῶς εἶπεν· οἱ θέλοντες, οὐ γὰρ τῆς τῶν πραγμάτων ἀκολουθίας, ἀλλὰ τῆς ἐκείνων ἀκαίρου φιλονεικίας τὸ πρᾶγμα ἦν.

τὸν νόμον οὐκ ἀκούετε;] Hear ye not the law? Is it not read in your hearing? Comp. Joh_12:34; 2Co_3:14. The public reading of the venerated divine Scriptures of the law and the prophets, after the manner of the synagogues (Rom_2:15; Act_15:21; Luk_4:16), took place in the assemblies for worship of the Christian churches both of Jewish and of Gentile origin: they contained, in fact, the revelation of God, of which Christianity is the fulfilment, and an acquaintance with them was justly considered as a source of the Christian knowledge of salvation; for its articles of faith (1Co_15:3 f.) and rules of life (Rom_13:8-10; Rom_15:4) were to be κατὰ τὰς γραφάς. Now the hearing of the law must necessarily have taught the Galatians how much they were in error. Hence this question expressive of astonishment,[210] which is all the stronger and consequently all the more appropriate, the more simply we allow ἀκούετε to retain its primary literal signification. Hence we must neither explain it (with Winer; comp. Matthies) as audisse, i. e. nosse, notum habere (see Heind. ad Plat. Gorg. p. 503 C; Ast, ad Plat. Legg. i. p. 9; Spohn, Lectt. Theocr. i. p. 25); nor, with Jerome and many others, including Morus, Koppe, Rosenmüller, Borger, Flatt, Schott, Olshausen, as to understand (comp. on 1Co_14:2), which Paul conceives as the hearing of the πνεῦμα speaking behind the γράμμα (so Holsten, z. Evang. d. Paul. u. Petr. p. 382); nor, with Erasmus, de Wette, Ewald, Wieseler, Hofmann, as ἀκούειν τινος, to give attention, that is, to bestow moral consideration (rather, to have an ear for, as 1Co_14:2; Mat_10:14; Joh_8:47).

νόμος is used here in a twofold sense (comp. Rom_3:19): it means, in the first place, the institute of the law; and secondly, the Pentateuch, according to the division of the Old Test. into Law, Prophets, and Hagiographa. See on Luk_24:44. The repetition of the word gives emphasis.

[210] Hofmann (comp. also his Schriftbew. II. 2, p. 57) deals with our passage in an unwarrantable and intolerably violent manner by writing οἳ (as relative), but makes the summons (tell me, ye who, wishing to be under the law, do not hear the law) to be only prepared for by ver. 22 ff., and that which Paul had in view in the λέγετέ μοι of ver. 21 to follow at length in ver. 30. The address runs on simply and appropriately, and affords no occasion for any such intricacy.

Gal_4:21-30. Now, at the conclusion of the theoretical portion of his epistle, Paul adds a quite peculiar antinomistic disquisition,a learned Rabbinico-allegorical argument derived from the law itself,calculated to annihilate the influence of the pseudo-apostles with their own weapons, and to root them out on their own ground.

Meyer — Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament — English translation by Peter Christie, edited by Frederick Crombie (T&T Clark, 1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Gal 4:21-30 . PATRIARCHAL HISTORY IS EMPLOYED TO ILLUSTRATE THE PERSECUTION OF CHRISTIANS, WHO ARE THE PROMISED SEED OF ABRAHAM, BY JEWS WHO ARE HIS SEED AFTER THE FLESH. HAGAR AND HER SON, SARAH AND HER SON, FURNISH PROPHETIC TYPES OF THE MUTUAL RELATIONS BETWEEN THE TWO. AS HIS ELDER SON, THE SLAVE-BORN ISHMAEL, WAS CAST OUT FOR MOCKING THE FREEBORN CHILD, SO THE OLDER ISRAEL UNDER BONDAGE TO THE LAW WILL BRING ON THEMSELVES THE DOOM OF NATIONAL REJECTION BY PERSECUTING THE TRUE ISRAEL OF GOD WHOM CHRIST HATH ENDOWED WITH THE FREEDOM OF THE SPIRIT. The force of this illustration depends on the distinction drawn in Gal 3:16-22 between the seed of promise and the seed of Abraham after the flesh. The argument of Rom 9:6 … is likewise based on the successive exclusion of the latter from inheritance of the blessing. John the Baptist and Jesus Himself expressly warned the Jews not to rely on their claim to be sons of Abraham.

Isaac the child of promise, only son of a free mother after years of barrenness, and heir to an indisputable birthright, aptly prefigured the Church of Christ, born in the fulness of time, made free by the gift of the Spirit, and established for ever in the house of their heavenly Father by an eternal covenant of adoption. Ishmael again, who had for some years filled the position of a son without the birthright which could entitle him to inherit the blessing, but was eventually driven out for his mockery of the promised child supplied an exact prototype of Israel after the flesh, long recognised as the people of God, but bound under the Law, and eventually destined to be shut out from the household of God for their guilt in persecuting Christ and His Church. τ . νόμον οὐκ ἀκούετε . This is a remonstrance addressed to men who are bent on upholding the authority of the Law, but are indifferent to the lessons which it teaches. ἀκούειν has this force of listening , not only when used absolutely, but when coupled as it is here with an accusative ( cf. Luk 10:39 , Eph 1:13 ).

The Expositor's Greek Testament, edited by W. Robertson Nicoll (1897–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

21–5:1. Another appeal, based upon the principles underlying the history of Hagar and Sarah, and the birth of Isaac. Christ set us free; stand fast therefore in this freedom

(Gal 4:21) You wish to be under the Law? Listen then to the teaching of the Law itself, (Gal 4:22) For it stands written that in Abraham’s own children there was a difference, 1st of origin, one being by the bondservant and the other by the freewoman; 2ndly (Gal 4:23) in the circumstances of birth, the bondmaid’s son being born in accordance with the natural impulses of the flesh, the freewoman’s by means of promise. (Gal 4:24) Now things of this kind are written with more than their bare historical meaning. To take first the difference in the mothers. These are two Dispositions; one given forth from Mt Sinai, bearing children born into a state of spiritual bondage, (Gal 4:25) I mean Hagar—but the idea of Hagar suits Mt Sinai in distant and desert Arabia—but though distant it is in the same class as the present Jerusalem, for Jerusalem too is in bondage literal and spiritual with those who belong spiritually to her. (Gal 4:26) But (I do not say Sarah but rather what she represents) Jerusalem above is free—which is in fact the mother of us believers, (Gal 4:27) She, not the present and visible Jerusalem, is our mother, as the prophet has written: Rejoice, thou barren etc., for Sarah the desolate has more children than Hagar who had Abraham; the unseen Jerusalem has more than the seen. (Gal 4:28) I need only mention again the second point of difference, that we are also like Isaac in being children of promise. (Gal 4:29) But we are persecuted! Yes even as Isaac, who was born after the spirit, by him who was born after the flesh. (Gal 4:30) But Scripture says to us by way of encouragement and command: Cast out the handmaid and her son, for the son of the handmaid shall not be heir with the son of the freewoman. (Remember this for your comfort, and act on it in your relation to the false teachers.) (Gal 4:31) Therefore, as a practical conclusion, we are not children of a bondmaid but of the freewoman! (Gal 4:1) For freedom (nothing less) Christ set us free! Stand fast therefore and do not again be held in the yoke of bondage.

21. Although St Paul is at a loss about the Galatians (Gal 4:20) he will try yet another method. He appeals to the very Law itself under which they were wishing to be. The argument of the following verses is subtle, and to us seems to insist unduly on mere words, but to readers more or less accustomed to Jewish interpretations bound up with words and letters as such it had much force In any case the Jewish writings, as we shall see, afford close parallels to the modes of expression and argument employed by St Paul here It may also be assumed that the Galatians, even though converts from heathenism, would not find this kind of argument strange. Not only had they in all probability heard it employed by Pauline teachers, and also by the false teachers, both of Jewish origin, but also as heathen they will have been accustomed to deduce lessons from what we should call unimportant parts of oracles or other utterances deemed inspired.

λέγετέ μοι. Tell me; will you not listen to that very Law under which you desire to be?

οἱ ὑπὸ νόμον θέλοντες εἶναι, cf. Gal 4:9. In itself and apart from other examples we should naturally take ὑπὸ νόμον to mean “under law” as a principle, to which τὸν νόμον forms a contrast. But in view of the many cases where νόμος, anarthrous, means the Jewish Law, it is better to understand it so here. See Gal 2:16 note.

τὸν νόμον. The article is resumptive: cf. Gal 3:23. The argument of the following verses put briefly is this: the Law itself tells us that natural birth is no proof of spiritual privileges. The story of Abraham himself shows this. For he had a son who was eventually driven out. All blessings are for him who was by promise.

οὐκ ἀκούετε; This may mean: (a) hear in public reading. You act as though you had never heard Abraham’s history read out loud: cf. Act 15:21; 2Co 3:14; (b) hear and obey. Will ye not listen to, and act upon, the lessons of the history of Abraham? This interpretation is the simpler. For this use of ἀκούειν see Mat 13:13. For a similar appeal to Scripture see Mat 12:5.

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Because the false apostles always urged this, that unless the Gentiles were circumcised, Christ could profit them nothing at all, and this dissension of them which believed of the circumcision against them which believed of the uncircumcision, was full of offense: the Apostle, after divers arguments whereby he hath refuted their error, bringeth forth an allegory, wherein he saith the holy Ghost did shadow not unto us, all these mysteries: to wit, that it should come to pass, that two sorts of sons should have Abraham a father common to them both, but not with like success: for as Abraham begat Ishmael, by the common course of nature, of Hagar his bondmaid and a stranger, and begat Isaac of Sarah a free woman by the virtue of the promise and by grace only, and the first was not only not heir, but also persecuted the heir: So there are two covenants, and as it were two sons born to Abraham of those two covenants, as it were of two mothers. The one was made in Sinai, without the land of promise according to which covenant Abraham’s children according to the flesh were begotten: to wit, the Jews which seek righteousness by that covenant, that is, by the Law: but they are not heirs, nay they shall at length be cast out of the house, as they that persecute the true heirs. The other was made in that high Jerusalem or in Zion (to wit, by the sacrifice of Christ) which begetteth children of promise, to wit, believers by the virtue of the holy Ghost which children (as Abraham) do rest themselves in the free promise, and they only by the right of children shall be partakers of the father’s inheritance, and those servants shall be shut out.

That desire so greatly.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

In these verses the apostle illustrates the difference between believers who rested in Christ only and those judaizers who trusted in the law, by a comparison taken from the story of Isaac and Ishmael. This he introduces in such a manner as was proper to strike and impress their minds, and to convince them of their great weakness in departing from the truth, and suffering themselves to be deprived of the liberty of the gospel: Tell me, says he, you that desire to be under the law, do you not hear the law? He takes it for granted that they did hear the law, for among the Jews it was wont to be read in their public assemblies every sabbath day; and, since they were so very fond of being under it, he would have them duly to consider what is written therein (referring to what is recorded Gen. 16 and 21), for, if they would do this, they might soon see how little reason they had to trust in it. And here, 1. He sets before them the history itself (Gal 4:22, Gal 4:23): For it is written, Abraham had two sons, etc. Here he represents the different state and condition of these two sons of Abraham - that the one, Ishmael, was by a bond-maid, and the other, Isaac, by a free-woman; and that whereas the former was born after the flesh, or by the ordinary course of nature, the other was by promise, when in the course of nature there was no reason to expect that Sarah should have a son. 2. He acquaints them with the meaning and design of this history, or the use which he intended to make of it (Gal 4:24-27): These things, says he, are an allegory, wherein, besides the literal and historical sense of the words, the Spirit of God might design to signify something further to us, and that was, That these two, Agar and Sarah, are the two covenants, or were intended to typify and prefigure the two different dispensations of the covenant. The former, Agar, represented that which was given from mount Sinai, and which gendereth to bondage, which, though it was a dispensation of grace, yet, in comparison of the gospel state, was a dispensation of bondage, and became more so to the Jews, through their mistake of the design of it, and expecting to be justified by the works of it. For this Agar is mount Sinai in Arabia (mount Sinai was then called Agar by the Arabians), and it answereth to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children; that is, it justly represents the present state of the Jews, who, continuing in their infidelity and adhering to that covenant, are still in bondage with their children. But the other, Sarah, was intended to prefigure Jerusalem which is above, or the state of Christians under the new and better dispensation of the covenant, which is free both from the curse of the moral and the bondage of the ceremonial law, and is the mother of us all - a state into which all, both Jews and Gentiles, are admitted, upon their believing in Christ. And to this greater freedom and enlargement of the church under the gospel dispensation, which was typified by Sarah the mother of the promised seed, the apostle refers that of the prophet, Isa 54:1, where it is written, Rejoice, thou barren that bearest not; break forth and cry, thou that travailest not; for the desolate hath many more children than she who hath a husband. 3. He applies the history thus explained to the present case (Gal 4:28); Now we, brethren, says he, as Isaac was, are the children of the promise. We Christians, who have accepted Christ, and rely upon him, and look for justification and salvation by him alone, as hereby we become the spiritual, though we are not the natural, seed of Abraham, so we are entitled to the promised inheritance and interested in the blessings of it. But lest these Christians should be stumbled at the opposition they might meet with from the Jews, who were so tenacious of their law as to be ready to persecute those who would not submit to it, he tells them that this was no more than what was pointed to in the type; for as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit, they must expect it would be so now. But, for their comfort in this case, he desires them to consider what the scripture saith (Gen 21:10), Cast out the bond-woman and her son, for the son of the bond-woman shall not be heir with the son of the free-woman. Though the judaizers should persecute and hate them, yet the issue would be that Judaism would sink, and wither, and perish; but true Christianity should flourish and last for ever. And then, as a general inference from the whole of the sum of what he had said, he concludes (Gal 4:31), So then, brethren, we are not children of the bond-woman, but of the free.

Matthew Henry's Commentary on the Whole Bible (1708–1710) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

desire--of your own accord madly courting that which must condemn and ruin you.

do ye not hear--do ye not consider the mystic sense of Moses' words? [GROTIUS]. The law itself sends you away from itself to Christ [ESTIUS]. After having sufficiently maintained his point by argument, the apostle confirms and illustrates it by an inspired allegorical exposition of historical facts, containing in them general laws and types. Perhaps his reason for using allegory was to confute the Judaizers with their own weapons: subtle, mystical, allegorical interpretations, unauthorized by the Spirit, were their favorite arguments, as of the Rabbins in the synagogues. Compare the Jerusalem Talmud [Tractatu Succa, cap. Hechalil]. Paul meets them with an allegorical exposition, not the work of fancy, but sanctioned by the Holy Spirit. History, if properly understood contains in its complicated phenomena, simple and continually recurring divine laws. The history of the elect people, like their legal ordinances, had, besides the literal, a typical meaning (compare Co1 10:1-4; Co1 15:45, Co1 15:47; Rev 11:8). Just as the extra-ordinarily-born Isaac, the gift of grace according to promise, supplanted, beyond all human calculations, the naturally-born Ishmael, so the new theocratic race, the spiritual seed of Abraham by promise, the Gentile, as well as Jewish believers, were about to take the place of the natural seed, who had imagined that to them exclusively belonged the kingdom of God.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Verse 21. Ye that desire to be under the law] Ye who desire to incorporate the Mosaic institutions with Christianity, and thus bring yourselves into bondage to circumcision, and a great variety of oppressive rites.

Do ye not hear the law?] Do ye not understand what is written in the Pentateuch relative to Abraham and his children. It is evident that the word law is used in two senses in this verse. It first means the Mosaic institutions; secondly, the Pentateuch, where the history is recorded to which the apostle refers.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

21. Tell me. Having given exhortations adapted to touch the feelings, he follows up his former doctrine by an illustration of great beauty. Viewed simply as an argument, it would not be very powerful; but, as a confirmation added to a most satisfactory chain of reasoning, it is not unworthy of attention.

To be under the law, signifies here, to come under the yoke of the law, on the condition that God will act toward you according to the covenant of the law, and that you, in return, bind yourself to keep the law. In any other sense than this, all believers are under the law; but the apostle treats, as we have already said, of the law with its appendages.

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

(21) Ye that desire to be under the law.—A direct appeal to those who were inclined to give way to the Judaising party.

Do ye not hear the law?—“Hear” is probably to be taken in the sense of “give heed to,” “listen to with attention,” as in Mat_10:14; Mat_13:9; Mat_13:13; Luk_16:29; Luk_16:31. Some have thought that it merely refers to the practice of reading a lesson from the Old Testament, which was adopted into the Christian Church from the synagogue.

(21-31) The next eleven verses contain an elaborate argument from the history of the two sons of Abraham, as types of the two covenants, in further proof that freedom is the essential character of the Christian dispensation.

We have seen that St. Paul applies the history of the natural Israel allegorically to the spiritual Israel; and not only does he do this with reference to the history of the formed theocracy, but he goes back to its origin in the time of the patriarchs, and traces there the first beginnings of the separation between the Law and the promise. The same history had been already allegorically treated by Philo. The treatment of it by St. Paul is, however, quite different, and in keeping with the line of argument followed in the context.

The points of parallelism, which are drawn out in much detail, may be exhibited thus:—

Jewish Church.Christian Church.The bondwoman, Hagar.The freewoman, Sarah.Son of the bondwoman, Ishmael.Son of the freewoman, Isaac.Natural birth (the flesh).Supernatural birth (the promise).Mount Sinai.Mount Zion.The Law.The Promise.The earthly Jerusalem.The heavenly Jerusalem.Enslaved.Free.Fruitful.Barren.Small offspring.Large offspring.Persecuting.Persecuted.Expulsion.Inheritance.The Jewish Church is enslaved.The Christian Church is free.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

21–31. The Allegory of the two Covenants, pointing to liberty only in Christ

21. The final argument is an appeal to Scripture, to that very law to which the Galatians were desiring to subject themselves. If they would but listen to the teaching of the law they would hear it declaring its own inferiority to the Gospel, the bondage of its children as compared with the liberty of those who are the children of God through faith in Jesus Christ and heirs of the promise. Calvin says that St Paul in these verses employs a very beautiful illustration of the doctrine on which he has been insisting, but that viewed merely as an argument it has no great force. But he seems to forget that the cogency of an argument is relative to the habits of thought of the persons addressed. Some of those employed by our Lord seem to us inconclusive, because we find it difficult to put ourselves in the place of the Jews who heard Him. To them His words carried conviction or at least provoked no answer, e.g. Luk_11:47-48; Mat_22:31-33; Mat_22:41-46.

under the law] perhaps ‘under (i.e. subject to) law’, legal observances, used in a wider and less definite sense than ‘the law’ which here refers to the Pentateuch. St Paul adopts the well-known Jewish division of the O.T. Scriptures, the Law (or Pentateuch), the Prophets, the Hagiographa (or rest of the sacred writings).

do ye not hear] Either ‘do ye not listen to its teaching?’ or ‘is it not read in your hearing?’ Act_15:21. Some copies have ‘do ye not read the law’, i.e. aloud in the Synagogues? Comp. Luk_4:16-17. The first is probably the meaning.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

For it is written,.... In Gen 16:15

that Abraham had two sons, not two sons only; for besides the two referred to, he had six more, Gen 25:2 but it being only pertinent to the apostle's purpose to take notice of these two, he mentions no more, though he does not deny that he had any more. These two sons were Ishmael and Isaac:

the one by a bondmaid. Ishmael was by Hagar, Sarah's servant, who represented the covenant the Jewish nation was under the bondage of.

The other by a free woman. Isaac was by Sarah, Abraham's proper and lawful wife, who was mistress of the family, and represented in figure the covenant, and Gospel church state, and all believers, Gentiles as well as Jews, as under the liberty thereof.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

21 Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law?

Ver. 21. Ye that desire, &c.] That are ambitious of slavery, of beggary, Gal 4:9. How many have we at this day that rejoice in their bondage and dance to hell in their bolts!

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Tell me ... - In order to show fully the nature and the effect of the Law, Paul here introduces an illustration from an important fact in the Jewish history. This allegory has given great perplexity to expositors, and, in some respects, it is attended with real difficulty. An examination of the difficulties will be found in the larger commentaries. My object, without examining the expositions which have been proposed, will be to state, in as few words as possible, the simple meaning and design of the allegory. The design it is not difficult to understand. It is to show the effect of being under the bondage or servitude of the Jewish law, compared with the freedom which the gospel imparts. Paul had addressed the Galatians as having a real desire to be under bondage, or to be servants; the note at Gal 4:9. He had represented Christianity as a state of freedom, and Christians as the sons of God - not servants, but freemen.

To show the difference of the two conditions, he appeals to two cases which would furnish a striking illustration of them. The one was the case of Hagar and her son. The effect of bondage was well illustrated there. She and her son were treated with severity, and were cast out and persecuted. This was a fair illustration of bondage under the Law; of the servitude to the laws of Moses; and was a fit representation of Jerusalem as it was in the time of Paul. The other case was that of Isaac. He was the son of a free woman, and was treated accordingly. He was regarded as a son, not as a servant. And he was a fair illustration of the case of those who were made free by the gospel. They enjoyed a similar freedom and sonship, and should not seek a state of servitude or bondage. The condition of Isaac was a fit illustration of the New Jerusalem; the heavenly city; the true kingdom of God. But Paul does not mean to say, as I suppose, that the history of the son of Hagar and of the son of Rebecca was mere allegory, or that the narrative by Moses was designed to represent the different condition of those who were under the Law and under the gospel.

He uses it simply, as showing the difference between servitude and freedom, and as a striking illustration of the nature of the bondage to the Jewish law, and of the freedom of the gospel, just as anyone may use a striking historical fact to illustrate a principle. These general remarks will constitute the basis of my interpretation of this celebrated allegory. The expression “tell me,” is one of affectionate remonstrance and reasoning; see Luk 7:42, “Tell me, therefore, which of these will love him most?” Compare Isa 1:18, “Come, now, and let us reason together, saith the Lord.”

Ye that desire to be under the law - See the note at Gal 4:9. You who wish to yield obedience to the laws of Moses. You who maintain that conformity to those laws is necessary to justification.

Do ye not hear the law? - Do you not understand what the Law says? Will you not listen to its own admonitions, and the instruction which may be derived from the Law on the subject? The word “law” here refers not to the commands that were uttered on Mount Sinai, but to the book of the Law. The passage to which reference is made is in the Book of Genesis; but; all the five books of Moses were by the Jews classed under the general name of the Law; see the note at Luk 24:44. The sense is, “Will you not listen to a narrative found in one of the books of the Law itself, fully illustrating the nature of that servitude which you wish?”

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law; you that cannot be content to receive Jesus Christ alone, for justification; but have a mind to maintain a necessity of obedience to the law of circumcision, and other Judaical rites;

do ye not hear the law, that law which curseth every one who continueth not in all that is therein written to do it? Or rather, the story which follows; which is taken out of one of the books of the law, which the apostle makes a mystical revelation of the Divine will, that there should come a time when circumcision should be cast out.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Tell me, ye that desire to be under the Law (legete moi oiJ uJpomon qelontev einai). After the outburst of affectionate earnestness expressed in the last four verses, the apostle seems to have paused, reflecting in what way he could the most effectually convince these Galatian legalists of their error. At length, a consideration occurs to him, which he impetuously so to speak hastens to abruptly sot before them. He has before (Gal_3:29) shown to the Galatian believers that they were "Abraham"s seed." He now means to show that, as children of Abraham through faith in Christ, they stood on a far higher footing than the children of the Sinai covenant did a position which, by subjecting themselves afresh to the Law, they would forego. The verb "desire" (qelontev), as here introduced, intimates that this aspiration of theirs was a mere freak of self-will, there being nothing in the circumstances to prompt it. So in ver. 9, "Ye desire to be in bondage." In consequence of there being no article with nomon, some would render uJpomon "under Law," that is, Law viewed in genere, as in mov Rom_4:15. But the whole scope of the Epistle resists this view. The apostle"s contention with the Galatian perverters of the truth is not concerning Christians being subject to Law absolutely, but concerning their being subject to a Law of outward ceremonial observance; that is, to the Law of Moses; for there was no other system of positive ordinances by which, as of Divine authority, they could imagine themselves to be bound. The noun no is used without the article, like other monadic nouns with an understood specific reference (for examples, Qeov, Kuriov Cristov Pneuma diabolov kosmov); as it is also Rom_2:23 Rom_3:31 Rom_4:13, 14 5:13; 1Co_9:20; Gal_2:21 Gal_4:5; ete; Php_3:5, 6. Do ye not hear the Law? (tomon oujk ajkou) to that Law give ye no heed? The article is here prefixed to nomon to make the repetition of the noun the more telling; just as it is in mw Rom_2:23, Ov ejn no kaucasai diasewv tou nomou ton Qeozeiv; The verb ajkouete, hear, like our "listen to," means "take to heart what it says;" as in Mat_10:14; Luk_16:29, Luk_16:31. There is no reason for attributing to the verb such a sense of listening to an oral utterance as should warrant us in supposing, that the apostle is thinking in particular of the Galatian Christians as in the habit of "hearing" the Pentateuch and ether Old Testament Scriptures read, whether in Jewish synagogues (cf. 2Co_3:14, 2Co_3:15; Act_15:21) or in Christian assemblages. That such Scriptures in the Septuagint Version were customarily read aloud when Christians assembled for united worship, especially in the absence or dearth of other inspired writings, is more than probable: we know from Justin Martyr ("Apol.," 1. p. 83) that such was the custom from Sunday to Sunday in his days, when there were ajpostolikamata also available for such use. Moreover, the existence of such a custom helps us to understand how it was that the apostle could here, as inskete, Rom_7:1, presuppose with Christian believers an acquaintance with the contents of the Pentateuch. But we require more here than the thought, "Are ye not wont to hear the Law read?" It is rather an acquaintance with its contents, and taking due account of them, that he demands of his readers. Some uncial manuscripts have ajnaginw read, instead of ajkouete. This reading of the text would only imply, not without a touch of sarcasm, the sense which the more accredited reading, ajkouete, may be understood as directly denoting. The use of the word "Law" to denote at once the system of Mosaic legislation and the historical record in which it is embedded, is remarkable. The Jews were accustomed to designate the Pentateuch by this term (comp. Mat_5:17; Luk_16:16 Luk_24:44) and whoever would fain subject themselves to the positive enactments of the Mosaic Law as possessing Divine authority, would of course feel themselves bound also to accept the teaching of the historical record as clothed with the like authority. The apostle himself also accepted both as alike coming from God; only he required that the Divine purpose in both should be clearly understood and be suitably complied with.

Vers. 21-23.

An appeal to Bible history.

me, ye that desire to be under the Law, do ye not hear the Law?" The apostle makes a fresh appeal to convince the Galatians of the essential difference between the Law and the promise. The reasoning is conveyed in language of affectionate remonstrance. Consider

I THE IMPORTANCE OF HIS ARGUMENT. The Law itself, upon which the Galatians laid such stress, showed that they were not meant to be under it. If he could prove from the Law of Moses that Abraham"s children by faith were free from the bondage of the Law, no further argument was needed to show that obedience to the Law was not necessary to salvation.

II THE ARGUMENT AS EMBODIED IN THE HISTORY. "For it is written, that Abraham had two sons, one by the bondmaid, the other by the freewoman; howbeit, he who was of the bondwoman was born alter the flesh, but he of the freewoman was of the promise." Here we have:

1. Two sons of Abraham Ishmael and Isaac, Ishmael being mentioned first, because he was born first. Abraham had other sons by Keturah, but they had no relation to the particular illustrations desired by the apostle.

2. Two different mothers the bondmaid Hagar whom Sarah gave to Abraham that he might not be without offspring; and the freewoman, Sarah.

3. Two entirely different conditions of birth. Ishmael was horn in bondage and in the common course of nature; Isaac was born in freedom and against nature, when Sarah was old, according to "the promise." These are the simple historic facts which form the basis of the apostle"s allegorical explanation.

4. They are Scripture facts. "It is written," as if to show that God"s Word is decisive upon the question.

Ver. 21-Gal_5:1.

The children of the bondwoman and of the free.

Paul now passes from a personal appeal to an allegorical argument from the Law. As legalists, they are asked it" they will not hear the Law which in its history really condemns them as children of the bondwoman and not children of the freewoman. For such an allegorical interpretation we are content with Paul"s authority, since he was inspired of God in his handling of Scripture as well as in writing additions to it. His rabbinical education would incline him to allegory; but we would not in consequence take any liberties with Scripture on the same track. Still, as we face the history as given in Genesis 21. with Paul"s help in our hands, it gives a very interesting and beautiful application of it.

I LET US CONSIDER THE CHILD OF THE BONDWOMAN IN HIS EARLY YEARS. (Ver. 23.) Ishmael, as the child of Abraham, had for thirteen years a happy and interesting life. He was the issue of a union promoted by Sarah in her own despair. Upon him the patriarch looked with all an old man"s pride; and, had not God expressly forbidden it, Abraham would have looked no further than Ishmael for a son and heir. Hagar naturally played the haughty part before her mistress and despised the beautiful woman because of her barrenness. But as soon as Isaac came to gladden the aged pair, Hagar and Ishmael fell of necessity into the background. In due time there is the weaning feast. "Hagar and her son heard the merriment," says Robertson, "and it was gall to their wounded spirits; it looked like intentional insult; for Ishmael had been the heir presumptive, but now, by the birth of Isaac, had become a mere slave and dependant; and the son of Hagar mocked at the joy in which he could not partake." Now, Ishmael all these years was the type of the legalist who prides himself on his observance of the ceremonies. Just as the boy thought that he was son and heir by undisputed right and title, so the legal spirit imagines that in God"s house his rights cannot be disregarded. In the pride of self-satisfaction he sees no rival in the house and is disposed to brook none. And yet a touch of fate will make him realize at once his slavery and outcast condition.

II CONSIDER NEXT THE SON OF PROMISE. (Ver. 23.) But for the promise of God, Isaac never would have been born. He belonged consequently to a different order from Ishmael. Ishmael was the son of nature; Isaac was the product of grace. In this Isaac is the type of the son of the gospel, as Ishmael is the type of the son of the Law. Isaac is born to freedom, to honour, to inheritance; while Ishmael is cast out as the slave who has no recognized rights in the household. So is it with the free-born son of the gospel as contrasted with the legalists of Paul"s time. The believer is God"s son through the freewoman; he has his inalienable rights in God"s household; he may be persecuted and mocked by the Ishmaels who are but bondslaves; but he is destined to keep the field of privilege in spite of foes and triumph over them at last.

III LEGALISM AND GOSPEL FREEDOM ARE INCOMPATIBLE. (Vers. 24-30.) One house could not hold both Ishmael and Isaac. They could not get on together. No more can the legal and the gospel spirit. Self-righteousness and faith in Christ are irreconcilable. Hence the war between the legalists and the apostle. It was war to the bitter end. The principles are antagonistic, and the one must triumph over the other. And liberty is sure to triumph over legalism in the end, as Isaac triumphed over Ishmael.

IV THE CONSEQUENT DUTY OF MAINTAINING OUR CHRISTIAN LIBERTY. (Gal_5:1) Paul calls upon the Galatians not to go back to bondage, but to maintain the freedom which Christ has given them. If he has fulfilled the ceremonies, why should they go back to the bondage of observances? If they are born as children of promise, why go back to the birth of bondslaves? It is like emancipated slaves insisting on surrendering their freedom. What the liberty bestowed by Christ is in its length and breadth may be realized from the close and climax of one of Liddon"s masterly sermons. "It is freedom from a sense of sin, when all is known to have been pardoned through the atoning blood; freedom from a slavish fear of our Father in heaven, when conscience is offered to his unerring eye morning and evening by that penitent love which fixes its eye upon the Crucified; freedom from current prejudice and false human opinion, when the soul gazes by intuitive faith upon the actual truth; freedom from the depressing yoke of weak health or narrow circumstances, since the soul cannot be crushed which rests consciously upon the everlasting arms; freedom from that haunting fear of death, which holds those who think really upon death at all," all their lifetime subject to bondage," unless they are his true friends and clients who by the sharpness of his own death " opened the kingdom of heaven to all believers." It is freedom in time, but also and beyond freedom in eternity." May we realize our rights as children of the free! R.M.E.

Ver. 21-ch. Isa_54:1. In the same prophecy. (Isa_51:2) use is made of God giving Abraham and Sarah a numerous offspring. In this language the prophet makes use of Sarah having a more numerous people descended from her than Hagar. And what the apostle does in quoting it is to give the fact another application. The Church represented by the desolate Sarah is to have a more numerous offspring than the Church represented by the favoured Hagar.

(c) It has an offspring according to promise. "Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are children of promise." We are not certainly children according to the course of nature, or in virtue of influences that belong to our nature. We are children through the Divine influences that are efficient in the gospel surmounting great natural obstacles. We are miraculously, supernaturally born.

(2) An instructive parallel added.

(a) The persecutors. "But as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was horn after the Spirit, even so it is now." It is said, in connection with a festival in honour of the weaning of Isaac, that Sarah saw the son of Hagar, which she had born unto Abraham, mocking. This little circumstance is referred to here, not so much for what it was in itself, as for its foreshadowing the bearing of the Arab tribes toward the Israelites. As the descendants of Ishmael persecuted the descendants of Isaac, so in the apostle"s day did the Jews persecute the Christians. It was a well-known fact that they were the bitterest enemies of the Christians and were the principal instigators of persecution against them.

(b) Their fate foreshadowed. "Howbeit what saith the Scripture? Cast out the handmaid and her son; for the son of the handmaid shall not inherit with the son of the freewoman." Ishmael could not be allowed to live in the same house with Isaac. He had to be cast out and was no sharer of the inheritance with him. So the Jewish Church and the Christian Church could not coexist. Jews could only be in the Church as Christians. As Jews they were cast out of the special covenant position, the stern reality of which was soon to be made evident in the destruction of Jerusalem and the breaking up of the Jewish nationality.

(3) General conclusion regarding our slate o/freedom. "Wherefore, brethren, we are not children of a handmaid, but of the freewoman.

Exhortation founded on it.

(a) To maintain our freedom. "With freedom did Christ set us free: stand fast therefore." We owe our freedom to Christ. And it can be said that with a great price have we obtained our freedom, that price being his blood. We are not, therefore, to treat lightly what has been so dearly won. We must show our sense of it by maintaining it in its entirety.

(b) To eschew bondage. "And be not entangled again in a yoke of bondage." They had formerly been under the yoke of heathenism; they were not to put themselves under the similar yoke of Judaism. A slave who has been liberated does not voluntarily put himself into the hardships he has left. So they who had experienced the sweets of Christian liberty were not to go back to bonds. R.F.

Vers. 21-31.

The allegory of Hagar.

Writing to men who were unduly subservient to the Jewish Law, St. Paul clenches his argument with an appeal to what he regards as the typical meaning of the history contained in that very Law. This was an argumentum ad homines. It is important, when possible, to convince men on their own ground. Among believers in Scripture, arguments are naturally drawn from Scripture, Only it is necessary to bear in mind that there are different "views " of Scripture; so that we must not be impatient if the dogmatic assertion of our own interpretation as Scripture itself is not acquiesced in. To many the allegory of Hagar seems to be an illustration rather than an argument. A reference to it is chiefly useful to move our sympathies. It needs to be preceded by solid reasoning founded on direct statements of Scripture. Thus St. Paul argues from the history of Abraham (Gal_3:6) before making use of the typical significance of Hagar.

I BOTH SARAH AND HAGAR WERE OF THE HOUSEHOLD OF ABRAHAM. The very honours conferred upon Hagar led to her ultimate rejection from the home through the spirit of insubordination they bred in her. The Law was given by God. We must not assume that all things of Divine origin possess equal value, nor because a thing is only intended for some lower use and is set aside when that use has been made of it, that it is therefore inherently bad and cannot have come from God.

II HAGAR WAS ONLY A BONDWOMAN, WHILE SARAH WAS A WIFE AND A FREEWOMAN. Herein is a type of the fundamental distinction between the Law and the gospel.

1. The Law imposes bondage

1. to constraint and compulsion;

2. to definite precepts and irksome deta ils; and

3. to the burden of past transgression and omissions.

1. The gospel brings freedom

1. in forgiveness of the past and justification by faith for the future;

2. in revealing general principles of righteousness and giving us liberty to apply them for ourselves; and

3. in infusing love as the motive of obedience.

III ISHMAEL WAS A SLAVE, WHILE ISAAC WAS FREE. The children took the status of their mothers. We enjoy only the privileges of the religion under which we live. The Law cannot develop liberty. As it is a system of bondage, all who follow it lose their freedom, whether they will or no. The gospel confers liberty on all who accept it-even on those who at first have not faith, or hope, or desire to be free.

IV ISAAC ONLY RECEIVED THE PROMISE. God"s blessing comes to the free soul. If we cling to our fetters we lose the grace of God. Liberty is the parent of innumerable good things, politically, socially, religiously. As we free ourselves from superstition and needless restraints we rise into the healthy atmosphere where the largest Divine blessings flourish.

V ISHMAEL WAS FINALLY CAST OUT. The Law, having done its part, is discarded. The Jews lost their peculiar position as the central spiritual light of their age when their mission was completed. The tutelage of Law may be useful for a time, but to dwell in it perpetually will be to become ultimately castaways. W.F.A.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Do ye not hear the law - Regard what it says.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

VERSE 21. Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law?

Here Paul would have closed his Epistle because he did not know what else to say. He wishes he could see the Galatians in person and straighten out their difficulties. But he is not sure whether the Galatians have fully understood the difference between the Gospel and the Law. To make sure, he introduces another illustration. He knows people like illustrations and stories. He knows that Christ Himself made ample use of parables.

Paul is an expert at allegories. They are dangerous things. Unless a person has a thorough knowledge of Christian doctrine he had better leave allegories alone.

The allegory which Paul is about to bring is taken from the Book of Genesis which he calls the Law. True, that book contains no mention of the Law. Paul simply follows the custom of the Jews who included the first book of Moses in the collective term, "Law." Jesus even included the Psalms.

Martin Luther — Commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians (1535), English translation by Theodore Graebner (Zondervan, 1939) — public domain (U.S. copyright not renewed). Text from a community e-Sword module.

Our apostle here proceeds to the end of this chapter, in showing the Galatians that it was the design of God, at the coming of Christ, to abolish the legal dispensation, and free men from the servitude and bondage of that law.

And, first, he argues with them from the nature of the law they were so willing, yea, so desirous, to be under, Ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law? That is, "Ye that desire to be justified by your legal performances, by observing circumcision, &c. do you not hear and take notice how the very law itself doth sentence, curse, and condemn you? And do you not find in the Old Testament, the story of Sarah and Hagar, of Ishmael and Isaac? Are you ignorant that Abraham had two sons, Ishmael by Hagar the bond-woman, and Isaac by Sarah the free-woman? Ishmael the bond-woman’s son was born after the flesh; that is, by the ordinary strength of nature in generation, Hagar being young, and Abraham being strong. But Isaac was the son of the promise; God gave him, by virtue of his promise made to Abraham when his body was dead, unfit for generation, and Sarah past conception also."

Now from this history of Abraham’s family, considered in itself, (without the mystery prefigured by it,) we learn,

1. That the best of men are imperfect men; the holy patriarchs lived in the sin of polygamy, or taking more wives than one, contrary to the first institution of marriage, either not knowing or not considering it was a sin. Abraham had two wives.

Learn, 2. That the truth and veracity of God engages him to fulfil and make good all his promises, though all ordinary means and secondary causes fail, and become impotent and unable to bring about the thing promised.

Thus here, a promise being made to Abraham, that Sarah should have a child, she conceiveth and beareth Isaac; not according to the course of nature, but through virtue of the promise: He of the free-woman was by promise.

William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law?

J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

21–31. Tell me, ye that desire, etc. What troubled him was their tendency to accept the obsolete law of Moses. He now addressed all such a question. Will they hear the law itself?

B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.

Tell me

"I want to ask a question" or "I want to tell you something"

do you not listen to the law?

Paul is introducing what he will say next. AT: "you need to learn what the law really says." or "let me tell you what the law really says." (See: Rhetorical Question)

translationWords

law

Abraham

servant

flesh

free

promise

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

21-30.] Illustration of the relative positions of the law and the promise, by an allegorical interpretation of the history of the two sons of Abraham: “intended to destroy the influence of the false Apostles with their own weapons, and to root it up out of its own proper soil” (Meyer).

21. θέλοντες] καλῶς εἶπεν· οἱ θέλοντες, οὐ γὰρ τῆς τῶν πραγμάτων ἀκολουθίας, ἀλλὰ τῆς ἐκείνων ἀκαίρου φιλονεικίας τὸ πρᾶγμα ἦν. Chrys.

τ. νόμον οὐκ ἀκούετε] do ye not hear (heed) the law, listen to that which the law imparts and impresses on its hearers? Meyer would understand, ‘do ye not hear the law read?’ viz. in the synagogues, &c. But the other seems to me more natural.

Henry Alford, The Greek Testament (1849–1861) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

21. Λέγετέ μοι, οἱ ὑπὸ νόμον θέλοντες εἶναι, τὸν νόμον οὐκ ἀκούετε; “Tell me, ye that wish to be under law, do ye not hear the law?” The abrupt beginning reflects excited feeling, and is calculated to arrest attention. Cf. chap. 3:2: τοῦτο μόνον θέλω μαθεῖν ἀφʼ ὑμῶν. It had apparently only just occurred to the apostle that he might reach his readers by such an argument as that which follows. The address οἱ ὑπὸ νόμον θέλοντες εἶναι implies, as is indicated throughout the letter, that the Galatians have not adopted, but are on the point of adopting, the legalistic principle and practices. Cf. 1:6, 3:3, 4:11, 17. The Galatians are not ὑπὸ νόμον but ὑπὸ νόμον θέλοντες εἶναι. ὑπὸ νόμον evidently has the same meaning as in 3:23, v. 4, and in Rom 6:14, Rom 6:15; the word νόμος thus bearing the same sense which it has constantly in this and the preceding chapter, divine law viewed by itself as a legalistic system. See note on 3:13 and detached note on Νόμος, V 2. c. On the other hand, τὸν νόμον in itself probably refers, as is indicated by 4:22, etc., to the O. T. scriptures (detached note, V 3), which, they had been taught, contained that legalistic system which they were urged to accept.

International Critical Commentary — older volumes (1896–1929), various authors — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Tell me. He plunges into the subject without introduction, and with a direct appeal.

Desire [θελοντες] . Are bent on being under the law. See on verse 9. Under the law [υπο νομον] . For nomov with and without the article, see on Rom 2:12. Here, unquestionably, of the Mosaic law.

Hear [ακουετε] . (Do ye not) hear what the law really says : listen to it so as to catch its real meaning? Comp. 1Co 14:2; LXX, Gen 11:7; Deu 28:49. 7 5 The law [τον νομον] . In a different sense, referring to the O. T. For a similar double sense see Rom 3:19. For nomov as a designation of the O. T. generally, see 1Co 14:21; Joh 10:24; Joh 11:34; Joh 14:25.

Marvin R. Vincent, Word Studies in the New Testament (1887–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.