Galatians 4:21-23 21Tell me, you who desire to be under the law, do you not listen to the law? 22For it is written that Abraham had two sons, one by a slave woman and one by a free woman. 23But the son of the slave was born according to the flesh, while the son of the free woman was born through promise.
Paul now does some biblical interpretation to back up his central claim that the works of the law do not justify anyone. The false teachers who had come to Galatia were using the law as a way to force the Galatians to conform to their interpretation of the gospel. These so-called agitators taught that the Galatians needed to follow certain regulations like circumcision in order to become righteous in God’s sight. Paul now addresses those who desire to be under the law. Paul claims that these people have a selective interpretation of the law. They have interpreted the law to support their interpretation of the gospel. In this interpretation, circumcision is necessary to be considered righteous before God. Circumcision represents human effort to be righteous by following certain laws and traditions. Paul will use the law, the Torah (first five books of the Old Testament attributed to Moses), to counter their claims.
Paul appeals to the story of Hagar and Sarah and the two sons they bore through Abraham found in the Torah in Genesis 16 and 21. Ishmael was the son of the Egyptian slave Hagar. Abraham had waited on God’s promise but no child had been born to him through Sarah. Ishmael was not the son that God had promised but came by way of human effort and thinking. Paul labels this as born according to the flesh. The “flesh” here represents human effort to achieve and experience God’s promise. But this was not God’s will. God has an even more dramatic, amazing, and grace-filled way of fulfilling the promise to Abraham. The birth of Isaac through the free woman, Sarah, could only come about because of God’s power at work.
These two women represent two ways of seeking God’s promises. Hagar represents trying to receive the promise through worldly means, human effort, and “works of the law.” This only leads to slavery. Sarah represents receiving the promise through God’s grace. It was an impossible situation to give birth to a child at her and Abraham’s age. The only way possible was through God’s intervention and miracle. This way of grace represents freedom. Paul will build on these concepts in this chapter and the next.
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