Galatians 4:31

31 Isn't that conclusive? We are not children of the slave woman, but of the free woman.

Galatians 4:31 Meaning and Commentary

Galatians 4:31

So then, brethren
This is the conclusion of the whole allegory, or the mystical interpretation of Agar and Sarah, and their sons:

we are not children of the bondwoman;
the figure of the first covenant, which gendered to bondage, and typified the Jews in a state, and under a spirit of bondage to the law; New Testament saints are not under it, are delivered from it, and are dead unto it:

but of the free;
of Sarah, that was a type of the new and second covenant; and answered to the Gospel church, which is free from the yoke of the law; and whose children believers in Christ are, by whom they are made free from all thraldom and slavery; so the children of the mistress and of the maidservant are opposed to each other by the Jews F11. The Vulgate Latin version adds to this verse from the beginning of the next chapter, "with the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free"; and the Ethiopic version, "because Christ hath made us free"; and begin the next chapter thus, "therefore stand, and be not entangled" and so the Alexandrian copy, and three of Stephens's.


FOOTNOTES:

F11 Tzeror Hammor, fol. 152. 1.

Galatians 4:31 In-Context

29 In the days of Hagar and Sarah, the child who came from faithless connivance (Ishmael) harassed the child who came - empowered by the Spirit - from the faithful promise (Isaac). Isn't it clear that the harassment you are now experiencing from the Jerusalem heretics follows that old pattern?
30 There is a Scripture that tells us what to do: "Expel the slave mother with her son, for the slave son will not inherit with the free son."
31 Isn't that conclusive? We are not children of the slave woman, but of the free woman.
Published by permission. Originally published by NavPress in English as THE MESSAGE: The Bible in Contemporary Language copyright 2002 by Eugene Peterson. All rights reserved.