The Termination Of The Law In Galatians

THE INFERIORITY OF THE LAW IN GALATIANS

A Paper presented to Dr. Gary Tuck Western Seminary San Jose

In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Course BLS 507S, New Testament Studies II

by Jason A. Clark April 2001

THE INFERIORITY OF THE LAW IN GALATIANS In his epistle to the churches of Galatia, Paul refutes the teaching that a believer is obligated to become circumcised in order to obtain the blessings of Abraham. False teachers had started the Galatians down a pathway that seemed ultimately to lead to the keeping of the Law of Moses. The Apostle Paul, who was an expert in Judaism (1:13-14; cf. Acts 22:3; Phil. 3:5) before receiving both a revelation of the grace of Christ and his apostleship to the Gentiles (1:15-16), was uniquely equipped to address this dangerous heresy. His letter to the Galatians, therefore, serves as a treatise demonstrating the inferiority of the Mosaic Law to the New Covenant of faith in Jesus the Messiah. Fundamental to Paul’s theology of the Law is his conviction that the works of the Law are unable to effect righteousness before God (3:11). Instead, justification can only come by faith in Jesus as Messiah (2:16; 3:24). Paul contends that “if righteousness comes through the Law, then Christ died needlessly” (2:21, NAS) and that “if a law had been given which was able to impart life, then righteousness would indeed have been based on law” (3:21). In a stunning rebuke, Paul indicates that those who are seeking to be justified by law “have fallen from grace” (5:4). Paul taught that the promises of Abraham were separate from and superior to the Law of Moses, presumably in response to the teaching that the Galatians had to be circumcised in order to participate in the blessings of the Abrahamic Covenant. Paul argues that the Sinai Covenant, since it followed the Abrahamic by four hundred and thirty years, did not supersede or nullify the promise given to Abraham (3:17). Therefore, the inheritance of Abraham and the Mosaic Law are not interdependent (3:18). In his allegory of the bondwoman and freewoman, Paul claims that the children of law and promise are as distinct as the descendants of Ishmael and Isaac (4:22-31).

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According to Paul, the Law of Moses was given exclusively to Israel (4:24-25). It was “added because of transgressions” (3:19) and served to keep the Jews in custody (3:23) as a “tutor to lead [them] to Christ” (3:24). Everyone who is under the law is under a curse (3:10,13), and everyone who becomes circumcised is “under obligation to keep the whole law” (5:3), something the false teachers did not themselves do (6:13). Paul characterized their teaching as a threat to Christian liberty intended “to bring us into bondage” (2:4). The Law kept the Israelites “in bondage under the elemental things of the world” (4:3). The Son of God was born under the Law so that He could redeem the Jews out of bondage to the Law (4:4-5). He further demonstrates in his allegory of the bondwoman that the children of the Sinai Covenant are slaves (4:24) and correspond to the present, enslaved Jerusalem (4:25). Paul and the Galatians were not children of the slave woman but of the free woman, so he admonished them not to revert to a yoke of slavery such as the works of the law provide (4:31—5:1). That the Law of Moses was never given to Gentiles is often overlooked. When Paul presented his gospel to the apostles at Jerusalem, the Gentile Titus was not required to be circumcised (2:1-3). Peter, James, and John recognized Paul and Barnabas’ mission to the Gentiles and required only that they remember the poor, not that they require the Gentiles to adhere to the Law (2:7-10). That the dietary law was not enforced among the Gentile Christians is evident in the story of Paul’s public rebuke of Peter’s (and all the Jews’) hypocrisy (2:11-14). In Paul’s allegory of the childheir and the slave, he indicates that the Gentiles were never under the law, though they were similarly enslaved in their pagan religions (4:6-9). Again, in the bondwoman allegory, the Gentile Galatians are identified with Isaac as children of promise, having never been under the Sinai Covenant (4:28).

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Finally, Paul proposes that the Jewish Law came to an end when Christian faith had come. Paul insisted that to rebuild the works of the Law in his life would be to resume status as a lawbreaker (2:18), for he had clearly died to the Law (2:19). Paul soundly rebukes the Galatians for attempting to mix the two systems of faith and works (3:1-5). He argues that the Law was added “until the seed would come to whom the promise had been made” (3:19), which necessitates an ending. In the passage to follow, the temporary nature of the Law is seen: “Now before [this] faith came we were held in custody under the law, kept as prisoners until the coming faith would be revealed. Thus the law had become our guardian until Christ” (3:23-24a, NET). After this faith had come, Jewish Christians were “no longer under a tutor” (3:25, NAS). The Jewish heir was under the Law only “until the date set by the father. … But when the fullness of the time came, God sent forth His Son, born of a woman, born under the Law” (4:2b, 4) for the purpose of redeeming Jews under the Law (4:5). Obviously a time element is in view. That faith in Christ precludes adherence to the Law is evident through Paul’s identification with the free woman as opposed to the bondwoman of Sinai (4:30-31). Paul emphatically states that those seeking justification by the works of the Law are not a part of Christ but have fallen from grace (5:4). Furthermore, the circumcision integral to the Mosaic Law is dismissed as irrelevant— hardly salvific—to Christians (5:6). The Christian is led by the Spirit and has no need to be under the Law (5:18, 23), for he has “crucified the flesh with its passions and desires” (5:24b). Near the end of his epistle, Paul reiterates that the Christian, a new creation, is unconcerned with matters of circumcision (6:15). Even Peter felt release from the Jewish dietary law (2:12; cf. Acts 10:11-15; 11:5-9). The Old Covenant and the New Covenant cannot peacefully coexist: the Law is not of faith (3:12); the Law is not of the promise (3:18; 4:23,28); the Law is not of the

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Spirit (3:2-5; 5:18-23). The Law, however, is fulfilled and therefore rendered obsolete by the Golden Rule (5:14). Paul was passionate in his refutation of those influencing the Galatians with this doctrine. He said that they were disturbing them with another “non-gospel” (1:7; 5:10). Paul twice wished a curse upon anyone preaching to them a distorted gospel (1:8-9). He likened them to the false brethren who had sneaked in to spy out their liberty and bring them into bondage (2:4). He recognized that the Galatians had been bewitched by someone’s teaching (3:1) and that it had the capability to destroy all that Paul had built (4:11) by hindering them from obeying the truth (5:7). He emphasizes his disdain for these teachers by encouraging them to take the circumcision they cherished one step further and castrate themselves (5:12). According to Paul’s teaching in Galatians, the Law of Moses is hopelessly inferior to the New Covenant. It was given exclusively to Israel, is separate from and inferior to the promises of Abraham, is incapable of providing righteousness, and came to an end as the Messianic faith appeared. Paul insists that adding any commandment of the Law to faith in Christ in an attempt to gain righteousness amounts to nullification of the grace of God (2:21). His words are as poignant today as when they were first penned centuries ago: “You have been severed from Christ, you who are seeking to be justified by law; you have fallen from grace” (5:4).

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