Galatians 4:21-5:21

Bridgeway Bible Commentary - Galatians 4:21-31

Example of Hagar and Sarah (4:21-31)Paul now attacks the Judaisers by using a form of argument that they themselves liked to use. He returns to the story of Abraham to show that law-keeping is slavery and it cannot be mixed with grace. (For the background to the illustration that follows read Genesis 15:1-6; Genesis 16:1-16; Genesis 17:15-22; Genesis 18:1-15; Genesis 21:1-21.) Abraham had two sons, Ishmael, who was born as a result of human arrangements that lacked any exercise of faith, and... read more

James Burton Coffman

Coffman Commentaries on the Bible - Galatians 4:21

Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law?THE ALLEGORY OF ISAAC AND ISHMAELDesire to be under the law ... There has always been a basic natural appeal in visible, ceremonial, liturgical, external and spectacular religion, as witnessed continually by the churches of all ages in the persistent drifting into those very things. To the Galatians, so soon out of paganism, they were simply hypnotized and seduced into receiving the allegations of the Judaizers. Paul's... read more

Thomas Coke

Thomas Coke Commentary on the Holy Bible - Galatians 4:21

Galatians 4:21.— The Apostle exhorts the Galatians to stand fast in the liberty with which Christ hath made them free; shewing those who are so zealous for the law, that if they mind what they read in the law, they will there find that the children of the promise, or of the new Jerusalem, were to be free; but the children after the flesh, of the earthly Jerusalem, were to be in bondage, to be cast out, and not to have the inheritance. read more

Robert Jamieson; A. R. Fausset; David Brown

Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible - Galatians 4:21

21. 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... read more

Thomas Constable

Expository Notes of Dr. Thomas Constable - Galatians 4:21

Paul challenged his readers, who claimed to value the Law so highly, to consider what it taught. He chose his lesson from Genesis, a book in the "Law" section of the Old Testament. Thus he used the term "law" to refer to two different things in this verse: the Mosaic Law and the Old Testament. Again Paul returned to Abraham, the founder of Judaism. read more

Thomas Constable

Expository Notes of Dr. Thomas Constable - Galatians 4:21-23

The biblical story 4:21-23 read more

Thomas Constable

Expository Notes of Dr. Thomas Constable - Galatians 4:21-31

3. The biblical illustration 4:21-31Paul interpreted allegorically (i.e., figuratively, NIV) features of the history of Abraham’s two sons to convince his readers that they were in danger of joining the wrong branch of Abraham’s family. The apostle appears to have used the story of Abraham the way he did because this was a common rabbinic method that the Judaizers probably employed in their teaching in Galatia. [Note: R. Alan Cole, The Epistle of Paul to the Galatians, pp. 128-29. Longenecker... read more

John Dummelow

John Dummelow's Commentary on the Bible - Galatians 4:1-31

The Bondage of the Law. Freedom in Christ1-7. Under the Law we were in bondage; under the Gospel we have received the freedom of sons.Paraphrase. ’(1) The heir before he comes of age can no more enter upon his inheritance than a servant in the family can possess himself of it, (2) but must continue, until the set time, in a subordinate position, and under the authority and training of others. (3) So, when we were under the elementary Law system, we were in a position like that of the heir in... read more

Charles John Ellicott

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers - Galatians 4:21

(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 Matthew 10:14; Matthew 13:9; Matthew 13:13; Luke 16:29; Luke 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. read more

Charles John Ellicott

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers - Galatians 4:21-31

(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... read more

Grupo de Marcas