Two issues that frustrate a lot of Christians in their quest to understand Scripture are 1) apparent contradictions, and 2) first century Roman cultural mixtures. With all the English translations available, it’s not difficult to get around a lack of original language knowledge.
But what if you add in a layer of complexity where the author
seems contradictory as he tries to help the first century culture understand
the ancient culture from a thousand years before? It’s not helpful that the
current iteration of that culture, the Jews, probably were not using their writings
as they should have been. This additional confusion led many of them who
claimed Jesus as their Messiah to also misuse their “legal texts” in
their relations with Gentiles.
In the previous entry on Galatians, we saw that the law shows
what’s wrong, the problem Jesus fixes. Yes, it contains a lot of rules, but it
also contains a record of the Creator’s work with His human creatures. That
work is completed in Jesus.
Paul acknowledges the rules, but he focuses on Abraham:
Just as Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness, so then, understand that those who believe are the sons of Abraham. And the scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, proclaimed the gospel to Abraham ahead of time, saying, “All the nations will be blessed in you.” So then those who believe are blessed along with Abraham the believer.
Galatians 3:6-9 NET
I’m going to skip a bit here because I want to focus on the apparent
contradiction. Paul focuses on Abraham as the source of our heritage as
Christians. For Paul, though, he has to draw that line through Jesus, a direct
descendant of Abraham. And this is how he does it:
Brothers and sisters, I offer an example from everyday life: When a covenant has been ratified, even though it is only a human contract, no one can set it aside or add anything to it. Now the promises were spoken to Abraham and to his descendant. Scripture does not say, “and to the descendants,” referring to many, but “and to your descendant,” referring to one, who is Christ. What I am saying is this: The law that came 430 years later does not cancel a covenant previously ratified by God, so as to invalidate the promise. For if the inheritance is based on the law, it is no longer based on the promise, but God graciously gave it to Abraham through the promise.
Galatians 3:15-18 NET
Paul does several frustrating things here. First off, he
switches terminology from “covenant” to “promise,” and second, he makes much of
a mass noun in Greek, “descendant(s),” literally, “seed.” His audience would
understand “seed” as not requiring a plural form. It works similarly in English
but as a “mass noun” rather than a true irregular plural. You can use
the plural, seeds, and sometimes that appropriate. But if someone scatters seed
in a field, few people would assume the reference is to a single seed. So, you
see why what Paul is claiming was done with Abraham can be confusing. His
audience might not agree with him here, so why would he do that?
Also, keep in mind that Paul knows Hebrew, not just the
Greek, Scriptures. So, he knows this is an irregular plural in Hebrew. And
in other places in the Hebrew Scriptures where the usage is singular, Paul
would not consider this to mean a single person, but rather all
of the descendants. This becomes obvious here:
For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female —for all of you are one in Christ Jesus. And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s descendants, heirs according to the promise.
Galatians 3:27-29 NET
This translation obscures (but footnotes) that “descendants”
is the singular “seed” in Greek. Literally, Paul says, “But if you [are]
of Christ, then you are seed of Abraham…” The brackets supply a missing
verb (they do that in Greek), and I emphasized the “of” where the preposition
was missing, but the inflected part of speech makes it likely. It could be “from,”
but the possessive “of” makes more sense.
Anyway, the point here is that Paul uses the singular as it
would have been expected, and different than he claimed previously in verse 16.
Or is it?
If you read Galatians 3:6 through 4:7, you get a context
which suggests why Paul is trying to have it both ways. He wants the Galatians
(and, therefore, us) to realize that while our faith maybe analogous to
Abraham, the true source of our relationship with our Creator is through
Jesus. We may be Abraham’s seed in a spiritual sense, but actually this happens
through Jesus, the “singular seed” of Abraham.
In other words (and in line with most modern English
translations), the Galatian disciples and we are not to rely on rules for our walk
with our Creator, but our Creator Himself. We follow rules only in so far as we
understand our Savior’s perspective. It’s not the rules themselves, but our
Savior we follow. The rules help us perceive His purpose, His priorities, and
His definitions of good and evil. That is the point, the goal, and the purpose
of the law. It’s also the point, goal, and purpose of our eternal existence.
