Tool Beta
The Ancient World Behind the Text
Pick a passage anywhere in the New Testament. See the customs and ideas a first reader knew without being told.
Galatians 4:21-5:1, Hagar, Sarah and Sinai in Arabia
Paul reads the story of Abraham's two sons as a figure of two covenants: Hagar the slave stands for Sinai and the present Jerusalem, Sarah the free woman for the Jerusalem above, and he calls the Galatians to stand firm in freedom.
Galatians 4:21-5:1, in every translation this tool compares.
Paul turns to the law's own story for those eager to live under it: Abraham fathered a son by Hagar, a slave, in the ordinary way, and another by Sarah, a free woman, through God's promise. He reads the two women as two covenants, Hagar standing for Sinai and the present Jerusalem in slavery, Sarah for the free Jerusalem above, the mother of believers. As the slave's son troubled the free son then, the children of promise face hostility now, and Scripture says to send away the slave and her son; Christ has freed them, so they must not return to slavery.
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- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/slavery\/","n":"Slavery and slave managers","s":"Slaves were everywhere in the Roman world, from field hands to stewards who ran whole estates and handled their master's money. A master away and slaves left in charge was a familiar story.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/present-age-and-age-to-come\/","n":"This age and the age to come","s":"Jews divided history into the present age, under the rule of evil nations, and the age to come, when God would rule unchallenged. The sufferings expected before the change were called birth pangs.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/heavenly-jerusalem\/","n":"The heavenly Jerusalem","s":"Jews looked for a Jerusalem built by God for the age to come, and some spoke of it as already waiting in heaven. Exiles and resident aliens knew what it was to look for a city that would be home.","r":""}
Some scholars suggest that Abraham and Sarah followed an ancient Near Eastern custom in using the barren wife's servant as a surrogate mother (Keener), and the Zondervan dictionary agrees. Philosophers often used allegory to deny a story's literal sense, while Jewish interpreters usually kept the literal sense and added an application; Philo made Sarah and Hagar advanced and elementary education (the cultural backgrounds notes; Keener). The dictionary notes that Paul keeps the history and that many prefer to call his method typology. Arabia included Mount Sinai as well as the land near Damascus, and Jews of the period saw the Nabatean Arabs as Ishmaelites (Keener and his notes); Josephus says Ishmael's twelve sons "inhabited all the country from Euphrates to the Red Sea, and called it Nabatene." Because Paul rarely argues this way, some think he is answering rivals who likened God-fearers to Ishmael and law-keepers to Isaac (the cultural backgrounds notes; Keener). Jewish texts looked for a Jerusalem in heaven that would descend to earth, and called Jerusalem our mother (Keener and his notes). Jewish teachers honored the yoke of the law, but a yoke also meant slavery (the cultural backgrounds notes).
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, introduction to Galatians 4:21-5:1, and on Galatians 4:21, 4:22-23, 4:24, 4:25, 4:26 and 4:29
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, notes on Galatians 4:24, 4:25, 4:26 and 5:1
- Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews 1.12.4, trans. William Whiston
- J. D. Douglas and Merrill C. Tenney, Zondervan Illustrated Bible Dictionary, entries Hagar and allegory
