Question

Discuss the view that Galatians 4:21-31 represents a response to the Galatian opponents.

Abstract

This study examines the proposition that Paul’s argumentation and, in particular, his choice of texts for exposition in Gal 4:21-31 are in response to similar argumentation on the part of the Galatian agitators. After examining the case put forward by C. K. Barrett and others, several difficulties in this position are noted which prompt the reconsideration of the idea that the initiative is Paul’s own. Several possibilities are critically appraised, including recent studies by Susan Elliott and Karen Jobes. As a result, a proposal is offered, building on Jobes’ work, to the effect that Paul in fact chose Isa 54:1 as his text for exposition. On this reading, the choice of the Genesis narrative was conditional upon his choice of Isaiah, and not a response to exegesis of Gen 16-17 by the Galatian opponents. Finally, this proposal is subjected to critical evaluation, with the result that it is found to be compatible with Barrett’s reconstruction, but that it also renders the latter unnecessary in understanding Gal 4:21-31.

Essay

Galatians 4:21-31 represents a significant challenge for exegetes of the New Testament. The sources of difficulty are many. In particular, modern exegetes struggle to comprehend Paul’s hermeneutical method in applying the OT narrative of Sarah and Hagar, Ishmael and Isaac to the Galatian context, or to appreciate its rhetorical and argumentative force. Further, two semantically important words in the passage – ἀλληγορούμενα (v. 24) and συστοιχεῖ (v. 25) – are hapax legomena in the NT. Indeed, confusion about this passage is not limited to the modern reader, as evidenced by the 11 textual variants exhibited in this short passage. Yet even more basic to the understanding of this passage than Paul’s hermeneutic is the reason he selected the narrative of Sarah and Hagar as the basis for his exegesis. Two main answers to this question have been put forward: (1) Paul adopts texts in use by his Galatian opponents; or (2) Paul selects this narrative of his own accord. It is the aim of this study to examine these two options.¹

In 1976 C. K. Barrett wrote an influential essay proposing that Paul’s choice of texts for exposition in Gal 3-4 was actually determined by the texts in use by the Galatian agitators.² On this reading, Paul takes up the texts presented by the opponents, and corrects their exegesis, demonstrating in the process that these same texts support his own position.³ In relation to Gal 4:21-31, Barrett argues that,

(1) This is a part of the Old Testament that Paul would have been unlikely to introduce of his own accord; its value from his point of view is anything but obvious, and the method of interpretation is unusual with him… It stands in the epistle because his opponents had used it and he could not escape it. (2) Its plain, surface meaning supports not Paul but the Judaizers: the Jews, who live by the law of Moses, are the heirs of Abraham and it is to Jews that the promise applies.⁴

In response to the argument put by the agitators, then, Paul argues that Hagar is to be identified not with Paul’s gospel to the Gentiles, but with the agitators’ nomistic teaching. Then, having turned his opponents’ arguments against them, he turns to his more positive exposition at 5:2, indicated by his words ‘Look! I Paul…’.⁵

Many have followed Barrett in this reading. Fung points out that since the manner of OT exegesis found in this passage is not characteristic of Paul, some explanation for its use here is necessary, with the implication that allegory⁶ was the only way Paul could convert the text to his own use.⁷ More plausibly, Longenecker points to the present participle ἀλληγορούμενα (4:24) and suggests that the agitators were the innovators in using allegory and Paul is simply correcting their system of tropes.⁸ He also adds that it explains the use of affirmative particle μέν (‘indeed’) in vv. 23, 24, which signals points of agreement with the opponents’ interpretation. Drane comments that this text would have been one familiar to Jewish controversialists as demonstrating the superiority of the Jewish nation to those outside the covenant.⁹

Barrett’s proposal has great merit, although some qualification is needed. For instance, Bruce argues that the customary interpretation of Gen 16-17 in rabbinical schools would have been to identify Ishmael as the ancestor of the Gentile nations, but no evidence is adduced in support of this.¹⁰ Neither is it clear how this would advance the push for circumcision, since both Isaac and Ishmael were circumcised. More attractive is the proposal that the agitator’s polemical target was Paul himself; thus Ishmael, the son who did not have the law, is identified as Paul, and the Galatian Christians are his progeny.¹¹

Yet even in its strongest form, Barrett’s hypothesis is not without problems. The most obvious is that it fails to account for why this passage is not treated before the shift of direction signalled in 4:12-20.¹² That the Hagar/Sarah narrative should be an ‘afterthought’ is hardly plausible if it was one of the key texts in the agitators’ argument;¹³ that it should occupy such a significant position, as the climax of Paul’s exegetical argument, less plausible still. Are we to believe that Paul did not bring any Scripture of his own to the debate, except in an effort to ‘commute’ his opponents’ exegesis? Even then, the strongest basis Barrett and those who follow him can suggest for Paul’s introduction of Isa 54:1 is a thematic link with the idea of barenness.¹⁴ Barrett’s conclusions, whilst possibly apt for Paul’s use of Scripture in Gal 3, seem less appropriate for Gal 4:21-31. Thus it is necessary to reexamine the possibility that the choice of the narrative of Gen 16-7 is Paul’s own initiative.

Several suggestions have been made. Bligh proposes that Paul’s speech to Peter carries through to 5:13a, and thus 4:21-31 constitutes a rhetorical flourish more appropriate to a Jewish audience than a Gentile one.¹⁵ Barrett notes this hypothesis as his point of departure, agreeing that it gives a concrete setting to the pericope and would have been an impressive conclusion to a speech.¹⁶ However, he also rightly points out that it ‘fails to carry conviction’, since Paul did not call it a speech and it fails to account for the direct address (‘O foolish Galatians…’) in 3:1. One might add that it relegates the function of this passage to being a mere adornment,¹⁷ rather than a part of the argument proper, surely insufficient cause for Paul to depart from his usual methods of exegesis in favour of allegory.¹⁸

Elliott suggests that Paul is constructing an argument targeted at the Galatians themselves, and rooted in their own context.¹⁹ Her proposal is that the Galatians would have understood Paul to mean that Mount Sinai was an incarnation of the mother of the Gods, who was often identified with a mountain overlooking the cities and villages she was held to protect and who would then be known by the name of her mountain e.g. Meter Dindymenē, Meter Sipylenē, Meter Zingotenē, Meter Kotianē etc.²⁰ This ‘Mountain Mother’ held a role in Anatolian culture as an ‘enforcer deity,’ upholding the laws of men and gods,²¹ and so would have been readily identified with the Jewish law and nomism. Further, this goddess was often served by ‘sacred slaves’ (ἱερόδουλοι), including the galli, young men who would castrate themselves during orgiastic rituals in her honour.²² Thus, according to Elliott, we see why the Galatians may have been willing to undergo the rite of circumcision (5:2) and providing context for Paul’s outburst in response (5:12). To be the slave of the Mother of the Gods would have been a real attraction, so the argument based on freedom/slavery in chapter 3 would not, of itself, have been sufficient.²³ Paul’s rhetorical purpose, then, is to show that she is herself a slave, for being the slave of a slave would not have been attractive.²⁴

Elliott’s thesis has strength in explaining some of the distinctive aspects of this passage. It eases somewhat the notorious difficulty of the otherwise bare geographical fact in v. 25 (τὸ δὲ Ἁγὰρ Σινᾶ ὄρος ἐστὶν ἐν τῇ Ἀραβίᾳ), which would thus be translated as ‘now Hagar-Sinai is a mountain [mother] in Arabia’. It explains why Sarah and ‘her’ mountain are not named, since this would make ‘our mother’ just another Mountain Mother.²⁵ It may also offer entry points for understanding Paul’s use of στοιχεῖα (4:9; cf. 4:3; 5:25; 6:16) and ‘Jerusalem above… is our mother’ (4:26). Yet Elliott’s proposal has failed to find much support among NT scholars, for a number of reasons. Elliott cites a substantial body of lithographic and textual evidence to establish the basic facts of the background, yet provides no indication of dates for that evidence. Yet even supposing that her montage accurately depicts first century Anatolia, there are numerous problems with her application to Paul’s Epistle. Whilst Elliott’s interpretation brings a measure of unity to 4:21-5:11 with a sustained focus on the broader Anatolian context, it fails to find much basis in the rest of the Galatian Epistle. It also presupposes that Paul²⁶ had sufficient knowledge of Anatolian culture to construct this elaborate allegory to refute it, and that he should be willing to do so under the guise of ‘exegeting’ OT Scripture. Finally, the association of the Mountain Mother with law (and hence nomism) seems too tenuous to bear the weight Elliott gives to it, and it is by no means clear that the Galatians would have equated castration with circumcision. Thus Elliott’s proposal fails, and must be rejected as having insufficient textual basis.

The most persuasive explanation for Paul’s use of the OT in this passage has been offered in an important study by Karen Jobes.²⁷ Building on work by Hays, she approaches the issue by considering the ‘intertextual space’ set up by Paul’s three uses of Scripture in this passage.²⁸ Of particular interest is the quotation of Isa 54:1 in 4:27 which ‘metaleptically evokes the whole rippling pool of promise found in the latter chapters of that prophetic book’.²⁹ Thus, Isaiah speaks of barrenness (49:21; 54:1), inheritance (14:21; 49:8; 57:13; 58:14), seed (6:13; 59:21), the Holy Spirit (11:12; 28:6; 30:1; 32:15; 34:16; 42:1; 44:3; 48:16; 59:21; 61:1; 63:10, 14) and Jerusalem (passim, but particularly 51:17). Indeed, Isa 51:2 is the only reference to Sarah in the OT outside of the Genesis narrative. But this correspondence is more than just verbal – Isaiah ‘provides a canonical basis for at least three points with which Paul later resonates':³⁰ (1) Sarah is the mother, not just of Israel, but of those ‘who pursue righteousness and who seek the LORD’ (Isa 51:1-2); (2) the images of matriarchal barrenness and female personification of capital cities are conjoined to produce two Jerusalems, one barren and cursing, the other rejoicing; and (3) a barren Jerusalem miraculously gives birth as demonstration of God’s power to deliver a nation of people from death (Isa 54). Thus, in Jobes’ words, ‘Paul’s argument in Gal 4:21-31 resonates, not with the Genesis narrative, but with Isaiah’s transformation of its themes of seed and inheritance’.³¹

Jobes’ argument shows great strength, in that it explains Paul’s juxtaposition of the texts from Genesis and Isaiah. This is made more plausible still when considered in the light of Di Mattei’s observation that synagogue reading practices sought to eschatologize the Torah by reading Genesis through its haftarah, or interpretation in the prophets.³² Thus Paul’s allegorical use of the Genesis narrative mimics how Paul may have conceived Isaiah using it.³³ Jobes is also successful in explaining why Paul names only Hagar and not Sarah, since this preserves sufficient ambiguity to allow the Isaianic identifications to prevail. Jobes accounts for the unusual nexus of ideas in this passage – Sarah, Jerusalem, the Holy Spirit – as well as certain parallels between the two texts (e.g. Isa 53:1 // Gal 3:2; Isa 53:2-12 // Gal 3:1; Isa 54:1 // 4:27). In short, Jobes provides a concrete explanation for Paul’s otherwise arbitrary allegorical method, and demonstrates that it is an integral part of Paul’s argument.³⁴

The most substantial objection to Jobes’ position is one that she notes herself: would the Galatians have been sufficiently versed in Isaiah to understand the nuances of Paul’s argument?³⁵ Would the Galatians even have known which slave girl and which free woman Paul was referring to? Evidently, if this was part of the teaching of the opponents then they would, but is Jobes’ reading necessarily dependent upon Barrett’s? In response, Jobes conjectures that Paul is reminding the Galatians of what he taught them during his initial visit, a solution not without problems of its own. Apart from the obvious fact that Paul is not generally shy about signalling such reminders (cf. Rom 15:15; 1 Cor 15:1; 2 Tim 1:6), one may well ask, ‘If Paul has already taught them on this subject, why are they taken in by the agitators’ teaching? What makes him think simple reiteration will prevent it from happening again?’ A more likely possibility is that Paul gave such fuller instruction to the emissary with whom he sent the Galatian Epistle. In either case, it is not at all implausible that Paul’s original proclamation included teaching from Isaiah, particularly when we consider that right in between the text Paul quotes (Isa 54:1) and one of the texts Jobes sees being metaleptically invoked (Isa 51) lies Isaiah’s prophecy concerning the Suffering Servant (Isa 52:13-53:13), a text very relevant in explaining how the Messiah came to die on a Roman cross.³⁶ And Paul includes numerous quotations from these chapters in his own writings (Rom 2:24; 10:15, 16; 15:21; 1 Cor 2:9; 2 Cor 6:17; Gal 4:27; cf. Acts 13:34, 47). The quotations in his Epistle to the Romans – a church he had never visited, and thus to whom he was proclaiming the gospel for the first time – are particularly significant in suggesting that Isa 51-54 formed a key component of Paul’s kerygma.

Thus, Jobes makes a good case for metalepsis as the reason for Paul’s selection of Isa 54:1 as a text through which to interpret the Genesis narrative. But is it sufficient cause for the selection of the Genesis text in the first place? In other words, is Barrett’s reconstruction of Paul responding to opposing exegesis still necessary in explaining Gal 4:21-31? Certainly, the two readings are compatible – the opponents selected Gen 16-17 (Barrett) and Paul selected Isa 54:1 in order to correct their exegesis (Jobes) – and this renders a thoroughly consistent overall picture. But Barrett’s proposal was made in response to a number of perceived problems within Gal 4:21-31, and these same problems are independently solved by Jobes, rendering Barrett’s hypothesis unnecessary. Thus, where Barrett found that the Genesis narrative was selected by the opponents, Jobes opens up the possibility that Paul selected the Isaiah text first and then summarised the Genesis background accordingly. Both provide explanations for describing Jerusalem as ‘our mother’ (4:26) and Jobes provides the stronger explanation for Paul’s allegorical method. The weakness of Jobes’ reading (the necessity of familiarity with Isaiah) is inherent in Barrett’s as well, otherwise the Galatians will not understand Paul’s response. Perhaps the only area where Barrett’s hypothesis provides a stronger reading is in Longenecker’s point that Paul uses μέν to signal points of agreement with the opposing exegesis, but other explanations have been offered for this as well.³⁷

In summary, then, whilst Barrett’s argument that in Gal 4:21-31 Paul is responding to and correcting exegesis of Gen 16-17 offered by the opponents is possible, it is rendered unnecessary if Jobes’ explanation is accepted. The selection of Isa 54:1 was clearly Paul’s (on either reading), and was motivated by metaleptic invocation of a nexus of themes integral to his argument, and thus apt for serving as a conclusion to his proof from Scripture and a sound basis for transitioning to paraenesis in 5:1ff. His method is therefore calculated rather than arbitrary, and is part of Paul’s positive argument from Scripture rather than an apologetic response to the exegesis of the Galatian agitators.

Bibliography

Barrett, C. K. Essays on Paul Westminster Pr, 1982.

Bligh, John. Galatians: A Discussion of St. Paul’s Epistle, Householder Commentaries. London: St. Paul Publications, 1969.

Boer, Martinus C. de. “Paul’s Quotation of Isaiah 54.1 in Galatians 4.27.” New Testament Studies 50, no. 3 (2004): 370-89.

Bruce, F. F. The Epistle to the Galatians: A Commentary on the Greek Text. Accordance electronic ed, New Internation Greek Testament Commentary. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1982.

Caneday, A. B. “Covenant Lineage Allegorically Prefigured: “Which Things Are Written Allegorically” (Galatians 4:21-31).” Southern Baptist Journal of Theology 14, no. 3 (2010): 50-77.

Dahl, Nils A. “Paul’s Letter to the Galatians: Epistolary Genre, Content, and Structure.” In The Galatians Debate: Contemporary Issues in Rhetorical and Historical Interpretation, edited by Mark D. Nanos, 117-42. Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson Publishers, 2002.

Davis, Anne. “Allegorically Speaking in Galatians 4:21-5:1.” Bulletin for Biblical Research 14, no. 2 (2004): 161-74.

Di Mattei, Steven. “Paul’s Allegory of the Two Covenants (Gal 4.21-31) in Light of First-Century Hellenistic Rhetoric and Jewish Hermeneutics.” New Testament Studies 52, no. 1 (2006): 102-22.

Drane, John W. Paul: Libertine or Legalist. London: SPCK, 1975.

Elliott, Susan M. “Choose Your Mother, Choose Your Master: Galatians 4:21-5:1 in the Shadow of the Anatolian Mother of the Gods.” Journal of Biblical Literature 118, no. 4 (1999): 661-83.

Fee, Gordon D. Galatians: Pentecostal Commentary. Blandford Forum: Deo Publishing, 2007.

Fung, Ronald Y. K. The Epistle to the Galatians, The New International Commentary on the New Testament. Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1988.

Hansen, G. Walter. Abraham in Galatians: Epistolary and Rhetorical Contexts. Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1989.

Jobes, Karen H. “Jerusalem, Our Mother: Metalepsis and Intertextuality in Galatians 4:21-31.” Westminster Theological Journal 55, no. 2 (1993): 299-320.

Longenecker, Richard N. Galatians. Accordance/Thomas Nelson electronic ed, Word Biblical Commentary. Waco: Word Books, 1990.

Luther, Martin. A Commentary on St. Paul’s Epistle to the Galatians: Based on Lectures Delivered at the University of Wittenberg in the Year 1531 and First Published in 1535. London: James Clarke & Co, 1953.

Martyn, J. Louis. Galatians: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary. 1st ed, The Anchor Bible. New York: Doubleday, 1997.

Silva, Moisés. Interpreting Galatians: Explorations in Exegetical Method. 2nd ed. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Academic, 2001.

Stott, John R. W. The Message of Galatians. Accordance electronic ed, The Bible Speaks Today. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1984.

Tamez, Elsa. “Hagar and Sarah in Galatians: A Case Study in Freedom.” Word & World 20, no. 3 (2000): 265-71.

Endnotes

1. There are 3 OT texts in view in this passage: (1) Gen 16-17, which Paul summarises in vv. 21-23 rather than quoting; (2) Isa 54.1, which is cited in v. 27; and (3) Gen 21:10, cited in v. 30. (3) Is clearly dependent upon the choice of (1), and that (2) is Paul’s own choice, being of no service to the agitators, would scarcely be contested by the majority of interpreters – so, for example, J. Louis Martyn, Galatians: A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary, 1st ed., The Anchor Bible (New York: Doubleday, 1997), 441. Thus, the focus of this study is on the selection of the Genesis narrative as exegetical battleground.
2. C. K. Barrett, Essays on Paul (Westminster Pr, 1982), 154-68. This essay was originally published as “Allegory of Abraham, Sarah, and Hagar in the Argument of Galatians,” in Rechtfertigung (Tübingen: J C B Mohr, 1976).
3. Ibid., 158ff.
4. Ibid., 162.
5. Ibid., 165.
6. Much controversy attaches to the translation of ἀλληγορούμενα in Gal 4:24. The points of contention are twofold: (1) should it be translated ‘is written allegorically’ or ‘is interpreted allegorically’?; and (2) is it more accurate to describe Paul’s method as ‘typological’ rather than ‘allegorical’? For recent studies on these issues, see Anne Davis, “Allegorically Speaking in Galatians 4:21-5:1,” Bulletin for Biblical Research 14, no. 2 (2004). and A. B. Caneday, “Covenant Lineage Allegorically Prefigured: “Which Things Are Written Allegorically” (Galatians 4:21-31),” Southern Baptist Journal of Theology 14, no. 3 (2010). The findings of this study are not dependent on answers to either of these questions, although the findings of the study may be relevant to answering (1). Thus both questions may be left open; in particular, the traditional translations ‘allegory’ and ‘allegorical’ will be used in a non-technical sense that also encompasses ‘typology’ and ‘typological’. Overall, the important thing to remember is that, as Stott puts it, Paul’s method ‘is allegorical, although not arbitrary.’ John R. W. Stott, The Message of Galatians, Accordance electronic ed., The Bible Speaks Today (Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 1984), 121.
7. Ronald Y. K. Fung, The Epistle to the Galatians, The New International Commentary on the New Testament (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1988), 219.
8. Richard N. Longenecker, Galatians, Accordance/Thomas Nelson electronic ed., Word Biblical Commentary (Waco: Word Books, 1990), 210.
9. John W. Drane, Paul: Libertine or Legalist (London: SPCK, 1975), 39.
10. F. F. Bruce, The Epistle to the Galatians: A Commentary on the Greek Text, Accordance electronic ed., New International Greek Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1982), 218-9. cf. Longenecker, who says, ‘When one looks into the rabbinic traditions for a similar contemporization of the Hagar-Sarah story in which the interpreter’s opponents are identified with Hagar and Ishmael and so denounced or marginalized, one finds the potential but not the reality—that is, one finds all the elements being present, but not, with only rare and generally late exceptions, being brought together for polemical purposes.’ Longenecker, Galatians, 205.
11. Ibid., 199-200, 07-8, 18.
12. Barrett’s own explanation, that Paul is catering for a Gentile audience and supplying real world examples more familiar to them, misses the different character of argumentation from 4:12 (Barrett, Essays on Paul, 160-1.). Various theories have been suggested for this ‘interruption’ in the flow of Paul’s argument. Notably, Dahl uses epistolary analysis and concludes that 4:12 marks a transition from ‘rebuke’ to ‘request’ (Nils A. Dahl, “Paul’s Letter to the Galatians: Epistolary Genre, Content, and Structure,” in The Galatians Debate: Contemporary Issues in Rhetorical and Historical Interpretation, ed. Mark D. Nanos (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson Publishers, 2002), 134.). Similarly, Hansen arrives at a compatible conclusion using rhetorical analysis, arguing for a shift from forensic to deliberative rhetoric at 4:12. His conclusion is that ‘The unity of 3.1-4.11 as a section on its own makes it difficult to see how 4.21-31 is related structurally to that section.’ (G. Walter Hansen, Abraham in Galatians: Epistolary and Rhetorical Contexts (Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1989), 143.)
13. Caneday, “Covenant Lineage,” 56.
14. Bruce, Galatians, 222. and Martinus C. de Boer, “Paul’s Quotation of Isaiah 54.1 in Galatians 4.27,” New Testament Studies 50, no. 3 (2004): 379.
15. John Bligh, Galatians: A Discussion of St. Paul’s Epistle, Householder Commentaries (London: St. Paul Publications, 1969), 235-6.
16. Barrett, Essays on Paul, 158.
17. cf. ‘For as painting is an ornament to set forth and garnish an house already builded, so is an allegory the light of a matter which is already otherwise proved and confirmed.’ Martin Luther, A Commentary on St.Paul’s Epistle to the Galatians: Based on Lectures Delivered at the University of Wittenberg in the Year 1531 and First Published in 1535 (London: James Clarke & Co, 1953), 417.
18. cf. Elsa Tamez, “Hagar and Sarah in Galatians : A Case Study in Freedom,” Word & World 20, no. 3 (2000): 269. Tamez argues that Paul’s purpose in choosing this constellation of texts (Gen 16-17; 21:10; Isa 54.1) is to demonstrate God’s preference for excluded ones. This is not implausible, but is probably not sufficient cause to explain the distinctives of this passage. Nevertheless, it is compatible with other explanations, and is worth bearing in mind as a secondary purpose.
19. Susan M. Elliott, “Choose Your Mother, Choose Your Master: Galatians 4:21-5:1 in the Shadow of the Anatolian Mother of the Gods,” Journal of Biblical Literature 118, no. 4 (1999).
20. Ibid., 672.
21. Ibid., 674-5.
22. Ibid., 675.
23. Ibid., 680.
24. Ibid., 681.
25. Ibid., 682.
26. Or one of his associates, perhaps whoever brought news of the Galatian situation in the first place. Yet no associate is mentioned in the epistolary greeting.
27. Karen H. Jobes, “Jerusalem, Our Mother: Metalepsis and Intertextuality in Galatians 4:21-31,” Westminster Theological Journal 55, no. 2 (1993).
28. Ibid., 305.
29. Hays, quoted in Ibid.
30. Ibid., 309.
31. Ibid., 310.
32. Steven Di Mattei, “Paul’s Allegory of the Two Covenants (Gal 4.21-31) in Light of First-Century Hellenistic Rhetoric and Jewish Hermeneutics,” New Testament Studies 52, no. 1 (2006): 102.
33. Ibid., 119. This, of course, does not solve the problem of what warrants allegorical interpretation of the Genesis narrative in the first place, merely shifts the initiative from Paul to Isaiah. ‘Yet one does not usually hear complaints that the OT prophets are guilty of using allegorical exegesis; nor is it common to argue that, in their view, Scripture contained a sensus plenior (“fuller meaning”). We simply recognize that the prophets knew how to exploit their literary tradition.’ Moisés Silva, Interpreting Galatians: Explorations in Exegetical Method, 2nd ed. (Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Academic, 2001), 164.
34. Contra Gordon D. Fee, Galatians: Pentecostal Commentary (Blandford Forum: Deo Publishing, 2007), 197. Fee writes ‘[T]he most striking thing about the paragraph [sc. Gal 4:24-27] is how unnecessary it is to the present passage itself… [O]ne could very easily go from v. 23 to v. 28 without missing a beat, which suggests that nothing in this brief “interpretive” moment is actually crucial to Paul’s point.’
35. Jobes, “Jerusalem, Our Mother,” 318.
36. Indeed, we have at least one account of a God-fearing Gentile reading from this prophecy (Acts 8:32).
37. Longenecker, Galatians, 208. cf. Di Mattei, who argues that it is part of a μέν… δέ construction, for which the ‘other’ apparently never eventuates, thus creating tension and provoking thought. Di Mattei, “Paul’s Allegory,” 109.