CHAP. IV.]

g

THE MOTHER OF US ALL.

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26 But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the

mother of us all.

h

27 For it is written, " Rejoice, thou barren that bearest not; break forth and cry, thou that travailest not: for the desolate hath many more children than she which hath an husband.

26. "The mother of us all." So A., K., L., P., most Cursives; but N, B., C., D., E., F., G., a few Cursives, Ital., Vulg., Syriac, Sah., Copt., read, "our mother" (μrng ἡμῶν).

salem that now is, refuses to be delivered, to be gathered, to be exalted. She became a burnt out city, a city of dry ashes; but from these ashes there arose like a phoenix a new city of God—a free city, receiving all who will into the enjoyment of its freedom -wonderfully free, for she is above the conditions of space-no longer local, for wherever there is the setting forth of the Son of God and the unifying Eucharist, there is Jerusalem from above, freeing men, if they will, from the direst of all yokes, the yoke of sin.

"Which is the mother of us all." There is doubt whether we should retain the word "all," as it is not in most ancient authorities and versions; but it is absolutely true that the Church, the heavenly Jerusalem, is the mother of us all, if it be true, as the Apostle had said, "We are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus." The Church is the mother of all Christians, because by her doctrine, by her sacraments, by her ministry she bears us to God.

27. "For it is written, Rejoice thou barren that bearest not; break forth," &c. The barren that bears not signifies in the prophecy the captive Jerusalem, for a time desolate and a widow. She on her return became far more populous than she was before her captivity, when she was married to God. And so the heavenly Jerusalem, which existed in a measure in and under the earthly, but had few or no children, is now called upon to rejoice, and break forth into singing for the multitude of her offspring. The "many more "betokens the myriads of Christians-first in Jerusalem, then spread over the earth-which the Catholic Church has borne to Christ.

I cannot see that it is proper to bring in here the barrenness of

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THE CHILDREN OF PROMISE.

[GALATIANS.

28 Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are 'the children of

Acts iii. 25. Rom. ix. 8. ch. iii. 29.

k Gen. xxi. 9.

1 ch. v. 11. & vi. 12.

promise.

29 But as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit, 1 even so it is now.

28. "Now we, brethren." So N, A., C., E., K., L., P., most Cursives, Vulg., Syriac, Copt., Arm.; but B., D., F., G., d, e, g, Sah., read, "ye."

Sarah, for she was never desolate, and she and Agar had each one child.

66

28. "Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise." There is a difference of reading here, some MSS. reading we," others "ye." But it makes little difference to the innermost sense. The converted Gentiles were the children of the promise to Abraham: "In thy seed shall all the nations of the earth (the Gentiles) be blessed;" but when Paul and his fellow Apostles and the elect Jews accepted Christ, they also became children of the promise; they received the promise of the Father; they received the promise of the new and better covenant (Jerem. xxxi. 33). They no longer rested on their circumcision and their carnal Passovers, but on their partaking of Christ-on the promises of God made to them in His Word and Sacraments.

29. "But as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him," &c. I have noticed that the word translated "mocking" has no idea of ridiculing attached to it in the original, much less of persecution; but, in the glosses or legends of the Rabbis, Ishmael is supposed to have persecuted Isaac.

St. Paul thus, it appears, turns the traditions of the Judaizers against themselves.'

And if they voluntarily put themselves into the place of Ishmael, refuse to believe in that Son Who would make them free indeed, and persecute those who take refuge in Him, they do the deeds of their proper typical ancestors; they become as the seed of the

1 May I be permitted to suggest that Sarah may have had other reasons for resenting this playing, this phy. If we follow the guidance of Gen. xxvi. 8 and xxxix. 17, it may have been something lewd or indecent. If we take the meaning of Exod. xxxii. 6, it may have been something idolatrous, as Ishmael's mother was an Egyptian.

CHAP. IV.]

CAST OUT THE BONDWOMAN.

m

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30 Nevertheless what saith " the scripture? "Cast out the bondwoman and her son: for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the freewoman.

31 So then, brethren, we are not children of

m ch. iii. 8, 22.
n Gen. xxi.
10, 12.

o John viii. 35.

bondwoman, and will share her ejection from the true house and family of God, as the Apostle proceeds to say:

30. "Nevertheless what saith the scripture? Cast out the bondwoman and her son," &c. This was the request of Sarah to Abraham; but it was according to the express will of God, Who said to Abraham, "Let it not be grievous in thy sight, because of the lad, and because of thy bondwoman for in Isaac shall thy seed be

called." (Gen. xxi. 12.)

The seed of the bond woman-i.e., the Judaizers-were never, as far as we know, cast out of the Church as heretics, but, as I shall show, their error sprang not from ritualism, but from unbelief. Judaism and Faith in the Incarnation could not co-exist in the Catholic Church, and they did not. The errors against which St. Paul contended seem not to have been cast out, but to have cast themselves out of the Church. The errors, or supposed errors, of the mediæval Church could not, except by the most extreme perversity of language, be called Judaism or Judaizing. That the Body and Blood of Him Whom the Jews crucified was to be the spiritual Food of His people was not Judaizing, so far as I can see. Reliance upon self is an evil inherent in the human heart, and in its fruit of pride and self-sufficiency is particularly rife amongst those who claim the teaching of this Epistle as peculiarly their

own.

31. "So then, brethren, we are not children of the bond woman, but of the free." This is the re-assertion in another form of, "If ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise." Both on the father's and on the mother's side we are free-born. We are children of God by faith in His Son. We are children of the Church, the New Jerusalem of whom Sarah was the type by the same faith. But let us take care that we value and assert our freedom, and let our watchword be, "Verily, verily, I say unto you, whosoever committeth sin is the servant of

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CHILDREN OF THE FREE.

[GALATIANS.

P John viii. 36. the bondwoman, but of the free.

ch. v, 1, 13.

sin, and the servant abideth not in the house for ever, but the Son abideth ever. If the Son, therefore, shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed” (John viii. 34).

ST

CHAP. V.

b

TAND fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with John viii. 32. the yoke of bondage.

Rom. vi. 18.

1 Pet. ii. 16.

b Acts xv. 10.

2 Behold, I Paul say unto you, that if ye be

ch. ii. 4. & iv. 9. circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing.

c Acts xv. 1.

See Acts xvi. 3.

1. Bishop Lightfoot has two pages of discussion respecting a considerable number of various interpretations. Revisers read, "With freedom did Christ set us free. Stand fast therefore." So also Professor Jowett. Bishop Ellicott seems to side mostly with Authorized.

1. "Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free," &c. There are various readings of this verse, some connecting it more closely with the last verses of the last chapter, but there is no real difference in the meaning.

"With that liberty (wherewith) Christ has made us free." "Stand fast, therefore, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage." What does he mean by “ again ”? Had they or some of them been proselytes before they became Christians? Or does he allude to that law under which all men are naturally? Cornelius à Lapide amalgamates both: "Olim servistis idolis et dæmonibus, cur iterum servire vultis non idolis, sed umbris, et crassis onerosisque cæremoniis legis Mosi ?"

2. “Behold, I Paul say unto you, that if ye be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing."

3. "For I testify," &c. These two verses are of unspeakable importance to the understanding of the whole scope of the Epistle,

CHAP. V.] A DEBTOR TO DO THE WHOLE LAW.

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3 For I testify again to every man that is circumcised, that he is a debtor to do the whole law.

d ch. iii. 10.

for they teach us that the argument of the Apostle is not upon a matter of ritual, but of faith. Nothing effectually cuts off from Christ except want of faith, and the Gentile, who after accepting the faith of Christ, the Eternal Son Incarnate, Crucified, Risen, and Ascended, and sealing that faith by receiving Baptism into the mystical Body; yet deliberately, and with the full consciousness of what he was doing, submitted to receive circumcision, expressed as far as a man could do, his disbelief in the Christ of the Gospel. For how could a man who really believed in the Son of God as the Mediator of the New Covenant, revert back to the Old? Christ was the Son over His own house; could a man really believe this, and put himself under Moses the servant? Circumcision was not one bit of ritual amongst many, but the Godordained sign of a Covenant which God instituted till the New and better Covenant of His Son should take its place.

When, then, a baptized Gentile received circumcision, he deliberately expressed his conviction that a Baptism in which he had been buried and raised again with the Son of God, and had been joined mystically to One then ruling the universe at the right hand of God, must be supplemented by a ceremony which, though it had a moral significance, had no promise of grace-the promise of grace being attached to Baptism, the inaugurating rite of another order of things. And if he proceeded in his perverse course he would express his belief that the Eucharist in which he had been made to partake of the Living Bread must be supplemented by the eating of a dead lamb, which set forth the deliverance of a nation to which he did not belong from a mere carnal servitude. Well may the Apostle say, "If ye be circumcised Christ shall profit you nothing," for your submission to it is a sign of your rooted unbelief in the whole system of salvation, introduced amongst us by no less a thing than the Incarnation.

3. "For I testify again to every man that is circumcised, that he is a debtor," &c. Circumcision was the sign of submission to a covenant of works which of itself (apart from that grace which we would fairly hope, in some way unknown to us, corrects or supplies the defects of imperfect systems or ways of access to God), neces