# Galatians 3:13-14



## arapahoepark (Apr 23, 2016)

I am curious as to Paul's line of thought in these two verses that Christ became a curse so that the blessing of Abraham may come to the Gentiles.
Something I have been encountering recently is the idea that Christ died as a representative or substitute for Israel (maybe implying not for Gentiles) since the Law was given only to them. Thus with the law and curse removed all can share in the blessing of Israel. Seems interesting but, I am not sure.
What are your guys' thoughts?


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## Dekybo (Apr 23, 2016)

The law was also for the sojourner. Just something that came to mind.


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## Peairtach (Apr 23, 2016)

Christ died for all the Israel of God (Galatians 6:16) i.e. all of the elect. All of mankind is under the curse of the broken moral law, which curse includes damnation if God does not intervene in salvation, although the ceremonial and civil law was not given to all mankind, but only to the Jews along with a restatement of the moral law.

In the civil law of Israel, the full curse of the moral law - damnation - was symbolised in the execution of offenders who were without a symbolical animal sacrifice. Their bodies would sometimes be hung from a tree.

There were Gentile believers - "God-fearers of the Gentiles" - under the Old Testament, but they didn't have the full status and blessing of full Jews. E.g. if they visited the Temple they had to stand in the Court of the Gentiles - further from the Holy of Holies than the Jews. Through Christ's work in both fulfilling the sacrifices of the OT and fulfilling the typological teaching about God's curse, and everything else, the barrier between the privileged position of Jewish believers in this world, and the less privileged position of Gentile believers in this world, ended.



> Wherefore remember, that once ye, the Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by that which is called Circumcision, in the flesh, made by hands; that ye were at that time separate from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of the promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus ye that once were far off are made nigh in the blood of Christ. For he is our peace, *who made both one, and brake down the middle wall of partition, having abolished in his flesh the enmity, even the law of commandments contained in ordinances*; that he might create in himself of the two one new man, so making peace; and might reconcile them both in one body unto God through the cross, having slain the enmity thereby: (Eph 2:11-16)


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## arapahoepark (Apr 27, 2016)

Also remembering the book of Joshua, a king or two, were hanged from trees and yet there were not of Israel....


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## Contra_Mundum (Apr 27, 2016)

Trent,
Seems like you are facing two fundamentally different outlooks. WHY is ancient Israel "special?" Is it for their own sake, or for the whole world? Christ came as a representative and substitute for Israel, in the sense that the elect of God are the ones for whom he is given. But, contrary to Paul and the apostolic witness, lots of people seem bound to this idea that ethnicity and social/cultural identity is of fundamental significance. It isn't, and never was.

That's a mystery revealed in the NT. There was a temporary importance (for about two-thousand years) for the separate significance of Abraham's family and eventually the Israelite nation. And it all had to do with the work of bringing Christ into the world--as the WORLD's Savior. Who "Israel" is in fact, as opposed to type, is part of the revelation of Christ to the whole world.

The Law of Moses performed multiple functions. It properly regulated divine worship. It separated this nation. And in its moral exhibit, it represented a pitch of perfection that proved human moral corruption. It exposed the hideous nature of Gentile practices of all kinds; and it showed the rebellious nature of fallen man, which resists (as it has from Adam) the good will of God, by the example of the stiffnecked Israelites. Israel wasn't _uniquely_ stiffnecked; no, they were perfect human specimens of fallen nature.

When the nation of Israel fails, they are cursed *just like Adam*, in typical fashion; he is the father of the whole race, and ALL of us are cursed in him. Jesus comes, to take the curse from... whom? From just that type, just national Israel? No, but from his church, the Israel-of-God, the elect from all the nations, and all time, who are under the original curse.

The confusion arises when the role of God's covenant-of-grace interaction with man, through a specific man then his progeny, is mistaken for some kind of "plan A." Are we dealing with a "history of religion" matter? Is this a case of people starting off with a kind of selfish perception of their identity, and only gradually it comes to light that this should be shared with the whole world? Do the Gentiles get blessed as a kind of secondary-result of Jesus fixing Israel's focused failure?

Or does the Christ fulfill the original and culminating aspect of the Abrahamic covenant? "And in you will all the families of the earth be blessed," Gen.12:3. It doesn't get any earlier than that. Reading the history of Israel in a parochial fashion, as if the NT was not the last (intended) chapter, bringing full clarity and light to all the went before and anticipated the fulfillment found in Christ: that's the error.

The dispensationalists don't agree. The scholars of religion don't agree. The Jews ever since the year of our Lord don't agree. Lots of disagreement out there, for a variety of reasons. NTWright doesn't bother to read Reformed theology, or compare his "fresh insights" with the things we've taught for centuries. He accepts many critical foundations, and yet he tries to read the NT in a serious manner, but de novo. So, he ends up with a bunch of overlooked (by the liberals) puzzle pieces, which he tries to put in the picture using the critical assumptions as his frame. Consequently, he ends up with a collage of "modern art," and not the true picture.


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## MW (Apr 27, 2016)

arapahoepark said:


> Something I have been encountering recently is the idea that Christ died as a representative or substitute for Israel



In terms of redemptive history, that is true, but in a "manifold" way; not in the specific and personal sense in which we speak of Christ being a substitute for the sins of the elect. Israel herself was designated the servant of the Lord to be the light of the Gentiles, but became like the nations and was handed over to the Gentiles. The tree was brought down; but God left a remnant. Out of it sprung a stem who constituted true Israel, God's righteous servant, who suffers the malediction of Israel and brings benediction to all believers, Jews and Gentiles, specifically fulfilling the office of being a light to the Gentiles which Israel failed to do.

The servant songs of Isaiah are well worth studying in the light of their Messianic fulfilment. It is clear that the apostle Paul understood his mission to the Gentiles in their light, and it provides fundamentally important teaching on the Israel-Christ-Church relationship to the world at large in terms of God's redemptive purpose.


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## Tom Hart (Apr 27, 2016)

Thank you, Reverend Buchanan. Just recently I had a conversation with someone who had a wobbly popular dispensationalist understanding. He is convinced of the continuing importance of the people of Israel (the modern state of Israel and those of Jewish ethnicity). Your answer will really help me to continue to discuss it with this person.


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