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1) Sinai. 2) Abraham.How would you describe or identify the 2 covenants here? Interested to see the various views.
According to Moses, Abram had one son by a bondwoman, a servant-girl-'come-concubine, which move he made to “assist God” in the accomplishment of those covenant-promises. This was an error of epic proportions, and it was just one of many sins in the story and life of the all-father patriarch.
And this same had another son by the freewoman, the wife he took originally from his Ur-homeland, the woman who shared his faith in the God of Promise, despite her own sins. Beautiful and spirited, she nevertheless called Abraham ‘lord,” 1Pet.3:6, obeying him even when his foolishness put her in various perils. Sarah was truly a freewoman, in all spiritual freedom besides her queenly status befitting the name God gave to her.
These facts were the very fabric of the narrative, and not to be dismissed or glossed-over. The contrast of the combined stories is brought out in v23, when we see that him born of the bondslave was born according to the flesh, by the will of a man, the consent of a nubile woman and the power of the natural drive, still strong enough in an aging man to get the job done.
But regarding the other son, born of the freed, there was nothing natural about it. Desire, as Solomon put it, had failed (or as Paul elsewhere: "...him as good as dead"). Sarah was not only barren all her days, but was finally far past the time of children. And into this situation, beyond any earthly expectation, God at last acted to fulfill his promise, so that there could be no question that this birth was a miracle, and was the stuff of Messianic Promise.
So then, with this history brought fresh to mind, Paul in v24 introduces his theological reflection, through what he calls “allegory,” and which I think might well be a play off the Judaizer’s professed technique. There is symbolism here, typology, referential occurrences that point ahead to a grander fulfillment. There will be later in history further recapitulations of this same conflict, the progress of revelation making the hopes clearer to succeeding generations.
The two sons and mothers point to two covenants. Sinai was one, and Abraham’s was another. Abraham’s covenant has priority, Paul argues. For it is the Sinai covenant that gives birth to (or rise to) the bondage to the law. Abraham is first married to Sarah, but after that (so to speak) he is married to Hagar, but that union is not better than that he shares with Sarah. No, it is inferior, and the promised seed shall come by virtue of the original covenant.
This you see corresponds exactly to the Abrahamic and Siniatic covenants. The law which comes 430 later cannot annul a covenant made by promise; the law symbolizes the flesh’s attempt to please God, by works to attain some promise, sure to fail due to sin. Hagar, v25, and Sinai-in-Arabia, is in just the position of the “Jerusalem which now is.” This is that geographic Jerusalem, the seat of Judaism, and the Temple, and the law. All that represents bondage.
But there is another Jerusalem, the one above, the Mt. Zion of literature and Psalmody. The heavenly city which Abraham was always looking toward, the place where a greater Melchizedek has a Mediatorial king-priesthood. That is the true Jerusalem, and the place where freemen walk with head erect, and have their king’s name emblazoned on their foreheads. She, and Sarah of faith, is the mother of us all.
Paul’s typological interpretation is anchored like a piton in the historic facts of the text. He expects you to agree with him on the plain meaning of the words before you before any additional theological content is mined from that foundation. The allegorizer: he would say you cannot truly understand the original text, or you will be diverted to a false meaning if you cling to the surface meaning of the text. The allegorizer is promoting mystery, and himself as the guru of clarity.
How should we come to the OT? It speaks of Christ.
thus it was consistent for a saved member of the Old Covenant of works to continue its practices (ie circumcision).
Covenant of Circumcision was a covenant of works
Covenant of Circumcision was a covenant of works
Thank you, Bruce. I appreciate your help. Could I ask a favor?1) Sinai. 2) Abraham.
Paul's typological hermeneutic of Israelite history means that he views the conditions and persons of history as prophetic. In various ways, they point ahead to One who will fulfill that which has been lived out in an historical frame, combining (as only the true Fulfillment could) the many experiences and events in a coherent and integrated whole.
As Acts begins, the New Covenant church has taken over the identity of Abraham's proper offspring, through the Sole Heir (Gen.24:36). All others have been disinherited (Acts 2:36-37). Those who are clinging to their Old Covenant identity are, ironically, in the position of recapitulating the situation of Ishmael, who was cast out, and refused any claim to patrimony on the basis of kinship.
Only by accepting that there is no inheritance available outside of submission to and receipt of gifts from the Only Begotten Son (Gen.22:2,12,16) and Mediator, can anyone of spiritual-Ishmaelitish stock be received again.
Here is how I interpreted those covenants when preaching this passage:
Thank you, Bruce. I appreciate your help. Could I ask a favor?
Can you tell me some writers, commentaries, and so on that offer this perspective?