blessing of abraham vs curse of the law - gal 3.10

7/31/2019 Blessing of Abraham vs Curse of the Law - Gal 3.10

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WTJ 53 (1991) 73-91

"THE BLESSING OF ABRAHAM"

VERSUS "THE CURSE OF THE LAW":

ANOTHER LOOK AT GAL 3:10-13

JOSEPH P. BRASWELL

IN the preface to his commentary on Galatians, Hans Dieter Betz remarks: "Strange as it may be after such long and intensely scholarly

efforts, Paul's letter to the Galatians . . . still presents the scholar with a

most formidable challenge."1

The interpretation of this epistle is far from

settled; questions, problems, and difficulties yet remain. Progress comes by

inches, however, and in this article I wish to consider some aspects and

implications of the interpretation of Galatians 3 suggested by David L.

Lull.2

Building upon his work, though not necessarily in directions he him

selfwould move, I hope to showwhat Paul is reallyarguing in Gal 3:10-13:

what he sees as the problem of being , why this state of

existence operates under a curse, and how Christ as curse-bearer provides

a solution within the framework of the problem-situation of Jew-Gentile

relations in the church.

Gal 3:10 reads: "For as many as are characterized by oraA-works are

under a curse; for it stands written: Accursed is everyone who does not

abide within all those things that have been written in the Torah scrolls to

do them' " (my translation; for the distinction between torah and Torah, see

below). According to Lull, Paul here asserts that all peoples are under thelaw-curse pronounced in Deut 27:26. In his words: "This question [of why

the law was given], to which Paul has given an implicit answer in 3:6-18,

namely, to place everyone, Jew and Gentile alike, 'under a curse/is raised and

addressed explicitly in 3:19-25."3

At first this may not sound especially new and original. Indeed, at least

prima fade, it might seem to be simply the traditional Protestant Reforma-

tional understanding of the verse, a reading within the theological context

provided by Romans 1-3.4

In the context of Lull's article, however, an


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74 WESTMINSTER THEOLOGICALJOURNAL

altogether different sense is intended. ForLull seems to distinguish between

being "undera curse" and actually being accursed.5

The precise significance

of this distinctionthough seemingly merely a comment made in passing

(albeit a highly suggestive one)is what I would emphasize as the mostimportant part of Lull's thesis relevant to my concerns in the present essay.

I would insist, however, that the exegetical fruitfulness of Lull's insight can

only come into its own and be further specified and developed after we first

take issue with Lull over another part of his thesis, making important

modification regarding the precise identity ofthose who are .

I. Those Who "Are of the Works of the Law"

It is my contention that Lull's thesis requires an important modification

at one crucial point. As can be seen from the above quotation, Lull places

both Jews and Gentiles under the curse. This understanding I believe to be

a grave error for interpretation, having the potential to ruin an otherwise

promising proposal for exegesis. I would propose instead that we under

stand as having reference only to Jews. Redemptive-

historically, only the Jewish people were placed under the law;6only they

Gal 3:10 in light of Rom 1:18-3:20 (Paulandthe Law[Philadelphia: Fortress, 1986] 95-96).

Reformed theology in general has traditionally held that even Gentiles are under the moral

law of God as imposed by the creation covenant of works, extending by the analogy of

Scripture the application ofthis curse (even as Paul supposedly does in Romans) to condemn

all persons as being guilty transgressors subject to the eternal death penalty for covenant-

breaking for their failure to keep the moral law perfectly. Whatever theological merit this view

may enjoy, the concern ofthe exegete is solely with what Paul has in mind in this passage. I

shall presently argue that, because Paul refers to the law ofMoses, he is making application

here onlyto Jews as those who are under the law and therefore under the curse-threat of the

law. What I therefore regard as a theological imposition upon the text from the Protestant

Reformational view of the law is responsible for misdirecting exegesis to an unwarranted

assumption that Paul is concerned here with the law's unfulfillability.5

Lull, "Pedagogue," 485.6

Even were we to assume that the Gentiles are in some sense underobligation to the law

(qua universal moral law of the creation covenant), the expression does not

capture such a sense of culpability. It rather signifies those whose lives are in some sense

characterized bythe law (and clearly the law ofMoses). To be designated is to

have given indication that one's lifestyle reflects a pattern ofconformity (at least on some level

of external expression via observable behavior) to the law's demands. R. Bertram (","

TDNT 2.646) identifies 'with the rabbinic "works of the commandments" as

"works required by God." Gentiles cannot be said to be characterized by such a lifestyle; itis the distinctive markof the Jews. Nor can we adjust the expression to denote legalism and

h b i l d ll ( h h J G il ) h ki i i k


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THE BLESSING OF ABRAHAM 75

not the Gentileswere made recipients of the divinely revealed covenant

torah through Moses. Possessing this law was one of the marks oftheir special

status as a peculiar people (Deut 4:6-8). It constituted their covenantal

status as the chosen people of God.

Paul affirms this unequivocally elsewhere (Rom 2:12-3:12; 9:1-5) and

there is no textual reason to assume he intends a different significance here.

On the contrary, his use of the "we"/"youw

distinction in Gal 3:23-4:7 (cf.

also "us"/"Gentiles" in 3:13-14 and the "we who are Jews" as distinguished

from "Gentile sinners" in 2:15-16) provides a strong contextual case for the

same limitation of reference, especially when we consider his use of "we

Jews"/"you Gentiles" language in his other epistles.7

Certainly it would

create a most strange reading of Gal 3:17-19 if we were to imagine thatPaul sees the special revelation of the law through Moses as being to all

peoples rather than only to those regarded as the corporate seed ofAbra

ham, who regarded themselves as the seed to whom the promise referred.

The sphere of the law's dominion and authority therefore extends onlyto

the Jews and it is only those who are under the law who could be under a

curse pronounced by that law. The people who are those

whose way of life is characterized by foroA-worksare those who are Jews

(or Jewish proselytes), those whose manner of life, in distinction from theGentiles, is distinctivelyJewish according to the tokens of (Mosaic) cove

nant identity. It is they who are somehow found on the other side of the

"fence" from the sphere in which the Abrahamic blessing upon the nations

is operative.

II. The Curse-Threat of CovenantalJmism

With this modification ofthe Lull thesis we can now paraphrase Paul assaying:

You Judaizers think that form the law's fence, demarcating theidentityand boundaryofcovenantal nomism as a sphere in which the Abrahamic

blessing operates. Far from blessing, it is a sphere operating upon the principle

7Gf. for a fuller discussion the treatment given in T. L. Donaldson, "The 'Curse of the

Law' and the Inclusion of the Gentiles: Galatians 3:13-14," NTS 32 (1986) 95-97. Lull

("Pedagogue," 481 n. 1) appeals to thefirstperson plural pronoun ("us") in Gal 3:13 precisely

as evidence firinclusion of the Gentiles among those "under a curse" (see also Risnen, Paul


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76 WESTMINSTERTHEOLOGICALJOURNAL

ofcurse-threat. The fence imprisons you and serves as a barrier to your inheritance ofthat blessing.

8

It is this startling Pauline thesis (which invokes those questions concerning

the seed-referent and the promised blessing of Abraham) that must be

discussed and answered in the remainder ofGalatians 3 (w. 15-29).

According to the interpretation I am proposing then, "under a curse" is

parallel to the later expressions "under law" (3:23; 4:4) and "under tutors

and governors" (4:2).9Related (but not equivalent) to these are "under sin"

(3:22) and "under the elements" (4:3, 8).10

All ofthese expressions describe

spheres of power and dominion to which the people therein enclosed are

made subject and under whose sway, reign, and jurisdiction they live. The

are not said to be accursed; they are merely under a curse(-threat) as those living within the sphere in which the curse principle is

operative. The curse reigns as the power which enforces the law's boundary-

function ofkeeping the Jews within the fence as a peculiar people set apart

from the nations.11

What we find in v. 10 is an enthymeme, and the missing premise in Paul's

argument here is simply the tacitly assumed, quite uncontroversial, and

readily granted proposition that the (Jewish people) are

under the torah. This implicit premise, coupled with the stated premise thatthe torah threatens a curse (the Deut 27:26 citation), yields the conclusion:

"As many as are are undera curse."

Being "under a curse" therefore refers (ifLull is correct) to the situation

of living with the real and abiding possibility of becoming accursed. This

curse-threat looms overhead like the sword ofDamocles, ever ready to fall

and realize its full maledictory potential upon those who stand beneath it.

This state ofexistence results from being "under the law," for it is the torah

8This view of the torah as a fence to protect the people and identify them as those who

abide within the sphere of covenant life is central to what is referred to as "covenantal

nomism." On the concept ofcovenantal nomism, see E. P. Sanders, Paul and Palestinian Judaism

(Philadelphia: Fortress, 1977) passim, but esp. pp. 422-23. Cf. also the helpful discussions of

as particularistic identity-markers, defining and setting covenantal identity and

boundaryfor the Jews as the peculiarforaA-people,in Joseph P. Tyson, " 'Works of Law' in

Galatians," JBL 92 (1973) 423-31; J. D. G. Dunn, "Works of the Law and the Curse of the Law

(Galatians 3.10-14)," NTS 31 (1985) 523-42; and T. David Gordon, "The Problem at Ga-

latia," Int41 (1987) 32-43. As James A. Sanders states: ".. . Torah was by the time of Christ

and Paul the symbol par excellence, incomparable, indestructible and incorruptible, of Ju

daism. It meant Judaism's identity and way of life" ("Torah and Christ," Int29 [1975] 381).9

See also the significance accorded to these patterns in Donaldson, "Curse of the Law,"


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which pronounces the threat ofcurse. The missing premise can be tacitly

assumed simply because it implies no more than that the one "under a

curse" lives within the sphere of the law's jurisdiction. He is, in other words,

a Jew, one whose life is marked by those tokens of covenant (i.e., torah)identity that distinguish and separate Jew from Gentile. Therefore, ifI am

correct in my proposed modification of the Lull thesis, those who are

"under the law"the who are "under a curse"are sim

ply (all and only) thetomA-people,since it was only to the Jews that the

oracles of God were entrusted through Moses. The reference is not to le

galists, Judaizers, or all of unredeemed humankind, but to Jews in their

special identity and distinctiveness provided by a torah lifestyle.

III. The Law IsMotof Faith

1. OpposedPrinciplesorDifferentEconomies?

Paul has used the authority of Torah and an uncontroversial premise to

justify a controversial thesis: thatJews, far from being guaranteed the Abra

hamic blessing, must face the live possibility of a curse. This implication

had certainly not been drawn by the Judaizers, nor by most Jews. Even ifgranted, this thesis raises several issues that must be dealt with by the

apostle. Before he turns to these issues, however, Paul chooses to buttress

further his provocative and controversial thesis by another argument stated

in w. 11-12. The do not provide a wayofjustification because

"the just shall live by faith." Hab 2:4 is thus used to reinforce his previous

allusion to Abraham's justification by faith (v. 6 and its citation of Gen

15:6). Thus far the argument is sufficiently uncontroversial. Next, however,

Paul sets Lev 18:5 over against the Habakkuk citation, apparently to contrast sharply two disparate spheres of life before God. "The law is not of

faith," he concludes, because to do the law is to live within its sphere. From

this Paul proceeds to conclude that no one can be justified by the law. What

exactlyhas Paul intended in this argument and what has it established in

support of his previous argument in v. 10?

Lev 18:5 epitomizes the principle ofcovenantal nomism.12

In covenantal

nomism the law is viewed as a fence or boundary within which Jews must

faithfully abide as a holy people. Paul, however, argues that this fence,inside of which the Jews find themselves, is actually the wall ofa prison in


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seem to stress what "is written in the book of the law."15

Thus, a passage

which may have been a prooftext ofhis Judaizing opponents for covenantal

nomism places them in an inescapable dilemma wherein disobedience

seems unavoidable. The Torah enjoins both law and faith.

IfI am correct in my construction ofPaul's argument, his thesis appears

to create a tension in the law (Torah): an antithesis between faith and law

(torah). The law is not of faith but the law nonetheless enjoins faith, all the

while erecting a curse-barrier that blocks the way to blessing. The cove

nantal nomism enjoined by torah demands exclusivity, separation; the par

adigmatic case ofAbraham (cited from the Torah) requires as a "law of

faith" inclusivism. The Jews quite literally seem "damned if they do and

damned iftheydon't," for on the horns ofthis dilemma disobedience seemsinevitable. The only way to blessing is through the curse, across the fence.

It is quite understandable, therefore, that someone might raise the question:

"Is the law against the promise of God?" (Gal 3:21). However, Paul is

emphatic in his reply: !16

There is no real antithesis.

Christ redeemed the Jews from this dilemma of the curse. Christ was

born a Jew, "under the law," and therefore under the curse. By himself

becoming accursed on behalf of the Jews ( ), Christ has given

Jews in him safe passage through and beyond the boundaryof

into the sphere ofAbrahamic blessing to the nations. But this solution to the

Jewish dilemma provides no explanation for Paul's emphatic ,

why there can be no real law/promise antithesis. Indeed, Christ's deliver

ance of the Jews through the nomistic boundary-barrier, from curse to

15This emphasis seems far more justified than the emphasis placed on the text by the

traditional Protestant reading. Since is a given ofthe LXX text, there is no particular

warrant for assuming that it is being given special significance by Paul in his argument. His

own additions are far more significant for understanding where his emphasis lies. I do not findarguments that Hellenistic Judaism (hence the LXX and allegedly Paul) was more legalis-

tically oriented than Palestinian Judaism (e.g., H. J. Schoeps, Paul: The Theologyofthe Apostle

in Light ofJewish ReligiousHistory[Philadelphia: Westminster, 1961] 213-15) to be particularly

impressive. Even assuming that such neat, hermetically sealed categories as these had any

basis in the real situation or that Paul was closer to the Hellenistic side ofthe spectrum (both

assumptions being unwarranted in my opinion), in its OT canonical context Deut 27:26

cannot be understood as demanding absolutely perfect lawkeeping, nor is there any evidence

that any branch ofJudaism in Paul's time understood it this way (cf. . P. Sanders, Pauland

Palestinian Judaism, 137,426-28). The demand is rather for allegiance and consecration. Trans

gression ofthe covenant is not the same as transgressing a single commandment. For the latter,

atonement could be made bysacrifice; for the former, a sin ofpresumption, no trespass offering

was possible and the covenant-breaker was to be cut off, because such transgression, consid


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80 WESTMINSTER THEOLOGICALJOURNAL

blessing, would seem to presuppose that a real and irreconcilable tension in

fact exists between law and promise. This problem necessitates our post

poning any discussion of redemptive mechanism (how Christ effected the

Jews' deliverance) until we address Paul's (textually subsequent) treatment

ofthe role and purpose ofthe law in redemptive history. Ifthe law did not

demarcate the sphere of covenant blessing, what was its function relative

to the promise?

Paul clearly considers the lawto be addressed to the Jews but he calls into

question the idea that the Abrahamic promise directly and immediately

addresses the Jews (v. 16). Paul thereby denies the very heart ofJudaism's

view ofthe law's purpose and function.17

Law and promise therefore do not

share the same set ofreferents. Indeed, with the exception ofChrist as seedofpromise born under the law, these sets do not intersect. It is only if the

loci of law and promise were identical or overlapped that the tension be

tween them could be real. Only then could one guaranteed the blessing by

immutable promise find it contingent upon curse-avoidance and the un

certainty following from this. The promise is only in Christ; it was never in

torah. Thus the law is not against the promise because sons of torah are not

assuch sons of promise and one can abide in one sphere without any right

gained thereby to claim membership in the other. The Judaizers havemerely created a false dilemma, fabricating a problem where none actually

exists.

A problem does appear to exist, however, if we are not careful to read

Paul's argument within a redemptive-historical framework. After all, the

Torah, which enjoins Abrahamic faith, isaddressed to the Jews. It would

seem then that they, throughout their covenant history, are caught in this

tension between law and promise, that they are inevitably accursed as

covenant breakers by the dilemma Paul has presented. Yet this is not so, for

Paul has something more in mind when he says that the law is not offaith.18

17See Sanders (Pauland Palestinian Judaism, 422-23) on the pattern of religion of covenantal

nomism in Judaism. The heart of this pattern was the belief that abiding in the covenant

constituted one righteous (i.e., aJew maintained his right relation to God by obeying the terms

which defined that relationship). Paul is emphatic in his insistence that such cannot be the case

(2:15-16,21).Jews and Gentiles are righteous as they abide in Christ, in the sphere of the Spirit,

not in torah.18

This possibility was first suggested to me by Dr. Vern Poythress of Westminster Theo

logical Seminary in a 1987 letter. On this interpretation the redemptive-historical senses of

"law" and "faith," explicitly developed in w. 19-25, are already anticipated in v. 12. I offer

the following argument in defense ofPoythress' fruitful suggestion. Already in the preceding


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82 WESTMINSTER THEOLOGICAL JOURNAL

Indeed, in my opinion the tendency to read Galatians in terms of

Luther's contrast of works and faith leads exegesis astray.20

While blunting

the contrast significantly, James A. Sanders still attempts to cast the debate

between Paul and his opponents in terms oftheir respective emphases onmythos (haggadah) or ethos (halakah).21 The debate, however, is not over ab

stracted 7oroA-ethics (i.e., removed from their grounding in the recital of

God's mighty deeds of salvation and covenant words of promise) versus the

7orA-story (qua Heilsgeschichte).22 Paul's controversy with the Judaizers in

volves rather his opposition to their misplaced stress on the Torah-mythos as

though it were something alongside (and therefore in competition for loyalty

with) the gospel-narrative of Jesus Christ.

J. C. Beker correctly refers to the Judaizers' message of lawkeeping in itssalvation-historicalsense ofsignifying the distinctive covenantal identity of

the Jewish people.23 In this self-understanding, the member of the covenant

community believes himself to be an heir ofthe promise because his iden

tification with covenant people (and the holy history in which they are

involved) means his participation in the seed-line understood as the sphere

of promise.24 In other words, the significance ofcircumcision, diet, sab

bath to the Jews (and Paul's Judaizing opponents) lay in

their signification ofthe Torah-mythos. Their emphasis on "works" was simplya concern with the means ofincorporation into the locus ofblessing, which

covenantal nomism understood to be defined by the torah (Lev).25

2 0I will return to this point to offer substantiating evidence in the conclusion.

21Sanders, Torah and Christ," 375.

2 2E.g., John Murray, in commenting on Rom 10:5, sees Paul as battling an interpretation

of the law which abstracts it from its covenantal context in which it is grounded in promise

and calls for obedience as response to God's grace and salvation (The Epistle to the Romans

[NICNT; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1975] 2.249-50). Thus, according to Murray, Paul cites

Lev 18:5 out ofcontext to illustrate the bare law (ethos in abstraction from mythos), not cov

enantal torah. Supposedly, the Jews had legalistically reduced the Torah to abstract ethos.2 3

J. C. Beker, The Apostle Paul: The Triumph ofGodin Life andThought(Philadelphia: Fortress,

1980) 43-44.2 4

Thus, we could speak of a controversy over competing participationist soteriologies:

should one be involved in the corporate seed (the Jewish people) or the individual seed (Jesus

Christ)? Note that R. B. Hays sees participationist soteriology as structuring Paul's whole

argument in 3:1-4:7, esp. 3:16, 26-29 (Faith ofJesusChrist, as cited in Donaldson, "Curse of

the Law," 101-2).2 5

But were Judaizers full-blown covenantal nomists or compromisers? Gal 5:3 and (esp.)

6:13 may indicate that neither were they advocating to the Gentiles nor were themselves

concerned with the full demands oftrue covenantal nomism. Indeed, circumcision and kosher


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Paul, on the other hand, refuses to coordinate Torah and Christ. Torah is

subordinate (the argument of 3:19-25: temporary, administered by angels,

having a function analogous to that of a household slave). Indeed, Paul sees

the Torah-mythos as taken up into, recapitulated by, and fulfilled in the

Christ-event. Hence, for Paul, the 7oroA-story has been exhausted and su1

perseded by the gospel-story. Shadow and substance cannot be placed on

par. Participation in Abrahamic lineage is involved in the state of being

Christ and is therefore a given to those in Christ.26

At best, therefore, a

distinct act of incorporation into the Torah-storywould be superfluous, but

such incorporation could well (depending upon the attitude and perception

of the candidate concerning the significance ofthis act) usurp the glory and

lordship ofChrist, setting up a rival dominion with demands (exclusivistic

particularism) contrary to the gospel ofJesus Christ.

IV. The Divine Pedagogy

We have seen why the law was not inherently opposed to promise and

how the Judaizers' error succeeded in creating a false law/promise tension.

Paul has demonstrated that the law was not the way to the Abrahamicblessing. Now he must tell the Galatians what the law was intended to do.

If it did not bestow inheritance rights upon the corporate seed (the torah-

people), as Paul argues once more in 3:17-18, what was its intended func

tion in the history of salvation? It is to this question that Paul directs his

attention in 3:19-24. Why the law? To prepare the corporate seed for the

coming of Christ, that they might become heirs of the promise in him

(3:23-24). Whether the law was added in order to provoke transgressions,27

or to curb the existing problem of transgressions (as Lull suggests),28

thegiving of the law to the corporate seed ofAbraham served to advance the

progress ofredemptive history. In a situation in which all ( Jews

and Gentiles) were confined under the power and dominion of sin, it

marked offthe Jews for a special purpose by creating a fence around them,

whether to keep sin out or to imprison them inside a sphere of intensified sin.

Judaizers advocated circumcision and other such sociologically identifying symbols ofJew-

ishness because of the intensified concern with separation and national identity caused byzealot pressure groups ("The Agitators and the Galatian Congregation," NTS 17 [1970-71]

198-212) R. G. Hamerton-Kelly provides further substantiation for this thesis ("Sacred Vi


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Lull has made an excellent case for understanding w. 19-25 as saying

that the law served to protect the people from sin, to guard and keep them

by restraining sin and shutting out bad influences.29 When we look at

various statements about the purpose and function of the law that Paul

made in his epistle to the Romans, however, Lull's interpretation seems

untenable.30 There it is said that the law increases transgressions, provides

experimental knowledge of sin, and works wrath.31 Can these negative

statements be reconciled with a reading of Gal 3:19 that presents the law

in a positive light? v

I would suggest that the answer lies in the fact that the law can be viewed

from different perspectives. Paul's letters are occasionaland must be read as

such. The specific, concrete problem-situation that occasions his writingmust be taken into account in the interpretation of his writings. Paul's

letters are answers to problems and/or questions which have arisen in his

churches, and these responses will not make sense in a vacuum, out of their

context. They are relative to the situations addressed rather than exhaus

tive theological treatments. Therefore, we cannot simply assemble seem

ingly parallel passages abstracted from different Pauline letters without

giving due consideration to this relativity.32 Many allegations of contra

dictions33 or simplistic and artificial harmonizations often result from theinterpreter's failure to note this occasionalism. Once we acknowledge that

a different situation may warrant a different perspective, an emphasis on a

different aspect which is seen in light of an approach from a different angle,

our apparent problem in harmonizing Galatians with Romans disappears.34

29 Ibid., 488-96.30 Bruce, again quite representatively, appeals to Romans for understanding Paul's mean

ing in Galatians (Galatians, 175-76). Lull argues that we not make appeal to other contextsin interpreting what Paul has in mind in Galatians ("Pedagogue," 483-85).31 Rom 3:20; 4:15; 5:20; 7:5. Also cf. 1 Cor 15:56. Gal 3:19 seems most parallel to Rom 5:20.32 This is not to say that all appeals to apparent parallels are wrong (note the qualification).

Internal coherence, however, is more reliable for interpreting a literary unit (such as one of

Paul's letters) than is external consistency (harmonizing the interpretation with statements

made in other Pauline letters). In other words, I put more stock in making his argument in

Galatians coherent than I do in bringing all that he has said into harmony, because internal

coherence seems better suited to occasional literature. If importing parallels can shed some

genuine light on otherwise ambiguous passages without sacrificing the coherence of the total

interpretation, well and good, but the use of Rom 5:20 does not provide a coherent under

standing of Gal 3:19 within the total framework of the interpretation of Paul's argument (and

its total coherence, self-consistency, and explanatory/predictive fruitfulness provide for me


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Therefore, rather than letting Romans dictate to us what Galatians can

and cannot mean (a luxury the Galatians surely did not have), we must

allow Galatians to speak to us with its own integrity. Doing that, I at least

am persuaded by the case Lull has made for understanding the law's function in a positive light, as a temporary measure for dealing with the prob

lem of transgressions, protecting and guarding (even ifsometimes by harsh

means) the underage children.35

To set forth in summary fashion Lull's

interpretation, we should understand Paul to be saying in w. 19-24 some

thing along the lines of the following paraphrase:

What, then, was the purpose for which the law was given? It was added in orderto deal with the problem oftransgressions through punishment and deterrenceuntil the coming of the seed ofAbraham to whom the promise had reference.. . .Is the law therefore contrary to the promise? Absolutely, unequivocally, andemphaticallynot! The law was not intended to confer righteousness and life bythe way of covenantal nomism (as ifthe law were a cure that definitively eradicates sin, delivering us from its power). Rather, in the situation in which the

whole world was divinely confined under the dominion ofsin's reign, the lawserved the Jews as a protective fence to mitigate somewhat this situation until therevelation offaith as the real solution to the problem. The lawwas our pedagogueuntil the time of Christ.

36

The law's purpose was not one of provoking sin, or entrapping the Jews

in sin, but one of restraining sin and keeping the Jews until Christ came.

It was, as the Jews believed, a fence, and their concern with boundary

(separation) was good and proper in the divinely appointed time-frame.

The Judaizers' mistake was one of confusing law and promise, of absolu

tizing the law.37

They thought the law in itselfconferred righteousness and

of this epistle, one cannot expect qualified statements. Paul is not giving a complete andbalanced treatment but is very singlemindedly focused on the issue at hand.35

Although I cannot argue it here, I believe that this positive approach to the law's

function puts Paul more in harmony with the picture of the law presented by OT theology.

We need only look at the state of the Hebrews in Egypt (many forsaking the covenant of

circumcision and succumbing to idolatry) or during their wanderings to understand the

necessity of the law as a .3 6

Particular exegetical problems on the interpretation of w. 19, 22, and 23 (e.g., whether

is telic or causal) are dealt with by Lull in "Pedagogue," 483-88.37

In much of the Judaism of this period there was what Paul would have considered a

confusion oftype and antitype. The law had been idolatrously absolutized into the eternal torah,

exalted to a place of honor beside God as a Wisdom/Logoshypostasis. Paul opposed such as

usurping the place of honor that rightfully belongs to the Son alone. The issue is not whether


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life to those who remained within the bounds it set. Instead it only pro

nounced a curse upon those who transgressed those boundaries, those who

"jumped the fence."38 It was a restraining force, not a cure.

V. The Curse-Bearing ofChrist

If the interpretation I have offered above is correct, we now know why

the law was given: to protect and guide the underaged children until they

could be adopted as full heirs (4:1-5). This sets the stage for understanding

what it means that Christ vicariously bore the curse for the Jews. Somehow,

the death of Christ removed the curse-barrier of the nomistic boundary. In

so doing, that death made possible movement outside the exclusivistic sphere

defined by the torah, breaking down the middle wall of partition that sep

arated Jew and Gentile. With the removal of the torais boundary-barrier

the blessing of Abraham could extend to all nations and Jews could exercise

Abrahamic faith in the universal scope of the promise.

Again, the Jewish notion of the torah as a fence is important to the

understanding of the problem to which the death of Christ provided the

solution. The fence was protective in nature, keeping out evil influences by

separating the Jews from the Gentile "sinners."39 The way it kept checkupon the full manifestation of sin, however, was the deterrent involved in

its threat of punishment (the curse), not by a bestowal of righteousness as

a definitive cure to the enslaving power ofsin. The sins ofthe nations were

kept out of Israel to some extent because the Jews were kept in the pro

tective custody and under the supervision of a babysitter. In this sense, the

Jews were imprisoned; the fence prevented them from wandering outside,

in harm's way, because to cross over was to bring down the curse. Sepa

ratism was thereby enforced from the inside.Jesus the Jew was born into this covenantal situation, under the law and,

hence, inside the fence of covenantal identity and boundary. His crucifix

ion, however, was (as Paul argues) the bearing of a curse according to Deut

38 The noncurative nature of the torah captures the contrast between the old and new

covenants in Jer 31:31-33 which Paul recognizes in 1 Corinthians 3-4. The law did not have

the power to free men from the powers that bound them in slavery.39 On the meaning of "sinners" in Gal 2:15 as covenantally determined by the torah-

boundary, see Bruce (Galatians, 137) and Betz (Galatians, 115). Calvin also recognized this.

Commenting on 2:15 (Galatians, 66), he notes that "sinners" denotes the Gentiles as those


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21:23 (Gal 3:13). This ignoble death put him outside the sphere of thecovenant as one cut off, disinherited from the promised land. He was regarded as though he were a Gentile "sinner," handed over to the Gentiles

for execution, believed to be rejected by God and under divine judgment(accursed) as a covenant breaker. The barrier between Jesus and the Gentiles was thus broken down; Christ was outside the fence as a curse-recipient, no longer under the law because now dead to it.

To confess Jesus as Lord was to identify in faith with his lot, to belong tohim and therefore to be united to and participate in this accursed state asone cast out, cut off, disinherited. Those Jews who confessed this Jesus were,in him, found outside the boundary of nomistic distinctions. They hadrenounced in principle their torah identity. This was an implicit recognitionthat there was no difference between them and the "sinners of the Gentiles"(2:15-17).41

It is on this basis that Paul at Antioch convinces Peter that separatism iswholly inconsistent with the gospel of justification. If Jews find justificationin Jesus Christ, they must admit more than their need for atonement andforgiveness; they must reject the heart of the covenantal nomist position andconcede that they cannot be "righteoused" by abiding within the torah-fence. God's way of redemption made it clear that covenantal nomism was

not the way of justification. If God raised Jesus from the dead, he hasthereby vindicated this one which the torah pronounces accursed; he hasdeclared this Jesus to be the accepted and beloved Son-heir through whomthe blessing comes. Not to follow Christ beyond the barrier by faith, not torenounce covenantal nomism as a failure for righteousness, is in principle to saythatJesus died in vain (2:21), to deny the meaning of the resurrection, and thus(adopting the perspective of covenantal nomism) to call Jesus "accursed."

40 Cf. the discussion of this text in M. Wilcox, "Upon the TreeDeut. 21:22-23 in the New

Testament," JBL 96 (1977) 94-99.41 One view found among Protestant interpreters understands Gal 2:17 to be saying that,

because justification in Christ exposes the problem of the human condition (all have sinned),

since a solution (justification) presupposes a problem (sin), some might conclude that this

implies that Christ serves the cause ofsin. Such a conclusion is so obviously a non sequitur that

I seriously doubt Paul would have taken it seriously enough to refute (w . 18-20). Indeed, Jews

(orJudaizers) would not entertain such an argument, for by analogy it is as absurd as their

reasoning that the sacrifices of atonement (which, by their performance presupposed the need

for atonement: the sins of the people) are also servants ofsin! What Paul really intends in 2:17

is best disclosed within the framework of interpretation I am proposing in this article. Bearing

in mind the Jewish meaning of "sinners" in v. 15 (a label not applicable to Jews practicing

covenantal nomism), if justification in Christ has indeed broken down the barrier between Jew


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88 WESTMINSTERTHEOLOGICALJOURNAL

Having died to the law in the curse-bearing of Christ, the Jewish believer

finds sonship and inheritance, not in the law but in the resurrection-life of

Christ bestowed by the Spirit which has made him a new creation. In

Christ, he has been transferred out of the sphere of life under the law(hence, under the curse), crucified to the world, delivered out of this present

evil age into the inheritance ofa Jerusalem above. To attempt to erect the

broken wall, as the Judaizers did, was to become a transgressor against the

law of Christ and itsM

new-covenantal nomism."42

It was to blaspheme the

Lord!43

The Spirit, not the torah, defines the new community; the new

identity-marker is baptismal faith in Christ and the fruit of the Spirit.

VI. To the Jew First

Up to this point we have been concerned with the redemption of the Jews \

from their curse (3:10-13), but 3:14 connects the blessing ofAbraham upon

the Gentiles with the redemption of the Jews. They must be blessed to

gether. The Jews' redemption set them upon the stage where this blessing

was to take place, beyond the fence and among the nations.44

The Jews

could not be blessed while trapped inside the sphere of particularistic law,

since the blessing was directed to all the nations. The Gentiles, hpwever,could not be blessed without the Jews45

(a salvation-historical point Paul

42In the last days, the nations are to flock to an exalted Jerusalem "above the hills" to be

instructed in the law (Isa 2:2-3). Paul may have in mind in Gal 4:24-31 a tradition that

contrasts the role ofthe Zion-torah with that ofthe Sinai-toraA. See Hartmut Gese, The Law"

(chap. 3 in Essayson Biblical Theology[Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1981]) 60-92, esp. 81-85 and

89-92.43

Hamerton-Kellycites S. Kim (Origin ofPaul'sGospel, 47): "Paul must have judged the

Christian proclamation ofthe crucified Jesus as Messiah to be a blasphemy against G o d . . . .

So Paul, the 'zealot' for God's honour, was compelled to persecute the Christians. Deut 21.23

must have been a catch-phrase of Paul when he went around persecuting the Christians'*

("Sacred Violence," 105 n. 17). After his conversion Paul came to regard his formerly torah-

zealous attitude as blasphemyagainst the LordJesus Christ, a blasphemynecessarilyfollowing

from the perspective of the nomists. Therefore, covenantal nomism is inherently opposed to

the gospel, since no one by the Spirit calls Jesus accursed, but this is exactly the blasphemy

involved in the nomisi understanding ofJesus' death "upon the tree."4 4

Cf. Jub. 16:17-18. Paul has simply argued for redefining the fence between the Jewish

"Isaac-seed" and the Gentile sons, extending the logic ofJewish particularism to the exclusivity

ofthe singular seed. Thus, Jew and Gentile are located together outside, since the new bound

ary is drawn around Christ as the one holy"Isaac-seed" through whom the blessing comes toall who enter into the sphere of Christ/Spirit through the new identity/boundary marking-

f f f 6


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develops at great length in Romans). By removing the curse-threat, God

brings Jew and Gentile together in Christ to die to this world and be

delivered as a new creation out of this present evil age. All the children of

the "father of many nations** must be included, so the freeing of the Jewsopened the gate for Gentile justification.

VII. Conclusion

The law's purpose was to mitigate for a select group the problem of the

worldwide reign of sin. This group was the seed-line through whom the

seed-heir parexcellence would come, and they needed the law's protection.

The instrument of this protection was the restraint imposed by the curse-threat, forming a fence that few would dare to cross. The law could not

solve the root problem of sin as a power that has dominion over this present

evihage; it treated the symptoms onlywhat Paul calls transgressions in

3:19. It was a temporary measure, in place only until the fullness of time.

With the coming of the seed-heir, the law's purpose has been served and the

Jews must be set free from the reign ofthe law so that they may partake of

the definitive cure in Christ with the Gentiles. This cure is deliverance from

sin's dominion in the power of the liberating Spirit.Using the two-age framework of Jewish apocalyptic, Paul insists that the

law has reference only to this present evil age ofsin's worldwide rule. It was

added (but not as a covenant codicil) because the world-order was con

signed under sin and transgressions must be restrained among the seed-line

(3:19, 22). Therefore, the law belongs to the class of the elementaryprin

ciples of this present world-order and has no reference to the new creation

(3:19; 4:2-3, 9; 6:15). Its reign ends with death, with the end of life in this

world. The deliverance of the Jews from the reign of the law and across its

fence comes with deliverance out of this present evil age (cf. 1:4) into the

sphere of new creation (6:15) as those who have died to the law in Christ

(2:19; 6:14) and share in the new life of him whom God has raised from the

dead (1:1; 2:20). While the curse-bearing of Christ was a disinheritance

according to the law (3:13; Deut 21:22-23), the resurrection establishes his

Sonship, his rights as heir to receive the blessing as the antitypical Isaac-

seed.46

Those Jews who confess Jesus as Lord have in principle renounced

the barriers erected by the , following Christ outside the fence,

themes more fully in Romans; his apparently contrary attitude in certain statements in Gal


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and are equal in status to the Gentiles. The wall of partition is thereby

broken and God's Spirit defines the new boundaries for his people in Christ.

In Christ there is neither Jew or Gentile.

One of the benefits accruing to this interpretation of the message ofGalatians is that it eliminates the numerous "contradictions" that scholars

like Heikki Risnen find in the more traditional Protestant approach to

3:10-13 in terms of Luther's law/gospel contrast.47 Those who accept what

Schoeps has called "the tacit underlying assumption" of Paul's argument in

3:1048that the missing, implicit premise is that no one can fulfill the

demands of the law adequately enough to escape the cursesimply play

into Risnen's hands at this point. Paul becomes incoherent in his use of

mutually inconsistent, ad hoc arguments that are merely designed to attackthe law by any and all means at hand.

I can here simply catalog some of the more serious problems which arise

within the traditional interpretation. If we assume the Protestant-

Reformational exegesis of 3:10-12, we find Paul first asserting that those

who do what the law requires (i.e., render obedience!)49 are accursed.

However, the reason given for this condemnation is that the law pronounces

its curse on the disobedient (reading in an allegedly implicit premise that

no one truly fulfills the law).50

Whether or not Paul's supposedly legalistic

antagonists would grant this tacit premise, or even agree with this strict

interpretation of Deut 27:26,51 Paul later contradicts himself in 5:14 (cf.

also Rom 8:4; 13:8-10). Moreover, the implication of Paul's reference to

Deut 27:26 (further supported by his use of Lev 18:5 in v. 12) is that, were

the law kept perfectly, the blessing ofjustification unto life would follow by

the way of works, for those who do the law will live therein. Yet Paul weaves

into this argument the wholly incompatible thesis of v. 11 that the

are accursed simplybecause theyare not offaith; law and faith are

47Risnen, Paul and the Law, 94-96, 109.

48 Schoeps, Paul, 176. This viewpoint is also expressed by Calvin (Galatians, 89), E. D.

Burton (The Epistle of Paul to the Galatians [ICG; Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1921] 164), R. Y.

K. Fung (The Epistle to the Galatians [NICNT; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1988] 142), J. B.

Lightfoot (The Epistle ofSt. Paulto the Galatians [London: Macmillan, 1865] 137), and Bruce

(Galatians, 159). This view is also held by Risnen (Paul and the Law, 95). It is rejected by E.

P. Sanders (Paul, the Law, and the Jewish People [Philadelphia: Fortress, 1983] 20-23, 127), Betz

(Galatians, 145-46), Dunn ("Works of the Law," 534), and Daniel Fuller (Gospel andLaw:

Contrast or Continuum? [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1979] 90-93).49 See the discussion in Fuller, Gospel andLaw, 89-93. However, I find Fuller's attempt at

a positive solution to be untenable (see my discussion in n. 6 above and references provided


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mutually exclusive principles and the just live by faith. Therefore, imper

fection in lawkeeping has nothing to do with the reason for their condem

nation. Life cannot come by the law (3:21). Besides, Lev 18:5, which at first

seems to support the argument of v. 10, is actuallyadducedin conjunctionwith Hab 2:4to prove this inherent impossibility, not to establish a hy

pothetical works-principle ofjustification for the perfectly obedient, and

this puts it in tension with the argument of v. 10. Nevertheless, despite theradical antithesis of law and faith asserted in w. 11-12, Paul emphatically

denies ( !) any such opposition. But if these perplexities are not

enough to destroy the cogency of Paul's argument, the Judaizers (as pro

fessed Jewish-Christians) can appeal to the atoning sacrifice ofChrist as the

divine provision for imperfect lawkeeping (thereby escaping the force ofPaul's argument in v. 10) and to the intrinsic compatibility of faith with

doing what God requires (Jas 2:14-26). This does seem to be a contradictory and incoherent mess, as Risnen charges.

What Risnen fails to consider, however, is that these alleged contra

dictions are more likely to be anomalous counter-instances to his interpre

tive model, indicative of its inadequacy and incorrectness. Paradigm failure

is a more probable explanation than imputing to Paul such blatant con

tradictionsoften within the space of one paragraph.

My proposal effectively eliminates these "contradictions," thus findingconfirmation in its greater explanatory power and its coherence. While this

does not prove my thesis, anymore than it disproves the traditional Protes

tant interpretation (for there may be other ways within that paradigm to

explain away the so-called contradictions Risnen finds in Paul's theol

ogy), it at least lends credence to it as a coherent interpretation, able to deal

with the context ofPaul's polemic (the Jew-Gentile problem), and providing

the promise of solution to a host of otherwise thorny exegetical problems.

4954 S. W. 91 Avenue

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