Allegory

Greetings everyone.

It's New Year's Day 2026.  I hope the new year finds you well. We will continue to examine Galatians 4 today, looking at verses 21-27, where Paul uses the story of Abraham, Sarah and Hagar as an allegory to further make his point:  

21 Tell me this, those of you who want to be under the law, do you not listen to the law? 

22 It is written that Abraham had two sons, one from a slave woman and another from a free woman. 23 The one born to the slave was born of the flesh, but the one born to the free woman was born out of a promise.  24 This is an allegory.  These women represent the two covenants. One comes from Mount Sanai, and bears children into slavery.  This is Hagar. 25 So, Hagar is Mount Sanai in Arabia, and she corresponds to Jerusalem, as it is now, for she is enslaved along with her children.  26 But the Jerusalem that is from above is free, and she is our mother. 

27 As it is written, 

       Rejoice, those who are barren, and cannot give birth. 

          Lift your voices and shout, those without labor pains.

       Because the barren woman will have more children than the woman who has a husband. 

Paul, in verse 21, specifically addresses those who desire to be under the Law. He asks those who choose to live that way, whether they truly hear the law.  Do they really understand what the Law is saying to them?  It is an implied “No,” because if they really understood the Law, they would be happy that its time had passed and they were now able to under a new and better covenant.  

To make his point, Paul goes to the source material of his detractors, the Old Testament.  He starts to explain the Old Testament story of Abraham and his two sons, as an allegory for their present situation, telling us in verse 24 that they serve as an allegory for the two covenants.  

Allegory, in case you have forgotten, is a story that uses symbols to convey a hidden meaning.

Here is the allegory: 

• Abraham has two sons, by two different women.  
• One woman is a slave, Hagar. The other is a free woman. (Although not mentioned specifically by name, in Paul’s text, we know that the free woman is Sarah.)
• Hagar gives birth to Ishamel.  She represents the Law, the old covenant and slavery. So, Ishamel is the child of slavery. 
• Sarah gives birth to Isaac.  She represents the promise, the new covenant and freedom.  Isaac is the child of freedom. 

Douglas Moo makes the point that earlier in Galatians Paul had been concerned with paternity, showing that those who by faith in Christ are the children of Abraham, but "In this passage, Paul’s concern is with maternity, and the argument proceeds by oppositions: believers are the children of the free woman, and not the children of the slave woman.” (Moo, 298.)

The link between Hagar, the slave, and the law given at Mount Sinai is not an obvious one, but does explain that he is speaking allegorically.  Paul makes a second not-so-obvious connection, connecting Hagar to the Jerusalem of that day.  His reference connects Judaism to slavery, so it is likely that Paul’s reference to Hagar and current Jerusalem refers to his antagonists, the Judaizing teachers.  They are the children of slavery.  

In his allegory, Paul discusses two Jerusalems, the current Jerusalem, which, again, he equates to slavery and the new Jerusalem that is from above.  It is heavenly. This new Jerusalem, Paul says, is free. 

This allegory makes clear distinctions and they are represented by Hagar and Sarah.  On one side you have Hagar, slavery, Mount Sinai, the Law, obedience, legalistic righteousness, the Judaizing teachers, contemporary Jerusalem and Earth. On the other side you have Sarah, freedom, the Cross, the Promise, faith, grace, true Christianity, Jerusalem from above, and Heaven. 

God is not down on Hagar.  He speaks to her and protects in Genesis 21.  However, the Sarah side (Grace) of the argument is so far superior to the Hagar side of the argument, that choosing to live under the Hagar side (the Law) is pure nonsense. Paul has been furthering this same argument since the beginning of the letter when he compared the Gospel of Grace with the other gospel, which really is no gospel at all. 

Paul ends verse with the phrase ἐστὶν μήτηρ ἡμῶν (estin mētēr hēmōn), which is translated “(she) is your mother.” Paul is hitting this point from every possible angle.  Grace is better than obedience.  The Promise is better than the Law.  Freedom is better than slavery, and as followers of Christ, and recipients of His grace, freedom (Sarah, new Jerusalem) is our mother, and slavery (Hagar, old Jerusalem) is not.  Why would anyone choose slavery over freedom?  

Paul wraps this thought up by quoting Isaiah 54:1.  “Because the barren woman will have more children than the woman who has a husband.”  Moo says, “Paul’s gospel-oriented reading of Isa. 54:1…convinces him that Sarah represents the new age…Hagar, on the other hand, must therefore represent the old age, with its outmoded and futile focus on doing the Law.” (Moo, 307-308.) Paul has been contrasting the free woman, Sarah, with the slave woman, Hagar, and it appears that in verse 27 is equating Sarah with the barren woman, and Hagar with the one who has a husband.  Sarah, barren until her old age, gave birth to a son, and ultimately, a nation.