Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Galatians 4:26
But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all.
26. the mother of us all ] Probably we should read with R.V. our mother, where of course ‘ our ’ is emphatic. Comp. Gal 4:31.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
But Jerusalem which is above – The spiritual Jerusalem; the true church of God. Jerusalem was the place where God was worshipped, and hence, it became synonymous with the word church, or is used to represent the people of God. The word rendered above, ( ano) means properly up above, that which is above; and hence, heavenly, celestial; Col 3:1-2; Joh 8:23. Here it means the heavenly or celestial Jerusalem; Rev 21:2, And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God, out of heaven. Heb 12:22, ye are come unto Mount Zion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem. Here it is used to denote the church, as being of heavenly origin.
Is free – The spirit of the gospel is that of freedom. It is freedom from sin, freedom from the bondage of rites and customs, and it tends to promote universal freedom; see the note at Gal 4:7; compare Joh 8:32, Joh 8:36; and the note at 2Co 3:17.
Which is the mother of us all – Of all who are true Christians, whether we are by birth Jews or Gentiles. We should not, therefore, yield ourselves to any degrading and debasing servitude el any kind; compare the note at 1Co 6:12.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Gal 4:26
But Jerusalem, which is above, is free.
Notes of the Church
The Church is–
1. Heavenly.
2. One.
3. Invisible.
4. Free.
5. Propagative.
6. Careful of her children.
Jerusalem a type of the Church
Cf. Heb 12:22-23; Rev 21:2.
I. God chose Jerusalem above all places to dwell in; the catholic Church is composed of those in the midst of whom He dwells (Mat 18:20; Mat 28:20).
II. Jerusalem is a city compact in itself by reason of the bond of love and order among the citizens (Psa 122:3); so the members of the Church are linked together by the bond of one Spirit.
III. In Jerusalem was the sanctuary, a place of Gods presence and worship and truth; the Church is now in the room of that sanctuary; in it we must seek the presence of God and the word of life (1Ti 3:15).
IV. In Jerusalem was the throne of David (Psa 122:5); the Church, is the throne and sceptre of Christ (Rev 3:7).
V. The commendation of a city, as Jerusalem, is the subjection and obedience of its citizens; in the Church all believers are citizens (Eph 2:19), and yield voluntary obedience and subjection to Christ the King (Psa 110:2; Isa 2:5)
VI. As in Jerusalem the names of the citizens were enrolled in a register, so the names of Christians are recorded in the Book of Life (Rev 20:15; Heb 12:23). (W. Perkins.)
The heavenly Jerusalem
The Church in the creed has three properties: holy; catholic; knit in a communion. The word above intimateth that she is holy; mother, that she is knit in a communion; of all, that she is catholic.
I. Jerusalem a type of the church.
1. In election (Psa 132:13; cf. 1Pe 2:9).
2. In collection (Isa 5:2; cf. Eph 4:3).
3. In nobility (Psa 122:5; cf. Rev 3:7).
II. This new jerusalem is heavenly.
1. In respect of her birth and heavenly beginning (Jam 1:18).
2. In respect of growth and continuance (Php 3:20).
3. In respect of the end (Joh 17:24). (T. Adams.)
The heavenly origin and nature of the Church
The Church is said to be above–
I. In respect of her beginning, which is from the grace of God.
II. Because she dwells by faith in heaven with Christ. Wherefore we are admonished–
1. To live in this world as pilgrims and strangers (1Pe 2:21).
2. To carry ourselves as burgesses of heaven (Php 3:20).
(1) By seeking heavenly things;
(2) by leading a heavenly life. (W. Perkins.)
Characteristics of the Church
In that it is said she is above it signifies her heavenly origin; that she is Jerusalem, her peaceful multitude; that she is free, her great liberty; that she is mother, her abundant fecundity; that she is mother of us all, her wide charity. (Cardinal Hugo.)
Jerusalem our mother
The holy Church is our mother, and the most holy God our Father. She feeds us with sincere milk (1Ti 3:15) from her two breasts, the Scriptures of both Testaments, which God hath committed to her keeping. God doth beget us of immortal seed by the Word (1Pe 1:23), but by the instrumentality of the Church. (T. Adams.)
The comprehensiveness of the Church
The city of God, of which the Stoics doubtfully and feebly spoke, was now set up before the eyes of men. It was no unsubstantial city, such as we fancy in the clouds; no invisible pattern, such as Plato thought might be laid up in heaven; but a visible corporation, whose members met together to eat bread and drink wine, and into which they were publicly initiated. Here the Gentile met the Jew whom he had been accustomed to regard as an enemy of the human race; the Roman met the lying Greek sophist; the Syrian slave the gladiator born beside the Danube. In brotherhood they met, the natural birth and kindred of each forgotten, the baptism alone remembered to which they had been born again to God and to each other. The edict of comprehension conferred citizenship upon every class. Under it, whatever law of mutual help and consideration had obtained between citizen and citizen obtained also between the citizen and his slaves. The words foreign and barbarous lost their meaning. All nations and tribes were gathered within the pomoerium of the City of God; and on the baptized earth the Rhine and the Thames became as Jordan, and ever sullen desert-girded settlement of German savages as sacred as Jerusalem. (Ecce Homo.)
The Judaizers would have made the Jerusalem which is above, which is free, and which is the mother of us all, a mere cramped and narrow faubourg in the metropolis of Jerusalem. (Paul of Tarsus.)
Christian freedom
Jesus Christ not only called Lazarus into life, but he commanded the grave-clothes to be taken off him, that he might have liberty in life. Life, without liberty from the grave-clothes, would scarcely have been a blessing. So Jesus Christ not only gives life to the soul which believes in Him; He also commands the Spirit to descend upon him, to set him free from all enslaving habits. If the Son make you free, ye shall be free indeed, (J. Bate.)
True Liberty.
Who then is free? the wise who well maintains
An empire oer himself; whom neither chains
Nor want nor death with slavish fear inspire,
Who boldly answers to his warm desire;
Who can ambitions vainest gifts despise,
Firm in himself who on himself relies;
Polished and round who runs his proper course,
And breaks misfortune with superior force.
(Horace.)
St. Pauls allegory
And because similitudes and figures will hold faster in the memory of the unlearned, who are the greater number, than powerful arguments; after weighty reasons premised, the apostle concludes with an allegory at the end of his disputation, as a banquet after a meal of solid meat. And thus it runs, that they who sought righteousness by the law were no better than Ishmael, the son of Hagar; they that sought righteousness by faith were as Isaac, the heir of his father. That the law came from Sinai, which was seated in Arabia, a mountain quite out of the confines of the Land of Promise; the gospel began at Sion, or Jerusalem, which was the heart of the Holy Land. In this little abstract of the excellency of the Church, six portions of its glory are contained in six words.
1. She is a Jerusalem, a visible fair city, thats her external communion.
2. A Jerusalem above, thats her internal sanctity.
3. A Jerusalem that is free, which is her supernal redemption.
4. A mother, thats her fruitfulness.
5. The mother of us, which comprehends her unity.
6. The mother of us all, which expresseth the universality.
1. Jerusalem is the substantive or fundamental word that bears up the whole text, and it is as musical a word as most that run upon syllables; but it offers more pleasantness to the understanding than to the ear; full of happy signification; a name given, as the philosopher Plato was wont to say, so accommodate to the Church apostolical, that unless God had foreseen that His saving truth should first grow up within the walls thereof, it had never been called Jerusalem. And I refer myself to two things especially, how the name descended upon the Church.
(1) While the old tabernacle stood, Jerusalem was the chief place wherein men called upon the name of the Lord.
(2) Out of the same Sion went forth the new law, and Jerusalem was the mother of the first-born in Christ.
2. It was not enough in St. Pauls judgment to denominate the spouse of Christ from the best habitation (for earth is but earth be it never so much a selected portion); therefore he carries her aloft in his praise, and adds, that it is Jerusalem which is above, an heavenly city (Heb 12:22), as if it had not its original here, but fell down from the starry firmament.
(1) Because Christ our head is ascended into heaven, and governs all things beneath from thence, sitting at the right hand of His Father. As a king, upon whose safety the weal of the kingdom depends, is said to carry the lives of his people with him, when he adventures his person into danger; so our souls do hang upon Christ our Redeemer in Him we live and move, wheresoever He goes He draws us after Him; if He be lifted up on high, so are we also by virtue of concommitancy; it is His will, and we have His word for it, that where He is, there should we be also. When we pray unto Him, if our spirit do not issue out from us, and prostrate itself before Him in heaven, that petition solicits faintly, and is not like to speed, because it comes not nearer to Him who is our advocate with the Father. When we come to His Holy Supper, unless we carry up our heart unto Him by strong devotion, and presume that we see that very Body which was crucified for us before our eyes, we pollute the Sacrament for want of faith. There are such joints and bands which knit the body unto the head, as mortal reason cannot express; but through faith and love we are often with Him by invisible ascensions; but most assured be we that there He intercedes for us, from thence He assists His sacraments, sanctifieth His ministry, gives grace unto His Word. And if they did not escape who refused Him that spake on earth, much more shall not we escape, if we turn from Him that speaketh from heaven.
(2) Our Jerusalem is above, not only in the head, but in the members. I do not say in all the members; for the Church is that great house in which are vessels of honour and dishonour. Terms of excellency, though indistinctly attributed to the whole, are agreeing oftentimes only to the chiefer or more refined part. Some there are in this body, whom though we salute not by the proud word of their sublimity, yet in true possession, which shall never be taken from them, they are those that are above. Witness that the angels make up one Church with us, being the chief citizens that are reckoned in the triumphant part; fellow servants with us under one Lord; adopted sons under one Father; elect under one Christ. This is the language of the Scripture, and surely members of one mystical body, for the same Jesus is the head of all principality and power (Col 2:10). Of this family also are the saints departed, even all those holy spirits that obey God in heavenly places, and do not imitate the devil and his angels.
(3) We have obtained this dignity, to be ranked as them that are above, because our calling is very holy: He hath saved us, and called us with an holy calling (2Ti 1:9); called to doctrine which is above, which flesh and blood did not reveal, but the Father that giveth wisdom plentifully.
(4) This holy city of God is above, because it pursues not the things beneath, but it seeks those things above, where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God; it is above in its affections. The delights of the synagogue were victory over their enemies, length of days, a land of wine and olives, and flowing with milk and honey, poor accessories of a transitory happiness. This was tolerated unto them, when the first rudiments of the fear of God were taught; but these are too childish for us to look after, inasmuch as long continuance of time hath taught us to choose the better part.
(5) The Church evangelical is Jerusalem above in respect of the Jewish Hagar, propter sublime pactum, the covenant that is made with us is sublime and magnificent; not the dreadful law of works, but the mild and gentle covenant of faith in the blood of Christ.
3. Jerusalem, which is above, is free. The precedent praise of the Church adheres unto this word for the consummation thereof. If there be any that take upon them to belong to the New Jerusalem, and to the city which is above, let them show the copy of their freedom, that they are not led by the spirit of bondage, but by the spirit of adoption.
(1) What this freedom is. Our freedom consists in a manumission from a fourfold servitude.
(a) We are delivered from the yoke of ceremonies, called the bondage of the elements of this world, in this chapter, verse 4.
(b) We are most free for the new covenants sake, which is made with us. For salvation is not offered us through the works of the law, but through the promise of grace. We brethren, as Isaac was, are children of promise (verse 28).
(c) We have not received the spirit of bondage to fear, but the spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father (Rom 8:25). Says Theophylact upon my text, The gospel exhorts us gently, it doth not affright us tyrannously.
(d) The rewards of the New Testament are not momentary things, such as the law propounded, but heavenly. Says the same author, We are not servants that do our duty for visible wages. And all these together make the copy of a perfect freedom.
(2) How we got this freedom. We all know the procurer, and what He did to gain it for us; it is a flower that grew out of the blood of Christ. We were not protected, as Joshuas spies were, by a common woman; nor set at large, as Samaria was, by the tidings of lepers; our Deliverer is more honourable to us than our freedom. The Son of God was made a servant, that we servants might become sons. As God made nothing in nature but by His Son, by Him He made the worlds, so He did nothing for the restoration of the world without Him. He is all in all. He bath freed us from the bondage of shadows by taking a body; from the covenant of works by satisfying His Fathers justice; from the dread of fear by the sweetness of His mercy; from the sordid desire of earthly things by the operation of His holy Spirit.
(3) How we should use this freedom. No blessing hath been more abused than this. Under colour hereof the Galileans would be free from tribute, the Nicolaitans from the bond of marriage, the Gnostics from all justice and temperance, the clerks of the Roman Church from the courts of the civil magistrate, and the Anabaptists from all moral duties. No, says St. Peter to all these, As free, but not using your liberty as a cloak of maliciousness, but as the servants of God. It was St. Austins by word, You are free, therefore love God, and do what you will. If ye love Him keep His commandments. We are not so soon loosed but we are tied again, both freed and bound at once. We must recompense His goodness with our imperfect obedience. It is the law of gratitude; it is the bond of nature. As we commonly say, that nothing is more dearly bought than that which comes by gift; so we owe the greater service to Him of whom we got our freedom. Nay, we are bound to endure all for His sake. We feel the pain as much as they that curse and rage in their sufferings, but our love unto Christ doth overcome it. A free man, that will thrive, follows his trade as close as any apprentice, though not by austere compulsion. So our freedom will not make our hands slack from working, if we mean to lay up a treasure in heaven.
4. And as the Church hath taken upon it the proper name of Jerusalem, yet without any contract to the local and material building of Jerusalem, so she hath taken up the appellation of a mother, yet without any respect to nature, no way bending to natural causes, or natural affections. For not only our parents in the flesh, ,but the whole world, hath quite lost us in this word. As Moses remembered the great devotion of Levi, that he said of his father and mother, I have not seen them, or I respect them not, and of his brethren, I do not acknowledge them (Deu 33:9); so by deriving ourselves from this mother, we east our fleshly parentage aside, and we say to her, who did give us to suck from her breasts, as oar Saviour did to the blessed Virgin; What have I to do with thee? Jerusalem is ours, and we are hers, First, to know our mother, that we may not be ignorant either of her fruitfulness or our own obedience. He is a wise son, says Telemachus, in Homer, that knows his father; but he is a foolish son that doth not know his mother. Secondly, note the unity and indivision of the children of this mother. They are a cluster of grapes hanging upon one stalk, a brood of chickens clockt under the wings of one hen; there is but one stem and one progeny; one in relation to this parent, the mother of us. The third and last part puts us to observe, that the note of universality was large in Pauls days, but now much more amplified than in those times–the mother of us all. (Bishop Hacker.)
The new Jerusalem
Liberty is the element of a Christian. The fall placed nature under the bondage of sin; but then the law placed sin under the bondage of fear; but Christ first delivers sin from fear, and then delivers nature from sin. That the Jerusalem above means the present Church militant, as well as the Church triumphant the kingdom of heaven within you, as well as the kingdom of heaven above you–both grace and glory–is evident from the manner in which the expression Jerusalem, or Zion, is used in its connection of thought in many other parts of Scripture; as, for example, in the Psalms; or Isa 62:1-2; or Heb 12:22; or Rev 3:12; or Rev 21:2. Of all this Jerusalem, then, or Church-state, the character, the determining character, is liberty. If I wanted a proof of this, I might see it in the fact that everything which is not free is from beneath. Every machination of Satan against Gods people–every dark heresy that comes to confine the Church–every spiritual temptation which ensnares a mans conscience–every distress which cramps a believers mind–is from beneath; therefore, because it is from beneath, it is bondage. Bondage is from below. Jerusalem above,–that which your citizenship is–is free. Endeavour now to catch, for a moment or two, a feature, one or two features, in the liberty of the Church in heaven, that we may, by Gods grace, copy it into our liberty of the Church below. I observe that in heaven everything is very large, to us infinite. The room is boundless; the inhabitants are beyond computation–even as those stars in the heavens, which no man can reckon. But yet, as God does with those stars, so God does with everything in heaven. The gates, the fruits, the seats, the elders, the crowns, are all numbered–so that I see in heaven at once vastness and accuracy; the freest scope with the minutest observation. So be out freedom here. Our mercies are infinite. Still, every one of my mercies is known, and written down in Gods book, as a separate item. It is written; it is catalogued, and responsible. The multitude is vast; but, for each one that goes to make that multitude, I have to give a separate account how I have used it in this world. That is my liberty. Again, look at the cervices of heaven. I note that they use forms in heaven. We are told the very words, which they cease not day and night to say (never weary, though)–Worthy is the Lamb!–Amen!–Alleluia!–For the Lord God omnipotent reigneth! But oh! what a freshness, what spirit there is in those celestial formularies! Let us take our liberty. Free thoughts and full affections, in prescribed currents of regulated words, go to send up our separate feelings in all the individualities of unpremeditated prayer; and now we blend in social worship, as in the beautiful prayer and language of the holy services in which we have been this night engaged; and, in all, with the equal liberty of Zions children. That is heavens free worship, and that is the liberty of the Church around. There must be law to have freedom. The greater the law, the greater liberty; but the deeper that law is engraven in the hearts fine feelings, and the more a man is the spring of his own obedience, the more of habit, the more of anticipations boundings, the less of misapprehensions without a man, and the more felt presence of the love of Christ in a man, the nearer are we to the Jerusalem which is above, which is free, and which is the mother of us all. The mother of us all. There is no confidence which the world ever shows, so intimate and so tender, as that which a son feels for his mother. There are feelings which a man will deposit nowhere but with his mother. The mother of us all! Children of the New Jerusalem–children of the Church–set much by your Church. She is to you no other than a parent. Children of the new Jerusalem–children of heaven–remember into what a registry your name is now, by your second birth, enrolled. Demean it not; sully it not; sit loose to this world in the spirit of your minds; for, behold! she, which is your mother, will come presently, in her perfect beauty; and where should your eye be, and where should your anticipation daily be, but to that new Jerusalem, which shall come from heaven. Children of the new Jerusalem–children of liberty–take the image of your parents features. Be free in the spirit of your minds. Have freer prayer–freer hope–freely take the freedom so freely given you. (J. Vaughan, M. A.)
The liberties of the Church
We must understand St. Paul here to speak of the Church; and not of the Church triumphant in heaven, as some of the schoolmen have asserted, but the Church militant here on earth, that glorious edifice of the faithful, whose names are written in the book of life, and who are united with Christ above in a fellowship of His sufferings. But the word above is not to mislead you, as Luther has well observed; for all the processes of spiritual generation and adoption are from above; all intercourse between God and His faithful worshippers is from above; and our conversation is in heaven. All, then, that are allowed to see the kingdom of God, are to be born from above: this is the decree of the Head of the Church. As Christ, therefore, is in heaven, and as He is Head of the Church, so is the Church spiritually in heaven, even whilst she is militant here below; for the Church is an unmeasured edifice, and never can be measured till some one by searching can find out the limits of the Almighty: It is as high as heaven, what canst thou do? deeper than hell, what canst thou know? The Head of the Church is at the right hand of God; the feet are walking here on earth; and yet one mighty eternal Spirit animates the whole, one will and principle of action pervades the immense body; one thought and intention directs and disciplines all the mass;–for in Him we live, and move, and have our being; and the whole company of true and faithful believers, from the day that Christ was crucified, down to the hour when the last trumpet shall sound from heaven, do form but one mystical body, with one soul and One spirit, entire in union and perfect in co-operation. But the beauty of this city is her freedom: the real Church of Christ has ample privileges; and all her laws are comprehensive and liberal. There is no spirit of bigotry, no local attachments, no exclusive jealousy, no straining on the conscience, no turning of the fancies of man into the decrees of God. St. Paul, the illustrious scribe of that holy city, lays no heavier burthen on the chartered inhabitants than this–Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free; and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage (Gal 5:1.) How easy, one would think it must be, to love the freedom which God has given us I But, alas! that which has been given us as our freedom by God, has been, by the world in general, considered irksome and intolerable. The world cannot endure a spiritual Church; it loves neither a spiritual worship nor a spiritual faith; and to worship God in spirit is what it can neither understand nor tolerate. (R. M. Beverley.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 26. But Jerusalem which is above] The apostle still follows the Jewish allegory, showing not only how the story of Hagar and Sarah, Ishmael and Isaac, was allegorized, but pointing out also that even Jerusalem was the subject of allegory; for it was a maxim among the rabbins, that “whatsoever was in the earth, the same was also found in heaven for there is no matter, howsoever small, in this world, that has not something similar to it in the spiritual world.” On this maxim, the Jews imagine that every earthly thing has its representative in heaven; and especially whatever concerns Jerusalem, the law, and its ordinances. Rab. Kimchi, speaking of Melchizedec, king of Salem, says: zu Yerushalem shel malah, “This is the Jerusalem that is from above.” This phrase frequently occurs among these writers, as may be seen in Schoettgen, who has written an express dissertation upon the subject. Hor. Hebr., vol. i. page 1205.
Is free, which is the mother of us all.] There is a spiritual Jerusalem, of which this is the type; and this Jerusalem, in which the souls of all the righteous are, is free from all bondage and sin: or by this, probably, the kingdom of the Messiah was intended; and this certainly answers best to the apostle’s meaning, as the subsequent verse shows. There is an earthly Jerusalem, but this earthly Jerusalem typifies a heavenly Jerusalem: the former, with all her citizens, is in bondage; the latter is a free city, and all her inhabitants are free also. And this Jerusalem is our mother; it signifies the Church of Christ, the metropolis of Christianity, or rather the state of liberty into which all true believers are brought. The word , of all, is omitted by almost every MS. and version of antiquity and importance, and by the most eminent of the fathers who quote this place; it is undoubtedly spurious, and the text should be read thus: But Jerusalem, which is above, is free, which is our mother.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
The new covenant, or the dispensation of the gospel, or the Christian church,
which is above, or from above, which answereth to Sarah, and is said to be above, because revealed from heaven by Christ, sent out of the bosom of the Father, not as the law was revealed upon earth, upon Mount Sinai. Hence apostates from the doctrine of the gospel, are said to turn from him who speaketh from heaven, Heb 12:25. Or else it is said to be above, because it is the assembly of the firstborn written in heaven, Gal 4:23; hence the gospel church is called the heavenly Jerusalem, Gal 4:22. Of this gospel church the apostle saith, that it is free; i.e. free from the yoke and bondage of the ceremonial law, or from the covenant and curse of the law. Which church, he saith,
is the mother of all believers, they embracing the same faith, and walking in the same steps; from whence it was easy for the Galatians to conclude their freedom and liberty also from the law.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
26. This verse stands instead ofthe sentence which we should expect, to correspond to Ga4:24, “One from Mount Sinai,” namely, the othercovenant from the heavenly mount above, which is (answers in theallegory to) Sarah.
Jerusalem . . . above(Heb 12:22), “theheavenly Jerusalem.” “New Jerusalem, which cometh down outof heaven from my God” (Rev 3:12;Rev 21:2). Here “theMessianic theocracy, which before Christ’s second appearing isthe Church, and after it, Christ’s kingdom of glory”[MEYER].
freeas Sarah was;opposed to “she is in bondage” (Ga4:25).
allomitted in many ofthe oldest manuscripts, though supported by some. “Mother ofus,” namely, believers who are already members of theinvisible Church, the heavenly Jerusalem, hereafter to be manifested(Heb 12:22).
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
But Jerusalem which is above,…. This Sarah was a type and figure of; she answered to, and agreed with this; which is to be understood, not of the church triumphant in heaven, but of the Gospel church state under the administration of the new covenant; and that, not as in the latter day glory, when the new Jerusalem shall descend from God out of heaven, but as it then was in the apostle’s time, and has been since. Particular respect may be had to the first Gospel church at Jerusalem, which consisted of persons born from above, was blessed with a Gospel spirit, which is a spirit of liberty, out of which the Gospel went into all the world, and from among whom the apostles and first preachers of the word went forth everywhere, and were the means of the conversion of multitudes, both among Jews and Gentiles, and so might be truly said to be the mother of us all. The church in general, under the Gospel, may be, as it often is, called Jerusalem, because of its name, the vision of peace; being under the government of the Prince of peace; the members of it are sons of peace, who are called to peace, and enjoy it; the Gospel is the Gospel of peace, and the ordinances of it are paths of peace; and the new covenant, under the administration of which the saints are, is a covenant of peace. Jerusalem was the object of God’s choice, the palace of the great King, the place of divine worship, was compact together, and well fortified: the Gospel church state consists of persons, who, in general, are the elect of God, among whom the Lord dwells, as in his temple. Here his worship is observed, his word is preached, and his ordinances administered; saints laid on the foundation, Christ, and being fitly framed together, grow up unto an holy temple in him, and are surrounded by him, as Jerusalem was with mountains, and are kept by his power unto salvation. This is said to be above, to distinguish it from the earthly Jerusalem, the inhabitants of which were chiefly men of the world, carnal men; but this heavenly Jerusalem, or Gospel church state, chiefly consists of persons born from above, called with an heavenly calling, and who bear the image of the heavenly one, whose conversation is in heaven, who are seeking things above, and in a little time will be there themselves; its constitution and form of government are from above, and so are its doctrines, and its ordinances. The Jews often Speak of
, or , or , “Jerusalem above” x, as distinguished from Jerusalem below: and to this distinction the apostle seems to have respect here, who further says concerning this Jerusalem, that she
is free; from the servitude of sin, Satan, and the world, from the yoke of the law, and from a spirit of bondage; having the Spirit of God, the spirit of adoption, who is a free spirit, and makes such free that enjoy him; and where he is, there is true liberty. He adds,
which is the mother of us all; that are born again, whether Jews or Gentiles, as particularly the church at Jerusalem was, and the Gospel church state in general may be said to be; since here souls are born and brought forth to Christ, are nursed up at her side, and nourished with her breasts of consolation, the word and ordinances. This form of speech is also Jewish: thus it is said y that
“Zion, , “the mother of Israel”, shall bring forth her sons, and Jerusalem shall receive the children of the captivity.”
Again, explaining Pr 28:24 it is observed z, that there is no father but the ever blessed God, , “and no mother” but the congregation of Israel. Some copies leave out the word “all”; and so do the Vulgate Latin, Syriac, and Ethiopic versions, and only read, “the mother of us”, or “our mother”.
x Zohar in Gen. fol. 13. 2. & 16. 2. & 75. 4. & 77. 1. & 78. 2. & 114. 3. & 121. 1. & in Exod. fol. 6. 1. & 92. 2. T. Bab. Taanith, fol. 5. 1. Gloss. in T. Bab. Sanhedrin, fol. 97. 2. Caphtor, fol. 14. 2. & 25. 2. & 65. 1. & 68. 2. & 71. 2. & 118. 2. Raziel, fol. 13. 1. & 27. 1. Tzeror Hammor, fol. 61. 3. & 150. 3. Nishmat Chayim, fol. 26. 2. Kimchi in Hos. xi. 19. y Targum in Cant. 8. 5. z Sithre Tora in Zohar in Gen. fol. 55. 2. & Raya Mehimna in Zohar in Lev. fol. 34. 1.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
The Jerusalem that is above ( ). Paul uses the rabbinical idea that the heavenly Jerusalem corresponds to the one here to illustrate his point without endorsing their ideas. See also Re 21:2. He uses the city of Jerusalem to represent the whole Jewish race (Vincent).
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
1) “But Jerusalem which is above is free,” (he de ano lerousalem eleuthera estin) “But the Jerusalem above is free”; heaven, our homeland is free, admissible, not by works of law, but by faith in Jesus Christ, Eph 2:8-9; Tit 3:5; Gal 3:26; Gal 5:13; Joh 8:32; Joh 8:36.
2) “Which is the mother of us all,” (hetis estin meter hemon) “who is (exists as) our mother,” of all who are born from above, Joh 3:5-7, with an heavenly citizenship, Php_3:20-21; Eph 2:19-22. The Jerusalem from above, Spiritual realm of peace, is the believers true homeland, motherland of all true children of God.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
26. But Jerusalem, which is above. The Jerusalem which he calls above, or heavenly, is not contained in heaven; nor are we to seek for it out of this world; for the Church is spread over the whole world, and is a “stranger and pilgrim on the earth.” (Heb 11:13.) Why then is it said to be from heaven? Because it originates in heavenly grace; for the sons of God are
“
born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man,” (Joh 1:13,)
but by the power of the Holy Spirit. The heavenly Jerusalem, which derives its origin from heaven, and dwells above by faith, is the mother of believers. To the Church, under God, we owe it that we are
“
born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible,” (1Pe 1:23,)
and from her we obtain the milk and the food by which we are afterwards nourished.
Such are the reasons why the Church is called the mother of believers. And certainly he who refuses to be a son of the Church in vain desires to have God as his Father; for it is only through the instrumentality of the Church that we are “born of God,” (1Jo 3:9,) and brought up through the various stages of childhood and youth, till we arrive at manhood. This designation, “the mother of us all,” reflects the highest credit and the highest honor on the Church. But the Papists are fools and twice children, who expect to give us uneasiness by producing these words; for their mother is an adulteress, who brings forth to death the children of the devil; and how foolish is the demand, that the children of God should surrender themselves to her to be cruelly slain! Might not the synagogue of Jerusalem at that time have assumed such haughty pretensions, with far higher plausibility than Rome at the present day? and yet we see how Paul strips her of every honorable distinction, and consigns her to the lot of Hagar.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(26) Jerusalem which is above.The ideal or heavenly Jerusalem. (Comp. Heb. 12:22, Ye are come to . . . the heavenly Jerusalem; Rev. 21:2, the holy city, new Jerusalem. This new or heavenly Jerusalem is the seat or centre of the glorified Messianic kingdom, just as the old Jerusalem had been the centre of the earthly theocracy. The conception of the heavenly Jerusalem among the Jews, like the rest of their Messianic beliefs, took a materialistic form. It was to be a real but gorgeous city suspended in mid-air, three parasangs (11 miles) above the earthly city. Sometimes it is regarded as the exact copy of its earthly counterpart, and at other times as forming a perfect square. (Comp. Rev. 21:16.) No such materialistic notions attach to the idea as presented by St. Paul. Jerusalem which is above is to him a spiritual city, of which the Christian is a member here and now. It is part of the Messianic kingdom, to the whole of which the Apostle gave an ideal character. He could not but do so, seeing that the kingdom began with the coming of its King, though there was no earthly and visible realisation of it. The Christian conversation (or, rather, commonwealth, the constitution that he was under) was in heaven, while he himself was upon earth. (See Php. 3:20.)
Which is the mother of us all.The true reading is, undoubtedly, which is our mother, omitting all. The heavenly Jerusalem was the metropolis of Christianity, just as the earthly Jerusalem was the metropolis of Judaism.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
26. Jerusalem above Literally, the above, or upper Jerusalem. The same Greek phrase Josephus uses to designate the upper city of Jerusalem; and a parallel phrase, the upper city, was used in Athens to designate the Acropolis. Paul does not, however, mean the upper part of the then present Jerusalem, but a spiritual Jerusalem, higher, not only than the material one, but higher than the conceptual one, the old theocracy; namely, the new theocracy, the Church of the New Testament. This is called in Heb 12:22, the heavenly Jerusalem: not because it is heavenly in locality, but heavenly in nature. And in Revelation 21, John beholds the glorified counterpart of this earthly-heavenly Jerusalem descend from heaven, and identify itself with the earthly-heavenly Jerusalem, ( the beloved city of Rev 20:9.) In Paul’s allegory the correspondent item to Sinai is not formally supplied, and, as the above synopsis shows, Zion seems to be needed. Yet St. Paul skips it, really because, though needed to make out a regular programme, it is not needed for the complete exhibition of the truth. Wieseler furnishes in good Greek the apostle’s “missing link” (as quoted by Schmoller) thus: “The second covenant from mount Zion, bearing children unto freedom, which is Sarah. For Zion is a mountain in the Land of Promise, and corresponds to Jerusalem, for she is free with her children.”
Is free Her legal bonds are fallen off. She is like Sarah, whose name meant princess free and queenly.
Mother of us all Not a barren princess, as Sarai was, but a miraculously fertile mother of countless free and princely sons. They are the very progeny predicted by Jehovah, to be as numerous as the stars of heaven.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Gal 4:26. Jerusalem which is above, Under the name of Jerusalem is understood the gospel covenant, as will appear from the very etymology of the word; which signifies, the seeing or possessing of peace, or the peace-makera name highly applicable to the covenant of the Messiah, who is stiled, “The Prince of Salem, or, of Peace.” The Apostle here refers to the free genius of Christianity, which, when compared with Judaism, made it evidently fit, in the illustration of this allegory, to consider the free-woman, that is, Sarah, as representing the church under this nobler form. The temple of God and the new Jerusalem, under the Christian dispensation, is the whole collective body, the universal church, consisting of converts fromJews and Gentiles.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Gal 4:26 . But altogether different from the position of the present Jerusalem is that of the upper Jerusalem , which is free; and this upper Jerusalem is our mother.
] places the . in contrast with the previous . The of Gal 4:24 has been left, in consequence of the digression occasioned by the remarks made in Gal 4:25 , without any correlative to follow it (such as ), an omission which is quite in harmony with the rapid movement of Pauline thought. Comp. Rom 7:12 , et al.; also Rom 5:12 . He leaves it to the reader to form for himself the second part of the allegorical interpretation after the similarity of the first, and only adduces so much of it as is directly suggested by the contrast of the just characterized . He leaves it, therefore, to the reader to supply the following thought: “But the other covenant, which is allegorically represented in this history, is the covenant instituted by Christ, which brings forth to freedom: this is Sarah, who is of the same nature with the upper Jerusalem; for the latter is, as Sarah was, free with its children, and to this upper Jerusalem we Christians as children belong.”
] is neither the ancient Jerusalem, the Salem of Melchizedek (Oeder, Michaelis, Paulus), nor Mount Zion , which is called in Josephus (see the passages in Ottii Spicil. ex Josepho , p. 400 f.), as among the Greeks the Acropolis at Athens was also so named (Vitringa, Elsner, Mill, Wolf, Rambach, Moldenhauer, Zachariae). Both interpretations are opposed to the context, and the former to linguistic usage. [220] The contrast between heaven and earth elsewhere conveyed by , as used by Paul (Phi 3:14 ; Col 3:2 ), is found here also, since . is the earthly Jerusalem. It is true that this contrast would have been more accurately expressed if, instead of ., he had written . ( ); but in using the he thought of the future Jerusalem as its contrast (Heb 13:14 ), and afterwards changed his mode of representation, by conceiving the future as the upper: for it is the heavenly Jerusalem, called by the Rabbins , which, according to Jewish teaching, is the archetype in heaven of the earthly Jerusalem, and on the establishment of the Messiah’s kingdom is let down to earth, in order to be the centre and capital of the Messianic theocracy, just as the earthly Jerusalem was the centre and capital of the ancient theocracy. Comp. Heb 11:10 ; Heb 12:22 ; Heb 13:14 ; Rev 3:12 ; Rev 21:2 . See generally Schoettgen, de Hieros. coelest . in his Horae , p. 1205 ff.; Meuschen, N.T. ex Talm. ill . p. 199 ff.; Wetstein, in loc.; Bertholdt, Christol . p. 211 ff.; Ewald, ad Apoc . p. 11, 307. And as previously the present Jerusalem represented the Jewish divine commonwealth, so here the upper Jerusalem represents the Messianic theocracy , which before the is the church , and after the is the glorious kingdom of the Messiah . With justice, accordingly, the church on earth (not merely the “ecclesia triumphans ”) has at all times been deemed included in the heavenly Jerusalem (see Luther, and especially Calovius, in loc .); for the latter is, in relation to the church, its , which is in heaven (Phi 3:20 ). The heavenly completion of the church in Christ ensues at the , in which Christ who rules in heaven will manifest in glory the life hitherto hidden with Him in God (see on Col 3:3 f.) of the community, which is the body and of Him its Head (Eph 1:22 f.). Thus the church on earth is already the theocracy of the heavenly Jerusalem, and has its in heaven; but this its is, until the , only an ideal and veiled, although in hope assured , possession, which at the second coming of the Lord at length attains objective and glorious realization. It is, however, by no means to be asserted that Paul entertained the sensuous Rabbinical conceptions of the heavenly Jerusalem (see Eisenmenger, entdeckt. Judenth. II. p. 839 ff.); for he nowhere presents, or even so much as hints, at them, often as he speaks of the and the consequences connected with it. In his view, the heavenly Jerusalem was the national setting for the idea founded on the exalted Christ as its central point of the kingdom of the Messiah before and after its glorious realization .
] that is, independent of the Mosaic law (opposite of the in Gal 4:25 ), in free, moral self-determination, under the higher life-principle of the Spirit (Rom 8:2 ; 2Co 3:17 ).
] correlative with the above-mentioned . ; hence, if Paul had wished to lay the stress upon (Winer, Matthias), he must have made this evident by the marked position . . The emphasis lies rather on , that is, she who , etc. (comp. on Gal 4:24 ), quippe quae libera Hierosol. To this Jerusalem as our we Christians belong, as children to their mother (Phi 3:20 ; Eph 2:19 ). In bondage , it would not be our mother. Hofmann interprets differently: “the freedom of this Jerusalem may be seen in her children .” But this would be a correlative retrospective conclusion , since Paul has neither written (but ), nor has he expressed himself participially . . without the article is qualitative . That applies to the Christians generally , including also the Gentile Christians, is obvious of itself from the context, and does not require the addition of in the Textus receptus , which is defended by Ewald (in opposition to Reiche), to make it evident.
[220] always means above . When it appears to mean olim , it denotes the ascending line of ancestry, as e.g . in Plat. Legg . ix. p. 880 B: . Theact . p. 175 B al.; the earlier time lying behind being regarded as higher (Polyb. v. 6. 1, iv. 2. 3, iv. 50. 3).
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
26 But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all.
Ver. 26. But Jerusalem which is above ] That is, the Christian Church, the heavenly Jerusalem, the panegyris and congregation of the firstborn, whose names are enrolled in heaven, Heb 12:23 . The Hebrew word for Jerusalem is of the dual number; to show, say the Cabalists, that there is a heavenly as well as an earthly Jerusalem, and that the taking away of the earthly was intimated by the taking away of the letter jod out of Jerusalem, 2Sa 5:13 . Hebrew Text Note (Amama in Coronide.) Let us upon the sight of any famous city lift up our hearts with holy Fulgentius and say, Si talis est Roma terrestris, qualis est Roma caelestis? If there be such stateliness and sweetness here, what is there in that “City of the great King?”
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
26 .] But (opposes to the last sentence, not to , Gal 4:24 , which, as Meyer observes, is left without an apodosis, the reader supplying that the other covenant is Sara, &c.) the Jerusalem above (i.e. the heavenly Jerusalem = . Heb 12:22 , . Rev 3:12 ; Rev 21:2 , and see reff. on . Michaelis, al., suppose ancient Jerusalem (Melchisedek’s) to be meant.
Vitringa, al., Mount Zion , as means the Acropolis. But Rabbinical usage, as Schttgen has abundantly proved in his Dissertation de Hierosolyma clesti (Hor. Heb. vol. i. Diss. v.), was familiar with the idea of a Jerusalem in heaven. See also citations in Wetst. This latter quotes a very remarkable parallel from Plato, Rep. ix. end, , , . . , . , .
The expression here will mean, “the Messianic Theocracy , which before the is the Church , and after it Christ’s Kingdom of glory.” Mey.) is free, which (which said city, which heavenly Jerusalem) is our mother (the emphasis is not on as Winer: nay rather it stands in the least emphatic place, as indicating a relation taken for granted by Christians. See Phi 3:20 . The rendering adopted by Mr. Bagge, “ which (Jerusalem the free) is (answers to, as above) our mother (viz. Sarah),” is untenable from the absence of the article before , besides that it would introduce confusion, and a double allegory).
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
Gal 4:26 . . The Psalms and Prophets attest the enthusiastic devotion of Israelites to the city of Jerusalem. Since the temple of God and the palace of the house of David were within its walls, it was at once the holy city round which clustered the religious feelings of Israel, and the city of the great king, of whom the royal house of David were representatives ( cf. Psa 48 ). The events of the captivity and restoration associated it still more intimately with the national fortunes and aspirations of Israel. Hence both Isaiah and Ezekiel invested it with ideal glory in their prophetic anticipations of the Messianic kingdom. Their visions of its future destiny looked forward to its becoming the centre of a world-wide worship: there the great King of all the earth would manifest His presence, and thither would flow all nations, offering their homage and bearing due tribute of gifts and sacrifices. But the Hebrew ideal scarcely rose above imaginations of an earthly city and a temple on the mountains of Israel. It was the function of Christian inspiration to spiritualise this conception, to eliminate its local association with the typical temple on earth, and to substitute a heavenly for an earthly city. The Apocalypse bears witness to the process of transition. Though it adheres closely to the vision of Ezekiel, and continues to employ material imagery for expressing the dazzling brightness and intense purity of the temple-city, yet the New Jerusalem is now seen coming down from heaven to a new earth; in place of earthly light it is illuminated by the light which emanates from the throne of God and of the Lamb; and material images are interpreted as symbols of moral beauty and spiritual holiness. The Epistle to the Hebrews views the heavenly Jerusalem from another side. Whereas the Apocalypse depicts its buildings, streets and rivers, the Epistle describes the throng of angels, the assembly of the first-born, the spirits of departed saints that are gathered there round the throne of God, and contrasts the awful majesty of the living God with the material terrors of Sinai. This Epistle presents the contrast between the earthly and the heavenly Jerusalem, and between the covenants of Sinai and of Christ in a different aspect. For the Apostle embodies in his conception a purely Greek ideal of a city, the mother and home of freemen. A self-governed body of free citizens, subject to no foreign control, but maintaining justice and order in perfect peace by their own sovereign will, furnishes him with an appropriate type of the heavenly commonwealth, whereof Christians are even now citizens, dwelling in peace together in the unity of Christian brotherhood, and independent of all restraints of law because they themselves do the will of God from the heart.
The Hebrew form is naturally preferred to the Greek in all these passages, because Jerusalem is personified as an ideal city. The stress here laid on the freedom of Christ’s disciples recalls the conversation of Christ with the Jews in Joh 8:32 but the bondage is there more distinctly associated with actual sin.
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
above. Greek. ano See Joh 8:23.
all. The texts omit.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
26.] But (opposes to the last sentence, not to , Gal 4:24, which, as Meyer observes, is left without an apodosis, the reader supplying that the other covenant is Sara, &c.) the Jerusalem above (i.e. the heavenly Jerusalem = . Heb 12:22, . Rev 3:12; Rev 21:2, and see reff. on . Michaelis, al., suppose ancient Jerusalem (Melchisedeks) to be meant.
Vitringa, al., Mount Zion, as means the Acropolis. But Rabbinical usage, as Schttgen has abundantly proved in his Dissertation de Hierosolyma clesti (Hor. Heb. vol. i. Diss. v.), was familiar with the idea of a Jerusalem in heaven. See also citations in Wetst. This latter quotes a very remarkable parallel from Plato, Rep. ix. end,- , , . . , . , .
The expression here will mean, the Messianic Theocracy, which before the is the Church, and after it Christs Kingdom of glory. Mey.) is free, which (which said city, which heavenly Jerusalem) is our mother (the emphasis is not on as Winer: nay rather it stands in the least emphatic place, as indicating a relation taken for granted by Christians. See Php 3:20. The rendering adopted by Mr. Bagge, which (Jerusalem the free) is (answers to, as above) our mother (viz. Sarah), is untenable from the absence of the article before , besides that it would introduce confusion, and a double allegory).
Fuente: The Greek Testament
Gal 4:26. , but she who is above) Heb 12:22; Revelation 21-, free) as Sarah was.-, who) Jerusalem.-, mother) The ancients said of their own Rome: Rome is our common father-land.-, of all) as many as there are of us. To this refer the many [children] in the following verse.
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
Gal 4:26
Gal 4:26
But the Jerusalem that is above is free,-Sarah, the freewoman, mount Zion, or the Jerusalem which is above-the church of God. [Sarah, with Isaac, born in fulfillment of a promise, points to the heavenly, the ideal Jerusalem with its inhabitants, under no control of this world; and these in turn point to those Jews and Gentiles who have trusted Christ and who are free from the law in him; for the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus makes free from the law of sin and of death. (Rom 8:2).]
which is our mother.-She, this church of God, is the mother of all true Christians. [This language is, of course, figurative, and forms a basis for what is said of Abraham, when it is declared that he looked for the city which hath the foundations, whose builder and maker is God. (Heb 11:10; Heb 11:16). And it is further declared that believers in Christ are come unto mount Zion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem. But while, spiritually and potentially, obedient believers have already come to that city, yet, and indeed, on this account, they have here no permanent dwelling place, they seek after the city which is to come. (Act 13:14). To the church in Philadelphia the Lord said: He that overcometh, I will make him a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go out thence no more: and I will write upon him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, the new Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from my God, and mine own new name. (Rev 3:12-13). And before the close of the vision, John sees the city descending, and is invited to a closer view of it under the guidance of the angel. (Act 21:2; Act 21:9-10). The city exhibits the hosts of the redeemed in the renewed conditions of life when the purposes of God have been accomplished and all things have been made new. (Act 21:5). To this figure of an ideal city the language of Paul conforms: For our citizenship is in heaven; whence also we wait for a Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ: who shall fashion anew the body of our humiliation, that it may be conformed to the body of his glory, according to the working whereby he is able even to subject all things unto himself. (Php 3:20-21). That city of God is dominated by the powers of the age to come, the same powers that work in the believer now for his establishment in holiness and love.]
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
Jerusalem: Psa 87:3-6, Isa 2:2, Isa 2:3, Isa 52:9, Isa 62:1, Isa 62:2, Isa 65:18, Isa 66:10, Joe 3:17, Mic 4:1, Mic 4:2, Phi 3:20, Heb 12:22, Rev 3:12, Rev 21:2, 10-27
free: Gal 4:22, Gal 5:1, Joh 8:36, Rom 6:14, Rom 6:18, 1Pe 2:16
mother: Son 8:1, Son 8:2, Isa 50:1, Hos 2:2, Hos 2:5, Hos 4:5, Rev 17:5
Reciprocal: Gen 17:16 – be a mother of nations 1Ki 11:36 – the city 2Ch 8:9 – But of the Psa 45:16 – children Psa 87:6 – this man Son 1:5 – O ye Son 3:4 – I had Son 6:9 – General Isa 49:20 – children Isa 49:21 – seeing Isa 49:25 – I will save Isa 60:9 – thy sons Isa 66:7 – General Jer 3:17 – the throne Jer 50:12 – mother Eze 16:61 – when Eze 40:2 – as the Joe 2:23 – ye children Zec 14:2 – shall not Luk 13:34 – thy Eph 2:19 – but
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
THE SPIRITUAL JERUSALEM
Jerusalem which is above is free.
Gal 4:26
The spiritual Jerusalem is the Christian Church. The Church of God, in the full comprehension of the term, includes the Church Militant on earth, the Church at rest, and, in the future, the Church triumphant in heaven. In this passage, St. Paul speaks of the Church Militant here on earth.
It may seem a paradox to designate the Church below by the name Jerusalem above. But every writer can choose his own terms and define them; and that the Apostle refers to the Church on earth is clear from the context. The argument is with the Jewish nationalist, who strove to force his law upon the Church then existing, and consisting of Jews and Gentiles; the Body, which the Apostle defends from aggression, is not the Church in heaven, but this Church; and this same Body he calls Jerusalem above. We understand, therefore, that the Apostle thus designates the Christian Church, as she now is, militant here on earth.
I. Style and title.Why Jerusalem above?
(a) Her Supreme Head is above.
(b) The Head of the Church not only rules the Church from above, but represents her above.
(c) Again, the laws of the Church are from above; her laws of righteousness and her dogmas of faith.
(d) Her inheritance is above. Her dower is not earthly honour, earthly riches, earthly endowments and establishments. If she happen to be possessed of such temporalities, they are merely accidents to her spiritual position.
(e) The Church is Divine in her origin and has come to us from above.
II. Independence.This being the position of the Church of God in herself and in relation to the world, the second point in the text follows as a certain consequencethe Declaration of her Independence, Jerusalem above is free! The Church was constituted by Christ as a complete society, and no society can be complete without power to legislate for itself in all things which belong to the essentials of the society. Consequently, legislative power belongs inherently to the Church. Moreover, as this society is alone supernatural, and there is no other society on earth which can claim to be so, her legislative power must be complete and supreme within herself; and therefore she is independent of all other and free. Inasmuch also as Christ has promised His Presence to His Church to the end of the world, her supreme deliberative power is guided by the Divine assistance. The Church is free because she is a Divine society. In the case before us, St. Paul vindicates her freedom on the ground of her Divine position. At this time it was the Jewish nationalist who sought to bind her with old Hagars chain. The Apostle, defending her charter, says, Stand fast in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made you free! At another time it was the imperial magistrate and secular judge who claimed the right and used the might to bind her; the same champion of her freedom, even when he lay a condemned felon in prison, lifts his chained hands and cries, A prisoner in bonds!but the Word of God is not bound.
Rev. Dr. A. Nicholson.
Illustration
Everything which is not free is from beneath. Every machination of Satan against Gods peopleevery dark heresy that comes to confine the Churchevery spiritual temptation which ensnares a mans conscienceevery distress which cramps a believers mind, is from beneath; therefore, because it is from beneath, it is bondage. Bondage is from below. As sure as ever you are living in fearin tied prayerin bound affectionsin mechanism of works under human meritso surely you are in an atmosphere low, too low for spiritual life. Jerusalem abovethat which your citizenship isis free.
Fuente: Church Pulpit Commentary
Gal 4:26. , [b -But the Jerusalem above is free, and she is our mother. The is doubtful, though received by Lachmann on the authority of A, C3, K, L, 3; but is rejected by Tischendorf on the authority of B, C1, D, F, 1, with the Syriac, Latin, and Coptic versions, and the majority of the fathers. The insertion may have come from the parallel clause, Rom 4:16, . The phrase with the addition is found, as Prof. Lightfoot quotes, in Polycarp, 3, and in Irenaeus,5:35, 2, at least in the Latin translation-mater omnium nostrum, p. 815, Op. vol. i. ed. Stieren. The is opposed to the last clause: on the contrary. The epithet cannot refer in a temporal sense to the Salem of Melchisedec (Michaelis, Paulus), nor in a local sense to the upper city – the city of David, the Acropolis (Vitringa, Elsner, Zachariae),-for it is the new covenant that Sarah symbolizes, and the of the previous verse is opposed to it. Nor does it mean the New Testament (Grotius, Rollock), based on the meaning of Jerusalem as signifying vision of peace. Nor is it directly the church of the New Testament (Sasbout, a Lapide, Bullinger). It is the heavenly–as opposed to the earthly Jerusalem, the ideal metropolis of Christ’s kingdom-the church before the second advent and the kingdom of glory after it-the heavenly Jerusalem, Heb 12:22; but different in conception and symbol from the new Jerusalem, Rev 21:2. The phrase is also a rabbinical one, for the Rabbins speak of the Jerusalem . But their heavenly Jerusalem was merely the counterpart of the earthly one in everything; as the book Sohar says, Whatever is on earth is also in heaven,-one argument being that the pattern of the tabernacle in heaven was shown to Moses, so that the one constructed might be a fac-simile; and the tabernacle is called by the apostle the pattern of things in heaven. Schoettgen’s Horae Heb. vol. i. p. 1205; Wetstein in loc.; Witsius, Miscellanea Sacra, vol. ii. p. 199. Not that the apostle thought of it as the Rabbins did; it was to him the metropolis in which believers are now enfranchised as citizens, Php 3:20, not the triumphant church in heaven (Rosenmller, Winer), nor what Hofmann calls die in der Person Christi schon himmlisch vollendete Gemeine. And she–is our mother,-no one of us is excluded; for the Jerusalem is not the visible church with many in it who are not believers, but the invisible or spiritual church, all whose members, whether Jews or Gentiles, are true disciples. The apostle does not develop the contrast with technical fulness. It might have been, , . . . . The parallel is broken in the apostle’s haste; he seizes only on the salient points; the doctrine imaged out was of more importance than the formal or rhetorical symmetry of the figure. The apostle, as has been remarked, uses , the more sacred name, as in the Apocalypse, but in referring to the earthly capital in Gal 1:18, Gal 2:1, he uses , the name found also in the fourth Gospel.
Fuente: Commentary on the Greek Text of Galatians, Ephesians, Colossians and Phillipians
Verse 26. This Jerusalem is figurative and means the church that was started in that city. Hebrew 12:22, 23 connects the name of this city with the church, which is the institution through which Christians obtain their spiritual relation with Sarah, the mother of the great Seed that was to bless all nations.
Gal 4:27
Verse 27. Some comments on this verse are offered at verse 24. The barren woman is Sarah who travailest not (does not have pains of childbirth) for the most of her life, and hence was desolate in that she had no child over which to rejoice until near the end of her life. Many more children. Isaac was the only son whom Sarah ever bore, but he was the person through whom Christ came into the world, by whom “all nations” were destined to furnish spiritual children for God. Hath an husband. Hagar was but the handmaid of Sarah, yet she was permitted to receive Abraham in the relation of husband and wife. However, the descendants from this union though numerous, were people of the heathen world and not spiritual children of God, as were the descendants of Sarah through Christ.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Gal 4:26. But the Jerusalem which is above (or, the upper Jerusalem) is free; and she is our mother (mother of us). The reading of the E. V. of us air is not sufficiently supported, and arose probably at an early time from Rom 4:16, the father of us all, or from a loose quotation of this passage by Polycarp. The other covenant, that which is represented by Sarah and her believing offspring, is the true or heavenly Jerusalem, that is not (as the rabbinical teachers imagined) an actual material city in heaven (the exact counterpart of the earthly Jerusalem), which was to be let down in the Messianic age, but a spiritual city, the Messianic theocracy, the kingdom of heaven, to which all true Christians belong, even here on earth, Php 3:20. The word above, therefore is not local, but ethical and spiritual; as in the phrase, the kingdom of heaven, to be born from above. Comp. the heavenly Jerusalem, Heb 12:22 (where it is contrasted with mount Sinai, Gal 4:18), the new Jerusalem, Rev 3:12; Rev 21:2.And she is our mother, the mother of us Christians. This passage and the concluding chapters of Revelation struck the keynote to the hymn Mother dear, Jerusalem, and the other New Jerusalem hymns in Latin, English, and German, which express so touchingly the Christians longing after his eternal home in heaven.
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
But the Jerusalem that is above [Phi 3:20; Heb 12:22; Rev 3:12; Rev 21:2] is free, which is our mother.
Fuente: McGarvey and Pendleton Commentaries (New Testament)
Verse 26
Jerusalem which is above; the spiritual Jerusalem; that is, the body of believers under the gospel.
Fuente: Abbott’s Illustrated New Testament
In the selfsame day was Abraham circumcised, and Ishmael his son. 27 And all the men of his house, born in the house, and bought with money of the stranger, were circumcised with him.”
The question now is this. Just why would Paul describe Ishmael as being in the bondage of the covenant as compared to Abraham which was under the promise? It would seem that Ishmael was under the covenant because dad forced it upon him, but not under any subservience or faith in God. God made a deal with Abraham for his son Ishmael thus putting Ishmael under another covenant. He was circumcised under the Abrahamic covenant, but was ultimately under a different promise of God, than the one given to Abraham – that which Isaac came under.
I suspect that Gen 17:18 is the key and the answer, “And Abraham said unto God, O that Ishmael might live before thee!” Evidently Ishmael had rejected God but God wanted to bless him as much as He could for Abraham’s sake.
Thus, Agar (Hagar) and Sarah are pictured as the two covenants – one of the law and one of grace; one of bondage, and one of freedom; one of the flesh and one of the spirit; one of sin and one of salvation.
Ishmael had no promise, he had only the law that he could not keep. Abraham and Isaac’s seed were under the law, but they also had the promise and the results future of that promise.
Gen 17:18 is of interest in the NASB. It adds a little to the conversation “But God said, “No, but Sarah your wife will bear you a son, It seems God knew Ishmael’s heart and that it was not going to change so God was moving on the Isaac front. (The NET Bible, ASV, New King James also inserts the “no.”)
Jamieson Fausset and Brown suggest that even though Ishmael did not produce the church that he may have enjoyed the benefit of it – not likely from what we’ve seen thus far.
Isaac is an interesting name in the Hebrew “yits-khawk” is how it is pronounced – imagine calling him to dinner – some would think you were sneezing me thinks. (“yitschaq” is the word.) Now here is the clincher, Isaac means “he laughs.”
The comments concerning Jerusalem show once again that the city that is so prominent in the Bible is of spiritual importance as well. It, when contrasted to Mt. Sinai is the contrast between law and grace. Jerusalem is pictured as above Mt. Sinai. This is true geographically, it is north and some east of Sinai, but it is also always up from anywhere in the world to the Israelite – they always went UP to Jerusalem. It is the center of all God’s activities with the Jew and in my mind it is the center of all activity with man in general. (See my study on the location of the Garden of Eden.)
Jerusalem is also contrasted with Sinai as free, while Sinai is in bondage.
One further note concerning Jerusalem being the center of activity of God’s dealing with mankind – verse twenty-six “But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all.” Mother of us all relates directly to spiritually in the context, of believers being free, but it may also look back to the city being the starting point of mankind. How else could it be the mother of us ALL?
You might find Heb 12:22 of interest in relation to Jerusalem – the city of God. “But ye are come unto mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels,”
Jerusalem isn’t just a tourist destination to make the pastors and television evangelists of our day money; it is the City of God. It is that place where God has dealt with man for centuries and will for the future unto the end. Jerusalem is God’s place on earth to work with mankind. Something special, not just a place of interest.
Fuente: Mr. D’s Notes on Selected New Testament Books by Stanley Derickson
4:26 But Jerusalem which is {e} above is free, which is the mother of us all.
(e) Which is excellent, and of great worth.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
Hagar also represents old Jerusalem, enslaved under Rome and the Mosaic Law, which Paul did not mention in Gal 4:26. Sarah represents the heavenly city of Jerusalem, the final destiny of departed believers, which is free. She is also the mother of all true believers.
The main features in this analogy are as follows.
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Hagar is the bond women |
Sarah is the free woman |
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Ishmael was born naturally |
Isaac was born supernaturally |
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The old covenant |
The new covenant |
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The earthly Jerusalem |
The heavenly Jerusalem |
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Judaism |
Christianity |