Charles Ellicott Commentary Galatians 4:25

"Now this Hagar is mount Sinai in Arabia and answereth to the Jerusalem that now is: for she is in bondage with her children." — Galatians 4:25 (ASV)

For this Agar is mount Sinai in Arabia.—This clause will perhaps be best dealt with in an excursus. For now, we will merely summarize the result by saying that the true (or, rather, most probable) reading appears to be: Now this Agar is Mount Sinai in Arabia; and the meaning: “By the word Hagar is meant Mount Sinai in Arabia.” There appears to be sufficient evidence to show that Hagar can be regarded as the Arabic name for Sinai, so there would be a special reason for identifying Hagar allegorically with the old covenant. For a fuller discussion, see Excursus B (p. 467).

Answereth to Jerusalem which now is.—The word for “answereth” is a technical term in philosophy, applied to the parallel columns containing such antithetical pairs as good—evil; one—many; finite—infinite, etc. Here it will be illustrated by the parallel arrangement of the different points of the allegory given above. “Answereth to” will thus mean “stands in the same column with.” Hagar, Sinai, the old covenant, the Jewish nation, or the earthly Jerusalem, all stand on the same side of the antithesis. They are arranged one above another, or, in other words, they rank in the same line, which is the primitive meaning of the word.

Jerusalem which now is.—The present Jerusalem—i.e., the Jewish people still subject to the Law. It is opposed to Jerusalem which is above, as the pre-Messianic to the Messianic system.

And is in bondage with her children.—The true reading is, for she is in bondage with her children. Jerusalem is, so to speak, personified, so that “with her Children” means “all who are dependent upon her”—the Jewish system and all who belong to it.

EXCURSUS B: ON THE PASSAGE (Galatians 4:25),
FOR THIS AGAR IS MOUNT SINAI IN ARABIA.

The words For this Agar is Mount Sinai in Arabia present difficulties that seem to need a somewhat longer and more technical discussion than could properly be given to them in the body of the Commentary. It has therefore seemed more desirable to devote a short excursus to them, as the view taken is one that, in this instance, diverges from that adopted by more than one of the best authorities, and conspicuously by Dr. Lightfoot.

The first question is one of reading. The words appear in no fewer than four different forms. Two of these, however, can be set aside at once. For the two that remain, the authorities are nearly equally balanced. The simple reading For Sinai is a mountain in Arabia has in its favour the Sinaitic MS.; the Codex Ephraem; the Codex Augiensis, in the library of Trinity College, Cambridge; and another Dresden MS., which usually agrees with it and seems to have been derived from the same copy; a good—perhaps the best—cursive; quotations in Origen and Epiphanius; and the Latin authorities generally.

The other reading, Now this Agar is Mount Sinai in Arabia, is supported by the Vatican, Alexandrine, and Claromontane MSS., and by a fourth MS., now at Paris, which bears a somewhat similar relation to the Claromontane as the Dresden Codex does to the Augiensis; a good cursive (somewhat inferior to that on the other side); and the Memphitic version.

Balancing these authorities, the preponderance would seem—if we may venture to say so, where Dr. Lightfoot thinks differently—to be with the longer reading last mentioned. It is true that the list on the other side is more copious and represents a wider diffusion of text; but, taking the two groups together, we believe that the second represents the older and purer form of text, and that its readings will be verified in the greater number of instances.

Indeed, it is just that very group, headed by the Codex Sinaiticus, that marks the first stage of corruption—one of the very first and earliest forms of corruption, it is true, and one that is most nearly allied to the true text, but still a corruption and deviation from the original.

But if the external evidence bears in this direction, internal evidence would seem to confirm it. No doubt, internal evidence is a treacherous and double-edged weapon, and it is very often as easy to turn it to one side as to the other. It has been quoted here in support of the shorter reading, and something, perhaps, is to be said for that view.

Still, the simpler and more obvious considerations (which should be chiefly considered) seem to point rather decidedly the other way. The longer reading is much the more difficult, but it is one of the chief canons of internal evidence that the more difficult reading is to be preferred. It is also easy to see from the form of the Greek phrase what would induce an ignorant scribe to change it and, in doing so, simplify it. Or, even failing this, the hypothesis of an omission—always one of the most natural of accidents—is never very forced.

The reading of the Received Text (with the slight change of “now” instead of “for”) would seem, then, on the whole, to be the more probable. The next question is, assuming this reading, how should it be understood? There is an Arabic word corresponding very nearly (though not quite) in sound to “Hagar,” with the meaning “stone.”

Hence Chrysostom, in his exposition of this Epistle, assumes that St. Paul is playing on this similarity of sound. He says that Sinai “is so called (or translated) in the native tongue” of the Arabs, and he speaks of the mountain as “bearing the same name as the bondmaid.” This statement by Chrysostom does not appear to have received much independent corroboration, though one traveller (Harant), in the sixteenth century, makes the same assertion.

Still, even if Sinai were not called in a special sense “the stone” or “rock,” the identity of the Arabic word for “rock” might possibly have suggested to St. Paul a play on words very much in his style. We might imagine him arguing: “The very word Hagar, itself the name for ‘rock,’ suggests the appropriateness of the analogy I am applying. It points to the parallel between the stern and relentless legislation of Sinai and the history of Hagar the bondwoman and her son, who persecuted the child of promise.”

The literary methods of today are different, and such an explanation will seem far-fetched. It might be considered a conclusive argument against it that, whether St. Paul himself knew the Arabic meaning of “Hagar” or not, he could not expect a Celtic people like the Galatians to know it. But even this argument is less conclusive when applied to someone like St. Paul, who is so fond of following the course of his own thought. And yet, it must be admitted that there are too many elements of uncertainty for the explanation to be pressed very strongly: it must remain a possibility—and nothing more.

On the other hand, even if this explanation should break down, it would not necessarily follow that the reading must be abandoned—it would only lose some of its point. We would then simply have an assertion where otherwise there would also be an argument: “This Hagar—the Hagar of whom I am speaking—stands for Mount Sinai, which is in Arabia, the country of Hagar. The scene of the Mosaic legislation was part of the domains of the Ishmaelites, the children of Hagar, so the two may very well be compared.”

This interpretation has the authority of Theodore of Mopsuestia and Theodoret, and it is, perhaps, the safest to fall back upon. At the same time, there may be some truth to the additional point that Chrysostom and those who have followed him in modern times have supposed.