Thomas Aquinas Commentary Galatians 4:24

"Which things contain an allegory: for these [women] are two covenants; one from mount Sinai, bearing children unto bondage, which is Hagar." — Galatians 4:24 (ASV)

Above, the Apostle spoke of the mystical sense; here he discloses the mystery:

1. As to the mothers.
2. As to the sons (v. 28).

By the two mothers, he understands the two testaments. Therefore:

1. He states the thing signified.
2. He explains it: The one from Mount Sinai (v. 24).

He says, therefore, that these two wives, the slave woman and the free woman, are the two testaments, the Old and the New. “I will make with the house of Israel a new covenant” (behold, the New Testament), “not according to the covenant which I made with their fathers” (behold the Old Testament) (Jeremiah 31:31). For the free woman signifies the New Testament, and the slave woman the Old.

To understand what a testament is, we should consider that a testament is a pact or agreement dealing with matters confirmed by witnesses. Hence, in many places in Scripture, “pact” or “agreement” is used in place of “testament.” Now, whenever a pact or agreement is struck, a promise is made. Therefore, the diversity of testaments corresponds to the diversity of promises. Two kinds of things have been promised to us: temporal things in the Old Law, and eternal things in the New: “Rejoice and be glad, because your reward is great in heaven” (Matthew 5:12). These two promises are, therefore, the two testaments. Hence, when the Apostle says, The one from Mount Sinai, giving birth into slavery, he explains them:

1. As to the Old Testament.
2. As to the New Testament (v. 26).

To understand this text, it must first be noted that a citizen of a city is called its son, and the city itself his mother: “Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me” (Luke 23:28); “The noble sons of Sion” (Lamentations 4:2). Therefore, by becoming citizens of a city, people are made its sons. Now, there is a twofold city of God: one on earth, called the earthly Jerusalem, and the other in Heaven, called the heavenly Jerusalem. Furthermore, men were made citizens of the earthly city through the Old Testament, but of the heavenly city through the New. Therefore, concerning this, he does two things:

1. He expounds the mystery.
2. He accounts for the mystical explanation (v. 25).

He says first: I say that it signifies the two Testaments, namely, the Old and the New. In this respect he says: The one from Mount Sinai, giving birth into slavery. In this phrase, the place where it was given is mentioned first, namely, on Mount Sinai, as is recorded in Exodus 20. According to a Gloss, the mystical interpretation of this is that “Sinai” means “Commandment.” Hence, in Ephesians 2, the Apostle calls the Old Law the law of commandments.

Now, a mountain signifies pride: “Before your feet stumble upon the dark mountains” (Jeremiah 13:16). Hence, this mountain on which the Law was given signifies a twofold pride of the Jews: one by which they were arrogant against God—“I know your obstinacy and your most stiff neck” (Deuteronomy 31:27)—and the other by which they boasted at the expense of other nations, thus perverting what is said in Psalm 147:20: “He has not done in like manner to every nation; and his judgments he has not made manifest to them.”

Secondly, he explains the purpose for which it was given: not to make them free, but to make them children of a slave woman, giving birth into slavery. This is Hagar—that is, it is signified by Hagar, who gives birth into slavery—namely, the Old Testament. This it does with respect to three things: feeling, understanding, and fruit.

As to understanding, this concerns knowledge, because in man there is a twofold knowledge. One is free, when he knows the truth of things as they are in themselves; the other is slavish, that is, veiled under figures, as was the knowledge of the Old Testament. As to feeling, the New Law produces the feeling of love, which pertains to freedom, for one who loves is moved by his own initiative. The Old, on the other hand, produces the feeling of fear, in which there is servitude, for one who fears is moved not by his own initiative but by another’s: “You have not received the spirit of bondage again in fear; but you have received the spirit of adoption of sons” (Romans 8:15). As to the fruit, the New Law begets sons to whom the inheritance is owed, whereas those whom the Old Law begets are owed small presents, as to servants: “The servant abides not in the house forever; but the son abides forever” (John 8:35).

Then he gives the explanation of the mystery when he says: Sinai is a mountain in Arabia, which corresponds to the present Jerusalem, and is in bondage with her children. But here a difficulty arises, for since Sinai is almost a twenty-day journey from Jerusalem, it seems false that Sinai is connected to or borders on Jerusalem, as the Apostle says here.

To this, a Gloss responds in a mystical manner that Sinai is in Arabia, which stands for the degradation or affliction under which the Old Testament was given, because the men under it were oppressed by physical observances in the manner of slaves and foreigners: “This is a yoke which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear” (Acts 15:10). This mountain is near Jerusalem not by spatial continuity but by a likeness to the present Jerusalem—that is, to the Jewish people—because just as they love earthly things and are under the bondage of sin for the sake of temporal things, so that mountain gave birth into slavery.

But this does not seem to be the Apostle’s intention. For he wants to show that from the very place of bondage, the Old Testament, which was given on Mount Sinai, gives birth to children for slavery. This is because it was given on Sinai not as a place where the children of Israel were to remain, but as a stage in their journey to the promised land. For Jerusalem, too, gives birth to sons for slavery. Hence, it is in this respect that Mount Sinai is continuous with her. And this is what he says: which corresponds to (that is, by being part of the continuous route followed by those going to Jerusalem) the present Jerusalem, and is in bondage with her children. This refers to the bondage of legal observances (from which Christ redeemed us), of various sins—“He that commits sin is the servant of sin” (John 8:34)—and, literally, of bondage under the Romans who were their masters.

Then, when he says, But that Jerusalem which is above is free, he discloses the mystery of the free woman.

1. He discloses the mystery.
2. He refers to a prophecy (v. 27).

The first point can be understood in two ways, according to whether we understand this mother to be the one by whom we are born, which is the Church Militant, or the mother whose sons we become, which is the Church Triumphant: “He has regenerated us unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead” (1 Peter 1:3). Hence, we are so generated in the present Church Militant as to arrive at the Triumphant. In explaining it thus, our mother is described by four things: by her sublimity, when he says, above; secondly, by her name, when he says, Jerusalem; thirdly, by her freedom, when he says, is free; and fourthly, by her fruitfulness, when he says, our mother.

She is sublime on account of the face-to-face vision of God and the perfect enjoyment of God; this relates to the Church Triumphant: “Then you shall see, and abound, and your heart shall wonder and be enlarged” (Isaiah 60:5); “Mind the things that are above” (Colossians 3:2). She is also sublime through faith and hope, as this relates to the Church Militant: “Our conversation is in heaven” (Philippians 3:20); “Who is this that comes up from the desert, flowing with delights?” (Song of Solomon 8:5).

Further, she is a peacemaker, because she is Jerusalem, that is, “vision of peace.” This belongs to the Church Triumphant as having perfect peace: “Who has placed peace in your borders” (Psalms 147:14); “My people shall sit in the beauty of peace” (Isaiah 32:18). Likewise, it pertains to the Church Militant, which possesses the peace of resting in Christ: “In me you shall have peace” (John 16:33).

Furthermore, she is free: “Because the creature also itself shall be delivered from the servitude of corruption” (Romans 8:21). This applies to both the Church Triumphant and the Church Militant, according to Revelation 21:2: “I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God.” Finally, she is fruitful, because she is our mother: Militant, as giving birth; Triumphant, as the one whose sons we become: “Shall Sion say: This man and that man is born of her” (Psalms 86:5); “Your sons shall come from afar, and your daughters shall rise up at your side” (Isaiah 60:4).

For it is written in Isaiah 54:1, according to the Septuagint. Here a prophecy is mentioned which proves, first, that the mother referred to is free, and second, that she is fruitful. With respect to the first, it should be noted that a fertile woman first has sorrow in giving birth, but this is followed by joy in seeing the child: “A woman when she is in labor has sorrow, because her hour is come; but when she has brought forth the child, she remembers no more her anguish for joy that a man is born into the world” (John 16:21). But a barren woman neither suffers the pangs of birth nor has joy in a child. Again, there is a difference between bearing and laboring. For the latter refers to the effort to bear, whereas the former refers to the releasing of the fetus now formed. Therefore, the fertile woman experiences pain in labor but joy in bearing; the sterile woman, on the other hand, experiences neither the pain of labor nor the joy of bearing.

But these are the two things which the prophet announces to the barren woman: Rejoice, you barren, that do not bear: break forth and cry, you that do not travail. Here he speaks of Jerusalem, which he calls free and which is signified by the barren Sarah. For the Church of the Gentiles was barren before their conversion, when they offered their sons not to God but to the devil. Hence it is said to Babylon: “Barrenness and widowhood will come upon you, because of the multitude of your sorceries” (Isaiah 47:9). The Church Triumphant, too, was barren before the passion of Christ, because no sons were born to her who entered into glory, except in hope. For a mighty siege engine blocked the entrance to Paradise, so that no one might enter.

To this barren one he says: Rejoice, you that do not bear. It is as if to say: The barren, as has been said, are sorrowful not because they bear, but because they do not bear: “As Anna had her heart full of grief, she prayed to the Lord, shedding many tears” (1 Samuel 1:10). But you shall rejoice in the great number of your children: “Then your heart shall wonder and be enlarged,” that is, you will show the joy in your soul outwardly (Isaiah 60:5). For there are two things in childbirth: the pain from the rupturing of the membrane enclosing the child in the womb, and the crying from pain. Hence he says, you that do not travail—that is, the Church Militant, which makes no effort to bear through desire, and the Church Triumphant, which does not cry from labor. Or, because the time for having sons has not yet come, break forth—that is, show outwardly the joy you have within—and cry with sounds of praise: “Cry, cease not, lift up your voice like a trumpet” (Isaiah 58:1). These two things, to cry and to break forth, pertain to freedom. Thus the freedom of the mother is made manifest.

He follows with her fruitfulness: for many are the children of the desolate, more than of her that has a husband. But since it was said above that the free Church is signified by Sarah, there seems to be some doubt whether Sarah was desolate. I answer that she was made desolate by Abraham, as it is said here, not by a divorce but with respect to the work of the flesh. For Abraham resorted to the work of the flesh not for pleasure but to obtain a child. Therefore, when he learned that Sarah was barren, he abandoned her—not by forsaking the marriage bed, but by not resorting to her from the very time that Sarah introduced the slave woman to him.

By this we are given to understand that the Church of the Gentiles was left desolate by Christ, because Christ had not yet come, and that the Church Triumphant was desolate of men, for whom no means of entry was open. Of this desolate woman, the Church of the Gentiles, there are many children—more than of her, the synagogue, that has a husband, namely, Moses: “The barren has borne many: and she that had many children is weakened” (1 Samuel 2:5). And this is due to the coming of the husband, Christ, by whom she had been left desolate not for want of love, but because the bearing of children had been delayed.