SEV Biblia, Chapter 4:24
Las cuales cosas son dichas por alegoría, porque estas mujeres son los dos pactos; el uno ciertamente del monte Sinaí, el cual engendr para servidumbre, que es Agar.
Clarke's Bible Commentary - Galatians 4:24
Verse 24. Which things are an allegory] They are to be understood spiritually; more being intended in the account than meets the eye. Allegory, from allov, another, and agorew, or agopeuw, to speak, signifies a thing that is a representative of another, where the literal sense is the representative of a spiritual meaning; or, as the glossary expresses it, eterwv kata metafrasin nooumena, kai ou kata thn anagnwsin? "where the thing is to be understood differently in the interpretation than it appears in the reading." Allegories are frequent in all countries, and are used by all writers. In the life of Homer, the author, speaking of the marriage of Jupiter and Juno, related by that poet, says: dokei tauta allhgoreisqai, oti hra men noeitai o ahr-zeuv de, o aiqhr? "It appears that these things are to be understood allegorically; for Juno means the air, Jupiter the aether." Plutarch, in his treatise Deuteronomy Iside et Osir., says: wsper ellhnev kronon allhgorousi ton cronon? "As the Greeks allegorize Cronos (Saturn) into Chronos (Time.)" It is well known how fond the Jews were of allegorizing. Every thing in the law was with them an allegory. Their Talmud is full of these; and one of their most sober and best educated writers, Philo, abounds with them. Speaking (Deuteronomy Migrat. Abrah., page 420) of the five daughters of Zelophehad, he says: av allhgorountev aisqhseiv einai famen? "which, allegorizing, we assert to be the five senses!" It is very likely, therefore, that the allegory produced here, St. Paul had borrowed from the Jewish writings; and he brings it in to convict the Judaizing Galatians on their own principles; and neither he nor we have any thing farther to do with this allegory than as it applies to the subject for which it is quoted; nor does it give any license to those men of vain and superficial minds who endeavour to find out allegories in every portion of the sacred writings, and, by what they term spiritualizing, which is more properly carnalizing, have brought the testimonies of God into disgrace.
May the spirit of silence be poured out upon all such corrupters of the word of God! For these are the two covenants] These signify two different systems of religion; the one by Moses, the other by the Messiah.
The one from the Mount Sinai] On which the law was published; which was typified by Hagar, Abraham's bond maid.
Which gendereth to bondage] For as the bond maid or slave could only gender-bring forth her children, in a state of slavery, and subject also to become slaves, so all that are born and live under those Mosaic institutions are born and live in a state of bondage-a bondage to various rites and ceremonies; under the obligation to keep the whole law, yet, from its severity and their frailness, obliged to live in the habitual breach of it, and in consequence exposed to the curse which it pronounces.
John Gill's Bible Commentary
Ver. 24. Which things are an allegory , etc..] Or are allegorized: so Sarah and Hagar were allegorized by Philo the Jew f87 , before they were by the apostle. Sarah he makes to signify virtue, and Hagar the whole circle of arts and sciences, which are, or should be, an handmaid to virtue; but these things respecting Hagar and Sarah, the bondwoman and the free, and their several offspring, are much better allegorized by the apostle here. An allegory is a way of speaking in which one thing is expressed by another, and is a continued metaphor; and the apostle's meaning is, that these things point at some other things; have another meaning in them, a mystical and spiritual one, besides the literal; and which the Jews call rdm , Midrash, a name they give to the mystical and allegorical sense of Scripture, in which they greatly indulge themselves. An allegory is properly a fictitious way of speaking; but here it designs an accommodation of a real history, and matter of fact, to other cases and things, and seems to intend a type or figure; and the sense to be, that these things which were literally true of Hagar and Sarah, of Ishmael and Isaac, were types and figures of things to come; just as what befell the Israelites were types and figures of things that would be under the Gospel dispensation, ( 1 Corinthians 10:11) for these are the two covenants , or testaments; that is, these women, Hagar and Sarah, signify, and are figures of the two covenants; not the covenant of works, and the covenant of grace. Hagar was no figure of the covenant of works, that was made and broke before she was born; besides, the covenant she was a figure of was made at Mount Sinai, whereas the covenant of works was made in paradise: moreover, the covenant of works was made with Adam, and all his posterity, but the covenant which Hagar signified was only made with the children of Israel; she represented Jerusalem, that then was with her children. Nor was Sarah a figure of the covenant of grace, for this was made long before she had a being, even from everlasting; but they were figures of the two administrations of one and the same covenant, which were to take place in the world successively; and which following one the other, are by the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews called the first and the second, the old and the new covenants.
Now these are the covenants or testaments, the old and the new, and the respective people under them, which were prefigured by these two women, and their offspring. The one from the Mount Sinai ; that is, one of these covenants, or one of the administrations of the covenant, one dispensation of it, which is the first, and now called old, because abolished, took its rise from Mount Sinai, was delivered there by God to Moses, in order to be communicated to the people of Israel, who were to be under that form of administration until the coming of the Messiah. And because the whole Mosaic economy was given to Moses on Mount Sinai, it is said to be from thence: hence, in Jewish writings, we read, times without number, of ynysm hml hklh , a rite, custom, constitution, or appointment given to Moses from Mount Sinai, the same phrase as here. Sinai signifies bushes, and has its name from the bushes which grew upon if, f88 ; in one of which the Lord appeared to Moses; for Horeb and Sinai are one and the same mount; one signifies waste and desolate, the other bushy; as one part of the mountain was barren and desert, and the other covered with bushes and brambles; and may fitly represent the condition of such that are under the law. Which gendereth to bondage ; begets and brings persons into a state of bondage, induces on them a spirit of bondage to fear, and causes them to be all their lifetime subject to it; as even such were that were under the first covenant, or under the Old Testament dispensation: which is Agar ; or this is the covenant, the administration of it, which Hagar, the bondwoman, Sarah's servant, represented.
Matthew Henry Commentary
Verses 21-27 - The difference between believers who rested in Christ only, and thos who trusted in the law, is explained by the histories of Isaac an Ishmael. These things are an allegory, wherein, beside the literal an historical sense of the words, the Spirit of God points out somethin further. Hagar and Sarah were apt emblems of the two differen dispensations of the covenant. The heavenly Jerusalem, the true churc from above, represented by Sarah, is in a state of freedom, and is the mother of all believers, who are born of the Holy Spirit. They were by regeneration and true faith, made a part of the true seed of Abraham according to the promise made to him.
Greek Textus Receptus
ατινα 3748 εστιν 2076 5748 αλληγορουμενα 238 5746 αυται 3778 γαρ 1063 εισιν 1526 5748 αι 3588 δυο 1417 διαθηκαι 1242 μια 1520 μεν 3303 απο 575 ορους 3735 σινα 4614 εις 1519 δουλειαν 1397 γεννωσα 1080 5723 ητις 3748 εστιν 2076 5748 αγαρ 28
Vincent's NT Word Studies
24. Are an allegory (estin allhgoroumena). N.T.o . Lit. are allegorised. From allo another, ajgoreuein to speak. Hence, things which are so spoken as to give a different meaning from that which the words express. For parable, allegory, fable, and proverb, see on Matthew xiii. 3.
