the flesh, was not only a bondman, but was cast out of his father’s house; but Isaac, who was born according to the promise, being a true son and free, was lord of all. Ver. 24. “Which things contain an allegory.”112 Contrary to usage, he calls a type an allegory; his meaning is as follows; this history not only declares that which appears on the face of it, but announces somewhat farther, whence it is called an allegory. And what hath it announced? no less than all the things now present. Ver. 24. “For these women,” he says, “are two covenants; one from mount Sinai, bearing children unto bondage, which is Hagar.” “These:” who? the mothers of those children, Sarah and Hagar; and what are they? Two covenants, two laws. As the names of the women were given in the history, he abides by this designation of the two races, showing how much follows from the very names. How from the names? Ver. 25. “Now this Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia:” The bond-woman was called Hagar, and “Hagar” is the word for Mount Sinai in the language of that country.113 So that it is necessary that all who are born of the Old Covenant should be bondmen, for that mountain where the Old Covenant was delivered hath a name in common with the bondwoman. And it includes Jerusalem, for this is the meaning of, Ver. 25. “And answereth to Jerusalem that now is.” That is, it borders on, and is contiguous to it.114 Ver. 25. “For she is in bondage with her children.” What follows from hence? Not only that she was in bondage and brought forth bondmen, but that this Covenant is so too, whereof the bondwoman was a type. For Jerusalem is adja- 112 [“The story of Hagar and Sarah has another (namely a figurative, typical) meaning besides (not instead of) the literal or historical. Paul does not deny the fact but makes it the bearer of a general idea which was more fully expressed in two covenants. He uses allegorical here in a sense similar to the word “typical” in 1 Cor. x. 11.”—Schaff.—G.A.] [See on this difficult passage Schaff’s Excursus in Com. and Lightfoot’s Excursus xiii. Com. p. 368.—G.A.] 113 [So Meyer: “In Arabia the name Hagar (τὸ ῞Αγαρ) signifies Mt. Sinai.” But Schaff says: “It cannot be sat- isfactorily proven that the name Hagar was an Arabic designation for Mt. Sinai, as the testimonies of Chrysostom and the traveler Harant are isolated and unconfirmed. The shorter reading, ‘For Sinai is a mountain in Arabia’ (το γὰρ Σινᾶ ὄρος ἐστίν ἐν τῇ ᾽Αραβί& 139·) given by the Sinaitic and other mss. and preferred by Lachmann, Tischendorf and Lightfoot (Excursus p. 361 of Com.) is quite intelligible and easily gives rise to the longer reading.”—G.A.] 114 [“This interpretation of Chrysostom is hardly the right one. The subject of συνστοιχεῖ is Hagar and not Mt. Sinai—a view which runs counter to the context. It means that Hagar belongs to the same category with the present Jerusalem, is like it in that she was a bondwoman as Jerusalem with its children is also in bondage.” Meyer.—G.A.] 68 Galatians 4:1-3