Ver. 3. Having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh?—What monstrous folly is this! Will you so violate the Divine order of progress? The flesh may be easily mistaken for the Spirit, even by those who have made progress, unless they continue to maintain a pure faith (Bengel).
Ver. 4. Have ye suffered so many things in vain?—Since ye might have avoided them by professing Judaism. Will ye lose the reward promised for all suffering?
Ver. 5. He that worketh miracles among you.—In you, at your conversion and since.
Ver. 6. Even as Abraham believed God.—Where justification is there the Spirit is, so that if the former comes by faith the latter must also.
Ver. 8. Preached before the Gospel unto Abraham.—Thus the Gospel in its essential germ is older than the law, though the full development of the former is subsequent to the latter. The promise to Abraham was in anticipation of the Gospel, not only as announcing the Messiah, but also as involving the doctrine of righteousness by faith.
Ver. 10. As many as are of the works of the law are under the curse.—This the Scripture itself declares. It utters an anathema against all who fail to fulfil every single ordinance contained in the book of the law (Deut. xxvii. 26).
Ver. 13. Christ hath redeemed us from the curse.—Bought us off from our bondage and from the curse under which all lie who trust to the law. The ransom price He paid was His own precious blood (1 Pet. i. 18, 19). Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree.—Christ’s bearing the particular curse of hanging on the tree is a sample of the general curse which He representatively bore. Not that the Jews put to death malefactors by hanging, but after having put them to death otherwise, in order to brand them with peculiar ignominy, they hung the bodies on a tree, and such malefactors were accursed by the law. The Jews in contempt called Him the hanged one. Hung between heaven and earth as though unworthy of either.
Ver. 17. The covenant, that was confirmed before of God in Christ, the law cannot disannul.—From the recognised inviolability of a human covenant (ver. 15), the apostle argues the impossibility of violating the Divine covenant. The law cannot set aside the promise.
Ver. 19. Wherefore then serveth the law?—As it is of no avail for justification, is it either useless or contrary to the covenant of God? It was added because of transgressions.—To bring out into clearer view the transgression of the law; to make men more fully conscious of their sins, by being perceived as transgression of the law, and so make them long for the promised Saviour. It was ordained by angels in the hand of a Mediator.—As instrumental enactors of the law. In the giving of the law the angels were representatives of God; Moses, as mediator, represented the people.
Ver. 20. Now a Mediator is not a mediator of one, but God is one.—The very idea of mediation supposes two persons at least, between whom the mediation is carried on. The law then is of the nature of a contract between two parties—God on the one hand, and the Jewish people on the other. It is only valid so long as both parties fulfil the terms of the contract. It is therefore contingent and not absolute. Unlike the law, the promise is absolute and unconditional. It depends on the sole decree of God. There are not two contracting parties. There is nothing of the nature of a stipulation. The Giver is everything, the recipient nothing (Lightfoot).