Jason Conrad
How will we be judged? As a Christian, should I continue to defend and to practice the Law of Moses? Though Paul felt he had clearly taught the answer to these questions, the Galatian Christians fell under the sway of teachers who led them in a different direction. Perplexed by their lapse, Paul penned this letter to revisit those very questions in a highly creative and potent fashion. Since Paul's day, many teachers have come and gone swaying Christians in the wrong direction just like Paul's opponents. In the midst of confusion on these central issues, this commentary seeks to settle the conscience of the modern reader by answering those very questions.
Jason Conrad, M. Div., lives in South Carolina with his wife Jennifer.
He is the Vice President for Academic Affairs and professor of New Testament, theology, and church history at Christ Central Institute.
Jason is also the author of The Call to Care: Charity in Ancient Christianity. For more on Jason’s work visit the Christ Central Institute website at
www.ccins.org.
Excerpt from Chapter 6: An Appeal to the Prophets (3:10-14)
This claim was rather unique to Paul, and it strikes at a rooted misinterpretation in Jewish tradition. It is essentially the same claim that he made in Romans 3:23. All people have sinned willfully. Laying aside any talk of an age of accountability and such, the statement is very clear. All people at some point, young or old, have sinned by choice. Paul knew the Mosaic Law left ample room for people to find forgiveness for sins committed in ignorance or on accident. But Paul’s claim was that the Mosaic Law left no room for people who sinned willfully, even once. Consequently, all people are under the Mosaic Law’s curse.
Paul’s claim denied his own Jewish traditions about willful sin. The clearest passage in the Mosaic Law concerning willful, presumptuous sin was Numbers 15:30-31. It declared no sacrifice or chance for forgiveness when a person willfully transgressed the Mosaic Law. They were to be “cut off,” “extirpated,” killed. Significantly, Jewish tradition reinterpreted this passage to have the death penalty applicable only when a person committed idolatry or blasphemed the Name of God. In the Jewish list of 36 sins that merited the death penalty, willful sin in general was not listed.
In 3:11-12, Paul moved to two other passages in the Scriptures to further prove this same point that the Mosaic Law was not designed to guide people to be justified at the Judgment Day. Paul even states boldly that this conclusion was “evident,” unmistakably clear to understand. He made his self-evident conclusion by comparing a verse from the Law with a verse from the prophets.
