But before faith came, we were guarded under law, shut up to faith [which was] about to be revealed.
Paul looks back at the centuries before Christ came. He describes that whole era as custody: people held under law, waiting. Who is the "we" being held? And is the law here a jailer or a protector?
The pronouns matter. One writer says readers often take this verse as a picture of their own Christian life:
We must notice here a very common mistake. People often misquote this scripture, as though it said that the law is our schoolmaster to bring us to Christ (Gal. 3:23-25). Bear in mind that the word "we" refers to the Jews, and "ye" applies just as plainly to the Gentiles, who had never been under the law... Now, to change all this and apply it to us, the Gentiles, is to deny that faith has come. In effect it denies that Christ has come. It goes back to the schoolmaster, as if Christ still had to come and deliver us from him.
Paul speaks of faith as something that arrived at a point in time. One writer explains what arrived:
Faith here means Christian faith: the principle of relationship with God. Before it came, the positive objects of faith — the Person, the work, and the glory of Christ as man — had not yet become the means of establishing the faith of the gospel. Until then the Jews were kept under the law, shut in with a view to enjoying this privilege that was still to come.
Being kept was not comfortable. People looked to the law for rescue, but it held the keys, and a believer under it lived in bondage:
If all are shut up in hopelessness under sin, the law itself takes the place of a jailer. Men look to it for deliverance, but it acts as the very strength of sin, to make them aware how completely sin ruled them... His spirit is and must be the spirit of bondage. He is "a prisoner of hope," craving liberty, yet not knowing how to get it... The law kept even the saints who were under it, as it were, in jail. Look at Hezekiah. He was in bondage under fear of death, shut up in prison, waiting for the faith that would later be revealed.
One writer works from an older translation that reads "guarded under law" instead of "held captive," and shows what that guarding did:
"But before the coming of that faith we were being constantly guarded under law."... It is true that the law turned their sin into transgression and showed how bad they were. But the law did more than this. It guarded them from the idolatry that was all around them. There was one nation in the world (even though that nation had failed so terribly) that still held the truth and the knowledge of the One true God... The law was not the means of justifying them, for they did not keep it; but they were shut in under the obligation to keep it.
The confinement had a direction. There was only one way out of it, and the law itself offered none:
Scripture had confined all under sin. Then the Law, which held authority over Israel, shut them in even more firmly to faith. Faith was the only way of escape from their bondage to sin and to the Law. Law gave no hope of escape, but tended to increase the misery of confinement. Faith is the only door out of sin and out of the Law. But it is a door thrown wide open in Christ and His accomplished redemption.
The custody described here belonged to a stage that has closed. Even the best of those under it were treated as minors:
Under the law, before Christ came, the choicest saint alive was treated as a child under age. So the schoolmaster kept him, convicted of sin and shut up to the faith that the coming of Christ would reveal. Now faith has come, because Christ, the Object of faith, is revealed. We come out of that guardianship and take our place as sons in the Father's house.
- Kept — for whom. "We" means the Jews under the law, not the Christian today. To apply it to ourselves is to act as though Christ had not yet come.
- Kept — as prisoner. The law that men hoped would free them became the jailer. Even a believer under it had the spirit of bondage — "a prisoner of hope."
- Kept — as guard. The same guarding kept one nation clear of the idolatry all around it. So the knowledge of the true God survived.
- Kept — until. The confinement pointed one way only. Faith was the single exit, and Christ's finished redemption threw that door wide open.
- Kept — no longer. "Faith" here is the whole revealed system that came with Christ. Now that it has come, the child under age grows up: we take our place as sons in the Father's house.
So that the law has been our tutor up to Christ, that we might be justified on the principle of faith.
Paul has just said the law was added because of transgressions, until the promised offspring came. Now he gives the law a job title. One word settles how the whole verse reads. Was the law a teacher who drives sinners to Christ? Or a minder who kept God's people until Christ came?
Older Bibles call this person a schoolmaster; the ESV calls him a guardian. The picture came from ordinary household life in Greece and Rome. It was not a picture of a classroom.
Wealthy families in Greece and Rome often put a man in charge of boys from about age six until about sixteen. This man would have complete charge of the boy, and would be responsible for his manners and for his morals. He would have the authority to punish him when necessary. He would take him to school, though he would not generally teach him. This man was very often a slave... You will understand this man was really more of a guardian than a teacher... This is just what the law was to Israel. It was given to train them, to show them their own wickedness, and to punish them.
Older English Bibles print the words "to bring us" in italics. That means the translators added them. The ESV leaves them out, and the writers here say they should go.
"To bring us" has no business here. The meaning is that the law was a schoolmaster dealing with these Jews, until Christ came... This is not about bringing people to Christ now. The effect of the law is instead to minister death and condemnation, as Scripture tells us plainly elsewhere. God may let people come under sentence of death in this way, and afterwards bring them out of it by Christ. But no one can say that a power that kills is itself the means of bringing people to Christ.
The same point cuts down a popular use of the verse:
Upon this the statement is often made that the law is like a whip to bring us to accept Christ. But that is not the meaning. The law was the schoolmaster for the Jews until Christ came — the schoolmaster up to the time of Christ.
Paul writes "our" in this verse, then "you" two verses later. The switch marks off who was ever in this school.
The law was a schoolmaster to the Jews, not to the Gentiles. Paul said "we" in Gal. 3:24, in contrast to "you" in Gal. 3:26. It was their schoolmaster until Christ came, but any led to Christ were no longer under that schoolmaster.
If the law was not driving people to Christ, it was still teaching while it waited for Him.
There were two lessons to learn. First, we cannot keep the law. Second, the system of sacrifice pointed on to the sinner's only hope: Christ and His finished work. Thus the law is a tutor, a schoolmaster, till Christ appears on the scene.
The verse says justification comes by faith, not by the schoolmaster. One writer lists what the law could and could not do:
It could curse. It could kill. It could not give life. So righteousness could not come by it. Nor could it condemn sin in the flesh. Yet even now it is good, we learn, if a man uses it lawfully. It was made not for the righteous, but for the lawless and the disobedient... And no one whom God had put under the law could have got free from its curse, if the Lord Jesus Christ had not become a curse for them.
The picture also marks what the law never gave, and what faith gives instead.
The schoolmaster is not the Father. He is the one the child is put under, to be cared for until the child is ready to deal directly with the Father's mind. Under law, it was like saying to a child under age, "Do this, and do that," without giving reasons. But those brought to be Abraham's seed by being put in Christ are all "sons of God, through faith."
Verse 25 sets the believer free from the guardian. That freedom can be taken in two wrong ways.
When we grow up, we usually respect and value our schoolmasters more than we ever did before. We do not want to get rid of them — that would be lawlessness — nor to stay under their authority — that would be the Galatian error, and against Christ.
- Guardian: the "schoolmaster" was a household servant who walked a boy to school and disciplined him. His job was charge and restraint, not teaching.
- Until: "until Christ came" fixes an end date. The law minded Israel until Christ came; it was never the whip that drives sinners to Him.
- Ours: Paul says "our," meaning the Jews. Gentiles were never put in that school at all.
- Unable: the law could curse and kill, but it could not give life. So justification had to come by faith. Freedom from its curse came only because Christ became a curse for them.
- Sons: the guardian is not the Father. Once faith came, the schoolroom ended. Believers stand as sons — free from the law, but not free to live as they please.