There is no Jew nor Greek; there is no bondman nor freeman; there is no male and female; for ye are all one in Christ Jesus
Paul has just told the Galatians that faith in Christ, not law-keeping, makes a person a child of God. This verse closes that argument. It names three walls that once divided people, and it raises a question: does being "one in Christ Jesus" erase who you are as a Jew or Greek, a slave or free person, a man or a woman?
The three pairs are not random. Each names a different kind of barrier.
In the new creation there is neither Jew nor Greek [no national or religious distinction], there is neither slave nor free [no social distinction], there is no male and female [no natural distinction].
Teachers were pushing the Galatians back under the law. Writers point out what that move does. It brings back the very differences this verse removes.
By pushing people back to the Jewish law, they had brought national differences back to life. They even created new ones they had not noticed before. Legalism always insists on the difference between the Jew and the Gentile, and claims the Jew is superior... Under the law, women had a lower place in worship than men. The males were the appointed worshippers at the great national gatherings... But now males do not go up alone to keep God's feasts. Believers of either sex are heirs together of the grace of life. Both come alike into the presence of the Father. Both come to the throne of grace where He sits. Both come in the same powerful Name, and by the one Spirit who lives in them.
The reason lies in the two words at the end: in Christ. If everyone is in Christ, then what God sees is the same in every case.
God sees His perfection, His beauty, on us. He sees nothing else — no earthly condition, no special standing... If each one of us is in Christ, then Christ must be the same for each and all of us. There can be no distinction here. For distinction, we must look away from Christ.
The differences listed belong to the world as it now is. Christ's people already belong to a new order — though, one writer notes, their bodies do not yet.
In the last chapter we find that in Christ Jesus there is new creation. That is why all the differences of the old creation are gone. This new creation work has already reached our souls, though not yet our bodies. So we cannot yet take these things up in an absolute way... Still, even now we are in Christ Jesus. So we can learn to see each other apart from these differences, and lifted above them.
Writers here draw a line. The verse speaks of our place before God, and they warn against two ways it has been misused.
All these differences belong to the old creation. The risen Christ brings all into equal blessing and privilege. It is a question of our place and portion in Him. Let us be careful to keep the passage to that. People have used it to set aside or belittle the ordinary relationships of life. Others have used it to justify a woman taking the man's place in the services of God. But this twists the plain words of Paul. God approves the ordinary relationships of life in Christianity, just as before, and the letters of the New Testament all give order to them.
One writer follows that second misuse into the home.
The husband would give up his rightful place of authority. The wife would lose her only happy place of subjection. And where would the Christian child be if this idea were carried out? As children of God, all do stand on the same level. Father, mother and child, if they believe, enjoy the same spiritual privileges.
This oneness was not just a teaching. It produced a community the surrounding world could not explain.
...the new brotherhood that astonished the world. It included women whom faith in Christ had set free. They had been treated as mere servants and playthings by men. Now they stood in a close, shared relationship where Jew or Greek, slave or free, male and female cannot be; "for you are all one in Christ Jesus."
- One garment. Because every believer is in Christ, God sees the same beauty on each — nothing else, no earthly condition, no extra privilege.
- One standing. The three walls fall: national and religious, social, natural. Legalism put the Jew above the Gentile and women below men; in Christ both sexes reach the Father by the same Name and one Spirit.
- One creation. The differences belong to the old creation. The new creation has reached our souls, not yet our bodies. So we cannot take this up in an absolute way today.
- One caution. Standing before God is not the same as roles on earth. God still approves the ordinary relationships of life. The New Testament letters give order to them. Using this verse against them twists Paul's plain words.
- One brotherhood. Lived out, this oneness astonished the world. Others could see it, not just hear it.
but if *ye* [are] of Christ, then ye are Abraham's seed, heirs according to promise.
Teachers in Galatia told Gentile believers to get circumcised and keep the law of Moses to count as Abraham's family. Paul's answer points to a Person, not a ceremony: the claim rests on two words, "Christ's" and "promise."
Everything turns on the opening phrase. One writer notes that a closer rendering — "if you are of Christ" — makes the logic plain.
The most vital point is this: Christ Himself is the Seed of Abraham. All believers are represented in Christ — they are "of Christ." So because He is Abraham's seed, they are too. Faith has brought them into this position and given them a close connection with Christ. It is a faith that sees its own worthlessness. It turns away from self completely and finds all good, all blessing, in the blessed Person of the Son of God. The promise was made to Abraham and to his Seed — that is, to Christ. Our own wonderful place of blessing is as "fellow heirs with Christ" (Romans 8:17).
So the title comes to us only through Him: we are Abraham's seed because we are Christ's.
Paul's answer had a practical target: the demand that Gentiles take up Jewish rites.
That is to say, they did not have to submit to circumcision, or any other rite of the law, to get the promises. The Holy Spirit brings us into these promises through having Christ. If you are striving to gain them by law, you lose them; if you receive Christ, they are certainly yours. He is the true seed of Abraham, and, having Christ, I have all the promises of God.
Another writer puts it from the Galatians' side. They already were what the teachers told them to become.
The Galatian believers saw that they needed to be linked with Abraham. But how to do that was the question. Teachers who pressed the Jewish law claimed to have the answer. They insisted on the rite of circumcision and on keeping the law of Moses. Paul showed them the error of all this... and told them that they were Abraham's seed already, because they were in Christ.
The verse redraws the line of who counts as Abraham's family.
The fatness — that is, spiritual enrichment — did not come to a man because he was a direct descendant of Abraham as a Jew. It came because he shared Abraham's faith and shared the blessing Abraham enjoyed. And this is open to Gentiles as well.
The word "heirs" points forward to what is not yet in hand.
The apostle has been reasoning earlier that Christ is the true seed of Abraham. Here He brings us into the same place. We share it. All that is true of Him, as the risen and accepted Man, is true of everyone who believes. He has given us His standing and portion, and we are to inherit all things with Him in the coming day.
The last phrase names the principle on which that inheritance rests. One writer traces the whole chapter as a single contrast: under law the result is a curse, while "in the latter part, we find the blessings of the inheritance ours, not by law, but by promise" — a way of dealing that "applies itself to the constant tendency of the human heart... which ever goes to exalt man, and to debase God."
One writer adds a caution. This verse states a real privilege, but not the highest blessing God gives to believers.
The letter to the Galatians never takes up the standing of the Church in the proper sense. It does not go beyond the inheritance of promise... But in Ephesians the great point is that God is bringing out completely new and heavenly privileges. There are distinct, added privileges there that Abraham never thought of or heard of... So to have a right view of the Christian's full blessing, we must take the Ephesian blessing along with the Galatian.
A second caution concerns Israel, and it turns on which promise this verse is about.
Here the promise is the blessing of all nations in the seed, that is, in Christ. Of this promise believers are heirs as made one with Christ. The chapter does not name the promise given to Abraham's countless descendants. Still less does it show the Church taking this promise away from Israel.
- Christ first. He is the true Seed of Abraham. Every title in this verse is His before it is ours.
- Christ's, therefore Abraham's. Belonging to Him is the only qualification. No rite adds to it, and striving by law loses what faith secures.
- Christ reaches further. The family line now runs through shared faith, not through descent. So it reaches Gentiles too.
- Christ's portion shared. "Heirs" means His standing is ours now. His inheritance is ours in the coming day — by promise, not by law.
- Christ has more to give. Being Abraham's seed is real, but it is not the summit. Commentators point to Ephesians for privileges Abraham never heard of.