Sin in Galatians 3-4

These chapters seem like the top of an iceberg whose base we cannot see. I've wondered if this thick argumentation came from Paul's instruction in the Hall of Tyrannus at Ephesus. How much of this argument did the Galatians actually follow--it seems so minute?

For our purposes, perhaps 3:22 is the best place to begin:

"The Scripture has shut up everything under sin, so that the promise might be given by the faith of Jesus Christ to all who have faith."

What Scripture, we might ask, and what does it mean to be under sin? Is it the law itself, which is part of Scripture? Is it Habakkuk 2:4: "the one who is righteous on the basis of faith will live."

Perhaps it is not just one Scripture. The combination of Deuteronomy 28:58 with Habakkuk 2:4 seem to make Paul's point for him in 3:10-12. Deuteronomy 28:58 reads, "Cursed is everyone who does not remain in all the things that have been written in the book of the law to do them." Paul implies that no one remains in all the things in the law, therefore, all are cursed on the basis of the law and are "under sin."

It would not be clear from 3:22 alone whether Paul was thinking of sin as a power. It seems possible to read the chapter and only conclude that a person's violation of the law--a person's sins--showed them that they were in the category of sinful.

Nor does Paul clarify here what he means when he says that the law was added "because of transgressions" (3:19). Does he mean to control transgressions (unlikely). Does he mean to point out transgressions to those who sinned? Romans is clearer on these questions in that the law told the Jew what sin was and drew attention to their powerlessness to keep it.

The law did point toward the coming of Christ and the coming of faith. So perhaps the law was added to show us our transgressions (parabasis) and thus to show us our need for the promise (3:19).

Chapter 4 probably implies the enslavement dimension of sin that Paul will expand on in Romans 6-8. However, he does not actually mention sin in this chapter. Before Christ came, all were enslaved "under the elements of the world" (4:3). This expression is intriguingly similar to his earlier statement that the law has shut up everything under sin.

Being enslaved in this way is to be "enslaved to things that are not by nature gods" (4:8), presumably these same elements of the world. Paul strikingly equates enslavement to these "empoverished elements" (4:9) with the observance of days, months, seasons, and years in the Jewish law (4:10). Such calendar items of course relate to various heavenly bodies which many ancients considered to be deities. We remember that Paul considered the law to have been delivered through angels, who were thought to inhabit the various layers of heavens. Evil angels and demons were thought to inhabit the lowest sky or heaven.

Getting into Paul's head is very difficult here but let me give it a try. Although he does not develop the line of thinking very much, Paul seems to consider the physical realm, the elements, to be under the power of spiritual forces of some kind, things that are not by nature gods. Angels for Paul are not clearly the good guys, as we see in 1 Corinthians 6:3. It is possible to read Galatians 3:19-20 as Moses mediating between God and the ambiguous angels in the deliverance of the law (Hubner). Difficult to know exactly what Paul was thinking.

Flesh, which Paul will expand on, is of course composed of these elements and is thus susceptible to these powers. Perhaps we should, in the end, see sin as a power in these chapters, a power connected to spiritual forces that currently hold sway in the physical realm and the realm of the lower heavens where the more ambiguous angels dwell.

Summary: These are very difficult chapters!
1. With regard to definitions of sin, two (or three) seem to show up in these chapters. The first is the transgression of the law. But in Galatians 3-4 we also seem to have sin as a power over the elements of the world, the parts of the universe in the lower heavens and on the earth. This is a domain where angels currently function. A third possibility is that sin is a category, "sinful," under which heading all things are located (I'm not going for this one today).

2. All things are "under sin." Before Christ came (4:4), all were under a curse because no one was able to do the things of the law (3:10). All were enslaved to the impoverished elements of the world. All were in the flesh, as Paul will say.

3. The implication is that those who have faith are no longer enslaved to the elements of the world and are no longer under sin. Gentiles believers do not need to observe the feasts and sabbaths of the law. Indeed, we should see the turning of this state of things not just in the individual pilgrimage of a believer. No, in the greatest sense, the change of affairs took place with Christ and the redemption from the curse of the law (3:13).