The Heart Of Paul’s Theology: Paul And The GalatiansMuestra

Paul’s Understanding of Law: Galatians 3:19

Paul touched on the subject of the law several times in this letter, but in chapter 3 he dealt clearly with its purpose in relation to this age and the age to come. 

Now, we’ve already seen that receiving God’s blessings by faith was not some new doctrine Paul had brought to Gentile evangelism. Faith had always been the way of salvation throughout the Scriptures. But Paul’s emphasis on faith raised a serious question: if God’s blessings for Jews and Gentiles have always come by means of faith alone, then what was the purpose of the law of Moses? Why had God given the Mosaic law to Israel? Paul answered these questions in 3:19: 

What, then, was the purpose of the law? It was added because of transgressions until the Seed to whom the promise referred had come (Galatians 3:19).

Notice how Paul put it. The law was given “because of transgressions,” and “until the Seed … had come.” 

At first glance, it might look like Paul simply brushed aside the moral relevance of the law of Moses, consigning it to an age before the coming of Christ. Several passages in Galatians show that this was not so. In Galatians 5:14 Paul appealed to Leviticus 19:18 to explain why believers should pursue love:

The entire law is summed up in a single command: “Love your neighbor as yourself” (Galatians 5:14).

A similar appeal to the law appears in Galatians 5:22-23. As he put it there:

The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law (Galatians 5:22-23).

But if Paul wasn’t teaching Christians to throw away the law of Moses, then why did he write in Galatians 3:19 that the law was given “because of transgressions,” and that it was to be effective “until the Seed … had come”?

To answer this question, it helps to recall that the problem in Galatia was that the false teachers thought the law was even better than it really was; they thought obedience to the law was the way to receive salvation from God. But Paul taught that God always blessed his people through the means of faith. That’s why in 3:19 he said that the law was “added because of transgressions.” The law wasn’t instituted to give God’s people salvation or to empower them to live righteously; it was instituted to reveal their sin. 

But the law had this important function in God’s plan “until the Seed… had come,” that is, until Christ had come. The Mosaic law was given to condemn men and women for their sins. But the law’s authority to condemn was only temporary. Now that Christ has come, he has inaugurated a new age, and because believers are united to Christ, they are ushered into the age to come. And in the age to come, the law’s authority to condemn has been abolished. True followers of Christ are free from the condemnation of the law.