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was so strong, that very shortly before the time when St. Paul wrote, the legislature had
expressly limited the number of slaves that an owner might manumit by will"
(W. E. Ball).
In all these things there is necessarily more than one aspect to be remembered. The
bearing of the Old Testament teaching of the Kinsman-Redeemer and of the Hebrew law
must never be forgotten, but for the moment we are limiting ourselves to the laws in force
during the period covered by the Acts. Many passages like Rom. 8: and Gal. 3: & 4:
are given a much fuller meaning when we are able to understand the allusions to customs
and procedure that were everywhere in vogue at the time they were written.
No modern writer has greater first-hand knowledge of this term than
Sir William Ramsay, and in order to acquaint ourselves with its usage in Galatia, we will
first of all quote from Sir William's "A Historical Commentary on St. Paul's Epistle to
the Galatians":--
"The idea that they who follow the principle of faith are sons of Abraham, whatever
family they belong to by nature, would certainly be understood by the Galatians as
referring to the legal process called adoption, huiothesia."
"Adoption was a kind of embryo will; the adopted son became the owner of the
property, and the property could pass to a person that was naturally outside the family
only through his being adopted. The adoption was a sort of Will-making; and this
ancient form of Will was irrevocable and public. The terms `Son' and `Heir' are
interchangeable."
"An illustration from the ordinary fact of society, as it existed in the Galatian cities, is
here stated: `I speak after the manner of men'. The Will (diatheke) of a human being is
irrevocable when once duly executed. But if Paul is speaking about a Will, how can he
say, after it is once made, it is irrevocable?"
"Such irrevocability was a characteristic feature of Greek law, according to which
an heir outside the family must be adopted into the family; and the adoption was the
Will-making. The testator, after adopting his heir, could not subsequently take away
from him his share of the inheritance or impose new conditions on his succession. The
Roman-Syrian Law Book will illustrate this passage of the Epistle. It actually lays down
the principle that a man can never put away an adopted son, and that he cannot put away
a real son without good ground. It is remarkable that the adopted son should have a
stronger position than the son by birth; yet it is so. The expression in Gal. 3: verse 15,
`When it hath been confirmed', must also be observed. Every Will had to be passed
through the Record Office of the city. It was not regarded in the Greek law as a purely
private document. It must be deposited in the Record Office."
Here it will be seen that one may be "adopted", or made the heir, without being at the
same time a true child, but in the case of the Scriptural usage of adoption there is no idea
that the believer is only an "adopted" child, for the testimony of the Word is explicit on
the point, making it clear that adoption is something added:
"The Spirit itself beareth witness with our spirit, that we are the children of God"
(Rom. 8: 16).
The argument of Gal. 4: 1-7 proceeds upon the supposition that there is a difference
between a "child" (1, 2), and one who has received the "adoption" (5). "If a son, then an
heir of God through Christ" (7). That "adoption" is related to "inheritance" we can see