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These references fall into three groups, each group having one dominating word. The
first four references are under the heading of "faith", the next three deal with "promise",
the last two with "Seed" or "Son". It would occupy too much space, to go through the
nine references to Abraham found in Romans, but we are sure that the reader would gain
further and fuller light if this were undertaken. We must now return to Gal. 3:, where
the apostle introduced Abraham and associates with him the glorious doctrine of
justification.
The point of the apostle's argument concerning justification by faith may be more
keenly felt if we remember that the Jews' tenet concerning the Law as contained in the
Talmud and Rabbinical writings descends from:
"The six hundred and thirteen precepts of the law as collected by Moses Maimonedes
reduced by David to eleven in Psa. 15:; further brought within the compass of six by
Isaiah (Isa. 33: 15); further reduced to three by Micah (Mic. 6: 8), and again to two
by Isaiah (Isa. 61: 1), to one by Amos (Amos 5: 4), and crystallized by Habbakuk in the
words "the Just by his faith shall live."
"Thus", says Dr. Lightfoot--"the Jews witness against themselves, while they
conclude that faith is the sum of the law, and yet they stand altogether upon works:--a
testimony from Jews exceedingly remarkable."
This confusion of faith and works accounts for the saying of the Jews concerning
Abraham, "Abraham performed all the law, every whit".
"Even as." The answer to the question already propounded is assumed, Lightfoot puts
it "surely of faith; and so it was with Abraham". As we have seen, there are four links
with Abraham in verses 6-9, and each the word "faith". First of all, and fundamental to
all, is the question of justification. This is the issue before the apostle, before the
Galatians, before the church to-day and will be before all men at the last.
In the Garden of Eden, two coverings symbolize the two methods that were then
adopted and will always be adopted until the end of time, the one a covering of leaves,
the other a covering of skins, the former a fit symbol of the fading covering of human
provision, the latter resulting from sacrifice and provided by God. Outside the garden of
Eden, these two ways are again set before us in the two offerings, the one of Cain, like
the apron of leaves being rejected, the other by Abel, like the coats of skin being accepted
and for this same reason. The apostle here brings this twofold aspect of righteousness
up to date. The Judaizers with their "works of law" were treading the way of Cain, the
only alternative being the way of Abel. While the cases of Adam and Abel are Scriptural,
the apostle knew how proudly these Judaizers clung to the thought that they were the
"children of Abraham". In Rom. 4: 9-11 he demolished this claim by showing that at
the time that Abraham was justified he was uncircumcised; here, he attacks the same
exclusivism by showing that Abraham's justification, as also the privilege of being
Abraham's children, is "by faith".
The precise doctrine of justification by faith and the doctrinal meaning of the term
"faith imputed for righteousness" is not so much the apostle's immediate concern as to