and looking for a city that was to be prepared for him, a city associated with a heavenly

country, and seen `afar off' (Heb. 11: 8-10, 13).

When we turn to Heb. 12:, and read of the two mountains, Sinai with its blackness

and darkness, its death and its terror, and Mount Sion, the city of the living God, the

heavenly Jerusalem, the parallel between this allegory and that of Gal. 4: is most

obvious. It is one of the many incidental evidences that the epistle to the Galatians was

the `covering letter' to that addressed to the Hebrews; such a covering letter would fully

explain the absence of Paul's name in the introduction of the epistle to the Hebrews as it

also explains the extraordinary omission of any reference to circumcision in that same

epistle. Moreover, the fact that both Galatians (Gal. 6: 11), and Hebrews (Heb. 13: 22)

at their close refer to the Apostle's writing with `large letters' and yet sending them an

exhortation in a letter of `few words' is readily understood if the two letters, the one to

the Galatians and the other to the Hebrews, accompanied each other.

It is beside the purpose of our present study to attempt a systematic examination of the

parallels that exist between these two epistles, or of the way in which the one epistle

supplements the other. This we may do at the close of the present exposition. What does

come before us with great force is that the emphasis in Heb. 11: and 12: concerning

Abraham's association by overcoming faith with the heavenly Jerusalem, unites this

epistle with that to the Galatians as entertaining a similar calling, for there not only are all

believers reckoned as Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise, but Jerusalem

which is above and free, is their mother (Gal. 4: 26).

Gentile believers have no place in Israel's earthly inheritance except as proselytes or

subservient nations, but Gentile believers whose faith follows that of Abraham, who was

himself one of the Gentile nations and received the promises, being justified by faith

before receiving the sign of circumcision (Rom. 4: 9-14), such believing Gentiles have a

place in the second sphere of blessing, the heavenly calling of Heb. 3: 1, the heavenly

Jerusalem of Heb. 11: and 12:, for Jerusalem which is above is their `mother', the goal of

their faith.

In Gal. 3: 8 and 22 the Scriptures are personified, being made to `foresee' and to

`conclude'.  In Gal. 4: 22-31 the Apostle takes this personification a stage further,

lifting out the history of Sarah and Isaac, and of Hagar and Ishmael, allegorizing the

details, to enforce the essential differences between the two covenants.

The A.V. reads, `which things are an allegory', but Paul uses the verb allegoreo,

saying in effect `I am going to allegorize this piece of O.T. history, but would have you to

remember that the record in Genesis is no mere allegory, but a record of sober fact'.