Paul now departs his series of questions designed to cause the Galatian believers to engage their minds and memories in order to correct the false teaching they've received from the Jewish legalists (3:2-5).
Beginning with our passage, he now launches a section of alternating argument that will continue to chapter 4:7.
This next section will allow Paul to undergird his argument with Scriptural support. At the same time, he is refuting the abuse of Scripture being perpetrated by the Judaizers.
Bottom line: You enter into salvation solely on the basis of faith in Jesus the Messiah. Paul uses the faith of Abraham as example. This is theology 101 based upon the life of Abraham.
We can assume that central to the false teaching of the Judaizers included the notion that new Gentile believers had to be circumcised in order to become true ‘sons' of Abraham.
Abraham was the proclaimed father of the faithful; the prototype. The man God started with. God called him and made a covenant with him that a great nation would come from him.
No doubt the Judaizers leaned heavily upon father Abraham to make their case convincingly to the Galatians.
What with his rich legacy of receiving the covenant from God and being the progenitor of a not only a nation, but of a faith, Abraham was impressive. Paul now uses the biblical teaching on Abraham itself to directly refute what the false teachers were espousing.
The fact is, Abraham's justification by faith came BEFORE his circumcision (justification Gen. 15:6; circumcision @ age 99 17:24). This is a big problem for the Judaizers and Paul masterfully dismantles their doctrine.
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