Gal_4:28. It is not till Gal_4:29 that a new thought is entered on; hence Gal_4:28 is to be regarded as a remark explaining the fulfilment of the prophetic utterance, which has its actual realization in the case of Christians, and is to be annexed to Gal_4:27 (by a semicolon). So correctly, in opposition to the usual separation from Gal_4:27, Hofmann, Ewald, Wieseler.
But the Christians (
ὑμεῖς
individualizing; see the critical notes) are the many children of that spiritual Sarah, the heavenly Jerusalem!
κατὰ
Ἰσαάκ
] After the manner of Isaac; comp. 1Pe_1:15; and see Wetstein and Kypke, also Heindorf, ad Plat. Gorg. p. 225 f.
ἐπαγγελίας
τέκνα
]
ἐπαγγ
. is emphatically prefixed: children of Abraham, who are not so by carnal descent like Ishmael, but by promise. So, namely, as Isaac was born to Abraham in virtue of the promise (Gal_4:23), are Christians by means of divine promise also children of Abraham, in virtue of the fact that they were promised by God to Abraham as
τέκνα
; without which promise, having reference to them, they would not stand in the relation of sonship to Abraham. Comp. Rom_9:8. We must not on account of Gal_4:23 explain the expression here, any more than in Rom_9:8 (see in loc.), as liberi promissi (Winer and others).