Historiographical Revisionism about Butler and Galatians

 

1. Butler and EGW speak of two different sets of chapters in Galatians.

2. Butler speaks of chapters 3-4 (Butler 1886: 76); EGW speaks of chapters 5-6 (see E. Seaton 1964 Sabbath School Quarterly on Galatians page 3)

3. Both Butler and EGW acknowledge that Galatians is talking about the moral law and ceremonial law. Butler feels that Paul speaks of the ceremonial law more in chapters 3-4 and EGW feels that Paul is speaking about the moral law more in chapters 5-6.

4. Butler has very good arguments for his case on the ceremonial law especially in chapter 3:19-29 (Butler 1886: 65-66).

 

Contemporary Issue on the Law in Galatians

 

Galatians 3:19-29.

C. P. Cosaert 2017: 75 talks about the purpose of the law and discussed this passage of Galatians 3:19-29. He emphasized that it is mainly the moral law although the ceremonial law is thought of by some.

 

“While the ceremonial laws pointed to the Messiah and emphasized holiness and the need of a Savior, it is the moral law, with its “Thou shall nots,” that reveals sin…….”

 

Butler (1886: 65-66) argued for the ceremonial law. If it is the moral law, says Butler, then it would imply that the moral law came 430 years after the promise to the seed “until the seed of the promise would come” meaning then that the moral law stopped when Christ came in 31 A.D.!

The 1900 Sabbath School Quarterly on Galatians page 17 point 6, answered:

 

"Until the seed should come to whom the

promise was made." The seed "to whom the promise was made"

is not yet come. Remember that Abraham is the father of all

them that believe, so that the seed will not be fully come until all

who will believe shall have conic to the possession of the inheritance.

Then will the promise be fulfilled. There will then

be no more need of a law to remind men of their sins, for the law

will be in the heart of each one, so that there will be no sin. The

name of Christ the King will be "THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS."

 

Question: But was the law not written on the heart of the believer of the Old Testament?

Answer: The writer of 1900 does not speak of the First Coming of Christ but the Second Coming, just like Butler in 1886. Cosaert 2017: 76 has in mind the First Coming of Christ just like Protestantism at large thinks about the passage. Cosaert wants to play with the semantics of “until” biblically to mean a-temporarily something else than the end of period.

 

“For how long a time will the law stand as the revealer and condemner

of sin ?

Why not longer?

Because after the coming of the Lord and the restoration of all

things, there will be no sin to be found in the universe.”

 

Cosaert found inspiration with W. Hendriksen (1968) for his view on the moral law here.