And because you are sons
This phrase emphasizes the identity of believers as children of God. The Greek word for "sons" is "huioi," which signifies a legal standing and inheritance rights in the family. In the historical context of Paul's time, being a son meant having a privileged position, often with rights to the family inheritance. This is a profound statement of the believer's status in God's family, highlighting the transition from slavery under the law to sonship through faith in Christ.

God sent
The Greek word "exapesteilen" is used here, meaning "sent forth" or "dispatched." This indicates a deliberate and purposeful action by God. It reflects the divine initiative in the salvation process, underscoring that it is God who reaches out to humanity. This sending is not random but part of God's redemptive plan, showing His sovereignty and love.

the Spirit of His Son
This phrase refers to the Holy Spirit, who is described as the Spirit of Jesus Christ. The Holy Spirit's role is to continue the work of Christ in the believer's life. Theologically, this affirms the Trinity, as the Spirit is both distinct and yet one with the Father and the Son. The Spirit's presence in believers is a testament to their adoption as sons and daughters of God, providing assurance and guidance.

into our hearts
The heart, in biblical terms, is the center of one's being, encompassing mind, will, and emotions. The Greek word "kardias" is used here, indicating the innermost part of a person. The indwelling of the Spirit in our hearts signifies an intimate and transformative relationship with God. It is not merely an external adherence to the law but an internal change that affects every aspect of life.

crying out
The Greek word "krazo" is used, which means to cry out loudly or to call out with deep emotion. This is not a timid or reserved expression but a bold and confident declaration. It reflects the deep assurance and intimacy that believers have with God, made possible through the Spirit's work in their lives.

'Abba, Father!'
"Abba" is an Aramaic term for father, expressing intimacy, trust, and respect. It is akin to saying "Daddy" or "Papa," conveying a close, personal relationship. The use of both "Abba" and "Father" (Greek "Pater") emphasizes the universal nature of this relationship, accessible to all believers, Jew and Gentile alike. This dual expression highlights the depth of the believer's relationship with God, made possible through the Spirit, and reflects Jesus' own relationship with the Father, which believers are invited to share.

(6) It is because you are sons that you are able to address your Heavenly Father in such genuine accents of filial emotion. It is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of Christ which has been given to you in virtue of your adoption. He prompts your prayers.

This verse should be read in connection with Romans 8:15-16, to which it forms a close parallel.

Because.--It is, perhaps, on the whole, best to retain this translation. The conjunction may, however, possibly mean "in proof that."

Abba, Father.--A reduplication of loving entreaty. (See Note on Romans 8:15.) For similar instances of a Greek word being repeated in Aramaic, or an Aramaic word in Greek, we may compare Revelation 9:11 : "The angel of the bottomless pit, whose name in the Hebrew tongue is Abaddon, but in the Greek tongue hath his name Apollyon;" Revelation 12:9 : "That old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan." The Aramaic "Abba" appears in our word "abbot." . . .

Verse 6. - And because ye are sons (ὅτι δέ ἐστε υἱοί). The apostle is adducing proof that God's people had actually received the adoption of sons; it was because it was so, that God had sent into their hearts the Holy Spirit, imparting that vivid consciousness of sonship which they enjoyed. The fact of the adoption must have been there, to qualify them to be recipients of this divinely inspired consciousness. The affirmation in Romans 8:16, "The Spirit himself beareth witness with our spirit that we are children of God," closely resembles our present passage; but it is not identical. We are not made sons (the apostle intimates) by the Spirit giving us the consciousness of sonship; but, having been previously made sons, the Spirit raises in our spirits sentiments answering to the filial relation already established. The position of the clause introduced by "because" is like that in 1 Corinthians 12:15, 16. The persons recited by the "ye" are still God's people; not the Galatian believers in particular, except as a portion of the whole Church of God. The apostle puts the thought in this form to bring the truth more strikingly home to their minds. This he does more closely still in the next verse by "thou." But that he has in view God's people as a whole is clear, not only from the whole strain of the context, but also from the phrase, "into our hearts," in the next clause. God hath sent forth (ἐξαπέστειλεν ὁ Θεός); God sent forth. The tense indicates that the apostle does not refer to a sending forth of God's Spirit to each individual believer, parallel to that "sealing" which believers are stated to be subjects of in Ephesians 1:13. This historic aorist, as it does in ver. 4, points to one particular emission - that by which the Comforter was sent forth to take up his dwelling in the Church as his temple through all time (John 14:16, 17; Acts 1:4, 5). The Spirit of his Son. The Spirit which "anointed" Jesus to be the Christ; which throughout animated the God-Man Jesus; which prompted him in full filial consciousness, himself in a certain critical hour with loud outcry (μετὰ κραυγῆς ἰσχυρᾶς, Hebrews 5:7) to call out, "Abba, Father!" The phrase, "his Son," is aetiological; by it the apostle intimates that it was only congruous that the Spirit which had animated the whole life of the incarnate Son should be shed forth upon those who by faith become one with him, and should manifest his presence with them, as well as their union with Christ, by outcome of sentiment similar to that which Christ had expressed. Since the sonship of Christ is here spoken of as if it were not merely antecedent, but also in some way preparatory to the sending forth of the Spirit, it best suits the connection to construe it, not, as in ver. 4, as that belonging to him in his preincarnate state of being, but as that which appertained to him after being "made to be of a woman," and in which his disciples might be considered as standing on a certain footing of parity with him. This harmonizes with the relation which in the Gospels and Acts the sending of the Spirit is represented as holding to his resurrection and ascension. The interpretation above given in one point presupposes the apostle's knowledge of the story of the agony in the garden, when, according to St. Mark (Mark 14:36), Jesus himself used the words, "Abba. Father." This presupposition is warranted, not only by the probabilities of the case, but also by what we read in Galatians 5:7 of the Epistle to the Hebrews, Pauline, certainly, if not actually St. Paul's. We have to add that the Gospels not only make repeated mention of our Lord as addressing the Supreme Being by the compellative of "Father," but also represent him as constantly speaking of God as bearing that relation both to himself and to his disciples. This mode of designating the Almighty was characteristic in the highest degree of Jesus, and up to that time, so far as appears in the Scriptures, unknown. The manner in which the apostle here speaks of the "sending forth" of the Spirit in close proximity to the mention of the "sending forth" of the Son, strongly favours the belief that he regarded the Spirit, as being also a personal agent. In Psalm 104:30 we have in the Septuagint "Thou wilt send forth (ἐξαποστελεῖς) thy Spirit, and they will be created." In Psalm 43:3 and Psalm 57:3 God is implored to "send forth [ἐξαπόστειλον, Septuagint] his light and his truth," "his mercy and his truth;" these being poetically personified as angelic messengers. Into your hearts (εἰς τὰς καρδίας ὑμῶν). But this reading of the Textus Receptus is, by recent editors, replaced by the reading, εἰς τὰς καρδίας ἡμῶν, into our hearts, the other reading being regarded as a correction designed to conform this clause with the words, "ye are sons," in the preceding one. In both cases the apostle has in his view the Church of God viewed generally. His putting "our" here instead of "your" was probably an outcome of his feeling of proud gladness in the thought of his own happy experience. A precisely similar change in the pronoun, attributable probably to the same cause, is observable in the remarkably analogous passage in Romans 8:15, "Ye received not the spirit of bondage again unto fear; but ye received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father." Crying (κράζον); crying out aloud. The word expressing loud utterance betokens in this case undoubting assurance. No faint whisper this of an inner consciousness, shy, reticent, because afraid to assure itself of so. glorious, so blissful a relation; no hesitating half-hope; it is a strong, unwavering conviction, bold, though humbly bold, to thus address the all-holy Supreme himself. The "cry" is here attributed to the Spirit himself; in Romans 8:15 to believers, these being the Spirit's organs of utterance; presently after in the Romans, vers. 26, 27, the Spirit himself is said to "intercede with groanings which cannot be uttered ... . according to the will of God." Analogously, in the Gospels, evil spirits in demoniacs at times are said to "cry out" (Mark 1:26; Mark 9:26), while in other passages the cry is attributed to the possessed person. Abba, Father (Ἀββᾶ ὁ Πατήρ). In addition to Romans 8:15, just cited, the same remarkable words are found once only besides, in Mark 14:36, as uttered by our Lord in the garden. St. Luke (Luke 22:42) gives only "Father" (Πάτερ); St. Matthew (Matthew 26:39, 42), "my Father" (Πάτερ μου: in ver. 39, however, νου is omitted by Tischendorf, though he retains it in ver. 42). St. Matthew, by adding μου to Πάτερ here, which he does not add in Matthew 11:25, 26, seems to indicate that the form of address which our Lord then employed bespoke more than usual of fervency or of intimacy of communion. According to Furst ('Concordance'), "Abba," אַבָּא, occurs frequently in the Targums "sensu proprio et honorifico;" in the Jerusalem Targum taking the form "Ibba," אִבָּא. In consequence, we may assume, of the "honorific" complexion of this form of the word, it was in Chaldee the form usually employed in compellation, or for the vocative. The hypothesis that either the Divine Sneaker, or the Evangelist Mark, or the Apostle Paul, added ὁ Πατὴρ as an explanatory adjunct to the Aramaic "Abba," for the benefit of such as might need the explanation, is resisted

(1) by the threefold recurrence of the conjoined phrases in just the same form;

(2) by the absence of any such intimation of a translation as we find given in other passages where an Aramaic word is explained, as in Mark 5:41; Mark 7:11, 34; John 1:38, 41, 42; John 20:16; Acts 9:36;

(3) by the addition of ὁ Πατὴρ being made by St. Paul in the Romans, when writing with a glowing ardour of strong feeling wholly repugnant to the didactic calmness of a translational gloss: he does not pause to add such a gloss to "Maranatha" in 1 Corinthians 16:22, where it would seem to be much more called for. The apparently nominatival form of ὁ Πατὴρ lends no countenance to this view, as is shown by the comparison of Matthew 11:26, ναί ὁ Πατήρ: Luke 8:54, 41 ἡ παῖς, ἔγειρε: and in the Septuagint, Psalm 8:1, 9, Κύριε ὁ Κύριος ἡμῶν: Psalm 7:1, Κύριε ὁ Θεός μου. Another hypothesis that the twofold compellative was meant to intimate that God was now Father alike to Jewish believers and to Gentile, is wrecked upon its occurrence in St. Mark. The present writer ventures to surmise that the conjoined phrase originated thus: The Lord Jesus, being wont very commonly to substitute for the name "God" the designation of "Father," may be supposed to have used for this designation the word "Abba" as the honorific form of the Chaldaic noun for "father," in much the same way as the Jews regularly substituted the noun Adonai, an honorific form of Adonim, "lord," or "master," for the unutterable tetragrammaton, יהוה. Instead of Adonai, Christ (it may be supposed) customarily employed the word "Abha," as an almost proper name of the Supreme Being. When our Lord had occasion to apply the word "Father" as a common noun to God, whether in addressing him or in speaking of him, we may infer firm the Peshito-Syriac Version of Mark 14:36 that he added another form of the same original noun "Abj," or "Obj," instead of or in addition to "Abba." The Πάτερ of Luke 22:42 may have been used to represent "Abba;" St. Matthew's Πάτερ μου to represent "Abj" or "Obj." The use of "Abba, ὁ Πατὴρ by believers, probably quite an exceptional use, was adopted, both as a conscious reminiscence of Christ's utterance in the garden - they, by conjoining themselves thus with their Lord, pleading, as it were, his Name as their warrant for claiming this filial relation with the Most High - and also as an intensely emphatic description of God's fatherhood, by conjoining together the almost proper name denoting his general fatherhood by which (supposably) Christ was used to designate God, and the common noun by which Christ's disciples had by him been taught to address him in prayer, and which embodied their sense of his especial fatherhood to those who serve him. The apostle is not to be understood as intimating that the Holy Spirit does actually produce in every heart in which he dwells the definite consciousness of sonship. It is enough for his purpose that the nisus, the endeavour and tendency of his spiritual operation, is in all cases in that direction, though through slackness on their own part so many Christians fail of conquering for themselves the full possession of their inheritance. But, however, we need not (he implies)go back to Mosaic ceremonialism to seek there for our assured sonship. We have it already here - here, in Christ, and in the indwelling presence of his Spirit.

Parallel Commentaries ...

And
δέ (de)
Conjunction
Strong's 1161: A primary particle; but, and, etc.

because
Ὅτι (Hoti)
Conjunction
Strong's 3754: Neuter of hostis as conjunction; demonstrative, that; causative, because.

you are
ἐστε (este)
Verb - Present Indicative Active - 2nd Person Plural
Strong's 1510: I am, exist. The first person singular present indicative; a prolonged form of a primary and defective verb; I exist.

sons,
υἱοί (huioi)
Noun - Nominative Masculine Plural
Strong's 5207: A son, descendent. Apparently a primary word; a 'son', used very widely of immediate, remote or figuratively, kinship.

God
Θεὸς (Theos)
Noun - Nominative Masculine Singular
Strong's 2316: A deity, especially the supreme Divinity; figuratively, a magistrate; by Hebraism, very.

sent
ἐξαπέστειλεν (exapesteilen)
Verb - Aorist Indicative Active - 3rd Person Singular
Strong's 1821: From ek and apostello; to send away forth, i.e. to despatch, or to dismiss.

the
τὸ (to)
Article - Accusative Neuter Singular
Strong's 3588: The, the definite article. Including the feminine he, and the neuter to in all their inflections; the definite article; the.

Spirit
Πνεῦμα (Pneuma)
Noun - Accusative Neuter Singular
Strong's 4151: Wind, breath, spirit.

of
τοῦ (tou)
Article - Genitive Masculine Singular
Strong's 3588: The, the definite article. Including the feminine he, and the neuter to in all their inflections; the definite article; the.

His
αὐτοῦ (autou)
Personal / Possessive Pronoun - Genitive Masculine 3rd Person Singular
Strong's 846: He, she, it, they, them, same. From the particle au; the reflexive pronoun self, used of the third person, and of the other persons.

Son
Υἱοῦ (Huiou)
Noun - Genitive Masculine Singular
Strong's 5207: A son, descendent. Apparently a primary word; a 'son', used very widely of immediate, remote or figuratively, kinship.

into
εἰς (eis)
Preposition
Strong's 1519: A primary preposition; to or into, of place, time, or purpose; also in adverbial phrases.

our
ἡμῶν (hēmōn)
Personal / Possessive Pronoun - Genitive 1st Person Plural
Strong's 1473: I, the first-person pronoun. A primary pronoun of the first person I.

hearts,
καρδίας (kardias)
Noun - Accusative Feminine Plural
Strong's 2588: Prolonged from a primary kar; the heart, i.e. the thoughts or feelings; also the middle.

crying out,
κρᾶζον (krazon)
Verb - Present Participle Active - Accusative Neuter Singular
Strong's 2896: To cry aloud, shriek. A primary verb; properly, to 'croak' or scream, i.e. to call aloud.

“Abba,
Ἀββᾶ (Abba)
Noun - Vocative Masculine Singular
Strong's 5: Abba, Father. Of Chaldee origin; father as a vocative.

Father!”
Πατήρ (Patēr)
Noun - Nominative Masculine Singular
Strong's 3962: Father, (Heavenly) Father, ancestor, elder, senior. Apparently a primary word; a 'father'.


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NT Letters: Galatians 4:6 And because you are children God sent (Gal. Ga)