Galatians 3:13 Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written… Two curses pronounced in the law are here referred to. All mankind was liable to the former one. How was it to be removed? 1. He who was to remove it must not Himself be liable to it. He who was to be a substitute for the guilty must Himself be innocent. He who was to suffer in the stead of the disobedient must Himself be obedient in all things. 2. He who was to be the substitute for all must have the common nature of all. He must not take the person of one individual man (such as Abraham, Moses, Elias), but He must take the nature of all, and sum up all mankind in Himself. 3. He who was to do more than counterbalance the weight of the sins of all, must have infinite merits of His own, in order that the scale of Divine justice may preponderate in their favour. And nothing that is not Divine is infinite. In order, therefore, that He may be able to suffer for sin, He must be human; and in order that He may be able to take away the sins, and to satisfy God's justice for them, He must be Divine. 4. In order that He may remove the curse pronounced in the law of God for disobedience, He must undergo that punishment which is especially declared in the law to be the curse of God. 5. That punishment is hanging on a tree (Deuteronomy 21:23). 6. By undergoing this curse for us, Christ, He who is God from everlasting, and who became Emmanuel, God with us, God in our flesh, uniting together the two natures — the Divine and the human — in His one person — Christ Jesus, redeemed us from the curse of the law. Thus, having accepted the curse, He liberated us from it. (Bishop Chris. Wordsworth.)Christ stood for the "every one who continueth not," by becoming the "very one" who hung upon the tree. (M. B. Riddle, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree: |
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