Galatians 3:16  “To Abraham and his Seed were the promises made. He does not say, ‘And to seeds,’ as of many, but as of one, ‘And to your Seed,’ who is Christ.” Galatians 3:29  “If you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.”

These verses in Galatians chapter 3 are often used as prooftexts by those who believe the New Testament church has either replaced the ethnic nation of Israel (Replacement Theology) or is a fulfillment of ethnic Israel, and has inherited the Old Testament promises made to Israel – thereby replacing Israel (Covenant Theology).

Here is how both Replacement and Covenant Theologians deconstruct verses like Gensis 12:3b (blessing to all mankind), Genesis 13:14-15 (the unconditional Land Covenant)  and Genesis 17:8 (the “everlasting possession”).

Gensis 12:3b “In you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”

Genesis 13:14-15 “And the Lord said to Abram, after Lot had separated from him: ‘Lift your eyes now and look from the place where you are – northward, southward, eastward, and westward; for all the land which you see I give to you and your seed forever.”

Genesis 17:8 “I give to you and your seed after you the land in which you are a stranger, all the land of Canaan, as an everlasting possession; and I will be their God.”

It is known as the “Argument for the “Singular Seed“:

They argue that the New Testament explicitly redefines the “lineage” of Abraham, removing the biological requirement (ethnic Israel, as descended through Abraham) and replacing it with the spiritual requirement (spiritual Israel, by God’s grace through one’s faith in Jesus Christ).

Texts used to argue for ethnic Israel no longer entitled to the Land Promises:

First, in Galatians 3:6-8, God explains through Paul that true children of Abraham are by faith as provided by God Himself in the Gospel of Jesus Christ: “Just as Abraham ‘believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.’ Therefore, know that only those who are of faith are children of Abraham. And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel to Abraham beforehand, saying, ‘In you all the nations shall be blessed.’”

Secondly, in Galatians 3:16, Paul writes: “Now to Abraham and his Seed were the promises made. He does not say, ‘And to seeds,’ as of many, but as of one, ‘And to your Seed,’ who is Christ.”

Finally, in Galatians 3:29, Paul writes: “If you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.”

Their Argument:

Replacement and Covenant Theologians argue that Paul is teaching us how to read the Old Testament book of Genesis. They claim Paul is saying the promise was never ultimately about Abraham’s plural descendants (ethnic Jews), but about Abraham’s singular Descendant (Jesus).

Their Conclusion:

Replacement and Covenant Theologians claim the “specific Jewish lineage” was merely a delivery mechanism to get to Jesus. Once Jesus arrived, the “lineage” promise was fulfilled in Him.

If you want the inheritance (the Land/the World), you don’t get it by being a child of Jacob; you get it by being “in Christ.”

3 Challenges that Demonstrate Why this Argument of “Singular Seed” Fails:

1. No One believes the Church has inherited the Promised Land
2. Logical Fallacy of False Equivalency in Galatians 3:16 between the Church to Israel
3. Exegetical Error of Illegitimate Totality Transfer of Galatians 3:16

In this second of 3 articles, we examine Challenge #2 è The Logical Fallacy of False Equivalency in Galatians 3:16 between the Church to Israel.

We start with the hermeneutic of “context” when the same word with multiple meanings is used across multiple passages. It is crucial to know the context in which that word is used.

 Seed / Offspring / Descendant = zera` = zeh’-rah è appears 230X throughout Old Testament, in nearly every time period and genre (category of artistic, musical, or literary composition characterized by a particular style, form, or content).

The 3 main uses of “seed” or “offspring” or “descendant” are:

1. Physical Seed: The substance by which plants reproduce.
   1. “Then God said, ‘Let the earth sprout vegetation: seed-bearing plants and fruit trees on the earth bearing fruit with seed in it, according to their kinds.’ ” (Genesis 1:11)

• Physical Seed: Biological offspring, whether immediate children or remote descendants.
  • Israel as an ethnic group – a nation – collectively is “the seed of Abraham” (Psalm 105:6), an identity carrying covenant privilege (Deuter. 10:15) and accountability (Deuter. 28:46).
  • Prophets console the Israelite exiles: “Your seed and your name shall remain” (Isaiah 66:22).  “I will plant them in their land, and they will never again be uprooted” (Amos 9:15).

• Spiritual Seed: The royal, Messianic line – the promise of a coming Redeemer.
  • The Suffering Servant: “He will see His seed; He will prolong His days” (Isaiah 53:10)
  • The singular “seed” is Christ: all who are “in Christ” become Abraham’s seed, “heirs according to promise” (Galatians 3:29). This Old Testament term here opens into the New Testament church.

The Patriarchs (Abraham, Isaac, Jacob): God gives Unconditional Land Promises to the Physical SEED

The Logical Fallacy of False Equivalency in Galatians 3:16 between the Church to Israel – As Professor Peter Goeman (Professor of Old Testament & Biblical Languages at Shepherds Theological Seminary in Cary, NC; host of the ‘Bible Sojourner’ podcast) explains, it is a logical fallacy to equate believers in Galatians 3:16 to Israel in all those Genesis verses of chapters 13-35 (see table above).

In his podcast “Does Galatians 3 Prove the Church is Israel?”, he explains the fallacy in this logic by walking us through the syllogism to uncover the error in thinking:

“Premise A = The Galatians chapter 3 passages clearly state that believers are Abraham’s sons and seed/ offspring/ descendant. Everyone agrees with Premise A. 

Premise B = In the Old Testament, Israel is called Abraham’s son and seed/ offspring/ descendant. This is also true, and nobody really argues against Premise B either. 

Conclusion = In light of Premise A and B being true, therefore believers are true Israel.”

What is being claimed here – the logical inference – in this syllogism is this:

Because ‘A’ is referred to as ‘X’, and

Because ‘B’ is referred to as ‘X’, then

We can conclude that ‘A’ refers to ‘B’.

If you formulate your argument this way, you should understand that this logical argument is problematic. Since a syllogism means the conclusion follows from the premises as being certain, as long as the premises are agreed to be true, then one can easily see this conclusion does not follow with certainty from the premises, even though we agree they are true. There could be other explanations for premises A and B then the Conclusion that was reached!

Just because ‘A’ is ‘X’, and ‘B’ is ‘X’, does not automatically mean that ‘A’ is ‘B’.

Biblically, we see this all over the place in the Bible.

One example is the phrase “son of man”:

This is very clearly a Messianic title (see Daniel 7:13) given to Jesus. But you also see it show up in Ezekiel quite often (see Ezekiel 2:1, 3:1, etc.). Does that mean that since Jesus is referred to as ‘son of man’, and Ezekiel is referred to as ‘son of man’, then automatically Jesus is Ezekiel?

No one would claim that, because CONTEXTUALLY you can see there is a difference in the use of ‘son of man’ between Jesus and Ezekiel. It is important to not say that just because the descriptions are the same, therefore they are the same.

Another example is ‘son of God’, where we see 4 different uses, all in different contexts:

(a) in Galatians 3:24-29 to refer to believers (also Matthew 5:9, Luke 6:35, John 1:12-13, etc.).

(b) in reference to Israel (Exodus 4:22-23).

(c.) in reference to angels (Job 1:6, Job 2:1).

(d) in reference to the Davidic kings (see 2Samuel 7:14, 1Chronicles ).  

Here are at least 4 different categories of ‘sons of god.’ No one would claim they are all the same.

But, we use this fallacious argument in Galatians 3:16 to support our position that Israel is the Church, when this argument is not very strong. So, just because believers are referred to as the seed of Abraham in Galatians does not mean de facto that Israel is not also the seed of Abraham. Context is crucial!

This is also known as the Logical Fallacy of False Equivalency, where someone incorrectly asserts that two (or more) things are equivalent simply because they share some terms or characteristics, despite there also being substantial differences between them.

For example, we can write a syllogism that commits the logical fallacy of False Equivalency using cats and dogs by saying that cats and dogs are the same animal, since they’re both mammals with a tail:

Premise A = cats are mammals with tails

Premise B = dogs are mammals with tails

x False Conclusion = cats are dogs.

Summary

To just say that some Scripture that references “seed”, or “offspring”, or “descendant”, or “son”, or “congregation”, is always used the same way across all Scriptures where it is being used… is sloppy exegesis.

We need to admit that the logical argument being used that how we interpret Galatians 3:16 for “seed” is how we can interpret the entire Old Testament is incorrect.

“The Evidence of Faith’s Substance”_Article #661