Well, let me elaborate on my view of the Galatian text so you can see where I am coming from.
Deut. 11:26 portrays the Law as both a blessing to those who keep it and a curse to those who don’t. Gal. 3:10 stresses that the curse follows a single slip-up (quoting Deut. 27:26). Gal. 3:11 tells us that justification does not come from the Law, and that life comes only from faith (quoting Hab. 2:4). But then Gal. 3:12 quotes Lev. 18:5, perhaps the leading OT passage suggesting that keeping the Law is what leads to life. (One finds this notion echoed in Ezek. 20:11, Prov. 19:16, Psalms of Solomon 14:1-5, Philo's Prelmininary Studies 86-87. even Matt. 19:16-17.) This strikes me as at worst contradictory, and at best a poor choice of Scripture in support of what I take to be Paul’s goal: dissuading the Galatians from turning to the Law instead of to faith for their salvation. If that were my agenda, Lev. 18:5 is the last verse I would quote!
Granted, Galatians never explicitly declares that nobody can keep the Law perfectly – perhaps because the “blessing” part of Deut. 11:26 makes that a questionable conclusion (see also Ps. 18:20-24), or perhaps because Paul himself elsewhere claimed to be “blameless” under the Law, Phil. 3:6 – but isn’t that exactly what he wants the “foolish Galatians” to infer? And, doesn’t his quote from Leviticus undercut him here?
Thus, a close reading of Galatians does not actually support that salvation is unavailable under the law. Rather, it supports “Don’t choose to play by those Rules, you foolish Galatians; for once you sign up for that, you’ll almost certainly fail to end up with the required perfect score – and thanks to Calvary, there is now an easier way, so why take the chance?”
This is why I mentioned the distinction between the Law’s innate inability to save, and mankind’s innate inability to keep the Law sufficiently to be saved (a la Rom. 2:1 - 3:20). On my reading, Galatians at best supports only the latter, although Christians everywhere seem to assume it supports the former. Someone may object that my distinction has no practical difference in effect. But if forgiveness when the Law is violated can reset the scoreboard, there is a HUGE practical difference. And that type of score reset is well attested in the OT.
I read Gal. 3:12 – and its analogue, Rom. 10:5 – to mean that salvation is available under the Law, provided one keeps it perfectly. (Calvin agrees: “The hope of eternal life is, therefore, given to all who keep the Law; for those who expound the passage as referring to this earthly and transitory life are mistaken.”) And difficult though it is, it is not an impossible task.
Who would be so bold as to declare that Luke 1:6 is a lie?
