Galatians 3:23
What does Galatians 3:23 mean?
A plain-English look at Galatians 3:23 in WEB alongside six other public-domain English translations, with cross-references and chapter context.
What Galatians 3:23 means
Paul describes the pre-Christ era as a time of custody under the law, confined and protected until faith was revealed. The law functioned like a guardrail, keeping Israel distinct and exposing sin, but it could not open the way to life. This shows both God’s wisdom in preserving His people and the incompleteness of that arrangement. With the coming of Christ and the clarity of the gospel, the time of confinement ended. The picture is not of oppression alone but of preparation, a season designed to point forward to something better that has now arrived in Christ.
Parallel translations
WEB
World English Bible · 2000But before faith came, we were kept in ward under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed.
KJV
King James Version · 1611But before faith came, we were kept under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed.
ASV
American Standard Version · 1901But before faith came, we were kept in ward under the law, shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed.
BBE
Bible in Basic English · 1949But before faith came, we were kept in prison under the law, waiting for the revelation of the faith which was to come.
YLT
Young's Literal Translation · 1862And before the coming of the faith, under law we were being kept, shut up to the faith about to be revealed,
DRA
Douay-Rheims (Challoner) · 1752But before the faith came, we were kept under the law shut up, unto that faith which was to be revealed.
DBY
Darby Bible · 1890But before faith came, we were guarded under law, shut up to faith [which was] about to be revealed.
Context
This verse begins a new metaphor that will run through verse 25. After explaining the universal confinement under sin (verse 22), Paul speaks of being kept under the law before the arrival of faith. The emphasis is temporal—before and after Christ’s coming. Verse 24 will make the metaphor explicit: the law as a tutor leading to Christ for justification by faith. Verse 25 will then state the conclusion: now that faith has come, believers are no longer under the tutor’s authority.
Cross references
Related passages from across Scripture, drawn from the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge.
- Galatians 4:21
Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law?
- 1 Corinthians 9:20
And to the Jews I became as a Jew, that I might gain Jews; to them that are under the law, as under the law, not being myself under the law, that I might gain them that are under the law;
- Luke 10:23
And turning to the disciples, he said privately, Blessed are the eyes which see the things that ye see:
- Romans 3:19
Now we know that what things soever the law saith, it speaketh to them that are under the law; that every mouth may be stopped, and all the world may be brought under the judgment of God:
- 1 Peter 1:11
searching what time or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did point unto, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glories that should follow them.
- Galatians 3:24
So that the law is become our tutor to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith.
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