Galatians 3:16: What Kind of Exegete Was Paul?

Abstract

This article aims to understand Paul’s argument about ‘seeds’ and ‘seed’ in Galatians 3:16 — first, by discerning which text of Genesis lies behind it; and secondly, by using recent grammatical work on ‘seed’ in Hebrew to discern whether the Hebrew is collective or singular. The article concludes that Paul was using Genesis 22:18, which speaks of an individual offspring, and that he properly applied it to Jesus as a Messianic text.