²⁴ These things are being taken figuratively: the women represent two covenants. One covenant is from Mount Sinai and bears children who are to be slaves: this is Hagar.

²⁶ But the Jerusalem that is above is free, and she is our mother.

¹⁹ My dear children, for whom I am again in the pains of childbirth until Christ is formed in you,

⁵ She gave birth to a son, a male child, who ‘will rule all the nations with an iron sceptre.’^[a] And her child was snatched up to God and to his throne.