ALLEGORY
A figurative mode of discourse, which employs terms literally belonging to one thing, in order to express another. It is strictly a prolonged metaphor. Such are Nathan’s address to David, 2 Samuel 12:1; Psalms 1:80-19, and our Lord’s parable of the sower, Luke 8:5. The expression, "which things are an allegory," Galatians 4:24, means that the events in the life of Isaac and Ishmael, mentioned in previous verses, have been allegorically applied.