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GENESIS ---EXODUS--- LEVITICUS 1.1-7.38 --- 8.1-11.47 --- 12.1-16.34--- 17.1-27.34--- NUMBERS 1-10--- 11-19--- 20-36--- DEUTERONOMY 1.1-4.44 --- 4.45-11.32 --- 12.1-29.1--- 29.2-34.12 --- THE BOOK OF JOSHUA --- THE BOOK OF JUDGES --- PSALMS 1-17--- ECCLESIASTES --- ISAIAH 1-5 --- 6-12 --- 13-23 --- 24-27 --- 28-35 --- 36-39 --- 40-48 --- 49-55--- 56-66--- EZEKIEL --- DANIEL 1-7 ---DANIEL 8-12 ---
NAHUM--- HABAKKUK---ZEPHANIAH ---ZECHARIAH --- THE GOSPEL OF MATTHEW ---THE GOSPEL OF MARK--- THE GOSPEL OF LUKE --- THE GOSPEL OF JOHN --- THE ACTS OF THE APOSTLES --- 1 CORINTHIANS 1-7 --- 8-16 --- 2 CORINTHIANS 1-7 --- 8-13 -- -GALATIANS --- EPHESIANS --- COLOSSIANS --- 1 THESSALONIANS --- 2 THESSALONIANS --- 1 TIMOTHY --- 2 TIMOTHY --- TITUS --- HEBREWS 1-6 --- 7-10 --- 11-13 --- JAMES --- JOHN'S LETTERS --- REVELATION
--- THE GOSPELS
Authorship.
The actual letter gives no indication of authorship, but we know that this letter was written well before 90 AD because it was cited in Clement of Rome’s letter to the Corinthians (c.96 AD) as the equivalent of Scripture, but never as by Paul, even though he regularly cites Paul and names him. This demonstrates that it was known to have been written by an Apostolic man, someone whose words could be seen as the very words of God, and someone well known to ‘our brother Timothy’ (13.23) who was still alive. The latter reference suggests that, if not Paul himself, he probably moved in Paul’s circle.
Like 1 John it has no introduction, but moves at once into its theme. The writer does not feel a need to cite his authority to write. And yet it is clearly written to a specific group of people, and there is no evidence of it ever being circulated without that ending, thus it is not does not seem to be just a circulated sermon. Interestingly it ends with a typical Pauline ending, ‘Grace be with you all, Amen’, as though Paul, or someone who followed his example, had taken pen in hand to sign off (see 2 Thessalonians 3:17, 18), a practise not found in any other New Testament letters than Paul’s (but see 1 Peter 5.17).
Yet its style is not that of Paul, its Greek is smoother and more sophisticated, its way of introducing Scripture quotes is different, and the later uncertainty as to whether Paul wrote it or not, while suggesting Pauline connections, militates against it being directly written by Paul. He may, however, have directly given approval to it.
Its content suggests a Hellenistic Jew, with somewhat like Stephen’s viewpoint (Acts 7), or a knowledgeable God-fearer with a sound background in the Septuagint. Eusebius, citing Clement of Alexandria, connects it with Luke as an interpreter/translator of an original Pauline composition written in Hebrew. It is quite clearly not a translation from Hebrew, but perhaps Paul had gathered together some notes in Hebrew which Luke felt very suitable for this particular occasion, and after making their content his own, took and expanded on, putting them in his own words, although possibly under Paul’s guidance and approval. It would enable the bearer to cite Paul’s authority while naming Luke as the author.
As we note from the acceptance of his Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles Luke’s credentials would be accepted. Tertullian describes it as though he had received a tradition that it was written by Barnabas, but there is no further evidence of this. Whoever it was, Luke, Barnabas, Apollos, Silas (Silvanus) or the like, it was seen as sufficiently authoritative to be received and cited by a prominent elder in the church in Rome (Clement of Rome - who presumably did know who wrote it, and probably expected the Corinthians to know) at the end of 1st century AD.
Theme.
It begins immediately with the emphasis that God has over the ages spoken to the world through the prophets, and then goes on to describe God’s final revelation of Himself through One who was, unlike them, a Son, One Whom He describes as a full and true portrayal of God’s glory and power, a royal figure (He sits at God’s right hand), and a High Priest (He makes purification for sins).
This One is shown to be greater than the angels, greater than Moses, greater than Joshua, and greater than Aaron, the earthly High Priest and as introducing a greater deliverance than all. Thus He is greater than all whom the Jews saw as great in their great previous deliverance at the Exodus. He is the new Deliverer. He is seen as having through the sacrifice of Himself replaced the sacrificial system, which had merely pointed ahead to His coming, making by the sacrifice of Himself a means by which those who are His can be sanctified and perfected, and providing for them a way into the presence of God.
Thus they must recognise that there is now acceptance with God by no other way. And his readers are urged to ensure that they continue their faith in Him right through to the end in order that they might be saved.
By the end of the second century AD it bore the heading ‘To The Hebrews’, and its message would certainly be applicable to Jewish Christians or converted God-fearers who were considering lapsing back to Judaism, possibly because of persecution, and because they were subsequently persuading themselves that the God-revealed religion of the Jews would surely be sufficient for salvation, while avoiding the tribulations of being a Christian. But its message rejects such an idea on the grounds that Judaism has now been replaced in Christ, which means that it is based on heavenly realities and not on earthly shadows. And being based firmly on an interpretation of the Old Testament, the letter has a message for all.
A good case can be made for it being seen as written to a small church grouping composed of mainly Greek speaking converted Jewish priests and Pharisees, who had become rather inward looking and were practising their own form of Jewish Christianity, some of whom, in the face of extreme pressure and persecution were speaking of turning from Christ and returning again to Judaism. It may well be that some who knew them had asked the writer to use his recognised authority to plead with them to think again.
That he did so on the basis of his very accurate knowledge of Old Testament teaching rather than on a general knowledge of Judaism comes out in the letter. And the lack of any mention of the destruction of the temple may well suggest a date before 70 AD.
Chapter 1 Jesus Is The Supreme Revelation of God And Greater Than, and Far Above, the Angels
God’s Only Son (1.1-4)
The prime opening message is that ‘God has spoken’, and that having spoken through the ages through revered men, He has finally spoken and given His final word through One Who is uniquely ‘of the nature of a Son’. All that had gone before had been building up to Him. This can be compared with Mark 12.1-11 and parallels, ‘He had yet one, a beloved son. He sent him last to them saying, “They will reverence my son” ’.
It can also be compared with John 1.1-18, ‘in the beginning was the Word, -- what God was the Word was, --- the true light which lights every man was coming into the word -- the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us --- we beheld His glory, glory as of the only begotten from the Father --- no man has seen God at any time, the only begotten Son who is in the Father’s bosom, He has declared Him’. So having first sent His servants, who had each fulfilled their missions, He has now sent His only Son. This Son is to be seen as God’s supreme word to man, for He is the Greatest of all, the very exact representation of God in all His glory and Being.
1.1 ‘By many portions and in many ways, God, having of old time spoken to the fathers in the prophets.’
God, says the writer, has spoken in the past ‘by many portions’ (polumerôs) --- ‘in many ways’ (polutropos).’ These words, which cover every aspect of Old Testament prophecy and teaching, emphasise, by their placement at the beginning of the sentence (and the letter) and by their emphasis on ‘many -- many’, the variety of God’s divine activity through the centuries, and the source from which the writer will draw in order to present his case.
For God, he says, has not in the past left Himself without a witness. He has spoken through many prophets, in many and varied ways, so that those who came after them had a growing source of material on which to draw. It was an enterprise worthy of God. And these were the Scriptures, deeply revered by men. Yet the very size and diversity of the material could only produce its own difficulties, as men sought to interpret their message and meaning.
But now, he writes, God has spoken in a greater and even more wonderful way, for He has spoken by sending to us One Who is, in relation to God, of the nature of Sonship, One Who is true ‘Son’, One Who is of the nature of God Himself. He is the One to Whom these Scriptures have been pointing.
And this Son, he will stress, is the fulfilment of all of which these prophets spoke. For it is now his intention to draw from those Scriptures in order to demonstrate that Who He is, and what He came to do, sums up the whole of their message. They were but the dawning. He is the sun. No longer need men seek to wrestle with what they say, puzzling over them, seeking to draw from them hidden meanings. No longer should they look to old institutions which were preparatory but have now been replaced. For they only provided a temporary measure, as they themselves revealed by their stress on what was coming. They looked ahead to what was to be, always in some way lacking, never finding total fulfilment.
But now here was their fulfilment in God’s true Son, Jesus Christ. The shadows had been replaced by the reality. And from now on those Scriptures must be read in that light. For He has come as the full revelation of God, the outshining of His glory, and those Scriptures therefore can no longer be read as though they stood by themselves. They must now be seen as heralds of His coming, and interpreted in those terms. They must be read in the light of Who He is. His very presence must illuminate every hidden message and explain every hidden thought, bringing to light their hidden depths and establishing that which is truly permanent.
Indeed now that He has come there is nowhere else to look. All else is but a pale reflection of the real thing. He alone is the fulfilment of their deepest meaning. For all must recognise that God has spoken through One Who is His Son, One for Whom those very Scriptures prepared. And as such He is the One Who has fulfilled, and has thus brought to final realisation, all to which those Scriptures point. And only in Him can they now have any meaning.
We must not, as he says this, overlook the pride that the Jews, and those who sought to their ancient Scriptures, had in those Scriptures. They saw them as containing ancient knowledge from the past which bore the stamp of God’s inspiration, and were a source of light in a dark world. They were treasured and carefully preserved and exalted to the heavens. When men were everywhere searching for truth, they were confident that here was that truth, if only one knew how to interpret it. And men had been, and still were, busy interpreting them, and were willing to die for them.
The writer does not deny this, as he indicates here. Indeed he too honours those Scriptures, and their diversity, and their wide coverage of divine wisdom. Through them ‘God has spoken’. But his emphasis is on the fact that they point to Someone even Greater than they Who has now come. They are truly God’s inspired revelation, but in the end their purpose has been to point to One Who was to come. And now He has come they must be interpreted in that light.
So this first verse is not intended to diminish those Scriptures in any way. Rather it is to give them due honour, as the vehicle which has prepared for the Coming One. But it is also to emphasise that a greater revelation than they are is here. In Him God’s final word to man has arrived.
And now he will go on to draw on those Scriptures in order to explain and amplify the one final way that God has now chosen to use, the manifestation of Himself through His Son! For He alone is the full manifestation of God and has brought His unique means of salvation. As he will reveal, the whole of Old Testament prophecy, including Moses and what we see as salvation history, is now to be seen as summed up in Christ. He is the whole of which all that was before revealed was a part.
So these words emphasise that God had built up through the centuries, in what we call ‘the Scriptures’, a multiplicity of different records, written at different times, and in various stages, and at distinct times in history, as a progressive revelation which had built up into a huge amount of different kinds and expressions of knowledge, but all pointing forward in the end to the One Who has now come, Who has summed it all up in Himself. They were God’s servants, He is ‘the Son’.
‘God has spoken to the fathers in the prophets.’ God, he stresses, has spoken through the prophets. He has no doubt that their words came from God. From Abraham (Genesis 20.7), through Moses (Deuteronomy 34.10), and David (Acts 2.30), and all the prophets, and on to Malachi, the prophets spoke from God to ‘the fathers’, bringing God’s word to men, to those who came before. He did not leave Himself without a witness, for through all of them God spoke in every age. The authority of the Old Testament Scriptures and of the Hebrew prophets is firmly asserted.
Mention of ‘the fathers’ does not necessarily mean that the recipients of the letter were Jews, (it does not say ‘our fathers’) for past faithful Israel could be seen as the fathers of the whole church, not just the Jews, for the church was very much seen as the new Israel, made one with them by integration through the covenant (Galatians 6.16; Ephesians 2.12-22; Romans 11.16-24), a part of the growth of the olive tree. But the content of the letter confirms his readers’ close connection with Judaism.
Indeed we should note that what came to be known as ‘Israel’ had never been limited to direct descendants of the patriarchs. It had always grown by accumulation, beginning with the servants and retainers of the patriarchs made up of a number of nationalities (Eliezer the Damascene, Hagar the Egyptian, etc.), moving on to the ‘mixed multitude’ of foreigners who had joined with them in the deliverance from Egypt (Exodus 12.38), followed by the command that they be ready to absorb ‘foreigners’ who willingly submitted to the covenant (Exodus 12.48-49), the continual influx of foreign names into Israel (e.g. Uriah the Hittite), and the absorption of Gentile proselytes, as the witness of the dispersed Israel, with their emphasis on the one God and their high moral basis, proved attractive among the Gentiles, and so on. The Jews were in fact a ‘gathering of God’ (the congregation of Israel) made up from many nations, all outwardly true to the covenant, and their true ancestry was a complicated one, and nothing like they themselves suggested.
‘Having of old time.’ As often in the New Testament time is split into ‘Then’ and ‘Now’; ‘of old time’ (in the completed past) and ‘at the end of these days’ (the final push towards the end, which results in the consummation, during which God is especially working) (verse 2). The whole of the Old Testament period is covered by these words in verse 1, ‘God has of old time spoken to the fathers in the prophets’. He spoke in Abraham, and indeed before Abraham (Luke 1.70; Acts 3.21), and on in the prophets to Malachi. Each was God’s spokesperson, God’s mouthpiece (Matthew 10.20; 2 Peter 1.21). But, he affirms, all that has been spoken and written through men of God over the past centuries, revealing truth only in part as man was able to receive it, has been preparatory to this time (compare 1 Peter 1.10-12). They have been laying the foundations for the One Who has now come.
1.2a ‘Has at the end of these days spoken to us in one who is Son.’
And now that time has come. At ‘the end of these days’ He has now spoken through One Who is ‘Son’. Away all partial understanding of God. He has revealed Himself through One Who is the very representation of Himself. He has revealed Himself through His Son. And no one better represents a father than his son. That is why He can be described as ‘the image of the invisible God’ (Colossians 1.15) for He is His full manifestation.
We are now, he writes, at ‘the end of these days’, the end of the days of preparation, the end of the days of continuing revelation (for the phrase compare Genesis 49.1 LXX; Numbers 24.14 LXX; Jeremiah 23.20 LXX). Called elsewhere ‘the last days’ (Acts 2.17), ‘the end of the times’ (1 Peter 1.20), ‘the end of the ages’ (1 Corinthians 10.11; Hebrews 9.26-28), this was the time to which God had been building up, the time when He would send into the world His own Son to bring about redemption, the end to which all the prophets had looked. The word ‘Son’ is without the article, not in order to mean ‘a son’ but in order to stress the nature of the One coming. He has come as ‘one Who is Son’. He is truly ‘Son’, of the same nature and being as ‘the Father’.
Note on the Sonship of Christ.
The question is regularly raised as to whether Christ saw the title ‘the Son’, and His reference to Himself as ‘the Son of God’, as first applying to Him when He came from God and was born into the world, with the Father likewise then coming to be seen as ‘the Father’ in that unique sense, or whether it can be related back, in terms of its New Testament use, to the very beginning.
We must emphasise that the question relates to the use of the title not to the significance behind it. The fact that the One Who came as Jesus was a coequal member of the Godhead must be decided on other bases than the use of terminology, although the use of terminology may relate to it. For the terminology was used in order to convey ideas.
Certainly in these verses it would seem that the One Who is ‘Son’ is being depicted as Creator in ‘the beginning’, and even as appointed as heir before the beginning. And the whole idea here is to relate the One who came to the One from Whom He came, as being of the same nature, essence and being. For the idea of ‘sonship’ here is precisely in order to do that. It is not the fact that He has come representing Himself as the Son that is of prime importance, but that He is ‘Son’, of the same nature and essence.
It is of interest in this connection that the writer in Hebrews does not speak of ‘the Father’, except when impelled to because it was in a quotation from Scripture that he wished to use (verse 5), the reason being that it was not an idea that he was seeking to convey. He nowhere emphasises the fact of God as Father. He speaks simply of ‘God’, as the glorious One, the transcendent One, the consuming fire. Thus his use of ‘Son’ stands alone in all its glory.
The same idea of Jesus as Son from the beginning may be also said to apply to John 1.18. ‘No man has seen God at any time, the only begotten Son Who is in the bosom of the Father, He has declared Him (made Him known).’ The idea of Him as the One Who ‘is in the bosom of the Father’, coming to declare Him, suggests ‘eternal Sonship’. And even if we accept the alternative rendering ‘God only begotten’, the thought is similar.
Again the thought that God ‘gave His only born Son’ in John 3.16 confirms that He was seen as ‘Son’ before being given. And in Galatians 4.4 God ‘sent forth His Son’, suggests that He was Son before He was sent forth. While the fact is also intrinsic in the Parable of the Wicked Husbandmen, for in that parable the son who was finally sent was sent precisely because he was already the son (Mark 12.1-11).
And Jesus constantly spoke in the Gospels of Himself as ‘the Son’ in contradistinction to ‘the Father’ in what appears to be a timeless way, setting Himself apart from all others as having a unique and permanent relationship with God.
On the other hand what is certainly true is that that ‘Sonship’ did also emphasise His coming into the world and becoming man. He came as the Son from the Father. Thus it could be stated at His baptism, ‘You are my beloved Son, in Whom I am well pleased’ (Mark 1.11), and in verse 5 here ‘You are my Son, this day have I begotten you.’ So we may distinguish His absolute Sonship, as being of the same being as the Father (as seems to be intended in its use by Jesus as He speaks of His relationship to the Godhead from man’s perspective), and His relative Sonship as representing His coming into the world from God to lead many sons to glory (2.10).
Both, however, are describing Jesus relationship with God in human terminology. How God was seen by the angels (and by Himself) prior to the creation of man was unlikely to be in terms of Father and Son. In view of the fact that among the angels there were no such relationships, for they neither married nor were given in marriage, we must doubt whether father-son relationships would have had any meaning to them. As far as we have cause to be aware father-son relationships began shortly after the creation of man (or if we prefer it the creation of reproducing creatures).
But the very fact that ‘God is love’ demands that there ever be a lover and a beloved, that there was and is always One available to be eternally loved. It must in itself be seen as requiring a plurality within God. Love could only be if there was One to be loved. But that is a totally different question from the idea of the love between ‘Father and Son’, in contrast with love within the interpersonality of the Godhead. ‘Father and Son’ was an idea which would not exist before the creation of the world because the language and concept is based on human relationships. Until humanity existed there were no grounds for thinking in terms of a son being born. As we have said, there is no hint of such among the angels, who neither marry nor are given in marriage, and thus presumably do not produce children. So it is only with regard to man that the concept of ‘Father and Son’ gains meaning, and we may see the terminological distinction made in the Godhead by these words as being made in order to help us to understand and appreciate relationships within the Godhead, not as describing the essential nature of God. It is probably safe to say that a book on doctrine written by the angels before the creation of the world would not have spoken of Father and Son.
We may see therefore that God represented Himself as ‘Father/Son’ in order for man to begin to understand Him. It was a way by which He could bring home to man that these two ‘persona’, inter-personalities, within the Godhead, were of the same nature, being and essence. But it also conveyed the idea of the One as coming forth from God, and as continually looking to God as a son would look to his father. (For in human understanding a son would not send his father. It was the father who was supreme. He would send the son). The same applies to the Holy Spirit. It was because He came to act in the world that His relationship with the Godhead had to be defined in the terms used. But all three were still of the essential nature of God.
All the titles and descriptions are thus to be seen as ‘pictures’ describing the indescribable so as to illuminate men, and must be taken as such and not be pressed beyond what is elsewhere revealed. The fact that in His eternal existence as seen by men Jesus is described as ‘the Son’ does not mean that He was as such at some stage ‘born’ as a son, as a human child is born. It is a declaration of like nature, of relationship. For He is revealed as eternal. That is until, of course, He was born into the world. Thus it is saying that, in the dealings of the Godhead with the world of men, ‘Son’ conveys something of the significance of what He essentially is, as being of one nature and being with the Father, and yet as having a part in God’s dealings which would be in an outwardly subsidiary role as ‘the Sent One’.
So we should not see ‘Father’ and ‘Son’ as descriptions of how the Godhead essentially is, but of how the Godhead is towards the world, and as a means of seeking to bring home to men certain truths about God and His interpersonal activities. In that sense therefore the question as to when the title of Son first applied is simply a doctrinal one, not an essential one.
The only question therefore is whether it is applied back in Scripture as referring to ‘before the beginning’ (but put in terms we can understand), in order to indicate the loving relationship within the Godhead in eternity, while at the same time recognising how that relationship would develop in terms of redemption, or whether it should only be referred to the incarnation. The Scriptures indicate that it refers to both.
However, this in itself warns us against overpressing the idea. ‘The Son’ is a human term and a human idea which is intended to help us, in terms of our own relationships, to appreciate that the Father and the Son are of one nature and being, while at the same time being a twoness in an eternal interpersonal relationship, and a threeness with the Holy Spirit. And as stressing the subsidiarity in position that the One Who is seen as ‘the Son’ took up in the course of the plan to redeem man. It was He Who ‘came forth’ from the Godhead, while declaring His total dependence on, and oneness with, the Godhead. ‘Father and Son’ was seen as a fitting way to describe this relationship, in the same way as it was in the Parable of the Wicked Husbandmen (Mark 12). But both the ‘begetting’ of ‘the Son’ and the ‘procession’ of the Holy Spirit are to be seen as ways of describing how God is seen as He comes into relationship with man, not as they are in ‘themselves’. They do not with full accuracy describe the essence of the Godhead which was essentially a tri-unity. This is why we have to speak of ‘eternal begetting (or filiation)’ and ‘eternal procession’ (both concepts beyond man’s understanding and experience) in order to seek partially to do so.
Eternally the Son’s relationship with the Father and the Holy Spirit is not to be seen as essentially any different from the Holy Spirit’s relationship with the Father and the Son; and the Father’s relationship with both is similarly not to be seen to be as essentially different. It is only as seen in their relationship with man and with creation that they are seen as different, and to have an order of priority, which results from the fact that Son and Spirit personally came into the world, while ‘the Father’ continually represents the triune Godhead in Heaven.
End of note.
1.2b ‘Whom he appointed heir of all things, through whom also he made the worlds (ages).’
And Who is this One Who has come? He is not only ‘Son’, but both Son and Heir. Before time began He was ‘appointed heir of all things.’ Everything has been promised to Him, whether in heaven or earth. He is destined to receive ‘all things’, everything that exists, an assurance which will come to its climax at His final coming. Nothing will be excluded, except the One Who will subject all things to Him (1 Corinthians 15.27), the One Who is the Ultimate Being.
We note that this appointment seemingly comes before the creation of the world, otherwise we would expect the clauses to be the other way round. It was in the eternal reaches of heaven, before creation ever was, that in the counsel of God this appointment was made. For nothing that was to come would take God by surprise. It was all known and purposed beforehand. Just as Jesus was ‘delivered up by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God’ (Acts 2.23; 1 Peter 1.20), so did He first come in that counsel and foreknowledge in order to be delivered up, and so was His appointment as heir one that was from eternity (Ephesians 1.4; 2 Timothy 1.9).
We note here the use of the term ‘heir’. It must be interpreted correctly. It is a reminder that, when we are describing eternal things, earthly terminology has to be considered carefully. For God would not either die or retire. Just as with the term ‘son’, where we must not ask ‘when was he born’, for He ‘was’ in the beginning from all eternity (John 1.1-3), so when He is called ‘heir’ we must recognise what it is saying, that all will be His, but not that the Godhead as a whole will cease to be over all. (Whoever heard of an heir handing everything back? - 1 Corinthians 15.24).
‘Through whom also He made the worlds.’ The word for ‘worlds’ actually originally first meant ‘ages’. But it came to mean ‘that which contained the ages’, that is the physical world (compare Hebrews 11.3 where this is specific and crystal clear). Only the context in each can therefore tell us what is being indicated in that particular context.
So the One Who was appointed ‘heir of all things’ (of the whole universe in totality) was also the One through Whom God made the worlds. They were destined for Him and He then made them. It is telling us that it was through Jesus Christ, for Whom they were destined, that He created all things and all ages. He was the Word Who spoke and it was done, and He did so in the course of His appointment as heir of all things, to give Him the more of which He would be heir. He was to be heir of both Heaven and earth. We note then that His creative act was subsidiary to His Appointment over all things, for that included all heavenly worlds as well as creation.
But why should He be heir? Was not all His from the beginning? Yes, indeed it was, as Lord and as Creator. But by the rebellion of angels and of men it had in a sense been wrested from Him. His gift of freewill had resulted in the sin of angels and of men. The establishment of morality, the ‘making and willing with determination’ of the ‘right’ choice in all freewill decisions, necessary if beings were to be truly themselves, had resulted in immorality and rebellion, in ‘knowing (by experience) good and evil’, because angels and men deliberately chose wrongly. And therefore the position had now to be restored, by the deliverance wrought by Him, through sacrifice, of those whom God chose and effectually called from among those who sinned, of His ‘elect’ (1 Peter 1.1-2), and the destruction of those who had rebelled and who refused to yield.
He could, of course, have destroyed all who failed instantly. But then His purposes to establish a freewill ‘Universe’ would have failed, and there would be none to enjoy it. Thus it was necessary for the process to carry through so that that end might be achieved for the good of all who responded.
1.3a ‘Who being the outshining of his glory, and the exact representation of his substance, and upholding all things by the word of his power.’
The ‘being’ of the coming Mighty One is now described. ‘Being’ (ôn), speaks of absolute and timeless existence (the present active participle of eimi) in contrast with genomenos (having become) in verse 4. Compare ‘was’ (ên) in John 1:1, in contrast with ‘became, was made’ (egeneto) in John 1.14, and ‘being, subsisting’ (huparchôn) and ‘having become’ (genomenos) in Philippians 2.6-7. This is thus describing the ‘being’ of God’s Son, what God’s Son essentially was, in contrast with what He ‘became’.
He ‘is’ the ‘outshining’ of the glory of God, the ‘effulgence of his glory’ (apaugasma tês doxês). Thus could John say, ‘we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only Son of the Father’ (John 1.14). The word apaugasma, is a late substantive from apaugazô, which means to ‘emit brightness’, to ‘illuminate’, in 2 Corinthians 4.4, and apaugasma is found only here in the New Testament. But it is found in the Wisdom of Solomon 7.26 where it refers to the outshining of wisdom, and in Philo, when expressing the relationship of the Logos (the eternal reason) to God. Thus it speaks of ‘revealing the essence of’. It can sometimes indicate reflected brightness, but even then it indicated the reflection of the real, for such reflections were not seen scientifically but as ‘revealing the true nature of’. So its meaning here is of the outshining of light from an original light body, and thus as being of the same nature as the light body. These ideas had already been applied to Wisdom and the Logos, of which they were partially true. But they are even more appropriate here.
For ‘outshining’ is more consonant of Christ in His relationship to God than reflected brightness. See John 1.4 with 5.21, 26; 3.16 with 19; 12.45; 14.9. The meaning "outshining" suits the context best. This is not a clinical analysis but an expression of worship. Compare ‘the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ’ (2 Corinthians 4.6) where the parallel of the glory on the face of Moses was not a reflection but the essential light of God. It was the outshining of what God essentially is.
‘And the exact representation of His substance’ (charaktêr tês hupostaseôs). Charaktêr comes from charassô, to cut, to scratch, to mark. It was first used of the tool that did the marking, then of the mark or impress which it made, the exact reproduction; compare charagma in Acts 17.29. It was used of the ‘stamped out image’ on coins, and of the impression that was reproduced by seals and dies. It thus indicates an exact representation.
The word hupostasis is used philosophically for the substantial nature, thus for the actual being or essence of God. Etymologically it is used, for example, of the sediment or foundation under a building, as that which forms the basis underneath, that which supports all, from which it came to mean the essence of a thing, what a thing is ‘underneath’. Thus the whole phrase means the exact reproduction of what God essentially is. It means that ‘what God was, the Word was’ (John 1.1).
‘And upholding (‘bearing’) all things by the word of his power.’ He not only fully represents and reveals God, He fulfils His responsibility to creation. By His powerful word, His creative and active word, He upholds all things. In Him all things consist (hold together) - Colossians 1.17. He did not just create and leave it to function on its own, He continued His activity in maintaining its functioning. It should be noted that the impression given is that this process continued even while He was on earth revealing the fullness of God. The thought of ‘bearing’ is not that of carrying a weight, but of moving all things forward so that the world does not go into decline.
1.3b ‘When he had himself made purification of sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high.’
And this One Who was of the nature of an only Son, appointed the heir of all things, creator of the world, the outshining of God’s glory and the exact reproduction of what He is, ‘Himself made purification of sins’ (middle voice - He was intimately involved). We later discover that this was by the sacrifice and offering of Himself (10.10). He suffered, the righteous for the unrighteous, that He might bring us to God (1 Peter 3.18). He was indeed both priest and sacrifice.
In the words of the hymnwriter,
‘Purification for sins.’ (katharismon tôn hamartiôn). Katharismos is from katharizô, to cleanse (see 9.14; 1 John 1.7, 9) and is also found in the same sense of cleansing from sins in 2 Peter 1.9; Job 7.21 LXX. He made possible, through His sacrifice of Himself, the total and complete cleansing and purifying, of all who responded to Him, by which He has perfected for ever those who are sanctified (9.14; 10.10, 14, 17-18).
And having accomplished purification of sin He ‘sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high’. His work of atonement accomplished once for all, He took His seat of authority and power (compare 10.12), receiving again the glory which He had had with the Father before the world was (John 17.5). He became the One Who sat on the throne, the Lamb ‘in the midst’ of the throne (Revelation 5.6). The ‘right hand’ simply indicates the hand of power, the ruling hand. The earthly language (there is neither physical throne nor physical right hand) represents the fact that having accomplished His saving work He rejoined His Father in exercising His absolute power and authority (Revelation 3.21). The fact that He sat down indicates that His work, including His priestly work, was now complete. He has returned to His rightful glory (John 17.5).
‘Of the Majesty on high.’ (tês megalosunês en hupsêlois). Coming from megas (great) megalosunês is found in Deuteronomy 32.3 LXX; Psalm 79.11 LXX; 145.3 LXX; and often in LXX; and in Hebrews 8.1; Jude 1.25. We could thus call God ‘His Supreme Greatness’. And having offered Himself Christ resumed his original greatness and glory (John 17.5). The phrase ‘on high’ (en hupsêlois) occurs in the Psalms (Psalm 93.4 LXX), but only here in the New Testament. Having fulfilled His ministry of Priesthood in the offering of Himself, Jesus is here portrayed as receiving His Kingship as both Lord and Christ in Heaven (Acts 2.34-36) and enjoying the restoration of His previously manifested glory (John 17.5).
Jesus is therefore Son, heavenly High Priest in an intercessory sense (His sacerdotal work having been completed as evidenced by the fact that He is now seated) and King.
1.4 ‘Having become by so much better than the angels, as he has inherited a more excellent name than they.’
Furthermore in His exaltation He, as man, ‘has become’ (contrast ‘being’ - verse 2) superior to the angelic realm (see 2.6-9). He has received superiority (kreitton) in status and power above the angels as a result, being raised far above all (Ephesians 1.19-22), something which will now be shown from Scripture. This was important. The Jews saw the Law as having been ministered by angels (2.2; Galatians 3.19), and as therefore superior. They saw it as something which gave it its supernatural aura (see also Deuteronomy 33.2; Psalm 68.17; Acts 7.53).
This idea of Messiah’s exaltation above the angels is also found in the Rabbinical writings. For example, commenting on Isaiah 52.13, they wrote ‘he shall be exalted beyond Abraham, and extolled beyond Moses, and raised high above the ministering angels’. He was to be supreme.
Angels had an important place among both orthodox (e.g. the Pharisees) and unorthodox (the Essenes, etc.) Jews, as well as in the Gentile world (Colossians 2.18). They were seen as intermediaries and mediators, maintaining the separation of the awesome holiness of God from men. They were those through Whom God acted because He Himself was unapproachable. Others considered that there were hierarchies of them between God as pure spirit, and man as unworthy flesh, a descending order with a gradual lessening of deity as the lower ‘angels’ became less spirit-like. Through them men received ‘knowledge’ about God. Their mediation was seen as essential so that they had even been introduced into the idea of God’s dealings with Moses. In their view it had to be so. Thus the thought that Jesus as the Christ (Messiah) was in direct touch with God and reigned with Him as representative Man was awesome. It was a revelation of the fact that even in His Manhood He was superior to the angels. Who then, the writer will ask, could sensibly and rightly seek to come to God through angels, when a greater than the angels, Who is directly approachable, is here?
That Jesus Christ is already seen in His essential deity to be superior is first confirmed by the fact that the One Who came is called ‘Son’, that is, among other things, the One Who is over the house instead of just being in it (3.6), the One Who has unique rights of intimate relationship. However, the writer now describes Him as also ‘having become so’ in His manhood as a result of inheriting a ‘more excellent’ name. He will then go on to describe other indications of His superiority to the angels from Scripture.
‘Having become.’ Note the contrast with ‘being’ (1.3a). What is described in verse 3 is His essential being, what is described here is what He ‘became’ as man in the purposes of God, ‘so much better than the angels’.
‘As he has inherited (come into possession of) a more excellent name than they.’ And this is because He ‘has inherited’, perfect tense, ‘has inherited and still possesses’, ‘a more excellent name.’ In view of the following quotations where it is continually mentioned, it would appear that that more excellent name is the title ‘Son’. Although it may be that we should not lay the emphasis on a particular name, but on the significance of ‘name’ which indicates status. Thus the more excellent name also has in mind His exaltation in His manhood as ‘Lord and Christ’ (Yahweh and Messiah) which goes with the idea of His sonship (Acts 2.34-36; Philippians 2.9-11 compare Ephesians 2.20-22). For ‘the name’ refers to what a person actually is. As the appointed heir of all things (verse 2) He Who was already the outshining of the glory of God has now ‘inherited’ in His manhood that exalted status as the Son, the anointed Christ, the receiving Heir. He receives in practise what was already His.
So in these verses the writer has laid bare the full truth about Jesus Christ; His eternal Being (verse 2), His being able fully to reveal the Father (verse 2), His being appointed before time began to bring the world to Himself (verse 3), His creative and sustaining power and activity (verse 3), His becoming man and dying for our sin (verse 3), His rising and being exalted in His manhood by taking His seat at ‘at God’s right hand’ (verse 3), and His receipt as man of the name of ‘Son’ as both ‘Lord’ (Yahweh) and ‘Christ’ (Messiah) (verse 4).
The Superiority of the Son to the Angels (1.5-2.14)
He Is Now Contrasted With The Angels, the Heavenly Beings and Intermediaries between God and the world (1.5-14).
Having revealed the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ as ‘the Son’, the writer now goes on to contrast Him with all heavenly beings, although already having revealed Him as superior to the angels in His being stated by God to be ‘My Son’. He does this by means of seven quotations from the Scriptures.
There is a certain pattern to them. The first quotation affirms His crowning as God’s king and, in its context in the Psalm, also presents Him as God’s ‘Anointed’, and this leads on in the second quotation into a reign where God is His Father, and He is His Son. These two tie in with his opening statement in verse 2 that He has spoken through One Who is a Son.
In parallel to this the fifth quotation emphasises His possession of His everlasting, durable throne and His further ‘anointing’ as Supreme Ruler over His ‘fellows’, and leads on in the sixth into His supremacy over creation from its beginning to its end (as in verse 3) and His complete everlastingness and durability in all things.
The third affirms the homage of angels at His coming because He is God’s chosen and His heir (firstborn), and the seventh the submission of all His enemies at His coming. The fourth and central one defines the comparative status of the angels, as sandwiched on each side by three declarations of His authority and power (three being ever the number of completeness).
Thus we may picture this as follows;
Note how the first three relate to His appointment resulting in due honour, the second three to the manifestation of this in rulership and triumph. And these two ideas surround the description of angels as being closely connected with created things.
1.5a ‘For to which of the angels said he at any time, “You are my Son, This day have I begotten you?” ’
‘For to which of the angels.’ Angels are only ever seen singly when on direct service for God as His messengers. Otherwise they are always seen in plurality. As a class angels can be called ‘sons of the Elohim (heavenly beings/God)’ (Psalm 29.1), but ‘son’ in the singular is never used of an angel. Whereas, says the writer, the Christ (Messiah) is addressed as God’s Son in both Psalm 2.7 and 2 Samuel 7.14.
Thus to no angel has He ever spoken in terms of true sonship. When they were thought of as ‘sons of the elohim’ it was their supernatural nature that was in mind, not their divinity. The idea was that they had the likeness of the ‘elohim’, the heavenly. To Israel the description ‘sons of -’ signified ‘likeness to’ without necessarily signifying relationship, compare the ‘sons of Belial’ (1 Samuel 2.12 and often).
“My son you are. This day have I begotten you?” Note the emphasis on ‘son’. Literally it is ‘Son to me you are.’ This quotation is taken from Psalm 2 which is a psalm declaring the choice and anointing of the house of David to be ‘God’s anointed’, God’s ‘chosen and set apart one’ for ever, so as to bring about world subjugation to God and final judgment, and calling on all to respond to Him.
Initially it may well have been used as a coronation Psalm, with ‘begotten’ carrying the significance of adoption by God at the crowning of each king, but the whole Psalm was intended to be a constant reminder of God’s promise of their final worldwide dominion, clearly to be fulfilled in a super-king. It was a true ‘Messianic’ psalm from the beginning, with a vision of the ‘Messianic’ future, for it spoke of the Davidic kingship in terms beyond the ordinary as ‘the anointed’ of Yahweh for the purpose of total worldwide domination. This was His purpose in ‘begetting’ the house of David, as represented in each king, until the One came in the future Who would finally achieve the dream.
Once the house of David ceased to be relevant after the time of Zerubbabel, and even before, thoughts moved forward to the necessary coming of a greater David (so that God’s promise would not fail) who would bring in God’s everlasting kingship (Isaiah 9.6; Ezekiel 37.24-28). These developed into the explicit idea of a coming ‘Messiah’ (anointed one) which was already intrinsic in the Psalm. Thus the psalm undoubtedly has ‘Messianic’ reference, (compare Acts 13.33), depicting the eternal kingship of the house of David, and in the end, by necessity, the coming of an eternal king Who is to be ‘God’s Son’.
The writer’s main point is that He is there emphatically called ‘my Son’, which he then links with begetting by God. And it is Jesus, Who, being of the house of David, and because He was recognised as ‘the Christ’, that he depicts as finally fulfilling this role. He must necessarily then be greater than the angels. What this ‘begetting’ is to be referred to is an open question which is much disputed. Some see it as referring to an ‘eternal begetting’, although that disagrees with the idea of ‘Today’, (although, as is pointed out by many, if we have eternal begetting we can have an eternal ‘today’). That would, however, run counter to the use of ‘today’ elsewhere in the letter where it means a specific point in time (see especially 4.7).
Others therefore refer it alternately to His birth, His baptism, His resurrection or His exaltation as being the time when He is declared to be and instated as, or reinstated as, Son. All are possible. In a sense all are true, for each is a reaffirmation of His Sonship in increasing degrees, right from the beginning.
He was sent forth as the Son (Galatians 4.4), His miraculous birth pointed to His Sonship (Luke 1.35), at His baptism He was declared to be the Son (Mark 1.11), in the Transfiguration He was manifested as the Son (Mark 9.7), by His resurrection He was revealed as the Son (Romans 1.4), and in His exaltation He was established as the Son, sharing His Father’s throne (Revelation 3.21). In the end it resulted in Him being made the heavenly High Priest (5.5, 9).
In Acts 13.33-34 Jesus is described in terms of being ‘raised up’, and there too we have the problem as to whether ‘raised up (anistemi) Jesus’ in verse 33 means the incarnation, the baptism or the resurrection. We can compare Acts 13.22 where it speaks of David as being ‘raised up’ (egeiro) after the rejection of Saul. But this is in contrast with, or paralleling, the raising up (anistemi) from the dead (verse 34). The fact is that egeiro and anistemi cross over in meaning. Both have similar varieties of meaning and both can refer to the resurrection, but in Acts 33 are probably intended to differentiate between David’s ‘raising up’ and that of Jesus as being of a different nature, both in His birth/ministry and in His resurrection.
However, the point behind all is that it is God’s unique act on this One unique ‘person’, demonstrating that He and He alone is God’s Son, that thus shows Him to be superior to the angels.
1.5b ‘And again, “I will be to him a Father, And he will be to me a Son?” ’
Or ‘And again, “I will be to him as a Father, And he will be to me as a Son.” ’ ‘And again’ (kai palin), signifies the introduction of a further witness from Scripture. This quotation is taken from 2 Samuel 7.14. Note the use of eis (unto) in the predicate with the sense of "as" like the Hebrew (an LXX idiom), not necessarily needing to be preserved in the English. See Matthew 19.5; Luke 2.34.
The same passage is applied to the relationship between God and His people see 2 Corinthians 6.18; Revelation 21.7, but not there with Messianic implications except in so far as they are spoken to the Messianic community.
These words were spoken after David had determined to build a Temple for Yahweh and God had come back with the reply that He did not want a temple, only a tent, but that in view of David’s faithfulness He would build for David an everlasting house, a living house of successive kings so that his throne would be established for ever. And this would begin with his son.
Yahweh then promised that He would be his father and would adopt him as His son (2 Samuel 7.5-16). And this relationship, along with the right to the throne, would then go on for ever in his descendants (verse 16). It would therefore also apply to the final everlasting king (Ezekiel 37.25). Intrinsic within the promises is potential for the kings who follow David to have a special relationship with God as appointed by Him, with a recognition of a greater Messianic fulfilment.
Again, once the Davidic house faded this became firmly attached to the necessary idea of a future coming king (which is intrinsic in the words) which eventually resulted in the words specifically being applied Messianically (as witnessed in the Dead Sea Scrolls). Thus, says the writer, God promised to the Messiah that He would be His Father, and He would be His Son.
So in both promises we have the assurance that the Messiah would be greater than the angels for He would be God’s Son, and God would be His Father. Such a relationship is never suggested of angels, and makes clear that the Sonship is no earthly expedient.
1.6 ‘And when he again brings in the firstborn into the inhabited earth he says, “And let all the angels of God worship him.”
The idea of sonship (and heirship - verse 2) continues under another title, the firstborn. ‘When He again brings in the firstborn into the inhabited earth ’. The firstborn is another title for the unique son. Israel had been His son, even His firstborn (Exodus 4.22), but had then come to be represented by the King whom they saw as ‘the breath of our nostrils, the anointed of Yahweh’ (Lamentations 4.20), so that the Davidic king is described as God’s ‘firstborn’ in Psalm 89.27. There the idea is of high favour and honour, which is very much in mind there. The idea behind the use of ‘firstborn’ (of a king) is of prestige and authority. Colossians links the title to creation indicating the One Who is the pre-existent non-created source Who has authority over creation (Colossians 1.15), ‘pre-born’ not created, and to the resurrection (the new creation) indicating the One Who as the initial Resurrected One, raised in honour and power, is the Giver of life to God’s people (Colossians 1.18), and thus He is the Firstborn twice over. All contain the thought of authority and power and relationship.
But the idea of the firstborn also contains within it that the firstborn is the heir. This ties it in here with verse 2 where He is declared to be the heir of all things. So as the Firstborn He is the One Who was before all things, the One for Whom all things are destined, and the One Who was raised as the Source of all true life.
‘Again.’ The question here is as to whether we translate ‘again’ as indicating a second ‘bringing into the world’ of the Firstborn (‘again brings’), thus looking to His second coming, or whether ‘again’ is to refer back in contrast and conjunction with the previously quoted verses, as with ‘again’ in verse 5. This latter is superficially attractive in the English rendering but the opening construction in Greek is very different. It is not kai palin as in verse 5 but ‘otan de palin’, representing not a simple continuation but a specific break. The natural reading is to take it as ‘again brings’.
Such a reference to His second coming as the Firstborn to finalise His creative and life-giving purpose, following the description of His first coming as ‘Son’, gives added significance to the passage, indicating an advancement in idea rather than it being just a string of quotations all with the same point, and significantly it parallels the similar idea in the seventh. It also fits in with the use of firstborn in Colossians 1.18 as ‘the firstborn from the dead’. He Who was the firstborn from the dead, the first to arise and the Lord of resurrection, now comes again to the inhabited world for His own to raise them too, whether by resurrection or rapture (compare 9.28). It also explains the emphasis on the ‘inhabited earth’. The idea then is that He is called Son or its equivalent, firstly at His anointing, and then on His return to bring all to its consummation.
‘He says.’ Compare the use of the present tense with ‘He said’ (aorist - verse 5), thus giving a differing emphasis. Verse 5 was referring to a once for all event. This refers to something that is to be said continually. Thus God’s command comes over continually, ‘let all the angels of God worship Him’.
“And let all the angels of God worship him.” This could be a paraphrase of Psalm 97.7 where we read, ‘Worship Him all you heavenly beings (elohim - LXX ‘angels’)’, the Him referring to ‘the Lord’ Who ‘reigns’, and this would fit the quotation reasonably well.
But the almost (but not identical) exact phrase may be seen in Deuteronomy 32.43 LXX, where it is shown as an addition which is not found in the Hebrew text, (but is now actually confirmed as in a Hebrew text found at Qumran). The LXX version reads, ‘Rejoice, you heavens, with him, and let all the sons of God worship him; rejoice you Gentiles, with his people, and let all the angels of God strengthen themselves in him.’ This is spoken of the Lord Who comes to judge His people (Deuteronomy 32.36), and would therefore naturally be applied to Him Who is called Lord, and to Whom judgment has been committed (John 5.22, 27).
But the important point here is that all angels will pay Him homage, confirming that He is to be superior to the angels at the second coming (Mark 13.26-27 and often in the Gospels) as He was at the first (compare Philippians 2.9-11; Ephesians 1.19-21).
This is now followed by a series of quotations which are clearly interpreted Messianically, and thus as referring to the Son, in line with previous verses. But first we have one which contrasts the transitory work of angels. Note that this one is placed in the middle of the seven. The angels in their anonymous tasks are sandwiched within the authority and power of the Son as He fulfils His destiny, in order to indicate the secondary and derived nature of their authority and power.
1.7 ‘And of the angels he says,
Firstly he takes a quotation to demonstrate what the angels are. They are powerful. They are made winds and a flame of fire (Psalm 104.4 compare 148.8), but they do not represent God directly.
We note first of all that they are said to be ‘made’ not ‘begotten’. Then that they have specifically allocated functions and do God’s will. ‘Winds’ refers to invisible but powerful activity, ‘a flame of fire’ to glory and judgment.
It may also be that we are to see them as carrying on their ministry through natural forces which are transitory and not lasting, affecting the world but not permanently transforming it. (The movement between spiritual activity and physical activity is not always made plain. The two were seen as going closely together). Certainly when connected with their attendance on Yahweh these descriptions are often connected with storm phenomena. Thus they are described in terms of created things, not as creating.
Their tasks, however, are many and varied as required, but like wind and fire they reveal no permanence. Like winds and fiery flames they arise and then disappear. They are here today and gone tomorrow. They are servants who do God’s will.
And yet that does not indicate that they must be looked on lightly. While invisible they are effective, and even devastating. They can make an impact in the world. We must not underestimate or dismiss them as unimportant. Their activity is, for example, indicated in Daniel 10. And we can indeed compare all the Psalms where such phenomena signal the approach of God Himself accompanied by His attendants. But in the end, however great, that is all they are, servants of Yahweh. Compare in Jewish literature 2 Esdras 8.21-22, ‘before whom the hosts of angels stand with trembling, at whose bidding they are changed to wind and fire’ (probably also based on the Psalm). Then he moves on to show what the Son is, the One to Whom God has in contrast given a permanent and everlasting purpose over all universes.
We should note therefore that this verse does not stand by itself but is specifically contrasted with the idea of the Son’s permanent rule. They are set individual but temporary tasks as servants. He rules on an everlasting and permanent throne. Their tasks are physical. His go to the root of morality. They are many, but He is the Anointed one, anointed as over all. Thus he now makes this contrast.
1.8-9 ‘But of the Son he says,
This fourth quotation parallels ideas in the first. There He was crowned, here He has his everlasting throne. There He became God’s Anointed. Here He is anointed as supreme ruler. And central to the idea is His perfect righteousness and uprightness.
‘But of the Son.’ There is a direct contrast here of ‘the Son’ with the angels.
His supreme greatness is emphasised in that He Who is the Son, the Messiah, is either called ‘God’, or has ‘God as His throne’ (Psalm 45.6-7). If we translate in the first way it was originally a courtesy title, flattering the Davidic king as being almost like one of the elohim (heavenly beings), or indicating his unique position as God’s prime representative and adopted son, and the description is kept in its rightful place by referring almost immediately to ‘your God’. In that case the writer has no hesitation in seeing it as an unconscious prophecy (compare John 11.51) concerning the greatest of the Davidic kings, and of the Messiah. The One Who is Son is described as ‘God’, as One Who will sit on an eternal throne. As such He will reign under the Heavenly Rule of God.
However the equally possible translation ‘your throne is God’ (compare ‘Yahweh is my rock’ (Psalm 18.2), ‘You are my rock’ (Psalm 31.3) so that they could equally well have said a parallel, ‘My rock is God’) would equally indicate the Son’s unique status. It could be seen as the equivalent of sitting at God’s right hand (verse 13), but even more so, as sitting in God’s hand, so that God is giving full support to Him in his rule. He acts totally as God’s viceroy, and is seated in God as the one who is in God’s hand. In the initial Psalm it might indicate the divinity, the heavenly status, of the king’s throne as indicating that he is the favourite of Yahweh.
(It is in fact difficult to think of the Davidic king in the Psalm, who was originally an ordinary king, even though Davidic and therefore adopted by God, and in the Psalm in process of being married, being called ‘God (elohim)’. It is true that it could be seen as meaning ‘godlike’, or even ‘glorious representative of the true God’, but it is only used in this sense in the plural, and such a description in the singular would be unique in the Old Testament, and this is especially significant in the light of the fact that an alternative translation is equally possible. It is very different from the reference which Jesus does use, ‘I have said you are elohim’ (Psalm 82.6) for there the plural is referring to a plurality and the use is explained and defined. The use of Mighty God in Isaiah 9.6 is different because it refers to a unique, miraculously born person. Had Jesus interpreted the Psalm as describing the king as elohim would He not have used that against the charges of blasphemy that were brought against Him? It would have been the perfect riposte. That being so, however, many translators and interpreters do prefer the rendering ‘O God’, and it certainly ties in with the progression ‘Son’, ‘God’, ‘Lord’ in the quotations.).
‘And the sceptre of uprightness is the sceptre of your kingdom.’ The sign of His kingly office will be uprightness, which will be the symbol of what distinguishes His kingdom, for his throne is God. That would mean that we have the parallels, ‘his throne is God’ and ‘his sceptre is uprightness’. This in direct contrast to the winds and flames of fire, where they but act as servants and ministers.
‘You have loved righteousness, and hated iniquity. Therefore God, your God, has anointed you with the oil of gladness above your fellows.’ And it is because of His truly righteous rule, and especially because of His love for righteousness and hatred of iniquity, that ‘God His God’ (the equivalent of ‘Yahweh your God’), has anointed Him with the oil of gladness, the special anointing that makes glad the heart because it is the anointing of the supreme king. No joy is like the joy of being supreme.
‘Above your fellows.’ In the Psalm initially this probably signifies other kings. But it possibly has in mind here both the whole of mankind and of the angels as his ‘fellows’ over whom He is set. So again He is set above the angels. (For if the king is elohim, so can be the angels, who are also elsewhere called elohim, but the overall point is rather that He is the One chosen as supreme king on the everlasting throne and above all His ‘fellows’ of whatever kind). So His deep love and concern for righteousness is what has set Him apart from all others. It is seen to exceed that of all, even that of the angels, of kings and of his fellow-men. He is uniquely the King of Righteousness, the Righteous One (7.2; 1 Peter 3.18), the One Who is ‘apart from sin’ (9.28).
1.10-12 ‘And,
This next quotation is taken from Psalm 102.25-27. Having described His supremacy over all rulers and powers, the writer now stresses His supremacy over creation. If ‘God’ can be seen as a suitable address for ‘the One Who is Son’ (verse 8), so certainly can ‘Lord’ (as found in the text of the Psalm in LXX), a regular ascription by the writer to Jesus Christ (Hebrews 2.3; 7.14; 13.20). The Psalm is here quoted as having in mind the Son’s upholding of all things by His powerful word (verse 3). Once He withdraws His word they perish and He ‘rolls them up’. For He is here seen as Lord of creation, and controller of its destiny. Both heavens and earth will be taken off like a cloak and rolled up, or stripped off like used clothes and changed, while He remains the same and goes on for ever, never growing old, and having no beginning or end. As such He is superior to the angels, who while they could devastate the earth with wind and fire, were unable either to create the earth or to effect its final destiny. (And once the world ceased there would be no more wind and fire for them to control).
We note also that in the fifth quotation reference was made to His enduring throne. Here in the sixth reference is made to His own enduring. He is the Enduring One.
In the original Psalm the One addressed is Yahweh. But the writer has already made clear that Jesus is the outshining of Yahweh, and the express image of what He is. And Paul also makes clear that Jesus bears the name of Yahweh (Philippians 2.9-11). So that as Jesus is constantly called ‘Lord’ (Yahweh) regularly in the New Testament, and therefore in the early church, and is regularly depicted as the Creator in the New Testament (1.2; John 1.3; Colossians 1.16), this action with regard to creation can be assigned to the Son. The writer has no difficulty in applying the words to Him.
1.13 ‘But of which of the angels has he said at any time,
It will be noted that this is the seventh quotation, a number seen as the number of divine perfection in all nations from the time when numbering was first invented. The sevenfold witness is thus seen as divinely decisive. This quote is taken from Psalm 110.1 and refers to God’s king being told by God to take His seat at God’s right hand while God makes His enemies His footstool. The placing of the foot on a conquered king’s neck may well have been an evidence of his submission, but the thought may simply be to picture submission. To which of the angels, the writer asks, did God ever say that? So do we have the sevenfold witness to the superiority of Christ over the angels.
To sit in the presence of God was the Davidic king’s prerogative (2 Samuel 7.18; Ezekiel 44.3). It was in itself a clear indication that He enjoyed God’s favour and was God’s viceroy. To have all enemies ( here both of heaven and earth) His footstool is an indication of His guaranteed final triumph.
So we note here the advancement in thought of the quotations:
And within it all is set the contrast with the angels. This contrast between the Son and the angels (verses 4, 5, 6, 7-8, 9, 13) is then brought to its conclusion by a positive declaration of what the position and responsibilities of the angels are.
1.14 ‘Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to do service for the sake of those who will inherit salvation?’
What the angels are is now made clear. They are spirits who serve God, who are sent by Him to do service for those who are to inherit salvation, that is, for those who are His, and destined for final salvation, God’s elect, in order to keep them and help them as they walk in God’s ways. Rather than being Lord over God’s people the good angels are His servants and theirs. This is noble service indeed, but not enjoying the same dignity as the status of the Son, Who is made Lord of all.
We must beware of reading too much into the words in this verse. The task of angels has been defined in verse 7 as to be that of being like winds and flames of fire, and it is as such that they serve the heirs of salvation. This would seem to point to invisible yet physical help, rather than to spiritual sustenance. Elsewhere specifically seeking to angels is frowned on (Colossians 2.18), and there is nowhere a suggestion that we look to the angels for help. They are not at man’s bidding, but at God’s. We may, however, draw lessons from past angelic activity which involves their going invisibly before God’s people as they obey God (Exodus 23.20, 23 compare Numbers 20.16), protection (Psalm 91.11; Daniel 6.22), deliverance (Acts 12.7), and strengthening (Luke 22.43), as well as occasional judgment (2 Samuel 24.16, 17; Acts 12.23), and acting as God’s messengers (often). And Revelation makes clear the powerful background activity of angels. But all solely as God wills. We should be looking to the Son, not to angels.
Chapter 2 A First Warning To Take Heed To His Words - Followed By The Revelation That This One Who Is Son Is Now Revealed As Jesus Who Has United Himself with Mankind Through Being made Lower Than The Angels And Crowned As True Man So That Through Suffering He Might Save All Who Believe Making Them His Brothers And Destroying The Fear of Death (2.1-18)
The First Warning - We Must Take Heed To What God Has Said For God’s Salvation Is What Is Involved And Especially As We Have Learned It On The Greatest Possible Authority, That Of The Son Himself (2.1-4).
2.1 ‘Therefore we must give the more earnest heed to the things that were heard, lest it be that we drift away.’
Therefore, because the things that we have heard have come to us, not on the authority of angels, but on the authority of the Son, we must (it is necessary to) take the more earnest heed to them, for otherwise the danger is that we may drift away from them, like a boat loses anchor and drifts from its moorings, or like a pilot misses His way through neglect and takes his charge away from the harbour, and thus by carelessness lose sight of them. That would indeed be a great loss when we consider the importance of the One who brought them.
Note that he speaks of ‘we’. He includes himself along with them because he wants to be identified with them and wants them to feel included within the whole church of Christ. He does not want them to feel that they have been selected out as especially weak.
‘Give the more earnest heed’ contrasts with ‘neglect’ (verse 3). We cannot just mark time in the things of God. We either go on growing by giving determined consideration to the truths that we have heard, and to our response to them, or we begin to drift away because of neglect, for the tide is certainly against us. There is no standing still. We must go on. This is a theme of the letter (e.g. Hebrews 6.1). Note the strength of the phrase, ‘the more earnest’. It requires effort and dedication.
‘The things that were heard.’ The message of Christ and His Gospel in all its fullness. It is not enough just to believe one or two simple facts. We must enter ever more deeply into its truths, for they keep us close to Christ, and it is He and His promises Which are our anchor and prevent us from drifting (compare 6.19).
2.2 ‘For if the word spoken through angels proved steadfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just recompense of reward,’
For if the word that was spoken by angels proved true in what it said, which was that every failure to keep it and every disobedience to it would receive its just punishment, (that is, what it justly deserved as a result of breaking it), as it did, then those who have received an even greater word and who neglect it can certainly have no hope.
And that is what history proved. Israel reaped what it sowed. It heard, it sowed disobedience, it reaped disaster. The Old Testament is packed with examples of those who transgressed and suffered punishment, even Moses. How much more then will the word spoken by the Son have such a result for those who disobey or neglect it. Note that he does not speak of ‘the Law’ but of ‘the word’, both softening its harshness and paralleling it with the word spoken by the Son. It is seen as a word from God (as it was) rather than a harsh law; as a resultant of salvation for those who would respond to His saving covenant. But they were destroyed by the very means that had been intended as a blessing. And observing the ‘word’ now from God is equally important. Failing to observe it can also only bring the same harsh consequences.
‘The word spoken through angels.’ Both Paul (Galatians 3.19) and Stephen (Acts 7.53) mention the part played by angels in the giving of the law, but the Old Testament is almost silent about it. All took place behind a cloud. Deuteronomy 33.2 and Psalm 68.17 provide what are references to angels as present at Sinai, but without amplifying them. The idea arose from a recognition that God was so holy that He could not be dealt with by the people face to face, but that everything had to be mediated through angels.
‘Every transgression and disobedience.’ The former word emphasises more the sins done positively by breaking the Law, a crossing of the boundary, the latter the failure to obey, a falling short in obedience.
‘Received a just recompense of reward.’ It was the sin that brought the punishment. Man was to receive the due reward for his sins. This was a necessity because of what God is, because of His aversion to all that is sin. The punishment was not arbitrary, but in accordance with the crime. It is just that when we consider it we underestimate the crime, often not realising the consequences, while God does not.
2.3 ‘How shall we escape, if we neglect so great a salvation? Which having at the first been spoken through the Lord, was confirmed to us by those who heard,’
That being so how can we hope to escape judgment if we neglect an even greater offering of salvation, ‘so great a great salvation’, such as is revealed in the words of the Son, Who is a far more wonderful deliverance vehicle than anything the Old Testament could produce? If we neglect this new ‘word’ that was originally taught directly by the Lord Himself, and which we have heard confirmed to us by eyewitnesses, that is, by those who personally heard it and knew Him, what hope of escape from just punishment can we possibly have?
For to neglect a message is to treat it with contempt, but to neglect such a message delivered by such a Person is to be in total contempt of God Himself. This is in fact the great sin of the majority of the world. It is not that they reject the truth out of hand, it is that they simply do not bother with it. They neglect it. They often claim to honour Jesus but they disregard His word as ‘Lord’.
‘So great a salvation.’ In considering its greatness we should consider certain factors.
‘Having at the first been spoken through the Lord, was confirmed to us by those who heard.’ Central to Christian truth is that its source is in Jesus. Only what is in conformity with His words can be accepted as ‘Gospel truth’. This was why Paul himself stressed that what he taught came directly from Him, and this was why the Apostles were inspired by the Holy Spirit to later fully remember His teaching.
Much is often made of this verse as though it required that the writer had not himself heard the teaching of Jesus personally. But while the writer does use ‘we’ (emphasised, in contrast with those who were not Christians) he may well be using it rather loosely, signifying by it the group to which he was writing of which he saw himself a part, and continuing the use of ‘we’ with which he had begun the chapter. Thus he may simply be saying that while his readers had not heard it directly from the Lord, they, along with the whole church, had nevertheless heard it from eyewitnesses, from those who were actually there and heard His words, without necessarily saying anything about himself. But it is not characteristic of Paul who tended to stress his own special reception of revelation.
For it was ‘the Lord’ Who spoke it, and reliable eyewitnesses confirmed it, as they all know, and the authority of it is therefore unquestioned, and its certainty assured. What hope then can there be for them if they neglect it, when it has such authority behind it?
‘The Lord.’ We become so used to using the term glibly that we can easily not notice its force. It was because it was spoken by the Lord of glory, God’s true Son, the Creator and Sustainer of the world, the One Who is higher than the angels, that it was to be heard.
2.4 ‘God also bearing witness with them, both by signs and wonders, and by manifold powers, and by gifts of the Holy Spirit, according to his own will.’
And not only did the word come directly from the Son through impeccable witnesses, but God also Himself bore witness to it among them, through those very witnesses, providing a further witness which came by signs and miracles and by many revelations of power wrought by them and among them, and by the gifts of the Holy Spirit given to those who heeded Him in accordance with His will.
The witness was both from without, in outward manifestations, and from within, through gifts of the Spirit (Romans 12.5-11; 1 Corinthians 12.7-11; 28-31; Ephesians 4.11-12). He had thus given them every opportunity to heed it, and it had been as He Himself had determined. It had been directly in accordance with His will. For He had wanted them to have full evidence of the truth that was being taught, and His assurance that He was behind it.
‘Both by signs and wonders, and by manifold powers, and by gifts of the Holy Spirit.’ Compare here Acts 2.22. Jesus had Himself given evidence of Who and What He was by ‘mighty works and wonders and signs’; by His control over nature, by turning water into wine, by stilling the storm, by multiplying bread, by raising the dead, by healing the sick, and by casting out evil spirits. And this had continued on with the Apostles, and in the early church (see Galatians 3.5).
Signs, wonders, and manifold powers as mentioned in this verse bring to mind the miracles by which God at certain points in history confirmed His message to man at crucial times. Moses appeared before Pharaoh in a series of amazing signs and wonders at the time of the deliverance from Egypt, followed by Joshua on entry into Canaan; Elijah, followed by Elisha, was involved in a number of signs and miracles at a time when belief in God was at its lowest, and the coming of Jesus, followed by His disciples, was a further time of signs and miracles as the Gospel first began to spread. There is a clear pattern. But outside of those times miracles have been rare.
We should not therefore be surprised that after the early church had been established miracles became a rarer phenomenon. It follows the pattern of history. And it was also in full keeping with that pattern that the new revelation preached to people through the Jesus and His Apostles should have been corroborated and confirmed in the beginning by certain signs and miracles.
The very birthday of the church at Pentecost saw the apostles speaking with known tongues so as to understood (Acts 2.1-11). The gift of prophetic foretelling was exercised by Agabus (Acts 11.28; 21.10), and by Paul himself when he prophesied that all on board the shipwrecked vessel would be spared alive (Acts 27.34). The disciples rejoiced at their being able to cast out evil spirits and heal the sick while Jesus was on earth (Luke 10.17), and that continued with the disciples after Pentecost (Acts 3.1-10; 4.33; 5.12; 6.12) and with Paul and the girl at Philippi (Acts 16.18), while the power to inflict divine punishment on the wicked, as in the case of Elymas who was blinded (Acts 13.11) and that of Ananias and his wife who were stricken with death (Acts 5.1-10), was a reminder that God was not to be dallied with. Thus the confirming miracles that established the word of the Apostles of Christ as being truly that of God Himself were numerous. But it is apparent that even then they died down to a lesser level, for they are rarely mentioned later, although see Galatians 3.5; 1 Corinthians 12.10, 28-30, both comparatively early letters. By the time of the death of the Apostles they appear to have almost, but not completely, ceased.
Note the contrast between Sinai and Christ. At Sinai the voice of angels, the manifestations of power and glory, both coming from the mountain; here signs and wonders and manifold powers and gifts of the Holy Spirit directly present among them and revealed before their very eyes, and even manifested through them. At Sinai God before them in veiled glory as their sovereign Lord, compared with God among them here as their Saviour and within them as their ‘Helper’.
The Son Is Now Declared To Be Jesus Who Has Been Made Lower Than The Angels In Order To Be Crowned As True Man So That He Might Suffer For Mankind And Make Them His Brothers Through Saving Them From Sin And Bringing Them To Glory, Destroying The Fear of Death, And Becoming Their Effective High Priest (2.5-18).
Having revealed the glory of the Son and His superiority to angels, the writer now develops the theme of how low He stooped in order to help mankind and what the result will be for those who respond to Him. For God did not choose out angels to be His assistants, He decided to choose out sinful men, paying for them a huge price that He might deliver them. The angels indeed have no great part to play in His plan (see the repeated ‘not to angels’ - verses 5 and 16). While they do in their own way minister to the heirs of salvation (1.14), they are very much in the background. The central players are God, Jesus and redeemed men. (So is the importance of angels thrust into the background as far as men are concerned. For in the writer’s day too much emphasis was being laid on angels).
2.5 ‘For not to angels did he subject the world to come, of which we speak.’
For let them consider that it was not to angels that God gave authority over ‘the world to come’, it was to the Lord and to these witnesses who received His word, those through whom these signs and wonders were done. When God decided to act it involved His Son and those men who were chosen by Him and had responded to Him. The angels had no part to play in it.
The word for ‘world’ is oikoumene. This can signify the inhabited world, or one section of the world subjected to order and discipline, in contrast to another. Thus the Greeks used it of their own ‘ordered world’ in contrast with the world of Barbarians, and it was used of ‘ordered world’ of the Roman Empire in contrast with the world outside. In this case therefore ‘the world to come’ means ‘that world forecast as coming in the Scriptures, and now here, which is under the control of God’, in contrast with the world in general, and thus signifies the coming and arrival of the Kingly Rule of God in Jesus, in contrast to the world outside that Rule. It refers to that sphere of Kingly Rule which was under the sway of the King and His followers (Colossians 1.13), and subject to the law of Christ (1 Corinthians 9.24), in Jewish terminology, to the coming days of the Messiah and His Kingdom.
Thus the ‘world to come’ here indicates ‘the world’ known from Scripture ‘to be coming’, and which had now arrived in the coming of Jesus and the establishing of the ‘worldwide’ Christian community, the sphere of the Kingly Rule of God, and is to be seen as including all that follows from it. It represents the new stage of God’s purposes in its totality. The old ‘world’ was passing. The new had come.
It had arrived at ‘the end of these days’ (1.2), that is, ‘in the last days’ (Acts 2.17), which are in Acts very closely connected with signs and wonders and gifts of the Spirit (verse 4; Acts 2.17-20). For this use of ‘to come’ compare 6.5; 9.11; 10.1. In other words it is speaking of the Christian presence on earth in these final days before the end (the days from the first coming of Christ to the rapture, and then to the end of time) as new creatures in Christ, living ordered lives under the King, followed by their continual existence in glory. It is the result of the presence in the world of the Kingly Rule of God as proclaimed by Jesus and manifested in power. Such an ‘ordered world’ was not subjected to angels, it was subjected to the Son and His followers. And they had come manifesting that kingship with all the outward and inward signs of God’s presence and power. Thus those in it are without excuse if they drift away to the world outside.
This is in contrast with the world in general. In Deuteronomy 32.8 (LXX) we read,
The idea is that once the nations were separated at Babel and languages became confused, angels took authority over the different sections into which the world of men was split. Man had lost his authority over creation. This is confirmed further in Daniel 10.20, which speaks of angelic beings such as "the prince of Persia" and "the prince of Greece," as having sway in those areas, and Daniel 10.21 and 12.1 which speak of Michael as "the great prince" who champions the people of Israel. Man had lost his dominion through sin, and was swayed by heavenly powers, although God kept a special watch on His own.
The result was that the ‘present world’ (compare 2 Timothy 4.10; Galatians 1.4) was seen as no longer under the sway of man but as under the sway of angelic forces, the majority of them seemingly evil. However, the ‘coming world’ (now come) is different. It is under the sway of the King and His disciples, and angels have no part in its rule. The kingdom of the Son of His love is in vivid contrast with the power of darkness (Colossians 1.13).
Others, however see ‘the world to come’ as indicating the afterlife when Christ will rule over all along with His own, and this is not to be excluded, but the idea is surely more immediate than that. For ‘the world to come’ is to be seen as that promised by the prophets, in contrast with ‘this present world’, the new world under the rule of the promised King, and is to be seen as beginning at Christ’s first coming with the advent of the Kingly Rule of God. Then there came a new world (oikoumene) within the world (kosmos). It covers the life and activity of God’s people under His Kingly Rule in this world, although it then moves on to embrace all God’s future purposes and plans for His people. In other words the ‘world to come’ is all embracing. It is the new God-ordered ‘world’ introduced in the coming of Christ. For that is central to the whole passage, that Jesus has come and established that new world for those who are His own.
2.6-8a ‘But one has somewhere testified, saying,
The writer confirms his position by quoting Psalm 8.4-6 (LXX) which states that God’s original intention was that the world would be ruled by man, who was made ‘only a little lower than what was heavenly (the elohim)’, so that all on earth would be subjected to him. His plan was for great things for man. And he sees this as not only so in the past but as something yet to be realised.
‘But one has somewhere testified, saying.’ This did not mean that the writer did not know who had written it (the Psalmist), but was a way of stressing that what was spoken was of God. It was God Who in the final analysis was the author of Scripture, and the name or title of the testifier was of little importance.
‘What is man, that you are mindful of him? Or son of man, that you visit him?” This is spoken of mankind in general as descended from Adam. In the Hebrew it depicts mankind as weak and frail man (enosh) and as a ‘son of man (Adam)’ (ben-adam). In the Greek here it is ‘man (anthropos) and ‘son of man’ (huios anthropou) as in LXX. ‘Son of man’ was simply another way of saying ‘man’ (‘son of man’ is without the article). It could be a simple questioning of man’s status, ‘where does man stand in the order of priority?’, or hold within it the idea of man’s inferiority, ‘when you consider the heavens, what after all is man?’. But the overall emphasis is on the fact that God is mindful of man, and acts on his behalf even in his frailty, and intends for him rulership over creation.
‘Mindful -- visit--.’ God both has man in mind and acts on man’s behalf (visits him), as the coming of Jesus witnesses.
Man’s status is then declared. ‘Made a little lower than the angels (Hebrew: elohim)’, that is, of heavenly beings. So although frail man is the next step down from the heavenly, being lower than the angels, as regards earth, he is potentially ‘crowned with glory and honour’ and set over all living creation, so that all is to be in subjection under his feet. Man was made God’s crowning glory on earth. To be but a little lower than the angels was to be given great honour. It meant that in all creation as described in Genesis 1 man was supreme, first in line after the angels, after what was ‘heavenly’. He was thus, as regards the earth, the supreme lord of all. He was the one who was ‘crowned with glory and honour’, and, says the Psalmist, the one who will find all things put under his feet.
(To translate as ‘for a little while’, while possible in the Greek, is to overlook the whole context in the original. The thought of the Psalmist was not of a short while but of a position which was only a little short of the elohim, a position as man made in God’s spiritual image, heavenly as well as earthly. This whole passage is about status).
‘You crowned him with glory and honour, and set him over the works of your hands. You put all things in subjection under his feet.’ Herein is confirmed man’s potential supremacy over all things on earth. Man was gloriously crowned with great honour. He was given total dominion on earth. He was set over all things, and especially all living creatures. Everything was subject to him. He was supreme (Genesis 1.28-30). So ‘crowned with glory and honour’ here indicates the triumphant rule of man as God intended him to be.
That the Psalmist is looking at a future hope based on what man had lost in Genesis 1-3 is clear. Seeing man as potentially this, for he must have been well aware that it was not so in his time, he looks to what will be when God has restored His people and established His true King.
2.8b ‘For in that he subjected all things to him, he left nothing that is not subject to him. But now we see not yet all things subjected to him.’
Indeed God did not intend to withhold anything from man. He intended to give him all, He would have omitted nothing. His purpose was to subject ‘all things’ to him. Man on earth was to be ‘lord of all’. Nothing was to be left which was not subject to him.
And that was how it was in the beginning. Man was lord over all creation. But through his folly man had lost much of what he had. ‘All things’ became no longer subject to him. The snake became his enemy. The earth was apportioned to angels (see on verse 5). Man’s rule over living creatures, and over the fruit of the world that God gave him, was partially lost. So now we no longer ‘continually see’ all things subjected to him, even though there are still traces of his one time rule in that animals still cannot look him in the eye, some animals are domesticated and part of the earth is still cultivated.
But the writer sees a deeper significance in the words, in the light of what he knows. He notes that here in the Psalm ‘all things’ is not qualified in any way. And ‘all things’ can include both heaven and earth (verse 10). So he writes that while God did subject all things on earth to man (Genesis 1.28-30), and left nothing that was not subject to him, He had not yet subjected ‘all things’ without exception to him, even when he was in innocence. For God’s purpose for man was greater than he knew. Man’s final triumph still awaits. There was not only to be a restoration, but an exaltation. His real destiny still lies before him. And this, he next points out, is to be through Jesus.
2.9 ‘But we behold him who has been made a little lower than the angels, even Jesus, because of the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour, in order that by the grace of God he should taste of death for everyone.’
Before looking at this verse in detail we must consider the phrase ‘crowned with glory and honour’ for it helps to determine the meaning of the whole passage, and is regularly misunderstood. Now the temptation, if we ignore the context, is undoubtedly to see it as signifying Christ’s resurrection and exaltation and then to try to fit around it the other phrases, which in truth then fit rather strangely. And that is done by most commentators. But that is totally to ignore the context. Reference to His exaltation, except in a secondary, inclusive way, is out of place here. And the Greek in its obvious sense is against it.
For had this been its meaning we might have expected the whole sentence to be constructed differently (as commentators tend to confirm by constantly switching it around), especially by so consummate an author as we have here, for the natural reading here is to see ‘crowned with glory and honour’ as leading on into ‘in order that by the grace of God He should taste death for everyone’, as though the one resulted in the other, as though the crowning preceded the suffering and was necessary for it, and if that is so it bars us seeing in it simply a direct reference to the resurrection and exaltation. Is there then any alternative, which actually avoids the manipulation of the verse required for that view?
Firstly we should note that the same words are also cited in verse 6. There they indicate that (as a result of his creation in ‘the image and likeness of the elohim (or ‘God’)’ (Genesis 1)) man was ‘crowned with glory and honour’ by being made the earthly lord of creation, so that all creation was subjected to him. This was what pinpointed what man was. He was placed there from the very beginning. He was ‘crowned with glory and honour’, with authority over all things. And it was from this exalted position that he fell, so that creation became no longer subject to him and only a small part, the domestic animals and the cultivated fields, still did his bidding. As fallen man he had become a king without a kingdom, He had been uncrowned as lord of creation.
Now if we consider that, in order for Jesus to be fitted to be a substitutionary and perfect sacrifice for man, it was necessary for Him to become ‘perfect man’, to become what man originally was, we will recognise that this required that He too in His lifetime be ‘crowned with glory and honour’ in relation to creation, so that as man He became overlord of creation, as man was, and man should be.
And that this was so is in fact evidenced in two ways. Firstly by the declaration at His baptism, ‘You are my Son’ (Mark 1.11), when He was endued with the Holy Spirit. For these words were probably used at the coronation of the kings of Israel/Judah, and certainly used in some way of the kings of the house of David in their special relationship to God (Psalm 2.7). By them Jesus was marked off as unique, and as representing God on earth in a unique and glorious way, fulfilling the destiny that man had failed to fulfil, and manifesting His rule. This was then confirmed at the transfiguration when His full glory was momentarily revealed, and God said of Him ‘This is my Son’, and He spoke of His coming death in Jerusalem (Luke 9.31, 35). Here His humanness was seen as veiling the divine glory of the representative Man.
And secondly by His life in which He demonstrated His lordship over creation and superiority to angels. He was ‘with the wild beasts’ and angels ministered to Him (Mark 1.13), the evil spirits obeyed Him and were cast out (Mark 1.25-26 and regularly), the water turned into wine at His will (John 2.1-11), the fish moved at His command (Luke 5.4-6; Matthew 17.27; John 21.6), the wind and waves did His bidding (Mark 4.39), the sea provided Him with a pathway through the storm (Mark 6.48), the storm ceased at His presence (6.51), the unbroken ass walked quietly into Jerusalem through noisy crowds, responsive to His hands (Mark 11.2, 7-9), (which made a jockey cry out when he read it, “what hands He must have had”), the fig tree withered at His command (Mark 11.14, 20). Indeed He could have commanded the mountain to fall into the sea and it would have obeyed Him because of His total faith in God (Mark 11.23). All this emphasised the restoration of the crowning with glory and honour.
And it was this overlordship of creation that revealed that He was perfect man as God had intended man to be, and it was this that made Him fitted to ‘taste death for everyone’, because it revealed that He was truly ‘the second man’, ‘the last Adam’, (1 Corinthians 15.45-47) man restored to what he should be. So was He seen as ‘crowned with glory and honour’ in His lifetime, as Man restored to his lost status, that status given by God from the beginning. And thus could it be that as perfect man He would offer Himself, the One for the many. (Neither in Genesis 1 as expanded in Psalm 8, nor here, is the crowning necessarily to be seen as literal. The point is that that was His status).
And in this lies explained the mystery of His suffering. When He came He was here as lord of creation, all of which obeyed Him. He was declared to be crowned with glory and honour as God’s Son. Creation was under His sway. It was only man who was in rebellion and was antagonistic, and opposed His rule. It was thus man, guilty rebellious man, out of tune with creation, who brought about His sufferings, and the sufferings of all who would follow Him, as they made clear their total rejection of what God is. From the world came glory (‘even the stones would cry out’ - Luke 19.40), from rebellious man, overwatched by sinister angels, came persecution and suffering.
So as Jesus walked the world as Lord of Creation, crowned with glory and honour, He called men to come under the Heavenly Rule of God, to submit to Him even as nature submitted. And in their refusal and rejection, apart from the few, was made clear the need for Him to die. They were in rebellion against God’s purpose in creation, and only through His death on their behalf could a way be made for them back to God.
Nor should we overlook the fact that, with the exception of the crown of thorns, Jesus is never elsewhere depicted as undergoing a process of being crowned. He is ever depicted as already being King (Matthew 2.2; 21.5; John 1.49), depicting Himself as such when He entered Jerusalem on an ass (John 12.13), depicting Himself as such to a cynical Pilate (John 18.37; Luke 23.3 compare 23.38) and in His parables (Matthew 18.23; 22.2). His message was that the Kingly Rule of God was here, and the implication He gave was that He was here as the king. He was here as God’s anointed (Luke 4.18-21; Acts 10.38). If we wish to see a moment of crowning was it not at His baptism when God declared, ‘You are My Son’ and anointed Him with the Holy Spirit? What greater glory and honour could there be than that?
But there was also this physical crowning, a recognition that that overlordship was established and confirmed, as He went on to face His final sufferings. For a mock crown was placed on His head, and in that too He was in the eyes of Heaven crowned with glory and honour, and Pilate too confirmed in writing somewhat cynically that ‘this is the king of the Jews’ (Luke 19.38). For as He faced up to the suffering and death which was the direct result of man’s rebellion against God He faced it because He was the king, and because He was the true representative of what man should be, and because only man was rejecting Him as such. And He declared that He was to be glorified in that suffering too (John 12.23, 27-28). He was to face His death as He had faced His life, as the One Who was crowned with glory and honour, and Who was Himself receiving great glory as he crushed all the forces that were against Him.
This is especially brought out in the fourth Gospel where one of John’s aims was to bring out that in all the events that took place He was sovereign. The soldiers, for example, fell back before Him until He again spoke; and they let the Apostles go free because He commanded it (John 18.6-8). He was in charge of events, and they proceeded at His will. And all the Gospels essentially agree on the same, for Matthew’s Gospel tells us that twelve legions of angels waited to do His will and could have prevented all that happened, but did not do so because it was not His will (Matthew 26.53).
Our problem is that we often overlook His earthly glory and concentrate on His humiliation. But while this picture is in accordance with Scripture from one point of view (Isaiah 52.13-53.12; Philippians 2.6-11), we must remember that when He was made a servant it was as the Servant of Yahweh, and that while He walked in submission to God He was still a Colossus on earth, for He always prevailed until the time came for Him to die.
So that being how we might see his words here, let us then consider the passage as a whole.
‘But we behold him who has been made a little lower than the angels, even Jesus, because of the suffering of death.’ But look! says the writer. Here is One Who has been made man, and thus made a little lower than the angels, and Who has been declared to be God’s Son, and ‘crowned with glory and honour’ as man was at his first creation, as One Who has all things under Him. Here is One Who is even now true representative man.
And why was He made lower than the angels? It was because of the need for a sacrifice, ‘because of the suffering of death’, something that was required for man’s redemption. That is the very reason why He came as One ‘lower than the angels’, although in His case, because of Who He is, the ‘making lower’ was a humiliation, not a privilege to rejoice in. The Psalmist could proclaim that man had been privileged to be made a little lower than the angels, but for this One that was a humiliation not a privilege, for He was the outshining of the glory of God, the Lord over all. And the purpose of it was simply in order that He might be able to fully identify with those He had come to save, that as representative man He might suffer death on their behalf and in their place, that He might be able to become their saving sacrifice and their great High Priest. Without His lowering Himself to become man this could not have been.
And the context supports this. For it was only through such humiliation, suffering and death, which followed His crowning with glory and honour as true man, that He could become the author, the source and worker out, of our salvation (verse 10; Isaiah 53; Mark 10.45), leading many sons to glory. It could only be through His becoming truly man and suffering as man, that, as the One Who in Himself represented all mankind, He could be ‘the second man’ and ‘the last Adam’ (1 Corinthians 15.45-47), The One Who could as man’s representative and substitute offer Himself as a ransom for many (Mark 10.45), making many to be accounted righteous (see Romans 5.12-21; Isaiah 53.11). The emphasis all through is on Christ’s perfect manhood, resulting from His choosing to humble Himself below the angels.
And so as Adam had been the first man, representing all mankind, and had been ‘crowned with glory and honour’ but had then brought sin into the world, and had dragged man down from his status, so was Jesus also ‘crowned with glory and honour’ in His life on earth, as the second man, the sinless man, so that as such He might live triumphantly in this world as lord over creation, remaining free from sin, and thus be in a position to endure death for the sin of ‘everyone’, and restore all who would come to Him.
Here then was the full explanation of why the Lord of glory became man, why He was seen in His humiliation as lower than the angels. It was not because He was so in Himself, but because He had in eternity chosen to humble Himself and become man, so that He could be in a position to die for us (Philippians 2.6-8). And it was as the sinless and representative man who had come into the world, that He was ‘crowned with glory and honour’, that is, was reinstated into the place that man had forfeited as lord of creation (verse 7), so that He could as their accepted representative, as lord of creation, die on man’s behalf. And as we have seen, the fact that He was indeed, as man, lord of creation came out in His being with the wild beasts without being harmed, in His turning water into wine, in His lordship over fish, in His stilling of the storm, in His riding of an untrained ass amid a frenzied crowd, and in the withering of a tree at His command. Wild beasts, domestic animals and fish, and even inanimate nature, all did His bidding. Only man rebelled.
‘Because of (through) the suffering of death.’ Why then was He made lower than the angels? It was in order that He might become truly mortal, as God made man, ‘because of the suffering of death’. That was why He had to do it. It was because of the necessity for a death for sin that would satisfy the requirements of a holy Law. There had to be a sufficient death, and there therefore had to be a humiliation of One Who could die that death and yet be sufficient to save the world. For the presence of sin in the world demanded death, and it had to be either the death of all of us, or the death of Another sufficient to bear it for us.
This then was why it was necessary for Him to die, indeed, came in order to die. And the stress on His death in the Gospels emphasises the truth of this. In other men’s biographies their life is stressed, and death is but the end, but in the case of Jesus it is His death that takes the prime place. There had to be a death, and that necessity for death is emphasised. But it was only because He was truly made man, and that as man restored, that He could thus die, and so offer Himself as a sacrifice for the sins of the world.
In their superior existence angels are not mortal, and will not and cannot die, for they are heavenly beings. No angel or above could fulfil this requirement to die, even had they been sufficient for it. There was only One Who was supreme enough to become lower than the angels and Who could do so. So, for Jesus, although He was the outshining of the glory of God and the express ‘stamped out’ image of His substance, being made ‘lower than the angels’ was essential in order that He might be made truly mortal and suffer. And this was also why He had to receive on earth the ‘crowning with glory and honour’ which was man’s right through creation, but which had been previously forfeited, constituting Himself thus as ‘reinstated man’, able to suffer for mankind.
So here we ‘behold’ Him as ‘crowned with glory and honour’, firstly as representative, sinless, and reinstated man, revealing His lordship as man over creation, and fitted by what He was for the task of salvation, and secondly as triumphant, victorious man, defeating even the angels in achieving His victory through suffering. In His manhood He is truly established as lord over ‘all things’. And the purpose behind this humiliation and glorification through suffering was so that He might be fitted to ‘taste’ (experience to the full) death for everyone. That is, as restored Man He was to experience death to the full, to absorb it to the full, so that we who are His might not have to finally die, and He could only do this because He was ‘crowned with glory and honour’ as the last Adam. So central to His humiliation and exaltation as man was that as true representative man He would thus truly die. For it was finally through His death that He was able to become the perfect means of salvation.
‘We behold Him.’ That is, we behold Him as described by eyewitnesses, we behold Him in our hearts by faith, and we behold Him in the testimony by the Spirit through chosen men of God (including this writer), as they speak of what He accomplished. We behold Him as we take heed and consider Him and receive Him within out hearts in responsive faith. As John said of those who walked with Him, ‘we behold His glory’ (John 1.14)
‘Who has been made a little lower than the angels.’ We behold that He Who was in the form of God, humbled Himself to become a servant and to be made in the likeness of men, thus being made for a time lower than the angels (Philippians 2.5-8). The Son of Man came down from Heaven, He Who is in Heaven (John 3.13), and became Man. And so we behold Him.
‘Even Jesus, because of the suffering of death.’ And to Whom did this happen? We behold what happened to ‘Jesus’, to the One born of Mary by the Holy Spirit, to Him Who walked as a man among men in order that He might truly suffer death. Without such humiliation, death as a human being would have been impossible, as would also the resulting accomplishment of men’s salvation. It was by becoming a human being that He became qualified to die for the sins of the world.
‘Crowned with glory and honour.’ And we behold that in His coming as sinless man He had to be ‘crowned with glory and honour’ as man had originally been in order to be true man. He had, as sinless and truly obedient Man, firstly to be reinstated into man’s destiny (verse 7) as lord of creation, and secondly, He had to be accepted as a sufficient sacrifice, so that He could suffer, in order that all who respond to Him might be reinstated. And God confirmed this at His baptism, and at the mount of transfiguration, and through His signs and wonders, and through His power over creation.
And in the end we behold that God had openly declared His status, although in a partly hidden way known only to His elect, through the mockery of men. For He was literally at this time given a crown. It was a crown of glory, even though a crown of suffering; it was a crown of honour, even though a crown of thorns. No greater glory and honour could have been suggested than by this crown of thorns, the crown that revealed that the Creator was offering Himself up to suffer for His creatures, that the Lord was offering Himself up to suffer for His servants, that the Son was offering Himself up to suffer for His slaves, so that they might be redeemed. It laid bare the very heart of God. And were not the thorns in themselves a reminder that Jesus was bearing man’s curse on Himself? For thorns were a part of man’s curse. How symbolic was this, that perfect man, the Lord of creation, was crowned with thorns.
For this crown of thorns, and what it portrayed, revealed that sacrificial, self-giving love lay at the very heart of the Universe. It revealed that true morality (part of what God is in Himself) was fully and permanently established as a prime concern within it. No more could morality be passed over as unimportant, for it was established as vital through the suffering and the death for sin of this perfect Man. By it was revealed that He Who is love is also light, and that He Who is light is also love. That He is both light and love (1 John 1.5; 4.8, 16). For His light shines and necessarily condemns mankind, and in that light mankind are revealed for what they are, while His love seeks to win mankind to Himself and makes provision for that purpose, and for their sin, through His own Son’s suffering. And because His crowning is ‘over all things’ it is finally also over the angels. As the Man, crowned with thorns, He would be made Lord of all, rising triumphantly from the dead and taking His seat on His Father’s throne because of Who He was, the One Who was already crowned with glory and honour. Compare the ‘Lamb as it had been slain’ Who ruled in Heaven (Revelation 5.6).
‘Crowned with glory and honour, that by the grace of God he should taste of death for everyone.’ We should note carefully how this ‘crowned with glory and honour’ is sandwiched between two references to His sacrificial death, and intimately connected with them, which must in our view, as we have seen, suggest that we are to see His crowning, not as being the result of, but as being the essential groundwork for, and included within, His suffering. He was crowned that He should be fitted to be a sacrifice, as on a par with first-created man, and even above him. That He should be revealed as ‘the second man’, the One Who replaced and followed the first. He was crowned that He might taste death for those who had ‘lost’ their crown, and admitted it, that is, ‘for everyone’, men of all races, who would hear and respond. And it was His suffering that was His triumph, the revelation of the fullness of His glory and honour, as by it He defeated sin and death and the forces of darkness who held sway in the world.
Just as hidden behind the living earthly Man was the glory of the transfiguration, unseen, so hidden behind the suffering Man was the glory of the triumphant King, unseen. This comes out in the use in John’s Gospel of the words ‘being glorified’ as including His being glorified in death (John 12.23-24 compare 7.39). It was when the crown of thorns was placed on His head that the first stage in His glorification by suffering began (Matthew 27.28-29; Mark 15.17), that He entered into His glorification. It was then paradoxically that He was revealed by the crown of thorns as crowned with glory and honour, as being the suffering Servant and Messiah, Who could ‘taste death for everyone’. (For the son of man who entered into triumph in Daniel 7.13-14, 27, had first been ‘perfected’ in suffering (Daniel 7.21-22, 25)).
While the soldiers mocked, and the angels worshipped, standing by for God’s command and perplexed that it never came, for even they did not understand, it was God Who, unknown to all, put that crown upon His head. He overruled man’s mockery. It was the next stage in His victory. It was a crown of honour. The One Who had been crowned with glory and honour in life was now crowned with glory and honour in facing death. For in the final analysis that crown was the declaration that the King was here, and was highly honoured, and was entering into the battle that would determine the destiny of the world, mocked it is true by man, but honoured by God (see Isaiah 50.5-8; John 18.37). It was the declaration of the way that victory and salvation would be achieved, through suffering (see Isaiah 52.13-53.12).
By that crown He was crowned with glory and honour, even while the ‘royal’ robe was put upon Him, and the ‘royal’ sceptre placed in His hand. Even while He turned His back to the smiters, and to those who plucked off the hair, and did not hide His face from shame and spitting (Isaiah 50.6). The world intended it to symbolise His humiliation. But God intended that it should symbolise His path through suffering to glory. It was a crown declaring the victory to be achieved through suffering. It symbolised the fact that the crowned Messiah was on the way to His heavenly throne, initially to face His destiny and win the victory in triumphant suffering (Isaiah 53.3-10), after which He would be lifted up and be ‘very high’ (Isaiah 52.13), seated at God’s right hand.
For while His death seemed to much of the world to be a pointless tragedy, in reality it was a triumph which brought Him great glory even while it was in process. For a brief while the powers of darkness thought that they had won. Angels shook their heads in perplexity. Disciples wept and felt ashamed. But the crown of thorns was the perfect revelation of what He was about to do. It was Messiah’s crown, and it led on to the cross and victory. It was the crown of His glory and honour which was now being manifested. Through His royal suffering He thrust off the principalities and powers of evil, making an open show of them and triumphing over them in the cross (Colossians 2.15), defeating them for ever so that although they retired to carry out their activities from ambush, they knew that their power was broken. For even in His death He was revealed as superior to the angels. Through it also He broke the power of sin to destroy men. Through it He took away the fear of death for those who are His own. And through it, as the crowned One, He bore the sin of many and was raised in the glory and honour with which He had been crowned.
In many ancient festivals men were selected out to be brought to the gods in one way or another, and in preparation were crowned and robed. And thus was Jesus crowned and robed by God in preparation for that moment when He would offer Himself to God. And by it He was glorified. It was through the cross that He triumphed and was made glorious and received the ultimate honour. Now was the judgment of this world. Now was the prince of this world cast out (John 12.31). And while the resurrection was its firstfruit (1 Corinthians 15.20, 23), and the final proof of victory, it occurred because the victory had already been won, and the crowning had already taken place on the victorious field of action, in the glorious but persecuted life of the Son of Man, and on the battleground of the cross.
‘That by the grace of God he should taste of death for everyone.’ And His life, and His suffering, and His crowning and His triumph at the cross were so that by the grace of God, the unmerited love and favour of God active on our behalf, He should be fitted for and finally taste fully of death ‘for everyone’, that is, potentially for all, and effectually for all those who believe. He offered Himself as the Saviour of all men, but He was essentially so only for those who believe (1 Timothy 4.10). The idea behind ‘tasting death’ is not of simply having a sample, it is of tasting it to the full. None but One Who was perfect, the crowned Lord of creation, could truly taste of death to the full, because for no other could it be so awful and so real. Only One Who enjoyed full and perfect life and was crowned with glory and honour could then move on to appreciate the awfulness of death.
‘By the grace of God.’ And this was by the compassion and love of God reaching out through Him to the undeserving, to those who merited nothing. It was all of grace. Who can ever begin to measure the depths and height of that grace? In this was love, not that we loved God but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins (1 John 4.10; John 3.16). Was ever love like that?
(The alternative choris theou - ‘apart from God’ - found in some few witnesses has little early support in manuscripts, although some see it as original because of its unusualness, often seeing it as a marginal note incorporated by a copyist. But in view of the widespread and overwhelming nature of the early manuscript evidence against it this seems unlikely. It may equally well have been an emendation in order to separate God from the possibility of being directly associated with Jesus’ dying, although some do see it as referring to His sense of forsakenness from God as depicted in Mark 15.34. It is even possible that someone who was thinking in those terms, while they were copying, ‘saw’ choris even though it was not there. It would not be the first time that someone read a different word than was actually there because that was the way in which their minds were working).
So when He rose from the dead, and ascended to God, and took His place on God’s throne, He was not being ‘glorified’, He was not being crowned with glory and honour, He was rather manifesting the glory and honour (as the transfiguration had previously done) that was already His through His anointing by God, His glory as Lord of creation, and finally through the cross, the glory and honour which He had already achieved when He cried out ‘it is finished’ on the battlefield. His receiving of dominion (Daniel 7.13-14) was but the confirmation of His crowning during His life of warfare. No other crowning of Jesus is ever described in Scripture than the crowning of Jesus in mockery by the world. And that was the greatest possible symbol of His triumph achieved through suffering. No other crown would fit His brow. The crown of thorns, like the living ‘slain Lamb’ (Revelation 5.7), is the symbol of all that He