October 16th, 2021

This Sunday is our third week in the Epistle to the Hebrews [4:1-13 (14-16)]. This section contains the well-known quotation which the writer describes as ‘somewhere’ in the Old Testament (see verse 4), but it is a VERY well-known passage from the second chapter of Genesis and describes God’s resting on the seventh day. The writer is not claiming to be ignorant—or even too busy to check his Bible.

In a way, by doing this the writer claims to be the unimportant part of the equation. Just as the high priest wore the linen garments and looked like an angel, a messenger, the details of who he was were not important. This is especially true when he was going into the Most Holy Place and sprinkling the blood in various places, here and there. He was told to do certain things; but the blood was the important thing; the man was just the messenger; he was delivering what he was told to deliver.

What also draws our attention to this verse is the combination of ‘he has said’ and ‘thus’. For these two things to come together is an unusual combination. This verb tense emphasizes a ramification into the present, and so it is not just translated as ‘he said’, but ‘he HAS said….’ And the word ‘thus’ before a verb can mean ‘so intensely’ [See A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and other Early Christian Literature, Third Edition, Chicago & London: University of Chicago Press, 2000; page 742].

This epistle is called a ‘word of exhortation’ near the very end of the work, at Hebrews 13:22. Here is a somewhat-literal translation:

And I exhort you, brothers, endure the word of exhortation. For, indeed, through a few [words] I wrote to you. Know the brother of us, Timothy, having been released, with whom, if soon, I come, I will see you.

This sounds like the apostle, Paul, but the literary style of this entire epistle is significantly different from his writings. Could it still be him? Of course! But that is certainly not the important thing.

The apostle Paul happens to give the only other word of exhortation that is in the New Testament. In Acts 13[:14-15], here is the introduction to that section (again, in a somewhat-literal translation):

And setting sail from the Paphos, the ones around Paul come into Perga of Pamphylia; and John departing from them, returned into Jerusalem. And they going through from the Perga, arrived into Antioch, the Pisidian, and going into the synagogue in the day of the sabbaths, they sat. And after the reading of the law and of the prophets, the synagogue rulers sent to them, saying, ‘Men, brothers, if there is in you any word of exhortation to the people, speak.’

It seems that the word of exhortation comes near the end of the service at a synagogue. This may be why the Epistle to the Hebrews is near the end of the New Testament—because it is a word of exhortation and comes near the end. By being at the end, it may point to important ramifications. And it may be written by Paul, but that is not the important thing.

It is a similar thing that the two volumes of Luke are never together in a New Testament manuscript. If you wrote two volumes, you would, in all likelihood, want them to be put together. But the structure of a fourfold gospel of Jesus is more important than the two volumes of one of Jesus’ many followers.
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The blood is the important thing; it was sprinkled here and there; the man was just the messenger.