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The Four: A Survey of the Gospels
Defending Constantine: The Twilight of an Empire and the Dawn of Christendom
From Behind the Veil: The Epistles of John
Deep Exegesis:The Mystery of Reading Scripture
1 & 2 Kings
Brazos Theological Commentary
The Promise Of His Appearing: An Exposition Of Second Peter
A Great Mystery: Fourteen Wedding Sermons
Deep Comedy: Trinity, Tragedy, And Hope In Western Literature
Miniatures & Morals: The Christian Novels of Jane Austen
The Priesthood of the Plebs: A Theology of Baptism
A Son To Me: An Exposition of 1 & 2 Samuel
From Silence to Song: The Davidic Liturgical Revolution
Ascent to Love: A Guide to Dante's Divine Comedy
Blessed Are the Hungry: Meditations on the Lord's Supper
A House For My Name: A Survey of the Old Testament
Heroes of the City of Man: A Christian Guide to Select Ancient Literature
Brightest Heaven of Invention: A Christian Guide To Six Shakespeare Plays
Wise Words: Family Stories That Bring the Proverbs to Life
The Kingdom and the Power: Rediscovering the Centrality of the Church
The NASB translates Deuteronomy 32:43, “Rejoice, O nations, with His people; for He will avenge the blood of His servants.” Hebrews 1:6, partially quoting the LXX of the same passage, says “and worship Him all angels of God.” The LXX also includes an exhortation to the “sons of God” to praise Yahweh for His just vengeance against the enemies of His people.
This is intriguing on all sorts of levels.
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Tuesday, December 9, 2008 at 6:12 am
Of course Hebrews is written to Hebrews, not to Greeks. But there are suggestive echoes of the proem of the Odyssey in the opening chapters of the letter. The first words of the letter, polymeros kai polytropos, remind me of Homer’s first description of his hero – polymetis, the man of many devices.
More, Homer withholds the name of the hero until the very end of the proem, giving us a summary of his adventures and sufferings before assigning a name to the famously anonymous “nobody.” The writer of Hebrews does the same, telling us all about the Son’s preeminence and superiority to angels before, finally, naming Jesus in 2:9, at the very same time he first speaks of death.
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Tuesday, December 2, 2008 at 6:12 am
In his NIV Application commentary on Hebrews, George Guthrie offers this chiastic outline for Hebrews 1:2b-4:
A. God appointed Christ as heir
B. Through him he created the world
C. He is the radiance of God’s glory
C’. He bears God’s stamp
B’. He governs universe
(having made purification for sin)
A’. He sat down at God’s right hand
This works very neatly, apart from that parenthetical reference to purification.
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Tuesday, December 2, 2008 at 6:07 am
The writer to the Hebrews expounds on the superiority of the Son in a series of seven quotations mainly from the Psalms. Seven words certainly piques one’s interest, no?
Day 1: Light, and the beginning of creation. Hebrews 1:5a: the Son is begotten “today,” likely the day of resurrection, as in Acts 13.
Day 2: Firmament. Hebrews 1:5b quotes from 2 Samuel 7, where the Davidic king is set up as the son of Yahweh, the “firmament” between the heavenly king and the earthly people.
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Monday, December 1, 2008 at 3:19 pm
The contrast between the angels and the Son in Hebrews 1-2 is primarily a contrast of the law “delivered through angels” (cf. 2:2) and the word now spoken in the Son.
But these chapters also touch on another aspect of angelic ministry. Twice the author mentions the oikoumene, once saying that the “firstborn” has been brought there (1:6) and once to speak of the coming oikoumene, which is subjected not to angels but to the Son (2:5).
This is particularly interesting if we follow James Jordan’s suggestion that the oikoumene is not generic but specific, not “inhabited earth” but the imperial system erected after the exile (cf. Daniel 2, 7). That imperial order was subjected to angels, as Daniel occasionally hints; but the new imperial arrangement, the fifth monarchy, is the monarchy of the Son.
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Monday, December 1, 2008 at 11:05 am
INTRODUCTION
God is love, John says, and that love is manifested in history through the Father’s love for the Son, a love expressed in the gift of the Spirit. That eternal familial love of Father and Son in the Spirit is the source and model of all human love.
THE TEXT
“Therefore we also, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith. . . .” (Hebrews 12:1-13).
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Monday, November 5, 2007 at 6:13 am
Watch that no root of bitterness grow up, Hebrews 12:15 warns. What’s a root of bitterness? Sounds like someone who’s bitter in the church. But Deuteronomy 29:18 uses a similar phrase to describe those who turn aside from Yahweh to serve other gods. This fits the context of Hebrews very neatly: The root of bitterness in Hebrews is the Christian who intends to turn back from Jesus to Moses. With the coming of the New Covenant, that’s an equivalent of a return to Egypt, a return to slavery.
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Thursday, August 9, 2007 at 6:55 am
Christian worship is God’s service to us.
Yet, Christian worship is sacrificial, and sacrifice appears to be a human act reaching toward God. That’s certainly how Luther understood the sacrifice of the Mass.
How to resolve?
Teresa Okure, Professor of New Testament and Gender Hermeneutics (!) at the Catholic Institute of West Africa in Port Harcourt, Nigeria, suggests this solution:
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Thursday, June 28, 2007 at 6:16 pm
A student points out that Hebrews 1-2:4 contains seven quotations from the Old Testament. Through these seven words, God speaks His Son as the new creation.
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Monday, May 7, 2007 at 1:51 pm
Gabriella Gelardini of the University of Basel gave an excellent presentation on the structure of Hebrews, defending this basic chiasm:
A. Elevation and Abasement of the Son, 1:1-2:18 (terminology: son, angels, abase)
B. Faithlessness of fathers and sons, 3:1-6:20
C. New Covenant and the cult, 7:1-10:18
B’. Faith of sons and fathers, 10:19-12:3
A’. Abasement and elevation of sons, 12:4-13:25 (terminology: sons, angels, abase)
Further, she described the following chiastic arrangement of key unique, or nearly unique terms:
posted by Peter J. Leithart on Sunday, November 19, 2006 at 10:34 am
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