Vincent Word Studies - Hebrews 5:8

Vincent Word Studies - Hebrews 5:8 - 5:8

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Vincent Word Studies - Hebrews 5:8 - 5:8

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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:

Though he were a Son (καίπερ ὣν υἱὸς)

For were rend. was. His training for the priesthood involved suffering, even though he was a son. Connect with ἔμαθεν learned, not with the preceding clause, which would mean that his position as a son did not exempt him from the obligation to godly fear, which is true as a fact (see Heb 5:7), but is not the point of emphasis here.

Learned he obedience (ἔμαθεν τὴν ὑπακοήν)

Omit he, since the subject of ἔμαθεν learned is ὃς who, Heb 5:7. Jesus did not have to learn to obey, see Joh 8:29; but he required the special discipline of a severe human experience as a training for his office as a high priest who could be touched with the feeling of human infirmities. He did not need to be disciplined out of any inclination to disobedience; but, as Alford puts it, “the special course of submission by which he became perfected as our high priest was gone through in time, and was a matter of acquirement and practice.” This is no more strange than his growth in wisdom, Luk 2:52. Growth in experience was an essential part of his humanity.

By the things which he suffered (ἀφ' ὧν ἔπαθεν)

Or from the things, etc. Note the word-play, ἔμαθεν ἔπαθεν. So Croesus, addressing Cyrus, says, τὰ δέ μοι παθήματα, ἐόντα ἀχάριστα, μαθήματα γέγονεν, “my sufferings, though painful, have proved to be lessons” (Hdt. i. 207): so Soph. Trach. 142, μήτ' ἐκμάθοις παθοῦσα “mayst thou not learn by suffering.”