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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comRobertson Word Pictures - Hebrews 3:12 - 3:12
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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:
Take heed (blepete). Present active imperative as in Phi 3:2 (three times) of blepō in place of the more usual horate. Solemn warning to the Jewish Christians from the experience of the Israelites as told in Psa 95:1-11.
Lest haply there shall be (mē pote estai). Negative purpose with mē pote and the future indicative as in Mar 14:2. But we have in Col 2:8 mē tis estai as in Heb 12:25; mē occurs with the aorist subjunctive, and mē pote with present subjunctive (Heb 4:1) or aorist subjunctive (Act 5:39).
In any one of you (en tini humōn). The application is personal and pointed.
An evil heart of unbelief (kardia ponēra apistias). A remarkable combination.
Heart (kardia) is common in the lxx (about 1,000 times), but “evil heart” only twice in the O.T. (Jer 16:12; Jer 18:12). Apistias is more than mere unbelief, here rather disbelief, refusal to believe, genitive case describing the evil heart marked by disbelief which is no mark of intelligence then or now.
In falling away from the living God (en tōi apostēnai apo theou zōntos). “In the falling away” (locative case with en of the second aorist active (intransitive) infinitive of aphistēmi, to stand off from, to step aside from (apo with the ablative case theou) the living God (common phrase in the O.T. and the N.T. for God as opposed to lifeless idols)). “Remember that to apostatize from Christ in whom you have found God is to apostatize from God” (Dods). That is true today. See Eze 20:8 for this use of the verb.