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Verse Commentaries:
EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS
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by
CARL BERNHARD MOLL,
Doctor Of Theology, General Superintendent Of The Province Of Prussia, Director Of The Royal Consistory And Chief Court Preacher In The Cathedral Church Of Königsberg, Knight, &c.
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TRANSLATED FROM THE SECOND EDITION OF THE GERMAN ORIGINAL, WITH NOTES AND ADDITIONS, ORIGINAL AND SELECTED,
by
A. C. KENDRICK, D.D.,
Prof. In The University Of Rochester And In The Rochester Theological Seminary
In the textual notes the Editor has pursued a slightly different plan from that adopted in the other volumes of this work. He has given first in a body the critical notes of the author, with such occasional additions as he deemed necessary, and then followed these with his own brief, chiefly philological notes, intended mainly, though not exclusively, to point out the variations from the common English version which would be demanded, or suggested by the original. Of course, the suggestions thus made are not to be judged from the point of view of their fitness for a popular translation, but simply as aids to the study of the original text. These notes in many cases the Editor would have been glad to amplify: the necessity of the case has made them brief. It is scarcely necessary to add that all the Editor’s notes are in brackets, and where they extend beyond two or three words, are marked with his initial K., except those which, are given as quoted, and accredited to their author. The majority of the Exegetical notes are incorporated into the body of the text, the translator deeming that thus they would be more likely to be read in their place, than if transferred, in a smaller type, to the foot of the page.
The translator unhesitatingly concurs with Dr. Moll in the view now acquiesced in by nearly all scholars, which looks elsewhere than to the Apostle Paul for the authorship, at least as to its form, of this Epistle. Without derogating in the slightest degree from the canonical authority and the intrinsic excellency of the Epistle, he regards the evidence, partly external and partly internal, of its non-Pauline origin, as overwhelmi[illegible]cisive. He believes, too, that the suffrage of the Christian world will concentrate itself more and more upon Apollos.
The Editor, finally, commits the work to the Christian public with the assurance that (whatever may be the value of his own additions) the Commentary of Dr. Moll will he found, in its Exegetical, Doctrinal, and practical features, eminently worthy of the valuable work of which it forms a part, and an important addition to the resources of the English student of the Scriptures. May the Spirit of Truth bless it to the spiritual interests of the Church.
Rochester, March 1, 1868.
HEBREWS
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INTRODUCTION
§ 1.—CANONICAL POSITION AND AUTHORITY
From what cause now should such a production be involved in doubt regarding its canonical validity? In most MSS. it stands at the close of the Pauline Epistles. In the Peshito-Syriac version, indeed, which originated probably (Ewald, Hist. of the Israel. Nation, vii., 449) soon after the middle of the Second Century, it stands without the name of any author; then with the name of Paul, in the Greek MSS., and in the translations made under the influence of the Greek Church. In the Cod. Sinaiticus discovered by Tischendorf, and published 1863, and in some other MSS., it has its place even immediately before the Pastoral Epistles, in accordance with the Canon 60 of the Council of Laodicea between 343 and 381; as early as in the Sahidic or Upper Egyptian version it stands exceptionally after the Second Epistle to the Corinthians; in the Codex B. after that to the Galatians.
Luther, on the contrary, places it after the Epistles of Peter and John, and distinguishes it, along with the Epistles of James and Jude and the Revelation, from “the certain, clearly authenticated leading books of the New Testament,” (Works by Walch, xiv. 146 f.). This proceeding of Luther springs from his false interpretation of the passages—ch. Heb_6:4 f.; Heb_10:26 f.; Heb_12:17, in which he found a “hard knot that seems, in its obvious import, to run counter to all the Gospels and Epistles of St. Paul.” Apart from this he regards it as “an Epistle of exquisite beauty; discussing from Scripture, with masterly skill and thoroughness, the priesthood of Christ, and interpreting on this point with great richness and acuteness the Old Testament.” Moreover, he employs the Epistle variously in argumentation in the same way as the acknowledged writings of the Apostles. For “he who wrote it is unknown, and wished, doubtless, for a while, to remain unknown; but this is a matter of no importance. We should rest satisfied with the doctrine which he so constantly bases upon the Scripture, showing, at the same time, a subtle tact and moderation in reading and dealing with Scripture.” In the same way Melancthon employs our Epistle, although he rejects its Pauline authorship; in like manner, also, the Symbolical books of the Lutheran Church, which, in using it, adduce the name of no author, but, instead of this, simply the “writing” or “Epistle to the Hebrews,” and only in the Formula Concordiæ, and not even here in the German original, employ the term Apostle. This proceeding stands connected with a change of views, in other respects also noticeable, regarding the conditions of canonicity in any alleged Scriptural production. In ecclesiastical antiquity, the question turned on the authority of the author; and precisely in regard to the author was there a diversity of judgment in the case of our Epistle (see § 2). For this reason not only did the later Arians, on account of its non-Pauline origin, deny its authority in matters of doctrine, but the teachers in the Latin Church also, even Novatian and Cyprian, refrained from its use until the middle of the fourth century, because up to this time the Western Church did not regard Paul as its author. Augustine adduces it, indeed, (de doctr. Christ. II. 8) among the canonical writings, and occasionally makes use of it; but he apologizes for it on account of the then existing opposition of some in the Western Church to the already widely-spreading conviction of its Pauline origin. Even Irenæus, of whom Eusebius relates as something remarkable (Hist. Eccles. v. 26), that in his âéâëßïí äéáëÝîåùí äéáöüñùí he has a citation from the Epistle to the Hebrews, and one from the book of Wisdom, and who (adv. hær. II. 30, 9), by alluding to the “word of his power,” clearly indicates his knowledge of our Epistle, makes no use of it, whatever, in his refutation of the heretics. In the second Monkish Fragment (Iren. ed. Stieren 1, 854) Heb_13:15 is, indeed, cited as an exhortation of Paul; but the genuineness of this fragment is very doubtful. And Origen, in cases where its Pauline composition is controverted, does not insist upon a recognition of its canonical authority, but either resorts for his proof passages to acknowledged canonical productions, or deems it necessary to make a special argument in favor of its composition by Paul (on Matth. Hebrews 23; Ep. ad African, Hebrews 9). Tertullian, too, employs it in but a single instance (de pudic. Hebrews 20), and that merely in confirmation of a point already established. Volo tamen ex redundantia alicujus etiam comitis Apostolorum testimonium superducere. In entire accordance with this, also more recent Scholars, e. g., Michaelis (Einleit. ins neue Test. 4 ed. 2 Part, § 234) and Ziegler (Complete Introd. to the Epistle to the Hebrews, Göttingen, 1791, § 17), reject alike the hypothesis of its composition by Paul, and its canonical authority.
As early, however, as Jerome, who says, ep. 125 ad Evagrium: Epistola ad Hebraos quam omnes Græci recipiunt et nonnulli Latinorum, we find presenting itself (Ep. 129 ad Dardanum) the view, nihil interesse cujus sit, quum ecclesiastici viri sit, et quotidie ecclesiarum lectione celebretur. According to this now, the decision turns no longer on the name and person of the author but on a reception into the canon, ecclesiastically determined by a Synodical decision; since, according to Can. 59 of the Conc. Laodic. in the 4 century, no âéâëßá ἀêáíüíéóôá were to be read in the church. Erasmus goes yet a step further with the declaration: Imo non opinor periclitari fidem si tota ecclesia fallatur in titulo hujus epistolæ, modo constet Spiritum Sanctum fuisse principalem auctorem, id quod interim convenit (Opp. ix. 595). Calvin, who does not regard Paul as its author, still ascribes even to the cunning of Satan the denial, on the part of some, of its canonical validity, and Beza holds decidedly to the inspiration of the author, and declares, therefore, the precise person and name to be a matter of comparative indifference. The attempt of Carlstadt (de canonic. Scripturis libellus, Viteb. 1520) to distribute the books of the Old and the New Testament, according to their rank, into three classes, assigning to the first class of the New Testament books the four Gospels and the Acts of the Apostles, to the second the thirteen Epistles of Paul, and John and Peter, and to the third the remainder, including the Epistle to the Hebrews, has failed to make converts. But since Martin Chemnitz (Examen Conc. Trident.) it has been customary to speak of Apocrypha of the New Testament in the sense in which Rufinus had spoken of libris ecclesiasticis, and Jerome of uncanonical writings, which, like the Apocrypha of the Old Testament, might serve for popular edification, though not for establishing the doctrines of the Church. Among writings of this class, the Wittenberg theologians in particular, toward the end of the 16th and the beginning of the 17th centuries, reckoned the Epistle to the Hebrews, the 2d Epistle of Peter, and the 2d and 3d of John, and James, Jude and the Revelation. A revolution, however, was produced by John Gerhard, who (Loci Theolog. ed. Cotta Vol. II.) found fault with the term ‘Apocrypha,’ specially on the ground that in the early church doubts regarding these portions of the New Testament were in part confined to individual teachers or churches, and in part had reference only to the auctor secundarius. Gerhard introduced the distinction between canonical books primi ordinis and secundi ordinis, the distinction, meantime, having a purely historical, not a doctrinal significance, and referring not to the canonical consideration, or to the inspired character of the work, but simply to the greater or less degree of confidence to be reposed in opinions regarding its author.
§
The Syrian Church, on the contrary, although the Epistle stands in the Peshito without the name of an author, from the middle of the third century regarded the Epistle as from Paul. For the Council at Antioch (264) in its letter directed to Paul of Samosata, refers to Heb_2:14; Heb_4:14-15; Heb_11:26, and connects the last named passage with citations from the Epistle to the Cor. as utterances of the same Apostle. In like manner, at a later period, Ephraem Syrus (* 378) connects Heb_10:31 with Rom_2:16, and Eph_5:15, by the introductory words, “In respect to this day, exclaims also the Apostle Paul,” while he elsewhere, like his teacher Jacob, Bishop of Nisibis, adduces passages of our Epistle merely in general terms, as words of an Apostle. On this point the Egyptian Church seems to have had a controlling influence.
Unquestionably remarkable is not merely the testimony of the Oriental Church for the Pauline composition of the Epistle, and the marked use of it by Clement of Rome, but especially the circumstance that the testimony of the Alexandrians may not (with Eichhorn, Schmidt, Dav. Schultz) be referred back to purely hypothetical assumptions; comp. Stenglein Historical Testimonies of the first four centuries regarding the Author of the Epistle to the Hebrews, Bamberg, 1835. True, indeed, as we have already intimated, the tradition in favor of Paul upon which Pantænus, about the middle of the second century, seems to rely, is not so sure and decisive as Storr, Hug, etc., imagine. And entirely justifiable is the cautious language of Bleek, who regards it as probable, on scientific grounds, that Pantænus already found different views existing in his church regarding the Author of our Epistle, and that he had reference to an objection urged against his own view in the words preserved by Euseb. H. E., VI., 14, that “Paul from modesty and a spirit of reverence toward the Lord, did not designate himself as Apostle of the Hebrews, because to the Hebrews the Lord had been sent as the Apostle of the Almighty, but he, Paul, as Apostle and Preacher to the Gentiles, had written to them gratuitously and outside of his appointed sphere of labor.”
This sagacious position is needlessly surrendered in the otherwise valuable “History of the N. Test. Canon, by C. A. Credner, Edited by G. Volkmar, Berlin., 1860, p. 182,” according to which Pantænus might merely have spoken the sentiments of those who, like him, wished to connect the Epistle, that had originated, perhaps, but without clearly settled authorship in the Alexandrian Church, with the name of Paul as opposed to the Catholic Church, which was disposed to contest with him its claim to canonical authority. How decided, on the contrary, was with others the consciousness and influence of a tradition in favor of its Pauline composition is conspicuously evinced by the fact that the Alexandrians themselves, while observing its diversity of style from that of Paul, for this reason framed the hypothesis that the Epistle had sprung from an Aramæan original, of which Paul was the author (Clem. Alex.), or that Paul did not dictate its language, but only gave the ideas (Orig.); while, meantime, Origen concedes (Eus. H. E., VI. 25) that “if any church deems this Epistle a production of Paul, it is liable to no blame, ïὐ ãὰñ åἰêῆ ïἱ ἀñ÷áῖïé ἄíäñåò ὡò Ðáýëïõ áὐôὴí ðáñáäåäþêáóéí , (“for not without cause—not at mere hap-hazard—have ancient or the primitive men handed it down as Paul’s”). This language points to a real tradition, going back to men well-known, and already to be reckoned as ancestors, even granting it to have been held only here and there by an individual church. And the circumstance that Origen regards this procedure as not groundless and irrational, is all the more weighty as he gives in immediate connection his own dissenting view, resting on critical grounds; viz., “that should he declare his own opinion, it is this, that the thoughts belong to the Apostle, the style and composition to another, who has written down the ideas of the Apostle, and carried out in his own explanatory language the statements of his teacher.” Then follow the words cited above, after which: “But who actually committed it to writing, is known to God.” He adds that tradition ascribes it partly to Clement of Rome, partly to Luke.
The weight of these facts has led to successively renewed endeavors to defend the Pauline authorship of the Epistle. To this effect—after the assaults of an independent criticism commencing with Semler—Meyer, in the Journal of Ammon and Bartholdt II., 3; Cramer, in his Commentary; and particularly Storr: while Kleuker (Extended Inquiries, etc., Riga, 1793 II.) sought to show that the assumption of a Pauline authorship was at least not unreasonable. Against the assaults of Dav. Schultz appeared specially Steudel in Bengel’s Archiv., IV., 1; Hofstede de Groot (disput. qua ep. ad Heb. cum Paulinis epp. comparatur, Traj. ad Rhen., 1826); Stuart of Andover, U. S., 1827, and Hug in the Second Ed. of his Introd. to the N. Test., 1821. Even after the investigations of Bleek, the Pauline authorship was still defended by Gelpke (vindiciæ originis Paulinæ Ep. ad Heb., Lugd. Bat., 1833); by Paulus in Heidelberg, 1833; by the Catholic Klee, 1833; and by Stein in the Appendix to his Commentary on Luke, 1830. More recently again L. Gaussen (Le canon des saintes écritures, translated into German by Pastor Grob, 1864) who, after Wordsworth (on the Canon, London, 1847, p. 234), finds a direct and authentic testimony in favor of Paul as its author, in the closing salutation (v. 25), in connection with a false explanation of 2Th_3:17.
Yet even the passage Heb_2:3, taken in its connection, makes strongly against the Pauline authorship, as, since Cajetan and Erasmus, is commonly conceded. It is, indeed, true that the writer here in terms distinguishes himself properly only as a non-eye-witness from the actual eye-witnesses of the life of Jesus (Hofm. Schriftbeweis, II., 2, p. 352). The contrast of Apostle and non-Apostle is here not in question; and thus we might find in this passage, perhaps, no formal contradiction to Paul’s uniform and studious assertion of his Apostolical authority, Galatians 1, and 2 Corinthians 11, 12. But no less certainly does the author class himself with his readers as belonging to a generation to which the salvation—originally uttered by the Lord—has been confirmed by the testimony of intermediate ear-witnesses. And in such a manner Paul could not have expressed himself, however much, for purposes of instruction, he might have chosen for once to hold his Apostolical claims in abeyance; for thus he would not merely have concealed—he would have denied them.
Again the personal references of Hebrews 13 contain nothing which decidedly points to Paul. True, we may not specially determine to what considerable Christian man Timothy could, during the life of Paul, have stood in any such relation of fraternal coöperation as Heb_13:23 indicates; and just as little can we establish the fact that he, after the death of Paul, although bishop of the Church at Ephesus, again made journeys as a missionary. But undeniably men like Luke, Barnabas, Apollos, might thus express themselves in regard to Timothy, well-known doubtless in his fortunes to the readers; and as Paul, 2Ti_4:9, summons Timothy to himself from Ephesus we are not required to regard him as fixed irremovably at Ephesus. Further, against the Pauline hypothesis are the facts that the expression ïἱ ἀðὸ ôῆò Ἰôáëßáò they from Italy (Heb_13:24) philologically, to be sure, can be understood of Italians, but hardly of them including Romans; that the request to the readers (Heb_13:19) to pray to God for his restoration to them, points to such a connection with the Church addressed as Paul could not have had with the Churches of Palestine; that Paul could not expect so peaceful a return after his experiences in Jerusalem; that Heb_13:18-19 hardly point to an imprisonment of the author (since also at Heb_10:34, we are to read not ôïῖò äåóìïῖò ìïõ , but ôïῖò äåóìßïéò ); and finally that we can scarcely conceive how Paul should have written to Hebrew Christians, if we remember the agreement made at Jerusalem among the Apostles, in regard to their spheres of labor, and the declarations of Paul himself in regard to his position and the immediate duty assigned him, Rom_15:20; 1Co_10:13. And besides, how could Paul, who elsewhere always prefixes to his letters his name and opening salutation, have written without affixing his name, and in such terms as at Heb_2:3, precisely to those churches that had sought to spread their doubts of his Apostolical authority even by their deputations to the Gentile Churches?
To these grounds of doubt we may add the important fact that, alike in its train of thought and the closely related character of its style, this Epistle stands clearly distinguished from the undoubted compositions of Paul. We may not, indeed, emphasize the doctrinal diversity so strongly as does Dav. Schultz, and in part Ed. Reuss, who even maintains that the Christology of our Epistle has a “decidedly spiritualistic tendency whereby ( ἀìÞôùñ ) obscurity is thrown upon Christ’s connection with humanity.” Heb_2:14; Heb_2:17, stands in decided hostility to this view. In general the undeniable diversities in the doctrinal statements can be converted into discrepancies only by misconception, and they are easily explicable from the character of the readers, and the special object of the Epistle. Paul, starting from the condition and needs of humanity, points usually to the subjective influences of the work of salvation, deducing thence the contrasted nature of law and Gospel, and thus leading on his readers from these phenomena, to the profounder truths of Christology. Our author proceeds by a reverse process. He deduces the infinite superiority of the New Covenant to the Old, from the infinite elevation of Jesus Christ above all the mediators of salvation, and all the servants and organs of Divine revelation. Paul again links the death of Christ with that of the sacrificial victim; here it is linked with the fact of priestly intercession. Paul lays the stress on that which was accomplished on the cross; here it is laid on that which is accomplished in the heavenly sanctuary by the perfected Royal Priest, who is exhibited before us in his entire personality as a sacrifice which, “through an eternal Spirit,” has in a perfect manner been offered to God. Yet the words of Paul regarding the exaltation of Christ above the heavens (Eph_4:10), and regarding his intercession for the saints at the right hand of the Father (Rom_8:34), contain the germ of the doctrine here unfolded of Christ’s high priesthood in the heavenly holy of holies. And in Paul’s designation of the Old Test. ceremonial law as the “rudiments of the world” ( óôïé÷åῖá ôïῦ êüóìïõ , Gal_4:3) lies enfolded all that is here taught regarding the inability of the law to bring anything to perfection, as, on the other hand, our Epistle is but an expansion and carrying through, in its own peculiar way, of the Pauline doctrine that Christ is the ôÝëïò ôïῦ íüìïõ , Rom_10:4, and that the Law has partly a disciplinary and “pedagogical” (Gal_3:24), partly a typical (1Co_10:11; Col_2:17) significance. So also at once independent, and yet standing in close relationship with Php_2:7 f., is the treatment of the doctrine of the humiliation and exaltation of Jesus Christ (Heb_1:4; Heb_2:9), who here, as with Paul, is not merely the mediator of the New Covenant on the ground of the redemption wrought through His blood (Heb_7:22; Heb_9:15; Heb_12:24; Gal_3:19; 1Ti_2:5), but, as the Image of God, is also the Mediator in the creation, preservation and government of the world (Heb_1:1-3; 1Co_8:6; 2Co_4:4; Col_1:15-17; Eph_1:10). And in the same reciprocal relation stand the. declarations (Heb_6:1; Heb_9:14; comp. Heb_9:9) regarding dead works and their distinction from good works, to which Christians are mutually to incite each other (Heb_10:24), as the Pauline distinction of works of law and good works; and faith is brought into direct relation not barely with the righteousness of man (Heb_11:7; comp. Heb_10:38), but also with the expiatory death of Jesus (Heb_10:22). Any essential difference, therefore, must not be assumed. But here the prevailing contrast is not that between faith and law, or works of law. The conception of faith is here preponderantly the more general one of abiding “and obedient trust in the promises of God, so that on the one hand it forms a contrast to the vision of the period of fulfilment (as 1Co_5:7), and on the other, particularly in Hebrews 11, is regarded as that which from the outset has been through all ages the condition of salvation, thus simply carrying out Paul’s representation (Romans 4.) of the faith of Abraham. Precisely so the ethical element of faith, particularly in the life of Jesus himself, is still more expressly exhibited (Heb_2:17; Heb_4:15; Heb_12:2). It does not lie within the scope of the Epistle to dwell on the universality of the plan of grace, and on the calling of the Gentiles. So also the resurrection of Jesus is but once mentioned, Heb_13:20; and Paul’s doctrine of sin and grace is but lightly touched by the mention of the “deceitfulness of sin,” Heb_3:13, comp. Heb_11:25; Heb_12:4; in like manner his doctrine of ÷Üñéò , Heb_4:16; and of deliverance” ( ἀðáëëáãÞ ), in contrast with bondage ( äïõëåßá ).
But it is not merely individual terms, expressions, and references, which exhibit a deviation from those familiar to Paul, and regarding which it might be possible to say that under like conditions, or for a like purpose, Paul would very probably have thus expressed himself. The state of the case is rather this, that along with an essential accordance with the fundamental ideas of Paul; along with the occasional recurrence of modes of thought specifically Pauline, and with a frequent use of substantially equivalent doctrinal expressions, there yet, on the one hand, runs through our Epistle a thorough independence in the modes of conception, in the style of argumentation and the diction, which precisely in minute and familiar matters, gives spontaneous expression to a writer’s individuality; and, on the other, it displays here and there a decidedly non-Pauline terminology, as, e.g., in the use of ἁãéÜæåéí and ôåëåéïῦóèáé . A resort to the opinion of Origen, (as by Guericke, Thiersch, Bisping, Stier, Ebrard, and partly Delitzsch), which refers the substance of the Epistle to Paul, its form to one of his companions, does not explain the phenomenon, and in fact involves a superficial view that will bear no close inspection. Even Olshausen has felt (Opusc. Theol. Königsberg, 1834, p. 118 f.) that in assuming such an indirect authorship on the part of Paul, nothing is gained, and that the immediate composer, standing forth in undeniable individuality, must be regarded as the proper author of the Epistle. In the endeavor, however, to maintain its outward connection with Paul, he advances the hypothesis, destitute of the slightest historical support, that the Epistle is properly a hortatory discourse, composed by Presbyters of a church in Asia Minor, to which Paul has lent his approval, regarding which then the writer apprises us in appending some personal notices.
We shall find it, then, advisable, in inquiring after the author of our Epistle, to leave Paul, directly, entirely out of the question. For the view of Baumgarten-Crusius (On the Origin and Internal Character of the Epistle to the Hebrews, Jena, 1828), that it belongs to the class of interpolated writings, and that the Alexandrian author has designed to produce a re-moulding of the contents of the Epistles to the Ephesians and Colossians, for the Jewish Christians, finds no shadow of support in the character of the Epistle. Equally untenable is the view of Schwegler (Post-Ap. Age, II. p. 312) and Zeller (Theol. Jahr. 1842, 1), that this is a treatise of the Pseudo-Johannean school of the second century, to which the form of an epistle is incidentally given, together with such personal references as should allow of its being referred to Paul. It is necessary, on the other hand, that our conjectures should remain within the sphere of the action and influence of Paul. The view of Köstlin (Theol. Jahrb., 1854, Heft 4) and of Alb. Ritschl, (Origin of the Early Catholic Church, 2 ed., Bonn, 1857), that the Epistle to the Hebrews presents an advanced stage of the primitive Apostolical Judaism, and displays but here and there traces of the Pauline spirit, can scarcely be carried through, although in the turn given to it by Weiss (Stud. und Crit., 1859, I. 142 ff., and Riehm, Lehrbegriff, II. 861 ff.), it assumes a more plausible form. The author appears as an independent missionary laborer among those connected with Paul, and pre-eminent in talent and influence. Hence, it does not meet the case to refer it, as a mere matter of conjecture, to Mark or Aquila; or, with Böhme in his Commentary, or with Mynster (Kleine theol. Schriften, Copenhag., 1825), in part also Riehm II., 893, to Silas; or with Erasmus, and hesitatingly Calvin, and more recently Bisping, following some ancient authorities (Eusebius, H. E. III. 38), to Clemens Romanus. To trace the authorship of the Epistle with Eichhorn, Schott, Baumgarten-Crusius, Seyffarth (de epistolæ quæ dicitur ad Hebr. indole maximæ peculiari Leipz., 1821) to an Alexandrian in general, is going too far, and is mixing with the question some irrelevant considerations (see sec. 5). We might, however, if we do not decide in favor of Barnabas, be easily tempted, with Hugo Grotius, Hug, since the third edition of his Introduction, Köhler (Essay on the Date of the Composition of the Epistles, 1830), Ebrard and Delitzsch, to fix upon Luke. Luke alone was with Paul (2Ti_4:11) when he summoned Timothy to come to him with all speed (Heb_4:9), and he was also with him in his last visit to Jerusalem, Act_21:17. Besides this, he was, according to Eusebius, H. E., III. 4, 3, from Antioch, and was, hence, a sort of fellow-countryman to the Christians of Palestine. Delitzsch lays much stress on the similarity of the style to that of Luke (a similarity previously perceived by Grotius), particularly from Act_16:10, which also Weitzsacker (Jahrb. für deutsche Theol. 1862, II. 399) deems deserving a close investigation, and of which he adduces a multitude of new examples. Nay, he even finds modes of expression such as belong specially to a, physician, (to which calling, according to Col_4:14, Luke belonged), particularly Heb_4:12 f.; Heb_5:11 ff.; Heb_6:12; Heb_12:12 f. But Lönemann (Comm. 2 ed.) shows-that these points of relationship, are comparatively slight, while one cannot fail to discover a prevailing diversity in style and manner. He also maintains as decisive the evidence from Col_4:16, that Luke was a Gentile Christian, against Tiele (Stud. und Krit., 1858, IV. 753) and Hofmann (Schriftbeweis 2 Aufl. II. 2, 99), who regard him as a Jewish Christian. All this makes against Luke as author of the Epistle. True, the partial errors of the author of our Epistle regarding the arrangements of the Levitical worship, assumed by most interpreters, would be easily explained under this hypothesis. But they are equally so on the theory which, since the time of Luther, has been maintained by most expositors, of its authorship by Apollos (Doric abbreviation of Ἀðïëëþíéïò ). On behalf of this may be urged, first of all, that union of independence in his ministry with harmony with the Apostle, to which the Epistles to the Corinthians bear testimony; then the description of him given in the Acts (Act_18:24) as a born Jew and earlier disciple of John, learned and profoundly versed in Scripture, who overpowered the Jews by reasonings drawn from Scripture; the fact that, for these reasons, although by birth an Alexandrian, he, nevertheless, still appears standing in relation with Palestine, and holding himself free from the idealism of Philo, and the influences of Greek philosophy, (as indeed it was also by Aquila, one of Paul’s converts, that he was introduced at Ephesus into a deeper understanding of the Gospel (Act_18:2 f.); the fact that he had either been in Crete, or must have intended to come thither (Tit_3:13), and that he devoted his labors especially to the Jews (Act_18:28); and finally, that that exclusive use of the Septuagint, which attracted notice as early as Jerome (ad Isaiah 6, 9), would, in his case, be entirely explicable. There remain, however, two grounds of hesitation. The first is, that in Christian antiquity his name is unmentioned in connection with this question. The second, that in the historical accounts regarding him, we find no proper points of support for the personal relations touched upon at the close of the Epistle. The question regarding its authorship must, therefore, still be considered as standing open.
[The question regarding the authorship of this noble Epistle, must indeed be regarded as undecided, and may very possibly ever remain unsusceptible of positive solution. The only point which may be regarded as established beyond all controversy, is, that at least in its present form, it did not proceed from the pen of the Apostle Paul. The diversities—discrepancies, it seems to me, are out of the question—between this Epistle and the acknowledged writings of Paul, are too numerous and too great, both in the subject-matter and the style, to render it conceivable that they should have come from the same pen. And I deem scarcely less improbable the hypothesis, that the Epistle was dictated in substance by Paul, and committed to writing in his own independent diction by another. The Epistle bears the stamp of unity; thought and diction appear in it closely and inseparably allied; and the difficulties are equally great, either of assuming that the supposed amanuensis speaks in the name of his principal, or that he speaks in his own name. Still, English and American commentators have by no means uniformly abandoned the Pauline hypothesis. In this country Prof. Stuart defended it with great zeal, if not with very great acumen, and Sampson, Turner, Dr. Barnes, and Dr. Lindsay, all maintain this view. In England Alford follows the lead of the Continental scholars, and makes an elaborate and able appeal in behalf of the claims of Apollos; Conybeare and Howson also yield entirely the Pauline authorship. Wordsworth, however, representing the conservative tendencies of the English Church, still, adheres to the view that Paul was its author; but defends the position on no new or decisive grounds.—In relation to the question who was the author, there doubtless will continue to be, among those who conceive that it could not have been written by Paul, various opinions. The claims of Barnabas, Luke, Silas, Clemens Romanus, have been canvassed, and those of each, especially the two former, admit of many plausible and not entirely unweighty considerations in their favor. Still, they also admit of much being said against them. In regard to Barnabas, it certainly seems a mysterious dispensation of Providence—granting that the Epistle to the Hebrews is really his production—that he should be known to posterity as an author, by productions so nearly intrinsically worthless as the spurious Epistles that bear his name, while with that genuine production which is one of the noblest and most precious legacies to us of the age of inspiration, his name should have but the most uncertain and shadowy connection. But in regard to all these persons, except Luke, the case is too purely hypothetical to warrant any thing more than the merest conjecture; while, in regard to Luke, noble as are the two undoubted productions of his pen, they furnish no indications of that depth of thought, and that profound knowledge of the Old Testament, which would have enabled him to write the. Epistle to the Hebrews. The only name on which we can, as it seems to me, faster and make a vigorous and solid argument, is that of Apollos, The author of the Epistle to the Hebrews was certainly a Jew. He was no less certainly a person of elegant culture, and trained in the arts of rhetoric; for this Epistle is full of delicate rhetorical points. He was a person of fine Greek culture, as shown by the elegance of his Greek style. He was, it seems almost certain, acquainted with the writings of the Alexandrian Philo (for the verbal coincidences are too numerous and striking to be the offspring of mere accident), though untinctured by his philosophizing and mystical tendencies; he therefore, in all probability, must have been from Alexandria. He stood as a teacher on high and independent ground, and yet did not belong to those who had received the Gospel from the Lord at first hand. He differed widely from Paul in his mode of presenting the Gospel, and was yet, in every fundamental point, in perfect harmony with him. He was profoundly versed in the Old Testament, and had precisely that power of fathoming and drawing out the deeper sense of the Old Testament, which would enable him “with great power, to convince the Jews from the Old Testament Scriptures, that Jesus was the Christ.” All these requisites of the author of this Epistle are fulfilled in Apollos. If a writer should attempt to put into one or two brief sentences, all the qualifications which would be demanded for the authorship of the Epistle to the Hebrews, he would need only to write the sentences contained in Act_18:2, etc. Nor do I conceive that there is much force in the two counter-suggestions of Moll. It seems indeed surprising that Christian antiquity should not have suggested the name of Apollos in this connection; and at first view, the consideration looks like a weighty one. But when we look at the actual treatment of the question by the Christian Fathers, and the exceeding superficiality of their discussion of the subject, the objection loses most of its force. Where the positive testimony is of so little value, the negative testimony of silence cannot be allowed any great weight. As to the other point, viz., that the history of Apollos furnishes no points of support for the personal references at the close of the Epistle, this is perhaps true; but it is equally true, that it furnishes none against them; and these references are so very few and vague, that they are of very slight value in an adjustment of the question. On the whole, while conceding, of course, that “the question of authorship still stands open,” I cannot forbear the opinion that the weight of argument is now very strongly in favor of the learned and eloquent Jew of Alexandria.—K.].
§
The contents and tone of our Epistle do not allow us to regard it as addressed to Jewish Christians in general (Euthal.; Oecum.); nor to such Christians of Hebrew extraction as, united in one Church with Christians of different origin, were living among Gentiles (Braun, Baumg., Stenglein, Heinrichs, Schwegler, Stier, in part Wieseler). Not a syllable points to relations with Gentile Christians as such. Every thing indicates a purely Jewish community, and that, too, in which many members adhere to the Levitical temple service and sacrificial rites, as to a Divine institution (Heb_13:9), and, although they have become believers in Jesus as the Messiah (Heb_5:12), have fallen into a disturbed state of conscience, and danger of apostacy (Heb_6:6-10; Heb_10:25-32; Heb_12:15), in that, along with threatened exclusion from participation in the Temple, and from the Commonwealth of Israel, they fear, also, to lose their claim to the salvation and kingdom of the Messiah. Nowhere is there implied in the persons addressed, any theoretical preference of the law, against which, as an error fraught with heretical and disturbing tendencies, was frequently directed the sharp argumentation of Paul. But neither does the Epistle presuppose any shaking of their faith,—occasioned by the destruction of Jerusalem,—in the fulfilment of the Divine promises given to the Covenant people of the Old Testament, and in the restoration of the nation to a glory corresponding with the character of the New Testament and of its Founder (Kluge). Just as far is it from presupposing an undeveloped Christian life, resting on a feeble faith, which needs to have the groundlessness of its fears set before it in a calm and clear presentation of the real facts of the case (Ebr.). It rather addresses Christians who have formerly had a deeper knowledge than now (Heb_5:11; Heb_6:4); to whom, however, the capital points in the relation of the New to the Old Covenant have become alarmingly obscured, so that a warning against apostasy from Christianity has to be laid upon their consciences with terrible earnestness and severity. In this it is not the feasts and their celebration that are brought into the foreground; but the Temple with its worship, especially its expiatory sacrifices. The prevailing contrast is not that of synagogue and church, but of Temple and the ἐðéóõíáãùãÞ of Christians (Del.); Conf. van den Ham Diss. expon. doctrinam de Vet. Novoque Test. in epist. ad Hebr. exhibitam, Traj. ad Rhen., 1847.
For this reason the Epistle can hardly be addressed to Jewish Churches “in the dispersion,” whose members, in their journeys to the feasts, might have been thrown, by their exclusion from the temple, into doubts and anxieties, which led them well nigh to the point of a return to Judaism. Among these Christians “in the dispersion,” the slightest possibility, the bare shadow of an allusion, has sufficed to find a home for the readers of the Epistle in Spain, (Nicol. de Lyra); in Rome, (Wetstein, Baur, Holtzmann, Alford); among one or more Italian Churches, yet entirely exclusive of Rome, (Ewald); in Corinth, (Mich. Weber, Mack, Tobler); in Thessalonica (Semler, Nösselt); in Cyprus, (Ullmann; who, however, deems it possible to find them in Alexandria); in Laodicea, (Stein, who finds in it the lost Epistle of Paul mentioned Col_4:16); in Asia Minor, (Bengel, Schmid, Cramer); in Antioch, (Böhme); in Lycaonia, (Credner, in his Introd. to the New Test., but who subsequently judges differently); in Galatia, (Storr, Mynster); in Ephesus and its adjacent territory, (Baumgarten-Crusius, Röth, the latter standing entirely alone in supposing that the Epistle was addressed to Gentile Christians., If we feel ourselves obliged to leave Palestine wholly out of account (Schneckenburger and Holtzmann in Stud. u. Krit., 1859), our thoughts turn most naturally to Egypt and the Christians of Alexandria. Thus now also Credner (Hist. of the N. Test. Canon, pp. 161, 182), Volkmar (the same, p. 394 f.), Hilgenfeld (Zeitschr. für wissensch. Theol., 1858, I. 103 f.), Ed. Reuss (Gesch. der heil. Schriften des N. Test. 4 Ausg., 1864), most thoroughly Wieseler (Untersuchung, etc., 2 Hälfte, 1861); still earlier, Schmidt (Einl. I., p. 284), Wieseler (Chronologie des apostol. Zeital., p. 479 f.), Bunsen (Hippolytus I., p. 365), Köstlin (Theolog. Jahrb., 1854, Heft 3, p. 388). But passages like Heb_8:3 ff; Heb_9:6 ff; Heb_13:13 ff., point clearly to an actual temple of Jehovah with a worship really present to the readers, not to a merely spiritual sanctuary, existing only in the author’s symbolical interpretation; and the temple of Onias at Leontopolis in Egypt, built under Ptolemy Philometor, and established exclusively (Joseph., Ant., 13, 3. 1), for Jews dwelling in Egypt, with reference to Isa_19:18-19, and in part obscurely described by Josephus (B. Judges , 7, 10, 3), was not merely held in light esteem in Palestine, but even Philo knows but one ðáôñῷïí ἱåñüí , that of Jerusalem, to which also Alexandrian Jews directed their sacred gifts and their festal journeys (comp. Herzfeld, Gesch. des Volkes Israel von der Zerstörung des ersten Tempels bis, etc., III. p. 557 f. Jost, Geschichte des Judenthums, I. 116 f.). We need not, however, for this reason, with Ebrard (Am. Ed. of Ols. Commen., Vol. VI., p. 280), confine the readers to a narrow circle of Neophytes in Jerusalem, for whose instruction and confirmation the Epistle was to serve as a sort of manual. Better to adhere still to the view which embraces the Jewish Christians of Palestine. To these best apply the few characteristic marks contained in the Epistle. They form evidently the “Second Christian Generation” (Thol.). They have received the gospel not from the Lord Himself, but from His witnesses, subsequently to His ascension, Heb_2:3. Some of their leaders ( ἡãïýìåíïé ) have already suffered martyrdom (Heb_5:12; Heb_13:7), and they themselves have already suffered persecutions, although as yet not bloody ones (<