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Heb_10:5. Διό ] Wherefore, i.e. in accordance with the impossibility declared at Heb_10:4.
λέγει ] He saith. As subject thereto is naturally supplied Christ, although He was not mentioned again since Heb_9:28. This determination of the subject is already placed beyond doubt by the whole connection, but not less by the pointing back of τοῦ σώματος Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ , Heb_10:10, to σῶμα δὲ κατηρτίσω μοι , Heb_10:5. According to the view of our author, Christ is speaking[98] in the person of the psalmist. The psalm itself, indeed, as is almost universally acknowledged, refuses to admit of the Messianic interpretation (comp. especially Heb_10:13 [12]). The present λέγει , moreover, might be placed, because the utterance is one extending into the present, i.e. one which may still be daily read in the Scripture.
εἰσερχόμενος εἰς τὸν κόσμον ] at His coming into the world, i.e. on the eve of coming (see Winer, Gramm., 7 Aufl. p. 249) into the world[99] (sc. by His incarnation). This determining of time is taken from the ἥκω , Heb_10:7. According to Bleek, who is preceded therein by Grotius, and followed by de Wette, as more recently by Maier and Beyschlag, die Christologie des Neuen Testaments, Berl. 1866, p. 192, the author in penning the words εἰσερχόμενος εἰς τὸν κόσμοΝ was thinking “less of the moment of the incarnation and birth than of the public coming forth upon earth to the work assigned to Him by the Father, in connection with which His entrance into the world first became manifested to the world itself.” But in that case ΕἸΣΕΛΘΏΝ must have been written, and the formula ΕἸΣΕΡΧΌΜΕΝΟς ΕἸς ΤῸΝ ΚΌΣΜΟΝ (Joh_1:9; Joh_6:14; Joh_11:27; Rom_5:12; 1Ti_1:15, al.) would lose its natural signification. The same applies against Delitzsch, who, bringing in that which lies very remote, will have the words explained: “incarnate, and having entered upon the years of human self-determination, signified Isa_7:16,”—an exposition which is not any the more rendered acceptable, when Delitzsch adds, with a view to doing justice to the participle present: “we need not regard the εἰσέρχεσθαι εἰς τὸν κόσμον as a point; we can also conceive of it as a line.”[100] For the author cannot possibly have thought of Christ’s εἰσέρχεσθαι εἰς τὸν κόσμον , and His λέγειν temporally therewith coinciding, as something constantly repeated and only progressively developed.
θυσίαν καὶ προσφορὰν οὐκ ἠθέλησας ] sacrifice and offering (bloody and un-bloody sacrifices) Thou didst not will. Kindred utterances in the O. T.: Psa_50:7-15; Psa_51:18 ff. [16 ff.]; Isa_1:11; Jer_6:20; Jer_7:21-23; Hos_6:6; Amo_5:21 ff.; 1Sa_15:22. That, however, the author founded his Scripture proof precisely upon Psalms 40, was occasioned principally by the addition, very important for his purpose: σῶμα δὲ κατηρτίσω μοι , which is found there.
σῶμα δὲ κατηρτίσω μοι ] but a body hast Thou prepared me, sc. in order to be clothed with the same, and by the giving up of the same unto death to fulfil Thy will. Comp. Heb_10:7. Thus, without doubt, the author found in his copy of the LXX. But that the Hebrew words: àÈæÀðÇéÄí ëÌÈøÄéúÈ ìÌÄé (the ears hast Thou digged to me, i.e. by revelation opened up religious knowledge to me), were even originally rendered by the LXX. by ΣῶΜΑ ΔῈ ΚΑΤΗΡΤΊΣΩ ΜΟΙ , as is contended by Jac. Cappellus, Wolf, Carpzov, Tholuck, Ebrard, Delitzsch, Maier, Moll, and others, is a supposition hardly to be entertained. Probably the LXX. rendered the Hebrew words by ὨΤΊΑ ΔῈ ΚΑΤΗΡΤΊΣΩ ΜΟΙ , as they are still found in some ancient MSS. of that version, and ΣῶΜΑ ΔῈ ΚΑΤΗΡΤΊΣΩ ΜΟΙ arose, not “from the translator being unable to attach any satisfactory meaning to the words ‘the ears hast thou digged to me,’ and therefore altering them with his own hand” (Kurtz); but only from an accidental corruption of the text, in that Σ , the final letter of the ἨΘΈΛΗΣΑς immediately preceding, was wrongly carried over to the following word, and instead of ΤΙ the letter Μ was erroneously read.
[98] Arbitrarily does Kurtz place in λέγει a double sense, in that he will have it understood on the part of the psalmist of a speaking in words, on the part of Christ of a speaking by deeds.
[99] Without reason do Delitzsch and Alford object against this interpretation, that the following σῶμα κατηρτίσω μοι is not in harmony therewith. See the exposition of the words.
[100] So, in accord with Delitzsch, also Alford, who observes: “It expresses, I believe, the whole time during which the Lord, being ripened in human resolution, was in intent devoting Himself to the doing of His Father’s will: the time of which that youthful question, ‘Wist ye not that I must be ἐν τοῖς τοῦ πατρός μου ?’ was one of the opening announcements.”