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to Heb_6:20
Heb_5:11 to Heb_6:20. The author is on the point of turning to the nearer presentation of the dignity of High Priest after the manner of Melchisedec, which pertains to Christ, and thus of His superiority over the Levitical high priests. But before he passes over to this, he complains in a digression of the low stage of Christian knowledge at which the readers are yet standing, whereas they ought long ago themselves to have been teachers of Christianity; exhorts them to strive after manhood and maturity in Christianity, and with warning admonition points out that those who have already had experience of the rich blessing of Christianity, and nevertheless apostatize from the same, let slip beyond the possibility of recall the Christian salvation; then, however, expresses his confidence that such state of things will not be the case with the readers, who have distinguished themselves, and still do distinguish themselves, by works of Christian love, and indicates that which he desires of them,—namely, endurance to the end,—while at the same time reminding them of the inviolability of the divine promise and the objective certainty of the Christian hope.
Heb_5:11. Περὶ οὗ ] sc. Χριστοῦ ἀρχιερέως κατὰ τὴν τάξιν Μελχισεδέκ . To this total-conception, as is also recognised by Riehm (Lehrbegr. des Hebräerbr. p. 780), is περὶ οὗ to be referred back. We have to supplement not merely Χριστοῦ (Oecumenius, Primasius, Justinian), because that would be a far too general defining of the object, inasmuch as confessedly the discourse is not first about Christ in the sequel, but everywhere throughout the epistle. But neither is Μελχισεδέκ to be supplied to οὗ (Peshito, Calvin [Piscator hesitates between this and the following application], Owen, Schöttgen, Peirce, Semler, Chr. Fr. Schmid, Bleek, de Wette, Tholuck, Alford, Maier, al.). For even though—a fact to which Bleek appeals—the author, after having concluded the digression (Heb_7:1 f.), begins by characterizing this same Melchisedec, yet this description is subordinated to a higher aim, that of setting forth the high-priestly dignity of Christ; as surely also the reference of Heb_7:1 ff. to the close of the digression (Heb_6:20) clearly shows, since the former is represented by γάρ as only the development now begun of the main consideration: Ἰησοῦς κατὰ τὴν τάξιν Μελχισεδὲκ ἀρχιερεὺς γενόμενος εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα , taken up anew, Heb_6:20. To take οὗ as a neuter, with Grotius, Cramer, Storr, Abresch, Böhme, Kuinoel, Klee, Stein, Stengel, Bisping, Delitzsch, Kurtz, and others, and to refer it to the high-priesthood of Christ after Melchisedec’s manner,—according to which οὗ would thus have to be resolved into περὶ τοῦ προσαγορευθῆναι αὐτὸν ὑπὸ τοῦ θεοῦ ἀρχιερέα κατὰ τὴν τάξιν Μελχισεδέκ ,—is possible indeed, but not so natural as when it is taken as a masculine, since the discourse in that which precedes was about the definite person of Christ.
πολὺς ἡμῖν ὁ λόγος ] sc. ἐστίν . Wrongly, because otherwise ἂμ εἴη must have been added, and because a detailed development of the subject really follows afterwards; Peshito, Erasmus, Luther, and others: concerning which we should have much to speak.
καί ] and indeed.
λέγειν ] belongs to δυσερμήνευτος . Heinrichs erroneously joins it with ἡμῖν ὁ λόγος .
Even on account of the connectedness of the λέγειν with δυσερμήνευτος , but also on account of the preceding ἡμῖν , followed by no ὑμῖν , it is inadmissible, with Jac. Cappellus, Grotius, Peirce, Chr. Fr. Schmid, Valckenaer, Kuinoel, and others, to suppose the difficulty of the exposition or rendering intelligible of the λόγος to exist on the part of the readers, and thus to interpret δυσερμήνευτος in the sense of δυσνόητος 2Pe_3:16. On the contrary, as the author has abundant material for discoursing on the subject announced, so is it also difficult for the author to render himself intelligible thereon to the readers. The ground of this difficulty which obtains for him is introduced by the clause with ἐπεί , which on that account is to be referred only to δυσερμήνευτος λέγειν , not at the same time (Hofmann) to πολὺς ἡμῖν ὁ λόγος . For the rest, Storr and Bleek have already rightly remarked, that in the connecting of λόγος with the two predicates πολύς and δυσερμήνευτος a sort of zeugma is contained, inasmuch as λόγος is to be taken in relation to the first predicate actively,[74] in relation to the second passively. On the high-priesthood of Christ after the manner of Melchisedec, the author has much to speak; and truly it is difficult for him to make plain to his readers the contents or subject of his discourse.
γεγόνατε ] characterizes the spiritual sluggishness or dulness of the readers not as something which was originally inherent in them, but only as something which afterwards manifested itself in connection with them. Chrysostom: τὸ γὰρ εἰπεῖν ἐπεὶ νωθροὶ γεγόνατε ταῖς ἀκοαῖς δηλοῦντος ἦν , ὅτι πάλαι ὑγίαινον καὶ ἦσαν ἰσχυροί , τῇ προθυμίᾳ ζέοντες , καὶ ὕστερον αὐτοὺς τοῦτο παθεῖν μαρτυρεῖ .
νωθρός ] in the N. T. only here and Heb_6:12.
ταῖς ἀκοαῖς ] with regard to the hearing, i.e. the spiritual faculty of comprehension. Comp. Philo, Quis rer. divin. haeres. p. 483 (with Mangey, I. p. 474): ἐν ἀψύχοις ἀνδριάσιν , οἷς ὦτα μέν ἐστιν , ἀκοαὶ δὲ οἰκ ἔνεισιν . The plural is used, inasmuch as the discourse is of a multitude of persons. On the dative, instead of which the accusative might have been placed, comp. Winer, Gramm., 7 Aufl. p. 202.
[74] This is erroneously denied by Delitzsch and Alford. Even the two instances from Dionys. Halicarn., on which Delitzsch relies, plead against him.