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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadCambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges - Hebrews 2:11 - 2:11
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11. γάρ. The next three verses are an illustration of the moral fitness, and therefore of the Divine necessity, that there should be perfect unity and sympathy between the Saviour and the saved.
ὅ τε ἁγιάζων καὶ οἱ ἁγιαζόμενοι. The idea would perhaps be well, though not literally, expressed by “both the sanctifier and the sanctified,” for the idea of sanctification is here not so much that of progressive holiness as that of cleansing (Heb 13:12). This writer seems to make but little difference between the words “to sanctify” and “to purify,” because in the sphere of the Jewish Ceremonial Law from which his analogies are largely drawn, “sanctification meant the setting apart for service by various means of purification.” See Heb 9:13-14, Heb 10:10; Heb 10:14, Heb 13:12, and comp. Joh 17:17-19; 1Jn 1:7. The progressive sanctification is viewed in its ideal result, and in this result the whole Church of Christ shares, so that, like Israel of old, it is ideally “holy.”
ἐξ ἑνὸς πάντες. Sub. πατρός. The ἐξ implies descent; they alike derive their origin from God; in other words the relation in which they stand to each other is due to one and the same Divine purpose (Joh 17:17-19). This seems a better view than to refer the “one” to Abraham (Isa 51:2; Eze 33:24, &c.) or to Adam.
οὐκ ἐπαισχύνεται. Sc. ὁ ἁγιάζων.
ἀδελφοὺς αὐτοὺς καλεῖν. αὐτοὺς sc. τοὺς ἁγιαζομένους. If the Gospels had been commonly known at the time when this Epistle was written, the author would doubtless have referred not to the Old Testament, but to such direct and tender illustrations as Mat 12:49-50, “Behold my mother and my brethren! For whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother”: or to Joh 20:17, “Go to my brethren, and say unto them, I ascend unto my Father, and your Father; and to my God, and your God”: Mat 28:10, “go unto my brethren.” Or are we to suppose that this application of Messianic Psalms would have come with even greater argumentative force to his Judaising readers?
καλεῖν, i.e. to declare them to be His brethren by calling them so.