Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Hebrews 1:4
Being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they.
4. being made ] Rather, “becoming,” or “ proving himself to be.” The allusion is to the Redemptive Kingdom of Christ, and the word merely qualifies the “better name.” Christ, regarded as the Agent or Minister of the scheme of Redemption, became mediatorially superior to the Angel-ministrants of the Old Dispensation, as He always was superior to them in dignity and essence.
so much ] The familiar classical (involving the comparison and contrast which runs throughout this Epistle, Heb 3:3, Heb 7:20, Heb 8:6, Heb 9:27, Heb 10:25) is not found once in St Paul.
better ] This word, common as it is, is only thrice used by St Paul (and then somewhat differently), but occurs 13 times in this Epistle alone (Heb 6:9, Heb 7:7; Heb 7:19; Heb 7:22, Heb 8:6, Heb 9:23, Heb 10:34, Heb 11:16; Heb 11:35; Heb 11:40, Heb 12:24).
so much better than the angels ] The writer’s object in entering upon the proof of this fact is not to check the tendency of incipient Gnostics to worship Angels. Of this there is no trace here, though St Paul in his letter to the Colossians, raised a warning voice against it. Here the object is to shew that the common Jewish boast that “they had received the law by the disposition of Angels” involved no disparagement to the Gospel which had been ministered by One who was “far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come” (Eph 1:21). Many Jews held, with Philo, that the Decalogue alone had been uttered by God, and that all the rest of the Law had been spoken by Angels. The extreme development of Jewish Angelology at this period may be seen in the Book of Enoch. They are there called “the stars,” “the white ones,” “the sleepless ones.” St Clement of Rome found it necessary to reproduce this argument in writing to the Corinthians, and the 4th Book of Esdras illustrates the tendency of mind which it was desirable to counteract.
hath by inheritance obtained ] Rather, “hath inherited.” Comp. Luk 1:32; Luk 1:35. “Wherefore God also hath highly exalted Him and given Him a name which is above every name” (Php 2:9). He does not here seem to be speaking of the eternal generation. Christ inherits His more excellent name, not as the Eternal Son, but as the God-Man. Possibly too the writer uses the word “inherited” with tacit reference to the prophetic promises.
a more excellent name than they ] Not here the name of “the only-begotten Son of God” (Joh 3:18), which is in its fulness “a name which no one knoweth save Himself” (Rev 19:12). The “name” in Scripture often indeed implies the inmost essence of a thing. If, then, with some commentators we suppose the allusion to be to this Eternal and Essential name of Christ we must understand the word “inheritance” as merely phenomenal, the manifestation to our race of a prexistent fact. In that view the glory indicated by the name belonged essentially to Christ, and His work on earth only manifested the name by which it was known. This is perhaps better than to follow St Chrysostom in explaining “inherited” to mean “always possessed as His own.” Comp. Luk 1:32, “He shall be called the Son of the Highest.”
more excellent than ] This construction ( after a comparative) is not found once in St Paul’s Epistles, but several times in this Epistle (Heb 1:4, Heb 2:9, Heb 3:3, Heb 9:23, Heb 11:4, Heb 12:24). It should be observed, as bearing on the authorship of the Epistle, that in these four verses alone there are no less than six expressions and nine constructions which find no or no exact parallel in St Paul’s Epistles.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Being made so much better – Being exalted so much above the angels. The word better here does not refer to moral character, but to exaltation of rank. As Mediator; as the Son of God in our nature, he is exalted far above the angels.
Than the angels – Than all angels of every rank; see notes on Eph 1:21; compare 1Pe 3:22. Angels, and authorities, and powers being made subject unto him. He is exalted to his mediatorial throne, and all things are placed beneath his feet.
As he hath by inheritance – Or in virtue of his name – the Son of God; an exaltation such as is implied in that name. As a son has a rank in a family above servants; as he has a control over the property above that which servants have, so it is with the Mediator. He is the Son of God: angels are the servants of God, and the servants of the church. They occupy a place in the universe compared with what he occupies, similar to the place which servants in a family occupy compared with that which a son has. To illustrate and prove this is the design of the remainder of this chapter. The argument which the apostle insists on is, that the title the Son of God is to be given to him alone. It has been conferred on no others. Though the angels, and though saints are called in general sons of God, yet the title the Son of God has been given to him only. As the apostle was writing to Hebrews, he makes his appeal to the Hebrew Scriptures alone for the confirmation of this opinion.
A more excellent name – To wit, the name Son. It is a more honorable and exalted name than has ever been bestowed on them. It involves more exalted privileges, and entitles him on whom it is bestowed to higher respect and honor than any name ever bestowed on them.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Heb 1:4-14
Being made so much better than the angels
The superiority of Christ to the angels
I.
THE SUPERIORITY OF HIS NATURE.
II. THE SUPERIORITY OF HIS PREROGATIVE.
III. THE SUPERIORITY OF HIS OFFICE.
IV. THE SUPERIORITY OF HIS UNCHANGING EXISTENCE. Learn:
1. The error of those who would confound Christ with the angels.
2. The error of those who would bide Christ by the angels.
3. The error of those who would expect the success of Christianity from the intervention of the angels.
4. The error of those who think the Christian Church weak because it lacks angelic phenomena. We have the Cross; we have Pentecost; we need not seraphs or archangels. (W. L. Watkinson.)
Christs excellences above angels
1. Christs Divine nature is infinitely more excellent then an angelical spirit; yea, His human nature, by the hypostatical union of it with the Divine, hath likewise a dignity infinitely surpassing an angels nature.
2. Christ is the express image of the person of His Father, which is more than to be created, as angels were, after Gods image.
3. Christ is the brightness of Gods glory: therefore more glorious than the most glorious angels.
4. Christ is in heaven at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty: therefore in place of residency higher than angels. Christs function, to be a Mediator between God and man, is greater than any of the functions of angels.
6. Therefore Christ is more excellent than angels in their greatest excellences. Yet there is a greater excellency, wherein Christ doth further excel angels, comprised under this phrase, a more excellent name. This is that name which is above every name, at which every knee should bow Php 2:9-10). By virtue of this name He became a fit Mediator between God and man, and fit Saviour and Redeemer of man, a fit King, Priest, and Prophet of His Church; yea, and by virtue of this name, absolute dominion over all creatures, infinite majesty, Divine dignity, and all honour and glory is His; all worship, service, subjection, and duty is due unto Him. This name therefore must needs be beyond all comparison a most excellent name: and in this respect Christ may well be said to have a more excellent name than angels, because there is no comparison between them. The comparative epithet, translated more excellent, is derived from a compound verb that signifieth to differ in excellency, or to excel (1Co 15:41). It is translated to be better (Mat 6:26), or to be of more value (Mat 10:31). The positive of this comparative, signifieth divers or different (Rom 12:6). This word of comparison more excellent, is not to be taken of an exceeding in the same nature and kind, as one man is more excellent than another, but in different natures and kinds for Christ, as the Son of God, is of a Divine nature, even the Creator of all, and preferred before all created spirits; which though they be the most excellent of created substances, yet not to be compared with the Son of God. His name is infinitely more excellent then theirs; for by reason of this name He is the Lord of angels.
1. As He is the true, proper, only begotten Soil, by eternal generation. For the Father in communicating His essence to Him, communicated also this excellent name here intended.
2. As His human nature was hypostatically united to His Divine nature. For though according to the flesh He was not born of God the Father (in that respect He was, without Father, born of a Virgin), yet that flesh being personally united to the only begotten Son of God, He was born the Son of Luk 1:35). He was not then by grace and favour of no Son made the Son of God; but as God, and as God-man, He was the true begotten Son of God; and in both these respects the name here spoken of, by right of inheritance belonged to Him. (W. Gouge.)
The angels
Scripture speaks often of the angels. Let me remind you of some of the doctrines which the Bible contains concerning them. In the first place, human beings know nothing about angels except what God pleases to tell them. Hence all that human poets have imagined about them is of no value, unless it agrees with the Scripture. With regard to the angels, I may notice three tendencies to error. The first tendency to error we see in the Epistle to the Colossians, and we may call it the Gnostic error, when men, following their own speculative reason, endeavour to penetrate mysteries which are not revealed, and form erroneous views of the angels as to their nature, and their relation to God and to Christ. Secondly, the Romish error, according to which the angels are placed in a false mediatory position, and are invoked, when men rely upon their intercession, or call upon their aid. And the third tendency is what I may call the Protestant one–to think too rarely and in too isolated a manner about them, and not to remember vividly that they are constantly with us, that we and they are members of one great family.
1. Notice the multitude of angels: We have come to an innumerable company of angels.
2. This innumerable multitude is a polity, a state. There are gradations in it, groups, orders, legions of angels. There is a kingdom with gradations, with order. This kingdom is intimately connected with the kingdom of grace. When a sinner is converted, the angels rejoice; and when Jesus comes again, the angels will come with Him. They will last for ever, though they are not yet seen by us; and when all that is unreal and shadowy shall disappear, then they shall be made visible at the appearing of our great God and Saviour. Whenever there is a crisis in the history of Gods kingdom the angels appear, as at the giving of the law, and at the incarnation of the Son of God. When He conies again multitudes of angels shall come with Him and separate the evil from the good; before the angels Jesus shall confess His people. Angels are connected not merely with salvation and with the spiritual kingdom of God, but with all the kingdom of God; with all physical phenomena. God does not move and rule the world merely by laws and principles, by unconscious and inanimate powers, but by living beings full of light and love. His angels are like flames of fire; they have charge over the winds, and the earth, and the trees, and the sea. Through the angels He carries on the government of the world. Now, glorious as the angels are, they are in subjection to Jesus as man; for in His human nature God has enthroned Him above all things. Their relation to Jesus fixes also their relation to us. We know they love us; for they rejoice when a sinner turns from ungodliness and takes hold of salvation as it is in Jesus. They watch us in our dangers, in our difficulties. And after having ministered unto Gods people to the end of this age, they shall rejoice when they hear His voice saying unto the children, Come, ye blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For Jesus sake, are they not all ministering spirits? Oh, how great is Jesus! How great is the covenant of grace! How great is the glory of the Son, and how wonderful is our position as children of the Father! (A. Saphir.)
Thou art My Son
The eternal Sonship of Christ
In the Divine generation these distinct points following are observable
1. God as a Father, even the first Person in Trinity, begetteth. In this respect the Son of God is called the begotten of the Father (Joh 1:14).
2. God the Father begat the Son of His very substance, very God of very God. The title God properly taken and frequently applied to this Son, gives proof hereto (Joh 1:1; Rom 9:5), and especially the title Jehovah, which is given to none but the true God (Gen 19:24; Jos 5:14).
3. God the Father communicateth His whole essence to the Son. He begat another self of Himself, even that which He Himself is. In which respect this Son of God saith, I and My Father are one. The Father is in Me, and I in Him (Joh 10:30; Joh 10:38).
4. God the Fathers begetting His Son is truly and properly eternal. It was before all time, it continueth throughout all times, it shall never have any date, or end. In relation hereunto saith this Son of God, I was set up from everlasting, from the beginning, or ever the earth was. When there were no depths, I was brought forth: before the hills was I brought forth, etc. Pro 8:23-25). In this sense He was called the firstborn Col 1:15). Firstborn, because He was begotten before all things; and only-begotten, because He alone was properly begotten of God.
5. God the Fathers begetting His Son, manifesteth an equality of Father and Son. For if the nature of both be inquired after, it will hereby be found to be God, and not one greater than another. This also did the Son receive of the Father. He did not beget Him equal, and then add to Him, when He was begotten, equality, but in begetting Him He made Him equal. For being in the form of God, to be equal with God was no robbery Php 2:6), but nature: because He obtained it by bring begotten, He did not usurp it by a proud advancing of Himself. Where equality is, there is the same nature, and one substance. (W. Gouge.)
This day have I begotten Thee
Sonship in the resurrection
I. THE SENSE IN WHICH WE ARE TO UNDERSTAND THE DIVINE AFFIRMATION. I have begotten Thee. Says Meyer: I think that neither His eternal generation alone, as He is God, nor His temporary generation, as He is man, is here meant, but both. I have begotten Thee from eternity, in respect of Thy Divinity, and in time, as set forth by the term this day. I have, by the overshadowing of My Spirit, begotten Thee of the Virgin Mary, according to Thy humanity, so as it may appear to all the world that Thou art both God and man, and so My most noble Son and the Prince of heaven; this being made evident sundry ways, but especially by Thy rising again from death to life. That is, the resurrection was the day in which God made manifest that He had begotten the Lord Jesus as His Son; not that He was that particular day begotten, but the fact was then made patent, and proclaimed as the grand evidence of that article of faith which teaches us to say, I believe in the resurrection of the dead. Thus the act of our Lords resurrection presents the proof alike of His natural and eternal Sonship, being both divinely begotten. It sheds an equal lustre upon His eternal Deity and glorified humanity; and while the power which effected His resurrection exhibits Him as truly God, His condescension to the flesh, and death which preceded it, discovers Him as really Man; for who but man could die? and who but God could rise again? Death was the peculiar, and for aught I know, the exclusive sentence which was passed on man; life which could triumph over death, which is Gods ordinance, is the sole prerogative of God.
II. WHY WE THINK THE TERM THIS DAY EXCLUSIVELY DISTINGUISHES THE DAY OF HIS RESURRECTION,
1. Our first reason is, the position which the words occupy in the second Psalm, and the seventh verse, from which they are quoted. It is after the heathen had raged, and the people had imagined a vain thing, namely, that they could annihilate the pretensions of Jesus by His death; it is after the conspiring of the kings of the earth and their rulers that the decree is uttered, Thou art My Son; this day have I begotten Thee. That is, the resurrection which succeeded the crucifixion manifested in the most signal manner, that notwithstanding the enmity, apparent success, and short-lived triumph of the Jews, Truly, after all, as the centurion confessed, this man was the Son of God.
2. Our second reason for considering this day the resurrection, is because the assembled apostles so applied the Psalm in the fourth chapter of Acts, the twenty-fifth and following verses, where, having pointed out the accomplishment of the former verses of the second Psalm, in the conspiracy of the rulers and people against Christ, it is added in the thirty-third verse, And with great power gave the apostles witness of the resurrection.
3. A third reason we find in the Epistle to the Romans, the first chapter and the fourth verse, where St. Paul draws the distinction between Christs being made of the seed of David, according to the flesh, but declared (not made) to be the Son of God, according to the Spirit of holiness, by His resurrection from the dead. The word declared, in this place, is of the same force as the Hebrew word which is translated begotten, and which also means exhibited, or manifested; or as Paul saith declared. Thou art My Son; this day have I declared Thee–that is, this day of Thy resurrection, I have owned Thee, manifested Thee, as the Son of God.
4. If there be any remaining doubt as to the application of this passage, I refer you fourthly, to the thirteenth chapter of Acts, and the thirty-third verse, where, after speaking of the promises of God made to the fathers, Paul adds, God hath fulfilled the same unto us, their children, in that He hath raised up Jesus again; as it is also written in the second Psalm–Thou art My Son; this day have I begotten Thee; that is, the raising up of Jesus was the evidence of His Sonship, and His Sonship is the pledge for the fulfilment of the promises.
5. Once more: in the fifth chapter of Hebrews, and the fifth verse, where it is asserted that Aaron, the first high priest under the legal dispensation, and Christ the first High Priest of the gospel, took not this office upon Himself till He was called, the calling of Christ is referred to the same event and in the same terms as in the text are employed to prove the superiority of His nature over that of the angels. Then the day of His resurrection was the day of His ordination to the high priesthood.
III. WHAT WAS THE OFFICE AND COMMISSION CONFERRED UPON THE LORD JESUS BY THE DIVINE TESTIMONY? Thou art My Son. Angels needed not this attestation. They had often heard the grand acknowledgment in heaven. The eternal Sonship of the Christ was no secret there. But as Jesus said of the answer which mysteriously reached Him from the clouds at the raising of Lazarus, so might He have said of the testimony which accompanied His own resurrection–Because of the people who stand by I said it, that they may believe that Thou hast sent Me; that is, God condescended visibly and audibly to acknowledge His Son on earth, that man might believe that He was sent from heaven.
1. The title of the Son of God imports dignity. Hence the apostles argument in the text Unto which of the angels said He at any time, Thou art My Son?
2. The title of the Son of God imports office. It implies, in connection with His other title, the Son of man–which is applied to Christ about eighty times by the evangelists–a mediatorial office; that the Son of man, equally as the Son of God, is the connecting link between God and man, both natures being reconciled by His office as the two are united in His person.
3. Again: as the Son of God, Christ is our Prince and Judge. Henceforth, said He, the Father judgeth no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son; and Peter adds, He is exalted to be a Prince and a Saviour, to give repentance unto Israel, and forgiveness of sins. This is His present office; His sovereignty is now wholly exercised in grace. It now deals in love, mercy, and forbearance. Now He pleads at the throne–hereafter He will sentence from the throne.
4. Once more: as the Son of God, Christ is the Firstborn among many brethren. The term firstborn does not necessarily infer that the person to whom the epithet is applied is a creature; it often imports no more than excellency, or supremacy, or peculiar favour. Thus Job speaks of the firstborn of death–that is, the chief strength of death; so Christ is called in the first chapter of the Epistle to the Colossians, and the fifteenth verse, the Firstborn of every creature, the Firstborn from the dead–that is, the chief and supreme of all the creatures, as the Rabbins themselves spoke of Jehovah as the Firstborn of the creation, or at the bead of the universe. It is also a term of endearment and special favour. Thus the Lord said in the thirty-first chapter of Jeremiah, and the ninth verse–Ephraim is My firstborn; in other words, that His people were very dear to Him. In all these senses Christ is to us the Firstborn of God. He is our Strength and Excellency, our Firstfruits from the dead; and because He lives, we shall live also; for we are said to be begotten again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead. And further, He is Head over all things to His Church; and as there is a name given unto Him which is above every name, so that name is ours. Christs people are called Christians. I will write upon you, said He, My new name; and that is the everlasting name which shall not be cut off. (J. B. Owen, M. A.)
The First-begotten
Christ the First-begotten
I. We understand by this title, THE ETERNAL GENERATION AND SONSHIP OF OUR LORD; His possession of a seed and family made like unto Him here in holiness and hereafter in glory; His rule and preeminence in the house and family of God; His character, as head over all things to the Church.
II. We understand by the bringing in of the First-begotten into the world–THE MANIFESTATION OF THE ETERNAL SON OF GOD IN OUR FLESH–His birth, according to the prophet, of the Virgin Mary. Great indeed is this mystery: let us adore it reverentially! The joy which should pervade our hearts must be a holy joy; the feelings that should possess cur minds should be of lively gratitude and ready obedience.
III. But let us notice WHAT IS TO BE INFERRED FROM THE ADORATION ENJOINED UPON THE ANGELS: this adoration we find rendered at the birth of this wondrous personage; at His agony in the garden they waited on Him; at His resurrection and ascension they were in attendance upon His Majesty; and still they worship and adore. What can we conclude from the adoration of angels, but that He whom angels adore is God and Lord? Again, may we not conclude that the work of our redemption has been undertaken by One who is altogether equal to the task? May we not thus far be of good courage, and place our entire confidence in the virtue of His redemption? Lessons:
1. The unspeakable humiliation of our Lord. How low has He stooped to do us service! Are we filled with the opinion of our own importance? Let us turn to the manger and the stable; let us dwell upon the matchless humility of the Lord of life and glory; let us learn from it to be lowly in our own eyes.
2. Though we cannot copy the act, yet we can copy the motive, the spirit which brought the First-begotten into the world. By love we must serve one another.
3. Again, we are instructed hereby to deny self. (H. J. Hastings, M. A.)
Christ the First-begotten
That which the apostle here intendeth under this title first-begotten, is to set forth the excellency of the person of Christ, as God-man, and that
1. In His priority, which is eternity, as He is God (Pro 8:24-25).
2. In His dignity, being the most excellent of all (Gen 49:3).
3. In regard of His dominion over all (Psa 2:6-7).
4. In regard of the largeness of His inheritance (Psa 2:8). (W. Gouge.)
And let all the angels of God worship Him
These words are an exact quotation from Deu 32:4, as it stands in the LXX. version, but are not found in the original. The use of that passage as a Jewish liturgy of praise probably led to its expansion into a fuller song of triumph by additions borrowed from other parts of Scripture; and these words may have been taken from Psa 97:7, as it stands in LXX. version–Worship Him all ye His angels. In the farewell song of Moses, the verse is introduced on occasion of a majestic prophecy of the Lords appearance to judge the enemy and avenge His people. All such prophecies were interpreted in a Messianic sense; therefore the Epistle makes the reappearance of the firstborn the occasion for that angelic worship. In Deuteronomy the adoration is rendered to Jehovah; in the Epistle it is not clear whether it is rendered to Him or to the firstborn; it is therefore right to follow the Old Testament meaning the passage is quoted by way of exhibiting the subordinate position of angels as mere worshippers. (F. Rendall, M. A.)
Christ the object of angelic worship
I. IF ANGELS WORSHIP CHRIST, HIS CLAIMS TO WORSHIP ARE UNDOUBTED. There are only two conceivable causes for the worshipping of false gods:
1. The want of intelligence.
2. The want of right sympathies.
II. IF ANGELS WORSHIP CHRIST, THEN THE OBLIGATIONS OF MEN TO DO SO MUST REIMMENSE. Besides being the brightness of His Fathers glory, He is the expiator of human sin, &e.
III. IF ANGELS WORSHIP CHRIST, THEN A PRESIDING SYMPATHY WITH HIM IS THE NECESSARY MEETNESS YOU HEAVEN. It is even connected with two things:
1. An appreciative knowledge of Him.
2. An unreserved concurrence with Him. (Homilist.)
Christ worshipped by angels
I. THE FIRST THING WHICH THE TEXT TEACHES IS THAT CHRIST IS A PROPER OBJECT OF DIVINE WORSHIP. We know who has said, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve (Mat 4:10), and we know also, from St. Johns description in the Apocalypse, of the worship of heaven, that the Church universal, saints and angels, will pay Divine honours to Him who appeared upon earth as the gentle Babe of Bethlehem (Rev 5:13). Thus speaks the High and Holy One who inhabiteth eternity (Isa 42:8). If Christ Jesus be not God, how can the Almighty Father contradict Himself, and say even to the bright intelligences that minister about His throne, Let all the angels of God worship Him? If Christ be not a proper object of Divine adoration, how is it that we hear the meek and lowly Son of Mary declare, without hesitation or reserve, that All men should honour the Son, even as they honour the Father? (Joh 5:23). If Christ Jesus be not one with the Father and the Blessed Spirit, in the glory of the Eternal Trinity, why did the disciples who met Him after the resurrection bow themselves down and worship Him? Mat 28:9; Luk 24:52).
II. The text suggests another point–THAT THE INCARNATION AFFORDS A SPECIAL CALL UPON ALL IN EARTH AND HEAVEN TO ASCRIBE UNTO HIM THE HONOUR WHICH IS DUE UNTO HIS NAME. During the reign of Theodosius the Great, in the fourth century, the Arians put forth their strongest efforts to undermine that all-important doctrine of the divinity of our blessed Lord. The interesting event of making his son Arcadius the sharer with him of his throne was happily overruled to his discovering the fearful error which was thus sapping the foundations of the faith. Among the bishops who came to congratulate Theodosius on the occasion was Amphilochus, Bishop of Iconium, a man most highly esteemed. Approaching the emperor, the bishop addressed him in fitting words, and was about to withdraw from the presence chamber, when the angry father exclaimed, Do you take no notice of my son? Have you not heard that I have made him a partner with me in the empire. The good old bishop gave no direct answer, but going up to Arcadius, a lad of sixteen, he laid his hands upon his head, saying, The Lord bless thee, my son! and once more turned to depart. Even this did not satisfy the emperor, who inquired, in a tone of surprise and displeasure, Is this all the respect you pay to a prince that I have made of equal dignity with myself? The bishop indignantly answered, Do you so highly resent my apparent neglect of your son, because I do not treat him with equal honour with yourself? What, then, must the eternal God think of you, who have allowed His co-equal and co-eternal Son to be degraded from His proper divinity in every part of your empire? Theodosius felt that the withering rebuke was well deserved, and he ceased from that moment to show the least indulgence to such as ventured to cast dishonour upon the Son of God. It is not only our duty, but our precious privilege, to worship our Divine Saviour. (L N. Norton, D. D.)
Worship due to Christ from all
If the angels worship Christ, shall not we men that be dust and ashes worship Him? If the lords of the privy council stand bare to the king, shall not we silly men of the country do it? The angels that dwell in the court of heaven with God worship Christ; and shall not we on earth do it? Let us worship Him, and Him alone; let us not worship our gold and silver as covetous men do, and come within compass of idolatry; let us not worship our pleasures as epicures do, but let us worship Christ as the angels do. We worship Christ with our lips, we have His name in our mouth, but we worship Him not with our hearts and lives. A great number of Christians are like the soldiers that set a crown of thorns on Christs head, put a reed instead of a sceptre into His hand, clothed Him with a purple garment, and in the end did nothing but mock Him. So we talk gloriously of Christ and of His kingdom; in words we profess Him to be our King; but we do not worship Him in truth and sincerity, and serve Him in holiness and righteousness as we ought to do. (W. Jones, D. D.)
Who maketh His angels spirits
Angelic life and its lessons
It is true there are many who deny the existence of any spiritual beings save God and man. The wide universe is to them a solitary land without inhabitants. There is but one oasis filled with living creatures. There is something pitiable in this impertinence. It is a drop of dew in the lonely cup of a gentian, which imagines itself to be all the water in the universe. It is the summer midge which has never left its forest pool, dreaming that it and its companions are the only living creatures in earth or air. There is no proof of the existence of other beings than ourselves, but there is also no proof of the contrary. Apart from revelation, we can think about the subject as we please. But it does seem incredible that we alone should represent in the universe the image of God; and if in one solitary star another race of beings dwell, if we concede the existence of a single spirit other than ourselves, we have allowed the principle; the angelic world of which the Bible speaks is possible to faith. Our life with nature has lost its beauty, its joy, its religion. It was different with the ancient Jew and with the apostles and their followers. They lived in a world peopled with spiritual beings. They believed in invisible assistants, who were doing Gods pleasure and sympathising with His children. The hosts of heaven moved in myriads in the sky. The messengers of God went to and fro working His righteous will. The sons of God shouted for joy when the creation leaped to light. In every work of nature, in the summer rain and the winter frost, in the lifting of the billow on the sea and the growth of the flower on the plain, there were holy ones concerned who sang the hymn of continued creation to the Eternal Love. The very winds themselves were angels, and the flaming fires ministers of God.
I. Take first, THE RELATION OF GOD TO ANGELIC LIFE.
1. The first thing we understand of the angels is that in distant eternities God created them. God gave of His own life to others, and filled His silence with living souls. Here we have the principle of the social life of God. He listened with pleasure to the song of joy which filled His universe, and received and gave back in ceaseless reciprocation the offered love of the spirits He had made. And in that thought all social life on earth should be hallowed by being made like to that of God; we should be as gods and angels one to another, interchanging ever love and service. Is that the ideal which in society you strive to reach? Again
2. The angelic creation reveals to us the very principle of Gods proper life. He would not have a life which began and ended in Himself. His life was life in others. In giving of His life He lived.
II. I pass on to THE RELATION OF THE ANGELIC LIFE OF GOD. It is described as a life of exalted praise. The angels are pictured as employed in ceaseless adoration. The nearer that you live to God here, the nearer you will approach the angelic life. Our state of imperfection is characterised by prayer, the state of perfection is characterised by praise; and it is curious to mark in the history of some of the noblest of Gods saints, how, as they drew near the close of life and entered more into communion with the heavenly existence, prayer seems to be replaced by a sacred awe, and a deeper knowledge of holiness breaks forth into continual praise. So far for angelic life in connection with God.
III. We pass on to consider, AS IT IS DESCRIBED IN THE BIBLE, ANGELIC LIFE IN CONNECTION WITH NATURE. The Hebrew religious feeling always retained some traces of its connection through Abraham with Chaldaea. The old pastoral faith which was born on the wide plains of the East, with a magnificent arch of sky above, in which the sun and moon and stars walked cloudless with what seemed the stately step of gods, was always breaking through the pure monotheism which God revealed to the patriarchs. And not only the ordering of the stars, but all manifestations of the forces of nature were, in the poetry of the Hebrews, directed by the angels. Certain masters in science will smile at all this, and ask if that be philosophy? And I answer, No, not philosophy, but something higher–poetry; and as such, not disclosing the relations of phenomena, but revealing, through symbolic phrase, a principle. It matters very little whether the angels be the directing powers of the elements and their combinations or not; but it does much matter to us as spiritual beings with what eyes we look upon the universe–as a living whole informed and supported by a living will, or as dead matter drifting on in obedience to dead laws. So do we grasp the truth of these old Hebrew sayings of the angels–that nature in essence, or rather, in that actual world of which it is the witness, is not inanimate, but living. Then the universe becomes clothed in a more glorious form. The dead heavy mass which did but block up space is vanished, and in its place there flows forward, with the music of eternal waters, a stream of life and power and action which issues from the source of all life–the living will of God. Then it happens that to us the whole course of nature, and each separate thing within it, give up to us the secrets they half conceal and half express They speak not to intellect only or to feeling only, but to the entirety of our being. All God s living spirits are doing within the sphere of His life a portion of this redeeming work. The angels do it perchance as He performs it, finding a perfect joy in sacrifice; we are doing it in agony, finding every sacrifice a pain, and yet learning through the very pain to realise the sacrifice as joy; giving up our life with strong crying and with tears, but strangely discovering that we have been led into life: till at last the secret smites upon our heart in an ineffable light which transfigures all our being, and looking up to where, upon the cross of Calvary, all humanity was sacrificed and all life given away in infinite love that the life of the world might be, we know at last in Him the mystery of the universe. We see the very Life itself in the love which, in giving His Son, gave Himself. (Stopford A. Brooke, M. A.)
Angels and their alliance with nature
His angels spirits; better, His angels winds. The quotation is from Psa 104:4, according to the Greek translation. Two things are expressed: first, the service of the angels; and second, their alliance in this service to the material elements; under Gods transforming hand they suffer a change into winds and a flame of fire. This idea is not to be pressed so far as to imply that the angelic essence undergoes a transformation into material substance, but only that the angels are clothed with this material form, and in their service assume this shape to men. Illustrations of the idea from the Rabbinical writers are not wanting. The angel said unto Manoah, I know not after what image I am made, for God changes us every hour; why, therefore, dost thou ask after my name? Sometimes He makes us fire, at other times wind; sometimes men, at other times again angels. God is named God of hosts because He does with His angels as He pleases; He makes them sometimes sitting (Jdg 6:11), sometimes standing (Isa 6:2), sometimes to resemble women (Zec 5:9), sometimes men (Gen 18:2), &c. When His angels are sent forth as messengers they are made winds Psa 104:4), when they minister before the throne of His glory they are flames of fire (cf. Exo 3:2)
. (A. B. Davidson, LL. D.)
A flame of fire
Angels likened to fire.
1. Fire is lightsome and strikes a terror into men, so do the angels when they appear.
2. Fire is of a subtle and piercing nature: so are the angels, they are quickly here and there.
3. Fire consumes and burns up; so do they the wicked, our enemies. This is the greatest honour of the angels to be Gods ministers and messengers; so must we count it the greatest dignity of all men on the face of the earth. Though thou beest a rich tradesman, a wealthy merchant, a gentlemen of great revenues, a knight, a lord, or a king; yet the most magnificent style thou canst have is this, to be Gods minister and servant, to be His messenger and to go on His errands. (W. Jones, D. D.)
Thy throne, O God, Is for ever and ever
Christs throne and sceptre
I. THE THRONE.
1. It is a mercy throne.
2. It is a rich throne.
3. It is a throne of plenty.
II. THE SCEPTRE.
1. Righteously acquired.
2. Christ makes war in righteousness.
3. Christ maintains the rights of heaven. (James Wells.)
Messianic regalia
I. THE. THRONE OF MESSIAH. The power of Christ is
1. Divine.
2. Supreme.
(1) Moral, not secular.
(2) Personal, not derived.
(3) Universal, not local.
3. Everlasting.
II. THE SCEPTRE OF MESSIAH. The righteousness of His
1. Character.
2. Gospel.
3. Reign.
III. THE CROWN OF MESSIAH. (W. L. Watkinson.)
Divinity of Christ
So thoroughly intermingled with the whole texture of New Testament Scripture is the Godhead of the Saviour, that no criticism which does not destroy the book can altogether extinguish its testimony. We have seen a copy of the Gospels and Epistles which was warranted free from all trace of the Trinity, but it was not the Testament of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. We beheld it, and we received instruction. It did not want beauty; for the Parables and the Sermon on the Mount, and many a touching passage, still were there. But neither would a garden want beauty if the grass plats and green bushes still remained, though you had carefully culled out every blossoming flower. The humanity of Jesus still is beautiful, even when the Godhead is forgotten or denied. Or rather it looked like a coronation tapestry, with all the golden threads torn out; or an exquisite mosaic from which some unscrupulous finger had abstracted the gems and only left the common stones: you not only missed the glory of the whole, but in the fractures of the piece and the coarse plaster with which the gaps were supplied, you saw how rude was the process by which its jewels had been wrenched away. It was a casket without the pearl. It was a shrine without the Shekinah. And yet, after all, it was not sufficiently expurgated; for, after reading it, the thought would recur–how much easier to fabricate a Gnostic Testament exempt from all trace of our Lords humanity, than a Unitarian Testament ignoring His divinity! (James Hamihon, D. D.)
Christ is God
Think of all that is represented by that great word God; who can fathom it? Nothing is easier than to say the word universe, and yet it would take us millions of millions of years to bestow one hasty glance upon the surface of that small portion of it which lies within the range of our glasses. But what are all suns, comets, earths, moons, atmospheres, seas, rivers, mountains, valleys, plains, woods, cattle, wild beasts, fish, fowl, grasses, plants, shrubs, minerals, and metals, compared with the meaning of the one name God! (C. Stanford, D. D.)
The dominion of Jesus Christ
I. The conferring and COMPARING OF SCRIPTURES IS AN EXCELLENT MEANS OF COMING TO AN ACQUAINTANCE WITH THE MIND AND WILL OF GOD IN THEM. Thus dealeth the apostle in this place; he compareth what is spoken of angels in one place, and what of the Son in another, and from thence manifesteth what is the mind of God concerning them.
II. IT IS THE DUTY OF ALL BELIEVERS TO REJOICE IN THE GLORY, HONOUR, AND DOMINION OF JESUS CHRIST.
1. Herein God is glorified. The kingdom of Christ is the glory of God; thereby is His name and praise exalted in the world; and therefore upon the erection and setting of it up are all His people so earnestly invited to rejoice and triumph therein (Psa 95:1-3; Psa 96:1-4; Psa 97:1; Psa 79:2).
2. Herein doth the honour and glory of Christ as Mediator consist, which is a matter of great rejoicing unto all that love Him in sincerity.
3. Our own concern, safety, present and future happiness, lie herein: our all depends upon the kingdom and throne of Christ. He is our King, if we are believers; our King to rule, protect, and save us; to uphold us against opposition, to supply us with strength, to guide us with counsel, to subdue our enemies, to give us our inheritance and reward, and therefore our principal interest lies in His throne, and in the glory and stability thereof. While He reigneth, we are safe, and in our way to glory.
4. The whole world, all the creation of God, are concerned in this kingdom of Christ. Except His enemies in hell, the whole creation is benefited by His dominion; for as some men are made partakers of saving grace thereby, so the residue of that race, by and with them, do receive unspeakable advantages in the forbearance of God; and the very creature itself is raised, as it were, into a hope thereby of deliverance from that state of vanity whereunto now it is subjected (Rom 8:20-21).
III. IT IS THE DIVINE NATURE OF THE LORD CHRIST THAT GIVES ETERNITY, STABILITY, AND UNCHANGEABLENESS TO HIS THRONE AND KINGDOM.
IV. ALL THE LAWS, AND THE WHOLE ADMINISTRATION OF THE KINGDOM OF CHRIST BY HIS WORD AND SPIRIT, ARE ALL EQUAL, RIGHTEOUS, AND HOLY. His sceptre is the sceptre of righteousness. The world indeed likes them not; all things in its rule seem to it weak and foolish (1Co 1:20-23), but they are otherwise, the Holy Ghost being Judge, and such they appear unto them that do believe; yea, whatever is requisite to make laws and administrations righteous, it cloth all concur in those of the Lord Jesus Christ.
1. Christ is vested with sufficient authority for the enacting of laws and rules of administration in His kingdom.
2. Christ is abundantly furnished with wisdom for this purpose. He is the foundation-stone of the Church, that hath seven eyes upon Him Zec 3:9). A perfection of wisdom and understanding in all affairs of it; being anointed with the Spirit unto that purpose (Isa 11:3-4). Yea, in Him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge Col 2:3), it having pleased the Father that in Him all fulness should dwell (Col 1:19), so that there can be no defect in His laws and administrations on this account.
3. They are righteous, because they are easy, gentle, and not burdensome.
(1) His commands are all of them reasonable, and suited unto the principles of that natural obedience we owe to God; and so not grievous unto anything in us, but that principle of sin and darkness which is to be destroyed.
(2) His commands are easy, because all of them are suited to that principle of the new nature, or Dew creature, which He worketh in the hearts of all His disciples.
(3) His commands are easy, because He continually gives out supplies of Life Spirit, to make His subjects to yield obedience to them.
(4) This rule and administration of Christs kingdom is righteous, because useful and profitable to His subjects. They make them holy, righteous, such as please God and are useful to mankind.
(5) Their end manifests them to be righteous. The worth and equity of laws are taken off when low and unworthy ends are proposed to induce men to observe them. But these of the Lord Christ direct unto the highest end, propose and promise the most glorious rewards.
V. (see Isa 11:1-7).
VI. GOD IS A GOD IN ESPECIAL COVENANT WITH THE LORD CHRIST, AS HE IS MEDIATOR, GOD THY GOD.
VII. THE COLLATION OF THE SPIRIT ON THE LORD CHRIST, AND HIS GLORIOUS EXALTATION, ARE THE PECULIAR WORKS OF GOD THE FATHER. God, Thy God, hath anointed Thee.
VIII. THE LORD JESUS CHRIST IS SINGULARLY IN THIS UNCTION. This is that which the apostle proves in sundry instances, and by comparing Him with others who in the most eminent manner were partakers of it.
IX. ALL THAT SERVE GOD IN THE WORK OF BUILDING THE CHURCH, ACCORDING TO HIS APPOINTMENT, ARE ANOINTED BY HIS SPIRIT, AND SHALL BE REWARDED BY HIS POWER (Dan 12:3).
X. THE DISCIPLES OF CHRIST, ESPECIALLY THOSE WHO SERVE HIM IN HIS CHURCH FAITHFULLY, ARE HIS COMPANIONS IN ALL HIS GRACE AND GLORY, (John Owen, D. D.)
Christs kingdom
Christ is an eternal King, so is no angel, therefore is to be honoured above them. Thus having made mention of His kingdom, then He describeth it more at large, that though we could imagine easily that angels in honour deserved the name of kings, yet such a kingdom no angel could ever have; an everlasting throne, a righteous sceptre, exalting troth, beating down iniquity: in worthiness whereof God hath anointed this king with gladness above all other, and hath called Him by the name of God Himself. In this Scripture there are four special things spoken. First, He is called God alone, and without additions, even as the prophet Isaiah Isa 9:7) also calleth Him the mighty God. By which warrant of the prophets being a most sure word, the apostles are bold to give to our Saviour Christ the name and power of the living God (Joh 1:2; Joh 1:20.; 1Jn 5:20; Rom 9:4; Col 2:6). The second thing here attributed to Christ is, that His kingdom is everlasting, So the prophet Isaiah had said (Isa 9:7). The same testimony the angel gave of Hiskingdom when he came to the Virgin Mary (Luk 1:33). And how can this be possibly applied unto Solomon so directly against the Scripture, that the sceptre should be taken once away, not only from the house of Solomon, but from all the tribe of Judah? And how could they not see with their eyes the ruin of that kingdom and the throne of Solomon quite forgotten. The third thing attributed here to Christ is, that the sceptre of righteousness is the sceptre of His kingdom, according as David saith Psa 97:2). And the meaning of these words is after expressly added
– Thou hast loved righteousness and hated iniquity. This is the sceptre ofrighteousness which He speaketh of, that is, that His government shall be without all respect of persons, a ministry of justice, and true judgment, even according to the will of God His Father, with whom there is no acceptation of the person of a man. And how can they attribute this to Solomon? They know how Solomon did fall away so far from righteousness, and hated iniquity so little ere he died, that he became a notable idolater. And how was his government in such justice when the whole people came after to Rehoboam his son, and said: Thy father did make our yoke grievous, now therefore make thou the grievous servitude of thy father lighter, and we will serve thee (1Ki 12:4). The fourth thing here spoken of our Saviour Christ is, that for this cause God hath anointed Him with the oil of gladness above His fellows. For this cause, saith the Scripture, because Thou lovedst so much justice, what mean they still to think here upon Solomon, and of such reward of his righteous rule, except they would have the Scriptures false that bear witness of Him. He had turned has the prophet saith judgment into wormwood. And how standeth it that he was anointed with the oil of gladness? that is, with gifts of the Holy Ghost above his fellows, when many kings of Judah have greater praise of God than he? and: scarce any did fall from God so grievously as he. Now one refuge behind, which they think they have, is nothing at all. They will say that all this was spoken in respect of his beginning, in which he was famous, with this oil of gladness above his fellows, and above all the world. True it is in respect of his government at the first; but are not the words plain that they are not meant of any that should begin well and then fall back? For saith not the text, that this sceptre of justice shall be in His kingdom for ever? know, where Christ is set out thus a King for ever, we are taught not by days and times to measure His commandments, but to hold them without change as the government for ever of His eternal kingdom, for it is too gross folly for us to say He is still our King if we dare abrogate His laws, for He is our Ruler for ever, and yet without Him we will make laws continually? Was it ever heard among earthly kings that subjects could either repeal or change their princes laws? or make laws without them in their own kingdom? or can there be greater treason than to conspire for such a lewd liberty? And now to the end we may the more willingly do this, both we and our kings whom God hath set over us, let us mark this further which the apostle addeth of our Saviour Christ, that His sceptre is a sceptre of righteousness; meaning (as I said) that His government is all in truth and righteousness. And here let us also mark how the apostle setteth out this righteousness of Christ. Thou hast [saith he] loved transgression and sin So the prophet David saith: I hate vain inventions, but Thy law I love. And again, Thy law I love, but I hate falsehood and abhor it (Psa 119:113; Psa 119:163). Even so must we hate iniquity if we love righteousness, and abhor falsehood if we love the truth. And this is that eternal law which God gave from the beginning. I will, saith He, set enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed. It followeth in the end of this seventh verse, Thy God hath anointed Thee with the oil of gladness above Thy fellows. In this we may learn another notable cause why we should acknowledge Christ our only King and Lawgiver. Because He is thus anointed, that is, in Him dwelleth all fulness of grace, and the treasures of all wisdom and knowledge are hid in Him; so that leave Him, leave His laws, leave His sceptre, we leave instruction, we leave righteousness, we leave eternal life. And here note that the oil of gladness is the gift of the Spirit of God; gladness to ourselves, because it filleth us with joy in the Lord, and gladness to others because it poureth grace into our lips, to comfort the weak-hearted, and to make us a sweet savour of life unto life, to all that hearken unto us. (E. Deering, B. D.)
The Messiahs throne
I. A THRONE suggests many a sad and yet many a brilliant contrast. When one thinks of thrones, one cannot but compare how frail have been the noblest thrones that emperors and kings have sat on, but how enduring that throne on which the Lamb is enthroned for ever and ever. Alexanders throne is a mere word in history; the throne of Caesar has passed into the hands of a miserable superstitious priest. Thrones that once awed the world by their majesty, and from which voices came that shook the nations, are relics stored in museums, or studied by inquisitive antiquaries. The occupant of this throne, we read in this passage, is God. If Deity were not the occupant, if Omnipotence were not its foundation, the past history of this throne would be a prophecy of its everlasting duration. Sin rushed against it at the Fall; Satan predicted its overthrow; one would have thought it could scarcely withstand the force of an element that had thrust itself into the world in spite apparently of God. Infidelity has ass ,fled it with all its might. He must reign, it is truly said, till he has made all His enemies His footstool.
II. But, in the second place, let me notice a great element in this throne–ITS RIGHTEOUSNESS. A sceptre of righteousness. We are told in Scripture that all the laws that come from it are righteous laws; that its mercy is righteous, that its blessings are righteous, that its whole economy is righteous. And all thrones on earth partake of the strength of this just in the ratio in which they reflect its glorious character. What a great truth, that just in proportion as true religion saturates the masses of Great Britain, in the same proportion does it become strong, united, lasting! Let us now see where and over whom Christ reigns.
1. He reigns in the world; His throne is in the midst of the nations. Over the world He does not yet reign, for it is not yet universally reclaimed. In the world He does reign, or the world would go absolutely to ruin. Things that are wrong He restrains; things that He permits He overrule to His own glory. Depend upon it, Christ is in history; Christ is in its every chaplet, His presence in its every winding, His power giving direction to its every movement; and the explanation of all that is inexplicable now, He tells us that we shall know hereafter.
2. But Christs throne, or His reigning or governing presence, is not only in the world, it is also in the Church. What is good in it He inspires; what is evil in it He overrules. Again, every open door for the spread of the gospel in the visible Church results from the influence of the throne. The free course that is given to the Scripture is also the creation of Him who watches over the destinies of His own, and provides for the spread of the everlasting gospel. Because Christs throne is in that Church, we expect the increase of tidal Church. The darkness that now broods over the magnificent lands of the East shall one day be dissipated, and the rays of a rising sun of Righteousness shall be reflected from mosque and minaret, over the length and breadth of Eastern Christendom. The deadly superstition that now broods over the Western nations of the earth is soon to be scattered.
3. Let me ask now, in conclusion, is this throne, so precious in the world and in the Church–that makes us see all things adverse or friendly, co-operating or contributing only to its greater grandeur and magnificent.
in your hearts? Is Christ , our Prophet that teaches you, your Priest that pleads for you, your King that rules over you? Do you see Him in all that betides you as individuals, present in the tiniest rivalet of private life as truly as in the great cataracts of national history; in the individual
Christians heart a presence as precious as in the government of the world; in the development of the Church, in the spread of His kingdom and the glory among all nations? Do you find your afflictions sanctified to you? do you feel your losses and your crosses weaning you from earth and winning you to God? (J. Cumming, D. D.)
Hath anointed Thee with the oil of gladness
Christs holiness and unction
Jesus as mediator is advanced by God, not only above all men, but also above all angels. In handling of this point–I shall speak of the holiness of Christ; His unction, which is the consequent and fruit of it.
I. THE HOLINESS OF CHRIST, BOTH AS TO HIS PERSON AND OFFICE.
1. AS to His person. There we must consider the original holiness of His natures, Divine and human. Divine; He is called A just God and a Saviour (Isa 45:21). Human; He was wholly free from that original contagion wherewith others that come of Adam are defiled (Luk 1:35). Now add to this His perfect actual obedience to God both in heart and life, and this either to the common law of duty that lieth upon all mankind, for it became Him to fulfil all righteousness (Mat 3:15), or that particular law of mediation which was proper to Himself Heb 5:8), Though He were a Son, yet He learned obedience by the things He suffered; by which He answered the end of the law which we have broken, and was also the meritorious cause of the covenant of grace, by which all blessings are conveyed to us (2Co 5:21). Well, then, His personal holiness did make Him acceptable to God, and should make Him amiable to us.
2. Now let us see how He showeth this love to holiness and hatred to iniquity in His office as well as in His person. The general term whereby this office is expressed is mediator. The three particular functions are those of prophet, priest, and king.
(1) As to the general term mediator, whose work it is to make peace between God and man, all that He did therein was out of His love to righteousness and hatred of iniquity. So much we are told (Dan 9:24). Now, because His heart was so much set upon this, God anointed Him with the oil of gladness above His fellows.
(2) Come we to those three particular functions wherein this office is exercised, those of prophet, priest, and king.
(a) As a Prophet, by His doctrine He showeth that He loveth righteousness and hateth iniquity, for the whole frame of it diseovereth and breatheth out nothing else but a hatred against sin and a love to holiness (Joh 17:17; Psa 119:140). All the histories, mysteries, precepts, promises, threatenings, aim at this one business, that ,in may be subdued in us, and brought into disrepute in the world.
(b) His priestly office consists in His oblation and intercession, as the High Priest under the law did both offer sacrifice and intercede for the people. Now what was the intent of Christs sacrifice but to put away sin? Heb 9:26).
(3) The next thing is a King. He is one whose heart was so set upon the love of righteousness, and the hatred of all iniquity, that He would come ,s a prophet Himself to teach the lost world how to become holy again. And as a priest to die for the guilty world to reconcile them to God. Surely He was fit also to rule the world. There are two parts of government–laws and actual administration. His laws are all good and equal, the same with His doctrine. As He giveth notice of these things as a Prophet, so He giveth charge about them as a King. Now in the righteous ordering the affairs of His kingdom He showeth Himself to be one that loveth righteousness and hateth iniquity. As the laws are good and equal, so the administration is right and just. Well, then, we must neither rebel against His government nor distrust His defence; for Christ administereth justice in His kingdom, defending the good, and destroying the wicked, and He will in time earnestly espouse the cause of all holiness and righteousness.
II. THE UNCTION OF CHRIST, which is the consequent fruit of the former.
1. The author of this unction–God, even Thy God. Is this spoken to Him as God or man? It may be true in both senses. But especially is this spoken of Him as Mediator, so Christ is one of Gods confederates. The redemption of sinners is not a work of yesterday nor a business of chance, but well advised, and in infinite wisdom contrived. There was a preparatory agreement to that great work before it was gone about, and therefore it should not be slighted by us, nor lightly passed over.
2. The privilege itself; to be anointed with the of gladness. It noteth His solemn exaltation and admission to the exercise of His office. By oil all agree is meant the Spirit, by which Christ was anointed. The Spirit of the Lord is upon Me because He hath anointed Me (Luk 4:18).
(1) Christ was anointed at His conception in His mothers womb, when He was sanctified by the Holy Spirit.
(2) Again, Christ may be said to be anointed at His baptism, which was the visible consecration to His office, when the Holy Ghost descended upon Him in the form of a dove (Mat 3:16-17, Joh 1:33).
(3) He may be said to be anointed at His ascension, when he received of the Father the promise of the Spirit to pour Him forth upon His disciples Act 2:33). This I take to be the sense here, His glorious exaltation at the right hand of God, where, being possessed of all power, He joyfully expecteth and accomplisheth the fruits of His redemption. I am the more confirmed in this
(a) Because the exaltation of Christ, is as it were His welcome to heaven after all the sorrows of His humiliation.
(b) The term, the oil of gladness, implieth it; for that was the entertainment of honourable guests invited to a feast.
3. The persons anointed.
(1) One singular in this unction, the Lord Jesus Christ. There are two sorts of privileges
(a) Some things only given to Christ, not to us; as the name above all names to be adored (Php 2:9); to be the Head of the renewed Eph 1:21), the Saviour of the body (Eph 5:23); to have power to dispense the Spirit, to administer providences, etc. All this is proper to Christ; neither men nor angels share with Him in these honours.
(b) There are other things given to Christ and His people; as the sanctifying and comforting Spirit, the heavenly inheritance, victory over our spiritual enemies, the devil, the world, and the flesh; these are given to us and Him; only God doth grace His Son above His fellows. That He might be the firstborn among many brethren (Rom 8:29).
(2) Others are admitted to be partakers of this grace in a lower degree, called His fellows. They are also dignified and graced by God above the rest of the world, but not as Christ was. Two things I will observe here
(a) They must be His consorts and fellows. Sometimes they are called His brethren (Heb 2:11); sometimes members of His mystical body) Eph 1:22-23), sometimes joint-heirs with Christ (Rom 8:17); meaning thereby all believers, who are companions with Him both in grace and glory.
(b) That all these may have somewhat of this unction according to their measure and part which they sustain in the body (1Jn 2:20).
I shall exhort you to two things.
1. To holiness. If there were no more than that it is pleasing to Christ, and visibly exemplified in His own person, this should induce us. It was love to holiness and hatred of sin that brought Him out of heaven, and put Him on the work of our redemption. Nothing doth more urge us to do a thing than love, or to forbear it than hatred. These were Christs motives to undertake the redemption of sinners. Now we should love what He loveth, and hate what He hateth.
2. To look after more of this unction. He is Christ the anointed of God; we must be Christians. The disciples were called Christians first at Antioch Act 11:26); anointed with the Holy Ghost and with power, that we may understand the mind of God, consecrate ourselves to Him, work His work, and engage in His warfare, fighting against the devil, the world, and the flesh, till we triumph with Christ in heaven. All must be anointed.
(1) This is the fruit of Christs exaltation, to send and shed abroad the Spirit.
(2) Consider the necessity of this grace. Our love to righteousness and hatred of iniquity is the fruit of this unction, for affections follow the nature.
(3) Consider the utility and profit. It is for our comfort. The Spirit is called the oil of gladness, because the benefits whereof we are partakers are matters of great joy (Act 13:52). (T. Manton, D. D.)
Christs superiority to all created beings
I. THE CHARACTER OF CHRIST.
1. He loved righteousness. He loved it so as to be a perfect model of all righteousness.
2. But not only did Christ love righteousness, He hated iniquity. A man may admire excellency of character, and yet not follow in the steps in which it walks; he has not the moral courage to forsake his evil courses; and there is in the very best of men at seasons not that perfect hatred of sin which is proper. Not so our Emmanuel. He hated iniquity with as much force as He loved righteousness; not only sometimes, but always.
II. CHRISTS CONSEQUENT EXALTATION.
1. The apostle wishes to show the Hebrews the fact of Christs unequalled superiority to every created being in the universe. He therefore commences by showing Christs superiority to men, to the greatest of men that have ever lived–such as the patriarchs and prophets of the Old Testament dispensation. They were indeed vastly superior to the men of the age in which they lived -superior in point of gifts and endowments from heaven, superior in respect of the close intercourse they held with God. But they were infinitely inferior to the Son, as Christ is here called by way of pre-eminence, by whom God has spoken to us in these latter days.
2. But not only does Paul her prove Christs superiority to men, he proves the superiority of Christ to angels also. What does the term angel mean? It signifies messenger. The Son is greater than a messenger.
III. CHRISTS RELATIONSHIP TO US. We are Christs fellows. This singular expression is supposed by some to refer to the angels; but at once that supposition is rebutted by the fact that Christ took not on Him the nature of angels; He assumed the nature of man, and assuming the same torture seems to be the meaning of the expression. Man has a fellowship of nature with Christ; all men have this fellowship; but the redeemed–namely, all those that are sanctified by Christs Spirit–are Christs fellows in the highest and closest sense. (R. Jones, B. A.)
Oil of gladness
This Hebraism here intendeth two things
1. The excellency of this gladness. No external joy is to be compared to it.
2. The quantity of that joy. It far surpasseth all the joy that ever was or can be, which is manifested in this phrase following–above Thy fellows. This epithet gladness is attributed to this oil in relation to Christ the head, and to all believers His members. It hath relation to Christ in two respects.
(1) As it quickened Him up and made Him joyful in all His undertakings for our redemption, Christ, being by His Father deputed to His function, most willingly and joyfully undertook and managed it. As a bridegroom coming out of his chamber, He rejoiced as a strong man to run His race Psa 19:5). When He cometh into the world, He saith, I delight to do Thy will, O My God (Psa 40:8). When He was in the world, He said, My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me, and to finish His Joh 4:34).
(2) Gladness hath relation to Christ by reason of the fruit that sprouted out from thence. His coming into the world, and doing and enduring what He did, was matter of rejoicing to others, in which respect the prophet exhorteth the daughter of Zion to shout, and to be glad and rejoice with all the heart (Zep 3:14; Zec 9:9). And the angels that brought the first news of Christs birth do thus proclaim it: Behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people (Luk 2:10).
This epithet gladness hath relation to the members of Christ in two respects.
(1) As the things whereof in Christ they are made partakers are matters of great joy; for so many and so great are the benefits which believers receive from Christ by virtue of that anointing, as they very much rejoice their hearts. Many of these benefits are expressly set down (Isa 61:1-3). Other benefits are in other places distinctly noted–as redemption from sin, reconciliation with God, justification in His sight, adoption, regeneration, sanctification, and the end of all, eternal salvation. If any things in the world cause true joy and gladness, surely these effects which flow from the anointing of Christ will do it.
(2) As the members of Christ are quickened up by that Spirit which cometh from Him, do and endure readily, willingly, cheerfully, joyfully what the Lord calls them unto (Psa 122:1; 1Ch 29:9; 1Ch 29:17). It is said of those on whom the Spirit rested, that they received the Word gladly, and mutually communicated together with gladness. On a like ground the eunuch whom Philip baptized, and Pauls jailor, are said to rejoice (Act 8:39; Act 16:34). This fruit of joy gives evidence of a believers union with Christ, and of the abode of Christs Spirit in him; for the Spirit is as oil, of a diffusing nature. Hereby we may gain assurance to our own souls, and give evidence to others of the Spirit that is in us. So did the Jews of old (1Ch 29:9), and Christs disciples (Luk 10:17), and Christians in the primitive Church (Heb 10:34; Php 2:17-18). (W. Gouge.)
The gladsomeness of Jesus
If a lighted candle be brought into a room, we know that light streams from it. Lilies bring perfume, and spices exhale odours, from their very nature. The whole character of Jesus, when closely examined, is one that must have filled any dwelling where He came with gladness and comfort. (H. W. Beecher.)
Righteousness and gladness
Happiness is the light which flashes from the glittering armour of righteousness. If holiness be the priest, let happiness be the ephod of blue, and scarlet, and fine-twined linen, hung with bells and pomegranates, which be wears for glory and for beauty. (C. H. Spurgeon.)
Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation
Christian cosmogony
I. THE UNIVERSE HAD AN ORIGIN, AND IS DESTINED TO HAVE A DISSOLUTION.
II. BOTH THE ORIGINATION AND THE DISSOLUTION OF THE UNIVERSE ARE ATTRIBUTABLE TO CHRIST. This fact serves
1. As an argument for His Godhood.
2. To present nature in new aspects of attraction.
III. CHRIST REMAINS UNALTERABLE, FROM THE ORIGIN, THROUGH ALL THE DISSOLUTIONS, OF THE UNIVERSE. No change in His
1. Being.
2. Thoughts.
3. Heart. (Homilist)
Messiah and Nature
I. CHRIST BEFORE THE CREATION.
1. The material universe is not eternal.
2. The universe was created.
3. The universe had many beginnings. Earth, sun, stars, &c. Christ was before all beginnings.
II. CHRIST AT THE CREATION. He was the Creator, from the lowest to the highest; from the least to the greatest; from the first to the last. The Redeemer was the Creator; therefore
1. There are no contradictions between Nature and Christianity.
2. There are striking correspondences between Nature and
Christianity.
III. CHRIST WITHIN THE CREATION. The stars are the jewels on His brow; the sky His flowing train; the flowering landscapes, the shining seas, the gorgeous clouds–the fine needlework and wrought gold of His imperial raiment.
IV. CHRIST AFTER THE CREATION. The raiment waxes old, and is folded up, giving place to robes more glorious still; but He who is the fulness of the Godhead bodily is the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever. Lessons:
1. Remember that in the gospel we come nearer to Christ than we do in nature.
2. Let us build on Christ. (W. L. Watkinson.)
Jesus Christ the cause and the consummator of all things
I. THE SUBSTANCE OF THE ASCRIPTION. We are transported to a distant period, ere time had, in its strictest sense, begun, or the mechanism of its notations had received shape or being. The revolutions of this firmament had not commenced, nor was there a sign for seasons, Nothing is necessary but God. All else is but an effect of His pleasure and power. He composed matter, He gave life, He communicated spirit. Some of the stages in this formative process may be traced. He laid the foundations of the earth, a figure which signifies His stability. That stability rests on certain laws which He has ordained. The heavens are the works of His hands. He garnished them with all their exquisite furniture, drew their orbits, studded their stars. His fingers wove that splendid web. And when we consider His heavens, with what admiration are we overwhelmed! Magnitudes, distances, systems, parallelisms, still rise upon us. Did He lay the foundations of the earth? He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. But this ascription not only predicates His creative greatness, and how He produced the entire universe–it proclaims that all these effects are now at His disposal and under Hiscontrol.
1. Observe His independence of them. They are not built for eternity. They shall perish. Their perdition and change shake not His throne nor obscure His glory.
2. Mark His identity among them. They are the subjects of incessant revolution and variation. There is a constant disturbance in the natural system; things take new forms and circumstances; and though principles are unaltered, the dispositions under them are often the most strange and unexpected. The very elements around us wax old as doth a garment. Only Deity can say, I charge not. This is the true God, and eternal life–essential and exhaustless, the same yesterday, to-day, and for ever!
3. Trace His power over them. Nothing, once dependent and derived, can exist in defiance of His will. And what is there, or can there be, which this category does not include? Thus is the Lord Jesus exhibited to us! He lays the foundations of the earth; the heavens are the works of His hands: amidst their change and portended ruin He remains–He is the same; with Him awaits the dissolution of all things. He must be greater than those operations which He commands. Be must be apprised of the final causes of those operations which proceed from His unaided skill, and the more so, as, otherwise, he might close the great consummation with their imperfect fulfilment. Who, then, is this? God over all.
II. THE VALUE OF THE ARGUMENT. We must, at this point of the projected proof, look into our mind. There we behold a law, or a certainty of mental condition, which conducts us back from any result to a causative power.
1. Every effect of Divine power must be inferior to that power–that is, must be finite. It can create no rival being.
2. Upon the creative claim God has always been pleased to found Ills challenge of supremacy and exaction of worship. Then, whoever is Jesus
Christ, since the heavens are works of His hands, He is supreme, is entitled to worship, is authorised to require our service, is gloriously independent, and will pronounce the sentence of our endless destiny!
3. The works of creation are designed to be monumental of their immediate Author. When we investigate them, they speak a splendid panegyric to His fame. The heavens declare the glory of God, the firmament showeth His handywork. They are the signals of His might, and skill, and love.
III. THE ENFORCEMENT OF THE CONCLUSION. The truth of the theme being once allowed, its influence will be instantaneous. Not for a moment can it remain an indifferent sentiment. Let it be believed, and all the doctrines of the gospel follow in a necessary order, as very corollaries.
1. It is supposed by the Incarnation; but what illustrations does that marvel derive from the descriptions of the text! He laid the foundations of the earth, where He hath not a place to lay His head. The heavens are the works of His hands, though they beat on Him with their tempests and chill Him with their dews; though their stars hold watch over Him when His soul is sorrowful unto death. He formed the instruments of all the suffering He endured. He caused the thorns to grow which were knotted round His brow; He prepared the worm that spun the flaunting attire which mocked His person; He sent down into the ground the fibres of the tree which gave the wood that was fashioned for His cross; He veined the mine whose ore was converted into nail and spear-head to transfix His flesh; He withdrew the restraints from our fallen nature, and let loose all its enmities on Himself!
2. The character of that expiation, which is the first quality and intention of His death, will be greatly determined by a representation such as this. The merit of an atoning act will altogether depend on the disposition and worthiness of the party who presents it. Nor can the mediation of every party be allowed. High attributes of worthiness must inhere in him who takes up the quarrel and offers the vindication of it. Who shall interpose between God and man, between the dishonoured law and the offender? That Surety must have a perfect knowledge of the tremendous dilemma. And did not He, who laid the foundations of the earth, understand the moral order which He then established, the holy law which He gave, the system of good which He instituted? Who could be equally cognisant of its excellence? Who could be equally intent upon its restoration?
3. He who has done all this achievement of power and goodness in creating the universe, designed our redemption to be the great object and glory of it. Shall a sphere, in those heavens which are the works of His hands, refuse its music to the Saviour, or withhold to swell the triumph of His salvation over the earth whose foundations He has laid? Again–and far sweeter and more majestic than that natal peal which floated above our new created world- let the morning stars sing together, and the sons of God shout for joy!
4. This Creator-Saviour must have the direction of all mundane affairs. He knoweth the way that we take. He telleth our wanderings. He seeth of what we have need. He is touched with the feeling of our infirmities. He is able to succour us when we are tempted. Neither in life nor death can we stray out of His dominion or beyond His care. To the verge of that earth whose foundations he has laid; to the bond of those heavens which are the works of His hands–how safe are His disciples! This is your triple security, ye who put your trust in this great God your Saviour! All things are for your sakes! All things work together for your good t
5. An immutability most tender and amiable is opposed by this subject to all our fluctuating circumstances. Who has never found occasion of complaint against human fickleness? Who has never known a mortifying coldness where his heart had lavished all its store of love? Oh, then, to take these words with us, and looking up to Him who loves unto the end, what a relief our wrung soul finds as it cries, Thou art the same! Bereavement is one of the heaviest portions of our lot. What sepulchres lie along our path! Oh, then, to speak this assurance, and in it to feel that nothing is lost while this is left, Thou remainest! Age brings with it decay and infirmity, misgiving and irresoluteness, slight and inattention, physical depressions and mournful reviews. Sense has failed in its varied gratifications, and the heart is smitten with a desolateness. Oh, then, to turn from all beside, to clasp our feeble hands, to raise our dimming eyes, and with our tremulous accents to exclaim, Thy years shall not fail! How sweet are these supports! What a Saviour is ours! (R. W. Hamilton, D. D.)
Christs glory in creation
Where it is said further, God laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the works of His hands. We must consider the creation of the world is thus attributed to God, not only because all things were made by Him, but because He hath so made them that they carry a mark imprinted in them of the power and Godhead of the Creator. When I see the heavens I must see His greatness, who was able to set such a covering over the earth. When I behold the earth, I must behold His providence, who hath ordained such a place of nourishment for all creatures. When I look upon the unchangeable course in which all things are established, I must look upon His constant wisdom and goodness, who in a steadfast purpose hath extended His mercies over all His works. In the least of all the creatures of God, when I see wisdom, power, glory, more than all the world can reach their hands unto, let me humble myself under His high majesty, before whom no king, no prince, no power of the world hath any account; but all nations before Him are as nothing, and they are accounted unto Him less than nothing, and lighter than vanity itself. Another thing here we have to consider, that the apostle teacheth the excellency of Christ in respect of His continuance, before whom the heaven and earth are but a moment; for so in this comparison he speaketh of their age as a thing of nothing–They shall perish, they shall wax old as a garment, they shall be folded up as a vesture–making all the continuance of the heaven to be vanity, and of none account; for although it may seem he might have made his comparison with things of a more expressed show of vanity than a garment, as to have compared them with smoke, with the shadow of smoke, with the dream of a shadow, or such like; yet in comparing the time of the heavens, which are so many ages, with a garment which is scarce a year, it is as clear a testimony all is nothing as if all were not a minute of an hour. Besides this, the cause of this comparison with a garment was the similitude in which God hath set the heavens, who hath spread them like a curtain, and made them as a covering to all His creatures; it was not to make the comparison less in show of their vanity. Then here let us be wise-hearted as the prophet was, as oft as our hope is before our eyes, to see our Saviour Christ living for ever: let us not only confess that our own age is nothing in respect of Him, but let us boldly continue even the continuance of the heavens, and account all things nothing that hath an end; for let the days be never so many, which you can call into account, and multiply years into the longest continuance which your thoughts can comprehend, that thousand thousands be before you, and ten thousand thousands are in your mind, with one word you shall confute them all, and with the breath of your mouth you may blow them away, and, as the prophet saith, make them all as a garment that is rent and worn; for reckon up all thy thousands that thou canst, and put this word past unto them, and where are they now become? A thousand thousand thousand years past, what are they? And if time be such a tyrant to break the delight of the long age of the very heavens, that the wise heart of a man doth say even they are vanity, and wax old as doth a garment, what foolishness hath wrapped up all our understanding? and what blindness is in our hearts, that we see not our own life what it is? And shall yet this life, so short, so troublesome, so without pleasure, so fast hold us bound with blind desire, that we neither long for nor look after Jesus Christ, who liveth ever, and hast cast forth of His presence all sin, and sorrow, and death itself? (E. Deering, B. D.)
They shall perish; but Thou remainest
The world as a garment
As Christ had no beginning, so He shall have no ending. The heavens shall decay, but not He. He is immutable. They are young and old; so is not Christ: He remains always in the same estate and condition. All garments in the world in the end wax old (Deu 29:5). So the whole fabric of the world: there is not that clearness of light in the sun and moon that there was, not that force and strength in the stars, the earth is not so lusty and lively. Old things are not wont to be had in any price or estimation: who cares for an old pair of shoes that be not worth the taking up? Who regards an old coat that hath no strength in it, but is ready to be torn in pieces? Who will give much for an old house, the timber whereof is rotten, and it is ready to fall on his head? Now is the last age of the world, it hath continued many thousand years, it is now as an old house, an old garment that cannot last long: therefore let us not be too much in love with it. There was some reason why in former times, when this building was new and strong, when the coat and garment of the world was fresh, fair, and of good durance, that men should set their affections on it: but now when the beauty and strength of it is gone, why should we be enamoured with it? Let us use it as if we used it not, and let us long for that day when both the heavens and the earth and we ourselves likewise shall be changed and be translated with Christ into the kingdom of glory: the heavens are most fitly resembled to a garment. Observe the similitude and dissimilitude.
1. A garment covers a man: so do the heavens.
2. The substance of a garment must be before, as silk, velvet, cloth, else you can make no garment: but Christ made the heavens of nothing.
3. A garment must have a form or fashion: so has this an excellent one.
4. A garment stands in need of mending: we need be at no cost nor labour in mending of this garment; but Christ by the power of His providence upholds it. (W. Jones, D. D.)
Christ the Creator
We live in a world of change. The earth is not the same to-day as it was ages ago, and shall be ages on. The sun is radiating off its heat. The moon, no longer as of yore, burns and glows, and is but an immense opaque cinder, reflecting the sunlight from its disc. Stars have burnt out, and will. The universe is waxing old, as garments which from perpetual use become threadbare. But the dilapidation of the garment is no proof of the waning strength or slackening energy of the wearer. Nay, when garments wear out quickest, it is generally the time of robustest youth or mankind. You wrap up and lay aside your clothes when they have served their purpose, but you are the same in the new suit as in the old. Creation is the vesture of Christ. He wraps Himself about in its ample folds. Its decay affects Him not. And, when He shall bare laid it all aside, and replaced it by the new heavens and the new earth, He will be the same for evermore. With what new interest may we not now turn to the archaic record, which tells how God created the heavens and the earth. Those sublime syllables, Light be, were spoken by the voice that trembled in dying anguish on the cross. Rolling rivers, swelling seas, waving woods, bursting flowers, carolling birds, innumerable beasts, stars sparkling like diamonds on the pavilion of night, all newly made; all throbbing with Gods own life; and all very good; but, mainly and gloriously all the work of those hands which were nailed helplessly to the cross, which itself, as well as the iron that pierced Him, was the result of His creative will. (F. B.Meyer, B. A.)
God ever the same
On every Mohammedan tombstone the inscription begins with the words, He remains. This applies to God, and gives sweet comfort to the bereaved. Friends may die, fortune fly away, but God endures–He remains. (Perrine.)
Christ is everlasting and unchangeable
We may learn the dignity of our Lord from all the intermediate changes of the world between its creation and destruction.
1. First, then, we may observe that our Lord is everlasting. They all shall wax old as doth a garment, but Thy years shall not fail. What garments are to a man, the universe, with all its most glorious objects and element;, is to the Lord. These His glorious garments, then, in time shall wax old; but He who hath life in Himself, even as His Father hath life in Himself, shall continue still glorious as He was in His own glory, before He formed them and put them on.
2. And He is not only everlasting, but unchangeable. As a vesture shalt Thou fold them up, and they shall be changed; but Thou art the same. He may indeed lay aside His vesture. But as a sovereign, when after the pomp of a public ceremonial he unrobes, when his crown and sceptre are deposited in their caskets, and his garments of state are folded and put away, is a sovereign still, so our Lord, when He puts off the earth and heavens like a vesture, shall be still the same. There are differences of administrations, but the same Lord. Thou art the same: or, if we closely follow the original, Thou art He–He, the ancient of days, who speaks also by the mouth of Isaiah, even to your old age, I am He yea, before the day was, I am He The world passeth away, and the lust thereof. Times hurrying tide bears swift along our hopes, our joys, our vanities; ourselves, prone and struggling upon its waters. As we drive down upon the face of that gloomy stream, all our efforts seem vain, nothing is firm around, on whatever we lay hold, the same current is carrying it away, by which we ourselves are hurried on; till imminent danger forces from our souls the drowning cry, Save, Lord, we perish. The Lord extends His hand, and sets our feet upon a rock. He is Himself that Rock. He makes us, perishable creatures as we are, partakers of His stability, The various objects are carried rapidly by us, bat we are now upon solid ground. The world passeth away, and the lust thereof; but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever. (T. Bogs.)
Destructive agencies at work in the world
Even now agencies are at work in Gods material works tending towards the dissolution of certain of them. Water, frost, and fire are all eating away portions of the world. But to these will be added, at the last, some swift and sudden convulsion, telling that her end is nigh at hand. Probably no particle of matter will ever be annihilated; and out of the ruins of the world it seems, from 2Pe 3:13, as if new heavens and a new earth were to emerge. But still, the present world is to be utterly destroyed. The green earth and the azure heavens are to pass away. Both shall be consumed, and hurried into wreck and ruin, by the devastating fire that shall usher in the great day of the Lord. But even at this stage of the passage there is a direct testimony to the surpassing power and majesty of Christ. Thou, it is said of the Son–Thou shall fold them up. Christ, who, in the beginning, was theMaker, will, in the end, be the Destroyer, of the world. (A. S. Patterson.)
The solar system perishing
Change is necessarily going on in earth, sun, moon, and stars. It cannot possibly be avoided where there is motion. Day by day the alteration progresses. Millennium after millennium it advances. The earth is not now what it was millenniums ago. It will not be to-morrow what it was yesterday, or what it is to-day. The sun is radiating itself off, and must by-and-by cease to burn. It is simply, says Sir William Thomson, an incandescent mass cooling. Stars have already burnt out, or will. The moon no longer, as of yore, burns and glows. It is now an immense opaque cinder, only reflecting the sunlight that is thrown from afar upon its disc. (J. Morison, D. D.)
Thou art the same
The immutabulity of Christ
I. WHAT CHRIST IS IN HIMSELF.
1. As to His person, He is the eternal Son of God, who existed from everlasting (Joh 1:1).
2. As to His office. He is Mediator between God and man, fitted for it by assuming our nature into a personal union with the Divine, that as God and man in one person He might transact with both.
II. WHAT BELIEVERS HAVE FOUND HIM TO BE UNTO THEM.
1. It was Christ who awakened them to a sense of their lost, miserable state Eph 2:1).
2. Who received them upon their applying to Him for mercy and salvation, and believing on Him, He pardoned all their sins (Col 1:14).
3. Who adopted them into His family and gave them the earnest of their inheritance (Rom 8:15-16).
4. Thus passing into the number of His children, He continues to bless them, by subduing their corruptions, &c.
5. At death He receives their departing spirits.
III. AS TO ALL THIS THE TEXT IS APPLICABLE TO CHRIST. Thou art the same, &c.
1. He is the same in Himself, as to His person and offices.
2. As to His interest in His Father, and acceptance with Him: the Beloved, in whom He is always well pleased (Mat 3:17).
3. And with regard to us, the same as to His ability and willingness to save Heb 7:25).
4. The merit of His death is the same it ever was (Rev 5:6).
5. And He is the same, to pardon, justify, sanctify, and glorify.
Application:
1. If He is the same, let every Christless sinner seek an interest in Christ with the same diligence that ever any did; such have the same necessity, and the same encouragement.
2. Despair, under the gospel, is most unreasonable; seeing Christ came to save sinners, assures of His having saved the chief of sinners, and represents Himself as, after all, the same.
3. Let believers rejoice in Christ as unchangeable. (J. Hannam.)
Of Christs immutability
Though all these three phrases in general intend one and the same thing, namely, immutability, yet to show that there is no vain repetition, they may be distinguished one from another.
1. Thou remainest, pointeth at Christs eternity before all times; for it implieth His being before, in which He still abides.
2. Thou art the same, declares Christs constancy. There is no variableness with Him; thus therefore He saith of Himself, I am the Lord, I change not (Mal 3:6).
3. Thy years shall not fail, intendeth Christs everlastingness; that He who was before all times, and continueth in all ages, will beyond all times so continue. Thus these three phrases do distinctly prove the three branch, as of this description of Christ, which is, and which was, and which is to come (Rev 1:4). This name that Christ assumeth to Himself, I AM, and this, I AM THAT I AM (Exo 3:14), and this also,
JEHOVAH (Exo 6:3), do demonstrate a perpetual continuing to be the same. In this respect He thus saith, I the Lord, the first, and with the last, I am He (Isa 41:4). This immutable constancy of the Lord is confirmed by this testimony, , with whom is no variableness nor shadow of turning (Jam 3:17), no show or appearance of alteration. This may be exemplified in all the things that are Christs.
1. His essence and being. This is especially here intended. So also Exo 3:14.
2. His counsel. Immutability is expressly attributed thereunto (Heb 6:17). It shall stand (Psa 33:11; Pro 19:21; Isa 48:10). It shall stand immutably, inviolably.
3. His attributes. Sundry attributes for teaching sake, by way of resemblance, are ascribed to the Lord. In this respect it is said, His compassions fail not (Lam 3:22). His mercy endureth for Psa 118:1). His love is everlasting (Jer 31:3). His righteousness endureth for ever (Psa 111:8). So His truth Psa 117:2). So His judgments (Psa 119:160).
4. His Word endureth for ever (1Pe 1:25). This is manifested in the Law, whereof not one tittle shall fail (Luk 16:17), and in the gospel, which is an everlasting gospel.
5. His bonds whereby He binds Himself to us are unalterable as promises and oaths. These are the two immutable things intended Heb 6:18), and His covenant also (Jer 32:20-21). (W. Gouge.)
Of the uses of Christs immutability
1. It domonstrateth Christ to be true God (Mal 3:6).
2. It distinguisheth Him from all creatures, from idols especially (Isa 41:4; Isa 44:6).
3. It strengtheneth our faith in all His Divine properties, promises, and former works (Psa 44:1-2; Psa 90:1; Psa 09:2; Gen 32:10-12; Heb 13:5-6).
4. It instructeth us in an especial use of Gods former dealings with men; which is in like good courses to expect like blessings, and in like evil courses to expect like judgments: for the Lord is ever the same, and ever of the same mind; what in former times was right in His eyes and acceptable unto Him, is so still (Rom 4:23-24). What formerly offended Him and provoked His wrath, still so doth (1Co 10:5-6, &c.).
5. It assureth us of His continual and perpetual care of His Church Mat 28:20), yea, and of the Churchs perpetual continuance Mat 16:18).
6. It encourageth us against all attempts of enemies present and to come Psa 110:1; Rev 2:10).
7. It teacheth us to do what in us lieth for perpetuating His praise; and for this end both to set forth His praise ourselves all our days (Psa 104:33), and also to teach our posterity so to do (Psa 78:5-6).
8. It directeth us bow to be like to Christ, namely, in constancy and unchangeableness in our lawful promises, oaths, vows, and covenants Neh 5:12-13; Psa 15:4; Ecc 5:4; Jer 34:10; Jer 34:18), and in our warrantable enterprises (1Co 15:58).
9. It admonisheth us to submit ourselves to the Lords ordering providence; all our strivings against the same cannot after this purpose 1Sa 3:18).
10. It establisheth such as have evidence of their election and calling against all Satans assaults and fears arising from our weak flesh (2Pe 1:10). (W. Gouge.)
The unchangeableness of Christ
I. Let us consider, WHAT CHRIST IS IN HIMSELF, AND THIS AS TO HIS PERSON AND OFFICE.
1. As to His person, He is the eternal Son of God–the second Person in the glorious Trinity–who bad a being, and a very glorious one, before He appeared it, our world, even from everlasting.
2. As to His office. Though He was not incarnate till the fulness of time, the office of Mediator was what He was early appointed to, and consented to undertake; and so He speaks of Himself as set up from everlasting, from the b ginning, or ever the earth was (Pro 8:23).
II. Let us see WHAT HIS PEOPLE HAVE FOUND HIM TO BE UNTO THEM.
III. THAT WITH RESPECT TO BOTH THESE, IT MAY BE SAID OF HIM, THOU ART THE SAME, AND THY YEARS SHALL NOT FAIL.
1. He is the same in Himself, as to His person and office, God in our nature, the great Immanuel, and so the only Mediator between God and man.
2. The same as to His interest in His Father, and acceptance with Him: the Beloved in whom He is always well pleased.
3. And with respect to us, the same as to His ability and willingness to save. APPLICATION.
1. May it be said of Christ, that He is the same, and His years fail not ? Let this put every Christless sinner upon looking out after an interest in Him. And this for these two plain reasons.
(1) You have the same need of Christ and interest in Him with any that are gone before.
(2) You have the same encouragement to come to Christ, under the assurance that He is the same as to His person and office, His fitness for His work, and delight in it.
2. Despair is most unreasonable in such as sit under the sound of the gospel, which tells us of Christs coming to save sinners, assures us of His having saved the chief of sinners, and represents Him as after all the same.
3. Let believers rejoice in Christ as unchangeable. (D. Wilcox.)
Christ immutable
I. AN EXALTED VIEW OF JESUS CHRIST. The text certainly implies
1. The Divinity of His nature. To be the same, is to be unchangeable; but immutability is an attribute of Deity.
2. The immutability of His perfections. Such are the amazing greatness and vast variety of the works of creation, that their Author must be God.
3. The perpetuity of His offices. When we speak of the offices of Christ, we have respect always to His character as Mediator, and His great undertaking as the Saviour of sinners.
(1) He assumed the office of a Prophet. In this character He went about teaching the words of eternal life. And He teaches now by His written Word, by the ministry of His gospel, and by His Spirit given to men.
(2) He bore the office of a Priest. In this view He offered Himself a Sacrifice of atonement to God the Father, for the sins of all that believe. And He wears His priesthood still. Jesus, the Son of God, who is passed into the heavens, is our great High Priest: as such, He is touched with the feeling of our infirmities; He knows the trial of severe temptation; He bears us on His heart; He pleads for us above: He ever liveth to make intercession.
(3) He sustained the office of a King. In His regal capacity, all power in heaven and in earth is is given to Him. He is constituted Supreme Ruler. He presides the Head of the Church, and I-lead over all things to the Chinch. He now reigns, and He must reign, till the tranquillity of all His friends be effectually secured, and till all His enemies be subdued under His feet.
II. The subject furnishes various REFLECTIONS, by way of IMPROVEMENT. IS the nature of Christ Divine? Are His perfections immutable, and His offices perpetual? Is He uniformly the same, and shall His years not fail? Then
1. All is well respecting the government of the world. Its government is assuredly wise, perfectly and invariably right; for it is committed to Him who ever lives, and who lives for ever the same!
2. We may rest assured of the safety of the Church. Whatever becomes of the kingdoms of the earth, the Church is safe. For the Church the world stands; and all events are doubtless under the direction and control of Him who is King of nations, and King of saints.
3. We are greatly encouraged as sinners to apply to Christ for salvation. Behold the glorious ability and fitness of the Son of God. What could you wish to find in a Saviour which you find not in Him?
4. Believers are hereby relieved under the pressure of their trials. You are in a wilderness, among briars and thorns; on an ocean, tossed with waves and tempests. You are subject to painful anxieties from various quarters. All around is lull of change; and there is nothing beneath the sun on which you can depend with confidence for an hour. Be it so there is One who is invariably the same; a Rock that never moves: a Refuge that never fails; and this Rock, this Refuge, is Christ. (T. Kidd)
Sit on My right hand
The exaltation of Christ
I. THE AUTHORITY OF GOD THE FATHER IN THE EXALTATION OF JESUS CHRIST AS THE HEAD AND MEDIATOR OF THE CHURCH, IS GREATLY TO BE REGARDED BY BELIEVERS. He says unto Him, Sit, Thou at My right hand. Much of the consolation and security of the Church depends on this consideration.
II. THE EXALTATION OF CHRIST IS THE GREAT PLEDGE OF THE ACCEPTANCE OF THE WORK OF MEDIATION PERFORMED IN THE BEHALF OF THE CHURCH. Now, saith God, Sit Thou at My right hand; the work is done wherein My soul is well pleased.
III. CHRIST HATH MANY ENEMIES UNTO HIS KINGDOM. Saith God, I will deal with all of them.
IV. THE KINGDOM AND RULE OF CHRIST IS PERPETUAL AND ABIDING, NOTWITHSTANDING ALL THE OPPOSITION THAT IS MADE AGAINST IT. His enemies rage, indeed, as though they would pull Him out of His throne; but it is altogether in vain. He hath the faithfulness and power, the word and right band of God, for the security of His kingdom.
V. THE END WHEREUNTO THE LORD JESUS CHRIST WILL ASSUREDLY BRING ALL HIS ENEMIES, let them bluster while they please, shall be unto them miserable and shameful, to the saints joyful, to Himself victorious and triumphant.
1. God hath promised unto the Lord Christ from the foundation of the world that so it should be. And it cannot be that this word of God should be of none effect.
2. The Lord Christ expects this issue and event of all things, and shall not be frustrated in His expectation. Having received the engagement of His Father, He rests in the foresight of its accomplishment. And thence it is that He bears all the opposition that is made unto Him, and to His kingdom, with patience and forbearance.
3. He is Himself furnished with authority and power for the accomplishment of this work when and as He pleaseth. And He will not fail to put forth His power in the appointed season. He will bruise them all with a rod of iron, and dash them in pieces like a potters vessel.
4. His glory and honour require that it should be so. This is a thing that He is very tender in. God bath raised Him up, and given Him glory and honour, and care must be taken that it be not lost or impaired. Now, if His enemies should go free, if they could by any means subduct themselves from under His power, or be delivered from His wrath, where would be His glory, where His honour?
5. His saints pray that it may be so, and that both upon His account and their own. Upon His, that His glory, which is dearer to them than their lives, may be vindicated and exalted. Upon their own account, that their miseries may be ended, that the blood of their fellow-servants may be revenged, that the whole Church may be delivered, and all their promises fulfilled. Now He will not disappoint their prayers, nor frustrate their expectations in anything, much less in those that are of so great importance.
6. His enemies deserve it unto the utmost; so that as well His justice as His glory, and interest, and people, are concerned in their destruction. In the most of them, their outrage against Him is notorious, and visible in the eyes of men and angels. In all of them there is a cruel, old, lasting enmity and hatred, which He will lay open and discover at the last day, that all shall see the righteousness of His judgments against them. (John Owen, D. D.)
Gods setting Christ on His right hand
God was pleased thus highly to exalt His Son in sundry respects.
1. In regard of that entire love which as a Father He did bear to a Son Joh 3:35; Joh 5:20).
2. In regard of the low degree of Christs humiliation (Php 2:8, Eph 4:9-10).
3. In regard of that charge which Christ undertook to provide for His Church, and to protect it. Hereunto is He the better enabled by that high advancement (Mat 28:18-20; Joh 17:2).
4. In regard of the saints who are Christs members, that they might with stronger confidence depend on Him (Psa 80:17-18; 2Ti 1:12).
5. In regard of His enemies, that He might be the greater terror unto them, and be more able to subdue them (Psa 110:2). (W. Gouge.)
Thine enemies Thy footstool
The Churchs enemies
Tell me, which of us having a long journey, by many thieves and wild beasts, or passing the rocky seas in great and violent storms, though he escape a place or two where no thief is, nor any beast hath molested him, yet at every place of danger his fear is still renewed. And though he have passed many high surges, and deep gulfs of water, yet at every wave he is still afraid, not careless, because he hath passed far, but still careful, because there is more behind; and this wisdom we use because we know we may as well fall toward our journeys end and as well be drowned before the havens mouth as when we first began our dangerous voyage. Even so with the Church of Christ, in which this day we confess ourselves to have our portion, from the first day of her peregrination in earth till her last entrance into glory, there is a perpetual hatred between the serpent and her Head and between the seed of the serpent and her children, in which strife every one of us particularly have our fight, so that from our mothers womb till we lie down in the grave our life is a warfare upon earth. No age, no condition of life, no day, no light, but brings his enemy with him, and the same enemy armed with sin and death, as well against the man of an hundred years old as against the child that is newborn, and as well we may fall into con-detonation through apostasy of old and crooked age as through concupiscence and pride of youth. And as the peril is great so we have heard the enemies are strong, and such as before whom we are very cowards; for be we otherwise never so valiant to endure pain, to quarrel, to fight, to despise any danger, as it is the manner of a great many ruffians, indeed, but men of good courage they would be called. Bring me one of them in battle against these enemies; we have to strive against pride, against concupiscence, against idle games, against all sin, and thou shalt see no boy, no woman, no sick man so very a coward. He hath not the heart to strike one blow, but yieldeth himself like a slave, and is led away as an ox to the slaughter-house. Let us therefore watch, let us pray; for in this dangerous battle, in which these strong men are very cowards, what can we do? Even let us deny ourselves, and trust unto Him that sitteth on the right hand of His Father, and He shall make all our enemies our footstool. (E. Deering, B. D.)
Are not they all ministering spirits?
The Church and the angels.
I. In the light of an ADMONITION.
1. Whilst Christ is one, the angels are many.
2. Whilst the individuality of Christ is powerfully brought out in the Scriptures, the angels flit past us in vaguest form.
3. Whilst Christ is supreme, the angels are ministrant.
II. In the light of a PATTERN.
1. The universality of their action. None idle.
2. The characteristics of their service.
(1) Unselfish.
(2) Unobtrusive.
(3) Condescending.
3. The aim of their mission. They help the saints to make their calling and election sure.
III. In the light of CONSOLATION. Think of their number, strength, swiftness, love. (W. L. Watkinson.)
Ministering spirits
I. THEY ARE SPIRITS.
1. The features in which they differ from man. Greater vitality, power, knowledge.
2. Some of the features which distinguish them from each other. They differ in the amount of faculty, in the form of talent, in the date of their existence, in the sphere of their agency.
II. THEY ARE MINISTERING SPIRITS. This implies
1. Activity.
2. Activity for others.
III. THEY ARE MINISTERING SPIRITS DIVINELY COMMISSIONED. How great must He be who directs the movements of these countless hosts, at whose throne the loftiest of their number bow in humblest homage, and whose behests each counts it his highest honour and blessedness to obey.
IV. THEY ARE MINISTERING SPIRITS DIVINELY COMMISSIONED TO HELP A CLASS OF MANKIND.
1. Their ministry to man implies that there is some method by which they can help us.
2. It implies that mans salvation is of paramount importance.
3. It implies that service to the lowest is consonant with the highest greatness.
4. It argues the obligation of man to seek the spiritual good of his fellows. (Homilist.)
Ministering spirits
I. THE BEINGS INTRODUCED TO OUR NOTICE.
1. They are purely spiritual in their nature.
2. They are pure and holy in their character.
II. THE SERVICE THEY PERFECT.
1. They are called ministering spirits to indicate their employment in Gods service, and they are said to minister to those who shall be heirs of salvation–to point out the service and assistance they render to the saints.
2. Angels serve the saints for Christs sake.
3. They sustain in time of depression. They avert danger in the path of duty.
4. They deliver from evils in a way which displays the omnipotence of Him whom they serve, and His love to His people.
5. They attend the departing scene of the believer. If a Lazarus die, angels bear his spirit to the abodes of the blessed. As Christs servants, they delight to wait upon those whom He loves, and to conduct them to His presence.
6. And they shall at last gather together the elect from the wicked and reprobate at the last day. (The Evangelical Preacher.)
Angels–ministers
1. Here we may see that the name of a minister is an honourable name. The magistrate is a minister, the angels are ministers, Christ Himself was a minister when He lived on the earth. We that be the ministers are servants to Christ the King of kings; therefore, think highly of us because of our office. Is it a grace to the angels to be called ministers, and shall it be a disgrace to us? Nay, we will glory in it, and shame shall light on them that contemn the ministers of Christ.
2. Whose ministers are the angels? They be our ministers, they minister for our sakes, and what be we in comparison of the angels? They are spirits, we flesh and blood; they holy, we unholy; they immortal, we mortal; they in heaven, we on earth; yet they be our ministers. They minister to Christ as to their Lord and Master; to us as to their fellow-servants. But what an honour is this to wretched and sinful man! As if the King should command an honourable Lord of his privy council to wait on a poor man in the country, to conduct him from the court to his own house. The angels are of Gods Court in heaven, and see His face continually. We are silly worms on earth, yet the Lord hath appointed them to attend on us, to be ore nurses, to carry us in their arms, that we dash not our foot against a stone. Let us praise and magnify God, that hath provided such keepers for us.
3. What an unspeakable comfort is this for us t What a tower of defence against Satan and his angels! As there be bad angels to hurt us, so there be good angels to defend us.
4. Since the angels are ever present with us, let us beware of grieving them by sin. (W. Jones, D. D.)
Angels–ministering spirits
Angels are spirits which serve the Lord for His Churchs safety. If yet we will be vain still, and think; yea, but what are arch-angels, principalities, powers, rues, thrones, dominions? What are Cherubim and Seraphim? All these, howsoever they be called in divers respects diversely, they are all angels in condition and nature, as they are here so defined. For if any archangel, throne, or dominion, or any other name that is named, were any way greater than an angel, all this disputation of the apostle were nothing worth; for how could it prove the excellency of Christ above all creatures, because He is greater than angels, if Cherubim or Seraphim or any archangel were also greater than an angel? And, therefore, that the reason of the apostle may be, as it is, strong and unanswerable, we must confess, all blessed spirits whatsoever they be, they be all this, and this is their glory, that they be Gods ministers for the safety of His children. This doctrine the prophet David teacheth also very plainly Psa 34:8; Psa 91:11). And according as this is Gods word and His promise, so we have many examples how He hath at all times justified His faith in the performance of it, t at we might not stagger in this doctrine of angels. The patriarchs, the people of Israel, the prophets, the apostles the saints of the New Testament, our Saviour Christ Himself; we have seen how the angels have been with them in dangerous times, and ministered the help of God unto them. Now, touching the manner how the angels of God execute this ministry, even as it is not hard unto the Lord in the battles of men to save with many or with few, so God sendeth out His angels, more or less, even as He will, that it might be known the power is the Lords. When Jacob feared before his brother Esau, God sendeth to him a host of angels to comfort him. When Elisha was beset with the great host of the King of Saria, and his servant was now exceedingly afraid, Elisha prayed to have his eyes opened, that he might see the help of God which was present with them, and he saw immediately the mountain full of horses and chariots round about Elisha, which were God s angels sent for the prophets safeguard. When our Saviour Christ is in distress and anguish, God sendeth many angels which do minister unto Him. And so He testifieth of the usual work of God common to all His saints, and applieth it particularly unto Himself in reproving Peter, who would needs draw his sword to maintain His cause. Thinkest thou, saith He, that I cannot now pray unto My Father and He will give Me more than twelve legions of angels? And as thus God send, the out a great multitude for the safety of one, so contrariwise sometimes He appointeth but one for the safety of many. So God sent an angel to deliver Israel out of Egypt, and to guide them through the terrible wilderness; and ever after in all their troubles, when they called upon Him, the angel of His presence, as the prophet Isaiah saith, was their Deliverer; and when they should enter the land of promise, God sent an angel to drive out the Canaanites before them. When the army of the King of Ashur came and besieged Jerusalem, God sent an angel who delivered the city, and in one night slew 185,000 of the Assyrians. When David numbered the people and procured the wrath of God, God sent an angel into Jerusalem, who slew with the pestilence 70,000 of the people. So we have many examples, where, upon occasion, to one man God sendeth one angel; even as it is said of one that He came to comfort our Saviour Christ in the garden. To Lot God sent two angels, so to the women that came to the grave of our Saviour Christ two angels appeared, and told them He was risen again. When the apostles looked after our Saviour Christ at His ascension into heaven, two angels appeared unto them, to teach them what they had to do. When God would destroy Sodom and Gomorrah, He sent three angels to Abraham to tell him of it. In the vision that Ezekiel had of the destruction of the city, God senteth out six angels to execute that judgment. And why is all this diversity? To the end, no doubt, we should not be curious, hut rest in the doctrine which the Lord taught us, that the angels are His ministers, f r their safety who shall inherit His kingdom. The angels, of whom so much we bay spoken, and who e honour is such, that seeing our Saviour Christ exceedeth them, the apostle here proveth He is the God of glory. In that, I say, these angels serve for our safety, how great is our safety, and what shall we render unto God for this salvation? It were exceeding love to give to any n, an a guard of men about him. It were more to give him a guard of princes; but what are men, what are princes, what arc kings in respect of angels, which God hath made to pitch above us? How can we envy earthly blessings, of houses, lands, servants, to abound unto our brethren, except we be ignorant what God hath done for us? And why should we now fear to be shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace, and go boldly, whither truth, faith, holiness, duty calleth us? What if the word break with hatred, or men swell in malice against us, are the angels driven back with vain threatenings? Or, what if we do fall before the enemy, and he prevail against us, as it happened to our Saviour Christ Himself, is this a want in angels that watch over us? or is it not rather the good will of God that we should die with Christ the sooner to reign with Him? Last of all, let us know how this glory is given us, not of ourselves, but as we are members of Christ; for to Him it doth properly belong, who is our Head. He is the ladder which Jacob saw in a dream, reaching from heaven to earth, and the angels ascending and descending by it. So that this honour is ours, as we be Christs; to Him it appertaineth, and to us it is given, as we be made members of His body by faith. (E. Deering, B. D.)
Ministry of angels
I. SOME GENERAL REMARKS CONCERNING ANGELS.
1. They possess high natural perfections.
(1) Extensive knowledge. Said to be full of eyes. Doubtless have distinguished capacities for knowledge and wisdom. Dwell in the clear, cloudless region of celestial light.
(2) Amazing power. Said to excel in strength. Scripture presents several striking proofs. The immense slaughter of the firstborn in Egypt, and the destruction of the 185,000 of the Assyrian army were effected by an angel. The various judgments described in the revelations are to be executed by angels.
(3) Astonishing activity. Doubtless they can move swifter than light; perhaps as rapidly as thought (Dan 9:3; Dan 20:23).
2. They possess great moral perfections.
(1) Spotless purity. Often called holy angels. Compared to light, morning stars, Sons of God, &c. (Rev 14:10).
(2) Exalted goodness. They love God, and they have displayed the greatest interest in the affairs of men.
(3) They are all perfectly obedient. They Lest not, but serve God incessantly. They do His work perfectly.
3. Let us notice some general things connected with angels.
(1) They dwell in Gods holy presence. The highest and most gracious station occupied by created intelligences.
(2) They are evidently diversified in rank and order. Hence we read of angels, archangels, seraphims, cherubims, thrones, powers, &c.
(3) They are exceedingly numerous (Dan 7:10; Psa 68:17; Heb 12:22.)
(4) They are all glorious and happy. Possessed of perfect harmony of powers, of moral goodness, and of resplendent beams of the favour of Gods favour.
II. THE OBJECTS AND CHARACTER OF THEIR MINISTRY.
1. Their ministry is by Divine appointment. Sent forth. They stand in Gods presence, ready to obey His commands. They go at H,s bidding, and are entirely subjected to His wise and benevolent appointments.
2. The objects of their ministry. Heirs of salvation. The children of God, who are heirs of God, &c. (Rom 8:17; 1Pe 1:2).
3. The character of their ministry. To minister is to serve. Hence they wait upon and communicate to these heirs according to the Divine will and pleasure. They have sometimes
(1) Been instructors (Gen 16:7; Gen 48:2; 2Ki 1:16; Luk 1:10; Mat 1:20; Act 8:16; Act 10:3).
(2) As deliverers (Gen 22:12; Gen 19:29; Dan 6:22; Act 5:19-20; Act 12:7).
(3) As comforters (Dan 10:19; Act 27:24).
(4) They rejoice at the conversion of sinners (Luk 15:10).
(5) They bear the souls of the pious to glory (Luk 14:22).
(6) Angels will assist at the saints coronation, and be their companions for ever (Rev 5:9-13).
Application
1. How dignified and happy are believers.
2. Let us be circumspect, on account of the presence of angels.
3. Let us try to imitate them as far as possible; be as wise, holy, good, and humble as angels.
4. Bless God for the service of angels.
5. Not trust in them, or pray to them, but in Jesus and in God only. (J. Burns, D. D.)
The worship of God and the service of man
What the text affirms is theft the angels are at once the worshippers of God and the servants of men. Our Lord sets forth the same idea when He says that the angels of the children behold the face of the Father in heaven. This combination of worship and service is of the deepest interest, not only because it exists in the angel life, of which we know so little, but because it is what we ought to aim at–the rule for all Gods servants on earth as well as in heaven.
I. IN RENDERING SERVICE TO MANKIND THEY OBEY A DIVINE COMMAND. They are sent forth. The particulars of the command we dont know. Their service, as far as we are concerned, is secret service. It might give rise to superstition, and encourage false hopes, if we knew all the ways in which they render aid to men. It is enough to know that their errand originates in a word from the throne. In this respect their case does not differ from our own. There is a word from the throne for us to obey. When Gods worshippers on earth draw near to Him, they are met by commands which point out the duty they owe to their fellow-men.
II. THE MINISTRY OF ANGELS TO MEN IS INSPIRED AND DIRECTED BY A DIVINE EXAMPLE. The Being they adore is the Infinite Goodness, the Infinite Love. In watching the course of human history they have seen, perhaps, more clearly than we can, an what wonderful ways God has carried out His merciful designs towards our race. It is said that our Lord was seen of angels, as though to imply that in a very special sense their regard was fixed upon Him. His service was a pattern for theirs. Even if they had no special regard for the children before, they must have learnt it in watching their King. When Marshal McMahon entered Milan, after the baffle of Solferino, a little peasant girl, with a few flowers in her hand, stepped out of the crowd and offered them to him. Immediately he reined up his charger, had the little one lifted Oil to his saddle-bow, and rode into the city with her in front of him. The child was at once the idol of the army and the populace. When the King of Angels was here they saw Him take little children up in His arms, put His hands upon them, and bless them. Is it any wonder that they are content to watch over the little ones? What can be too much to be done for those whom the King delighted to honour? Is it surprising that angels should rejoice when sinners repent when they know how He loved them? But the motive which operates with them should operate with us. Their King is our King. To us His love has been revealed in bright and beautiful manifestations. Indeed, we a nearer interest claim. It is a most flagrant inconsistency that a man should profess to worship a loving God, a self-denying Saviour, yet keep a selfish heart towards his fellow-men–careless of the sins and sorrows of the world, whilst he wraps himself round with religious privileges, and dreams away his life in the luxuries of spiritual self-indulgence. He may call that indulgence worship, but it is unworthy of the name.
III. THE WORSHIP OF THE ANGELS PREPARES THEM FOR THE SERVICE OF MEN. They excel in strength, yet their strength is not inherent. They derive their might from the Mighty One. He endows them with the energies they employ for the benefit of mankind. The sight of Him keeps fresh in them every gracious and loving impulse towards the children of men So with those who serve on earth. They can only maintain their capacity for service by communion with their Lord. (B. Bird.)
Ministration of angels
I. WHAT MAY RE LEARNED OF THIS SUBJECT FROM SCRIPTURE.
1. To minister for our good, is a part of the ordinary employment to which they are appointed.
2. This is not the work of one angel only, but they are all sent forth to minister (Psa 34:7; Heb 1:14).
3. They have had distinct employments assigned them on different occasions, as the honour of God and necessities of His Church required Luk 1:13; Act 10:3; Act 10:7; Act 12:7-11; Dan 3:28).
4. In this office they are servants of Jesus Christ, as the great Head of the Chinch.
5. Much of their work is to oppose the malice of evil spirits, who seek our hurt: and to defend us from their rage and subtlety (Rev 12:7; Rev 12:9; Mat 4:11; 1Th 2:18).
6. God by them suggests good motions to the minds of His saints. If it be asked, how these good motions from angels may be distinguished from the motions of the Holy Ghost, and His influence on the minds of believers? it is answered
(1) Angelic motions are from without, but the Spirit of our Father dwelleth in us.
(2) They consist in occasional impressions; and are made by advantages taken from outward objects, and the present dispositions of the soul; whereas the Holy Spirit, by His operations, engages all the faculties of the soul, really and immediately citing them to generous actions, according to their nature and qualities.
(3) Angels in their suggestions communicate no strength to perform good actions; they only stir us up to use the strength we have already in possession; but the Holy Ghost strengthens us with all might by His glorious power in our inner man, and effectually works every good work in us.
(4) Angelcal impressions are transient; but the gracious influences of the Holy Ghost are continual (Joh 4:13-14).
7. They are appointed in their ministry to be witnesses of our obedience, sufferings, &c. (1Co 4:9; 1Ti 5:21; 1Co 11:10).
8. They will attend Christ at His coming to judgment, to deliver His friends from every danger, and to execute the vengeance written upon all His obstinate enemies (1Th 4:16; Mat 13:30; Mat 13:41; Mat 13:49).
II. WHY GOD USES THE MINISTRATION OF ANGELS IN BRINGING HOME THE HEIRS OF SALVATION! Doubtless the principal reason is, Father, for so it seemed good in Thy sight; yet the Scriptures assign several others, such as
1. It employs and manifests the obedience of the angels, that in them the Church militant may have a fair example.
2. Hereby a blessed intercourse and fellowship is maintained between the several parts of the family of God; consisting of saints on earth and angels in heaven (Heb 11:22).
3. To reproach, awe, and restrain the devil. It is inconceivable what mischief might be done by this arch enemy, were it not for the constant vigilance of these holy watchers (Rev 2:10).
4. That the saints may see the greatness and glory of redemption, which even the angels desire to look into.
Inferences:
1. We should be very careful to use great sobriety in all our meditations on the subject, and never pretend to be wise above what is written.
2. Danger should not deter us from duty. We have the sacred word for our guide; let us abide by that, and we are safe; whether we treat of angels, who are still reserved holy and happy, or of such as have dreadfully fallen into sin and misery.
3. There is no sufficient reason to believe that every Christian has a particular guardian angel appointed to take care of him. It cannot increase our consolation, but has a dangerous tendency to superstition.
4. Such is the love and care of God towards His saints in their present state of trial, that He sends the glorious attendants on His throne to minister to them; He who gave His only Son to die for them, will certainly send His holy angels to bring them safe home to the purchased possession.
5. Let us always remember, that in all our approaches to God as humble worshippers, we join with the holy angels, and bear our part in the heavenly concert. (J. Hannam.)
Nature and employment of angels
I. NATURE OF ANGELS.
1. That they are the highest order of created beings that we have any account of. They are represented, in respect to their exist-nee, as prior and superior to men.
2. Angels are beings of superior power and wisdom. They are called mighty angels. They are said to excel in strength.
3. Angels are fixed in a state of permanent and superior holiness. They were once in a state of probation; but what was the test of their obedience we are nowhere expressly informed. It is, however, very probable that what proved the occasion of Satans falling, was the occasion of their establishment in holiness. They are called the elect angels.
4. Angels are not encumbered with such gross bodies as we have. The apostle calls them ministering spirits, and God says, He makes His angels spirits, and His minsters a flaming fire.
5. That there are various grades or ranks of angels. Whether the distinction in the orders of angels arises from any disparity in their powers, or from any distinct offices which they discharge, it is not easy to determine. It is, however, most agreeable to that beautiful variety which is everywhere to be seen in the works of God, to suppose there is a real diversity in the intellectual powers of individual angels. And they may be appointed to different offices, according to the difference in their mental powers and capacities.
II. THEIR EMPLOYMENTS.
1. Angels have been employed in bearing the messages of God to the Church. This was probably one of their first employments after the fall of man. And from this employment it seems they took their name.
2. It was the business of angels to attend upon Christ, from the time He came into the world to the time He went out of it. They were devoted to His service, and He could, as He intimated, at any time call more than twelve legions of them to His aid.
3. Angels are employed as executioners of Gods wrath, against His enemies and the enemies of the Church.
4. It is the employment of angels to take particular care of good men. Arc they not all ministering spirits sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation? We may not pretend to point out all that angels do for particular saints; but yet the Scripture clearly mentions some important services which they perform for the heirs of salvation.
(1) They often protect them from danger. Lot, Jacob, Peter in prison.
(2) They assist good men in their duties and devotions. They are represented as present in the assemblies of the saints. Two large cherubim were carved in the temple. And within the oracle, we read, were made two cherubim of olive tree, each ten cubits high. These emblems signified the presence of angels in the temple. Now if angels are present with good men in duty, they may have the: power of assisting them in their devotions.
(3) There is reason to believe that angels minister to saints in their dying moments.
Improvement:
1. Since angels wore created an order of beings superior to mankind, we have peculiar reason to admire the great and discriminating grace of God in providing salvation for fallen men, while He suffered ,allen angels to perish without remedy.
2. Since all the angels are employed in promoting the work of redemption, it must be an immensely great and important work.
3. Since God employs all the angels to minister for the benefit of saints, we may justly conclude that they are very precious in His sight. They are His children, His heirs, His jewels, and the richest treasure He has on earth.
4. Since God employs all His angels to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation, there is no god ground to believe that the departed spirits of good men are ever present in this world, to take care of the pious friends whom they have left behind.
5. Since angels are ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation, we may justly conclude that there is a great change in the circumstances of sinners, as well as in their character, when they become saints.
6. Since angels are ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for them who are heirs of salvation, they must be fully acquainted with this world, and with the circumstances, characters and conduct of mankind in general.
7. Are all the angels ministering spirits, sent forth to minister to them who shall be heirs of salvation? Then Christians have no ground to fear in appearing on the Lords side, and in performing every duty He has enjoined upon them. Those that are for them are more and mightier than those that be against them.
8. Since angels are such great and amiable beings as they bare been represented, saints have a bright prospect, not only through life, but through death and through a boundless eternity
9. This subject shows the sinful and miserable state of all incorrigible sinners, both in time and eternity. They have no holy angels to guide and guard them in this world; but they are under the power and influence of the god of this world, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience. They are constantly growing in sin and guilt, by all the light they have, and by all the mercies they enjoy, and by all the evils they suffer. The same evil spirits that attend them in life, will attend them at death, and drag their unwilling souls down to the chambers of eternal death. (N. Emmons, D. D.)
Angelic life in connection with man
Angelic beings do not appear now to our eyes, and yet I do not doubt that God speaks to us now as much as He did to Abraham, and saves men now from ruin as He saved Lot. And the Bible itself confirms this view. As we pass on from the early history of the Jewish nation to the later, the physical appearance of angels is Succeeded by the visionary appearance of angels, the conversation at the tentdoor by the vision of Isaiah and Ezekiel. It is the tendency of men in early times, when feeling is master of intellect, to represent spiritual impressions as sensuous impressions; indeed they feel so strongly that they see, and it is without the slightest want of truth that a patriarch would say that he heard Gods voice speaking to him when in fact he had only received a vivid spiritual impression. The whole account of Abrahams intercession with the Lord is probably a poetic account of a real spiritual struggle in Abrahams soul, the embodiment in words of the questions and replies of a passionate prayer.
1. The first principle, then, contained in the stories is that God speaks directly to man. We look upon these stories as isolated and preternatural. In this any we take all the comfort and reality out of the Bible. That book does not relate what God did once for men, but what God is always doing. If, in the wilderness, Hagar, in the hour of her bitterest desolation found that the Omnipresent was beside her; we know now and for ever that wherever a mother bends m misery over her dying child, there is then with her Gods never-faliling Love. The child may die, but He is there waiting to take it to His fatherhood, and keep it for her coming. Oh I take these Old Testament stories to your hearts. Realise a living God, who penetrates with His presence and His action every moment of your being. In whatever light we view these accounts of angels, this they suggest at least. There is not a struggle of your soul which is not known to Him, not a crisis in your life which your Father does not hang over with intensest eagerness, waiting for the fitting moment to speak.
2. And if this be true of our individual, so it is also true of our domestic, social, and national life. When the angel came to Monoahs altar, the truth was revealed that God takes interest in each mans home; that it should be pure and happy, a sacred altar of love, a school for sympathy and forbearance: a centre from which an impulse for wider work may spring, and whence self-sacrifice in daily trifles may swell into the self-sacrifice of a life for universal objects: a place where warriors may be trained for the army of Christ against the evil, a place where the heavenly life may be imaged forth by each living in the life of all.
3. Nor is the related interference of angelic powers with social and national movements without a meaning to us now. If it tells us in the form of certain stories that God was watching over and guiding Jewish society and Jewish national life, it tells us that God is watching over and directing English society and the English nation, every society and every nation. And God knows that we want here in England some belief of thug sort to protect us from despair and the sloth and indifference which are born of despair. And when God has thus brought by strange ways the body of English society into a more active life of self-sacrifice, a higher morality, and a wider love of the race, then I cannot but think that men will turn with new eyes contemplate the life of Christ and sue in Him the true King of the new society. And now, to sweep back for a moment to our first subject, we have found a ground for the hope that the future society will be constituted as a host warring against evil, under the leadership of Christ. If that be so, we shall not be devoid of the sympathy, nor apart from the communion, of the other spiritual beings who may inhabit Gods universe. Their life is no lazy dream, no indolent enjoyment. The spirit of the battle against evil is the spirit of there life. For there was war in heaven; Michael and his angels fought against the dragon. When we read that stanza in the symbolical poem of Apocalypse, our soul kindles. We have brother warriors, purer than we, who are waging the same great contest, and who watch us with faithful and sympathising eyes. The hosts of earth and heaven are bound together by the comrade spirit, by a common indignation, by a common devotion to the same Leader. (Stopford A. Brooke, M. A.)
The ministry of angels
I. SOME OF THE OBJECTS FOR WHICH SUCH MINISTRATIONS ARE EMPLOYED.
1. In imparting direction under circumstances of doubt and perplexity.
2. In affording consolation and support in seasons of distress and trial.
3. To defend and preserve in the hour of danger or peril.
4. As connected with the introduction of the believer to his final blessedness.
5. It seems further questionable whether angels may not have some special charge over the mortal remains of the believer (Deu 34:5-6).
6. There is one peculiarly striking circumstance noticed in the text, viz., that believers are represented as having been the subjects of this angelic attention prior to their actual possession of a good hope through grace:–they are sent forth to minister to those who shall be heirs of salvation.And how interesting might it often prove for the believer to review that part of his life in which he lived estranged from God, with the remembrance of this fact. Perhaps, Christian, you have been once and again held back, you knew not how, when upon the very brink of ruin. It was the restraining grace of God that held you, but of that grace perhaps an angel was the friendly minister.
II. SOME REASONS FOR WHICH ANGELIC MINISTRATION MAY PROBABLY BE EMPLOYED.
1. To display the superior honour and glory of the Divine Redeemer.
2. To afford to angels themselves opportunity of contemplating the most illustrious display of the Divine perfections.
3. To illustrate the Divine tenderness and care over His Church and people.
III. THE PRACTICAL REFLECTIONS THE SUBJECT SEEMS NATURALLY TO SUGGEST.
1. Let an apprehension of their presence make us watchful over the correctness and propriety of our external deportment.
2. Let the dispositions which in such conduct they evince, be studied as a model to which our own should be conformed.
3. Let the believer rejoice in the prospect of intimate and endeared association with these ministering spirits. (Essex Congreational Remembrancer.)
The nature, office, and employment of good angels
I. First, FOR THEIR NATURE, THEY ARE SPIRITS. This is universally agreed by all that acknowledge such an order of beings; but whether they are pure spirits, divested of matter, and all kind of corporeal vehicle (as the philosophers term it). Hath been a great controversy, but I think of no great consequence. Not only the ancient philosophers, but some of the ancient Christian fathers, did believe angels to be clothed with some kind of bodies, consisting of the purest and finest material; which they call ethereal. And this opinion seems to be grounded upon a pious belief, that it is the peculiar excellency and prerogative of the Divine nature, to be a pure and simple spirit, wholly separate from matter; but the more current opinion of the Christian Church (especially of latter times) hath been, that angels are mere and pure spirits, without anything that is corporeal belonging to them; but yet so, that they have power to assume thin and airy bodies, and can, when they please, appear in human shape, as they are frequently in Scripture said to have done.
II. Secondly, We have here THEIR GENERAL OFFICE AND EMPLOYMENT; they are ministering spirits; they are (as I may say) domestic servants, and constant attendants upon that great and glorious King, whose throne is in the heavens, and whose kingdom ruleth over all; they stand continually before Him, to behold His face, expecting His commands, and in a constant readiness to do His will; for though the Omnipotence of God be stash, that He can do all things immediately by Himself, whatever He pleaseth in heaven and in earth; can govern the world, and steer the affairs of it, without any instruments or ministers; yet His wisdom and goodness has thought fit to honour His creatures, especially this higher and more perfect rank of beings, with His commands; and to make them, according to their several degrees and capacities, the ordinary ministers of His affairs, in the rule and government of this inferrer world; and this not for His own ease, but for their happiness; and He therefore employs them in His service, that they may be capable of His favour and rewards.
III. THE SPECIAL OFFICE AND EMPLOYMENT OF GOOD ANGELS IN REGARD TO GOOD MEN; and for this the apostle expressly tells us that they are sent forth to minister for them (that as, in their behalf and for their benefit) who shall be heirs of salvation. In which words there are three things very considerable for our instruction and comfort.
1. Their particular designation and appointment for this employment, expressed in these words, sent forth, as if they were particularly commissioned and appointed by God for rids very end. God Himself doth superintend all affairs, and by His particular designation, the angels execute the pleasure of His goodwill towards us. Hence it is so frequently said in
Scripture that God sent His angel to such and such a person for such and such purposes.
2. You have here the general end of their employment–for good men; they are sent forth on our behalf, and for our benefit; to take care of us and protect us, to succour anal comfort, to direct and assist, to rescue and deliver us.
3. Here is the more special end of their employment, in regard to good men, intended in those words, for them who shall be heirs of salvation; hereby signifying, that the angels are employed about good men, with regard more particularly to their eternal happiness, and for the conducting and furthering of the great affair of their everlasting salvation. This certainly is our greatest concernment; and therefore they have a more particular charge and care of us in regard to this. It has been a general and, I think, not ill-grounded opinion, both of the Jews and heathens, that good angels are more especially present with us, and observant of us, and assistant to us, in the performance of all acts of religion; that they are particularly present at our prayers; and therefore the Jews speak of a particular angel for this purpose, whom They call the angel of prayer; that they observe our vows, and our breach or performance of them. So Solomon seems to intimate (Ecc 5:4; Ecc 5:6). But the angels are yet more particularly present in the places, and at the times, of Gods public worship. The placing of the cherubims in the holy of holies, seems to signify the presence of the angels in our most religious addresses to God. And Plutarch says that the angels are the overseers of Divine service. And therefore we ought to behave ourselves with all modesty, reverence, and decency in the worship of God, out of regard to the angels who are there present, and observe our carriage and behaviour (1Co 11:13). Nay, that the angels have some charge and ca e of the bodies of good men after death, may not improbably be gathered from the passage in St. Jude (verse 9). But to proceed: this we are sure of, that the angels shall be the great ministers add instruments of the resurrection of our bodies, and the reunion of them to our souls: for so our blessed Saviour has told us Mat 24:30-31). All that now remains is to draw some inferences from this discourse, and so I shall conclude.
1. What hath been said upon this argument, and so abundantly proved from Scripture, may serve to establish us in the belief of this truth, and to awaken us to a due consideration of it.
2. We should with great thankfulness acknowledge the great goodness of God to us, who takes such care of us, and that, not only some inferior spirits, but the chief ministers of this great King those that stand in His presence, and behold His face; and not a few of these but the whole order of them are employed about us.
3. If the angels have the particular charge of good men, we should take heed how we despise, or be any way injurious to them: for how despicable soever they may appear to us, they are certainly very dear to God; since He deems them so considerable as to employ His chief ministers about them, and to commit the charge of them to those who, by their office, do more immediately attend upon Himself.
4. If God appointed angels to be ministering spirits on our behalf: we may thence very reasonably conclude that God did not intend that we should worship them.
5. We should imitate the holy angels by endeavouring to serve God as they do, in ministering to the good of others.
6. And we should learn also of them to condescend to the meanest services for the good of others. (Archbishop Tillotson.)
The practical side of the doctrine of angels
1. The existence of angels extends and enlarges our views regarding the city of God.
2. Their number is fitted to encourage us when we are cast down by the spectacle of general unbelief.
3. The lively part, the tender interest which the Holy Scripture assures us that they take in the triumph of the Church in general, and in the progress of each believer in particular, ought to be a precious consolation to us.
4. The hope of being one day associated with these glorious inhabitants of heaven presents to us one of the most ravishing prospects.
5. We may find in the love which they have to God and in the zeal with which these perfectly holy beings serve Him, a very effectual stimulant to lead us to diligence and activity in the service of the Lord. (Dr. Grandpierre.)
The angelic hierarchy
Casting even a fugitive look on material nature, a prodigious diversity is perceived among the creatures which God has called into existence. None of them resemble one another; all differ either in their essence, or form, or structure, or organisation, or capacities; and although the Supreme Author of everything that we see has marked all of them with that stomp of unity which causes us to recognise the Divine Architect, it seems nevertheless that, to reveal His inexhaustible wisdom, He has been pleased to scatter with profusion variety among the works of His hands. We have a striking illustration in the world of matter, which, in its present constitution, is destined one day to perish. Now, can we believe that God, who has shown Himself so productive and so rich in creative energy in the world of bodies, has not employed the same liberality in the world of spirits? That that God who has fashioned matter with so much intelligence and care, has not taken an equal pleasure in creating an innumerable multitude of spiritual intelligences? Can we admit that, in the midst of those creatures which He commands as master, man is feared the only one of his kind that has not above him creatures proportionally greater than himself, that he is himself greater than the nature of which he is chief priest? Therefore, when Scripture affirms that beyond the bounds of this world there exist spirits superior to man in light, in strength, in dignity, and that they are called thrones, dominions, principalities, powers, angels and archangels, seraphim and cherubim, celestial armies of the Most High, does it teach us anything so unreasonable, so difficult to receive and to comprehend? This is a first consideration; here is a second, which is closely connected with the first, and which flows immediately from it. Not only does the material creation present to us a great variety of objects, but it shows them to us in an uninterrupted series, and causes us to see them appointed, so to speak, according to the laws of one vast and magnificent hierarchy. From the stone to the plant, from the plant to the animal, from the animal to man, an immortal spirit, everything is in succession, everything is united, everything is tied by wonderful knots, by the most regular transitions. You have here the first extremity of a chain, of which all links are united one to the other, without leaving between them any interval. Having arrived at man, would you abruptly break that chain, so well knit together, and because your eyes of flesh do not see it prolong and extend itself in the invisible world up to the highest degrees of celestial hierarchies, would you pretend that it does not pass beyond this earth, and that the most beautiful works of God are shut up within the limits of the globe which we inhabit? Just as well might the insect which creeps under the herb, and has but some inches of horizon, deny the existence of all the beings which people the vast extent of the earth, because with its short view it cannot perceive them. Assuredly it would not be more insensate than the rash man who, under the pretext that he had never seen angels, affirms that there cannot be in other worlds than ours intelligences superior to his own. (Dr. Grandpierre.)
Twofold aspect of angelic ministration
The original Greek here expresses to separate aspects of that angelic service now going on in the Church. The angels are the ministers of God, giving to Him always their constant adoration and worship, add they are therefore sent forth by Him on behalf of those who are about to inherit salvation. In other words, because of the Incarnation which has made us one with God, and of our incorporation into the Body of Christ, they both worship with us and work for us. In the first place, then, their ministry in heaven, where stands the one Priest, presenting before the Father that sacrifice which was offered once for all on earth, their celebration with Him of the Eucharist on high, is one and the same with ours when we present to the same Lord and heavenly Father the memorial His Son hath commanded us to make. And so, though our souls are stained with sin, while they are spotless; though we are fallen and weak, while they have been kept upright and strong by the constant help of the Holy Ghost, nevertheless ours is the blessed though solemn privilege–an honour to which our adoption in Christ has raised us–of joining with them in their worship of Him who sitteth upon the throne. The angels have their work also. They are ever being sent forth. Yes, into the ways, the dangerous ways, by which even the children of the kingdom must go, they are sent to minister in their behalf. No doubt they joy in ministering thus unto us, in guarding us amid dangers, and protecting even when we think we re safe, but are not. And they joy most of all because we bear the likeness of Him to whom they came in His hours of temptation. (E. E. Johnson, M. A.)
Angel aid
O cannot fail to take hint of spirit ministry in material nature and in mortal life. By arbitrary habit of tradition we are given to conceive of lofty spirits, as absorbed in sacred exercises, and hold them to have no other function than that of teacher. We recognise no uses of their hands, if hands they have, or other members. They have been esteemed as the clergymen of heaven, the seers and sages of a spirit land, leading in worship and dealing only with the souls of men, and the moral interests of beings. Theologians have set them thus apart, as theologians like themselves, to abstractions and speculations of a grander grade. And in so setting them apart, have set them over upon the outer edges of the material realm, even as in a lower way they would set off and set apart the earthly ministries of men, to a sainthood that broaches not nor touches their secular affairs. It may surprise us, however, to discover that there is no warrant for this notion on the page of inspiration. Angels are there considered to be messengers, that often carry sublime and stately truths. But they are neither unskilled nor unemployed in natural processes. It might not be too much to say that they are its artisans and artists. The creative acts themselves are spoken of as commands. At the Christ coming, they were eager and alert. In the Christ consummation they are neither to march in spectacle of mere parade, nor stand inactive as observers of the scene. Meantime, in every ransomed and resuscitated life they ate intrusted with material ministries. One period of human extremity, one pass of human flight there is at which no earthly means avail, even as means. All the same, God works by means, and everywhere employs instruments at hand. There is no life which is not replenished and refreshed by some other to a certain point–no human creature is left utterly alone in helplessness. Up to a certain pass of destiny it can scarcely be that any human being is left utterly alone, or goes unprovided with a means, a ministry which, if it may not deliver and must not restore, at least shall soothe and serve. But every human career arrives at a pitch when all this ceases, when it is not only rendered futile, but imperceptible and unreal. To one who has been tenderly cherished, and from infancy enclosed by assiduous care and delicate attention, not less than to one who has known hard times in his rugged self-support, or his lonely isolation–not less, but rather more. Not less to one who has been beset by services, or encrowned with honour, reverence, and love, than to one who has led an Arab life of estrangement from all others. Not less, but rather more, to one who has been waited on and greeted, and decorated, and endeared, and jealously guarded from the elements, the world of chance and change. Not less, but more to such an one it comes to be at last, when human helpers falter and fall back, and all appliances alike are powerless. Then will the all-gracious Author of this workmanship leave His creature to be the prey of nature? You might as well allege that He will leave the globe itself to be the prey of its own forces, and explode in the concussion and convulsion of its own collisions, the dissolution of its subsistence, and the disintegration of its substance. You might as well imply that the mother of a child will desert it coldly because it has lost its way, and lost its footing, and has fallen. But what aid can interpose? Instrumentally, what is the recourse? What agency can be employed? Who shall bear a message? Who shall breathe a whisper to the retreating spirit? the only touch that van be felt is the touch of kindred on the spirit, the voice of soul to soul. Consciousness opens on the gaze of eyes that are not made of flesh and blood. In that supreme experience there must hover round about the couch some band of those who shall be found as qualified as they are willing. God sends guards to welcome their brethren within His glory; to soothe the while the parting pangs. The hour of earths failure is the hour of heavens support. Let the nurse come in the room, Lord; let the nurse come in; let the nurse come now, before the undertaker. Thou who didst give us in the charge of Thy servants, upon the earth in infancy, give us in nobler trust to loftier care; and when the flesh faints and fails let us find the spirit welcome at the gate. (H. S. Carpenter.)
The liturgy of angelic service
This liturgy of service is a literal fact. When struggling against overwhelming difficulties; when walking the dark, wild mountain-pass alone; when in peril or urgent need; we are surrounded by invisible forms, like those which accompanied the path of Jesus, ministering to Him in the desert, strengthening Him in the garden, hovering around His cross, watching His grave, and accompanying Him to His home. They keep pace with the swiftest trains in which we travel. They come unsoiled through the murkiest air. They smooth away the heaviest difficulties. They garrison with light the darkest sepulchres. They bear us up in their hands, lest we should strike our foot against a stone. Many an escape from imminent peril, many an unexpected assistance, many a bright and holy thought whispered in the ear, we know not whence or how, is due to those bright and loving spirits. The good Lord forgive me, says Bishop Hall, for that amongst my other offences, I have suffered myself so much to forget the presence of His holy angels. But valuable as their office is, it is not to be mentioned in the same breath as Christs. (F. B.Meyer, B. A.)
Ministry of angels
I went once to see a dying girl whom the world had roughly treated. She never had a father, she never knew her mother. Her home had been the poorhouse, her couch a hospital cot, and yet as she had staggered in her weakness there, she had picked up a little of the alphabet, enough to spell out the New Testament, and she had touched the hem of the Masters garment, and had learned the new song. And I never trembled in the presence of such majesty as I did in the majesty of her presence as she came near the crossing. Oh, sir! she said, God sends His angels. I have read in His Word, Are they not ministering spirits, sent forth to minister to them who shall be heirs of salvation? And when I am learning in my cot they stand about me on this floor; and when the heavy darkness comes, and this poor side aches so severely, He comes, for He says, Lo, I am with you, and He slips His soft hand under my aching side, and I sleep, I rest. (Dr. Fowler.)
Ministry of angels
The only child of a poor woman one day fell into the fire by accident, and was so badly burned that he died after a few hours suffering. The clergyman, as soon as he knew, went to see the mother, who was known to be dotingly fond of the child. To his great surprise he found her calm, patient, and resigned. After a little conversation she told him how she had been weeping bitterly as she knelt beside her childs cot, when suddenly he exclaimed, Mother, dont you see the beautiful man who is standing there, and waiting for me? Again and again the child persisted in saying, that, the beautiful man was waiting for him, and seemed ready and even anxious to go to him. And as a natural consequence, the mothers heart was strangely cheered.
Heirs of salvation
The time and certainty of inheriting salvation
Though the possession of this inheritance be to come, while the heirs thereof here live, yet is it sure and certain. What title so sure among men as an inheritance? Much more sure is this inheritance of salvation than any earthly inheritance can be. For
1. It is prepared for us from the foundation of the world (Mat 25:34).
2. It is purchased by the greatest price that can be, the precious blood of the Son of God (Eph 1:14; 1Pe 1:19).
3. It is ratified by the greatest assurance that can be, the death of Him that gives it (Heb 9:14).
4. It is sealed up unto us by that Holy Spirit of promise, which is the earnest of our inheritance (Eph 1:13-14).
5. Gods promise is engaged for it, therefore they who possess it arc said to inherit the promises (Heb 6:12).
6. The faith of believers addeth another seal thereto (Joh 3:33).
7. It is reserved in heaven for us (1Pe 1:4). In heaven neither moth nor rust doth corrupt, nor thieves do break through nor steal Mat 6:20). (W. Gouge.)
Instructions and directions arising from the inheritance of salvation
Such an inheritance as salvation made sure to us, affords sundry instructions and directions. Instructions are such as these:
1. It commends Gods philanthropy, His peculiar love to men, who by nature are children of wrath and heirs of hell; yet made to be partakers of the inheritance of salvation (Eph 2:2-3; Col 1:12; Tit 3:3-5).
2. It takes away all conceit of merit by mans works. For an inheritance is the free gift of a Father.
3. It is enough to uphold our spirits against penury, ignominy, and all manner of misery in this world. An heir, that as long as he is a child, differeth nothing a servant, but is under tutors and governors; yet, because he is lord of all, will not be dejected; but will support himself with this, that he hath a fair inheritance belonging to him.
4. It is a great encouragement against all things that may threaten death; yea, and against death itself; in that death brings us to the possession of this excellent inheritance. Directions are such as these:
(1) Subject thyself to thy Fathers will, and to that government under which He sets thee, because thou art His heir (Gal 4:2).
(2) Raise up thy affections to the place of thine inheritance, and set thy heart thereon (Col 3:1; Mat 6:21).
(3) Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world (1Jn 2:15). Salvation is not there to be had.
(4) Moderate thy care about earthly things; thou hast a heavenly inheritance to care for.
(5) Suffer with joy all things for thy profession sake, knowing that thou hast an heavenly inheritance (Heb 10:34).
(6) Search thine evidences about this inheritance. There is great reason that in a matter of so great consequence thou shouldst i e sure of thy evidence for thy right hereto (2Pe 1:10).
(7) Expect with patience the time appointed for the enjoying this inheritance. Through faith and patience the promises are inherited Heb 6:12).
(8) Walk worthy of this high calling (Eph 4:1), and of God who hath called thee to His kingdom and glory (1Th 2:12).
(9) Be ever thankful for this privilege especially (Col 1:12; 1Pe 1:3-4).
(10) Despise not any of these heirs because they are here poor and mean Jam 2:5). Ishmael was cast out because he mocked the heir Gen 21:9-10). (W. Gouge.)
Being somebody
What is the use of being in the world unless you are somebody? said a boy to his friend. Sure enough, and I mean to be, answered the other. I began this very day. I mean to be somebody. Ashton looked George in the face. Began to-day I how? What do you mean to be? A Christian boy, and so grow up to be a Christian man, said George. I believe that is the greatest somebody for us to be. George is right. There is no higher manhood than Christian manhood; and it is in the power of every boy to reach that. Every boy cannot be rich; every boy cannot be President; every boy cannot be judge: but God asks you all to a Christian manhood–to be His sons, and so with His Son Jesus Christ to be heirs of heaven.
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 4. So much better than the angels] Another argument in favour of the Divinity of our Lord. The Jews had the highest opinion of the transcendent excellence of angels, they even associate them with God in the creation of the world, and suppose them to be of the privy council of the Most High; and thus they understand Ge 1:26: Let us make man in our own image, in our own likeness; “And the Lord said to the ministering angels that stood before him, and who were created the second day, Let us make man,” c. See the Targum of Jonathan ben Uzziel. And they even allow them to be worshipped for the sake of their Creator, and as his representatives though they will not allow them to be worshipped for their own sake. As, therefore, the Jews considered them next to God, and none entitled to their adoration but God; on their own ground the apostle proves Jesus Christ to be God, because God commanded all the angels of heaven to worship him. He, therefore, who is greater than the angels, and is the object of their adoration, is God. But Jesus Christ is greater than the angels, and the object of their adoration; therefore Jesus Christ must be God.
By inheritance obtained] . The verb signifies generally to participate, possess, obtain, or acquire; and is so used by the purest Greek writers: Kypke has produced several examples of it from Demosthenes. It is not by inheritance that Christ possesses a more excellent name than angels, but as God: he has it naturally and essentially; and, as God manifested in the flesh, he has it in consequence of his humiliation, sufferings, and meritorious death. See Php 2:9.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Being made so much better than the angels: this God-man, the great gospel Minister, is more excellent than angels, and so must surpass all the prophets. He became thus by being surety constituted and declared, as ordained by Gods decree from eternity, in eminency above them by actual investiture on his ascension, Eph 1:20,21. A more excellent person he is beyond any comparison for his Divine nature, and in his human transcending the angelical, on the account of the hypostatical union: see Heb 1:6.
Angels; these were spirits likest God, and called Elohims, or gods, Heb 1:7; Psa 104:4; being most pure, glorious, powerful, and heavenly creatures, Mar 8:38; 13:32; 2Th 1:7; of various ranks, orders, and degrees, Eph 1:21 Col 1:16; used by Christ as his ministers in the delivering of his law on Mount Sinai to Israel, Heb 2:2; Act 7:53; Gal 3:19. The measure of his transcendency over these, for person, office, and name, is infinitely beyond expression.
As he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name; this was his peculiar, hereditary lot, due to him by natural right, as the heir and first-born of God, justly acquired by him, and actually possessed of him, not as a mere title, but a name descriptive of his person, distinguishing him from, and setting him above, all others: God the Son incarnate, Isa 7:14; 9:6; Lord over all creatures in heaven and in earth, and under it, Phi 2:9-11; not a simple messenger, but a Son, Mat 17:5; Joh 1:18; the Redeemer, Justifier, and Saviour of his people, Luk 1:31,32. He is a person of name famous for power, glory, and dignity above all others, Eph 1:21; Phi 2:9-11.
A more excellent name than they; diaforwteron, differencing from, and setting above, all the names of angels for eminency, the archangel himself being a servant and attendant on him, 1Th 4:16. His is more differencing and transcending in his kind than the name of angels is in their kind; he is above whatever they can pretend to, and so a more excellent Prophet than they. He hath in all things, as well as name, over them the pre-eminency.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
4. Being made . . . betterbyHis exaltation by the Father (Heb 1:3;Heb 1:13): in contrast to Hisbeing “made lower than the angels” (Heb2:9). “Better,” that is, superior to. As “being”(Heb 1:3) expresses Hisessential being so “being made” (Heb7:26) marks what He became in His assumed manhood (Php2:6-9). Paul shows that His humbled form (at which the Jews mightstumble) is no objection to His divine Messiahship. As the law wasgiven by the ministration of angels and Moses, it was inferior to theGospel given by the divine Son, who both is (Heb1:4-14) as God, and has been made, as the exalted Son of man (Heb2:5-18), much better than the angels. The manifestations of Godby angels (and even by the angel of the covenant) at different timesin the Old Testament, did not bring man and God into personal union,as the manifestation of God in human flesh does.
by inheritance obtainedHealways had the thing itself, namely, Sonship; but He“obtained by inheritance,” according to the promise of theFather, the name “Son,” whereby He is made known tomen and angels. He is “the Son of God” is a sense farexalted above that in which angels are called “sons of God”(Job 1:6; Job 38:7).”The fulness of the glory of the peculiar name “the Son ofGod,” is unattainable by human speech or thought. Allappellations are but fragments of its glory beams united in it as ina central sun, Re 19:12. Aname that no than knew but He Himself.“
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Being made so much better than the angels,…. Christ is so much better than the angels, as the Creator, than the creature; as an independent being, than a dependent one; as he that blesses, than he that is blessed; as he that is worshipped, than he that worships: as a king, than his subjects; as a master, than his servants; and as he that sends, than he that is sent: and Christ may be said to be “made so”, when he was manifested and declared to be so; and he was actually preferred to them, and exalted above them in human nature, after he had expiated the sins of his people, and when he was set down at the right hand of God, as in the latter part of the preceding verse, with which these words stand connected; for in his state of humiliation, and through his sufferings and death, he was made lower than they; but when he was risen from the dead, and ascended to heaven, he was placed at the right hand of God, where none of them ever was, or ever will be: besides, the phrase, “being made”, signifies no more than that “he was”; and so the Syriac version renders it, “and he was so much better than the angels”; and so the Ethiopic version, “he is so much better”: and this is observed, to prove him to be more excellent than any creature, since he is preferred to the most excellent of creatures; and to show, that the Gospel dispensation is superior to the legal dispensation, which was introduced by the ministration of angels; and to take off the Jews from the worship of angels, to which they were prone: and this doctrine of his could not be well denied by them, since it was the faith of the Jewish church, that the Messiah should be preferred to the angels: for in their ancient writings they say of him, he shall be exalted above Abraham, he shall be lifted up above Moses, and be higher than the ministering angels s; and that he is above them, appears from what follows,
as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they; which is that of the Son of God, a name peculiar to him; and which belongs to him in such a sense as it does not to angels, as is evident from the following verse: and though this name is not founded on his office, as Mediator, but arises from his nature and relation to God; yet he was declared to be the Son of God, and it was made manifest, that this name of right belonged to him, upon the discharge of his office, at his resurrection and ascension to heaven; and therefore he is said to obtain it by inheritance; or he appeared to inherit it of right, and that it was his possession for evermore.
s Tanchuma spud Huls. p. 321.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
| The Dignity of Christ. | A. D. 62. |
4 Being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they. 5 For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee? And again, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son? 6 And again, when he bringeth in the first-begotten into the world, he saith, And let all the angels of God worship him. 7 And of the angels he saith, Who maketh his angels spirits, and his ministers a flame of fire. 8 But unto the Son he saith, Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever: a sceptre of righteousness is the sceptre of thy kingdom. 9 Thou hast loved righteousness, and hated iniquity; therefore God, even thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows. 10 And, Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth; and the heavens are the works of thine hands: 11 They shall perish; but thou remainest; and they all shall wax old as doth a garment; 12 And as a vesture shalt thou fold them up, and they shall be changed: but thou art the same, and thy years shall not fail. 13 But to which of the angels said he at any time, Sit on my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool? 14 Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation?
The apostle, having proved the pre-eminence of the gospel above the law from the pre-eminence of the Lord Jesus Christ above the prophets, now proceeds to show that he is much superior not only to the prophets, but to the angels themselves. In this he obviates an objection that the Jewish zealots would be ready to make, that the law was not only delivered by men, but ordained by angels (Gal. iii. 19), who attended at the giving forth of the law, the hosts of heaven being drawn forth to attend the Lord Jehovah on that awful occasion. Now the angels are very glorious beings, far more glorious and excellent than men; the scripture always represents them as the most excellent of all creatures, and we know of no being but God himself that is higher than the angels; and therefore that law that was ordained by angels ought to be held in great esteem. To take off the force of this argument, the penman of this epistle proceeds to state the comparison between Jesus Christ and the holy angels, both in nature and office, and to prove that Christ is vastly superior to the angels themselves: Being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they. Here observe,
I. The superior nature of Christ is proved from his superior name. The scripture does not give high and glorious titles without a real foundation and reason in nature; nor would such great things have been said of our Lord Jesus Christ if he had not been as great and excellent as those words import. When it is said that Christ was made so much better than the angels, we are not to imagine that he was a mere creature, as the angels are; the word genomenos, when joined with an adjective, is nowhere to be rendered created, and here may very well be read, being more excellent, as the Syriac version hath it. We read ginesthe ho Theos alethes—let God be true, not made so, but acknowledged to be so.
II. The superiority of the name and nature of Christ above the angels is declared in the holy scriptures, and to be deduced thence. We should have known little or nothing either of Christ or of the angels, without the scriptures; and we must therefore be determined by them in our conceptions of the one and the other. Now here are several passages of scripture cited, in which those things are said of Christ that were never said of the angels.
1. It was said of Christ, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee (Ps. ii. 7), which may refer to his eternal generation, or to his resurrection, or to his solemn inauguration into his glorious kingdom at his ascension and session at the right hand of the Father. Now this was never said concerning the angels, and therefore by inheritance he has a more excellent nature and name than they.
2. It was said concerning Christ, but never concerning the angels, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son; taken from 2 Sam. vii. 14. Not only, “I am his Father, and he is my Son, by nature and eternal promanation;” but, “I will be his Father, and he shall be my Son, by wonderful conception, and this his son-ship shall be the fountain and foundation of every gracious relation between me and fallen man.”
3. It is said of Christ, When God bringeth his First-begotten into the world, let all the angels of God worship him; that is, when he is brought into this lower world, at his nativity, let the angels attend and honour him; or when he is brought into the world above, at his ascension, to enter upon his mediatorial kingdom, or when he shall bring him again into the world, to judge the world, then let the highest creatures worship him. God will not suffer an angel to continue in heaven who will not be in subjection to Christ, and pay adoration to him; and he will at last make the fallen angels and wicked men to confess his divine power and authority and to fall before him. Those who would not have him to reign must then be brought forth and slain before him. The proof of this is taken out of Ps. xcvii. 7, Worship him, all you gods, that is, “All you that are superior to men, own yourselves to be inferior to Christ in nature and power.”
4. God has said concerning Christ, Thy throne, O God, is forever and ever, c., <i>v. 8-12. But of the angels he has only said that he hath made them spirits, and his ministers a flame of fire, v. 7. Now, upon comparing what he here says of the angels with what he says to Christ, the vast inferiority of the angels to Christ will plainly appear.
(1.) What does God say here of the angels? He maketh his angels spirits, and his ministers a flame of fire. This we have in Ps. civ. 4, where it seems to be more immediately spoken of the winds and lightning, but is here applied to the angels, whose agency the divine Providences makes use of in the winds, and in thunder and lightnings. Observe, [1.] The office of the angels: they are God’s ministers, or servants, to do his pleasure. It is the glory of God that he has such servants; it is yet more so that he does not need them. [2.] How the angels are qualified for this service; he makes them spirits and a flame of fire, that is, he endows them with light and zeal, with activity and ability, readiness and resolution to do his pleasure: they are no more than what God has made them to be, and they are servants to the Son as well as to the Father. But observe,
(2.) How much greater things are said of Christ by the Father. Here two passages of scripture are quoted.
[1.] One of these is out of Psa 45:6; Psa 45:7, where God declares of Christ, First, His true and real divinity, and that with much pleasure and affection, not grudging him that glory: Thy throne, O God. Here one person calls another person God, O God. And, if God the Father declares him to be so, he must be really and truly so; for God calls persons and things as they are. And now let who will deny him to be essentially God at their peril, but let us own and honour him as God; for, if he had not been God, he had never been fit to have done the Mediator’s work nor to have worn the Mediator’s crown. Secondly, God declares his dignity and dominion, as having a throne, a kingdom, and a sceptre of that kingdom. He has all right, rule, authority, and power, both as the God of nature, grace, and glory, and as Mediator; and so he is fully adequate to all the intents and purposes of his mediatorial kingdom. Thirdly, God declares the eternal duration of the dominion and dignity of Christ, founded upon the divinity of his person: Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever, from everlasting to everlasting, through all the ages of time, maugre all the attempts of earth and hell to undermine and overthrow it, and through all the endless ages of eternity, when time shall be no more. This distinguishes Christ’s throne from all earthly thrones, which are tottering, and will at length tumble down; but the throne of Christ shall be as the days of heaven. Fourthly, God declares of Christ the perfect equity of his administration, and of the execution of his power, through all the parts of his government: A sceptre of righteousness is the sceptre of thy kingdom, v. 8. He came righteously to the sceptre, and he uses it in perfect righteousness; the righteousness of his government proceeds from the righteousness of his person, from an essential eternal love of righteousness and hatred of iniquity, not merely from considerations of prudence or interest, but from an inward and immovable principle: Thou lovest righteousness and hatest iniquity, v. 9. Christ came to fulfil all righteousness, to bring in an everlasting righteousness; and he was righteous in all his ways and holy in all his works. He has recommended righteousness to men, and restored it among them, as a most excellent and amiable thing. He came to finish transgression, and to make an end of sin as a hateful as well as hurtful thing. Fifthly, God declares of Christ how he was qualified for the office of Mediator, and how he was installed and confirmed in it (v. 9): Therefore God, even thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows. 1. Christ has the name Messiah from his being anointed. God’s anointing of Christ signifies both his qualifying him for the office of the Mediator with the Holy Spirit and all his graces, and likewise his inauguration of him into the office, as prophets, priests, and kings, were by anointing. God, even thy God, imports the confirmation of Christ in the office of Mediator by the covenant of redemption and peace, that was between the Father and the Son. God is the God of Christ, as Christ is man and Mediator. 2. This anointing of Christ was with the oil of gladness, which signifies both the gladness and cheerfulness with which Christ undertook and went through the office of Mediator (finding himself so absolutely sufficient for it), and also that joy which was set before him as the reward of his service and sufferings, that crown of glory and gladness which he should wear for ever after the suffering of death. 3. This anointing of Christ was above the anointing of his fellows: God, even thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows. Who are Christ’s fellows? Has he any equals? Not as God, except the Father and Spirit, but these are not here meant. As man, however, he has his fellows, and as an anointed person; but his unction is beyond all theirs. (1.) Above the angels, who may be said to be his fellows, as they are the sons of God by creation, and God’s messengers, whom he employs in his service. (2.) Above all prophets, priests, and kings, that ever were anointed with oil, to be employed in the service of God on earth. (3.) Above all the saints, who are his brethren, children of the same father, as he was a partaker with them of flesh and blood. (4.) Above all those who were related to him as man, above all the house of David, all the tribe of Judah, all his brethren and kinsmen in the flesh. All God’s other anointed ones had only the Spirit in a certain measure; Christ had the Spirit above measure, without any limitation. None therefore goes through his work as Christ did, none takes so much pleasure in it as Christ does; for he was anointed with the oil of gladness above his fellows.
[2.] The other passage of scripture in which is the superior excellence of Christ to the angels is taken out of Ps. cii. 25-27, and is recited in v. 10-12, where the omnipotence of the Lord Jesus Christ is declared as it appears both in creating the world and in changing it.
First, In creating the world (v. 10): And thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth, and the heavens are the work of thy hands. The Lord Christ had the original right to govern the world, because he made the world in the beginning. His right, as Mediator, was by commission from the Father. His right, as God with the Father, was absolute, resulting from his creating power. This power he had before the beginning of the world, and he exerted it in giving a beginning and being to the world. He must therefore be no part of the world himself, for then he must give himself a beginning. He was pro panton—before all things, and by him all things consist, Col. i. 17. He was not only above all things in condition, but before all things in existence; and therefore must be God, and self-existent. He laid the foundations of the earth, did not only introduce new forms into pre-existent matter, but made out of nothing the foundations of the earth, the primordia rerum–the first principles of things; he not only founded the earth, but the heavens too are the work of his hands, both the habitation and the inhabitants, the hosts of heaven, the angels themselves; and therefore he must needs be infinitely superior to them.
Secondly, In changing the world that he has made; and here the mutability of this world is brought in to illustrate the immutability of Christ. Observe, 1. This world is mutable, all created nature is so; this world has passed through many changes, and shall pass through more; all these changes are by the permission and under the direction of Christ, who made the world (Heb 1:11; Heb 1:12): They shall perish, they shall all wax old as doth a garment; as a vesture shalt thou fold them up, and they shall be changed. This our visible world (both the earth and visible heavens) is growing old. Not only men and beasts and trees grow old, but this world itself grows old, and is hastening to its dissolution; it changes like a garment, has lost much of its beauty and strength; it grew old betimes on the first apostasy, and it has been waxing older and growing weaker ever since; it bears the symptoms of a dying world. But then its dissolution will not be its utter destruction, but its change. Christ will fold up this world as a garment not to be abused any longer, not to be any longer so used as it has been. Let us not then set our hearts upon that which is not what we take it to be, and will not be what it now is. Sin has made a great change in the world for the worse, and Christ will make a great change in it for the better. We look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. Let the consideration of this wean us from the present world, and make us watchful, diligent, and desirous of that better world, and let us wait on Christ to change us into a meetness for that new world that is approaching; we cannot enter into it till we be new creatures. 2. Christ is immutable. Thus the Father testifies of him, Thou remainest, thy years shall not fail. Christ is the same in himself, the same yesterday, and to-day, and for ever, and the same to his people in all the changes of time. This may well support all who have an interest in Christ under all the changes they meet with in the world, and under all they feel in themselves. Christ is immutable and immortal: his years shall not fail. This may comfort us under all decays of nature that we may observe in ourselves or in our friends, though our flesh and heart fail and our days are hastening to an end. Christ lives to take care of us while we live, and of ours when we are gone, and this should quicken us all to make our interest in him clear and sure, that our spiritual and eternal life may be hid with Christ in God.
III. The superiority of Christ to the angels appears in this that God never said to the angels what he has said to Christ, Heb 1:13; Heb 1:14.
1. What has God said to Christ? He has said, “Sit thou at my right hand, till I make thy enemies thy footstool, Ps. cx. 1. Receive thou glory, dominion, and rest; and remain in the administration of thy mediatorial kingdom until all thy enemies shall either be made thy friends by conversion or thy footstool.” Note, (1.) Christ Jesus has his enemies (would one think it?), enemies even among men–enemies to his sovereignty, to his cause, to his people; such as will not have him to reign over them. Let us not think it strange then if we have our enemies. Christ never did any thing to make men his enemies; he has done a great deal to make them all his friends and his Father’s friends, and yet he has his enemies. (2.) All the enemies of Christ shall be made his footstool, either by humble submission and entire subjection to his will casting themselves down at his feet, or by utter destruction; he shall trample upon those who continue obstinate, and shall trample over them. (3.) God the Father has undertaken for this, and he will see it done, yea, he will himself do it; and, though it be not done presently, it shall certainly be done, and Christ waits for it,; and so must Christians wait till God has wrought all their works in them, for them, and by them. (4.) Christ shall go on to rule and reign till this be done; he shall not leave any of his great designs unfinished, he shall go on conquering and to conquer. And it becomes his people to go on in their duty, being what he would have them to be, doing what he would have them to do, avoiding what he would have them to avoid, bearing what he would have them to bear, till he make them conquerors and more than conquerors over all their spiritual enemies.
2. What has God said to the angels? He never said to them, as he said to Christ, Sit you at my right hand; but he has said of them here that they are ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for those who shall be heirs of salvation. Note, (1.) What the angels are as to their nature: they are spirits, without bodies or inclination to bodies, and yet they can assume bodies, and appear in them, when God pleases. They are spirits, incorporeal, intelligent, active, substances; they excel in wisdom and strength. (2.) What the angels are as to their office: they are ministering spirits. Christ, as Mediator, is the great minister of God in the great work of redemption. The Holy Spirit is the great minister of God and Christ in the application of this redemption. Angels are ministering spirits under the blessed Trinity, to execute the divine will and pleasure; they are the ministers of divine Providence. (3.) The angels are sent forth for this end–to minister to those who shall be the heirs of salvation. Here observe, [1.] The description given of the saints–they are heirs of salvation; at present they are under age, heirs, not inheritors. They are heirs because they are children of God; if children, then heirs. Let us make sure that we are children by adoption and regeneration, having made a covenant-resignation of ourselves to God, and walking before him in a gospel-conversation, and then we are heirs of God, and joint-heirs with Christ. [2.] The dignity and privilege of the saints–the angels are sent forth to minister for them. Thus they have done in attending and acting at the giving forth of the law, in fighting the battles of the saints, in destroying their enemies. They still minister for them in opposing the malice and power of evil spirits, in protecting and keeping their bodies, pitching their tents about theirs, instructing, quickening, and comforting their souls under Christ and the Holy Ghost; and thus they shall do in gathering all the saints together at the last day. Bless God for the ministration of angels, keep in God’s way, and take the comfort of this promise, that he will give his angels charge over you, to keep you in all your ways. They shall bear you up in their hands, lest you dash your feet against a stone,Psa 91:11; Psa 91:12.
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
Having become (). Second aorist middle participle of . In contrast with on in verse 3.
By so much (). Instrumental case of correlative with (as) with comparative in both clauses (, better, comparative of , , more excellent, comparative of ).
Than the angels ( ). Ablative of comparison after , as often.
Than they (‘ ). Instead of the ablative here the preposition (along, by the side of) with the accusative occurs, another common idiom as in Heb 3:3; Heb 9:23. only in Hebrews in N.T. except Ro 12:6.
Hath inherited (). Perfect active indicative of (from , heir, verse 2), and still inherits it, the name (, oriental sense of rank) of “Son” which is superior to prophets as already shown (1:2) and also to angels (1:4-2:18) as he now proceeds to prove. Jesus is superior to angels as God’s Son, his deity (1:4-2:4). The author proves it from Scripture (1:4-14).
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
The detailed development of the argument is now introduced. The point is to show the superiority of the agent of the new dispensation to the agents of the old – the angels and Moses. Christ ‘s superiority to the angels is first discussed.
Being made so much better than the angels [ ] . The informal and abrupt introduction of this topic goes to show that the writer was addressing Jewish Christians, who were familiar with the prominent part ascribed to angels in the O. T. economy, especially in the giving of the law. See on Gal 3:9. For being made, rend. having become; which is to be taken in close connection with sat down, etc., and in contrast with wn being, ver. 3. It is not denied that the Son was essentially and eternally superior to the angels; but his glorification was conditioned upon his fulfillment of the requirements of his human state, and it is this that is emphasized. After having passed through the experience described in Phi 2:6 – 8, he sat down on the right hand of the divine majesty as messianic sovereign, and so became or proved to be what in reality he was from eternity, superior to the angels. Tosoutw – osw so much – as. Never used by Paul. Kreittwn better, superior, rare in Paul, and always neuter and adverbial. In Hebrews thirteen times. See also 1Pe 3:17; 2Pe 2:21. Often in LXX It does not indicate here moral excellence, but dignity and power. He became superior to the angels, resuming his preincarnate dignity, as he had been, for a brief period, less or lower than the angels (ch. 2 7). The superiority of Messiah to the angels was affirmed in rabbinical writings. He hath by inheritance obtained [] . More neatly, as Rev., hath inherited, as a son. See ver. 2, and comp. Rom 8:17. For the verb, see on Act 13:19, and 1Pe 1:4.
More excellent [] . Diaforov only once outside of Hebrews, Rom 12:6. The comparative only in Hebrews. In the sense of more excellent, only in later writers. Its earlier sense is different. The idea of difference is that which radically distinguishes it from kreittwn better. Here it presents the comparative of a comparative conception. The Son’s name differs from that of the angels, and is more different for good. Than they [ ] . Lit. beside or in comparison with them. Para, indicating comparison, occurs a few times in Luke, as Luk 3:13; Luk 13:2; Luk 18:4. In Hebrews always to mark comparison, except Heb 11:11, 12.
Fuente: Vincent’s Word Studies in the New Testament
THE SON BETTER THAN THE ANGELS
1) “Being made so much better than angels,” (tosouto kreitton genomenos ton angelon) “Becoming so much better than the angels,” who are gathered around the throne and directed from it to serve him and the redeemed. He is better in dignity and authority than angels; For angels are to worship and serve him in time and eternity, Heb 1:6-7; Mat 4:10-11; Luk 22:43. On the Mount of Temptation Jesus resisted Satan, till an angel came to minister to him, and in Gethsemane he prayed likewise; See also, Heb 1:14; Rev 5:11-12.
2) “As he hath by inheritance obtained;” (hoso kokleronomeken) “As (since or because) he has inherited (from his Father),” an heir-setting, a right to the ownership jurisdiction, to rule and to reign over the earth which he also died to redeem from its bondage to restore to his Father, Joh 3:34-35; Luk 1:30-33; 1Co 15:23-28.
3) “A more excellent name than they,” (diaphoroteron par’ autous onoma) “A more excellent name than (that given) them;” He is that Prophet, that Priest, that Redeemer, that King, that Judge, that Lord of lords who is to bring redeemed men to full Victory over all that is evil and hurtful one glorious day, Joh 14:6; Joh 8:24; Act 4:12; Rom 1:16; Rom 14:11-12; Php_2:9-10; that men might adore His Excellence, the Lord Jesus Christ! How High He is above men and angels! Before Him both fall and worship, around and before heaven’s throne, and to Him all men should give honor, service, and allegiance through His church today, Rev 5:6-11; Eph 3:21.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
4. Being made so much better, etc. After having raised Christ above Moses and all others, he now amplifies His glory by a comparison with angels. It was a common notion among the Jews, that the Law was given by angels; they attentively considered the honorable things spoken of them everywhere in Scripture; and as the world is strangely inclined to superstition, they obscured the glory of God by extolling angels too much. It was therefore necessary to reduce them to their own rank, that they might not overshadow the brightness of Christ. And first he proves from his name, that Christ far excelled them, for he is called the Son of God; (17) and that he was distinguished by this title he shows by two testimonies from Scripture, both of which must be examined by us; and then we shall sum up their full import.
(17) Some by “name” understand dignity, but not correctly, as it appears from what follows; for the name, by which he is proved here to be superior to angels, was that of a Son, as Calvin here states. — Ed.
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
II.
He is superior to the angels Heb. 1:4 to Heb. 2:18.
A.
In name: My Son Heb. 1:4-5.
Text
Heb. 1:4-5
Heb. 1:4 having become by so much better than the angels, as He hath inherited a more excellent Name than they. Heb. 1:5 For unto which of the angels said He at any time,
Thou art My Son,
This day have I begotten Thee? and again,
I will be to Him a Father,
And He shall be to Me a Son?
Paraphrase
Heb. 1:4 The Son, by Whom God hath spoken the Gospel, is by so much greater than the angels, by how much He hath inherited by descent a more excellent Name than they.
Heb. 1:5 For although in your scriptures angels have been called the Sons of God, to which of the angels did God ever say, by way of distinguishing Him from all other beings, My Son Thou art; to-day I have begotten Thee? See chap. Heb. 1:5. And again, I will declare Myself His Father, and Him My Son.
Comment
having become
This suggests a time when He was not better than the angels. When could this time have been?
a.
Perhaps just after the emptying spoken of by Paul. Php. 2:5-10.
b.
While Christ was in human flesh and before He was refilled with His original glory.
During the time of His humility on earth, He was at least in some respect lower than the angels:
a.
made a little lower than the angels. cf. Heb. 2:9.
b.
a body didst Thou prepare for Me. cf. Heb. 10:5.
so much better than the angels
What is meant by so much better? The word in the Greek is Kreithan.
a.
It very likely means a measure of place or position, not quality of being.
b.
Moral or spiritual excellence is not included.
c.
Gloryhonorreverence, He had less while on earth, being obedient to the cross.
d.
Ways in which He is better than angels:
1.
He is the Sonthey are servants. Heb. 1:5-7
2.
He is worshipped by angels. Heb. 1:6
3.
He may be addressed by God. Heb. 1:8
4.
He is a king with a sceptre of righteousness. Heb. 1:8
5.
He was anointed with the oil of gladness above His fellows. Heb. 1:9
6.
He is addressed as Lord. Heb. 1:10
7.
He is seated at the right hand of God. Heb. 1:13
8.
Angels minister to those who inherit salvation made possible by Christ. Heb. 1:14
9.
Not to angels did He subject the world to come, Heb. 2:5
e.
The word better appears frequently in Hebrews:
1.
Better than angels, Heb. 1:4
2.
Better things. Heb. 6:9
3.
Better person than Abraham. Heb. 7:7
4.
Better hope. Heb. 7:19
5.
Better covenant. Heb. 7:22
6.
Better covenant and promises. Heb. 8:6
7.
Better sacrifice. Heb. 9:23
8.
Better possessions. Heb. 10:34
9.
Better country. Heb. 11:16
10.
Better resurrection. Heb. 11:35
11.
Better things. Heb. 11:40
12.
Better than that of Abel. Heb. 12:24
f.
Paul elsewhere says that to depart and be with Christ is better. Php. 1:23
than the angels
Who are angels?
a.
Generally, it can be said that they are beings less than God, and other than men.
b.
Specifically, here are some facts about them:
1.
They are intelligent beings, showing some characteristics of men:
1Pe. 1:11-12which things angels desire to look into.
2.
They are messengers:
Rev. 4:8-11; Gen. 19:15Message to Lot.
3.
They praise God and sing before Him. Rev. 4:8-11; Rev. 5:9.
4.
They are emotional. Luk. 15:7; Luk. 15:10 : Angels rejoicing over sinners who repent.
5.
They are sexless creatures.
Mat. 22:30neither marry or are given in marriage.
6.
They are creatures of choice.
2Pe. 2:4when they sinned
Jud. 1:6kept not their own principality
7.
They seem to be winged creatures, in some instances at least.
a)
Six wings. Isa. 6:2.
b)
Four wings. Eze. 1:6.
c)
Wings. Exo. 25:30; Exo. 37:9
c.
There are two classes of angels:
1.
Gods angels who serve:
a)
1Ti. 5:21the elect angels.
b)
Rev. 14:10holy angels.
2.
Evil angels:
a)
Eph. 6:12spiritual hosts of wickedness.
b)
Rev. 12:9dragon was cast out and his angels.
A.
Superior to angels in name: My Son
as he hath inherited a more excellent Name
This is a reward for His obedience, and thus His Name is above every name:
a.
What name is foremost in the world but the name of Jesus?
b.
We might argue over the second place name, Paul, Augustine, Lincoln, etc., but Jesus stands alone.
c.
What is the Name referred to here? Jesus, Christ, Immanuel, etc.? The Name is Son, as seen by Heb. 1:5. Observe the importance of the Name of Jesus:
a.
Act. 4:12In none other is there salvation.
b.
Eph. 1:21; Php. 2:9Name above every name.
c.
Php. 2:10Name to bow before.
d.
Php. 2:11A Name to confess.
e.
Mat. 28:19Baptism in His name.
f.
Col. 3:17; Mat. 10:42All good to be in His Name.
g.
Joh. 14:13; Joh. 15:16Prayer in His Name.
h.
Eph. 5:20Prayer in His Name.
i.
Mat. 18:20Assemble in His Name.
j.
Eph. 3:14His is the family Name.
for unto which of the angels said He at any time, Thou art My Son
This is a question with an implied answer. He has never at any time said this to any of the angels.
a.
Christ is unique; He is not one of the many hosts of angels, but the only Son of God.
b.
We should not consider Christ as man or angel, but as Son of God.
Thou art my Son
This is a quotation from Psa. 2:7.
Son is the more excellent name spoken of in Heb. 1:4.
Paul in Act. 13:33 says Jesus fulfilled the prophecy of Psa. 2:7.
Mary was told by the angel that her child would be called Son of God,
Luk. 1:35 . . . shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.
God acclaimed Him as Son twice while He was on earth:
Mat. 3:17at His baptism,
Mat. 17:5at His transfiguration,
When did He become the Son of God?
a.
This is a useless theological question based on the assumption that perhaps once He was not the Son.
b.
The important thing is the fact that He was called the Son as against the fact that no angel was ever referred to as the Son of God.
c.
These words were spoken of Christ as the son of Davidas Man:
1)
As God He was eternally in this relationship.
2)
Isa. 7:14 spoke of Him as Emmanuel.
this day have I begotten Thee?
The meaning of beget:
a.
It means to procreate as a sire, generate.
b.
It means to produce as an effect.
Paul seems to connect the begetting with the resurrection of Jesus. Act. 13:33-34.
a.
If the resurrection is the begetting, then it is Gods declaration of Him as Son referred to in Rom. 1:4declared to be the Son of God with power
b.
Thus He was produced from the grave rather than produced as a child in a normal physical sense.
I will be to Him a Father and He shall be to Me a Son
This is a fulfillment of the royal covenant with David. cf.
1Ch. 17:13; 2Sa. 7:14.
Jesus spoke often of this relationship:
Mat. 11:25I thank Thee, Father.
Luk. 22:42Father, remove this cup
Luk. 23:46Father, into Thy hands
Study Questions
59.
Does having become so imply that one day He was not?
60.
In what way was He below them?
61.
How is Christ so much better than the angels?
62.
Is it quality of which he is speaking, or one of place?
63.
Find in this chapter ways in which He was superior.
64.
How does the author prove that Christ has inherited a more excellent name?
65.
When did God call Jesus his Son?
66.
Does this Psa. 2:7 actually refer to Christ?
67.
What is the day that Christ was begotten?
68.
When did God beget Christ?
69.
What does Rom. 1:4 say of his Sonship?
70.
Is the statement of Fatherhood a fulfillment of prophecy?
71.
Did Jesus ever call God Father?
72.
Name some instances when He did.
Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series
(4) Being made.Better, having become. These words must be closely joined with the last clause of Heb. 1:3; they speak, not of the glory which was ever His, but of that which became His after He had made purification of sins.
Better.That is, greater. We may discern a twofold reason for the comparison; having become greater than the angels, our Lord is exalted above the highest of created beings (see Eph. 1:21; Php. 2:9), and above those through whom God had in former time declared His law (Heb. 2:2).
Name.The verses which follow show that we are to understand by this all the dignity and glory contained in the name SON OF GOD. Not that this name first belonged to Him as exalted Mediator; but the glory which became His (Heb. 1:3-4) is proportionate to and consonant with the name which is His by essential right (Heb. 1:2).
That this name and dignity belong to Jesus Christ (as yet unnamed, but confessedly the subject of the preceding verses) is now to be established by the testimony of Scripture. Two important questions have been asked:(1) Does the writer adduce these quotations as strictly demonstrative? (2) If so, on what assumption does their relevancy rest? It is evident that the whole argument is addressed to men who believed that the Christ had appeared in the person of Jesus. Of the passages here cited some were already, by universal consent, applied to the Messiah. As to the others, it was sufficient if the trained and thoughtful reader could recognise the accuracy of such an application when once suggested. That in no case is there mere accommodation or illustration will, it is hoped, be made clear. On the other hand, the writers object is less to convince his readers of some new truth than to draw attention to what the well-known passages really contain and express.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
4. Being made Rather, having become; a state which had a commencement, as the being of Heb 1:3 is a state without commencement. This being made, takes place in the incarnate exaltation, as the made a little lower than the angels, of Heb 2:9, takes place in the incarnate humiliation.
By inheritance From an undying Father.
Name Rather, dignity embraced in the name of Son. It was by power of his eternal inheritance (Heb 1:2) as Son that he passed through the humiliation of the incarnation, and attained an incarnate exaltation above angelic rank.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
‘Having become by so much better than the angels, as he has inherited a more excellent name than they.’
Furthermore in His exaltation He, as man, ‘has become’ (contrast ‘being’ – Heb 1:2) superior to the angelic realm (see Heb 2:6-9). He has received superiority (kreitton) in status and power above the angels as a result, being raised far above all (Eph 1:19-22), something which will now be shown from Scripture. This was important. The Jews saw the Law as having been ministered by angels (Heb 2:2; Gal 3:19), and as therefore superior. They saw it as something which gave it its supernatural aura (see also Deu 33:2; Psa 68:17; Act 7:53).
This idea of Messiah’s exaltation above the angels is also found in the Rabbinical writings. For example, commenting on Isa 52:13, they wrote ‘he shall be exalted beyond Abraham, and extolled beyond Moses, and raised high above the ministering angels’. He was to be supreme.
Angels had an important place among both orthodox (e.g. the Pharisees) and unorthodox (the Essenes, etc.) Jews, as well as in the Gentile world (Col 2:18). They were seen as intermediaries and mediators, maintaining the separation of the awesome holiness of God from men. They were those through Whom God acted because He Himself was unapproachable. Others considered that there were hierarchies of them between God as pure spirit, and man as unworthy flesh, a descending order with a gradual lessening of deity as the lower ‘angels’ became less spirit-like. Through them men received ‘knowledge’ about God. Their mediation was seen as essential so that they had even been introduced into the idea of God’s dealings with Moses. In their view it had to be so. Thus the thought that Jesus as the Christ (Messiah) was in direct touch with God and reigned with Him as representative Man was awesome. It was a revelation of the fact that even in His Manhood He was superior to the angels. Who then, the writer will ask, could sensibly and rightly seek to come to God through angels, when a greater than the angels, Who is directly approachable, is here?
That Jesus Christ is already seen in His essential deity to be superior is first confirmed by the fact that the One Who came is called ‘Son’, that is, among other things, the One Who is over the house instead of just being in it (Heb 3:6), the One Who has unique rights of intimate relationship. However, the writer now describes Him as also ‘having become so’ in His manhood as a result of inheriting a ‘more excellent’ name. He will then go on to describe other indications of His superiority to the angels from Scripture.
‘Having become.’ Note the contrast with ‘being’ (Heb 1:3 a). What is described in Heb 1:3 is His essential being, what is described here is what He ‘became’ as man in the purposes of God, ‘so much better than the angels’.
‘As he has inherited (come into possession of) a more excellent name than they.’ And this is because He ‘has inherited’, perfect tense, ‘has inherited and still possesses’, ‘a more excellent name.’ In view of the following quotations where it is continually mentioned, it would appear that that more excellent name is the title ‘Son’. Although it may be that we should not lay the emphasis on a particular name, but on the significance of ‘name’ which indicates status. Thus the more excellent name also has in mind His exaltation in His manhood as ‘Lord and Christ’ (Yahweh and Messiah) which goes with the idea of His sonship (Act 2:34-36; Php 2:9-11 compare Eph 2:20-22). For ‘the name’ refers to what a person actually is. As the appointed heir of all things (Heb 1:2) He Who was already the outshining of the glory of God has now ‘inherited’ in His manhood that exalted status as the Son, the anointed Christ, the receiving Heir. He receives in practise what was already His.
So in these verses the writer has laid bare the full truth about Jesus Christ; His eternal Being (Heb 1:2), His being able fully to reveal the Father (Heb 1:2), His being appointed before time began to bring the world to Himself (Heb 1:3), His creative and sustaining power and activity (Heb 1:3), His becoming man and dying for our sin (Heb 1:3), His rising and being exalted in His manhood by taking His seat at ‘at God’s right hand’ (Heb 1:3), and His receipt as man of the name of ‘Son’ as both ‘Lord’ (Yahweh) and ‘Christ’ (Messiah) (Heb 1:4).
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
A comparison between Christ and the angels:
v. 4. Being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they.
v. 5. For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art My Son; this day have I begotten Thee? And again, I will be to Him a father, and he shall be to Me a Son?
v. 6. And again, when He bringeth in the First-begotten into the world, he saith, And let all the angels of God worship Him.
v. 7. And of the angels he saith, Who maketh His angels spirits and His ministers a flame of fire.
v. 8. But unto the Son he saith, Thy throne, O God, is forever and ever; a scepter of righteousness is the scepter of thy kingdom.
v. 9. Thou hast loved righteousness and hated iniquity; therefore God, even Thy God, hath anointed Thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows.
v. 10. And, Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth; and the heavens are the works of Thine hands.
v. 11. They shall perish, but Thou remainest; and they all shall wax old as doth a garment,
v. 12. and as a vesture shalt Thou fold them up, and they shall be changed; but Thou art the same, and thy years shall not fail.
v. 13. But to which of the angels said he at any time, Sit on My right hand, until I make Thine enemies Thy footstool?
v. 14. Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to minister for them who shall be heirs of salvation?
Having begun with the object of establishing the superiority of Christ over all created beings in the entire universe, the sacred writer takes occasion to show, first of all, the immeasurable excellence of our Lord when compared with the finest of all creatures, with the good angels: Having become so much superior to the angels as He has obtained (by inheritance a more excellent name than they. The divine excellence of Christ’s exalted position corresponds to the superiority of the names which are applied to Him in Scriptures, the latter indicating at once that a real comparison between the divine Christ and the created angels is not to be thought of, since Jesus belongs in a class all by Himself.
The statement as to the divine names given to Christ the author now corroborates by a reference to Scriptures: For to which of the angels did God ever say, My Son art Thou; this day have I begotten Thee? And again, I shall be to Him for a Father, and He shall be to Me for a Son? The words of Psa 2:7 are a part of a Messianic prophecy, and are therefore addressed, not to any angel, but to the eternal Son of God, whose incarnation in no manner changed His divine essence. The Messiah Himself, prophesying of the days of the coming dispensation, asserts that the Father applied these words to Him. The words of the second passage quoted are not to be referred, as Luther shows, to 1Ch 22:10, but to 2Sa 7:14, where God Himself, in speaking to David, gives him the promise that his great Descendant, whose kingdom would be established forever, would be the Messiah Himself. The Son of God, however, begotten out of the essence of the Father from eternity, is Himself true and eternal God. See Mat 4:17; Mat 17:5; Joh 5:17-39.
But not only the divine names ascribed to Christ in Scripture establish the fact of His deity and therefore His immeasurable superiority over the angels, but also the fact that the latter are directly commanded to give honor and homage to Him as that due to God Himself: And again, when He introduces the Firstborn into the world, He says, And let all the angels of God worship Him. The Greek text may also be rendered: But when He brings again the First-born into the world. The title “Son” is reserved for Jesus the Messiah, as the writer has shown, and this Son, the First-born of the Father, the angels of God are to worship. The time to which he refers, when Christ was introduced to the habitable world, or will be introduced to the inhabitants of the world for the second time, is either that of the resurrection of Christ, or, more probably, that of Christ’s second advent, His coming to Judgment. With regard to this event the sacred writer quotes an Old Testament prophecy, not that of Deu 32:43, but of Psa 97:7, where the majesty of the exalted Christ is pictured. All the angels of God, who are in this instance called gods in the Hebrew text, as being creatures of great power and authority, should nevertheless bow down in worship before Him; surely an overwhelming proof of His deity.
The same fact is brought out by the inspired author by means of a second comparison: With regard to the angels indeed He says, Who makes His angels spirits and His ministers flames of fire; but with regard to the Son, Thy throne, O God, is forever and ever, and a scepter of uprightness is the scepter of Thy kingdom. Thou hast loved righteousness and hated lawlessness; for that reason God, Thy God, has anointed Thee with the oil of gladness beyond Thy comrades. The angels indeed are messengers and servants of God; He uses them to produce unusual disturbances in nature; they are present in storms and lightnings, whether these are sent as righteous judgments and punishments of God or merely as indications of His almighty power, Joh 5:4; 2Sa 24:16-17; Psa 78:48. The characteristic functions of the angels, according to the passage referred to, Psa 104:4, consist in serving the Lord, and their form and appearance at such a time depend upon the will of their Master. In the great majority of cases, undoubtedly, the angels carry out their work in their proper, invisible nature: but the Lord often has a reason for making them visible, as men, as lightnings, and in other forms spoken of in Scripture. Powerful and mighty the angels were, as many examples illustrate, and yet they were only servants of God, whose rights and powers were strictly circumscribed, since they are dependent entirely upon their Master above.
In contrast to these qualities those ascribed to the Son stand out all the more prominently age to which the sacred writer has reference is Psa 45:6-7. There the Messiah, Jesus Christ, is addressed in words which fully describe His majesty and power as true God with the Father. As true God, His throne is one that is established to the age of the age, to all eternity. The conception of eternity is here brought out in the strongest possible way, the author ascribing to Jesus Christ the divine quality of eternity Having a throne, being entrusted with a rule, the Messiah wields a scepter of uprightness; all His judgments are right and just. It is characteristic of Him, therefore, that He has loved righteousness and hated lawlessness, both qualities fitting Him to be the Ruler of the universe. Whether the scene described is that of a wedding-feast or of the coronation of a king, it is clear, at least, that the Messiah, Jesus Christ, is said to have been anointed with the oil of rejoicing beyond His companions or fellows. The prophets, priests, and kings of the Old Testament were indeed also anointed, but only with perishable oil and for a short term of service. But the Messiah was anointed by the almighty God Himself with the oil of gladness and rejoicing, with the gifts and powers of the Holy Spirit, which are ever intended to bring true and lasting happiness to the hearts of all believers, here in time and hereafter in eternity. Jesus is the true Prophet, High Priest, and King, to whom all the types and examples of the Old Testament point forward.
And still another passage is quoted in support of the deity of Christ: Thou, O Lord, from the beginning didst found the earth, and works of Thy hands are the heavens; they will perish, but Thou wilt endure, and all as a garment will grow old, and like a mantle Thou milt roll them up, and they will be changed. Thou, however, art the same, and Thy years have no end. Even in Old Testament times the psalm from which this passage was taken, Psa 102:12, was considered a prophecy concerning the Messiah, and here the sacred writer substantiates this view by applying the words to Christ. It is Christ who, with the Father, created the world, laying the foundations of the earth: He made also the heavens and put them in their place. And He, the almighty and eternal Creator, will remain, even when the heavens and all creatures become old and perish, when the heavens will be dissolved in fire, and the elements melt with fervent heat, 2Pe 3:12-13. They will be rolled together and exchanged like a dress, a veil, or a mantle, and the old heavens and the old earth will be known no more. Only He, true God from eternity and to eternity, remains unchanged, and His years will never come to an end. Jesus Christ is not, like the angels, a mere servant of God; neither are His kingdom, office, power, and glory circumscribed, evanescent, temporary, as the works of the angels are: everlasting, all-powerful, unchangeable He stands, elevated above all the petty things of this world, true God forever
And still another verse of Scripture the inspired author quotes: But to which of the angels has He ever said. Sit at My right hand, till I make Thine enemies a footstool for Thy feet? These words God addressed in the prophecy to the Messiah, Psa 110:1, Jesus Himself using the argument against the Pharisees, Mat 22:41-46, See Act 2:34-36; 1Co 15:25 The sitting at the right hand of God is described explicitly Eph 1:20-23, and there also plainly ascribed to Jesus Christ in His state of exaltation. The final complete supremacy of Christ was prophesied of old and is being fulfilled at this time, in His person, not in that of any angel. The status of the latter, as compared with that of Jesus, is briefly and clearly described: Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth for the sake (in behalf) of those who are to obtain salvation? The angels are ministers; they render services to God and to men; they are used by God especially in behalf of those that are to inherit salvation, the believers in Christ. That is the destiny of those that place their trust in Jesus as their Savior, the inheritance of the blessings of heaven. And that is one of their distinctions, that they have the angels, the spirits of light, as their servants under the direction of God. It is a thought which is often overlooked by us, but which should be a source of great comfort to us at all times. At the same time, however, this position and state of service, which the angels occupy, is a definite and unassailable proof for the superiority of the Messiah, Jesus Christ, true God with the Father and the Holy Ghost.
Summary
The author shows that the perfect revelation of the ages was made in the person of Jesus Christ, true God and man, who is immensely superior to the angels, mighty spirits though they are, substantiating his arguments with many passages from the Old Testament.
Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann
Heb 1:4. Being made so much better than the angels, Being made so much superior to, or more excellent than the angels, by how much he hath obtained a more excellent name than they. The word , signifies to obtain, or be in possession of; without taking in the notion of inheritance. See on Heb 1:2. Christ is called the Son of God; a name, which implies peculiar love and affection in the parent, and superiority over the family in which he is. Christ, therefore, as being the only-begotten Son of God, is infinitely superior to angels, and is vested with an authority which they are of course destitute of; and has a right and title to dominion, to which they have no pretension; nor is any one of them ever dignified with that name. Some consider this as immediately referring to Christ’s authority and dignity, as Mediator; with which he was invested, when he sat down on the right-hand of glory after his resurrection.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Heb 1:4 . The author has first, Heb 1:1-3 , instituted a parallel between the mediators of the Old Testament revelations in general or in pleno , and the Mediator of the Christian revelation. But among the revelations of God under the Old Covenant, none attained in point of glory to the Mosaic; inasmuch as this was given not only through the medium of a man enlightened by the Spirit of God, i.e. by one of the , mentioned Heb 1:1 , but, according to the universal Jewish belief ( vid. ad ii. 2), was given by the instrumentality not only of Moses, but also of angels. As, therefore, the author has maintained the superiority of Christ, as the Son of God, over the , so is he now naturally further led to show the superiority of Christ over the angels also. This is done in the declaration, Heb 1:4 , which in a grammatical sense is closely connected with that which precedes, and serves for the completing of the description of Christ’s characteristic qualifications; at the same time, however, logically regarded, affords the theme for the following disquisition, which constitutes the first section of the epistle (Heb 1:5 to Heb 2:18 ).
The supposition of Tholuck, that the addition of Heb 1:4 “has an independent object,” i.e. is occasioned by polemic reference to the opinion spread abroad among the Jews, in addition to other conceptions with regard to the person of the Messiah, that He was an intermediate spirit or angel, [32] is entirely erroneous. It finds no countenance whatever in the reasoning of the author, and is opposed to the whole scope of the epistle, that of showing in detail the inferiority of the Old Covenant as compared with the New, and of influencing in a corresponding manner the conduct of the readers.
The oratorical formula of comparison: , which recurs Heb 7:20-22 , Heb 8:6 , Heb 10:25 , is found likewise with Philo, but never with Paul.
] better , or more excellent, namely, in power, dignity, and exaltedness; comp. Heb 7:19 ; Heb 7:22 , Heb 8:6 , Heb 9:23 , Heb 10:34 , Heb 11:16 ; Heb 11:35 ; Heb 11:40 , Heb 12:24 .
] marks the having begun to be in time, whereas , Heb 1:3 , expressed the timeless eternal existence. did Christ become just at that time when, having accomplished the work of redemption, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high. The thus closely attaches itself to the , Heb 1:3 , and is more fully explained by the fact that Christ, by virtue of His incarnation, and so long as He dwelt on earth, was made lower than the angels; comp. Heb 2:7 ; Heb 2:9 .
The comparative , found in the N. T. only here and Heb 8:6 , serves, since even the positive would have sufficed for the indication of the superiority, for the more emphatic accentuating of the signification of the word. The opinion of Hofmann, that the comparative is chosen because the name is in itself an , when the author contrasts the spirits of God with men living in the flesh, is quite remote from the idea of the passage.
] after a comparative is very common in our epistle; cf. Heb 3:3 , Heb 9:23 , Heb 11:4 , Heb 12:24 . Comp. also Luk 3:13 ; Luk 3 Esdr. 4:35; Thucyd. i. 4:23: , ; Herod. 7. 103; Winer, Gramm. , 7 Aufl. p. 225. With Paul it never occurs. Similar is with the accusative, Heb 4:12 ; Luk 16:8 .
] must not, with Beza, Calov, Wittich, Storr, Valckenaer, Zachariae, Heinrichs, be altered into the notion of “dignity.” For this never signifies in itself, and its substitution would in our passage, in relation to , bring about only a tautology. The name of pre-eminence above the angels, which Christ has obtained as an inheritance, is the name , Son of God, comp. Heb 1:5 and Heb 1:1 , while the angels by their name are characterized only as messengers and servants of God. Contrary to the context, Delitzsch says: the name suffices not to express the thought in connection with . The supra-angelic name, to which the author refers, lies beyond the notionally separating and sundering language of men. It is the heavenly total-name of the Exalted One, His , nomen explicitum , which in this world has entered into no human heart, and can be uttered by no human tongue, the , Rev 19:12 . The following words of Scripture are, he supposes, only upward pointing signs, which call forth in us some foreboding as to how glorious He is. But this is opposed to the connection. For even though it be true, as advanced by Delitzsch in support of his view, that in the following O. T. passages there occur also, in addition to , the wider appellations and ; yet, on the other hand, not merely , Heb 1:1 , as likewise Heb 1:5 with its proof-giving , but also the antithesis and , Heb 1:7-8 , shows that is the main conception, to which the words of address: and , Heb 1:8 ; Heb 1:10 , stand in the relation of subordination, inasmuch as they are already contained in this very idea of Son.
The perfect , however, not the aorist , is employed by the author; because Christ did not first obtain this name at the time of the ., Heb 1:3 , but had already as pre-existing Logos obtained it as an abiding portion and possession. We have not, in connection with , to think “quite in general of the O. T. time, in which the future Messiah received in the Word of God the name of Son,” as is asserted by Riehm (Lehrbegr. des Hebrerbr. p. 274), whose statement is endorsed by E. Woerner. [33] For this view is contradicted by the , Heb 1:2 , in its relation to , Heb 1:1 , according to which Christ already existed as the Son before all time. The declarations of Heb 1:5 , which Riehm has urged in favour of the construction put by him on our passage, have only the object of affording vouchers for a condition of things already existing.
The difficulty raised, for the rest, that the name of Son is here insisted on as a distinguishing characteristic of Christ, while, nevertheless, in single passages of the O. T. (Job 1:6 ; Job 2:1 ; Job 38:7 ; Gen 6:2 ; Gen 6:4 ; Psa 29:1 ; Psa 89:7 ; Dan 3:25 ), angels too are called sons of God, is already disposed of by the reflection that this is not the characteristic name for the angels as such. There is no need, therefore, of the justification of the author made by Bleek, that this writer, since he was not at home in the Hebrew text of the O. T., but only in the Alexandrine version thereof, which latter freely renders the majority of those passages by , may easily have overlooked, or perhaps have otherwise interpreted, those passages in which the literal translation is found in the LXX. (Psa 29:1 ; Psa 89:7 [Gen 6:2 ; Gen 6:4 ?]).
[32] That the defective view with regard to Christ, which saw in Him only an angel, must have called for rectification, has likewise been thought probable by Schneckenburger, who sought further to confirm this probability. Comp. the “Observations on the Epistle to the Hebrews,” contributed by Riehm from Schneckenburger’s remains, in the Theol. Stud. u. Krit . 1861, H. 3, p. 544 ff.
[33] Der Brief St. Pauli an die Hebrer , Ludwigsb. 1876.
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
(4) Being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they. (5) For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art my son, this day have I begotten thee? And again, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son? (6) And again, when he bringeth in the first begotten into the world, he saith, And let all the angels of God worship him. (7) And of the angels he saith, Who maketh his angels spirits, and his ministers a flame of fire.
We shall have occasion in the next Chapter, somewhat more particularly to treat of the nature of Angels, when we come to speak of the Son of God, passing by the nature of Angels, to take upon him the seed of Abraham. I therefore for the present pass it by, with only just observing, that the superiority of the Son of God in our Nature, God and Man, to that of Angels is evident, from every part of scripture, and with the most decided testimony. A few of the prominent points, in this Chapter, explained by other portions in the word of God, will set this matter in a clear light.
First. It is here said, that he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they: that is, than Angels. Now by inheritance, it should be observed, that as Son of God, one with the Father over all God blessed forever; his inheritance is his, by right, and not acquired, or given. But as heir of all things to which he is appointed as God-Man-Mediator, here in this sense, he hath obtained this dignity, and which is infinitely above all Angels. His Godhead confers to his human nature a dignity, infinitely superior to Angels. For such things can never he spoken of them; neither can any of them be called heir of all things.
Secondly. We not only hear God’s command issuing from the throne, when he bringeth in the first begotten into the world, or Angels to worship him; but we have on scripture record, an account of their adoration of Christ, as God-Man-Mediator. Isaiah the Prophet hath given the relation of a vision, which he saw of the kind. And that there might be no misapprehension concerning whose glory it was. John the Apostle declared the glory the prophet saw, was the glory of Christ. Compare Isa 6:1 with Joh 12:41 . And we have another account to the same purport, Rev 5:11-13 .
Thirdly. Christ is expressly declared to be, not only the Creator of all things, visible, and invisible; whether thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers; but he is said to be the head of them, and they are all subject unto him. Compare Col 1:16 with 1Pe 3:22 . So that they are his ministering servants; and, as the several principles of fire and lightening, and winds; and tempests, are directed by Him, in their agency: so it is said, that he maketh his angels spirits, and his ministers a flame of fire.
And all these things are said in a way, so immediately directed for the exaltation of Christ, in opposition to Angels; that it is demanded by way of question, When, or where, are Angels so distinguished? To which of the Angels, (said the Lord) at any time; Thou art my Son: this day have I begotten thee? To which the answer must be, yea, and is implied in the very question: to none of them! Of whom among them did ever God say, I will to him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son? To not a single creature of them. So that while God is the head of dominion to Angels; in Christ alone, is he united by nature. And therefore Christ is by so much better than the Angels, in that he hath, as God an inheritance of his own, underived; and as God-Man, an obtained inheritance, as being appointed heir of all things. See Heb 2 throughout.
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
4 Being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they.
Ver. 4. Better than the angels ] Therefore is his doctrine, the gospel, with more heed to be heard, than the law ordained by angels in the hand of a mediator, that is, Moses, Gal 3:19 .
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
4 .] having become ( , distinct from Heb 1:3 ; that, importing His essential, this, His superinduced state. This is denied by Chrys. ( , , ), Thl. (but not very clearly: ), Estius (“Significatur tum Christum angelis majorem effectum, i. e. excrevisse super angelos in hominum estimatione et fide, postquam cpit sedere ad dexteram Dei”): but they certainly are wrong. For we are now, in the course of the enunciation, which has advanced to the main subject of the argument, the proving of the superiority of the New Covenant, treating of the post-incarnate majesty of the Son of God. He WAS all that has been detailed in Heb 1:3 ; He made purification of sins, and sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high, and thus BECAME this which is now spoken of. This is recognized by Thdrt., but in a form not strictly exact: . , . , . (ch. Heb 2:9 ). , , , . To this Bleek very properly objects, that the making this exaltation belong only to Christ’s human nature, and supposing Him to have while on earth possessed still the fulness of the majesty of his Godhead, is not according to the usage of our Writer, nor of the N. T. generally, and in fact induces something like a double personality in the Son of God. The Scriptures teach us, that He who was with God before the creation, from love to men put on flesh, and took the form of a servant, not all the while having on Him the whole fulness of his divine nature and divine glory, but having really and actually emptied himself of this fulness and glory, so that there was not only a hiding, but an absolute , a putting off, of it. Therefore His subsequent exaltation must be conceived of as belonging, not to his Humanity only, but to the entire undivided Person of Christ, now resuming the fulness and glory of the Godhead ( Joh 17:5 ), and in addition to this having taken into the Godhead the Manhood, now glorified by his obedience, atonement, and victory. See Eph 1:20-22 ; Phi 2:6-9 ; Act 2:36 ; 1Pe 3:21-22 . cumenius, as an alternative, has given this well: , , , . The Son of God before his Incarnation was Head over Creation; but after his work in the flesh He had become also Head of Creation, inasmuch as his glorified Body, in which He triumphs sitting at God’s right hand, is itself created, and is the sum and the centre of creation) so much (reff. Bleek cites from Philo, , . Leg. ad Cai. 36, vol. ii. p. 586. In the classics, the idiom is common enough: see Palm and Rost’s Lex. It is wholly unknown to the writings of St. Paul) better than (the usual word of general and indefinite comparison in our Epistle, whether of Christian with Jewish (ch. Heb 7:19 ; Heb 7:22 ; Heb 8:6 ; Heb 9:23 ), heavenly with earthly (Heb 10:34 ; Heb 11:16 ; Heb 12:24 ), eternal with temporal ( Heb 11:35 ): see also Heb 6:9 ; Heb 7:7 ; Heb 11:40 . It is used only three times by St. Paul, and never (unless 1Co 12:31 rec. be counted) in this sense: but thirteen times in this Epistle. “The Greeks used , to signify superhuman beings, gods and demi-gods,” Bl. So on , sch. fragm. tn. 2, Hesych. says, . . See also Eurip. Orest. 709: Plato, Sophist. p. 216 (cir. init.): and Philo above) the angels (of God: the heavenly created beings; afterwards, Heb 1:14 , called . All attempts to evade this plain meaning are futile; and proceed on ignorance of the argument of our Epistle, and of the Jewish theology: see some such noticed in Bleek.
But why should the angels be here brought in? and why should the superiority of the Incarnate Son of God to them be so insisted on and elaborated? Bl. gives a very insufficient reason, when he says that the mention of God’s throne brought to the Writer’s mind the angels who are the attendants there. The reason, as Ebrard remarks, lies far deeper. The whole O. T. dispensation is related to the N. T. dispensation, as the angels to the Son. In the former, mankind, and Israel also, stands separated from God by sin; and angels, divine messengers (cf. “the angel of the covenant”), stand as mediators between man and God. And of these there is, so to speak, a chain of two links: viz. Moses, and the angel of the Lord. The first link is a mere man, who is raised above his fellow-men by his calling, by his office, the commission given to him, and brought nearer to God; but he is a sinner as they are, and is in reality no more a partaker of the divine nature than they are. The second link is the angelic form in which God revealed himself to his people, coming down to their capacity, like to man, without being man. So that Godhead and Manhood approximated to one another; a man was commissioned and enabled to hear God’s words: God appeared in a form in which men might see Him: but the two found no point of contact; no real union of the Godhead and the Manhood took place. Whereas in the Son, God and the Manhood not only approximated, but became personally one. God no longer accommodates Himself to the capacities of men in an angelophany or theophany, but has revealed the fulness of His divine nature in the man Jesus, in that He, who was the of His glory, became man. The argument of the Writer necessarily then leads him to shew how both Mediators, the angel of the O. T. covenant, and Moses, found their higher unity in Christ. First, he shews this of the angel or angels (for it was not always one individual angelic being, but various) by whom the first covenant was given: then of Moses, ch. Heb 3:4 . This first portion is divided into two: Heb 1:4-14 , in which he shews that the Son, as the eternal Son of God, is higher than the angels (see the connexion of this with the main argument below): then, after an exhortation ( Heb 2:1-4 ) founded on this, tending also to impress on us the superior holiness of the N. T. revelation, the second part ( Heb 2:5-18 ) in which he shews that in the Son, the manhood also is exalted above the angels (mostly from Ebrard)), in proportion as (see above) he hath inherited (as his own ( ): the word being perhaps chosen in reference to the O. T. prophecies, which promised it to Him: see below. The perfect is important, as denoting something belonging to His present and abiding state, not an event wholly past, as above, indicating the first ‘setting himself down:’ though that word might also be used of a permanent state of session, as in , ch. Heb 12:2 ) a more distinguished (or more excellent , as E. V. This sense of is confined to later writers, as Polybius and Plutarch: e. g. Polyb. vi. 23. 7, ( ) . So also Symm. in reff. The comparative is found only, besides ref., in Sextus Empir. Phys. i. 218, . For the construction, see below on ) name (to be taken in its proper sense, not understood, with Beza, Calov., al., to mean precedence or dignity; as Heb 1:5 shews: whence also we get an easy answer to the enquiry, what name is intended: viz. that of , in the peculiar and individual sense of the citation there. The angels themselves are called “ sons of God ,” Job 1:6 ; Job 2:1 ; Job 38:7 ; Dan 3:25 , and Gen 6:2 (notwithstanding Ebrard’s denial of this sense: see Delitzsch in loc., Jud 1:6 , note, and Proleg. to Jude, Heb 1:11 ); but the argument here is, that the title ‘SON OF GOD’ is bestowed on Him individually, in a sense in which it never was conferred upon an angel. This view is far more probable than that of Bleek, who thinks that the Writer used only the LXX, in which stands in all these places except Gen 6:2 , and there in the alex. MS. and Philo: and that he interpreted Psa 28:1 ; Psa 88:6 , of other than the angels. To say nothing of priori considerations, the canon to be followed in such cases is clearly never to suppose partial knowledge in a sacred writer, except where the nature of the case compels us in common honesty so to do: and here that canon is not applicable. See as a parallel, Phi 2:9 ff. Still it must be remembered, as Delitzsch beautifully remarks, that the fulness of glory of the peculiar name of the Son of God is unattainable by human speech or thought: it is, Rev 19:12 , an . And all the citations and appellations here are but fragmentary indications of portions of its glory: are but beams of light, which are united in it as in a central sun. Der uberengelische Name selber, den der aus dem Wege der Geschichte zu Gottes Thron Emporsteigende aus immer zu eigen bekommen, hegt jenseit der begrifflich zersplitternden Sprache der Menschen. Die folgenden Schriftworte find nur wie auswarts weisende Finger-zeige, die uns ahnen lassen, wie herrlich er ist .
Since when has Christ in this sense inherited this name? The answer must not be hastily made, as by some Commentators, that implies the glorification of the humanity of Christ to that Sonship which He before had in virtue of his Deity: e. g. c. (altern.): , , , . ; , , . Evidently so partial a reference cannot be considered as exhausting the sense of the Writer. Nor again can we say that it was at the time of His incarnation, though the words of the angel in Luk 1:35 , , seem to favour such a reference: for it was especially at His incarnation, that He was made a little lower than the angels , ch. Heb 2:9 . Rather would the sense seem to be, that the especial name of SON, belonging to Him not by ascription nor adoption, but by his very Being itself, has been ever, and is now, His: inherited by Him, “qu ,” as Chrys. says: the O. T. declarations being as it were portions of the instrument by which this inheritance is assured to Him, and by the citation of which it is proved. Observe, that the is not identical with the , but in proportion to it: the triumphant issue of his Mediation is consonant to the glorious name, which is His by inheritance: but which, in the fulness of its present inconceivable glory (see above), has been put on and taken up by Him in the historical process of his mediatorial humiliation and triumph) than (this construction of a comparative with is never found in St. Paul (Rom 14:5 , is a somewhat doubtful exception, and occurs 1Co 3:11 ), but often in this Epistle; and once in St. Luke (reff.). It occurs in Esdr. 4:35, . : and in Thuc. i. 23: Herod. vii. 103) they .
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
Heb 1:4 to Heb 2:18 . The Son and the Angels . Heb 1:4 , although forming part of the sentence 1 3, introduces a subject which continues to be more or less in view throughout chaps 1 and 2. The exaltation of the Mediator to the right hand of Sovereignty is in keeping with His designation as Son, a designation which marked Him out as superior to the angels. Proof is adduced from the O.T. To this proof, in accordance with the writer’s manner, a resulting admonition is attached, Heb 2:1-4 . And the remainder of chap. 2 is occupied with an explanation of the reasonableness of the incarnation and the suffering it involved; or, in other words, it is explained why if Christ is really greater than the angels, He had to be made a little lower than they.
“having become as much superior to the angels as He has obtained a more excellent name than they”. The form of comparison here used, . is found also, Heb 7:20-22 , Heb 8:6 , Heb 10:25 ; also in Philo. is one of the words most necessary in an Epistle in which comparison is never out of sight. The Son became ( ) greater than the angels in virtue of taking His seat at God’s right hand. This exaltation was the result of His earthly work. It is as Mediator of the new revelation, who has cleansed the sinful by His death, that He assumes supremacy. And this is in keeping with and in fulfilment of His obtaining the name of Son. This name , He has obtained, not “von Anfang an” as Bleek and others say, but as Riehm points out, in the O.T. The Messiah, then future, was spoken of as Son; and therefore to the O.T. reference is at once made in proof. The Messianic Sonship no doubt rests upon the Eternal Sonship, but it is not the latter but the former that is here in view.
In support of this statement the writer adduces an abundance of evidence, no fewer than seven passages being cited from the O.T. Before considering these, two preliminary objections may first be removed. (1) To us nothing may seem less in need of proof than that Christ who has indelibly impressed Himself on mankind is superior to the angels who are little more than a picturesque adornment of earthly life. But when this writer lived the angels may be said to have been in possession, whereas Christ had yet to win His inheritance. Moreover, as Schoettgen shows (p. 905) it was usual and needful to make good the proposition, “Messias major est Patriarchis, Mose, et Angelis ministerialibus”. Prof. Odgers, too, has shown ( Proceedings of Soc. of Hist. Theol. , 1895 6) that quite possibly the writer had in view some Jewish Gnostics who believed that Christ Himself belonged to the angelic creation and had, with the angels, a fluid personality and no proper human nature. In any case it was worth the writer’s while to carry home to the conviction of his contemporaries that a mediation accomplished by one who was tempted and suffered and wrought righteousness, a mediation of an ethical and spiritual kind, must supersede a mediation accomplished by physical marvels and angelic ministries. (2) The passages cited from the Old Testament in proof of Christ’s superiority although their immediate historical application is disregarded, are confidently adduced in accordance with the universal use of Scripture in the writer’s time. But it must not be supposed that these passages are culled at random. With all his contemporaries this writer believed that where statements were made of an Israelitish king or other official in an ideal form not presently realised in those directly addressed or spoken of, these were considered to be Messianic, that is to say, destined to find their fulfilment and realisation in the Messiah. These interpretations of Scripture were the inevitable result of faith in God. The people were sure that God would somehow and at some time fulfil the utmost of His promise.
The first two quotations (Heb 1:5 ) illustrate the giving of the more excellent name; the remaining quotations exhibit the superiority of the Son to angels, or more definitely the supreme rule and imperishable nature of the Son, in contrast to the perishable nature and servile function of the angels.
Fuente: The Expositors Greek Testament by Robertson
Being made = Having become.
hath . . . obtained = hath inherited. more excellent. Greek. diaphoros. See Rom 12:6.
name. Compare Act 2:21; Act 3:16. Isa 9:6.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
4.] having become (, distinct from Heb 1:3; that, importing His essential, this, His superinduced state. This is denied by Chrys. ( , , ), Thl. (but not very clearly: ), Estius (Significatur tum Christum angelis majorem effectum, i. e. excrevisse super angelos in hominum estimatione et fide, postquam cpit sedere ad dexteram Dei): but they certainly are wrong. For we are now, in the course of the enunciation,-which has advanced to the main subject of the argument, the proving of the superiority of the New Covenant,-treating of the post-incarnate majesty of the Son of God. He WAS all that has been detailed in Heb 1:3; He made purification of sins, and sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high, and thus BECAME this which is now spoken of. This is recognized by Thdrt., but in a form not strictly exact: . , . , . (ch. Heb 2:9). , , , . To this Bleek very properly objects, that the making this exaltation belong only to Christs human nature, and supposing Him to have while on earth possessed still the fulness of the majesty of his Godhead, is not according to the usage of our Writer, nor of the N. T. generally, and in fact induces something like a double personality in the Son of God. The Scriptures teach us, that He who was with God before the creation, from love to men put on flesh, and took the form of a servant, not all the while having on Him the whole fulness of his divine nature and divine glory, but having really and actually emptied himself of this fulness and glory, so that there was not only a hiding, but an absolute , a putting off, of it. Therefore His subsequent exaltation must be conceived of as belonging, not to his Humanity only, but to the entire undivided Person of Christ, now resuming the fulness and glory of the Godhead (Joh 17:5), and in addition to this having taken into the Godhead the Manhood, now glorified by his obedience, atonement, and victory. See Eph 1:20-22; Php 2:6-9; Act 2:36; 1Pe 3:21-22. cumenius, as an alternative, has given this well: , , , . The Son of God before his Incarnation was Head over Creation; but after his work in the flesh He had become also Head of Creation, inasmuch as his glorified Body, in which He triumphs sitting at Gods right hand, is itself created, and is the sum and the centre of creation) so much (reff. Bleek cites from Philo, , . Leg. ad Cai. 36, vol. ii. p. 586. In the classics, the idiom is common enough: see Palm and Rosts Lex. It is wholly unknown to the writings of St. Paul) better than (the usual word of general and indefinite comparison in our Epistle, whether of Christian with Jewish (ch. Heb 7:19; Heb 7:22; Heb 8:6; Heb 9:23), heavenly with earthly (Heb 10:34; Heb 11:16; Heb 12:24), eternal with temporal (Heb 11:35): see also Heb 6:9; Heb 7:7; Heb 11:40. It is used only three times by St. Paul, and never (unless 1Co 12:31 rec. be counted) in this sense: but thirteen times in this Epistle. The Greeks used , to signify superhuman beings, gods and demi-gods, Bl. So on , sch. fragm. tn. 2, Hesych. says, . . See also Eurip. Orest. 709: Plato, Sophist. p. 216 (cir. init.): and Philo above) the angels (of God: the heavenly created beings; afterwards, Heb 1:14, called . All attempts to evade this plain meaning are futile; and proceed on ignorance of the argument of our Epistle, and of the Jewish theology: see some such noticed in Bleek.
But why should the angels be here brought in? and why should the superiority of the Incarnate Son of God to them be so insisted on and elaborated? Bl. gives a very insufficient reason, when he says that the mention of Gods throne brought to the Writers mind the angels who are the attendants there. The reason, as Ebrard remarks, lies far deeper. The whole O. T. dispensation is related to the N. T. dispensation, as the angels to the Son. In the former, mankind, and Israel also, stands separated from God by sin; and angels, divine messengers (cf. the angel of the covenant), stand as mediators between man and God. And of these there is, so to speak, a chain of two links: viz. Moses, and the angel of the Lord. The first link is a mere man, who is raised above his fellow-men by his calling, by his office, the commission given to him,-and brought nearer to God; but he is a sinner as they are, and is in reality no more a partaker of the divine nature than they are. The second link is the angelic form in which God revealed himself to his people, coming down to their capacity, like to man, without being man. So that Godhead and Manhood approximated to one another; a man was commissioned and enabled to hear Gods words: God appeared in a form in which men might see Him: but the two found no point of contact; no real union of the Godhead and the Manhood took place. Whereas in the Son, God and the Manhood not only approximated, but became personally one. God no longer accommodates Himself to the capacities of men in an angelophany or theophany, but has revealed the fulness of His divine nature in the man Jesus,-in that He, who was the of His glory, became man. The argument of the Writer necessarily then leads him to shew how both Mediators, the angel of the O. T. covenant, and Moses, found their higher unity in Christ. First, he shews this of the angel or angels (for it was not always one individual angelic being, but various) by whom the first covenant was given: then of Moses, ch. Heb 3:4. This first portion is divided into two: Heb 1:4-14, in which he shews that the Son, as the eternal Son of God, is higher than the angels (see the connexion of this with the main argument below): then, after an exhortation (Heb 2:1-4) founded on this, tending also to impress on us the superior holiness of the N. T. revelation, the second part (Heb 2:5-18) in which he shews that in the Son, the manhood also is exalted above the angels (mostly from Ebrard)), in proportion as (see above) he hath inherited (as his own (): the word being perhaps chosen in reference to the O. T. prophecies, which promised it to Him: see below. The perfect is important, as denoting something belonging to His present and abiding state, not an event wholly past, as above, indicating the first setting himself down: though that word might also be used of a permanent state of session, as in , ch. Heb 12:2) a more distinguished (or more excellent, as E. V. This sense of is confined to later writers, as Polybius and Plutarch: e. g. Polyb. vi. 23. 7, ( ) . So also Symm. in reff. The comparative is found only, besides ref., in Sextus Empir. Phys. i. 218, . For the construction, see below on ) name (to be taken in its proper sense, not understood, with Beza, Calov., al., to mean precedence or dignity; as Heb 1:5 shews: whence also we get an easy answer to the enquiry, what name is intended: viz. that of , in the peculiar and individual sense of the citation there. The angels themselves are called sons of God, Job 1:6; Job 2:1; Job 38:7; Dan 3:25, and Gen 6:2 (notwithstanding Ebrards denial of this sense: see Delitzsch in loc., Jud 1:6, note, and Proleg. to Jude, Heb 1:11); but the argument here is, that the title SON OF GOD is bestowed on Him individually, in a sense in which it never was conferred upon an angel. This view is far more probable than that of Bleek, who thinks that the Writer used only the LXX, in which stands in all these places except Gen 6:2, and there in the alex. MS. and Philo: and that he interpreted Psa 28:1; Psa 88:6, of other than the angels. To say nothing of priori considerations, the canon to be followed in such cases is clearly never to suppose partial knowledge in a sacred writer, except where the nature of the case compels us in common honesty so to do: and here that canon is not applicable. See as a parallel, Php 2:9 ff. Still it must be remembered, as Delitzsch beautifully remarks, that the fulness of glory of the peculiar name of the Son of God is unattainable by human speech or thought: it is, Rev 19:12, an . And all the citations and appellations here are but fragmentary indications of portions of its glory: are but beams of light, which are united in it as in a central sun. Der uberengelische Name selber, den der aus dem Wege der Geschichte zu Gottes Thron Emporsteigende aus immer zu eigen bekommen, hegt jenseit der begrifflich zersplitternden Sprache der Menschen. Die folgenden Schriftworte find nur wie auswarts weisende Finger-zeige, die uns ahnen lassen, wie herrlich er ist.
Since when has Christ in this sense inherited this name? The answer must not be hastily made, as by some Commentators, that implies the glorification of the humanity of Christ to that Sonship which He before had in virtue of his Deity: e. g. c. (altern.): , , , . ; ,- ,- . Evidently so partial a reference cannot be considered as exhausting the sense of the Writer. Nor again can we say that it was at the time of His incarnation, though the words of the angel in Luk 1:35, , seem to favour such a reference: for it was especially at His incarnation, that He was made a little lower than the angels, ch. Heb 2:9. Rather would the sense seem to be, that the especial name of SON, belonging to Him not by ascription nor adoption, but by his very Being itself, has been ever, and is now, His: inherited by Him, qu , as Chrys. says: the O. T. declarations being as it were portions of the instrument by which this inheritance is assured to Him, and by the citation of which it is proved. Observe, that the is not identical with the , but in proportion to it: the triumphant issue of his Mediation is consonant to the glorious name, which is His by inheritance: but which, in the fulness of its present inconceivable glory (see above), has been put on and taken up by Him in the historical process of his mediatorial humiliation and triumph) than (this construction of a comparative with is never found in St. Paul (Rom 14:5, is a somewhat doubtful exception, and occurs 1Co 3:11), but often in this Epistle; and once in St. Luke (reff.). It occurs in Esdr. 4:35, . : and in Thuc. i. 23: Herod. vii. 103) they.
Fuente: The Greek Testament
Heb 1:4. , so much) This verse has two clauses, of which, by Chiasmus, the second is discussed in Heb 1:5, but the first in Heb 1:13; and the Interrogation gives a point to both. The Chiasmus,[6] , oratio decussata, is so frequent in this epistle, that the observation of this figure alone contributes very much to the explanation of the epistle. See Heb 1:9, ch. Heb 2:9; Heb 2:12; Heb 2:17, Heb 3:1; Heb 3:8, Heb 4:14-16, Heb 5:7, Heb 6:7, Heb 7:6, Heb 8:4; Heb 8:10, Heb 9:1, Heb 10:20; Heb 10:23; Heb 10:33; Heb 10:38, Heb 11:1; Heb 11:33, Heb 12:22-24, Heb 13:10, with the annott. It may be asked, Why, in this one epistle, does that figure occur in every chapter? Ans. It is shown, at some of those passages which I have just now quoted, that Paul uses the Chiasmus even elsewhere, but more frequently to the Jews; and Surenhusius shows, in the , p. 78, etc., 607, 608, that their teachers greatly delight in this figure of speech in their writings. Therefore the apostle, who became all things to all men, has adapted his style to the Hebrews; and these men, who were guided by the Spirit, had quite ready at their command all the forms of discourse, in a greater degree than the most practised rhetoricians.- , being made better) by His exaltation, Heb 1:3; Heb 1:13. The antithesis is , made lower or less, ch. Heb 2:9. This may be compared with Mar 10:18, note, [where Jesus, in His voluntary humiliation, saith, Why callest thou Me good? etc.] , better, more excellent, more powerful: , the gods, among the ancient heathens.- , than the angels) whose excellence is elsewhere spoken of as great.- ) denotes great pre-eminence above [as compared with] others. Comp. , Heb 1:9, ch. Heb 3:3. Angels are excluded in part explicitly, Heb 1:5; Heb 1:13, and in part by implication; for while none of them has taken this name, the Son of GOD, from that very circumstance they are not the heirs of this name, and therefore not the heirs of all things; but they are a portion, no doubt a distinguished one, of the inheritance of the Son, whom they worship as Lord, Heb 1:6 : nor were the worlds created by them, but rather they themselves were created, Heb 1:7.- , He hath inherited a name) The name of Son is proper for the Son, because He is the Son; and in this name principally the inheritance consists. All things are an addition to the inheritance, Heb 1:2. The inheritance of the name is more ancient than the worlds themselves. The inheritance of all things is as old as all things themselves.
[6] See Appendix.
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
Heb 1:4-14
THE SON OF GOD COMPARED WITH ANGELS
Heb 1:4-14
The object of the Apostle in this paragraph is twofold: (1) to develop and illustrate still further the infinite perfections of Jesus as the Son of God; and (2) to show as a consequence of his many excellencies, the paramount obligations that we are all under to observe and respect the revelation which God has so graciously made to us through him. This will appear more obvious as we proceed with the consideration of the several points that are brought out in the following comparisons.
Heb 1:4 –Being made so much better than the angels,-This clause is very nearly related to the last part of the preceding verse; and it is added for the purpose of defining and illustrating more fully the infinite power, majesty, and dominion of our Redeemer. The reference here is still of course chiefly, though not exclusively, to the Divine nature of Christ. It is not of the man Jesus alone, nor of the Logos alone, but of the Logos incarnate, that our author speaks in this, and in the following verses of this chapter. And be it observed that here, as well as in the clause immediately preceding, the exaltation of Christ is spoken of as a result and consequence of his humiliation and his obedience unto death. The idea of the Apostle is, not that he was made better than the angels by his in-carnation, but that having by himself made purification for our sins, and having been raised from the dead, the first-fruits of them that slept, he then became (genoemnos) in rank, dignity, and authority, superior (kreitton) to them: he was then exalted to a sphere of glory, dignity, and authority, which is as far above that of the highest angels, as the name which he inherited is superior to theirs.
Heb 1:4 –as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they.-Whenever God gives a name to anyone, he gives it in harmony with the rank and character of the person so designated. Previous to his incarnation, Jesus was called the Logos (Joh 1:1), because he was himself both the medium and the substance of all the revelations which God had ever made to fallen man. But after his resurrection, when by virtue of his sufferings and death he was made the Heir of all things, it became necessary that he should receive a name corresponding with his new rank and official dignity, as the First-born from the dead (Col 1:18), the Beginning of the creation of God (Rev 3:14)-then it was that by right of inheritance he was called the Son of God. This name, as the Apostle proceeds to show, indicates that Christ, in his new relations, is far superior to the angels.
Heb 1:5 –For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee?-That God the Father said this to Christ, when he raised him from the dead, and set him at his own right hand in the heavenly realms (Eph 1:20), is evident from the second Psalm, and also from Pauls address at Antioch in Pisidia (Act 13:33-34). But never was this name given in its full and proper meaning (Joh 5:18) to any of the angels. True, indeed, they are all called sons of God (Job 33:7) ; and so also are pious men and women called the sons and daughters of the Lord God Almighty (2Co 6:18). But no mere creature, however pure and exalted, was ever so singled out and distinguished from all others, by the Father of spirits. This is the peculiar honor of Him who is, not only one with the Father (Joh 10:30), and who is himself God equal with the Father (Joh 5:18), but who is also the First-begotten from the dead, the Prince of the kings of the Earth (Rev 1:5). On him this title was repeatedly bestowed by the Father, with reference to both his incarnation and his resurrection. See Psa 2:7; Mat 3:17 Mat 17:5; Act 13:33, etc. But in this case, the Spirit refers particularly to his resurrection from the dead, when the Father not only gave him a name indicative of his Divinity and oneness with himself, but also at the same time exalted him far above all principality, and power, and might, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come; and put all things under his feet, and give him to be the Head over all things to the Church, which is his body, the fullness of Him that filleth all in all (Eph 1:21-23) ; angels, and authorities, and powers being made subject unto him (1Pe 3:22).
Heb 1:5 –And again, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son?-This is a quotation from 2Sa 7:14, introduced here for the purpose of illustrating the very near, dear, and intimate relations which exist between the Father and the Son; with the view of showing still further the very great superiority of the Son over the angels. But there is an apparent difficulty in applying this passage to Christ; for it is quite obvious from the context, that primarily it had reference to Solomon. David, it seems, had purposed in his heart to build a house for the Lord God of Israel. But while he was meditating on the matter, God sent Nathan the Prophet to him, saying, When thy days are fulfilled, and thou shalt sleep with thy Fathers, I will set up thy seed after thee, who shall proceed out of thy bowels, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for my name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever. I will his Father, and he shall be my Son. If he commit iniquity, I will chasten him with the rod of men, and with the stripes of the children of men; but my mercy shall not depart from him, as I took it from Saul, whom I put away before thee. There can be no doubt, then, that this whole passage refers to Solomon; and so Solomon himself understood it, as we learn from 1Ki 8:17-21. How, then, can it with propriety be applied to Christ ?
It is usual with many commentators to explain such passages on the principle of accommodation. But this will not do. No exposition of this passage of Scripture is at all admissible which does not make its meaning extend through and beyond Solomon to him who is, par excellence, the Seed of David according to the flesh; and who, as such, is to sit on Davids throne, to order it, and to establish it, with justice and with judgment, from henceforth even forever. (Isa 9:7.) And hence the only way of explaining it properly is on the principle of double reference.
As a knowledge of this principle is essential to a proper understanding of much that is contained in this Epistle, the learned reader will excuse the following attempt to make it plain and intelligible to even mere beginners in the study of sacred literature. It is one of the very few principles of interpretation, which are peculiar to the Holy Scriptures. Generally, the Bible is to be interpreted like other books. But in the use of this principle, it is unlike any and every other document. The nearest approach to it may be found in the instructions which a skillful educator gives to his pupils by means of pictures and diagrams. For the purpose of illustrating the unknown or the abstract, he draws a visible outline or representation of it, by means of which he is enabled to impart to his pupils a more accurate knowledge of the object to be illustrated than he could possibly communicate to them by any mere combination of words and sentences. In his verbal remarks and explanations, he may sometimes refer exclusively to the pictorial illustration; and sometimes he may refer only to the object or thing that is to be illustrated; but not unfrequently he will purposely so arrange his remarks as to make them applicable to both the sign and the thing signified. He presents the picture to the eye of sense, as a sort of medium through which the eye of the understanding may perceive more clearly and distinctly the various qualities and properties of what he wished to describe and illustrate.
Very much in this way has God explained to mankind the more abstract and recondite realities of the economy of redemption. To do this successfully in the early ages of the world, in any way and by any means, was a very difficult problem; a problem which God alone was then capable of solving. But all things are possible with him. He resolved to give to mankind a revelation of his purpose of mercy concerning them; and he resolved to do it in such a way as would not only be best adapted to the purposes of instruction; but also, it would seem, in such a way that it could never be successfully imitated or counterfeited by any impostor.
For this purpose, he called Abraham out of Ur of Chaldea, and made him the Father of two families; the one according to the flesh, and the other according to the Spirit. The former was related to the latter, as the type is related to the antitype; or as the picture is related to the reality which it is designed to represent. And hence it is that many things said of the former in the Old Testament, have reference also to the latter. Sometimes, indeed, there are promises of an exclusive nature, made in reference to each of these. But not unfrequently what is said of the type, has reference also in a still higher sense, to the antitype. Of this we have many impressive examples in nearly all the books of the Old Testament. In the seventy-second Psalm, for example, David has given us a most graphic and interesting description of the peaceful and prosperous reign of Solomon; but throughout this beautiful ode there is also constant reference to a greater than Solomon.
And just so it is in the quotation made from 2Sa 7:12-16. The primary reference here is to Solomon; and in part of the narrative it is to Solomon only; for certainly God would never, even hypothetically, impute iniquity to Christ. But in the expression, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son, God speaks both of Solomon as a type and of Christ in a far higher sense as the antitype. The relation of Solomons sonship was, in fact, to that of Christ, just as the shadow is to the substance (Col 2:17) ; so that the meaning of the passage, properly understood, is in perfect harmony with the sentiment of the preceding clause. They both serve to present to us our blessed Savior in a relation that is peculiar to himself.
Heb 1:6 –And again, when he bringeth, etc.-To what does the adverb again (palin) here refer? Is it used here, as in the last part of the fifth verse, merely to indicate that this is another citation from the Old Testament? Or does it refer to a second introduction of the First-born into the world? On this point the critics are about equally divided. It is, however, generally conceded that the latter view is most in harmony with the Greek idiom and construction: and on this ground it is advocated by De Wette, Liinemann, Tholuck, Delitzsch, Alford, and most of the ancient interpreters.
But it is urged as an objection to this interpretation, that our author has not spoken elsewhere, in the preceding verses, of the first introduction of the First-born into the world; and that it is therefore not probable that he would here refer to the second, as such. And hence the former view (that the adverb again serves merely to introduce another quotation) is, on the whole, preferred by Luther, Calvin, Beza, Bleek, Ebrard, Stuart, and others, who think that there is really nothing in the Greek construction which seriously militates against this interpretation. According to their notion, the passage may be freely rendered as follows: But when, on another occasion, God speaks of bringing the First-begotten into the world, he saith, And let all the angels of God worship him. And according to the second mode of constructing the adverb, the meaning runs thus: But when God speaks of bringing the First-born a second time into the world, he saith, And let all the angels of God worship him. To my mind there is nothing in the latter rendering which is in any way inconsistent with either the Apostles reasoning in the case, or with the general tenor of the Psalm from which he quotes. And I therefore see no reason for departing from what is generally conceded to be the most simple and natural construction of the Greek text.
The First-born refers of course to Christ. The same word (prototokos) occurs in Col 1:18 and Rev 1:5; in both of which passages, it means the First-born from the dead; having reference to the fact that Jesus was the first who rose from the dead to die no more. Others, as Lazarus (John 11), had risen before him; but not as he rose, above death and superior to it. They were still under the dominion of death, and soon returned again to the dust to see corruption. But Jesus rose a conqueror over death, and also over him who has the power of death. (2: 14.) And to this same thought there may be some allusion in our text, and also in such parallel passages as Psa 89:27; Rom 8:29; and Col 1:15. But in these cases, the primary reference is to the laws and customs of primogeniture; according to which the first-born was entitled to preeminence in all things. For it pleased the Father that in him should all fullness dwell; and that in all things he should have the preeminence. (Col 1:18-19.)
Heb 1:6 –into the world,-The term world (oichoumenee) means properly the inhabited earth; the habitable globe. But to what bringing in of the First-born does the Apostle here refer ? Some say to his incarnation (Chrysostom and Calvin) ; some to his entering on his public ministry, after his baptism, when the Holy Spirit descended on him like a dove, and the Father himself proclaimed from Heaven in the audience of the people, This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased; some say that the reference is to his resurrection from the dead (Brentius and A. Clark); some, to his coming in power to set up his Kingdom on Earth, on the Pen-tecost which next followed after his resurrection (Grotius and Wetstein); and some again, to his second personal coming, when he will raise the dead, purify the Earth by fire, judge the world, and deliver up the Kingdom to the Father (De Wette, Lunemann, Tholuck, Hofmann, Delitzsch, Alford, etc.).
These several hypotheses, save perhaps the second, have all been maintained by men of learning and ability, and I therefore think it proper to introduce them to the reader. But to my mind, it is evident that it is to Christs coming in power to set up his Kingdom and begin his reign on Earth, on the fiftieth day after his resurrection ; and that it is to this alone, that the Holy Spirit here refers. To this view, I am led chiefly by the following considerations:
(1.) It is most in harmony with the construction and scope of both the text and the context. The adverb again (palin), as we have seen, indicates most naturally a return of the First-born into the world. And the scope of the Apostles argument clearly indicates, that this second manifestation of the Lord Jesus would be with great power and authority. When he came into the world the first time (Heb 10:5), he came in humility and weakness (Luke 2) ; for then it was necessary that he should by his own death make purification for sins (Heb 1:3). But having done this once for all, it was then fit that he should enter on his mediatorial reign over Heaven and Earth; which he did on the Pentecost which next followed after his resurrection. To this reign our author has constant reference in this part of his argument. His object here is, not to show what Christ was previous to his coronation; nor is it to show what he will be after that he shall have delivered up the Kingdom to the Father (1Co 15:24); but it is to show what he is now, and what are now our obligations to love, serve, and obey him in all things. And hence we are required by the force of the Apostles argument to understand this second coming of Christ as having reference to the beginning of his mediatorial reign.
(2.) This view is most in harmony with the scope of the ninety-seventh Psalm, from which this citation, in proof of Christs superiority over the angels, is made. The Psalmist begins by calling on the whole Earth, even on the isles of the Gentiles, to be glad and rejoice on account of the universal reign of Jehovah (verse 1). In the second paragraph (verses 2-5), he describes the majesty of Jehovah as the Lord of the whole Earth; speaks of the justice and righteousness of his administration, and of the awful manifestations of his power and judgments, before which the Earth melts and his enemies are consumed. In the third (verses 6, 7), he speaks of the manifestations of Gods glory, as it were, from the very heavens; predicts the embarrassment and confusion of all idolaters; and then calls on all in authority, all Eloheem, whether men or angels, to fall down and worship him. In the fourth (verses 8, 9), he speaks of the joy of all the saints, on witnessing the judgments and the glorious exaltation of their sovereign Lord. And finally (verses 10-12), he admonishes the pious to abstain from all evil; and encourages them to trust in the Lord and give thanks to him, on account of his gracious care over them, and the great abundance of the provisions which he has made for them. The whole Psalm, therefore, clearly indicates that it has reference to the long expected reign of the Messiah. And this is the view that was taken of it by many of the ancient Rabbis, as well as by most Christian expositors. Raschi and Kimchi say that all the Psalms, from 93 to 101, refer to the reign of the Messiah.
It is no objection to this interpretation, that the universal reign of Jehovah is the proper subject of this beautiful and triumphal ode; and that the name of the Messiah does not, in fact, occur in it. This is equally true of many other passages in the Old Testament, which, in the New, are applied directly to Christ. Take, for example, the following from Isa 40:3-5 : The voice of him that crieth in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord; make straight in the desert a highway for our God. Every valley shall be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be made low; and the crooked shall be made straight, and the rough places plain; and the glory of the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together ; for the mother of the Lord hath spoken it. Here, too, as well as in the ninety-seventh Psalm, it is Jehovah Eloheem that is spoken of by the Prophet. And yet, in Mat 3:3, this passage is applied to Christ; who, in Jer 23:6, is called Jehovah our righteousness.
But it is alleged by some, that our author cannot have reference here to the ninety-seventh Psalm; because, say they, the proper rendering of the last clause of the sixth verse is, Worship him all ye gods, and not all ye angels (angeloi). This is plausible; but it is by no means a valid objection against the view taken. For in the Septuagint the word Eloheem is rendered angels in this very passage; and better still the same word Eloheem in Psa 8:5, is by the author of our Epistle rendered angels in 2:7. Thou hast made him a little lower, he says, than the angels. Here the word rendered angels is in the Hebrew Eloheem, the same as that which occurs in Psa 97:7. So also Philo says, The angels are the servants of God; and they are esteemed actual gods by those who are in toil and slavery. (Philo on Fugitives, Section 38.) It is wholly unnecessary, therefore, to refer to Deu 32:43, for the quotation given in our text. True, indeed, the identical words, Let all the angels of God worship him, are there found in the Septuagint; but they are wholly wanting in the original Hebrew; and are of course without canonical authority.
(3.) The view taken of the passage is also most in harmony with other portions of Scripture which relate to the coming and reign of the Messiah. Our Savior himself speaks of the inauguration of his reign on Earth, as his second coming into the world. Verily, verily, says he, I say unto you, there are some standing here who shall not taste of death, till they see the Son of man coming in his kingdom. (Mat 16:28.) In this passage Christ has reference, most likely, to both his transfiguration, which occurred eight days afterward (Mat 17:1-13), and to his coming in power to set up his Kingdom and begin his reign on earth, as he did on the day of Pentecost which next followed after his resurrection (Act 2:138). But if so, the former was but the shadow, while the latter was the reality of what is here promised. And hence when Peter had, on the latter occasion, submitted to his astonished auditors the evidence of Christs resurrection, he closed his address with the assurance that God had made Jesus, the lately crucified One, both Lord and Christ; that is, the anointed Sovereign of the universe. And, accordingly, from that day forward his right to universal dominion is everywhere conceded. See, for example, Act 10:36; 1Co 15:27; Eph 1:22; and Php 2:9-11. The binding obligation of the decree of Jehovah with regard to the homage that is due to his Son, as our anointed and mediatorial Sovereign, commenced, therefore, with his coronation; and will continue, until having put down all adverse power and authority, he shall deliver up the Kingdom to the Father. Till then, every knee in Heaven and Earth must bow to him, and every tongue must confess that he is Lord to the glory of God the Father (Php 2:11).
Heb 1:6 –let all the angels of God worship him.-This is, at least to us, the main point of the argument. All that precedes this in the sixth verse is only circumstantial; and does not in any way, however construed, materially affect the sense of this clause. Even if we should have mistaken the proper grammatical use of the word again; the chapter and verse of the Old Testament from which the citation is made; and also the time of Christs introduction into the world as here spoken of; still the fact remains indisputable, that by the decree of Jehovah all the angels of glory are required to bow down and worship him who is the First-begotten from the dead, the First-born of the whole creation. This is enough for us. Resting as it does on apostolic authority, this one declaration is, of itself, sufficient to prove, beyond all doubt, not only that Jesus is infinitely exalted above all angels, but also that it is now right and proper that all created intelligences should adore and worship the Son, even as they also adore and worship the Father.
Heb 1:7 –And of the angels he saith,-That is, while he speaks thus and so of the angels, he speaks in immeasurably higher terms of the Son. This will appear clear in the sequel. But what does he say of the angels ?
Heb 1:7 –Who maketh his angels spirits, and his ministers a flame of fire.-This is another instance of Hebrew parallelism taken from Psa 104:4. The words angels and ministers refer to the same class of persons, and their predicates spirits and a flame of fire are both used for a like purpose. But what do those clauses severally mean? Some commentators have proposed to change the order of the words, so as to make the clauses read thus: Who maketh spirits [or winds] his angels; and a flame of fire his ministers. But this is scarcely allowable even in the Hebrew. To say that a flame of fire is the ministers of God, is not in harmony with the laws of propriety in any language. But in our Greek text the absurdity of this rendering is still more obvious. For (1) the proper subject of the parallelism is angels. The object of the Apostle is to contrast these high celestial intelligences, and not spirits, or winds, or a flame of fire, with Christ. (2) The use of the Greek article before angels (tons angelous) and ministers (tous leitourgous), and not before spirits (pneumata) and a flame of fire (puror phloga), clearly indicates that the former words are to be taken as the subjects, and the latter as the predicates of the phrases in which they severally stand. And hence we are compelled to accept the arrangements of these words as given in our English Version.
But what is the meaning of the word pnumata (pneumata) in the first clause? Does it mean spirits, as in our Common Version, or does it mean winds, as some have alleged ? This must be determined by the scope of the passage, which evidently is, not to degrade, but to exalt the angels as far as possible, with the view of exalting the Son still higher by the comparison. To say, then, that God makes his angels as strong and as irresistible as winds and tempests, would harmonize very well with the Apostles design; and also with the scope and construction of the next clause in which Gods ministers are compared, not merely with fire, but with a flame of fire. But in this case, though the word ruach might have been used in the Hebrew, it is most likely that it would have been rendered by the Greek anemos, as in Exo 10:13 Exo 10:19 Exo 14:21, etc., and not by pnuma, the current meaning of which in both classic and sacred literature, is breath or spirit. Seldom, if ever, does it denote a violent wind or tempest, unless when used figuratively, as in Exo 15:8 Exo 15:10, for the breath of Jehovah.
Much more, then, in harmony with the context and general usage is the word spirit as given in our English Version. Throughout the entire Bible, the word spirit often stands in antithesis with the word flesh; the latter being used symbolically for whatever is weak, frail, depraved, and corruptible; and the former, in like manner; for what is strong, pure, and incorruptible. That which is born of the flesh, says Christ, is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. (Joh 3:6.) And again he says, God is spirit; and they that worship him must worship him in spirit and in truth. (Joh 4:24.) And again, It is the Spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing. (Joh 6:63.) In no other way, therefore, could our author more effectually exalt the angels in the estimation of his Hebrew brethren than by calling them spirits; that is, beings who excel in strength, and who are wholly removed from all the weaknesses, impurities, and imperfections of the flesh.
This, too, corresponds well with the history of these pure celestial intelligences, so far as it is given in the Holy Scriptures. They have always served as Gods ministers (leitourgoi), before whom the enemies of Jehovah have often melted away as wax or stubble before a flame of fire. This is abundantly proved and illustrated by the overthrow of Sodom and Gomorrah (Gen 19:126) ; the destruction of the first-born of the Egyptians (Exo 12:29-30) ; the punishment of the Israelites under David (2Sa 24:15-17); the discomfiture of the hosts of Benhadad, King of Syria (2Ki 6:8-23) ; and the overthrow of the army of Sennacherib (2Ki 19:35).
Heb 1:8 –But unto the Son he saith, etc.-The quotation which follows in this verse and the next, is taken from the forty-fifth Psalm; on the meaning of which commentators are still much divided. Many suppose that this Psalm was designed primarily to celebrate the marriage of Solomon with the daughter of Pharaoh or some other foreign princess; and secondarily to foreshadow and illustrate, by means of this conjugal alliance, the union that exists between Christ and his Church. But it is difficult to see how this Psalm could with any propriety be applied to Solomon. He was not blessed forever as was the hero of this ode (verse 2) ; nor was he in any sense distinguished for his victories (verses 3-5); neither was his administration throughout one of justice and equity (verses 6, 7) ; nor did he ever make his sons princes in the Earth (verse 16). It is extremely doubtful also whether what is said of the queen and her companions (verses 9-15) can with truth and propriety be applied to any of the wives and concubines of Solomon. And hence it is most likely that the forty-fifth Psalm is a simple allegory designed to celebrate, primarily and exclusively, the perfections, conquests, and righteous administration of Christ; to illustrate the intimate and sanctified union which exists between himself and his Church; and to set forth, in the most pleasing and impressive manner, the happy and eternal consequences of this very holy and endearing relationship. That the marriage of Solomon, or some other king of Israel, may have suggested the form and much of the imagery of the Psalm, is quite probable. But it is most likely that the protasis of this allegory, like that of the parable of the ten virgins, was constructed from the conceptions of the writer. It is an ideal representation of certain realities in the grand drama of redemption which could not be so well illustrated by any one chapter of real history. The Psalmist begins with a brief statement of the effect which, under the influence of the Holy Spirit, his great theme was having on his own mind and heart. My heart, he says, is overflowing. I am saying a good word. My works are for the King. My tongue is the pen of a ready writer. Next, he describes the personal loveliness, grace, and blessedness of the royal Bridegroom. Beautiful, beautiful, art thou, above the sons of men. Grace is poured upon thy lips. Therefore, God hath blessed thee forever. In the third, fourth, and fifth verses, he speaks of the King as a great military hero. Gird thy sword on thy thigh, O mighty One; [put on] thy honor and thy majesty; and in thy majesty go forward, ride on, for the sake of truth, humility, and righteousness; and thy right hand shall teach thee terrible things. Thy arrows are sharp in the heart of the Kings enemies; nations shall fall under thee. Next in order is the given quotation from which our author infers the great superiority of Christ over the angels: Thy throne, God, is forever and ever; a scepter of righteousness is the scepter of thy kingdom.
Heb 1:9 –Thou hast loved righteousness, etc.-The inspired Psalmist, whoever he was, spoke of course the words of God; and hence our author justly ascribes these stanzas to God himself as their author. Viewed in this light they clearly indicate the superior rank and exaltation of Christ, in the following particulars: (1) He is here called God by the Father himself; and that, too, not as angels and magistrates are sometimes called gods, in a metaphorical sense, but in the literal and proper sense of this word as it is applied to the uncreated, eternal, and omnipresent Deity. The context fairly admits of no other meaning in this case. And this interpretation is fully sustained by many parallel passages. See remarks on verses third, fifth, and sixth. (2) His reign is eternal. The word throne indicates power, rule, and dominion. And hence to say that the throne of the Messiah is forever and ever is but to say that his dominion is an everlasting dominion. (Dan 7:4.) True, in one sense, his reign will terminate when he shall have put down all rule, and all authority, and power. Then, we are told, he will deliver up the Kingdom to the Father, that God may be all in all. (1Co 15:24.) But this is spoken of his mediatorial reign over the universe for the redemption and recovery of mankind. In another sense, however, he will reign over the house of Jacob forever; and of his Kingdom there shall be no end. (Luk 1:33.)
And hence, Peter speaks of the everlasting Kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. (2Pe 1:11.) (3) His administration is throughout one of absolute justice and rectitude. The word rendered scepter (rabdos) originally meant a rod or staff. But in the hands of the ancient patriarchs and shepherds, this scepter soon became a badge of their authority; and in the hands of kings it afterward became an emblem of royal authority. (Est 4:11.) And hence the word is used in our text to denote Christs power and authority over all. And as his entire administration is carried on in justice and in judgment, his scepter is called a scepter of rectitude. (4) In consequence of his exalted rank, immaculate holiness, and the righteous character of his administration, God has himself anointed him with the oil of joy and gladness above his associates. The oil of joy is a figurative expression derived from the Oriental custom of anointing the head at important festivals (Psa 23:5). Here, the reference is to the joyful effects of Christs coronation. But who are his fellows? Some say the angels (Bleek, Liinemann, Pierce); others think that the reference is to his disciples, all of whom are in fellowship with him (Braun, Cranmer) ; but as Christ is here described as a king, it is most likely that the Psalmist refers to kings as the associates of Christ (Ebrard, Alford, etc.). These were anointed with oil (1Sa 9:16 1Sa 16:3; 1Ki 1:34) ; but Christ was anointed with the Holy Spirit and with power (Isa 61:1-3; Act 10:38). They were anointed simply as kings; but Christ was anointed as a Prophet and as a Priest, as well as a King.
From these facts and illustrations, it is now easy to see the bearing of the whole passage on the Apostles argument. The angels, he admits, are beings of very high rank and of very great power and influence. But they are not gods, save in a metaphorical sense. Neither are they kings, like our Immanuel, reigning over the universe. On the contrary, as our author now proceeds to show, they are all but ministering spirits, sent forth under Christ to do his will in ministering to the heirs of salvation.
Heb 1:10 –And, Thou, Lord, in the beginning-The word and is used here by the author to connect the three following with the two preceding verses; so that the tenth, eleventh, and twelfth verses, as well as the eighth and ninth, are to be taken and construed as the testimony of God the Father, speaking by the mouth of one of his holy Prophets concerning his Son Jesus Christ. But here again there is an apparent difficulty in applying these words to the Son of God. The citation is made from Psa 102:25-27; and seems to refer primarily, not to the Son of God, as such, but to God himself absolutely considered. Some, I know, are of a different opinion. They think that there are in this Psalm sundry indications that it is a complaint of the Church, in her afflictions, addressed directly to her ever living and exalted Head, in the person of our adorable Redeemer. And this may be so. Certainly some of the expressions contained in this Psalm (see particularly verses 18-22) appear to be spoken of the reign of the Messiah over all the Earth. But the first impression of all who read this Psalm without prejudice, is, that it was primarily addressed to Eloheem Jehovah, the Lord God absolute. On what principle, then, is it here applied to Christ? Some say again, On the principle of accommodation. But this is manifestly wrong. The argument of the Apostle clearly requires more than this. His object here is, not to teach us what might be said of the Lord Jesus, but rather what the Father himself has actually said of him in the writings of the holy Prophets. On no other hypothesis would our author be justified in quoting and applying this passage as he does.
How, then, is this matter to be explained? Will it do to say with some that whatever is predicated of God the Father may also in like manner be predicated of the Son and of the Holy Spirit? Certainly not; save within certain well defined limits. The Father has his own proper personality, and performs his own proper work in creation, providence, and redemption. And this is also true of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. The Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the world. (1Jn 4:14.) The Son, by the grace of God, tasted death for every man; and so made it possible for God to be just in justifying everyone who believes in Jesus. (Joh 3:16; Rom 3:25-26.) He also sent the Holy Spirit to convince the world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment (Joh 16:8-11) ; and to be in all his saints as a well of water springing up into everlasting life (Joh 4:14 Joh 7:38-39). In some respects, therefore, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are essentially distinct from each other, and perform different functions in the economy of grace. But in other respects they are identical, one and essentially the same. I and my Father, says Christ, are one. (Joh 10:30 Joh 14:9-11.) And hence it is that in the Old Testament especially, they are all commonly included in the one name Eloheem Jehovah (Deu 6:4); and that the same works are often ascribed equally to each of the three. In Gen 1:1, for example, it is said that God (Eloheem) created the heavens and the Earth; that is, the whole material universe. But in Rev 4:8-11, the creation of all things is ascribed to the Father; in Joh 1:1-3, it is ascribed to the Son; and from sundry other passages, such as Gen 1:2; Job 26:13; Psa 104:30; Mat 12:28; Luk 1:35; Joh 6:63; and Rom 8:11, it seems clear that the Holy Spirit has an agency in the working of all miracles.
On the principle of identity in the Godhead, then, it seems to me, our author here applies to the Son language which, in its first intention, had reference to the entire Eloheem-the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. As on another occasion Eloheem said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness; so also it was in the beginning. It was not the Father alone, nor the Son alone, nor the Spirit alone; but it was the three in one, and the one in three, that created and garnished the heavens and the Earth. And hence it is perfectly legitimate to say as our author has said here, Thou, Lord, in the beginning, didst lay the foundation of the Earth, and the heavens are the works of thy hands.
But whatever may be true of the principle on which this language is applied to the Son of God, the fact itself, as here stated, is indisputable. Guided by the Spirit of God, the author of our Epistle here deposes, that this is the testimony of God the Father himself with respect to his Son. This, then, is enough. All who admit the inspiration and canonical authority of the Epistle, must also admit, that our Redeemer is the Creator of the heavens and of the Earth. And if he is, then it follows that he is Divine, God with us.
The words of these two clauses are, in the main, quite simple and easily understood. The word Lord is not expressed in the original Hebrew, but it is clearly implied. In the beginning (kata archas) means simply of old. The phrase is not so definite as the expression in Gen 1:1 (en archee) ; but it is here equivalent to it; and it means simply that at a certain epoch in past eternity, the Son, in connection and cooperation with the Father and the Holy Spirit, did actually create the whole material universe. To found the Earth, is equivalent to creating it. Christ is here presented to us as the great architect of nature. In this capacity, he is represented as laying the foundations of the Earth; not, however, as a human architect, out of preexisting materials: but ex nihilo, out of nothing: for things which are seen were not made out of things which do appear. (Heb 11:3.) The word heavens is in the plural number, and in connection with the word earth means at least the whole material universe. In the words, thy hands, we have an example of anthropomorphism.
Heb 1:11 —They shall perish;-That is, most likely, both the heavens and the Earth shall perish. But what is meant by the word perish (apollumi) ? Does it mean that the heavens and the Earth will hereafter be annihilated ? Or does it mean simply that they will be destroyed with respect to their present state? The latter is most likely all that is here intended by the Holy Spirit. Neither the Hebrew word nor the Greek ever means to annihilate, so far as we know. Nor have we any evidence either from the book of nature, or from the Holy Scriptures, that God will ever annihilate any substance to which he has given being. This he, of course, can do; and this he may do. No creature can foretell what changes God will work in nature, in the course of coming ages. But it is most likely from all the evidence of the context, as well as from parallel passages, that our author refers here only to those changes of form and state which will be necessary in order to refit and readjust the material universe to the wants and progressive developments of the spiritual. Such changes often have taken place; and it is quite probable that they will often occur hereafter; perhaps indeed while the cycles of eternal ages shall continue to roll on.
It is now, for instance, generally conceded by geologists, that the Earth was originally created in a state of igneus fusion; and that by the cooling process were formed vast quantities of granite, porphyry, and other kinds of unstratified rocks. But at the proper time, God effected a change on the whole surface of the Earth; and so adapted it to the growth of vegetables and animals. Another period of immense duration passed by, during which vast deposits of various kinds were laid up for the use of man; and then the Earth with all its living tenantry was again destroyed. And this occurred again and again; until finally out of the preadamic chaos God prepared the heavens and the Earth which now are; and which Peter says are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment; when, he says, the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat; the Earth also and the works that are therein shall be burnt up. But he adds, Nevertheless we, according to his promise, look for new heavens and a new Earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness. (2Pe 3:7 2Pe 3:10 2Pe 3:13.) See also Isa 65:17 and Rev 21:1-8.
By the word heavens in 2Pe 3:10, the Apostle most likely means only the aerial heavens, as does Moses in Gen 1:8; and not the sidereal heavens to which the Psalmist and our author manifestly refer in our text. The object of Peter is to describe the final change which will take place in our own mundane system, when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from Heaven with his mighty angels, in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ. (2Th 1:7-8.) But changes analogous to those wrought in our own planet, may also occur in every other planet and system throughout the vast empire of Jehovah. Indeed we are not wholly without evidence that such is the fact. Astronomers tell us that changes are now taking place in the Moon, similar to those which occurred in the preadamic Earth. And the history of astronomy records instances of celestial configurations, not unlike that which, according to the Apostle Pd:er, awaits our own world. A very reamarkable instance of this kind occurred in A.D. 1572, when suddenly a star shone forth in the constellation Cassiopeia, exceeding in brilliancy the largest of the planets; and after blazing for some months, it gradually disappeared forever. Another example of the same kind occurred in A.D. 1604, in the constellation Ophiuchus. The flame, at first, was of a dazzling white color; then of a reddish yellow; and finally it was of a leaden paleness. These phenomena are not so rare as many suppose. Dr. Good says, During the last century, not less than thirteen stars seem to have utterly perished; and ten new ones have been created.
These facts may serve to illustrate what seems to be here revealed to us by the Holy Spirit: viz., that all the suns, and moons, and stars, and systems, composing the sidereal heavens, are destined to undergo changes similar to those through which our own little mundane system is passing; and that in the course of ages, they will all wax old as doth a garment; and that our Redeemer will roll them up and recast them, as men are wont to change and recast worn-out vestments. But throughout all these changes and revolutions, he himself will remain unchanged; the same yesterday, today, and forever. (Heb 13:8.)
Heb 1:12 —And as a vesture shalt thou fold them up,-This verse is but an amplification of what is given in the preceding. The Psalmist, in order to give intensity to the thought, repeats the sentiment that while the material universe becomes old, and changes as a garment, Christ, the Creator of all things, will endure forever, without even the shadow of change. Here, then, it is clearly taught (1) that Christ is the Creator of all things; (2) that he is the immutable Lord and Governor of all things; and consequently, that he is infinitely superior to the angels.
Heb 1:13 —But to which of the angels, etc.-Our author now proceeds to lay the keystone of his argument, in vindicating the superiority of Christ over the holy angels. For this purpose he refers to Psa 110:1, where David speaking by the Spirit says, Jehovah said to my Lord, Sit on my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool; that is, until through your administration I shall have completely vanquished all who resist my authority, whether they be men or angels. It was a custom with ancient kings and princes to tread on the necks of their vanquished enemies, in token of their complete victory over them. See Jos 10:22-25. This symbol of conquest is often found in the paintings of the ancient Egyptians.
The word Lord (Kurios) in this citation refers to the Messiah. This is obvious from the scope and structure of the Psalm itself, and also from the repeated references that are made to it in the New Testament. See Mat 22:41-46; Mar 12:35-37; Luk 20:41-44; Act 2:34; 1Co 15:25; Heb 5:6 Heb 7:17 Heb 7:21 Heb 10:13. Indeed, the first of these references, Mat 22:41-46, is quite sufficient to satisfy every unprejudiced mind, that this is a Messianic Psalm; and that the address of Jehovah, given in the first verse, was made directly to his Son. While the Pharisees were gathered together, says Matthew, Jesus asked them, saying, What think ye of Christ? whose son is he? They say unto him, The son of David. He said unto them, How then doth David in Spirit call him Lord, saying, Jehovah said to my Lord, Sit on my right hand, till I shall have put thy enemies beneath thy feet? If David then calls him Lord, how is he his son ?
It is evident, therefore, that God has honored his Son by assigning to him the place of highest honor and authority, until he shall have completely subjugated all his and our enemies. But no such honor as this was ever conferred on an angel. On the contrary, as he says,-
Heb 1:14 —Are they not all ministering spirits, etc.?-The interrogative mode of expression, as it occurs in this verse, is not used to indicate any doubt or uncertainty on the part of the writer, but just the reverse. It is a figure of speech, often used in all writings, sacred and profane, to express an obvious truth in the most pointed and forcible manner. See, for example, Balaams reply to Balak, Num 23:19, and Gods reply to Job, given in chapters 38, 39, 40, and 41. There can be no doubt, then, that all the angels, of whatever rank and order, are now ministers of Christ; and that they are sent forth, under him, to minister in behalf of those who are about to inherit salvation. The Apostle does not mean to say that the angels have all actually left the realms of light, and come to this world to minister to the saints. This is no doubt true of many of them. But the words of the Apostle do not of necessity imply that it is true of them all. His meaning is more general. What he intends to say is simply this: that under Christ, it is now the business of all angels, from the highest to the lowest, to aid in the work of redeeming man; and in carrying out this work to its final consummation. Some of them may be sent to frustrate the wiles and devices of Satan and his fallen compeers (Jud 1:6) ; some, to punish wicked men (Gen 19:1-26; 2Ki 19:35; Act 12:23) ; some, to preside over the councils and courts of princes (Dan 10:20-21 Dan 11:1 Dan 12:1); some, to aid providentially in bringing men to repentance (Act 10:1-8) ; some, to take care of the living saints (2Ki 6:15-23; Psa 34:7 Psa 91:11; Dan. 3; 25-28; 6: 22; Mat 18:10; Act 5:19 Act 12:7-10) ; some, to comfort dying saints and to bear their spirits home to glory (Luk 16:22) ; some may peradventure remain in Heaven to minister to the spirits of the just made perfect; and some may go, as Christs ambassadors, to other worlds, to assist in there executing his decrees and purposes. But as the mediatorial reign of Christ, though extending over all worlds, is designed primarily and chiefly for the redemption of man, so also is the ministration of the countless myriads of angels that serve under him. They are all sent forth to minister in some way, directly or indirectly, for the benefit of those who are the heirs of salvation.
This is the end of our authors first argument drawn from the exalted rank and character of our blessed Lord and Redeemer. He has yet much to say of him in many respects. But being himself deeply impressed with a sense of the obligations which all men are under to love, honor, and obey such a Savior; and perceiving at the same time the dreadful consequences of their neglecting to do so; he suddenly breaks off from his direct line of argument, and draws from his submitted premises the conclusion which follows.
Commentary on Heb 1:4-14 by Don Boatman
Heb 1:4 –having become
This suggests a time when He was not better than the angels. When could this time have been?
a. Perhaps just after the emptying spoken of by Paul. Php 2:5-10.
b. While Christ was in human flesh and before He was refilled with His original glory.
During the time of His humility on earth, He was at least in some respect lower than the angels:
a. made a little lower than the angels. cf. Heb 2:9.
b. a body didst Thou prepare for Me. cf. Heb 10:5.
Heb 1:4 –so much better than the angels
What is meant by so much better? The word in the Greek is Kreithan.
a. It very likely means a measure of place or position, not quality of being.
b. Moral or spiritual excellence is not included.
c. Glory-honor-reverence, He had less while on earth, being obedient to the cross.
d. Ways in which He is better than angels:
1. He is the Son-they are servants. Heb 1:5-7
2. He is worshipped by angels. Heb 1:6
3. He may be addressed by God. Heb 1:8
4. He is a king with a sceptre of righteousness. Heb 1:8
5. He was anointed with the oil of gladness above His fellows. Heb 1:9
6. He is addressed as Lord. Heb 1:10
7. He is seated at the right hand of God. Heb 1:13
8. Angels minister to those who inherit salvation made possible by Christ. Heb 1:14
9. Not to angels did He subject the world to come, Heb 2:5
e. The word better appears frequently in Hebrews:
1. Better than angels, Heb 1:4
2. Better things. Heb 6:9
3. Better person than Abraham. Heb 7:7
4. Better hope. Heb 7:19
5. Better covenant. Heb 7:22
6. Better covenant and promises. Heb 8:6
7. Better sacrifice. Heb 9:23
8. Better possessions. Heb 10:34
9. Better country. Heb 11:16
10. Better resurrection. Heb 11:35
11. Better things. Heb 11:40
12. Better than that of Abel. Heb 12:24
f. Paul elsewhere says that to depart and be with Christ is better. Php 1:23
Heb 1:4 –than the angels
Who are angels?
a. Generally, it can be said that they are beings less than God, and other than men.
b. Specifically, here are some facts about them:
1. They are intelligent beings, showing some characteristics of men:
1Pe 1:11-12-which things angels desire to look into.
2. They are messengers:
Rev 4:8-11; Gen 19:15-Message to Lot.
3. They praise God and sing before Him. Rev 4:8-11; Rev 5:9.
4. They are emotional. Luk 15:7; Luk 15:10 : Angels rejoicing over sinners who repent.
5. They are sexless creatures.
Mat 22:30-neither marry or are given in marriage.
6. They are creatures of choice.
2Pe 2:4-when they sinned-
Jud 1:6-kept not their own principality-
7. They seem to be winged creatures, in some instances at least.
a) Six wings. Isa 6:2.
b) Four wings. Eze 1:6.
c) Wings. Exo 25:30; Exo 37:9
c. There are two classes of angels:
1. Gods angels who serve:
a) 1Ti 5:21-the elect angels.
b) Rev 14:10-holy angels.
2. Evil angels:
a) Eph 6:12-spiritual hosts of wickedness.
b) Rev 12:9-dragon was cast out and his angels.
Heb 1:4 –as he hath inherited a more excellent Name
This is a reward for His obedience, and thus His Name is above every name:
a. What name is foremost in the world but the name of Jesus?
b. We might argue over the second place name, Paul, Augustine, Lincoln, etc., but Jesus stands alone.
c. What is the Name referred to here? Jesus, Christ, Immanuel, etc.?
The Name is Son, as seen by Heb 1:5. Observe the importance of the Name of Jesus:
a. Act 4:12-In none other is there salvation.
b. Eph 1:21; Php 2:9-Name above every name.
c. Php 2:10-Name to bow before.
d. Php 2:11-A Name to confess.
e. Mat 28:19-Baptism in His name.
f. Col 3:17; Mat 10:42-All good to be in His Name.
g. Joh 14:13; Joh 15:16-Prayer in His Name.
h. Eph 5:20-Prayer in His Name.
i. Mat 18:20-Assemble in His Name.
j. Eph 3:14-His is the family Name.
Heb 1:5 –for unto which of the angels said He at any time, Thou art My Son
This is a question with an implied answer. He has never at any time said this to any of the angels.
a. Christ is unique; He is not one of the many hosts of angels, but the only Son of God.
b. We should not consider Christ as man or angel, but as Son of God.
Heb 1:5 –Thou art my Son
This is a quotation from Psa 2:7.
Son is the more excellent name spoken of in Heb 1:4.
Paul in Act 13:33 says Jesus fulfilled the prophecy of Psa 2:7.
Mary was told by the angel that her child would be called Son of God,
Luk 1:35- . . . shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.
God acclaimed Him as Son twice while He was on earth:
Mat 3:17-at His baptism,
Mat 17:5-at His transfiguration,
When did He become the Son of God?
a. This is a useless theological question based on the assumption that perhaps once He was not the Son.
b. The important thing is the fact that He was called the Son as against the fact that no angel was ever referred to as the Son of God.
c. These words were spoken of Christ as the son of David-as Man:
1) As God He was eternally in this relationship.
2) Isa 7:14 spoke of Him as Emmanuel.
Heb 1:5 –this day have I begotten Thee?
The meaning of beget:
a. It means to procreate as a sire, generate.
b. It means to produce as an effect.
Paul seems to connect the begetting with the resurrection of Jesus. Act 13:33-34.
a. If the resurrection is the begetting, then it is Gods declaration of Him as Son referred to in Rom 1:4-declared to be the Son of God with power-
b. Thus He was produced from the grave rather than produced as a child in a normal physical sense.
Heb 1:5 –I will be to Him a Father and He shall be to Me a Son
This is a fulfillment of the royal covenant with David. cf. 1Ch 17:13; 2Sa 7:14.
Jesus spoke often of this relationship:
Mat 11:25-I thank Thee, Father.
Luk 22:42-Father, remove this cup-
Luk 23:46-Father, into Thy hands-
Study Questions
59. Does having become so imply that one day He was not?
60. In what way was He below them?
61. How is Christ so much better than the angels?
62. Is it quality of which he is speaking, or one of place?
63. Find in this chapter ways in which He was superior.
64. How does the author prove that Christ has inherited a more excellent name?
65. When did God call Jesus his Son?
66. Does this Psa 2:7 actually refer to Christ?
67. What is the day that Christ was begotten?
68. When did God beget Christ?
69. What does Rom 1:4 say of his Sonship?
70. Is the statement of Fatherhood a fulfillment of prophecy?
71. Did Jesus ever call God Father?
72. Name some instances when He did..
Heb 1:6 –and when He again bringeth in the firstborn
The word again creates a problem.
a. It seems unlikely that this refers to Christs birth, for His second coming would then be His third; the birth was not again in the world.
b. A clarification of the problem of again may be in the alternate translation: and again, when He bringeth in-
1. This means He spoke again, rather than again bringing Him into the world.
2. The angels worshipped at His birth for they spoke-perhaps sang-from the heavens, Luk 2:14,
It can be said God brought Him in, for the Scriptures teach it.
Luk 1:35-To Mary: . . . and the power of the Most High shall overshadow thee-
Joh 3:16-that He gave-
Heb 1:6 –firstborn
This is a descriptive title and is used in at least two senses;
a. Firstborn of creation-Col 1:5-18.
b. Firstborn from the dead-Rev 1:5.
This is firstborn, God desires Him to have many brethren:
Rom 8:29-that He might be the firstborn among many brethren.
Heb 1:6 –into the world
The Greek word, here translated, world, suggests the inhabited world.
a. Christ came to man, for man needed a helper, an example, a Saviour.
b. Heb 4:15-tempted as we are-
c. Heb 2:18-able to succor them.
God was able to do the most for man by bringing Christ into the inhabited earth.
Heb 1:6 –He saith, and let all the angels worship Him
When did God say this?
a. Some commentators say the time is uncertain.
b. Some strain to suggest Psa 97:7 or perhaps Deu 32:43.
c. We do not need an Old Testament quotation; if the author were inspired as I believe he was, he spoke this by revelation, just as did John on Patmos.
The important thing is that the angels did worship Him while He was on earth, and now do so in heaven.
Luk 2:13-14-Glory to God-
Rev 5:11-12-and the number of them was 10,000 times
10,000 and thousands of thousands-saying-worthy-
Heb 1:7 –winds and His ministers a flame of fire
This is a quotation from Psa 104:4
In Psalms it reads a little differently-who maketh winds
His messengers, flames of fire his ministers.
Differences occur among the translators here:
a. Calvin: The passage quoted seems to have been turned to another meaning from what it appears to have; for as David is there describing the manner in which we see the world to be governed, nothing is more certain than the winds are mentioned, which he says are made messengers by the Lord.-this testimony is brought forward for this purpose, that it might by a similitude be applied to angels. (p. 44)
1. Calvin thinks that in this way David compares winds to angels because they perform offices in this world similar to what the angels do in heaven.
2. Hebrews seems to use winds to illustrate angels.
b. The correct thought of this phrase seems to be that angels move to serve Him-as spirits:
cf. Dan 9:21-they swiftly-
cf. Heb 1:14-they are ministering spirits-
Heb 1:7 –His ministers a flame of fire
Angels are related to fire.
Rev 14:18-Angels have power over fire.
Rev 16:8-An angel gives power to the sun to scorch men with fire.
Study Questions
73. What is meant when He again bringeth?
74. Does it change the meaning to move the word again?
75. What is meant by firstborn?
76. Does this refer to Bethlehem birth?
77. Are there second-born ones?
78. In what way is Christ firstborn? See Col 1:15-18; Rev 1:5.
79. How, when others were resurrected before Him, could He be firstborn from the dead?
80. When did God say, Let all the angels worship Him?
81. Was He worshipped by angels? When?
82. Where is a heavenly worship described?
83. How many angels worshipped Him in this instance?
84. Give an explanation of Who maketh His angels winds.
85. Where is the quotation found?
86. Do Gods angels move as wind?
87. What is meant by ministers a flame of fire?
88. Where is a New Testament scripture that may clarify this?
Heb 1:8 –Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever
This passage has various readings.
a. The original is found in Psa 45:6-In the footnote of the A.S. version it reads, Thy throne is the throne of God.
b. In Hebrews the footnote reads, Thy throne is God forever.
This is the problem: is Christ addressed here as God?
a. Calvin says: The Jews, in order to avoid owning Christ, make an evasion by saying that the throne of God is spoken of; whoever will read the verse who is of sound mind and free of the spirit of contention, cannot doubt, but the Messiah is called God. (p. 45)
b. To back up Calvins position, note Heb 1:9. Therefore God, Thy God, hath anointed Thee.
1. The commas could be removed so it would read, God Thy God hath-
2. The Psalm is addressed to Jesus, so the commas are correctly placed.
The main point should not be lost in the above discussion:
a. The point is the eternality of Jesus.
b. He is not just a minister of God as are the angels, but He has an eternal throne.
Heb 1:8 –and the sceptre
This is a baton or staff borne by a sovereign as an emblem of authority.
Heb 1:8 –of uprightness
In a world of corruptness and graft, we need one who rules with uprightness, Psa 37:18; Isa 26:7.
Jesus baptism was on the basis of righteousness.
Mat 3:15-to fulfill all righteousness.
Heb 1:8 –is the sceptre of Thy kingdom
Thy kingdom is also translated His kingdom.
Some make a distinction between kingdom of God and kingdom of heaven.
a. One view: The kingdom of God includes all saints from Adam to the present, and the church is a part of it.
b. Second view: The kingdom of heaven will be set up by Jesus when He comes, and the church is not a part of it.
SPECIAL OUTLINE
The New Testament Teaching on the Kingdom
I. The first preaching of the kingdom.
A. John, in Mat 3:2 : Repent ye for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.
B. Jesus in Mat 4:17 : From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say, Repent ye; for the kingdom of heaven it at hand.
C. Mat 10:7 to disciples: As ye go, preach saying the kingdom of heaven is at hand.
D. Luk 10:9-the seventy: . . . and heal the sick that are therein, and say unto them, the kingdom of God is come nigh unto you.
E. Two questions to be asked:
1. Were the seventy preaching differently than the twelve? No, all eighty-four were preaching the same message.
2. How near was the kingdom to them?
a. This is about six months before the death of Christ.
b. Within their lifetime: Mar 9:1-Verily I say unto you, That there be some of them that stand here, which shall not taste of death till they have seen the kingdom of God come with power.
3. The conclusion is that the kingdom and the church are the same.
II. The names of the kingdom
A. His kingdom
Mat 16:28 : Verily I say unto you, there be some standing here, which shall not taste of death till they see the Son of man coming in His kingdom.
cf. Joh 18:36 where Jesus said to Pilate: My kingdom is not of this world; if My kingdom were of this world then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews, but now is My kingdom not from hence.
The kingdom of God in the same instance:
Mar 9:1 Verily I say unto you that there be some of them that stand here, which shall not taste of death till they have seen the kingdom of God come with power.
Luk 9:27 : But I tell you of a truth, there be some standing here, which shall not taste of death, till they see the kingdom of God.
We are not discussing two different kingdoms; they are the same:
B. The kingdom of heaven
Mat 19:23-right after the rich young ruler went away sorrowing: Verily I say unto you, that a rich man shall hardly enter into the kingdom of heaven.
Mat 16:19 : And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatsoever-
C. The kingdom of God
Mar 10:25-The rich young ruler provoked this:
It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.
Joh 3:5 : Except a man be born of the water and the spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.
D. My church
Mat 16:18 : I say unto thee-upon this rock I will build my church.
E. The church of the firstborn
Heb 12:22-23 : But ye are come-to the general assembly and church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect.
F. A kingdom
Heb 12:28 : Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved,-let us have grace whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear.
G. The church of God.
1Co 1:2 Unto the church of God which is at Corinth to them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, with all that in every place call upon the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, both theirs and ours.
H. The churches of Christ.
Rom 16:16 The churches of Christ salute you.
Ecclesia is the Greek word here translated church, It means called out! Who are its members?
I. Church His body.
Eph 5:23 For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church and He is the Saviour of the body.
1Co 12:13 : For by one spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit.
J. The regeneration:
Mat 19:28 : And Jesus said unto them, Verily I say unto you, that ye which have followed me, in the regeneration when the Son of man shall sit in the throne of His glory, ye shall also sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.
III. The purpose of the kingdom
Luk 22:29-30 : I appoint unto you a kingdom, as my Father hath appointed unto Me; that ye may eat and drink at My table in My kingdom and sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel.
A. They would rule while Christ was reigning.
B. They would be the authority-keys to the kingdom.
Christ is superior to angels in universal rule because of character and creation
Heb 1:9 –Thou hast loved righteousness
What is righteousness?
a. It is in the realm of good beyond that which is demanded, but that which comes with love.
b. A man is right when he supports his family, but he is in the realm of righteousness when he goes beyond.
What evidence do we have that He loved righteousness?
a. His teaching emphasized it.
1. Mat 5:20.
2. Luke 10 : parable of the good Samaritan.
b. It was proved by His sinless life.
1. Luk 23:4 : Pilate found no fault in Him.
2. Matthew 4 : He insisted on righteousness when the devil tempted Him.
3. Heb 4:15 : was without sin.
c. His obedience to the Fathers will proves His love for righteousness.
Heb 1:9 –and hated iniquity
How do we know He did?
a. By his teaching.
1. The woes to the sinner. Mat 11:21; Mat 23:13-29; Luk 6:24.
2. His condemnation of hypocrisy. Mat 6:16; Mat 15:7.
b. He proved it by His actions.
Mat 21:12. The cleansing of the temple.
Jesus hated evil, but not the evildoer.
a. He looked upon the rich young ruler and loved him. Mar 10:21.
b. He ate with publicans and sinners. Mat 9:10.
c. He forgave the vilest of sinners, those who crucified Him. Luk 23:34.
d. He came to die for sinners.
We are expected to be like Christ.
a. Psa 97:10 : Oh ye that love Jehovah, hate evil.
b. Mat 6:15; Mat 18:35 : Forgiveness.
Heb 1:9 –therefore God, Thy God hath anointed Thee
Is Christ addressed as God here?
a. Yes, if the comma is left after God, if read as addressed to Jesus Christ.
b. No, if the comma should be removed and placed after therefore, for it then reads, God Thy God.
1. This means then that God is the God of Jesus.
2. It should be remembered that commas are arbitrarily placed in the scripture by men.
3. This is a quotation from Psa 45:6 and appears the same in the Old Testament as in the New Testament.
c. God is the God of Jesus.
Mat 27:46 : My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken me-
Anointing was a familiar practice in the scriptures.
a. There were two kinds, perhaps three.
1. The ordinary anointing of head and body, cf. Deu 28:40; Rth 3:3; Mic 6:15; Psa 23:5.
2. The official anointings:
a) Prophets were anointed at their inauguration to office, 1Ch 16:22; 1Ki 19:16; Psa 105:15.
b) Priests were anointed:
1) At the institution of the Levitical priesthood, they were anointed to office. Exo 40:15; Num 3:3.
2) The anointing for the high priesthood, Exo 29:29; Lev 16:32.
a) Kings were anointed in a divinely appointed ceremony, 1Sa 9:16; 1Sa 10:1; 1Ki 1:34; 1Ki 1:39.
3. The anointing of inanimate objects, Gen 31:13-Jacob anointed the pillar at Bethel, cf. Exo 30:26-28.
Jesus was anointed, as other scriptures indicate:
a. Act 4:27 : -Jesus whom Thou didst anoint-
Act 10:37-38 : -how God anointed Him with the Holy Spirit.
b. Jesus was and is Prophet, Priest and King, so He is deserving of anointment.
1) Prophet-Deu 18:15-18.
2) Priest-Heb 4:14.
3) King-Rev 17:14.
Heb 1:9 –with the oil of gladness
Jesus was glad-Heb 12:2 : -who for the joy that was set-
God was pleased with him; thus He was glad:
Matthew 3, at His baptism: -in whom I am well pleased-
Matthew 17, at His transfiguration: -well pleased-
There are two means or materials used for anointing, one material, and one figurative:
a. Material-oil. Luk 7:46 : respect paid to a friend or guest. Psa 23:5.
b. Gods anointing for man.
2Co 1:21 : -anointed us in God.
1Jn 2:27 : -the anointing which ye received-
The oil of gladness is figurative, and we may believe the Holy Spirit is referred to.
Act 10:37-38 : -anointed Him with the Holy Spirit.
Heb 1:9 –above Thy fellows
Who are the fellows?
a. Obviously the Godhead is not referred to.
b. He is above all others:
1. He is above man with whom He dwelt, as He took upon Himself the form of a servant, for these men must confess Him. Php 2:9-11.
2. He is above all rulers, for He is King of kings and Lord of lords. Rev 17:14; Rev 19:16.
3. He is above all saints, for He is their priest. Heb 4:14.
Heb 1:10 –the foundation of the earth
This is a quotation from Psa 102:25.
a. It seems not to refer to Christ at the first reading.
b. Christs name is not mentioned in the Psalm.
c. Calvin says, -but it is yet plain that He is so pointed out, that no one can doubt but that His kingdom is there avowedly recommended to us. (p. 47)
New Testament verses that suggest the same idea: Joh 1:1; Col 1:16. The eternality of Christ over the inhabited world is established.
Heb 1:10 –and the heavens are the works of Thy hands
This refers to the creation above the earth.
Heavens is in the plural form. The completeness of His power is established. There is not one God who made heaven, and another God who made earth.
Heb 1:11 –They shall perish
What is meant by they?
a. Specifically, the foundations of earth and the heavens.
b. This world will perish. See other verses: Mat 24:35; 2Pe 3:7-13; Rev 21:1 : The first heaven and first earth are passed away.
c. Other things will likewise perish:
1. Evil angels will perish. 2Pe 2:4; Mat 25:41.
2. Sinful men will perish. Joh 3:16; Rev 20:15; 2Pe 3:7.
Heb 1:11 –but Thou continuest
This is called immutability by the theologians. Christ is not mutable-not changing. Christ is invariable-unchangeable, Note His eternality as seen by other verses. Heb 1:8; Heb 13:8; 2Co 1:19.
Heb 1:11 –they shall wax old as a garment
Scientists agree to the ageing of the world.
They say that the sun is losing its heat, but of course tomorrow they may change their mind. They say the soil is wearing out, so our vegetables need vitamins added.
Obviously man grows old.
James verifies this-Heb 4:14 : Man is as a vapor.
Heb 1:12 –and as a mantle shalt Thou roll them up
The mantle was a loose sleeveless garment worn over other garments. God is powerful enough to roll up the earth as easily as man cares for his coat.
Heb 1:12 –and as a garment they shall be changed
Peter expresses this thought likewise in 2Pe 3:10.
God is able to make changes quickly. 1Co 15:52 : in a twinkling of an eye-
Heb 1:12 –but Thou art the same
In what ways is He the same?
a. He is the same in dependability, so His words will abide. Mat 24:35.
b. He is the same in character, so His love will save us in the end.
c. He is the same in any age, Heb 13:8-yesterday, today, yea and forever.
Heb 1:12 –and Thy years shall not fail Thee
Old age is no factor with Jesus.
Time does not enter in for He is eternal, Death could not corrupt Him.
Psa 16:10 : -Holy One did not see corruption.
Act 2:31 : -nor did His flesh see corruption.
Study Questions
89. What is the duration of Gods throne?
90. How does this prove His superiority over angels?
91. What is a sceptre?
92. What is its significance?
93. What is the nature of His reign? cf. Psa 37:18; Isa 26:7.
94. Does Mat 3:15 add to the idea of reign of righteousness?
95. Does Jesus have a kingdom?
96. What words are connected with the term, kingdom? What is the difference between the terms, kingdom of heaven, and kingdom of God?
97. Is it possible to have a kingdom without a king?
98. When was Jesus king?
99. When is He your king?
100. How did Christ feel concerning righteousness?
101. What is righteousness?
102. What evidence do we have that Christ loved righteousness? By His preaching? By His life?
103. How strongly was Jesus against iniquity?
104. Did Jesus hate the sinners?
105. Name some times that Jesus preached against sin.
106. Did He ever display wrath against sin?
107. Is God the God of Christ?
108. Is Christ spoken of as being God?
109. Did Jesus ever call God His God? cf. Mat 27:46.
110. Describe the various kinds of anointing in the Old Testament.
111. When was Christ anointed?
112. What about Jesus caused Him to deserve anointing? (Prophet-Priest-King.)
113. What is the significance of the expression, oil of gladness?
114. Did Jesus ever hear of an expression of gladness from God?
115. What other means has God used to anoint people?
116. In what way have we been anointed? cf. 2Co 1:21; 1Jn 2:27; Act 10:37-38.
117. Who are the fellows of Christ?
118. Could fellows refer to the Godhead?
119. Is He above man? How do we know this is true?
120. Is He above rulers? Rev 17:14; Rev 19:16.
121. Is He above priests? Heb 4:14.
122. And Thou Lord-To whom does this refer?
123. Read Psa 102:25, which is quoted in Heb 1:10.
124. Did He make the heavens? cf. Joh 1:1; Col 1:16.
125. What is the main idea established here?
126. What is meant by, they shall perish?
127. Does the scripture back up this teaching that the worlds and heavens will perish?
128. Will anything else perish?
1. Evil angels; 2Pe 2:4; Mat 25:41.
2. Sinful men: Joh 3:16; Rev 20:15; 2Pe 3:7.
129. But Thou continuest carries what idea?
130. Do other verses establish His eternality?
131. What figure of speech is used to describe the aging of the earth in Heb 1:11?
132. Do scientists agree?
133. Does man grow old? cf. Jas 4:14.
134. What figure describes the end of the world in Heb 1:12?
135. What is a mantle?
136. What other scriptures teach that God is able to change things? 2Pe 3:10; 1Co 15:52.
137. In what ways are God and Christ the same?
138. Are the Godhead members subject to failing years?
139. Can the Godhead be corrupted by failing years? cf. Psa 16:10; Act 2:31.
Heb 1:13 –any time
1. This is a question with an implied answer. The answer is none. Jesus was spoken to in words that were never spoken to any angels.
Heb 1:13 –sit thou on my right hand
This is a quotation from Psa 110:1.
It is not unusual to have God spoken of as having bodily organs:
a. Face: cf. Gen 32:30-God face to face. Exo 33:11-spoke to Moses face to face.
b. Hand: cf. Ezr 7:9-according to the hand of God. Job 2:10-receive good at the hand of God.
Heb 1:13 –till I make thine enemies the footstool
God and Christ have their enemies:
a. In Act 4:24-28, Psalms 2 is shown to be fulfilled in Jerusalem by Pilate; the Jews and the Gentiles in the crucifixion of Christ.
Enemies seem to combine forces when they have a common enemy or objective. The Sadducees and Pharisees joined forces against Jesus.
b. Jas 4:4 : Friendship of the world is enmity with God.
c. Rom 8:7 : A carnal mind is at enmity with God.
Heb 1:13 –the footstool of Thy feet
This is a familiar expression:
a. Christ is waiting to do this. Heb 10:13.
b. Christ will reign until this is a reality. 1Co 15:24-25.
c. Christs victory will come. Rev 19:11-21.
Enemies of Christ will be punished. Heb 10:27-a fierceness of fire which shall devour the adversaries.
Footstool of thy feet alludes to an ancient custom of princes and kings to tread on the necks of their vanquished enemies, in token of their complete victory over them.
Heb 1:14 –are they not all ministering spirits
This is an interrogative type of expression:
a. The question form is just as strong as a positive statement.
b. Angels are ministering spirits, for Heb 1:13 verifies that they refers to angels.
This establishes the superiority of Christ over angels.
a. Angels may minister, but Christ is Saviour.
b. Angels only serve those who have salvation made possible by Christ.
We have examples of different classes of angels that serve man and God;
a. The Cherubim and Seraphim:
1. Cherubim
a) Cherubim guarded Eden. Gen 3:24.
b) Figures of them were placed on the mercy seat, Exo 25:18.
c) Figures of colossal size, with extended wings, were in Solomons temple.
2. Seraphim
a) The name means, burning, glowing.
b) Isaiah saw them in his vision. Isa 6:2.
c) They had three sets of wings; one set covered the face in humility; the second covered the feet, showing respect; the third was used to fly.
d) They resembled men. Isa 6:3.
e) They had a twofold purpose; Isa 6:3, to praise God; Isa 6:6, to communicate.
b. Michael and Gabriel
1. Michael:
a) His name means, who is like God.
b) He is one of the chief princes or archangels, Dan 10:13; Jud 1:9.
c) He was the Prince of Israel. Dan 10:21.
d) He is spoken of as Great Prince. Dan 12:1.
e) He is the leader of the hosts of God in war. Rev 12:7.
2. Gabriel:
a) His name means man of God.
b) He is an angel of high rank.
c) He made two great announcements: the birth of John, Luk 1:11-22, to Zacharias; the birth of Jesus, Luk 1:26-31, to Mary.
d) He was sent to Daniel to explain his visions. Dan 8:16; Dan 9:21.
c. Elect angels
1. Paul speaks of them, 1Ti 5:21 : -and elect angels.
2. These are in opposition to the evil angels spoken of in Eph 6:12 : spiritual hosts of wickedness
d. Let us see their work in the past:
1. Old Testament ministry:
a) Appeared to warn Abraham and Lot. Gen 18:1-2; Gen 19:1.
b) Protected the men in the fiery furnace. Dan 3:19-28.
c) Stopped the mouths of lions for Dan 6:22.
d) Helped Gods people in war. Psa 34:7 : angel of Jehovah encampeth- Exo 23:20-21 : angel before thee- Jos 5:13-14-before Jerichos battle: -prince of host of Jehovah. Jdg 2:1-5-angel from Gilgal, telling them to destroy all paganism.
2. New Testament ministry:
a) Gabriel announced the birth of both John and Jesus in Luke 1.
b) Angels ministered unto Jesus after His temptation, Mat 4:11 and in Gethsemane, Luk 22:43.
c) Angels carried Lazarus to Abrahams bosom, Luk 16:22.
d) An angel directed Philip to the Ethiopian, Act 8:26.
e) An angel appeared to Cornelius, Act 10:7.
f) An angel comforted Paul, Act 27:23.
g) An angel released Peter and John from prison, Act 5:19.
h) An angel saved Peter from Herod, Act 12:7-11.
i) Churches in Revelation had angels, Rev 2:1; Rev 2:8; Rev 2:12; Rev 2:18.
j) They will be present when Christ comes. Mat 16:27; Mat 24:31.
e. Do they minister to us today?
1. The International Standard Bible Encyclopedia says, The modern conception of the possession by each man of special guardian angels is not found in the Old Testament. (p. 132)
2. Milligan believes they serve us:
a) He believes that they aid in the work of redeeming man; and in carrying out this work of its final consummation.
3. Some may be sent to frustrate the wiles and devices of Satan and his fallen angels. Jud 1:6.
4. Some are sent to punish wicked men. Act 12:23.
Study Questions
140. Did God ever speak to Christ something not said to angels, according to this verse?
141. Is it common for God to be spoken of as possessing organs, such as hands? cf. Gen 32:30; Exo 33:11; Ezr 7:9; Job 2:10.
142. What enemies does God have?
143. What makes us enemies of God? cf. Jas 4:4; Rom 8:7.
144. What is the significance of footstool?
145. Describe this time of waiting. cf. Heb 10:13; 1Co 15:24-25.
146. Will God see to it that Christ will be victorious? cf. Rev 19:11-21.
147. If angels minister, how is Christ greater?
148. What are the different classes of angels?
149. Where do the Cherubim and Seraphim appear?
150. What does Seraphim mean?
151. What can be said of Michael and Gabriel?
152. What does the name Michael mean?
153. What is the nature of his work?
154. What is the meaning of the name Gabriel?
155. Tell of some of his work.
156. What are elect angels?
157. What would be their opposites?
158. Tell of some of the work of angels in the past in the Old Testament.
159. What classes of work did they participate in?
160. Tell of the work of angels in the life of Christ.
161. What was their work in Acts?
162. What is their work described in the book of Revelation?
163. What passages teach that angels may minister to us today?
Commentary on Heb 1:4-14 by Burton Coffman
Heb 1:4 –Having become by so much better than the angels, as he hath inherited a more excellent name than they.
The remainder of this chapter, beginning here, extols the supremacy of Christ, as compared with angels. The force of the argument lies in the outlandish burden of importance the Jewish mind placed upon the function of angels in their history, especially in the giving of the Law of Moses. Cargill wrote that by the time of Christ,
The Jews had developed an elaborate system of angelology … They came to think of angels as intermediaries between God and man (and) also believed that there were millions and millions of them. They had many duties. They delivered messages, presided over the destiny of Israel, controlled the movement of stars, manipulated history. There were angels over the sea, the frost, the dew, the rain, the snow, the hail, the thunder and the lightning. There were angels who were wardens of hell and torturers of the damned. There were destroying angels and angels of punishment.[10]
In spite of the fact that an angel appeared to Cornelius and that an angel released Peter from prison, the visible ministry of angels was a strangely diminishing phenomenon in the early church, the emphasis going more and more to Christ and Christ alone. The author of Hebrews met the issue squarely, identifying Christ as God come in the flesh, and marshaling the Old Testament scriptures themselves to prove his superiority over angels. Significantly, the author did not refute these popular ideas regarding angels by any appeal to his own apostolic authority (though likely he was an apostle, probably Paul), appealing rather to the Old Testament scriptures which the addressees received and conceded to be Messianic. If Paul was the author, and in view of the procedure here, this method of appeal would explain why he chose to identify with them (as in Heb 2:3-4), and to omit all reference to himself as an apostle, or even any personal reference at all. The appeal which the author made to the Jewish scriptures, recognized by that generation as Messianic prophecies, takes all the weight out of the arguments which, during intervening centuries, have been invented to “prove” that those very scriptures were not Messianic.
As to the actual place of angels in the economy of redemption, there is a further discussion of that at the end of the chapter; meanwhile, let it be observed that there are no less than seven points of superiority of Christ over angels, catalogued by the nineteenth-century scholar, Adam Clarke, as follows: he has a more excellent name than they (Heb 1:4-5); the angels of God adore him (Heb 1:6); the angels were created by him (Heb 1:7); even while being a man, he was endowed with greater gifts than they (Heb 1:8-9); he is eternal, but they are not (Heb 1:10-12); he is more highly exalted (Heb 1:13); angels are only servants of God; Christ is the Son of God (Heb 1:14).[11]
The author of Hebrews laid out a proposition in Heb 1:4 to the effect that Christ is greater than angels; and he then proceeded to prove it by reference to seven passages in the Old Testament.
[10] Robert L. Cargill, Understanding the Book of Hebrews (Nashville: Broadman Press, 1967), p. 10.
[11] Adam Clarke, op. cit., p. 682.
Heb 1:5 –For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art my Son, This day have I begotten thee? and again, I will be to him a father, And he shall be to me a Son?
Psa 2:7,2Sa 7:14 are the two passages cited, both of which sustain the sonship of Christ. Now, all Christians are “Sons of God,” and it is thought that even the angels bear this designation too (see Job 1:6; Job 38:7); but in the lofty sense intended here, no angel was ever called a son of God. In modern times, Jewish expositors have tried to remove the Messianic application of Psa 2:7; but the fact remains that both the author and the readers of Hebrews accepted it as a true prophetic reference to the Messiah.
Pierce (as quoted by Macknight) affirms that the second Psalm belongs wholly to Messiah; and proves by passages from the writings of the ancient Jewish doctors, that they applied it to Messiah; and that some of the later doctors acknowledged “it advisable to apply the Psalm of David, in order to the better answering of the heretics” (meaning Christians).[12]
Apostolic authority for accepting it as reference to Christ comes from Peter’s application of the first three verses to him in Act 4:25. The question framing both these citations is clearly for the purpose of eliciting a negative response from the readers to the effect, “No, God, thou hast never referred to an angel as thy Son.” But of course, he did so address the Messiah.
“This day have I begotten thee” is a statement upon which such things as the so-called “eternal Sonship” and other implications are said to rest. Although widely received, the doctrine of the eternal Sonship of Christ is not supported by this epistle, nor by anything else in the scripture. In truth, the scriptures deny such a teaching. By prophecy, Isaiah called Christ “everlasting Father” (Isa 9:6), a patent contradiction of the notion that he was eternally a son. Christ is called God no less than ten times in the Greek New Testament; and the mind cannot accept an idea of true deity that is tainted with any possible kind of inferiority. (See under Heb 1:8.) This expositor agrees with the words of John Wesley, as quoted by Adam Clarke:
In 1781 he (John Wesley) published in the fourth volume of the Arminian Magazine, p, 384, an article entitled “An Arian Antidote”; in this are the following words: “greater or lesser in infinity, is not; inferior Godhead shocks our sense; Jesus was inferior to the Father as touching his manhood (Joh 14:28); he was a son given and slain intentionally from the foundation of the world (Rev 13:8), and the firstborn from the dead of every creature (Col 1:15-18). But our Redeemer from everlasting (Isa 63:16) had not the inferior name of Son.”[13]
To what, then, do the words “This day have I begotten thee” apply? An apostle has given the sure and certain answers; for, in the synagogue at Antioch, Paul said, “God hath raised up Jesus; as also it is written in the second Psalm, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee” (Act 13:33). Thus, the begetting mentioned in this place is the resurrection of Christ. It was the resurrection that established all that Christ said and did, confirming the virgin birth, the incarnation, the miracles, the prophecies, everything. Christ, therefore, in his risen human nature and united with Godhead, also glorified with the title of Son, in such a supremely exalted state, was and is far above all angels.
[12] James Macknight, op. cit., p. 510.
[13] Adam Clarke, op. cit., p. 694.
Heb 1:6 –And when he again bringeth in the firstborn into the world, he saith, And let all the angels of God worship him.
Scholars say that the author here quoted from the Septuagint translation of Psa 97:7, the common versions reading, “Worship him all ye gods.” Christ is here called the “firstborn,” a favorite expression of Paul who referred to Christ as “the firstborn from the dead” (Col 1:18); and as “the firstborn of all creation” (Col 1:15). This expression emphasizes the honor and dignity and primacy of Christ.
Of special interest is the word “again,” in which it appears that God’s commanding of all the angels to worship Christ has special reference to a second time that Christ is brought into the world; and thus this has been applied to the second coming. For example, Hewitt, in Tyndale’s Commentary, said, “The reference would seem to be to the second coming of Christ.”[14] However, there is one vast consideration that requires that it be construed as a reference to the resurrection of Christ from the dead; because it is certain that angels now worship Christ and that their doing so does not wait upon some future event like the second coming. Besides, Christ’s being raised from the dead was genuinely a coming “again” into the world, his descent into Hades separating between the two times he was in the world. If it should be insisted that this view would relegate the ultimate coming of Christ in judgment to the status of a third coming, this is not logical; because the two comings of Christ, if they be so viewed, were so intimately connected that they stand as one. The big point of this quotation, however, should not be lost sight of; and that is the fact that God has commanded the angels to worship Christ. Great and glorious as angels assuredly are, Christ is infinitely above them.
ENDNOTE:
[14] Thomas Hewitt, op. cit., p. 56.
Heb 1:7 –And of the angels he saith, Who maketh his angels winds, And his ministers a flame of fire.
The pertinent fact of this quotation from Psa 14:4 is in its reference to the status of angels as servants, that is, ministers of God. Some have concluded that the function of angels, at least partially, is to cooperate by means of using the winds and fire to bring about God’s will; but if such should be true, there is surely no information given in regard to how it is done and under what circumstances it could be expected. Christ’s rebuking the winds and the waves was hailed by Richard Trench as evidence that the fallen angel, Satan, could at least take advantage of certain disorders in nature, or even cause them.[15] Surely an even greater power pertains to the angels who kept their first estate. That superiority of Christ is seen in the elevation of the Creator above the creature, the master above his servant.
ENDNOTE:
[15] Richard C. Trench, Miracles (Westwood, New Jersey: Fleming H. Revell Company, 1953), p. 156.
Heb 1:8 –But of the Son he saith, Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever; And the scepter of uprightness is the scepter of thy kingdom.
This quotation is from Psa 45:6 and relates to the Godhead of Christ.
CHRIST AS GOD
This verse has proved offensive to commentators who apparently resent such a blunt reference to Christ as God; but all kinds of learned arguments, predicated upon the Greek word, whether nominative or vocative, are not able to obscure the obvious and only meaning. Such would-be translations as “God is thy throne,” or “Thy throne is God,” etc., do not make sense nor harmonize with anything else in the Bible. God is not a chair to be sat upon; and no throne could possibly be God! The reluctance of people to allow so forthright a declaration of Christ’s deity has been often noted. Bruce commented on this, saying “That he should be addressed as God has seemed too daring to many commentators who seek to evade it or explain it away.”[16] Significantly, the most widely accepted versions of the New Testament allow it to stand as here and in KJV and RSV. Heb 1:8 must therefore be allowed to take its place as a witness of the eternal power and Godhead of Christ. Other passages bearing the same witness are; Joh 1:1; Joh 20:28; Act 20:28; Rom 9:5; Php 2:6; Col 2:9; Tit 2:13; 2Pe 1:1; and 1Jn 5:20. To be sure, there are an almost unlimited number of other passages in which Christ’s deity must be inferred, as for example, in “Before Abraham was, I AM” (Joh 8:58).
A more indirect assault upon the plain meaning of this text is the allegation that would make Psalms 45 merely an epithalamium extolling the virtues of King Solomon (of all people)! Solomon does not fit the declaration here. His throne was not forever and ever; he did not love righteousness, but did love a thousand women; and, as for hating iniquity, he was a gross idolater. No, in the words of Christ himself, “A greater than Solomon is here”!
ENDNOTE:
[16] F. F. Bruce, op. cit., p. 19.
Heb 1:9 –Thou hast loved righteousness and hated iniquity; Therefore God, thy God, hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows.
This is a continuation of the quotation from Psa 45:6-7; and it cites the reasons for Christ’s exaltation as being founded upon his love of righteousness and corresponding hatred of evil. Can one imagine an application of this Psalm to Solomon? (See under above verse.) The anointing seems not to refer to any formal or official ceremony of appointment for Christ but rather to the happiness and joy which flowed unto him because of his successful encounter and resulting triumph over sin, death, and the devil. In one sense, Christ was anointed at his baptism; but this appears rather as a reference to that overflowing of joy of Jesus, mentioned again in Heb 12:3.
Heb 1:10-12 –And, Thou, Lord in the beginning didst lay the foundation of the earth, And the heavens are the works of thy hands: They shall perish; but thou continuest: And they all shall wax old as doth a garment; And as a mantle shalt thou roll them up, As a garment, and they shall be changed: But thou art the same, And thy years shall not fail.
This quotation is from Psa 102:25-27; and the great significance of its use here is in the fact that words originally addressed to Jehovah are unhesitatingly applied to Jesus Christ. Westcott was quoted by Hewitt writing of this verse that it is “the application to the Incarnate Son of words addressed to Jehovah.”[17]
Not merely the fact of creation by the Almighty, but the divine supervision of the universe and watchful control of all its changes are affirmed here. Bruce justified the application of this passage to Christ on the basis of the twin facts that the author had already said (Heb 1:2) that:
It was through the Son the worlds were made (and that) person to whom these words were spoken is addressed explicitly as the “Lord,” and it is God who addresses him thus![18]
Christ as the changeless one is the theme of these verses. The universe is constantly changing, however imperceptible those changes appear to the fleeting glance of people. Whatever the wreck of the matter and crush of worlds the future holds, the work and glory of Christ will not be affected. Of special interest is the comparison of the sidereal creation to a garment, indicating that the starry heavens themselves are but the usable and disposable accessories of Godhead. They are God’s garments and are subject to age and change. Exell has this,
The stars are the jewels on his brow; the sky his flowing train; the flowering landscapes, the shining seas, the gorgeous clouds – the fine needlework and wrought gold of his imperial raiment.[19]
In the light of this revelation, how foolish, therefore, must appear such things as sun worship, or the temptation to view the universe as eternal.
[17] Thomas Hewitt, op. cit., p. 59.
[18] F. F. Bruce, op. cit., pp. 21-22.
[19] Joseph S. Exell, The Biblical Illustrator (Grand Rapids, Michigan: Baker Book House, 1967), p. 53.
Heb 1:13 –But of which of the angels hath he said at any time, Sit thou on my right hand, Till I make thine enemies the footstool of thy feet?
The seventh quotation is Psa 110:1; and the complete verse is thus: “The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand, until I make thine enemies thy footstool.” Here is another instance of God’s being both the speaker and the person spoken to; and it is upon the most convincing evidence that this Psalm is considered Messianic, seeing that Christ himself thus applied it when he pressed the question upon the Pharisees, “How then doth David in the spirit call him Lord?” (Mat 22:43-44). Added to this, Jesus also identified himself as one “sitting upon the right hand of power” (Mar 14:62), and Paul declared that “He must reign until he hath put all enemies under his feet” (1Co 15:25).
This reference to “enemies” is a reminder of the opposing forces of evil, against which the servants of Christ are destined to strive throughout the days of their pilgrimage; and, as Exell expressed it,
Even so with the Church of Christ, in which this day we confess ourselves to have our portion, from the first day of her peregrination in earth until her last entrance into glory, there is a perpetual hatred between the serpent and her Head and between the seed of the serpent and her children, in which strife every one of us particularly have our fight, so that from our mother’s womb until we lie down in the grave our life is a warfare upon the earth.[20]
From that beleaguered citadel of faith in which every child of God is besieged and threatened by the encroachments and frustrations imposed by the evil one, how glorious is the refreshment that comes from a glance heavenward where the Head and Redeemer sits in eternal enthronement, exercising all authority in heaven and upon the earth. Not to lose sight of the argument the author made from this passage, how utterly beyond the glory and authority of angels is that of Christ!
ENDNOTE:
[20] Ibid., p. 60.
Heb 1:14 –Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to do service for the sake of them that shall inherit salvation?
The angels have the nature of servants, or “ministers,” as stated here, and thus must ever be accounted inferior to Jesus our Lord; despite this, however, those shining creatures of the unseen world possess a magnificence beyond our imagination; and the service they give to God and their activities on behalf of the saints, so mysteriously mentioned here, are matters of surpassing interest and curiosity. Salvation appears in this verse, not as something people may earn, but as a blessing they shall “inherit,” thus corresponding with the same view prevalent throughout the New Testament.
CONCERNING ANGELS
In view of the attention lavished in this chapter upon angels and their place in the economy of redemption, it is considered appropriate to set forth some of the basic scriptural teachings concerning them. They are innumerable (Heb 12:22); and from such impressions as may be gathered from our Saviour’s reference to “legions of angels” (Mat 26:53) and the use of words like “archangel” (Jude 1:1:1:9), as well as from our Lord’s making angels of little children to be of the highest rank in heaven (Mat 18:10), it is inferred that the angelic host are an organized company, or kingdom; and it is possibly from the nature of such an organization that the various words like “seraphim,” “cherubim,” and “archangel” have been derived, these terms standing for the several ranks or powers of the angelic company.
The intimate connection of the angels with the affairs of the kingdom of God is seen in the rejoicing of angels over one sinner that repents (Luk 15:7) and in the promise of Christ to confess his followers before God and his holy angels Mar 8:38). The angels attended Christ’s earthly mission, announced his conception and his birth, strengthened him in Gethsemane, awaited his call during the passion, rolled away the stone from his grave, announced his resurrection, and escorted him to glory. In the second advent, Christ will appear with ten thousand angels (perhaps a symbolical number for an infinite host) (2Th 1:7); and to those angels of his power shall be assigned the task of separating the precious from the vile (Mat 13:41; Mat 13:49). The love of angels for people, though incapable of comparison with the love of Christ for people, is nevertheless a valid assumption from the above premises; and the loving regard of angels stands as an effective foil of the hatred engendered against people by Satan and his angels.
The verse before us is a flat declaration that angels perform services for them that shall inherit eternal life; and a fair inquiry is, “What services?” The scriptures reveal the following kinds of services performed on behalf of people by the angels of God: (1) They bear away the souls of the righteous in death (Luk 16:22), as in the case of Lazarus. (2) They oppose purposes and designs of Satan, not in their own names, but in the name of the Lord (Jude 1:1:1:6). (3) They execute the punitive judgments of God upon the incorrigibly wicked, as in the case of Sennacherib (2Ki 19:35) and that of Herod (Act 12:23). (4) They exert influence over the rulers and governments of nations, as in the case of Persia (Dan 10:20). (5) They aid providentially in bringing the unsaved to hear the redeeming words of the gospel, as in the case of Cornelius (Act 10:3). (6) They exercise solicitous care over little children, as shown by Jesus’ words (Mat 18:10). (7) They are actively employed in maintaining free course and availability of the word of God, as indicated by a mighty angel’s holding in his hand “a little book” open (Revelation 10), a book which must certainly be hailed as the New Testament.
People can know nothing of angels except what God has revealed through the Bible; and, even from the Bible, it is possible to make incorrect deductions; but some things are definitely clear. There are countless millions of angels whom God created to perform his will throughout a vast theater of operations, cosmic in dimensions, with particular emphasis upon those matters that concern the salvation of people. Great as the privileges of angels appear to be, it would seem that there are two prerogatives not given them. It is not recorded that any of them ever preached the gospel, nor is it indicated that they have the power to reproduce themselves. Worshipping of the angels is forbidden (Col 1:18); and they have no mediatorial function between God and man, that position being reserved to Christ alone (1Ti 2:5).
Fuente: Old and New Testaments Restoration Commentary
The design of the apostle, as we have now often showed, is to evince the necessity of abiding in the doctrine of the gospel, from the excellency of the person by whom it pleased God to reveal it unto us. This he hath done already in general, in that description which he hath given us of his person, power, works, offices, and glory; whereby he hath made it evident that no creature whom God was pleased at any time to make use of in the revelation of his will, or the institution of his worship, was any way to be compared with him. Having proceeded thus far in general, he descends now to the consideration of particular instances, in all those whom God employed in the ministration of the law and constitution of Mosaical worship; and takes occasion from them all to set forth the dignity and incomparable excellencies of the Lord Christ, whom in all things he exalts.
First, then, he treateth concerning angels, as those who were the most glorious creatures, employed in the giving of the law. The Hebrews owned, yea, pleaded this in their own defense, that besides the mediation of Moses, God used the ministry of angels in the giving of the law, and in other occasional instructions of their forefathers. Some of them contend that the last of the prophets was personally an angel, as the signification of his name imports. Holy Stephen, upbraiding them with their abuse and contempt of their greatest privileges, tells them that they received the law by the disposition (ordering, or ministry) of angels, Act 7:53. And the Targum interprets the chariots of God, with the thousands of angels, Psa 68:17-18, of the angels by whose ministry God taught Israel the law. This, then, might leave a special prejudice in their minds, that the law being so delivered by angels must needs have therein the advantage above the gospel, and be therefore excellent and immutable.
To remove this prejudice also, and further to declare the excellency and pre-eminence in all things of Him who revealed the gospel, the apostle takes occasion, from what he had newly taught them concerning the exaltation of Jesus Christ at the right hand of God, to prove unto them, out of the scriptures of the Old Testament, that he is exceedingly advanced and glorious above the angels themselves, whose concurrence in the ministration of the law they boasted in; and to this purpose produceth four signal testimonies, one after another. This is the design of the apostle, which he pursues and makes out unto the end of this chapter; and that we may rightly conceive of his intention, and the meaning of the Holy Ghost in the whole, we shall, before we consider his proposition laid down in this fourth verse, or the ensuing confirmations of it, inquire in general what it is in Christ which he compareth with and preferreth above the angels, and wherein it is that he so exalts him.
The comparison entered on between the Lord Christ and angels must be either with respect unto their natures, or unto their dignity, office, power, and glory. If the comparison be of nature with nature, then it must be either in respect of the divine or human nature of Christ. If it should be of the divine nature of Christ with the nature of angels, then it is not a comparison of proportion, as between two natures agreeing in any general kind of being, as do the nature of a man and a worm, but a comparison only manifesting a difference and distance without any proportion. So answereth Athanasius, Orat. 2 adv. Arian. But the truth is, the apostle hath no design to prove by arguments and testimonies the excellencies of the divine nature above the angelical. There was no need so to do, nor do his testimonies prove any such thing. Besides, speaking of angels, the other part of the comparison, he treats not of their nature, but their office, work, and employment, with their honorable and glorious condition therein. Whereas, therefore, the apostle produceth sundry testimonies confirming the deity of the Son, he doth it not absolutely to prove the divine nature to be more excellent than the angelical, but only to manifest thereby the glorious condition of him who is partaker of it, and consequently his pre-eminence above angels, or the equity that it should be so.
Neither is the comparison between the human nature of Christ and the nature of angels; for that absolutely considered and in itself is inferior to the angelical; whence, in regard of his participation of it, he is said to be made lower than the angels, chap. 2.
The apostle, then, treats of the person of Christ, God and man, who was appointed and designed of God the Father to be the revealer of the gospel and mediator of the new testament. As such, he is the subject of the ensuing general proposition; as such, he was spoken of in the words immediately foregoing; and concerning him as such are the ensuing testimonies to be interpreted, even those which testify to his divine nature, being produced to demonstrate the excellency of his person, as vested with the offices of the king, priest, and prophet of his church, the great revealer of the will of God in the last days.
Heb 1:4. , .
Syr. Et ipse tantum praestantior fuit, Boderian.; And he was so much more excellent. At tanto potior factus est, Tremel.; And he is made so much more better. At ipse toto excellit; or, as De Dieu, At hoc totum excellit; And he wholly excelleth; or, in all things he excelleth. Vulg. Tanto melior factus angelis. The translation of by melior is blamed by Erasmus, Beza, Vatablus, and is generally deserted by the expositors of the Roman church; and it is hard, if not impossible, to find melior in any good author used in the sense that is here and elsewhere constantly applied unto. Ours render the word better, made better; to avoid, I believe, a coincidence with that which they express by, more excellent. is properly nobilior, potentior, praestantior, excellentior, more powerful, able, excellent, as to love, honor, or state and condition; as in that of Homer, Il. A. 80,
. That is, , saith Eustathius, multo potentior, more powerful, able to prevail, or more excellent. , factus, effectus, made, was, became. , differentius different; which is sometimes put absolutely for the best things, orthings far better than other things that differ: make to differ, to prefer, make better, 1Co 4:7. Syr. excellentius, more excellent. is both to differ and excel; but the differentius of the Vulgar yields no good sense in this place. , haereditavit, sortitus est, jure hereditario obtinuit; of the importance of which word before. [4]
[4] EXPOSITION. The comparison of the Son with angels divides itself into two sections; the Son is superior to the angels already, in virtue of his eternal existence as the Son of God, Heb 1:4-14; in the Son, man also has been exalted above the angels, Heb 2:5-18. Ebrard. , points out that this exaltation is true not only of the Logos in abstracto, but of the whole divine-human subject. Tholuck. The aorist, having been made or become, is antithetic to the present , being, in 1Co 4:3. Turner.
The name sons of God is given to angels. But it is a different thing to apply a common name in the plural to a class, from what it is to apply the same as an individual name in the singular to an individual. When Jehovah, in Psa 2:2; Psa 2:7, declares his anointed to be his Son whom he has begotten, this is something different from what is said, when the angels as a class are called sons of the Elohim who has created them. Ebrard.
. refers to superiority in rank or dignity. The term better suggests the idea of moral excellence, which is not the thought here. Craik.
TRANSLATIONS. . Exalted above the angels. Stuart.
Greater. Boothroyd, Conybeare, and Howson. Superior to the angels. Craik,
. Being made. Diodati. .
More distinguished, more singular. Ebrard. ED.
Heb 1:4. Being in so much preferred [exalted, made eminent] above angels, as he [obtained] inherited a more excellent name than they.
There are five things considerable in and for the exposition of these words:
1. What it is that the apostle asserts in them as his general proposition, namely, that the Son, as the great priest and prophet of the church, was preferred above, and made more glorious and powerful than the angels; and how this was done, and wherein it doth consist.
2. When, he was so preferred above them; which belongs unto the explication and right understanding of the former.
3. The degree of this preference of him above the angels, intimated in the comparison, Being by so much made more excellent, as he hath, etc.
4. The proof of the assertion, both absolutely and as to the degree intimated; and this is taken from his name.
5. The way whereby he came to have this name; he obtained it as his lot and portion, or he inherited it.
1. He is made more excellent than the angels, preferred above them, that is, say some, declared so to be. Turn res dicitur fieri, cum incipit patefieri. Frequently in the Scripture a thing is then said to be made, or to be, when it is manifested so to be. And in this sense the word is sometimes used: Rom 3:4, , , Let God be true, and every man a liar; that is, manifested and acknowledged so to be. So, Jas 1:12, , he that is approved in trial, and thereby manifested to be sincere and sound. In this sense the apostle tells us, Rom 1:4, that the Lord Christ was declared to be the Son of God by the resurrection from the dead. The resurrection from the dead did not make him to be the Son of God, but evidently manifested and declared him so to be. According to this interpretation of the words, that which the Holy Ghost intimateth is, that whereas the Lord Christ ministered in an outwardly low condition in this world, whilst he purged our sins, yet by his sitting down at the right hand of God he was revealed, manifested, declared to be more excellent than all the angels in heaven.
But I see no reason why we should desert the proper and most usual signification of the words, nothing in the context persuading us so to do. Besides, this suits not the apostles design, who doth not prove from the Scripture that the Lord Christ was manifested to be more excellent than the angels, but that really he was preferred and exalted above them. So, then, is as much as preferred, exalted, actually placed in more power, glory, dignity, than the angels. This John Baptist affirms of him, He was preferred before me, because he was before me, preferred above him, called to another manner of office than that which John ministered in, made before or above him in dignity, because he was before him in nature and existence. And this is the proper sense of the words: the Lord Jesus Christ, the revealer of the will of God in the gospel, is exalted above, preferred before, made more excellent and glorious than the angels themselves, all or any of them, who ministered unto the Lord in the giving of the law on mount Sinai.
Some object unto this interpretation, That he who is said to be made or set above the angels is supposed to have been lower than they before. To which I answer, And so he was, not in respect of essence, subsistence, and real dignity, but in respect of the infirmities and sufferings that he was exposed unto in the discharge of his work here on the earth, as the apostle expressly declares, Heb 2:9.
2. And this gives us light into our second inquiry on these words, namely, when it was that Christ was thus exalted above the angels.
(1.) Some say that it was in the time of his incarnation; for then the human nature being taken into personal subsistence with the Son of God, it became more excellent than that of the angels. This sense is fixed on by some of the ancients, who are followed by sundry modern expositors. But we have proved before that it is not of either nature of Christ absolutely or abstractedly that the apostle here speaketh nor of his person but as vested with his office, and discharging of it. And, moreover, the incarnation of Christ was part of his humiliation and exinanition, and is not, therefore, especially intended where his exaltation and glory are expressly spoken of.
(2.) Some say that it was at the time of his baptism, when he was anointed with the Spirit for the discharge of his prophetical office, Isa 61:1-2. But yet neither can this designation of the time be allowed; and that because the main things wherein he was made lower than the angels, as his temptations, and sufferings, and death itself, did follow his baptism and unction.
(3.) It must therefore be the time of his resurrection, ascension, and exaltation at the right hand of God, which ensued thereon, that is designed as the season wherein he was made more excellent than the angels, as evidently appears from the text and context: for,
[1.] That was the time, as we have showed before, when he was gloriously vested with that all power in heaven and earth which was of old designed unto him and prepared for him.
[2.] The order also of the apostles discourse leads us to fix on this season: After he had by himself purged our sins, he sat down, etc.; being made so much more excellent; that is, therein and then he was so made.
[3.] The testimony in the first place produced by the apostle in the confirmation of his assertion is elsewhere, as we shall see, applied by himself unto his resurrection and the glory that ensued, and consequently they are also in this place intended.
[4.] This preference of the Lord Christ above the angels is plainly included in that grant of all power made unto him, Mat 28:18; expounded Eph 1:21-22.
[5.] The testimony used by the apostle in the first place is the word that God spake unto his King, when he set him upon his holy hill of Zion, Psa 2:6-8; which typically expresseth his glorious installment in his heavenly kingdom.
The Lord Christ, then, who in respect of his divine nature was always infinitely and incomparably himself more excellent than all the angels, after his humiliation in the assumption of the human nature, with the sufferings and temptations that he underwent, upon his resurrection was exalted into a condition of glory, power, authority, excellency, and intrusted with power over them, as our apostle here informs us.
3. In this preference and exaltation of the Lord Christ there is a degree intimated: Being made so much more, etc. Now our conceptions hereabout, as to this place, are wholly to be regulated by the name given unto him. Look,saith the apostle, how much the name given unto the Messiah excels the name given unto angels, so much doth he himself excel them in glory, authority, and power; for these names are severally given them of God to signify their state and condition.What and how great this difference is we shall afterwards see, in the consideration of the instances given of it by the apostle in the verses ensuing.
4. The proof of this assertion which the apostle first fixeth on is taken from the name of Christ, his name, not given him by man, not assumed by himself, but ascribed unto him by God himself. Neither doth he here by the name of Christ or the name of the angels intend any individual proper names of the one or the other; but such descriptions as are made of them, and titles given unto them by God, as whereby their state and condition may be known. Observe,saith he, how they are called of God, by what names and titles he owns them, and you may learn the difference between them.This name he declares in the next verse: God said unto him, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee. It is not absolutely his being the Son of God that is intended, but that, by the testimony of the Holy Ghost, God said these words unto him, Thou art my Son, and thereby declared his state and condition to be far above that of the angels, to none of whom he ever said any such thing, but speaks of them in a far distinct manner, as we shall see. But hereof in the next verse.
Some by this excellent name understand his power, and dignity, and glory, called a name above every name, Php 2:9. But then this can no way prove that which the apostle produceth it for, it being directly the same with that which is asserted, in whose confirmation it is produced.
5. The last thing considerable is, how the Lord Christ came by this name, or obtained it. , he obtained it by inheritance, as his peculiar lot and portion for ever. In what sense he is said to be , the heir, was before declared. As he was made the heir of all, so he inherited a more excellent name than the angels. Now he was made heir of all, in that all things being made and formed by him, the Father committed unto him, as mediator, a peculiar power over all things, to be disposed of by him unto all the ends of his mediation. So also being the natural and eternal Son of God, in and upon the discharge of his work, the Father declared and pronounced that to be his name. See Luk 1:35; Isa 7:14; Isa 9:6. His being the Son of God is the proper foundation of his being called so; and his discharge of his office the occasion of its declaration. So he came unto it by right of inheritance, when he was declared to be the Son of God with power, by the resurrection from the dead, Rom 1:4.
This, then, is the sum of the apostles proposition, and the confirmation of it. A name given by God to that end and purpose doth truly declare the nature, state, and condition of him or them to whom it is given; but unto Christ the mediator there is a name given of God himself, exceedingly more excellent than any that by him is given unto the angels: which undeniably evinceth that he is placed in a state and condition of glory far above them, or preferred before them.
I shall only observe one or two things concerning the Hebrews, to whom the apostle wrote, and so put an end to our exposition of this verse.
First, then, This discourse of the apostle, proving the pre-eminence of the Messiah above the angels, was very necessary unto the Hebrews, although it was very suitable unto their own principles, and in general acknowledged by them. It is to this day a tradition amongst them that the Messiah shall be exalted above Abraham, and Moses, and the ministering angels. Besides, they acknowledged the scriptures of the Old Testament, wherein the apostle shows them that this truth was taught and confirmed. But they were dull and slow in making application of these principles unto the confirmation of their faith in the gospel, as the apostle chargeth them, Heb 5:11-12. And they had at that time great speculations about the glory, dignity, and excellency of angels, and were fallen into some kind of worshipping of them. And it may be this curiosity, vanity, and superstition in them was heightened by the heat of the controversy between the Pharisees and Sadducees about them; the one denying their existence and being; the other, whom the body of the people followed, exalting them above measure, and inclining to the worship of them. This the apostle declares, Col 2:18. Treating of those Judaizing teachers who then troubled the churches, he chargeth them with fruitless and curious speculations about angels, and the worshipping of them. And of their ministry in the giving of the law they still boasted. It was necessary, therefore, to take them off from this confidence of that privilege, and the superstition that ensued thereon, to instruct them in the pre-eminence of the Lord Christ above them all, that so their thoughts might be directed unto him, and their trust placed in him alone. And this exaltation of the Messiah some of their later doctors assert on Dan 7:9. , I beheld until the thrones were set, placed, exalted, as in the original Chaldee, and as all old translations, Greek, Latin, Syriac, and Arabic, render the words, however ours read, until the thrones were cast down, affirming that one of those thrones was for the Messiah, before whom all the angels ministered in obedience.
Secondly, It may not be amiss to remark, that the Jews have always had a tradition of the glorious name of the Messiah, which even since their utter rejection they retain some obscure remembrance of. The name which they principally magnify is , Metatron. Ben Uzziel, in his Targum on Genesis 5, ascribes this name to Enoch when he was translated: He ascended into heaven in the word of the Lord, , and his name was called Metatron the great scribe.
But this opinion of Enoch being Metatron is rejected and confuted in the Talmud. There they tell us that Metatron is , the prince of the world; or, as Elias calls him in Thisbi, , the prince of Gods presence. And in the first mention of this name, which is Talmud. Tract. Sanhed. cap. 4. fol. 38, they plainly intimate that they intend an uncreated angel by this expression. And such, indeed, must he be unto whom may be assigned what they ascribe unto Metatron; for as Reuchlin, from the Cabbalists, informs us, they say, , The teacher of Moses himself was Metatron. He it is, saith Elias, that is the angel always appearing in the presence of God, of whom it is said, My name is in him: and the Talmudists, that he hath power to blot out the sins of Israel, whence they call him the chancellor of heaven. And Bechai, on Exodus 23, affirms that this name signifies both a lord, a messenger, and a keeper; a lord, because he ruleth all; a messenger, because he stands always before God to do his will; and a keeper, because he keepeth Israel. I confess the etymology that he gives of this name to that purpose is weak and foolish; as is also that of Elias, who tells us that Metatron is , in the Greek tongue, one sent. But yet it is evident what is intended by all these obscure intimations. The increated Prince of glory, and his exaltation over all, with the excellency of his name, is aimed at. As for the word itself, it is either a mere corruption of the Latin word, mediator, such as is usual amongst them; or a gematrical fiction to answer , the Almighty, there being a coincidence in their numeral letters.
The doctrine of the preference and pre-eminence of Christ is insisted on by the apostle unto the end of this chapter, and therefore I shall not treat of it until we have gone through all the proofs of it produced; nor then but briefly, having already in part spoken of it, in our consideration of his sovereignty and lordship over all. That which we are peculiarly instructed in by these words is that, All pre-eminence and exaltation of one above others depends on the supreme counsel and will of God.
The instance he gives of him who is exalted over all sufficiently confirms our general rule. He had his name, denoting his glory and excellency, by inheritance, a heritage designed for him and given unto him in the counsel, will, and good pleasure of God. He gave him that name above every name, Php 2:9, and that of his own will and pleasure: It pleased the Father that in him all fullness should dwell, that so in all things he might have the pre-eminence, Col 1:16-19. He foreordained him unto it from eternity, 1Pe 1:20; and actually exalted him according to his eternal counsel in the fullness of time, Act 2:36; Act 5:31.
This prelation, then, of Christ above all depends on the counsel and pleasure of God; and he is herein a pattern of all privilege and preeminence in others.
Grace, mercy, and glory, spiritual things and eternal, are those wherein really there is any difference among the sons of men. Now, that any one in these things is preferred before another, it depends merely on the sole good pleasure of God. No man in these things makes himself to differ from another, neither hath he any thing that he hath not received. God hath mercy on whom he will have mercy. And this discrimination of all things by the supreme will of God, especially spiritual and eternal, is the spring, fountain, and rule of all that glory which he will manifest and be exalted in unto eternity.
Fuente: An Exposition of the Epistle to the Hebrews
Let All The Angels Of God Worship Him
The angels are venerated, and even worshipped by many, as the highest creatures of God. Therefore, the Holy Spirit shows us here the infinite superiority of Christ over those heavenly creatures. In Heb 1:1-3, we are told who Christ is and what he has done. Beginning with verse four, we see numerous displays of Christs superiority over the angels of God. This is in keeping with the whole theme of the book of Hebrews which was written to show us the excellence, superiority and glory of the Lord Jesus Christ over all creatures, all covenants, all priests and all sacrifices.
Christ Better Than Angels
Our Lord Jesus Christ is better than the angels by virtue of his eternal divinity; but he was made better than the angels as a man, as the God-man, by virtue of his success as our Mediator and Surety (Heb 1:1-3; Php 2:9-11). While we thank God for the angels and their work, we must never pray to or worship them (Rev 22:8-9). Neither angels nor men are to be worshipped, but God alone (Act 10:25-26; Mat 23:8-11).
Christ is, in all things, better than, superior to, and more excellent than the angels by an infinite degree. He is the Creator. They are his creatures. He is the King. They are his subjects. He is independent. They are dependent upon him for all things. He is the One worshipped. They are his worshipers. He is the Master. They are his servants. He is the One who sends. They are sent by him. He is the One who blesses. They are blessed by him.
God the Son
God never said to any angel, Thou art my Son. That title is given to the Lord Jesus Christ alone (Heb 1:5). When did the Lord God say to Christ, Thou art my Son? — At his baptism (Mat 3:16-17). — At his transfiguration (Mat 17:5). — At his resurrection ((Psa 2:7; Rom 1:4; Heb 5:5). Christ is the Son of God by nature. He is God the Son. Angels are the sons of God by creation. Gods elect are the sons of God by adoption. Our Lords office as the Messiah and our Mediator is not the foundation of his sonship. His sonship is the foundation of his office. He was the Son before he was the Prophet, Priest and King (Joh 1:1-2; Joh 17:1-5).
Angelic Worship
When our Lord Jesus Christ came into the world, the angels of God were called to worship the incarnate God, and they gladly did so. We see the angels worshipping him as God, and serving him as their Master with willing hearts in many places: at his birth, after his temptation in the wilderness, in Gethsemane, at his resurrection, at his ascension, and in heaven (Luk 2:9-14; Mar 1:13; Luk 24:2-5; Act 1:10-11; Rev 5:11).
Fuente: Discovering Christ In Selected Books of the Bible
so: Heb 1:9, Heb 2:9, Eph 1:21, Col 1:18, Col 2:10, 2Th 1:7, 1Pe 3:22, Rev 5:11, Rev 5:12
by: Psa 2:7, Psa 2:8, Phi 2:9-11
Reciprocal: Gen 32:1 – angels Psa 45:2 – fairer Act 10:3 – an
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Heb 1:4. Better does not apply to the personal character, for the angels who are living in heaven are perfect in that respect. Thayer defines the original word, “It is more advantageous.” The meaning of the phrase is that Jesus was given a greater advantage in the great plan of God than the angels. The word excellent is to be understood also in the sense of advantage. By inheritance means that Jesus received this mentioned advantage through his relationship with God. It was not merely given to him as a man might see fit to give something to a stranger, but this was his by right of being the Son of God; he inherited it. While the favors or honors that the angels enjoy were given to them by the Creator of all things.
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Heb 1:4. Having become, after He had made at nement for sin, as much superior to the angels, as he has obtained a name far more excellent than they. His greatness is partly essential and partly acquired (see Php 2:6-11). The first He had as Son before the world was; the second He obtained through His incarnation, and after He had suffered.
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
In the foregoing verses a comparison was made between Christ and the prophets, here between Christ and the angels, and the preference and pre-eminence is given to him above them all. Angels were very glorious creatures, employed by God in giving of the law; but Christ, whom God the Father employed in the dispensation of the gospel, is far superior to them, and has an excellency above them.
1. A more excellent name, they being called ministers or servants, he styled a Son.
2. A more excellent nature, his being a divine, theirs an angelic nature: yea, his human nature, by virtue of its union with the God- head, has a dignity surpassing the nature of angels.
3. A more excellent office and function, as Mediator between God and man, which belongs not to any angel.
4. Consequently a more excellent power and authority, with a right to adoration and worship, which the angels have not, but are commanded to worship him.
When he brought his first-begotten into the world, that is, in the morning of the resurrection, when he was in a glorious manner begotten from the dead, the Father says, Let all the angels of God worship him; and therefore he that is to be worshipped is greater than they that are to worship him.
Learn hence;
1.That the evidencing and declaring of Christ to be the Son of God, was the particular care and special work of God the Father; he said it, he recorded it, he revealed it; Thou art my Son.
2. The Lord Jesus Christ, the Mediator of the new covenant, is in his own person God blessed for ever, to whom divine honour and religious worship is due and payable from glorified angels: Let all the angels of God worship him.
3. The command of God is the ground and reason of all religious worship; the angels are to worship Christ, by the ground of their doing it is God’s command: He saith, Let all the angels of God worship him.
4. It can be no part of our duty to worship the angels, who are our fellow-servants in the worship of Jesus Christ; they that are to worship Christ with us, surely are not to be worshipped by us.
Fuente: Expository Notes with Practical Observations on the New Testament
Christ is Superior
The points concerning Christ made in the previous verses are used as reasons He is better than the angels. His name is better than all. One day, at the sounding of Jesus’ name, every knee will bow ( Eph 1:21 ; Php 2:9-10 ). It should be noted angels were used in giving the law of Moses ( Act 7:53 ; Gal 3:19 ). However, the one with the excellent name of the Son of God delivered the new covenant. Christ’s excellent name comes from His rank.
Fuente: Gary Hampton Commentary on Selected Books
Heb 1:4-6. Being made Rather being; (for the word made is not implied in the original expression, 😉 so much better Higher; than the angels As the Jews gloried exceedingly in the law of Moses, on account of its being delivered by the ministry of angels, the apostle proves, by passages from the Jewish Scriptures, that the Son is superior in nature and dignity to all the angelical hosts. How much more then may we glory in the gospel, which was given, not by the ministry of angels, but by the very Son of God. As he hath by inheritance obtained Greek, , he hath inherited; a more excellent name than they Namely, the name of Son; a name which he is said to inherit, because he really is Gods Son, and that in a sense in which no creature, man or angel, is his Song of Solomon 1 st, Not by adoption, regeneration, or title, as patriarchs, prophets, or any other saints might be his sons: for he is distinguished from all these, Mar 12:6. 2d, Not by the resurrection merely, by which the saints will hereafter be manifested to be the sons of God, Luk 20:36. For he was distinguished from Moses and Elias on the mount of transfiguration, who had both entered the immortal state, Mat 17:6. 3d, Not by creation, as Adam was, (Luk 3:38,) and angels are Gods sons; for he is here represented as having a right to the name of Son by inheritance, which the angels have not. Hence he is termed the only- begotten of the Father; an expression which excludes from that honourable relation angels, and all other beings whatever. For unto which of the angels Although sometimes termed in Scripture the sons of God, because created by him; said he at any time, Thou art my Son God of God, Light of Light, the eternal Word of the eternal Father; this day have I begotten thee Namely, in and from eternity; which, by its unalterable permanency of duration, is one continued unsuccessive day. See the note on Psa 2:7. It is true, because the angel said to his mother, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee; therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God; some contend that these words, Thou art my Son, &c.; are a prediction of our Lords miraculous conception. But on that supposition the argument taken from the name falls: for instead of proving Jesus superior to angels, his miraculous conception does not make him superior to Adam, who was as much the immediate work of God as Christs human nature was the immediate work of the Holy Ghost. Besides, he is said (Joh 3:17) to have been the Son of God before he was sent into the world; and Heb 1:2 of this chapter, when the worlds were made by him. See Macknight.
And again, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son I will own myself to be his Father, and him to be my Son, by eminent tokens of my peculiar love. The former clause relates to his natural Sonship by an eternal inconceivable generation, the other to his Fathers acknowledgment and treatment of him as his incarnate Son: indeed this promise related immediately to Solomon, but in a far higher sense to the Messiah; applied to whom, it hath a very different meaning from what it had when applied to Solomon. Wesley. Understood of the Messiah, it is a prediction that God would, in the most public manner, declare Jesus his Son by voices from heaven uttered on different occasions, and by the descent of the Holy Ghost on him after his baptism, and by his resurrection from the dead. Whereas the same promise spoken concerning Solomon, means only that he was to be the object of Gods especial affection and care. Accordingly it was so explained in the revelation to David himself, 1Ch 22:9; I will give him rest from all his enemies round about. And again That is, in another passage of Scripture; when he bringeth in the first-begotten Him who is before all creatures, Pro 8:24-25; more excellent than all, Gen 49:3; and Heir or Lord of all, Psa 2:6; Psa 2:8. The appellation first-begotten includes that of Son, together with the rights of primogeniture, which the first-begotten Son of God enjoys, in a manner not communicable to any creature; into the world Namely, at his incarnation; he, God, saith, Let all the angels of God worship him So much higher was he, when in his lowest estate, than the highest angel! In the Hebrew text it is cal Elohim, which in our Bibles is rendered all ye gods. But the expression is elliptical, and may be supplied as the writer of this epistle hath done; all ye angels of God In the 97th Psalm, whence it is commonly thought this quotation is made, the establishment of the kingdom of Christ is foretold, together with its happy influence in destroying idolatry. Because, in a few instances, the word Elohim, gods, denotes idols, this clause is translated by some, Worship him, all ye idols. But how can idols, most of whom are nonentities, worship the Son?
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
4. The angels are all created finite intelligences, and infinitely inferior to the divinity. Christ is perfect God and perfect man. Pursuant to His human perfection, He ha a perfect human soul an body. He is called the second Adam because In Him God gave humanity a second chance. Man is a trinity, similitudinous to God, consisting of spirit, mind, and body. The human spirit, soul or heart is composed of the conscience, the will and the affections The conscience is the voice of God in the soul. It is the solitary survivor of the fall, and, even in the sinner, always takes Gods side. The will is the king of humanity. In the sinner, it is on the devils side, ingeniously manipulated by him for the destruction of his victim. In conversion, the will turns over from the devil to God, and from sin to righteousness; meanwhile original sin, though subjugated by the Holy Ghost, still survives in the deep subterranean regions of the soul, till utterly eradicated by the cleansing blood and the consuming fire of entire sanctification. The mind consists of the intellect, the judgment, the memory and the sensibilities. The mind is not made perfect in sanctification, which is only spiritual perfection, leaving us encumbered with multitudinous infirmities because of our mental and physical imperfection, all of which are swept away in glorification when this mortal shall put on immortality. In Adam the first, Satan found an easy victim, and slew him on his first assault, made against his physical being in the simple temptation of his bodily appetite. But when he attacked Adam the Second he lost all of his ammunition. Beginning with his body he tempted Him to eat, after a fast of forty days. Signally defeated in his assault against His physical manhood, he tempted His intellect by offering Him the whole world. Again signally defeated, he attacked His faith, which is the basis of all spirituality, by tempting Him to leap from the pinnacle of the temple, presuming that God would hold Him up. In that case His faith would have been superseded by presumption, which is Satans counterfeit, and would have ultimated in spiritual apostasy and collapse, as in case of Adam the first; meanwhile the divinity, leaving the humanity, would have returned back to heaven, the hope of the world being blighted forever. Hence, the humanity of Christ has deservedly achieved a name whose glory eclipses that of all the angels.
Fuente: William Godbey’s Commentary on the New Testament
1:4 {4} Being made so much better than the angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent {i} name than they.
(4) Before he comes to declare the office of Christ, he sets forth the excellency of his person. First of all he shows him to be man, and that in addition he is God also.
(i) Dignity and honour.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
These seven facts also reveal clearly the Son’s superiority to any other of God’s messengers, even the angels. This superiority is clear too in the fact that His name is Son (singular) rather than sons (collectively). The Old Testament writers called angels "sons of God" (e.g., Job 2:1; Job 38:7). Jesus Christ "inherited" the name "Son" before creation (Heb 1:2; cf. Heb 5:8). Within the Trinity, God the Son carried out the will of God the Father in a way that corresponds to the way in which sons in biblical culture carried out the wills of their fathers. In another sense, Jesus became God’s Son at His ascension by taking His seat at the Father’s right hand with a view to returning to the earth and ruling over it (cf. 2Sa 7:12-16; Psa 2:7).
This is the first of the writer’s 13 uses of the word "better" (Gr. kreitton) all of which contrast Jesus Christ and His order with what preceded Him in Judaism (Heb 6:9; Heb 7:7; Heb 7:19; Heb 7:22; Heb 8:6 [twice]; Heb 9:23; Heb 10:34; Heb 11:16; Heb 11:35; Heb 11:40; Heb 12:24). This word appears only six times elsewhere in the New Testament. The writer used many comparatives (e.g., "more excellent," "lesser," "better," "more," "greater," et al.) to support his argument that the new Christian order is superior to the old Jewish order. This is also a "signpost passage" in which a brief statement (in this case "much better than the angels") identifies a main subject the writer proceeded to develop later (cf. Heb 2:17; Heb 5:9-10; Heb 10:36-39; Heb 12:11?). [Note: See David J. MacLeod, "The Literary Structure of the Book of Hebrews," Bibliotheca Sacra 146:582 (April-June 1989):187.] "Angel" (Gr. angelos) is another of this writer’s favorite words. It appears 13 times in Hebrews.
"Opinions differ as to what is meant here by ’the name.’ Some take this to mean that in his whole character and personality Christ was superior to any angel. Others think the reference is simply to the name ’Son,’ which is a better name than ’angel’ because it denotes superiority in character and personality. Either interpretation is possible." [Note: Morris, p. 16.]
The writer introduced several concepts in the prologue that he developed more fully later. These include the distinctive quality of the Son’s revelation, the superiority of His sacrifice, His sovereignty, and His greatness compared with the angels. [Note: For another exposition of Heb 1:1-4, see David J. MacLeod, "The Finality of Christ: An Exposition of Hebrews 1:1-4," Bibliotheca Sacra 162:646 (April-June 2005):210-30.]
The differences in the beginning of this epistle compared with the beginnings of other New Testament epistles are striking. There is no introduction of the writer, no mention of the original readers, and no benediction, all of which were common features of letters in the first century. The writer obviously wanted his readers to give their full attention to the greatness of Jesus Christ. Some students of Hebrews have concluded that the writer did not identify himself or his readers because he wanted to make Jesus Christ primary in the readers’ thinking throughout this epistle. I think this is very likely.
"In Heb 1:1-4 the writer gave christological precision to a cluster of ideas derived from hellenistic Judaism. He boldly applied the categories of Wisdom to a historical figure, Jesus. The writer to the Hebrews was a creative theologian who brought together wisdom motifs and priestly motifs in a tightly formulated statement concerning the dignity and achievement of the Son of God. The opening paragraph establishes a firm christological foundation for all that the writer has to say concerning the character and demands of the revelation mediated by the Son. The joining together of wisdom and priestly notes in the carefully orchestrated presentation of the Son provides the readers with the assurance of Jesus’ sustained concern for them and his ability to strengthen and vindicate the people of God when they become objects of contempt in a hostile world." [Note: Lane, p. 19.]
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
CHAPTER II
THE SON AND THE ANGELS
Heb 1:4 – Heb 2:18
The most dangerous and persistent error against which the theologians of the New Testament had to contend was the doctrine of emanations. The persistence of this error lay in its affinity with the Christian conception of mediation between God and men; its danger sprang from its complete inconsistency with the Christian idea of the person and work of the Mediator. For the Hebrew conception of God, as the “I AM,” tended more and more in the lapse of ages to sever Him from all immediate contact with created beings. It would be the natural boast of the Jews that Jehovah dwelt in unapproachable light. They would point to the contrast between Him and the human gods of the Greeks. An ever-deepening consciousness of sin and spiritual gloom would strengthen the conviction that the Lord abode behind the veil, and their conception of God would of necessity react on their consciousness of sin. If, therefore, God is the absolute Being–so argued the Gnostics of the day–He cannot be the actual Creator of the world. We must suppose the existence of an emanation or a series of emanations from God, every additional link in the chain being less Divine, until we arrive at the material universe, where the element of Divinity is entirely lost. These emanations are the angels, the only possible mediators between God and men. Some theories came to a stand at this point; others took a further step, and worshipped the angels, as the mediators also between men and God. Thus the angels were regarded as messengers or apostles from God and reconcilers or priests for men. St. Paul has already rejected these notions in his Epistle to the Colossians. He teaches that the Son of God’s love is the visible image of the invisible God, prior to all creation and by right of primogeniture Heir of all, Creator of the highest angels, Himself being before they came into existence. Such He is before His assumption of humanity. But it pleased God that in Him, also as God-Man, all the plenitude of the Divine attributes should dwell; so that the Mediator is not an emanation, neither human nor Divine, but is Himself God and Man.[8]
Recent expositors have sufficiently proved that there was a Judaic element in the Colossian heresy. We need not, therefore, hesitate to admit that the Epistle to the Hebrews contains references to the same error. Our author acknowledges the existence of angels. He declares that the Law was given through angels, which is a point not touched upon more than once in the Old Testament, but seemingly taken for granted, rather than expressly announced, in the New. Stephen reproaches the Jews, who had received the Law as the ordinances of angels, with having betrayed and murdered the Righteous One, of Whom the Law and the prophets spake.[9] St. Paul, like the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews, argues that the Law differs from the promise in having been ordained through angels, as mediators between the Lord and His people Israel, whereas the promise was given by God, not as a compact between two parties, but as the free act of Him Who is one.[10] The main purpose of the first and second chapters of our Epistle is to maintain the superiority of the Son to the angels, of Him in Whom God has spoken unto us to the mediators through whom He gave the Law.
The defect of the doctrine of emanations was twofold. They are supposed to consist of a long chain of intermediate beings. But the chain does not connect at either end. God is still absolutely unapproachable by man; man is still inaccessible to God. It is in vain new links are forged. The chain does not, and never will, bring man and God together. The only solution of the problem must be found in One Who is God and Man; and this is precisely the doctrine of our author, on the one hand, that the Revealer of God is Son of God; and, on the other hand, that the Son of God is our brother-man. The former statement is proved, and a practical warning based upon it, in the section that extends from Heb 1:4 to Heb 2:4. The latter is the subject of the section from Heb 2:5 to Heb 2:18.
I. THE REVEALER OF GOD SON OF GOD.
“Having become by so much better than the angels, as He hath inherited a more excellent name than they. For unto which of the angels said He at any time,
Thou art my Son, This day have I begotten Thee?
and again,
I will be to Him a Father, And He shall be to Me a Son?
And when He again bringeth in the Firstborn into the world He saith,
And let all the angels of God worship Him.
And of the angels He saith,
Who maketh His angels winds, And His ministers a flame of fire:
but of the Son He saith,
Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever; And the sceptre of uprightness is the sceptre of Thy kingdom. Thou hast loved righteousness, and hated iniquity; Therefore God, Thy God, hath anointed Thee With the oil of gladness about Thy fellows.
And,
Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth, And the heavens are the works of Thy hands: They shall perish; but Thou continuest: And they all shall wax old as doth a garment; And as a mantle shall Thou roll them up, As a garment, and they shall be changed: But Thou art the same, And Thy years shall not fail.
But of which of the angels hath He said at any time,
Sit Thou on My right hand, Till I make Thine enemies the footstool of Thy feet?
Are they not all ministering spirits, sent forth to do service for the sake of them that shall inherit salvation?
Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things that were heard, lest haply we drift away from them. For if the word spoken through angels proved steadfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just recompense of reward; how shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation? which having at the first been spoken through the Lord, was confirmed unto us by them that heard; God also bearing witness with them, both by signs and wonders, and by manifold powers, and by gifts of the Holy Ghost according to His own will” (Heb 1:4-14; Heb 2:1-4, R.V.).
Christ is Son of God, not in the sense in which angels, as a class of beings, are designated by this name, but as He Who has taken His seat on the right hand of the Majesty on high. The greatness of His position is proportionate to the excellency of the name of Son. This name He has not obtained by favour nor attained by effort, but inherited by indefeasible right. Josephus says that the Essenes forbade their disciples to divulge the names of the angels. But He Who has revealed God has been revealed Himself. He is Son. Which of the angels was ever so addressed? To speak of the angels as sons and yet say that not one of them individually is a son may be self-contradictory in words, but the thought is consistent and true.
From the pre-existent Son, regarded as the idealised theocratic King, the Apostle passes to the incarnate Christ, returning to the world which He has redeemed, and out of which He brings[11] many sons of God unto glory. God brings Him also in as the First-begotten among these many brethren. But our Lord Himself describes His coming. “The Son of man shall come in His glory, and all the angels with Him.”[12] In allusion to this saying of Christ, the Apostle applies to His second advent the words which in the Septuagint Version of the Old Testament are a summons to all the angels to worship Jehovah. They are the Son’s ministers. Like swift winds, they convey His messages; or they carry destruction at His bidding, like a flame of fire. But the Son is enthroned God for ever. The sceptre of righteousness, by whomsoever borne, is the sceptre of His kingdom; all thrones and powers, human and angelic, hold sway under Him. They are His fellows, and participate only in His royal gladness, Whose joy surpasses theirs.
The author reverts to the Son’s pre-incarnate existence. The Son created earth and heaven, and, for that reason, He remains when the works of His hand wax old, as a garment. Creation is the vesture of the Son. In all the changes of nature the Son puts off a garment, while He remains unchanged Himself.
Finally, our author glances at the triumphant consummation, when God will do for His Son what He will not do for the angels. For He will make His enemies the footstool of His feet, as the reward of His redemptive work. The angels have no enemy to conquer. Neither are they the authors of our redemption. Yea, they are not even the redeemed. The Son is the Heir of the throne. Men are the heirs of salvation. Must we, then, quite exclude the angels from all present activity in the kingdom of the Son? Do they altogether belong to a past epoch in the development of God’s revelation? Must we say of them, as astronomers speak of the moon, that they are dead worlds? Shall we not rather find a place for them in the spirit-world corresponding to the office filled in the sphere of nature by the works of God’s hands? God has His earthly ministers. Are not the angels ministering spirits? The Apostle puts the question tentatively. But the pious instinct of the Church and of good men has answered, Yes. For salvation has created a new form of service for which nature is not fitted. The narrative of the Son’s own life on earth suggests the same reply. For an angel appeared unto Him in Gethsemane and strengthened Him.[13] It is true that the Son Himself is the Minister of the sanctuary. He alone serves in the holiest place. But may not the angels be sent forth to minister? Salvation is the work of the Son. But shall we not say that the angels perform a service for the Son, which is possible only because of men who are now on the eve of inheriting that salvation?
We must beware of minimising the significance of the Apostle’s words. If he means by “Son” merely an official designation, where is the difference between the Son and the angels? The only definition of “Son” that will satisfy the argument is “God the Revealer of God.” Sabellius said, “The Word is not the Son.” The contrary doctrine is necessary to give any value to the reasoning of our Epistle. The Revealer is Son; and the Son, in order to be the full Revealer, must be “of the essence of the Father,” inasmuch as God only can perfectly reveal God. This is so vital to the Apostle’s argument that he need not hesitate to use a term in reference to the Son which in another connection might be liable to be misunderstood, as if it expressed the theory of emanation. The Son is “the effulgence” of the Father’s glory, or, in the words of the Nicene Creed, He is “Light out of Light.” It is safe to use such words when our very argument demands that He should also be “the distinct impress of His substance,”–“very God out of very God.”
The Apostle has now laid the foundation of his great argument. He has shown us the Son as the Revealer of God. This done, he at once introduces his first practical warning. It is his manner. He does not, like St. Paul, first conclude the argumentative portion of his Epistle, and afterwards heap precept on precept in words of warning, sympathy, or encouragement. Our author alternates argument with exhortation. The Epistle wears to a superficial reader the appearance of a mosaic. The truth is that no book in the New Testament is more thoroughly or more skilfully welded into one piece from beginning to end. But the danger was imminent, and urgent warning was needed at every step. One truth was better fitted to drive home one lesson, and another argument to enforce another.
The first danger of the Hebrew Christians would arise from indifference. The first warning of the Apostle is, Take care that you do not drift.[14] In the Son as the Revealer of God we have a sure anchorage. Let us fasten the vessel to its moorings. That the Son has revealed God is beyond question. The fact is well assured. For the message of salvation has been proclaimed by the Lord Jesus Himself. It has run its course down to the writer of the Epistle and his readers through the testimony of eye-witnesses and ear-witnesses. God Himself has borne witness with these faithful men by signs and wonders and divers manifestations of power, yea by giving the Holy Ghost to each one severally according to His own will. The last words are not to be neglected. The apparent arbitrariness of His sovereign will in the distribution of the Spirit lends force to the proof, by pointing to the direct, personal action of God in this great concern.
But the warning is based, not simply on the fact of a revelation, but on the greatness of the Revealer. The Law was given through angels, and the Law was not transgressed with impunity. How, then, shall we escape God’s anger if we contemptuously neglect a salvation so great that no one less than the Son could have wrought or revealed it?
Observe the emphatic notions. Salvation is contrasted with law. It is a greater sin to despise God’s free, merciful offer of eternal life than to transgress the commandments of His justice. There may be emphasis also on the certainty of the proof. The word spoken by angels was firmly assured, and, because no man could shelter under the plea that the heavenly authority of the message was doubtful, disobedience met with unsparing retribution. But the Gospel is proved to be of God by still more abundant evidence,–the personal testimony of the Lord Jesus, the witness of those who heard Him, and the cumulative argument of gifts and miracles. While these truths are emphatic, more important than all is the fact that the Son is the Giver of this salvation. The thought seems to be that God is jealous for the honour of His Son. Our Lord Himself teaches this, and the form which it assumes in His parable implies that He speaks, not as a speculative moralist, but as One Who knows God’s heart: “Last of all he sent unto them his son, saying, They will reverence my son.” But when Christ asks His hearers what the lord of the vineyard will do unto those wicked husbandmen, the manner of their reply shows that they only half understand His meaning or else pretend not to see the point of His question. They acknowledge the husbandmen’s wickedness, but profess that it consists largely in not rendering to the owner the fruits in their season, as if, forsooth, their wickedness in killing their master’s son had not thrust their dishonesty quite out of sight.[15] The Apostle, too, appeals to his readers,[16] evidently in the belief that they would at once feel the force of his argument, whether trampling under foot the Son of God did not deserve sorer punishment than despising the law of Moses. Christ and the Apostle speak in the spirit of the second Psalm: “Thou art My Son. Ask of Me, and I shall give Thee the heathen for Thine inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for Thy possession…. Kiss the Son!” Now, if Christ adopts this language, it is not mere metaphor, but is a truth concerning God’s moral nature. Resentment must, in some sense or other, belong to God’s Fatherhood. The doctrine of the Trinity implies the necessary and eternal altruism of the Divine nature. It would not be true to say that the God of the Christians was less jealous than the God of the Hebrews. He is still the living God. It is a fearful thing to fall into His hands. He will still vindicate the majesty of His law. But now He has spoken unto us in One Who is Son. The Judge of all is not a mere official Administrator, but a Father. The place occupied in the Old Testament by the Law is now filled by the Son.
II. THE SON THE REPRESENTATIVE OF MAN.
“For not unto angels did He subject the world to come, whereof we speak. But one hath somewhere testified, saying,
What is man, that Thou art mindful of him? Or the son of man, that Thou visitest him? Thou madest him a little lower than the angels; Thou crownedst him with glory and honour, And didst set him over the works of Thy hands: Thou didst put all things in subjection under his feet.
For in that He subjected all things unto him, He left nothing that is not subject to him. But now we see not yet all things subjected to him. But we behold Him Who hath been made a little lower than the angels, even Jesus, because of the suffering of death crowned with glory and honour, that by the grace of God He should taste death for every man. For it became Him, for Whom are all things, and through Whom are all things, in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the Author of their salvation perfect through sufferings. For both He that sanctifieth and they that are sanctified are all of one: for which cause He is not ashamed to call them brethren, saying,
I will declare Thy name unto My brethren, In the midst of the congregation will I sing Thy praise.
And again,
I will put My trust in Him.
And again,
Behold, I and the children which God hath given Me.
Since then the children are sharers in flesh and blood, He also Himself in like manner partook of the same; that through death He might bring to nought him that had the power of death, that is, the devil; and might deliver all them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage. For verily not of angels doth He take hold, but He taketh hold of the seed of Abraham. Wherefore it behoved Him in all things to be made like unto His brethren, that He might be a merciful and faithful High-priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For in that He Himself hath suffered being tempted, He is able to succour them that are tempted” (Heb 2:5-18, R.V.).
The Son is better than the angels, not only because He is the Revealer of God, but also because He represents man. We have to do with more than spoken promises. The salvation through Christ raises man to a new dignity, and bestows upon him a new authority. God calls into existence a “world to come,” and puts that world in subjection, not to angels, but to man.
The passage on the consideration of which we now enter is difficult, because the interpretation offered by some of the best expositors, though at first sight it has the appearance of simplicity, really introduces confusion into the argument. They think the words of the Psalmist,[17] as applied by the Apostle, refer to Christ only. But the Psalmist evidently contrasts the frailty of man with the authority bestowed upon him by Jehovah. Mortal man has been set over the works of God’s hand. Man is for a little inferior to the angels; yet he is crowned with glory and honour. The very contrast between his frailty and his dignity exalts the name of his Creator, Who judges not as we judge. For He confronts His blasphemers with the lisping of children, and weak man He crowns king of creation, in order to put to shame the wisdom of the world.[18]
We cannot suppose that this is said of Christ, the Son of God. But there are two expressions in the Psalm that suggested to St. Paul[19] and the author of this Epistle a Messianic reference. The one is the name “Son of man;” the other is the action ascribed to God: “Thou hast made him lower than the angels.” The word[20] used by the Seventy, whose translation the Apostle here and elsewhere adopts, means, not, as the Hebrew, “to create lower,” but “to bring from a more exalted to a humbler condition.” Christ appropriated to Himself the title of “Son of man;” and “to lower from a higher to a less exalted position” applies only to the Son of God, Whose pre-existence is taught by the Apostle in Heb 1:1-14 : The point of the Apostle’s application of the Psalm must, therefore, be that in Christ alone have the Psalmist’s words been fulfilled. The Psalmist was a prophet, and testified.[21] In addition to the witnesses previously mentioned,[22] the Apostle cites the evidence from prophecy. An inspired seer, “seeing this beforehand, spake of Christ,” not primarily, but in a mystery now explained in the New Testament. The distinction also between crowning with glory and putting all things under his feet holds true only of Christ. The Psalmist, we admit, appears to identify them. But the relevancy of the Apostle’s use of the Psalm lies in the distinction between these two things. The creature man may be said to be crowned with glory and honour by receiving universal dominion and by the subjection of all things under his feet. “But we see not yet all things put under him;” and, consequently, we see not man crowned with glory and honour. The words of the Psalmist have apparently failed of fulfilment or were at best only poetical exaggeration. But Him Who was actually translated from a higher to a lower place than that of angels, from heaven to earth–that is to say, Jesus, the meek and lowly Man of Nazareth–we see crowned with glory and honour. He has ascended to heaven and sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high. So far the prophecy has come true, but only so far. All things have not yet been put under Him. He is still waiting till He has put all enemies, even the last enemy, which is death, under His feet. As, then, the glory and honour are bestowed on man through his Representative, Jesus, so also dominion is given him only through Jesus; and the glory comes only with the dominion. Every honour that falls to man’s share is won for him by the victory of Christ over an enemy. This is the nearest approach in our Epistle to the Pauline conception of Christ as the second Adam.
But is there any connection between Christ’s victory and His being made lower than the angels? When the Psalmist describes the great dignity conferred on frail man, he sees only the contrast between the dignity and the frailty. He can only wonder and worship in observing the incomprehensible paradox of God’s dealings with man. The Apostle, on the other hand, fathoms this mystery. He gives the reasons for the strange connection of power and feebleness, not indeed in reference to man as a creature, but in reference to the Man Christ Jesus. Apart from Christ the problem that struck the Psalmist with awe remains unsolved. But in Christ’s incarnation we see why man’s glory and dominion rest on humiliation.
1. Christ’s humiliation involved a propitiatory death for every man, and He is crowned with glory and honour that His propitiation may prove effectual: “that He may have tasted[23] death for every man.” By His glory we must mean the self-manifestation of His person. Honour is the authority bestowed upon Him by God. Both are the result of His suffering death, or rather the suffering of His death. He is glorified, not simply because He suffered, but because His suffering was of a certain kind and quality. It was a propitiatory suffering. Christ Himself prayed His Father to glorify Him with His own self with the glory He had with the Father before the world was.[24] This glory was His by right of Sonship. But He receives from His Father another glory, not by right, but by God’s grace.[25] It consists in having His death accepted and acknowledged as an adequate propitiation for the sins of men. In this verse the great conception of atonement, which hereafter will fill so large a place in the Epistle, is introduced, not at present for its own sake, but in order to show the superiority of Christ to the angels. He is greater than they because He is the representative Man, to Whom, and not to the angels, the world to come has been put in subjection. But the Psalmist has taught us that man’s greatness is connected with humiliation. This connection is realised in Christ, Whose exaltation is the Divine acceptance of the propitiation wrought in the days of His humiliation, and the means of giving it effect.
2. Christ’s glory consists in being Leader[26] of His people, and for such leadership He was fitted by the discipline of humiliation. There is no incongruity in the works of God because He is Himself the ground of their being[27] and the instrument of His own action.[28] Every adaptation of means to an end would not become God, though it might befit man. But this became Him for Whom and through Whom are all things. When He crowns man with glory and honour, He does this, not by an external ordinance merely, but by an inward fitness. He deals, not with an abstraction, but with individual men, whom He makes His sons and prepares for their glory and honour by the discipline of sons. “For what son is there whom his father does not discipline?”[29] Thus it is more true to say that God leads His sons to glory than to say that He bestows glory upon them. It follows that the representative Man, through Whom these many sons are glorified, must Himself pass through like discipline, that, on behalf of God, He may become their Leader and the Captain of their salvation. It became God to endow the Son, in Whose Sonship men are adopted as sons of God, with inward fitness, through sufferings, to lead them on to their destined glory. Perhaps the verse contains an allusion to Moses or Joshua, the leaders of the Lord’s redeemed to the rich land and large. If so, the author is preparing his readers for what he has yet to say.
3. Christ’s glory consists in power to consecrate[30] men to God, and this power springs from His consciousness of brotherhood with them. But, first of all, the author thinks it necessary to prove that Christ has a deep consciousness of brotherhood with men. He cites Christ’s own words from prophetic Scripture.[31] For Christ has vowed unto the Lord, Who has delivered Him, that He will declare God’s name unto His brethren. Here the pith of the argument is quite as much in the vow to reveal God to them as in His giving them the name of brethren. He is so drawn in love to them that He is impelled to speak to them about the Father. Yea, in the midst of the Church, as if He were one of the congregation, He will praise God. They praise God for His Son; the Son joins in the praise, as being thankful for the privilege of being their Saviour, while they offer their thanks for the joy of being saved. That is not all. Christ puts His trust in God. So human is He that, conscious of utter weakness, He leans on God, as the feeblest of His brethren. Finally, His triumphant joy at the safety of His redeemed ones arises from this consciousness of brotherhood. “Behold, I and the children” (of God) “which God hath given Me.”[32] The Apostle does not fear to apply to Christ what Isaiah[33] spoke in reference to himself and his disciples, the children of the prophet. Christ’s brotherhood with men assumes the form of identifying Himself with His prophetic servants. Evidently He is not ashamed of His brethren, though, like Joseph, He has reason to be ashamed of them for their sin. The expression means that He glories in them, because His assumption of humanity has consecrated them. For this consecration springs from union. We do not, for our part, understand this as a general proposition, of which the sanctifying power of Christ is an illustration. No other instance of such a thing exists. Yet the Apostle does not prove the statement. He appeals to the intelligence and conscience of his readers to acknowledge its truth. Whether we understand the word “sanctification” in the sense of moral consecration through an atonement or in the sense of holy character, it springs from union. Christ cannot sanctify by a creative word or by an act of power. Neither can His power to sanctify be transmitted by God to the Son externally, in the same way in which the Creator bestows on nature its vital, fertilising energy. Christ must derive His power to sanctify through His Sonship, and men must become sons of God that they may be sanctified through the Son. Our passage adds Christ’s brotherhood. He that consecrates, therefore, and they that are consecrated are united together, first, by being born of the same Divine Father, and, second, by having the same human nature. Here, again, the chain connects at both ends: on the side of God and on the side of man. Now to have dwelling in Him the power of consecrating men to God is so great an endowment that Christ may dare even to glory in the brotherhood that brings with it such a gift.
4. Christ’s glory manifests itself in the destruction of Satan, who had the power of death, and his destruction is accomplished through death.[34] The children of God have every one his share of blood and flesh, which means vital, mortal humanity. Blood signifies life, and flesh the mortality of that life. They are, therefore, subject to disease and death. But to the Hebrews disease and death involved vastly more than physical suffering and the termination of man’s earthly existence. They had their angel, by which is meant that they had a moral significance. They were spiritual forces, wielded by a messenger of God. This angel was Satan. But, following the lead of the later Jewish theology, our author explains who Satan really is. He identifies him with the evil spirit, who from envy, says the Book of Wisdom, brought death into the world. To make clear this identification, he adds the words, “that is, the devil.” The reference to Satan is sufficient to show that the writer of the Epistle means by “the power of death” power to inflict it and keep men in its terrible grasp. But the difficulty is to understand how the devil is destroyed through death. Evidently the death of Christ is meant; we may paraphrase the Apostle’s expression by rendering, “through His death.” At first glance, the words, taken in connection with the reference to Christ’s humanity, seem to favour the doctrine, propounded by many writers in the early ages of the Church, that God delivered His Son to Satan as the price of man’s release from his rightful possession. Such a notion is utterly inconsistent with the dominant idea of the Epistle: the priestly character of Christ’s death. A Hebrew Christian could not conceive the high-priest entering the holiest place to offer a redemptive sacrifice to the spirit of evil. Indeed, the advocates of this strange theory of the Atonement admitted as much when they described Christ as outwitting the devil or escaping from his hands by persuasion. But the doctrine is quite as inconsistent with the passage before us, which represents the death of Christ as the destruction of the Evil One. Power faces power. Christ is the Captain of salvation. His leadership of men implies conflict with their enemy and ultimate victory. Death was a spiritual conception. Here lay its power. Deliverance from the crushing bondage of its fear could come only through the great High-priest. Priesthood was the basis of Christ’s power. We shall soon see that Christ is the Priest-King. The Apostle even now anticipates what he has hereafter to say on the relation of the priesthood to the kingly power. For as Priest Christ delivers men from guilt of conscience and, by so doing, delivers them from their fear of death; as King He destroys him who had the power to destroy. He is “death of death and hell’s destruction.” It has been well said that the two terrors from which none but Christ can deliver men are guilt of sin and fear of death. The latter is the offspring of the former. When the conscience of sin is no more, dread of death yields to peace and joy.
In these four ways is the glory of Christ connected with humiliation, and thus will the prophecy of the Psalmist find its fulfilment in the representative Man, Jesus. His humiliation implied propitiation, moral discipline, conscious brotherhood, and subjection to him who had the power of death. His glory consisted in the effectiveness of the propitiation, in leadership of His people, in consecration of His brethren, in the destruction of the devil.
But an interesting view of the passage has been proposed by Hofmann, and accepted by at least one thoughtful theologian of our country. They consider that the Apostle identifies the humiliation and the glory. In the words of Dr. Bruce,[35] “Christ’s whole state of examination was not only worthy to be rewarded by a subsequent state of exaltation, but was in itself invested with moral sublimity and dignity.” The idea has considerable fascination. We cannot set it aside by saying that it is modern, seeing that the Apostle himself speaks of the office of high-priest as an honour and a glory.[36] Yet we are compelled to reject it as an explanation of the passage. The Apostle is showing that the Psalmist’s statement respecting man is realised only in the Man Christ Jesus. The difficulty was to connect man’s low estate and man’s glory and dominion. But if the Apostle means that voluntary humiliation for the sake of others is the glory, some men besides Jesus Christ might have been mentioned in whom the words of the Psalm find their accomplishment. The difference between Jesus and other good men would only be a difference of degree. Such a conclusion would very seriously weaken the force of the Apostle’s reasoning.
In bringing his most skilful and original argument to a close, the Apostle recapitulates. He has said that the world to come,–the world of conscience and of spirit,–has been put in subjection to man, not to angels, and that this implies the incarnation of the Son of God. This thought the Apostle repeats in another, but very striking, form: “For verily He taketh not hold of angels, but He taketh hold of the seed of Abraham.” Though the old versions were incorrect in so rendering the words as to make them express the fact of the Incarnation, the verse is a reference to the Incarnation, described, however, as Christ’s strong grasp[37] of man. By becoming man He takes hold of humanity, as with a mighty hand, and that part by which He grasps humanity is the seed of Abraham, to whom the promise was made.
Four points of connection between the glory of Christ and His humiliation have been mentioned. In his recapitulation, the Apostle sums all up in two. The one is that Christ is Priest; the other is that He succours them that are tempted. His propitiatory death and His bringing to nought the power of Satan are included in the notion of priesthood. The moral discipline that made Him our Leader and the sense of brotherhood that made Him Sanctifier render Him able to succour the tempted. Even this also, as will be fully shown by the Apostle in a subsequent chapter, is contained in His priesthood. For He only can make propitiation, Whose heart is full of tender pity and steeled only against pity for Himself by reason of His dauntless fidelity to others.
Thus is the Son better than the angels.
FOOTNOTES:
[8] Col 1:15; Col 1:19.
[9] Act 7:53.
[10] Gal 3:19.
[11] agagonta.
[12] Mat 25:31.
[13] Luk 22:43. The genuineness of the verse is somewhat doubtful.
[14] m pararymen (Heb 2:1).
[15] Mat 21:33, sqq.
[16] Heb 10:29.
[17] Psa 8:4.
[18] Psa 8:2.
[19] 1Co 15:27.
[20] lattsas.
[21] Cf. Act 2:30.
[22] Heb 2:4.
[23] geustai (Heb 2:9).
[24] Joh 17:5.
[25] chariti.
[26] archgon (Heb 2:10).
[27] di’ hon.
[28] di’ hou.
[29] Heb 12:7.
[30] ho hagiazn (Heb 2:11).
[31] Psa 22:22.
[32] Heb 2:13.
[33] Isa 8:18
[34] Heb 2:14.
[35] Humiliation of Christ, p. 46.
[36] Heb 5:4-5.
[37] epilambanetai (Heb 2:16).