Hebrews 2

Hebrews 2:1

rom what has been before said, the apostle infers the danger of despising Christ on account of his humiliation; which in perfect consistence with his dominion over the world to come, was voluntarily submitted to by him, for wise and important reasons; particularly to deliver us from the fear of death, and encourage the freedom of our access to God. Heb. II. 1, to the end.

HEBREWS II. 1.

SOMETHING we have said in the former section concerning the supreme dignity of our blessed Redeemer. And now give me leave, before I proceed to other arguments which will naturally occur, to draw this obvious consequence from what I have already said: If he be so far superior to angels, we ought therefore to yield extraordinary attention to the things which we have heardᵃ by his authority; lest by any means we let [them] flow out of our minds, and lose the impression they once made upon us. For if the Mosaic law, which was the word spoken by angels,ᵇ proclaiming it in the name and presence of Jehovah from mount Sinai, was steadfast, and confirmed by such awful sanctions, that every instance of wilful transgression and disobedience received, as its reward, a correspondent and severe vengeance; How shall we have any room to hope that we shall escape, neglecting so great and glorious a salvation as that which the gospel sets before us? A salvation, which having at its beginning been spoken by the Lord of angels himself, was confirmed to us by the certain report of them that heard [him] preach it with

ᵃ We have heard.] Nothing can be more evidently weak than the argument drawn from hence, to prove that St. Paul was not the author of this epistle, because it was not by hearing only that he received the gospel. It is to be considered, that he asks in the name of all to whom he was

writing, as well as his own, to render the instruction the more unexceptionable and the more forcible. Besides, that to hear any thing, signifies in general to be instructed in it.

ᵇ Angels.] See Dr. Whitby’s admirable note on this text.

Which was proclaimed not by angels, but by t.

his own lips; The blessed God himself joining his own divine and sacred testimony with theirs, both by enabling them to perform the most amazing signs and wonders, and various incontestable miracles, and endowing them in a rich abundance, with distributions of the Holy Spirit in its extraordinary operations, imparted in different degrees to different persons, according to his own sovereign will and pleasure.

And by these wonderful operations the superiority of Christ to angels is farther illustrated; for to angels, even the most exalted of them, he, that is, God, hath not subjected the world to come, nor ever intended that they should preside in the latest and best dispensation, the kingdom of the Messiah, which extends not only to earth, but to heaven, concerning which we now speak, as it is the great business of the Author’s life to promote its interests. But a certain [writer,]

Signs and wonders.] I think it is very needless to inquire curiously into the difference of each of these words, when it is usual by a Hebraism to express a great degree and variety of things of any kind, by keeping together a great many synonymous words.

To angels he hath not subjected, &c.] Archbishop Tillotson thinks the meaning of this scripture is, that God did not empower the Angels who delivered the law, to enforce it with clear and express promises of a future state, as Christ had enforced the gospel. See his Works, Vol. III. p. 136. Dr. Barrow explains it of the Messiah making so great an alteration in the constitution of things, that it is represented by a new heaven and a new earth, (Isa. lxx. 17, 8) on which account it was called by the Jews, the world to come; a phrase, which it is observable St. Paul only uses in this epistle to the Hebrews, as being familiar to them. Barrow’s Works, Vol. II. p. 202. Others have argued from this text, that angels were possessed of certain authority and power in the world before Christ came, of which they were divested upon his appearance; and of those who have agreed in this general explication, some, (as Mr. Peirce,) have referred to the presidency of angels to their having the guardianship of particular countries, and others, to some particular influences of their counsels in projecting the schemes which preceded the display of the gospel. But it seems to me, that the simplest, plainest, and most unexceptionable sense is this, “That God had appointed his Son to preside in the last great dispensation; which he elsewhere expresses, by saying, He has united all things under him, as their common Head, Eph. i. 10,” and this certainly is an honour to which no angel can pretend. Dr. Burnet’s explication of this as referring to the new heavens and earth, which he supposes shall succeed the conflagration in which Christ is to reign, (which he also thinks referred to Isa. ix. 6,) is so very precarious and improbable an interpretation, that I think it is hardly worth mentioning. Burnet’s Theory of the Earth, Vol. II. p. 392

A certain [writer] bears his testimony.] It has been matter of much debate among critics, whether these words are to be considered as in their original intent, a prophecy of the Messiah, or a description of the dignity and glory of human nature, to which the apostle alludes; making use of David’s language to clothe his own ideas, though by an application very different from his design. It seems evident to me, that there is nothing in the viiih psalm by which, independent upon the apostle’s authority, it could be known to belong to the Messiah. On the whole therefore I prefer the latter opinion, though I readily confess, that if the former could be proved.

And to him all things are put in subjection.

well known I am persuaded to you Hebrews, somewhere bears his testimony, saying, (Psal. viii. 4.) O Lord, what is man that thou rememberest him, or the son of man that thou regardest him! After which he goes on in words that have a most remarkable correspondence to the character and circumstances of the Lord Jesus Christ, both in his humbled and in his exalted state; for he adds, speaking of the Son of man, Thou hast made him but a little lower than the angels; with glory and honour hast thou crowned him, and hast constituted him [lord] over all the visible works of thine hands. Thou hast put all things under his feet. This may be interpreted in the widest extent; for in putting all things under him, nothing was left out, [which was] not represented as reduced to subjection to him. But now we do not as yet see, that all things are put under him, to whom we refer these words; but on the contrary, a great part of the world is as yet unacquainted with him and his authority. Nevertheless, we see what we may well look upon as an earnest and security of it; for we see Jesus, who, for the few years he dwelt upon earth, was made in human form and state a little lower than the angels of God, over whom he had an original right, as their Maker, to preside, exalted to the most conspicuous dignity in the celestial world: we see him, who was thus humbled for the suffering of death, that he might be capable of it, and that by the grace of God to sinful creatures, he might taste the bitterness of death for every man, who would obediently accept of life through him, now crowned with a glory and honour far superior to what Adam had in the day in which he was created.

direct argument in therwise be only union; but the grand refer, the exaltation dignity, was so exhimself, Mat. xxviii. amental a doctrine, received in the Chrisdid not seem to stand ditional proof.

For the suffering of death.] 7 words may seem ambiguous, and ca of being referred either to the prec or following clause. It is indeed that Christ was crowned as a rewa suffering death, as the apostle exp teaches, Phil. ii. 8, 9. But the concl words of the verse, which have pla connection with these, determine to the former sense.

Yet it became him to be made perfect through s

Such hath been the conduct of God in this great affair of our redemption. And the beauty and harmony of it will be apparent, in proportion to the degree in which it is examined. For though the Jews dream of a temporal Messiah, as a scheme conducive to the Divine glory, it well became him for whom [are] all things, and by whom [are] all things, the glorious Being who is the first cause and the last end of all, in pursuit of the great and important design he had formed, of conducting many whom he is pleased to adopt as his sons, to the possession of that inheritance of glory he has intended for them, to make and constitute Jesus his first begotten and best beloved Son, the Leader and Prince of their salvation; and to make him perfect or completely fit for the full execution of his office, by a long train of various and extreme sufferings, whereby he was, as it were, solemnly consecrated to it.

Now in consequence of this appointment, Jesus, the great Sanctifier, who engages and consecrates men to the service of God, and they who are sanctified, that is, consecrated and introduced to God with such acceptance [are] all of one family; all the descendants of Adam, and in a sense, the seed of Abraham: for which cause he is not ashamed to call them whom he thus redeems and presents to Divine favour, his brethren; Saying, (Psal. xxii. 22, 26,) in the person of David, when representing the Messiah in his sufferings and exaltation, I will declare thy name to my brethren; in the midst of the assembly of thy people, the great assembly, which by way of eminence shall be called the church, will I praise thee for thy gracious interposition in my favour. And again, speaking as a mortal man, exposed to such exercises of faith in trials and difficulties as others were, he says in a psalm which represents his triumph over his enemies, I will trust in him as other good men have in all ages done; and again, elsewhere in the person of Isaiah, (Isa. viii. 18,) Behold I and the children which my God hath given me, are for signs and for wonders.

It became him] This seems to signify, worthy of himself, it was expedient he not only that the course he took was should take this method. well worthy of God, but that in order to act

cause he was a partaker of flesh and blood.

eeing then those whom he represents in one spec. place and another as the children of the same ii. family with himself, are partakers of human Heb. esh and blood, he himself in like manner par- ii. 14 ticipated of them, and assumed all their sinless infirmities, that thereby becoming capable of those sufferings to which without such a union with flesh he could not have been obnoxious, he might by his own voluntary and meritorious death, abolish and depose him, who by Divine permission had the empire of death, and led it in his train, when it made its first invasion on mankind, that is, the devil, the great artificer of mischief and destruction; at the beginning the murderer of the human race, who still seems to triumph in the spread of mortality which is his work, and who may often by God’s righteous permission be the executioner of it. But 15 Christ the great Prince of mercy and life, graciously interposed, that he might deliver those his miserable captives, who through fear of death were, or justly might have been, all their lifetime obnoxious to bondage; having nothing to expect in consequence of it, if they rightly understood their state, but future misery: whereas now, changing their Lord, they have happily changed their condition, and are, as many as have believed in him, the heirs of eternal life.

We the sinful children of Adam, though the 16 heirs of death, are thus delivered by him; but not the infernal powers, who were the first authors of their seduction; for truly he took not hold of the angels, to save them from plunging into the abyss of misery; but he took hold of the seed of Abraham, and hath made a gracious provision for the salvation of all who shall by true faith approve themselves the genuine children of that holy patriarch. From whence, and 17 in consequence of which design, it behoved

b Depose him.] The original word κα- λασχησον, properly signifies to deprive of all power, Rom. vi. 6. When applied to the law, it signifies abolition. To suppose with Archbishop Tillotson, that it chiefly means, that Christ might give mankind the hope of immortality, when they actually saw one risen from the dead, and ascend-

ing to heaven, is, I think, sinking the interpretation a great deal too low. The empire of death.] Some have in ferred from hence, that the devil is the executioner of the sentence of death but on good and bad men. But I think the sense in the paraphrase less obnoxious and precarious.

vo . 6.

ections on the character of Christ as our High Priest. him to be made in all things like unto those whom he condescends to call [his] brethren, that so he might be a merciful and faithful High Priest, in things [relating] to God, that he might in the most effectual manner make atonement for the sins of the people; which he could not have done if he had not assumed our nature. But now, in consequence of that, he has not only provided himself with something to offer, but has by the experience of our infirmities, contracted that peculiar kind of compassion, which nothing else can teach; and in that he hath himself suffered, being tempted and tried with such a variety of assaults and sorrows, he can, in the most ready and endearing, as well as effectual manner, help those that are tempted, and are making their way through those scenes of difficulty, which he passed through with such fortitude and honour.

IMPROVEMENT.

ETERNAL praise to our compassionate High Priest, who put on our infirmities that he might know how to pity and relieve them! Eternal praise to him, by whom are all things, and for whom are all things, that he has concerted the merciful scheme of bringing many sons unto glory, in a manner so well worthy of his Divine perfections, and so full of instruction and comfort to us; appointing his own Son the Captain of our salvation, and making him perfect through sufferings! Let us daily reflect upon it with pleasure and gratitude, that he is not ashamed to call us his brethren, though so highly exalted above the angels of God; and that he took not hold of the superior nature of angels, which was sunk into apostasy, guilt, and ruin, but took hold on the seed of Abraham. How venerable, as well as amiable, is that condescension with which he made himself a little lower than the angels, that by the grace of God which was to owe its highest honours to his cross, he might taste death for every man! He hath effected his merciful purpose: by death he hath deposed and abolished the tyrannical prince of death, that is, the devil, and delivered from the fears of death, those who, had they known and considered their real circumstances, might have been continually in bondage to it.

Faithful High Priest.] Mr. Fleming dence; but the former implies the latter. thinks signifies the same as a- Fleming’s Chrystology, Vol. II. p. 266. one worthy of our trust and confi-

They ought to regard the High Priest of their profession;

We see our great enemy deposed; we see life and immortality brought to light by his gospel: let us see it with gratitude and pleasure. And let us learn from all, if we would not charge ourselves with the most inexcusable guilt, and the basest ingratitude, if we would not plunge ourselves into the lowest gulf of perdition, not to neglect so great a salvation. Let the doom, which the law of Moses passed upon the presumptuous transgressor, deter us; and let the grace of the gospel allure and invite us to attend to the salvation spoken by the Lord, and to take the most earnest heed to it, lest we let slip that golden opportunity, which, if neglected, will never return.