Understanding Hebrews: Introduction

To whom was it written and for what purpose?

We are about to go on a journey together through a New Testament letter from the pen of a writer who does not add his name. In early editions of the English Bible it went under the title: “The Epistle of Paul to the Hebrews” , but there has never been any agreement concerning the writer of the letter. Some claimed that it was Paul; some claimed that it could not be Paul; some said it was Barnabas; some agreed with Martin Luther that it was Apollos who wrote it. If it were Paul who wrote it, his name as its author may well have prejudiced many of its readers against it. Paul was remembered still as someone who had persecuted the early Jewish believers and since he now spent most of his life among Gentiles, why should they now believe what he said about the religion that he had apparently abandoned?

Neither, it seems, is it addressed to a particular church in a particular city, but it is written to address the needs of a certain group of people who were facing a challenge to their faith in the face of pressure or a desire to go back to their former ways. The writer was keen for his readers to understand in their hearts that the faith that they professed was founded on Jesus and that Jesus was indeed the Messiah that they had learned about from childhood in their synagogues. Not only that, but that this Jesus and their new faith was far superior to anything from their past. The letter was an exhortation not to go back to their old way of living, but to go forward in faith and to look ahead to what God has promised — a new life here on earth and citizenship of a heavenly kingdom to come. The call is to persevere in faith. This faith is defined at the beginning of Chapter 11.

Heb 11:1 Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.

And the writer encourages them that Jesus is their hope.

Heb 6:19 We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure.

Who were these Jewish Christians that the letter was addressed to?

Based on verses such as Hebrews 5:12 some eminent commentators contend that the letter must have been written to a scholarly group. One of them wrote this: Hebrews demands such a knowledge of the Old Testament that it must always have been a book written by a scholar for scholars. He concludes: Hebrews is a letter written by a great teacher to a little group of Christians or college in Rome.

I think he was wide of the mark. God’s word is to all and for all and not limited to any one particular group. Some writings, of course, were to individuals or to specific churches, but they were available to all. Yes, there are difficult passages that we all need help with, but there are no passages or books to which we are denied access ourselves.

Others say that it was written to the Jewish Christians in Rome, who were being persecuted under the Emperor Nero, where Christianity had been made illegal, but Judaism had not. For the sake of their families many Jewish Christians were under pressure or were tempted to go back to the synagogue and renounce Christ.

In my view the letter was not written to a small group of educated Jews, but to a much larger group of Jews, including those Jews in Rome, who had accepted Jesus as Messiah, but had not yet understood fully the truth of the Gospel, especially in relation to the scriptures that they already knew. They probably included those to whom Peter wrote in his first letter.

1Peter 1:1 Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, To God’s elect, exiles scattered throughout the provinces of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithynia.

And it is no coincidence that in chapter two of the same letter he calls to mind the heritage that they share. First, a reminder of Jesus as their cornerstone - a reference to the temple that had been so important to them:

1Pe 2:6 For in Scripture it says: “See, I lay a stone in Zion, a chosen and precious cornerstone, and the one who trusts in him will never be put to shame.”

And then a reminder of their place in God’s kingdom:

1Pe 2:9,10 But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.

Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

Let me take you back to the days of the early Church in Acts. After Peter’s address to the crowd in chapter two about three thousand people became believers and in the days that followed more and more people were being saved. In the next chapter after the healing of the crippled beggar Peter made this statement: “The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified his servant Jesus.” What is important here is that Peter was affirming that this new happening was firmly based on the God they already knew. in 1 Pe 3:17 he says:

But this is how God fulfilled what he had foretold through all the prophets saying that his Christ would suffer.

If you read Peter’s speeches and then Stephen’s speech before he was stoned to death, it is clear that the God of the Old was the God of the New. Peter and Stephen understood and preached that Jesus was the Messiah that had been long awaited and prophesied throughout scripture.

As we read on in Acts we discover that those early Christians were mostly Jews who carried in their hearts and minds everything that they had learnt about their religion and their traditions. How did their Old Testament beliefs and practices fit into this new way? They continued to go to the Temple. They met together to learn from the Apostles. No doubt the teaching centred around Jesus, the Messiah that their prophets had written about. But it is probable that the understanding of the Apostles was incomplete. Even Peter had much to learn.

The first major awakening, and for many this was difficult to comprehend, was that Gentiles were hearing the message and were being saved.

You remember Peter’s vision, when God opened his mind to see that Gentiles or non Jews were just as important in God’s plan. What were the words of Peter in his vision?: “Surely not, Lord, I have never eaten anything impure or unclean.” In Jerusalem the circumcised believers criticised him and only when Peter had explained his actions did they accept that Gentiles could be part of God’s kingdom.

While Gentiles were accepted now into the church, differing attitudes and opinions were beginning to develop among the early followers of Jesus. Should these gentiles be required to follow the rites and practices of Judaism? This came into the open later on later in Acts 15 when “some men came down from Judea to Antioch and were teaching the brothers: “ Unless you are circumcised according to the customs taught by Moses you cannot be saved.”

This became such a talking point that there had to be a general meeting or Council in Jerusalem to discuss it. (Acts 15). The Council concluded that no extra burden should be placed on Gentile believers.

But the question of Jewish practices and adherence to the Law had not gone away for Jewish believers. There are signs of this in Acts 21 when Paul arrives back in Jerusalem after his journeys to the Gentile lands. We read this: “You see, brother, how many thousands of Jews have believed, and all of them are zealous for the law.” then he is confronted with the accusation:

Act 21:21 They have been informed that you teach all the Jews who live among the Gentiles to turn away from Moses, telling them not to circumcise their children or live according to our customs.

Clearly, going to the Temple and performing the rites of Judaism was still important to many or most Jewish believers.

It was a difficulty even for Peter as we discover in Paul’s letter to the Church in Galatia (chapter 2:11-14).

Gal 2: 12

For before certain men came from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles. But when they arrived, he began to draw back and separate himself from the Gentiles because he was afraid of those who belonged to the circumcision group.

Gal 2:13 The other Jews joined him in his hypocrisy, so that by their hypocrisy even Barnabas was led astray.

“I said to Peter in front of them all. “You are a Jew, yet you live like a gentile and not like a Jew. How is it then, that you force Gentiles to follow Jewish customs?””

It is clear from this that there were many Jewish Christians who still wanted to cling to the practices that they had grown up with and, as the debate at the Council of Jerusalem seems to suggest, many of them believed that Gentile Christians should now accept those practices as part of their new faith in Christ. After all, the Temple still stood and the temple courts were still a favourite meeting place for them.

This question was about to become more urgent when persecution of Jewish Christian believers began. Those who remained in Jerusalem were in danger of having their goods confiscated. They were banished from the holy places. Unless they gave up faith in Jesus they were forbidden from entering the Temple, the house of Jehovah. By clinging to Jesus as Messiah, they were cut off from the Messiah’s people, banished even from the temple courts that gentiles were permitted to enter. This was a severe test for them. Loyalty to Jesus involved separation from all the sacred rights and privileges of Jerusalem.

Hebrews 10: 32-34 sheds some light on these Jewish believers:

Heb 10:32 Remember those earlier days after you had received the light, when you endured in a great conflict full of suffering.

Heb 10:33 Sometimes you were publicly exposed to insult and persecution; at other times you stood side by side with those who were so treated.

Heb 10:34 You suffered along with those in prison and joyfully accepted the confiscation of your property, because you knew that you yourselves had better and lasting possessions.

There was now a real need for a clear exposition of the relationship between Judaism and Christianity, an urgent need for their faith to be strengthened and for their understanding to be increased. There was a need for a full explanation of Christianity in the light of the Old Testament. This is what the letter to the Hebrews provides.

In times past the letter to the Hebrews went under the title “The Epistle of Paul to the Hebrews”, but there has never been any agreement concerning the writer of the letter. Some claimed that it was Paul; some claimed that it could not be Paul; some said it was Barnabas; some agreed with Martin Luther that it was Apollos who wrote it.

Unlike all the other books of the New Testament, this letter to the Hebrews bears no writer’s name. If it were Paul who wrote it, his name as its author may well have prejudiced many of its readers against it. Paul was remembered still as someone who had persecuted the early Jewish believers and since he now spent most of his life among Gentiles, why should they now believe what he said about the religion that he had abandoned?

Perhaps the writer just wanted to fix his readers minds on Jesus and to exalt him above all else.

Heb 3:1 Therefore, holy brothers and sisters, who share in the heavenly calling, fix your thoughts on Jesus, whom we acknowledge as our apostle and high priest.

He is our Apostle, the one who brought us God’s message of salvation, and our High Priest, the one who offered the sacrifice on our behalf.

So what is the letter to the Hebrews all about? The letter begins with the words “In the past” or “In time past” (KJV) and then goes on to say “in these last days”. The writer is going to focus on Jesus and in His light is going to examine all that has gone before to show the immeasurable superiority of Christ. We will discover that what had been before under the Old Covenant were but shadows or types of Christ, pointing forward to his coming. The writer shows that in the presence of the glory of the Son of God all pale into insignificance.

The writer takes us to the prophets; to the angels; to Moses; to Joshua; to Aaron and the priesthood; to the covenant and shows Christ’s superiority over all.

The purpose of the letter was not to tell the Jewish Christians that what they had followed and practised before they accepted Jesus was wrong. No, it was to encourage them that following Jesus was a better way of life. This word “better” occurs several times throughout Hebrews.

Heb 6:9 Even though we speak like this, dear friends, we are convinced of better things in your case—the things that have to do with salvation.

Heb 7:22 Because of this oath, Jesus has become the guarantor of a better covenant.

Heb 8:6 But in fact the ministry Jesus has received is as superior to theirs as the covenant of which he is mediator is superior to the old one, since the new covenant is established on better promises.

Heb 9:23 It was necessary, then, for the copies of the heavenly things to be purified with these sacrifices, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these.

Heb 10:34 You suffered along with those in prison and joyfully accepted the confiscation of your property, because you knew that you yourselves had better and lasting possessions.

Heb 11:16 Instead, they were longing for a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.

Heb 11:40 since God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect.

Heb 12:24 to Jesus the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel.

And we find the word “Great”

Heb 2:3 how shall we escape if we ignore so great a salvation? This salvation, which was first announced by the Lord, was confirmed to us by those who heard him.

Heb 4:14 Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess.

Heb 10:32 Remember those earlier days after you had received the light, when you endured in a great conflict full of suffering.

Heb 12:1 Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles. And let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us,

Heb 13:20 Now may the God of peace, who through the blood of the eternal covenant brought back from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great Shepherd of the sheep,

On the face of it, the Jewish Christians felt that there were so many things from their past that they were being asked to give up or were no longer available to them. The writer reminds them of what they had gained.

“Though deprived of the temple, with its priesthood, and altar, and sacrifice, the apostle reminds them, “We have” the real and substantial temple, the great High Priest, the true altar, the one sacrifice, and with it all offerings, the true access into the very presence of the Most High.

Saphir, A. (1902). The Epistle to the Hebrews: An Exposition & II (Vol. 1, p. 12). New York: Gospel Publishing House.”

Heb 4:14 Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess.

Heb 6:19 We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. It enters the inner sanctuary behind the curtain,

Heb 10:19 Therefore, brothers and sisters, since we have confidence to enter the Most Holy Place by the blood of Jesus,

Heb 10:34 You suffered along with those in prison and joyfully accepted the confiscation of your property, because you knew that you yourselves had better and lasting possessions.

Heb 12:28 Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe,

Heb 13:10 We have an altar from which those who minister at the tabernacle have no right to eat.

Far from being a letter of discouragement, it was a letter to give them assurance that their faith was grounded on Jesus, ruling on an everlasting throne

Heb 1:8 But about the Son he says, “Your throne, O God, will last for ever and ever; a scepter of justice will be the scepter of your kingdom.

and the writer urged them to look forward. He writes of what is to come

Heb 2:5 It is not to angels that he has subjected the world to come, about which we are speaking.

Heb 2:10 In bringing many sons and daughters to glory,

Heb 10:1 The law is only a shadow of the good things that are coming—

Heb 9:28 so Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many; and he will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him.

Heb 10:36 You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised.

Heb 10:37 For, “In just a little while, he who is coming will come and will not delay.”

Heb 11:15 If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return.

Heb 11:16 Instead, they were longing for a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them.

Heb 13:14 For here we do not have an enduring city, but we are looking for the city that is to come.

The one central aspect of Judaism that from childhood was built into the lives and minds of its adherents was the Temple and the Priesthood. The priests were the mediators between the people and their God. It was the priest who offered the sacrifices and it was the High Priest only who could enter once a year, and then only briefly, the Holy of Holies. Throughout this letter the writer pays particular attention to the Priesthood of Christ.

Heb 6:5 who have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the coming age

Heb 8:10 This is the covenant I will establish with the people of Israel after that time, declares the Lord. I will put my laws in their minds and write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they will be my people.

Heb 9:11 But when Christ came as high priest of the good things that are now already here,

Heb 2:17 For this reason he had to be made like them, fully human in every way, in order that he might become a merciful and faithful high priest in service to God, and that he might make atonement for the sins of the people.

Heb 3:1 Therefore, holy brothers and sisters, who share in the heavenly calling, fix your thoughts on Jesus, whom we acknowledge as our apostle and high priest

Heb 4:14 Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess.

Heb 4:15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin.

Heb 5:6 And he says in another place, “You are a priest forever, in the order of Melchizedek.

Heb 5:10 and was designated by God to be high priest in the order of Melchizedek.

Heb 6:20 where our forerunner, Jesus, has entered on our behalf. He has become a high priest forever, in the order of Melchizedek.

Heb 7:26 Such a high priest truly meets our need—one who is holy, blameless, pure, set apart from sinners, exalted above the heavens.

Heb 8:1 Now the main point of what we are saying is this: We do have such a high priest, who sat down at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in heaven,

Heb 9:11 But when Christ came as high priest of the good things that are now already here, he went through the greater and more perfect tabernacle that is not made with human hands, that is to say, is not a part of this creation.

Heb 10:21 and since we have a great priest over the house of God,

The first three verses of the letter give us a summary statement that the writer is going to explore in the rest of the letter.

Heb 1:1 In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets at many times and in various ways,

Heb 1:2 but in these last days he has spoken to us by his Son, whom he appointed heir of all things, and through whom also he made the universe.

Heb 1:3 The Son is the radiance of God’s glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word. After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in heaven.

In these verses we discover a number of important truths

1. A god who speaks

2. Prophets as instruments of God’s revelation

3. The Son, the creator, the sustainer and the saviour; the beginning and the end.

4. In the past

5. In these last days

We will look at these on another occasion, but I would just like to consider the first. Why did God speak? Can you remember the first question that God spoke after the Fall in the Garden of Eden. “Where are you?” What was it that induced God to speak?

Here was man, now living in fear and guilt and shame, and God calls, “where are you?” This was God calling to man out of a heart of compassion and love. God already had in place his plan of redemption and it was because of this that he began to reveal himself. If there was no redemption, there would have been no revelation. It was this plan that God revealed at many times and in various ways in times past through the prophets. It was this plan that was now fully revealed in these last days in His Son.

The writer of this letter wants to show to the Jewish Christians the New Covenant exceeds and far excels the glory of the Old Covenant and he exhorts them to examine it with him, calling them to be steadfast and to persevere.

Heb 10:35 So do not throw away your confidence; it will be richly rewarded.

Heb 10:36 You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised.

Heb 10:39 But we do not belong to those who shrink back and are destroyed, but to those who have faith and are saved.

He calls to mind all those servants of God, whose faith was steadfast. He calls them a great cloud of witnesses, spurring us on to run the race.

And here is the remarkable promise that the writer of Hebrews says about all those heroes of faith that he has just written about in chapter 11

Heb 11:39 These were all commended for their faith, yet none of them received what had been promised,

Heb 11:40 since God had planned something better for us so that only together with us would they be made perfect.