Hebrews

1. Introduction, 2. Brothers and sisters â€" adelphoi, 3. The believers, 4. The saints â€" hoi hagioi, 5. The assembly â€" hÄ" ekklÄ" sia, 6. Disciples â€" mathÄ" tai, 7. The way â€" hÄ" hodos, 8.'Christian'â€" Christianos, 9. Conclusions.

Феномен священства в ізраїльському світогляді вважали «пластичним» (плем’я Левія, назореї, народ). Його варіативність визнає і наукова спільнота. Відомо, що паралельно до функціонування священничої структури «царства священників» (Вих 19:5–6) у  богослов’я Ізраїля було впроваджено й закріплено ідею сконцентрованості в одній особі виконання різних ролей: есхатологічного царя, первосвященника і слуги (1 Сам 2:35; Пс 109; Іс 52:13 – 53:12; Зах 3:1–10; 6:9–15; 9:9). Згадані у статті тексти й уривки зі Старого Завіту не раз ставали об’єктами богословського аналізу та історико-релігієзнавчих пошуків. У цьому
дослідженні уточнено характер стосунків між Ягве-Адонаєм і Адонаєм-Мелхіседеком. Окрім цього, проаналізовано міру залученості кожного з них у протистояння з опонентами. Поза тим, присвячено увагу позитивним наслідкам есхатологічного посередництва Адоная-Мелхіседека для тих, хто узгодив свій спосіб буття із законами святості.

Gabriella Gelardini highlights Hebrews’ concept of salvation over against Rome’s imperial “salvation,” as this comes to light through an examination of Hebrews’ faith-concept. She develops the empire-critical undertones of Hebrews’ πίστις rhetoric while observing the failure of earlier studies to appreciate the complexities of bilingualism, biculturalism, and code-switching relating to Hebrews’ use of the Greek language. She begins by noting Martin Buber’s distinction between Judaism’s (and Jesus’s) historically grounded and immediate trust in God (emunah), and Christianity’s (Paul’s) Greek πίστις, born not in history but in the souls of individuals and centering in the acceptance of the truth of certain tenets of faith. For Buber, in Heb. 11:1 these two aspects—assurance and conviction, as he translates the two words—stand unconnected beside each other. Recent research has also been convinced that Hebrews introduces a certain Greek rationalization to his OT concept of emunah (compare Käsemann, Grässer, Schliesser). Making reference to 11:6, however, Gelardini finds evidence that while the Greek way of thinking certainly has a persuasive function, the work of persuasion is carried out on those in whom the confessional tradition is already alive, or at least still awake, in whom faith lives and breathes; the author has addressees in mind whose thinking is already at home with religious beliefs from the Old Testament/Jewish understanding of trust in God’s faithfulness. Pausing to note recent work on bilingualism, biculturalism, and code-switching in relation to Greek-speaking Judaism and Christianity, Gelardini asserts that against the backdrop of a long-established tradition of bicultural interactions in the Hellenistic-Roman Mediterranean, we need to take due account of this—constant—process of negotiating identity. Noting that these cultural anthropological studies have already been applied to the idea of faith in Paul and in the Roman world, Gelardini wishes to apply them to Hebrews. Classical and philological studies have highlighted the importance of the πίστις or fides culture for the Roman empire, particularly the function of fides for relations in society, within the state and between states. Among the differences between the Greek πίστις concept and the Roman/Latin one, reciprocity is crucial for the Roman concept of fides. It marks a reciprocal, albeit hierarchically structured, relationship between the patron and his client in public, private, and also official contracts, as in alliances. Faithfulness and covenant belong together, as also justice and salvation; this is manifest in the fact that fides is a deity symbolizing Roman respect for international law. From this observation Gelardini turns to note how in Hebrews both God and Christ are πιστός (10:23; 2:17; 3:2). The noun πίστις is used for the attitude of the wandering people of God and is associated with the keyword διαθήκη, Latin foedus. Πίστις is a means of salvation, for instance in 11:7. And 10:37-39, a kind of “skopos of Hebrews,” presents salvation through faithfulness, that is, the “acquisition” or “production” of (eternal) life—the word [περιποίησις] does indeed have the basic meaning of the manufacture of commodities. At this point Gelardini notes that the theme of empire, important to the Roman conception, also belongs in this context, for the empire celebrated covenants and friendships in the temple of Fides on the Capitol. Thus also in Hebrews, empire-critical undertones may well also resonate (12:22; 13:14; cf. 11:14, 16). Unlike Augustan court poets, Hebrews hardly considers Rome to be the empire without borders in space and time, nor Rome the lasting and eternal πόλις. That sort of description is reserved for the “unshakable kingdom” in heaven, to which hope, patience, perseverance, and πίστις are directed (cf. 11:10). Christ is the leader of the salvation (salus and σωτηρία being the theme of empire). It is this empire-critical subtext that also underlines the capacity for bilingual or bicultural identity politics. Borrowing and rejection belong together in code-switching. In closing, Gelardini turns to 11:1 and 12:1. Ὑπόστασις indicates that πίστις is indeed a reality, but precisely the substrate of something else. Ἔλεγχος denotes an objective proof: faithfulness is proof or evidence of invisible things. The examples of faith that follow 11:1 are characterized in 12:1 as a νέφος μαρτύρων: the forensic idea of μάρτυς suits both the force of ἔλεγχος in 11:1 and the fact that πίστις can certainly mean credible witness in legal language. In the light of 11:3, πίστις does have an “intellectual” element. But Hebrews’ use of Koine rhetoric, especially with the emphasized contextual link with the comprehensive Greco-Roman concept of πίστις/fides, is also of importance. There might be irony that fides—an identity marker of Roman culture and domination—was used by Hebrews to culturally strengthen allegiance to the celestial empire.

TO READ THE PREVIEW SCROLL DOWN TO READ THE PREVIEW SCROLL DOWN

A great American psychologist summarizes one of the most difficult of subjects--the nature of dreaming--after decades of lifting matters out of the morass of Freudianism. The result nonetheless is a thin gruel that misses the main thing about dreams: their unworldly imaginative power. But he is not the only one. Who defends the psyche in modern science? Who knows what it is, where it resides, and how it controls the brain? The true theory of dreaming will emerge only by facing and answering these questions, which can be said to have baffled ancient, medieval, and modern investigators alike. At present materialism stands confused, pathetically benighted in its own shadow.

Readers are now advised that a new approach to the true theory of dreaming, as well as the first mechanistic explanation of Night Terrors in scientific history, is contained in the reviewer's illustrated essay on this page called 'The Last Day.' Both this late 2017 review and the new 2020 essay concern the same foundational ideas within idealism and can be said to blend smoothly together to produce an increasingly coherent view of the phenomenology as well as the fundamental nature of dreaming, the achievement of which depends on isolating and identifying the cosmic generator of dreams.

See also 'Sartre on Dreaming' (2022) and 'On the Materialization of Being' (2022) for deeper insights into the nature of dreaming according to idealism and in the context of the embodiment of the psyche, which reaches far deeper inwardly than the farthest galaxies are from the Solar System.

The warnings of the book of Hebrews are among the most debated passages in regard to interpretation and application. The exact verses vary, depending on which interpreter one references, but are generally seen to be in this range: 2:1-4; 3:7-4:13; 5:11-6:12; 10:26-39 and 12:25-29. The goal of this paper is to explain the given passages, including the audience, nature and results of each warning.

The concept of New Covenant, as Sussanne Lehne notes, is not only a major theme in Hebrews but a linchpin without which the structure of the author’s thinking would fall apart and lose its coherence.  Consequent upon the establishment of a new covenant--or the promise thereof, the old is rendered obsolete, outdated, and no longer valid. This new covenant language of Hebrews—based on the new covenant promises in Jeremiah chapter 31, and instituted by Christ’s Last Supper Verba—begs the question: which of the biblical covenants does this ‘New Covenant’ replace? Also, what are the better promises of this New Covenant on the grounds of which, the writer of Hebrews affirmatively says, makes the new covenant better than old? These better promises of the new—in comparison to those of the old—are what this paper seeks to highlight.

Excerpt from Caleb T. Friedeman, ed. Listen, Understand, Obey: Essays on Hebrews in Honor of Gareth Lee Cockerill (Eugene, OR: Pickwick, 2017). Used with permission of Wipf and Stock Publishers (http://wipfandstock.com/listen-understand-obey.html).

Hebrews was written, possibly as a sermon, possibly as a circular, possibly as an epistle to one congregation that became a circular.  The authorship and specifically intended audience(s) are unknown.  What is known is that the group(s) of Jewish Christians were in danger of backsliding into ways of worship that trapped people into empty ritualism instead of lifting people up into relationship with God.  There were strong cultural pressures on them to give up their Christianity and go back to the old covenant ways.
The writer of this epistle exhorted them to keep the course and to remember the promises of old, made during the old covenant and prophesied by Jeremiah.  The new covenant time had come, the old covenant was abrogated, abolished.  Today, while some may strive to return to the old ways, it is important to remember the lessons of the book of Hebrews, particularly 8:6-13, about leaving the past in the past and looking to the future while living in the present.

By Edward Fudge --
Edward Fudge, esteemed author of The Fire that Consumes,
sets out in Our Man in Heaven to explore the nature of Jesus
Christ and his relationship with all people as described in the
Epistle to the Hebrews. Fudge provides a short introduction
to the history, authorship, and cultural context of Hebrews,
then breaks down what Hebrews has to say to modern
readers. Our Man in Heaven is readily accessible, and Fudge
communicates even the more complex ideas of Hebrews in
a remarkably clear and easily understood way.

This article analyzes Heb 13, particularly vv. 7–19, applying the methods of spatial analysis. Of specific interest is the space described as “outside the camp” in Heb 13:11–13. As the term seems to allude to three different spaces in time, namely, the spaces outside the desert camp, outside Jerusalem, and outside Rome (the addressees’ location as generally assumed), a practice of overlapping maps can be observed, in which the first shapes all subsequent maps. This first map points to Sinai, where the ritual related to Yom Kippur was introduced. As Sinai is also the location where Israel’s leader Moses, to whom Jesus in Hebrews is compared, left the camp due to its defilement, the primary intertext underlying Heb 13 is identified in Exod 33, particularly in vv. 7–11. A detailed spatial analysis of the Sinai narrative adopting Edward W. Soja’s trialectic of Firstspace, Secondspace, and Thirdspace, together with additional readings from various Targumim as well as Philo of Alexandria, results in a useful model that seems to have served the author of Hebrews to interpret the spaces, bodies, and actions in ch. 13. This analysis not only sheds new interpretative light on a chapter widely considered to be a crux interpretum but also strengthens the position that this chapter is an integral part of the preceding text in Hebrews.

By means of a literary and rhetoric strategy of upgrading-through-downgrading, the
author of Hebrews called the attention of its original addressees to the fact that what
they felt prone to go back to as God’s most dependable self-disclosure (the temple, the
priesthood, the Sinai covenant, etcetera) had in fact Jesus Christ as its very foundation,
sub-stance and unsurmountable apex. All those former revelatory phases or stages were
only segments of a seamless continuum. Staring at the stem of God’s revelatory tree, they
were in danger of missing the nurturing root and the fruit-bearing top. The pre-incarnate
Son had been feeding endlessly and from the very onset every inch of the tree as its
divine Root, while the top was now offering dire and free access to the seasoned fruit of
salvation in and through the person and ministry of Jesus Christ both on earth at first and
in heaven now.

This article proposes a better source for the Son’s cry in Hebrews 5:7. It begins by surveying sources previous scholars have identified, including Jesus’ cry in Gethsemane and Golgotha, several Psalms, and the Maccabean martyr literature. It is then argued that these background sources for the language are insufficient. Instead the author of Hebrews has an entire motif from the Psalter as his informing source: the Davidic figure that cries out in trust to be delivered from a death-like experience. Firstly, the motif of the Davidic righteous suffering in the LXX Psalms is demonstrated. Secondly, Hebrews’ use of the Messianic royal figure is demonstrated and thirdly, Hebrews 5:7 as a portrait of the Christ who cries out for deliverance is demonstrated. Thus, Hebrews 5:7 sees the Son as the Davidic king who is the true representative human exercising trust in YHWH, bringing to fulfilment the theme from various Psalms.

It is the majority position that Hebrews has little to add to NT pneumatology (see §1.1). However, that is far from the case. Indeed, on all seven occasions that the author of Hebrews refers to the Spirit, he does so using language and concepts that are unique in the NT. The Spirit both speaks (λέγω) words of Scripture (3:7) and testifies (μαρτυρέω) from Scripture (10:15) using words elsewhere described as God’s words to the congregation. Elsewhere in the NT, when the Spirit ‘speaks’ he does so through human agents (see §§4.3-4.4). However, in Hebrews he speaks directly to the hearers without the need for an intermediary (see §4.5). Furthermore, the Spirit interprets (δηλόω) Scripture (9:8) and this is the only place in the NT where the Spirit is said to function as hermeneut (see §§4.5.3, 8.3.1). The phrase ‘Spirit of grace’ (10:29) is also a NT hapax and ‘Eternal Spirit’ (9:14) is a Biblical hapax. In addition, the concept of believers becoming μέτοχοι of the Spirit (6:4) and the description of God validating the gospel message by ‘distributing’ (μερισμός) the Holy Spirit to followers of Christ (2:4) are also unique to Hebrews.
After undertaking a close examination of all seven divine-πνεῦμα texts in Hebrews this thesis concludes that Hebrews has a significant, developed and unique pneumatology (§8.1). The author portrays the Spirit as personal, eternal and divine (§§8.2.2-8.2.4). He is actively involved in the atonement and the New Covenant (§8.3.3), showing the need for such a covenant (§8.3.1) and providing a partnership with each member of the New Covenant Community such that the Spirit enables that which the Covenant requires (§8.3.3). The Holy Spirit plays a crucial role in Hebrews. Both author and congregation experienced him as God, co-equal with the Father and the Son. In fact, Hebrews’ underlying pneumatology displays what might be called ‘Trinitarian coinherence’ (§§8.2.1, 8.4).

This article examines the biblical interpretation of Thomas Aquinas, which has until recently been relatively neglected amongst the many works of this leading medieval theologian. Looking particularly at ‘by the grace of God Christ tasted death for all’ (Hebrews 2:9), a key phrase which throws up several exegetical and theological puzzles, it concludes that Aquinas’s approach to it is a prime example of medieval commentating both at its best and its worst. It shows how his lack of knowledge of Greek led him astray, notes his neglect of textual criticism, and examines his reliance on tradition, especially the Hebrews commentary of Peter Lombard. It places his use of the theological formula ‘sufficient for all, efficacious for the elect alone’ when expounding the words ‘for all’ into historical context, surveying exegetical discussion of the extent of the atonement from Origen to Gottschalk to John Owen. Aquinas’s use of the scholastic ‘division of the text’ methodology to identify a melodic line centring on this verse’s theme of ‘grace’ within both Hebrews and Paul (the assumed author) is uncovered, along with other interpretative tactics and a reflective piety which jar against the presuppositions of modern academic biblical studies.

In “‘Behold! I Am with the Children God Has Given Me’: Ekphrasis and Epiphany in Hebrews 1–2,” Mackie considers ways in which Heb 1–2 encourages a mystical vision of the ascended Christ’s enthronement in the heavenly realms and sets the scene for the later passages of the homily that exhort the audience to approach God. Identifying rhetorical elements in Hebrews that parallel techniques in the wider Greco-Roman world that make up an ekphrasis (which intends to produce visual and emotional experiences in hearers), Mackie argues that Hebrews aims to make the heavenly tabernacle and divine presence visually accessible to the community. They can approach God, enter the tabernacle that is manifest to them in their gathered worship, and experience a vision of the risen and exalted Jesus. This experience forms a central aspect of the exhortation and encouragement the author uses to help persuade his audience to remain faithful to Jesus, as they have their identity as his siblings reconfirmed.

The present volume contains a collection of fourteen essays applying the latest and neglected methods and offering new and innovative insights into the interpretation of the New Testament book To the Hebrews.
The excitingly diverse contributions, which stem from an intriguing international group of senior and younger Hebrews, New Testament, and Old Testament scholars, are presented in three parts: Part One focuses on cultic language, concepts, and practice in Hebrews; Part Two on sociology, ethics, and rhetoric in Hebrews; and Part Three on textual-historical, comparative, and intertextual approaches to Hebrews.
As the first ever compilation of essays on Hebrews by a range of authors, this volume presents an important contribution to the field of New Testament studies. It will particularly appeal to students, teachers, and scholars interested in a variety of critical perspectives on Hebrews and on the New Testament’s third great theologian next to Paul and John. Moreover, the treatment of hermeneutical, cultic, sociological, and comparative matters in the context of biblical, Greco-Roman, and rabbinic literature will make this collection valuable to an even broader readership.

The article surveys evidence for Christians and Christian Jews observing festivals of autumn (New Year, Tabernacles and mostly the Day of Atonement): Paul, Hebrews, Luke-Acts, Hegesippus, Origen, Chrysostom and Abd Al-Jabbar as well as polemics.
One can perhaps distinguish 3 progressive stages in the perception of such religious behavior as the observance of Yom Kippur by followers of Christ: 1) normative (Luke) or acceptable (Paul); 2) peculiar, Judaeo-Christian but tolerable (Justin Martyr); and 3) un-Christian and prohibited (Diognet, Origen). There is a clear difference between the first century and later times regarding the social status of Jesus-followers observing Yom Kippur. In the first century, some leaders regarded the fast as normative (Luke-Acts) or acceptable (Paul). In later times, those observing the fast were probably ordinary Christians while those who defined Yom Kippur as un-Christian belonged to the leaders of the mainstream.

What is a religion? What triggered the spontaneous development of distinct religions throughout the ancient world? How do religions evoke the ultimate realities they claim to address? Such questions are as evergreen as belief itself. The Hellenistic and Roman worlds were a fertile seedbed of the monotheistic faiths that dominate today's western image of religion, as well as many global conflicts. In this concise and elegant overview, Jörg Rüpke addresses the similarities and differences of religions in antiquity, tracing their sometimes complex lineage into modern systems of belief. Greek and Roman religion is discussed not in isolation, but in the broader context of western Asia and Egypt. The author also addresses developments relating to early Islam on the south-eastern margins of the Byzantine Empire.

Examining such topics as the functions of priests and religious functionaries; religious individualism; the relationship between religion and political identity; the acceptance of the pagan Julian calendar by Christians; and contrasting ancient and modern understandings of divination, Rüpke shows that study of pre-modern culture enables us more daringly to explore the contemporary religious world.

Against many defenders of the LXX, such as Hilary of Poitiers and Augustine, Jerome tries to prove the superiority of the Hebrew text as a source text of translation. To do so, in his Preface to the Chronicles (iuxta Hebraeos), Jerome relies on three authorities: the Hebrews, the Apostles, and Christ. The Hebrews philologically endorse Jerome’s translation, by judging whether it literally agrees with the Hebrew text. The Apostles support Jerome’s position both philologically and theologically: sometimes their Old Testament quotations literally agree with the Hebrew text; at other times they spiritually agree with the Hebrew text, even though they do not literally. Christ functions as the highest authority. Relying on these three, Jerome’s real purpose concerning Hebraica veritas is not only the philological discussion between the Hebrew text and the LXX, but also the theological discussion between these two texts and the Old Testament quotations in the New Testament.

In the collection entitled Deciphering the Worlds of Hebrews
Gabriella Gelardini gathers  fifteen essays written in the last fifteen
years, twelve of which are in English and three in German.
Arranged in three parts (the world of, behind, and in front of
Hebrews’s text), her articles deal with such topics as structure and
intertext, sin and faith, atonement and cult, as well as space and
resistance.
          She reads Hebrews no longer as the enigmatic and homeless
outsider within the New Testament corpus, as the “Melchizedekian
being without genealogy”; rather, she reads Hebrews as one whose
origin has finally been rediscovered, namely in Second Temple
Judaism.

Though a "vision-centered " perspective is apparent in a variety of contexts in Greco-Roman life and literature, of particular interest to this essay are the visually oriented rhetorical techniques that Greco-Roman authors and orators used to appeal to the visual imaginations of their audiences. Through these well-theorized techniques, authors and orators hoped not only to engage their audiences' visual imaginations but also to transport them emotionally into the described scene. The author of the Epistle to the Hebrews was to all appearances well versed in these techniques, and perhaps this is nowhere more evident than in Heb 12:1-4. Enlisting the language and imagery of agonistic sport and spectacle, this visually evocative text helps the community reenvision their current situation. Their sufferings are thus reconfigured as normative to the athletic sphere, while their commitment to Christ and his community is translated into a test of endurance in a footrace. Integral to this agonistically shaped exhortation is the vivid portrayal of Jesus as the "forerunner" and victorious "finisher" of the same contest of faith in which the community is presently competing. Ekphrasis and epiphany coalesce in this mimetic portrayal, signaled by the author's exhortation to "fix our gaze" on the one who has triumphed over adversity and adversaries.