TEXT [Commentary]

  III.   Exhortation to Faithfulness (3:1–4:13)

A.   Jesus as Faithful Son and High Priest (3:1-6)

1 And so, dear brothers and sisters who belong to God and[*] are partners with those called to heaven, think carefully about this Jesus whom we declare to be God’s messenger[*] and High Priest. 2 For he was faithful to God, who appointed him, just as Moses served faithfully when he was entrusted with God’s entire[*] house.

3 But Jesus deserves far more glory than Moses, just as a person who builds a house deserves more praise than the house itself. 4 For every house has a builder, but the one who built everything is God.

5 Moses was certainly faithful in God’s house as a servant. His work was an illustration of the truths God would reveal later. 6 But Christ, as the Son, is in charge of God’s entire house. And we are God’s house, if we keep our courage and remain confident in our hope in Christ.[*]

NOTES

3:1 who belong to God. This phrase renders the adjective “holy” (hagioi [TG40, ZG41]), that is, set apart as God’s own people (the same word is translated as “other believers” in 6:10 and as “believers” in 13:24).

partners with those called to heaven. Lit., “partners in a heavenly calling.” The point is that the “brothers and sisters” being addressed are “partners” (metochos [TG3353, ZG3581]), that is, “partnered” with each other in being called to heaven, not partners with some other group, such as OT believers (see ch 11) or those from whom they first heard the word of God (2:3). While they are in partnership with both of those groups, that is not what is said here.

think carefully about this Jesus. This is a kind of sequel to the earlier remark that we “see” Jesus (2:9).

God’s messenger. Lit., “apostle” (apostolos [TG652, ZG693], “one who is sent”). Hebrews never calls Jesus’ immediate followers “apostles” (see 2:3, “those who heard him speak”) but reserves that title for Jesus himself. Nowhere else in the NT is Jesus called “apostle,” yet he was “sent” as God’s unique messenger (particularly in the Gospel of John). In the second century Justin Martyr did not hesitate to call him “Son and Apostle of God” and “angel and apostle” (First Apology 12.9; 63.10, 14; see Ante-Nicene Fathers 1.166, 184). This has suggested to some that Hebrews may be drawing on an early Christian creed or confession (homologia [TG3671, ZG3934]), as if to say that Jesus is the “apostle” and “High Priest” mentioned in our confession of faith. Instead of “apostle,” the author could have written angelos [TG32, ZG34], usually translated “angel” but also meaning “God’s messenger.” However, this would not have been suitable given the author’s sharp distinction between the Son and the angels in the first two chapters.

3:2 God’s entire house. Some ancient mss (13 46vid B cop) omit the word “entire.” In any case, no distinction is intended between “God’s house” (3:5, 6) and “God’s entire house” (3:2, 6), as if Moses were in charge of one and Christ of the other. The two are interchangeable. Christ’s superiority to Moses rests on no such distinction but on the fact that Moses is “a servant” (3:5) in the house, while Christ as God’s “Son” (3:6) is over, or in charge of, the house (see John 8:35).

3:6 Christ, as the Son. For the first time, the author uses the designation “Christ” without the definite article and thus probably not as a title (that is, “the Christ,” in the sense of “the Anointed One” or “Messiah”) but as a proper name (interchangeable with the name “Jesus”), here in contrast to the name “Moses” (this is the case also in 9:11, 14, 24, and in the use of the full name, “Jesus Christ,” in 10:10; 13:8, 21). Elsewhere it occurs with the definite article, and thus possibly as a title (see 3:14; 5:5; 6:1; 9:28; 11:26). The second occurrence of “Christ” at the very end of the verse is not in the Greek but is supplied by the NLT.

COMMENTARY [Text]

The first words of this section, “and so” (3:1), introduce a conclusion drawn from the preceding argument. The author shifts to direct address in order to make an application to his readers. For the first time, we meet the implied audience of Hebrews. Those whom Jesus called his “brothers and sisters” (2:11, 12, 17) are now identified as “dear brothers and sisters” to the author as well (3:1; see also 3:12; 10:19; 13:22). They “belong to God” (see note) because Jesus has made them “holy” (see 2:11), and heaven is their destination. Again (as in 2:9) the author points them by name to “Jesus,” and again he withholds the sacred name until he has explained who this person is: thus literally, “Consider the apostle and High Priest of our confession—Jesus.” This withholding of the name “Jesus” until after he has been in some way identified is characteristic of the author’s style (see also 4:14; 6:20; 7:22; 12:2, 24; 13:20) yet is not evident in most English translations. While Hebrews shows no sign of direct acquaintance with the Gospel of John, the nouns “God’s messenger” and “High Priest” (3:1) correspond to verbs in John’s Gospel, where Jesus is never called “messenger” or “apostle” yet is said to be “sent” from God and “consecrated,” or made holy, as priests are consecrated (see John 10:36; 17:17-19). Interestingly, it is just the opposite of the opening verses of the two works, as we have seen, where John’s Gospel has the noun (“the Word”) and Hebrews has the corresponding verb (“God spoke”).

Having reintroduced Jesus by name, the author next drives home his main point: Jesus, whether as “messenger” or as “High Priest,” was “faithful to God, who appointed him” (3:2), thus fulfilling his vow that “I will put my trust in him” (2:13). Here the author introduces a comparison with Moses. This seems appropriate to Jesus’ identity as “God’s messenger” but not necessarily to his identity as “High Priest.” Moses is not usually remembered as a priest; that role belonged to his brother Aaron. And yet Moses interceded with God for the people after they made the golden calf (Exod 32:11-13, 31-32), and offered the sacrifices to consecrate Aaron and the other priests (Lev 8). In Jewish tradition, Moses was regarded as “both a king and a lawgiver, and a high priest and a prophet, and . . . in each office he displayed the most eminent wisdom and virtue” (Philo Moses 2.3; Yonge 1993:491). Possibly the author begins with Moses instead of Aaron (5:4) or Levi, the ancestor of all Jewish priests (7:5), because he was interested first of all not in Jesus’ relationship to the Jewish priesthood but in his relationship to the law on which the priesthood rested (see for example 7:11-12, 19, 28).

Here the author of Hebrews draws on a well-known biblical passage in which God warned Moses’ brother Aaron and sister Miriam that “if there were prophets among you, I, the LORD. would reveal myself in visions. I would speak to them in dreams. But not my servant Moses. Of all my house, he is the one I trust. I speak to him face to face, clearly, and not in riddles!” (Num 12:6-8). Aaron and Miriam had “criticized Moses because he had married a Cushite woman,” asking, “Has the LORD spoken only through Moses? Hasn’t he spoken through us, too?” (Num 12:1-2). The author appeals to God’s ringing endorsement of Moses and his authority in order to make a point about Jesus: Just as God spoke more directly to Moses than to the prophets (much less to Aaron or Miriam), so God has now spoken more directly to (and through) the Son than to either Moses or the prophets (see 1:1). Moses becomes “an illustration of the truths God would reveal later” (3:5), in that what was true of him long ago would be true of Jesus many times over. Moses was “faithful in God’s house as a servant” (3:5, my italics), but Jesus was faithful as “the Son” (3:6) over or “in charge of” God’s house (see note on 3:2), for Jesus radiates the “glory” and “very character” of God (see 1:3). Jesus is greater than Moses, just as surely as he was greater than the angels.

The author drives home the point by comparing Jesus to the builder and Moses to the house (3:3), a puzzling comparison until we realize that God’s “house” (oikos [TG3624, ZG3875]) is a metaphor not for a place (such as the world, or heaven, or the Temple in Jerusalem) but for a people. “We are God’s house,” the author adds (3:6, my italics). To compare Moses to “the house itself” (3:3) is simply to acknowledge that Moses, despite his great preeminence, was one of God’s people. He was not God. By contrast, the Son is both human and divine. While his solidarity with his people has already been established (2:11-18), here the author insists equally on his solidarity with God, precisely as “Son” (see 1:2-4). If “the one who built everything is God” (3:4), then in some sense the Son is the builder as well, and we are the “house” (3:6).

Yet there are conditions attached: “We are God’s house, if we keep our courage and remain confident in our hope in Christ” (3:6, my italics). The “if” is crucial to the entire passage. The author wants his readers, first, to “think carefully about this Jesus” (3:1), and now finally to “remain confident” in Jesus (3:6). In short, he is urging faithfulness to our heavenly calling (3:1), just as Moses and Christ were faithful (pistos [TG4103, ZG4412]; 3:2, 5) to their respective callings as God’s servant and God’s Son. Because we are God’s “children” and Christ’s “brothers and sisters,” the words, “I will put my trust in him” (2:13) must be ours as well. We are “God’s house” if—and only if—we maintain faith, courage, and hope. The tone is positive, but the little word “if” signals warnings to come. The warnings follow immediately (3:7–4:11), but in the course of giving them, the author will again drive home the positive point that “if we are faithful to the end, trusting God just as firmly as when we first believed, we will share in all that belongs to Christ” (3:14, my italics).