§44 A Concluding Prayer (Heb. 13:20–21)
The letter is rounded out with a magnificent closing prayer in which the author picks up a number of the key motifs in the epistle. The prayer is notable for its beauty and comprehensive scope. Its powerful impact will be apparent to all who have read the letter and noted the deep pastoral concerns of the author’s heart.
13:20–21 / The address the God of peace is a formula common in the Pauline epistles (e.g., Rom. 15:33; 16:20; 2 Cor. 13:11; Phil. 4:9; 1 Thess. 5:23; 2 Thess. 3:16). God is further addressed as the one who raised Jesus from the dead, although in the original the phrase our Lord Jesus does not occur until the end of the address (i.e., the last words of v. 20), just prior to the first petition, in a climactic position. This passing reference, in the midst of a calling upon God in prayer, surprisingly constitutes the only explicit mention of the resurrection of Jesus in the entire epistle (although of course the resurrection is presupposed in the references to the ascension that are so important to our author). The words that form the immediate object of brought back from the dead are the great Shepherd of the sheep, language that finds a NT parallel in the reference to “the Chief Shepherd” of 1 Peter 5:4 (cf. “shepherd of the sheep” in the LXX of Isaiah 63:11) and the words of Jesus in John 10:11 (cf. Mark 14:27).
Through the blood of the eternal covenant is a pregnant phrase that at once alludes to the earlier, detailed description of the sacrificial meaning of Christ’s death (chaps. 7, 9–10) and to the accompanying powerful argument about the inauguration of a new covenant (7:22–8:13). The author’s choice of the adjective eternal is deliberate. For if the old covenant gave way to a new covenant, assurance is needed that the new covenant is definitive and not itself merely a transitory reality. This is not to deny that OT language is utilized here. For our author, the new covenant established by Christ is none other than that “everlasting covenant” spoken of in Isaiah 55:3, Jeremiah 32:40, and Ezekiel 37:26. This is the “better covenant” of which Christ has become mediator (cf. 7:22; 8:6f.); and with the concept of an eternal covenant we may recall the “eternal redemption” mentioned in 9:12.
The actual petition is that this great God, who has already done so much, would now meet the needs of his people by supplying them with everything good for doing his will, and remarkably that he would at the same time work (lit., “doing”) in us what is pleasing to him. The shift to the first person pronoun us provides a sensitive identification of the author with the readers. In that the readers are called to do the will of God, and God does that will in us, the passage is reminiscent of Philippians 2:12f. It is to be noted that the agency of that activity of God in us is expressed: through Jesus Christ. This is in complete accord with the view of Christ and his work throughout the book (cf. 7:22). Most of the NT doxologies are directed to God (e.g., Rom. 11:36; 16:27; Gal. 1:5; Eph. 3:21; Phil. 4:20; 1 Tim. 1:17; Jude 25), and only a few, like the present one, are directed to Christ (e.g., possibly 1 Pet. 4:11; 2 Pet. 3:18; Rev. 1:6). This doxology serves as the climactic ending which corresponds to the exalted Christology set forth in the opening chapter of the book and, indeed, the Christology that constitutes the basis of the exposition in the intervening chapters. In light of the treatise to which the author is now putting the final touches, this doxology to Christ is both appropriate and moving. Although the Amen is formulaic, it is also the only fitting response to things so wonderful.
13:20–21 / This concluding prayer and doxology bear some resemblance to the doxology at the end of Romans (16:25–27), which is also to some extent built upon themes expounded in the body of that work. F. F. Bruce notes the structure of the prayer is that of a collect: it is expressed in the third person, contains an invocation, an adjective clause pointing to the ground upon which the petition depends, main and subsidiary petitions, a plea to the merit of Christ’s work, a doxology, and an amen. There are several relatively unimportant textual variants in these verses. A majority of later manuscripts add the word “work” to the words every [thing] good; an unintelligible third person pronoun is found before “doing” in some manuscripts, perhaps by dittography (i.e., accidental repetition by a scribe), and thus the shorter reading is to be preferred; some manuscripts harmonize the pronoun us to agree with the earlier second person pronouns; and some manuscripts omit the words and ever at the end of the doxology, where the shorter ending is probably to be preferred. On these variants, see Metzger, TCGNT, p. 576f. The verb for brought back (or “raised”) is not one of the usual NT words (egeirō or anistēmi), but anagō (which is used of Christ in Rom. 10:7), perhaps by suggestion from the LXX of Isa. 63:11, where Moses, described as the shepherd of the sheep, is brought up “out of the sea.” This is the only occurrence of the words Shepherd (poimēn) and sheep (probatōn) in Hebrews.
The phrase through the blood of the eternal covenant probably modifies brought back from the dead as in NIV. But in the Greek text it may also be taken to modify the immediately preceding words, that great Shepherd of the sheep (thus GNB: “who is the Great Shepherd of the sheep as the result of his sacrificial death”; cf. JB).
For the expression “blood of the covenant,” see Zech. 9:11. On covenant (diathēkē), see note to 7:22. Good (agathon) is also used absolutely in 9:11 and 10:1, where, however, it refers to the “good things” of the eschatological order inaugurated by Christ’s finished work. The readers are called to do the will (thelēma) of God in 10:36; here the prayer is made that they might be equipped to do that will. What is pleasing to (lit., “before”) him reflects Semitic idiom. This is synonymous with “the sacrifices that please God” in v. 16.
Commentators differ as to whether the doxology is directed to God or to Christ, since the wording leaves some ambiguity. That doxologies are usually directed to God in the NT writings, that God is the acting subject of these verses and the object of praise in v. 15, together with the fact that the readers are Jewish Christians, argue that God is in view. On the other hand, and more compelling, are the facts that in the Greek, as in the NIV, the nearest antecedent to the pronoun whom is Jesus Christ, that Jesus assumes extraordinary importance as the great Shepherd by whose blood the covenant and its gifts are made possible, and that the author assumes the deity of Christ in chap. 1. Thus NIV’s translation seems justified (thus also GNB, NEB, JB). See C. E. B. Cranfield, “Hebrews 13:20–21,” SJT 20 (1967), pp. 437–41; R. Jewett, “Form and Function of the Homiletic Benediction,” AngThR 51 (1969), pp. 18–34.