After the Christian community had existed for a few decades, the enthusiasm that characterized its earlier years began to wane. The expected return of Jesus had not taken place, opposition to the movement had developed from different quarters, and doubts were beginning to arise concerning any permanent significance that Christianity might have over other religious sects and parties. To counteract these tendencies and to strengthen the faith of Christians who were associated with the new movement are the chief purposes of this letter. The author is unknown, but many guesses have been made concerning his identity. Authorship has been attributed to the apostle Paul; in many editions of the New Testament, this idea is expressed in the title given to the letter. However, the contents of the letter indicate that Pauline authorship is not likely. The ideas set forth in the letter are unlike those found in the genuine letters of Paul. In fact, Hebrews’ interpretation of Christianity in many respects is foreign to the thought and work of the apostle.
Whoever the author may have been, we can be certain that he was someone who believed that Christianity was something more than just another religious movement. Convinced that Christianity is the only true religion, he wanted to show its superiority over all the religions that were competing with it, and he was especially anxious to show its superiority over Judaism. To do this, he makes a series of comparisons between conceptions that he finds in the Old Testament and corresponding ideas in his interpretation of Christianity. In each of his comparisons, the Christian view is presented as the more advantageous of the two.
Hebrews begins with the statement that God, who in ancient times revealed himself through the prophets, has in these last days revealed himself through the life and teachings of a Son. This Son, who is identified with the person known as Jesus of Nazareth, is said to be greater than Moses or any of the prophets. He is superior even to the angels of heaven, for no one of them has ever been called a Son, nor did any of them have a part in the creation of the world. Because the messages delivered by angels have been valid and any transgression with reference to them has been justly punished, it is all the more important that people should heed what has been delivered to them by the Son. Calling Jesus the Son of God does not, for the author of this letter, constitute a denial of Jesus’ humanity. On this point he is quite emphatic: “Since the children have flesh and blood, he too shared in their humanity.” And again, “For this reason he had to be made like his brothers in every way.” It is because of Jesus’ humanity that it can be said of Jesus, “Because he himself suffered when he was tempted, he is able to help those who are being tempted.”
Throughout the letter, Jesus is referred to as the great high priest whose ministry exceeds in importance the services performed by the priests of ancient Israel. The greatness of the priesthood of Jesus is emphasized in a number of different ways, one of which concerns the priesthood of Melchizedek. The author refers to a story in the Book of Genesis in which Abraham encounters Melchizedek, who was a priest and the king of Salem. Abraham, returning from a battle, received a blessing from Melchizedek, to whom he paid a tithe of all the spoils he had obtained from the battle. This is the substance of the story as reported in Genesis, but from this meager account a number of conclusions can be drawn. One conclusion is that what happened to Abraham in this encounter affected the entire Levitical priesthood since the priests were all present in the loins of Abraham, the father of the Hebrew people. Asserting that the lesser is always blessed by the better, the author infers that the Levitical priesthood is necessarily inferior to the priesthood of Melchizedek; because Jesus is a high priest after the order of Melchizedek, he is therefore greater than any of the priests of the Old Testament. Quoting from Psalms 110, the author assumes that it was Jesus about whom the statement was made, “You are a priest forever, in the order of Melchizedek.”
Although Jesus is believed to have been a human being with actual flesh and blood, he is also the Son of God insofar as he is the incarnation of the divine Logos, or Spirit of God. This aspect of Jesus’ nature is eternal and has neither beginning nor end in the processes of time. The author of Hebrews draws another comparison between Jesus and the priests of the Old Testament: The narrative in Genesis says nothing concerning the parentage of Melchizedek, and from this silence the author draws the conclusion that Melchizedek had no father or mother. In other words, he was an eternal rather than a temporal being. All of the Levitical priests were men who were born and who died, but Jesus, who was a priest after the order of Melchizedek, had eternal life. In addition, the work that Jesus performed as a priest exceeded in importance that which was done by the men who ministered under the Levitical priesthood. One of the reasons given to support this claim of Jesus’ priestly superiority is that the priests of the tribe of Levi had to perform their services at repeated intervals. Even the sacrifice made on the great day of atonement had to be performed once every year. In contrast, Jesus as high priest offered the sacrifice of himself, which was done only once, but this one sacrifice was sufficient not only for all time to come but even for those who had died prior to the time when the sacrifice was made.
The real significance of Jesus’ sacrifice rests not merely on the fact that it was made once rather than repeated at regular intervals, but that it was qualitatively different from the ones made by the Levitical priests. The priests’ sacrifices involved merely the blood of bulls and of goats, but Jesus’ sacrifice was that of his own blood. By insisting on this difference, the author of Hebrews does not mean to infer that the priests’ sacrifices offered in ancient times had no value at all, for they did mean something to the people of Israel. His point is that the sacrifice made by Jesus has even greater value, not only for Jews but for all humans insofar as they believe in Jesus Christ. In fact, the real significance of the entire sacrificial system as set forth in the Old Testament stands in a very definite relation to the death of Jesus on the cross. As the Hebrews writer sees it, these sacrificial offerings were but shadows that pointed toward another and greater sacrifice to be made in the future and apart from which all of the Old Testament services would have been in vain.
