18. There is another answer to this objection, which seemeth to be solid and satisfactory, which most of the ancients rest in; and it is, that St Paul had weighty reasons not to declare his name at the entrance of this Epistle to the Hebrews, taken from the preju- dices that many of them had against him. This is insisted on by Clemens in Eusebius. “ He did wisely,” saith he, “ conceal his name, because of the prejudicate opinion that they had against him.”? And this is at large insisted on by Chrysostom,” who is fol- lowed therein by Theophylact, Gicumenius, and others without number. The persecuting party of the nation looked on him as an apostate, a deserter of the cause wherein he was once engaged, and one that taught apostasy from the law of Moses; yea, as they thought, that set the whole world against them and all that they gloried in, Acts xxi. 28; and what enmity is usually stirred up on such occasions all men know, and his example is a sufficient in- stance of it. And there was added thereunto (which Chrysostom,
1 Buseb. Eccles. Hist. lib. vi. cap. xiii. 2 Procem. in Epist. ad Heb.
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and that justly, lays great weight upon), that he was no ordinary per- son, but a man of great and ewtraordinary abilities; which mightily increased the provocation. Those among them who, with the pro- fession of the gospel, had a mind to continue themselves in, and to impose upon others the observance of, Mosaical institutions, looked on him as the only person that had frustrated their design, Acts xv. 1, 2. And this also is usually no small cause of wrath and hatred. The spirit of these men afterwards possessing the Ebionites, they despised St Paul as a Grecian and deserter of the law, as Epiphanius testifies, And even the best among them, who, either in the use of their liberty or upon an indulgence given them, continued in the temple worship, had a jealous eye over him, lest he had not that esteem for Moses which they imagined became them to retain, Acts xxi. 20, 21. How great a prejudice against his doctrine and reason- ings these thoughts and jealousies might have created, had he, at the entrance of his dealing with them, prefixed his name and usual salutation, is not hard to conjecture. This being the state and condition of things in reference unto St Paul, and not any other known penman of the Holy Ghost, or eminent disciple of Christ in those days, this defect of inscription, as Beza well observes, proves the Epistle rather to be his than any other person’s whatever. And though I know that there may be some reply made unto this answer, both from the discovery which he makes of himself in the end of the Epistle, and from the high probability there is that the Hebrews, upon the first receipt of it, would diligently examine by whom it was written, yet I judge it very sufficient to frustrate the exception insisted on, though perhaps not containing the true, at least the whole, cause of the omission of an apostolical salutation in the entrance of it.
19. If, then, we would know the true and just cause of the omis- sion of the author’s name and mention of his apostolical authority in the entrance of this Epistle, we must consider what were the just reasons of prefixing them unto his other epistles. Chrysostom, in his proem unto the Epistle to the Romans, gives this as the only reason of the mentioning the name of the writer of any epistle in the fron- tispiece of it otherwise than was done by Moses and the evangelists in their writings, namely, because they wrote unto them that were present, and so had no cause to make mention of their own names, which were well enough known without the premising of them in their writings; whereas those who wrote epistles, dealing with them that were absent, were necessitated to prefix their names unto them, that they might know from whom they came. But yet this reason is not absolutely satisfactory: for as they who prefixed not their names to their writings wrote, not only for the use and benefit of those that were present and knew them, but of all succeeding ages,
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who knew them not; so many of them who yet prefixed their names unto their writings, did preach and write the word of the Lord unto those that lived with them and knew them, as did the pro- phets of old; and some who did write epistles to them who were ab- sent omitted so to do, as-St John and the author of this Epistle. The real cause, then, of prefixing the names of any of the apostles unto their writings, was merely the introduction thereby of their titles as apostles of Jesus Christ, and therein an intimation of that authority by and with which they wrote, This, then, was the true and only reason why the apostle St Paul prefixed his name unto his epistles. Sometimes, indeed, this is omitted, when he wrote unto some churches where he was well known, and his apostolical power was sufliciently owned, because he joined others with himself in his salutation who were not apostles; as the Epistle to the Philippians, chap. i. and the second of the Thessalonians. Unto all others he still prefixeth this title; declaring himself thereby to be one so authorized to reveal the mysteries of the gospel, that they to whom he wrote were to acquiesce in his authority, and to resolve their faith into the revelation of the will of God made unto him and by him, the church being to be “built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets.” And hence it was, that when something he had taught was called in question and opposed, writing in the vindica- tion of it, and for their establishment in the truth whom before he had instructed, he doth in the entrance of his writing singularly and emphatically mention this his authority: Gal. 1.1, “Paul, an apostle, not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ, and God the Father, that raised him from the dead;” so intimating the abso- lute obedience that was due unto the doctrine by him revealed. By this title, I say, he directs them to whom he wrote to resolve their assent into the authority of Christ speaking in him, which he ten- ders unto them as the proof and foundation of the mysteries wherein they were instructed.