(2) THE MetHops oF THOUGHT AND THE PorINTS OF View. — These differ from those of the Pauline Epistles. The two do not materially disagree. They reach, substan- tially, the same conclusions, but by different processes and from different positions. The points of emphasis differ. Topics which, in the Pauline letters, are in the foreground, in Hebrews fall into the shade or are wholly passed over. (a) The conception of faith. In Paul, faith is belief in Jesus Christ as a means of justification, involving a sharp oppo- sition to the works of the law as meriting salvation. In Hebrews, faith is trust in the divine promises as distin- guished from seeing their realisation, a phase of faith which appears rarely in Paul. Both agree that faith is the only true medium of righteousness; but Hebrews sets forth two great factors of faith, namely, that God 7s, and that he is a rewarder of them which diligently seek him.
(6) The mode of presenting the contrast between the covenant of works and the covenant of grace through faith. Both Paul and the author of Hebrews recognise a relation and connection between the two covenants. The one prefigures and pre- pares the way for the other. The Christian church is “the Israel of God,” “the people of God,” “the seed of Abraham.” Both teach that forgiveness of sin and true fellowship with God cannot be attained through the law, and that Christian- ity represents the life-giving Spirit, and Judaism the letter which killeth. Both assert the abrogation of the old coven- ant by Christ. Paul, however, views Judaism almost entirely as a law to be fulfilled by men; while our writer regards it as a system of institutions designed to represent a fellowship between God and his worshippers. Paul, accordingly, shows that the law cannot put man into right relation with God, because man cannot fulfil it ; while Hebrews shows that the institutions of the old covenant cannot, by reason of their imperfection, establish a real fellowship with God. To Paul, the reason why the old covenant did not satisfy lay, not in the law, which “is holy and just and good,” but in the rela- tion of man to the law, as unable to fulfil its demands. It cannot effect justification, and it works to make man con-