The salvation which the writer has previously referred to as a glorious do- minion is here spoken of as a Rest. The significance lies in its being God’s rest which man is to share. It is the rest which God has enjoyed since the creation. From all His creative work God could
παι.
lol “ 39. , ἔργων αὐτοῦ, ὥσπερ ἀπὸ τῶν ἰδίων ὁ Θεός.
- ει Ν lol ~ εἰσελθεῖν εἰς ἐκείνην Thy κατάπαυσιν, iva μὴ ἐν τῷ αὐτῷ τις ὗπο-
δείγματι πέσῃ τῆς ἀπειθείας.
3 a ΄ / Ν .. ἐνεργὴς,' καὶ τοµώτερος ὑπὲρ πᾶσαν μάχαιραν δίστομον, καὶ διϊκνού-
µενος ἄχρι μερισμοῦ ψυχῆς τε” καὶ πνεύματος, ἁρμῶν τε καὶ
12. ζῶν γὰρ ὁ λόγος τοῦ Θεοῦ, καὶ
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ΤΙ, Σπουδάσωμεν οὖν ἆ Eccl. xii.
11; Esa. xix.2; Jer. XXiil. 29; τ Cor.xiv. 24,25; 2 Cor: x; 4; 5; Eph. vi. 17.
TR.) in SACDEHKLP ; εναργης in B. 2 sgABCHLP omit τε.
not be said to rest till, after what cannot but appear to usa million of hazards, man appeared, a creature in whose history God Himself could find a worthy history, whose moral and spiritual needs would elicit the Divine resources and exercise what is deepest in God. When man appears God is satisfied, for here is one in His own image. But from this. bare statement of the meaning of God’s rest it is obvious that God’s people must share it with Him. God’s rest is satisfaction jn man; but this satisfaction can be per- fected only when man is in perfect har- mony with Him, His rest is not perfect till they rest in Him. This highly spiritual conception of salvation is in- volved in our Author’s argument. Cf. the grand passage on God’s Rest in Philo, De Cherubim, c. xxvi., and also Barnabas xv., see also Hughes’ The Sabbatical Rest of God and Man.
Ver. 11. The exhortation follows naturally, ‘‘ Let us then earnestly strive to enter into that rest, lest anyone fall in the same example of disobedience ”. The example of disobedience was that given by the wilderness generation and they are warned not to fall in the same way. πέσῃ ἐν is commonly construed “fall into,” but it seems preferable to render “ fall by” or “in”; πέσῃ being used absolutely as in Rom. xiv. 4, στήκει ἢ πίπτει. Vaughan has ‘“ lest anyone iall [by placing his foot] in the mark left by the Exodus generation”. ὑπόδειγ- μα is condemned by Phrynichus who says : οὐδὲ τοῦτο ὀρθῶς λέγεται" παράδειγµα λέγε. “πη Attic ὑποδείκ- γυμι was never used except in its natural sense of show by implication ; but in Herodotus and Xenophon it signi- fies to mark out, set a pattern.” Ruther- ford’s Phryn., p. 62. Cf. viii. 5 of this Epistle with John xiii. 15 for both mean- ings. It is used in James v. 1ο with genitive of the thing to be imitated.
In vv. 12 and 13 another reason is added for dealing sincerely and stren- uously with God’s promises and especially
with this offer of rest. ζῶν yap ὃ λόγος τοῦ θεοῦ, “for the word of God is living,” that word of revelation which from the first verse of the Epistle has been in the writer’s mind and which he has in chaps, iii., iv. exhibited as a word of promise of entrance into God’s rest. Evidently, therefore, 6 λόγος τοῦ θεοῦ is not, as Origenand other interpreters have suppo-ed, the Personal Word incarnate in Christ, but God’s offers and promises. Not only is the γάρ, linking this clause to the promise of rest, decisive for this interpretation; but the mention of 6 λόγος τῆς ἀκοῆς in ver. 2 and the promin- ence given in the context to God’s promise make it impossible to think of anything else. To enforce the admoni- tion to believe and obey the word of God, five epithets are added, which, says Westcott, “‘mark with increasing clear- ness its power to deal with the individual soul. There is a passage step by step from that which is most general to that which is most personal.” It is, first, ζῶν, “living” or, as A.V. has it, “ quick”. Cf. τ Pet. i, 23, ἀναγεγεννημένοι . - - διὰ λόγου ζῶντος Θεοῦ καὶ μένοντος; and ver. 24 τὸ ῥῆμα Κυρίου μένει εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα. The meaning is that the word re- mains efficacious, valid and operative, as it was when it came from the will of God. “It is living as being instinct with the life of its source ’’ (Delitzsch). It is also ἐνεργὴς, active, effective, still doing the work it was intended to do, cf. Isa. 55-11. τομώτερος ὑπὲρ πᾶσαν μάχαιραν δίσ- τομον, “sharper than any two-edged sword”. oy. ὑπὲρ is a more forcible comparative than the genitive; cf. Luke xvi. 8; 2 Cor. xii. 13. The positive τομός is found in Plato Tim. 61 E. and elsewhere. δίστομος double-mouthed, 1.6., double-edged, the sword being considered as a devouring beast, see 2 Sam, xi. 25, καταφάγεται ἡ μάχαιρα. A double-edged sword is not only a more formidable weapon than a single-edged, offering less resistance and therefore cutting deeper (see Judges iii. 16 where Ehud made for