Vv. 17-End. The conclusion of the Epistle. Ver. 17. ‘Obey your rulers and sub-
mit; for they watch for your souls, know- ing they are to give account, that they may do this with joy not with lamenta- tion—for this would be profitless to you.”
Having exhorted the Hebrews to keep in mind their former rulers and adhere to their teaching, the writer now admonishes them, probably in view of a certain mutinous and separatist spirit (x. 25) encouraged by their reception of strange doctrines, to obey their present leaders, and yield themselves trustfully [ὐπείκετε)
15----Ἡδ,
379
χαρᾶς τοῦτο ποιῶσι, Kal μὴ στενάζοντες' ἀλυσιτελὲς γὰρ ὑμῖν
τοῦτο. 18. Προσεύχεσθε περὶ ἡμῶν " to their teaching—an admonition which, as Weiss remarks, shows that these teachers held the same views as the writer. The reasonableness of this in- junction is confirmed by the responsi- bility of the rulers and their anxious discharge of it. They watch, like wake- ful shepherds (ἀγρυπνοῦσιν), or those who are nursing a critical case, in the interest of your souls (ὑπὲρ τῶν ψυχῶν ὑμῶν) to which they may sometimes seem to sacrifice your other interests. They do this under the constant pressure of a consciousness that they must one day render to the Chief Shepherd (ver. 20) an account of the care they have taken of His sheep (ὡς λόγον ἀποδώσοντες). Obey them, then, that they may dis- charge their responsibility and peform these kindly offices for you (τοῦτο refer- ring not to λόγον ἀποδώσοντες as Vaughan, etc., which would require a much stronger expression than ἀλυσι- τελές, but to ἀγρυπνοῦσιν) joyfully and not with groaning (στενάζοντες, the groaning with which one resumes a thankless task, and with which he con- templates unappreciated and even op- posed work). And even for your own sakes you should make the work of your rulers easy and joyful, for otherwise it cannot profit you. Your unwillingness to listen to them means that you are out of sympathy with their teaching and that it can do you no good (ἀλυσιτελὲς γὰρ ὑμῖν τοῦτο).
Ver. 18. προσεύχεσθε περὶ ἡμῶν. . .. Both the next clause and the next verse seem to indicate that by ἡμῶν the writer chiefly, if not exclusively, meant himself; the next clause, for he could not vouch for the conscience of any other person; the next verse because one principal object or result of their prayer was his restoration to them. Request for prayer is common in the Epistles, τ Thess. v. 25; 2 Thess. iii. 1; Rom. xv. 30; Eph. vi. 18; Col. iv. 3. The reason here annexed is peculiar. ‘The allusion to his purity of conduct, and strong as- sertion of his consciousness of it, in regard to them and all things, when he is petitioning for their prayers, implies that some suspicions may have attached to him in the minds of some of them. These suspicions would naturally refer to his great freedom in regard to Jewish practises” (Davidson). But notwith- standing ver. 23 it may be that he was
πεποίθαμεν yap, ὅτι καλὴν
under arrest and shortly to be tried and naturally adds to his request for prayer a protestation of his innocence of all civil offence. [καλῶς ἀναστραφῆναι occurs in Perg. Inscrip., v. Deissmann, p. 194, E. Tr.] The writer was conscious of a readiness and purpose to live and con- duct himself rightly in all circumstances. This gives him confidence and will lend confidence to their prayers. He is more urgent in this request {περισσοτέρως παρακαλῶ) because he is desirous to be quickly restored to them; implying that he in some sense belonged to them and that the termination of his present exile from them would be acceptable to them as well as to him. [The verb ἄποκαθ. first occurs in Xenophon, see Anz. Ρ 338.] ' While asking their prayers for himself the writer prays for them: 6 δὲ θεὸς τῆς εἰρήνης. . -- He prays to the God of peace (cf. 1 Thess. v. 23 ; 2 Thess. iii, 16; Rom. xv. 33, xvi. 20; 2 Cor. ΧΙ. 11; Phil. iv. 9) because this attribute of God carries in it the guarantee that a termination shall be put to all misunder- standing, disturbance, and inability to do His will. His love of peace is shown in nothing more than in His concluding an eternal covenant with men. This coven- ant was sealed when ‘our Lord Jesus,” having laid down his life for the sheep, was brought up from the dead in virtue of the perfect and accepted sacrifice (év αἵματι διαθήκης). Elsewhere in the Epistle the blood is spoken of as giving entrance to the presence of God, here as delivering from that which prevented that entrance. As Vaughan says: ‘‘ The arrival in the heavenly presence for us in virtue of the atoning blood is here viewed in its start from the grave. . . It was in virtue of the availing sacrifice that Christ either left the tomb or re- entered heaven.” ἐν αἵματι δια- θήκης is therefore more naturally con- nected with ἀναγαγών than with τὸν ποιμένα, although the two connections are closely related. It was as the Great Shepherd that Jesus gave His life for the sheep and by this act established for ever His claim te be the Shepherd of His people. Itis this claim also that guar- antees that He will lose none but will raise them up at the iast day (cf. John xv.). [It is probable that the phrasing of this verse was influenced by Zech. ix. 7, σὺ ἐν αἵματι διαθήκης σου ἐξαπέ-