Post 10 of Study: Hebrews 1

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Briefly, we will look at the end of this chapter. From verse 8 on the writer is quoting First Testament, and the question remains, to me at least, why he is applying these specifically to Jesus Christ rather than God in general. That is perhaps a question deeper than I can answer here, but the writer does in his attempt to argue that Jesus is superior to all other possible means of salvation or faith--angels, priests, sacrifices, etc. Angels being the first, the writer uses Psalm 45:6-7, Psalm 102:25-27, and Psalm 110:1, and indirectly probably other passages in Psalms, to prove that angels are never addressed in certain ways and are never ascribed certain attributes. The three main characteristics here are:

  • The Son is enthroned as King
  • The Son is Creator of a Creation that changes and decays but He Himself does not change or fail. 
  • The Son is victorious (enemies are footstool).

In context, at least 8-9 and 13 seem to apply to the Messiah; 10-12 are less clear, at least to me. Of course, I don't get to make that call about whether the writer of Hebrews got it wrong or right; if it's right everywhere else, it can't be partially wrong in how he applies Psalms to support the deity of Christ. He has already established from New and First Testament scriptures that Christ was Creator. 

This, of course, brings us to deeper questions about which theologians have struggled for 2,000 years. Is there a difference between Jesus the Man and God the Son? Did Jesus exist before conception? Did God prepare a body and then at some point make Jesus the Man special, endowed with some being or consciousness that made him able to be Savior? And so on. The writer of Hebrews seems to say No, Yes, No. God has spoken to us through His Son (not Jesus who became the Son as some point), but Jesus the Man did "earn" something through his obedience and experience as a human.  

Does your head hurt? Mine does. But that is what beauty does. We think beauty comforts; I don't think so. I remember when I saw Guernica in the Sophia Real Museum in Madrid, when I saw the Rockies for the first time and Niagara Falls. I gasped, and wept, and was overwhelmed. I did not feel comforted. 

(The Mona Lisa gave me none of these feelings. I was kind of bleh on that one, sorry.) 

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