Hebrews 12:03b-07 – Do Not Despise The Discipline of the Lord

Translation & Sermon by Nate Wilson for Christ the Redeemer Church of Manhattan, KS, 10 Nov. 2019

Omitting greyed-out text should bring presentation time down around 45 minutes.

Intro

v.3 Indeed, y’all must start thinking logically about the One who persevered through such antagonism under the agency of sinners toward Himself, in order that y’all might not continue to be weary, coming undone in your souls.

v.4 Y’all have not yet stood up against this sin to the extent of bloodshed during your contesting.

v.5 and y’all have completely missed the exhortation which lectures to you as though to sons, “My son, don’t keep belit­tling the Lord’s training, and don’t keep coming undone when you are being reproved by Him,

v.6 for it is the one whom the Lord loves that He trains, and He whips every son whom He accepts.

v.7 Keep persevering for the purpose of training. It is as to sons that God is being offered to y’all, for what son is there which a father does not train?


APPENDIX: Greek Text & English Versions of Hebrews 12:3-7A

Greek NT

NAW

KJV

3 ἀναλογίσασ­θεB γὰρ τὸν τοιαύτην ὑπο­μεμενηκότα ὑπὸ τῶν ἁμαρτωλῶν εἰς [ε]αὐτὸνC ἀντιλογίαν, ἵνα μὴ κάμητε ταῖς ψυχαῖς ὑμῶνD ἐκλυόμενοιE.

3 Indeed, y’all must start think­ing logically about the One who persev­ered through such antagonism un­der the agency of sin­ners toward Him­self, in order that y’all might not con­tinue to be weary, coming un­done in your souls.

3 For consider him that en­dured such contradiction of sinners against him­self, lest ye be wearied [and] faint in your minds.

4 Οὔπω μέχριςF αἵματος ἀντι­κατέστητεG πρὸς τὴν ἁμαρτίαν ἀντ-αγωνιζόμενοι.H

4 Y’all have not yet stood up against this sin to the extent of bloodshed during your contesting,

4 Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against X sin.

5 καὶ ἐκλέλησ­θεI τῆς παρα­κλήσεως, ἥτις ὑμῖν ὡς υἱοῖς διαλέγεται· υἱέ μου, μὴ ὀλιγώ-ρει παιδείας Κυρίου, μηδὲ ἐκλύου ὑπ᾿ αὐτοῦ ἐλεγχόμενος.J

5 and y’all have completely mis­sed the exhorta­tion which lect­ures to you as though to sons, “My son, don’t keep belittling the Lord’s training, and don’t keep coming undone when you are being reproved by Him,

5 And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chas­tening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him:

6 ὃν γὰρ ἀγαπᾷ Κύριος παιδεύει, μαστιγοῖ δὲK πάντα υἱὸν ὃν παραδέχεται.L

6 for it is the one whom the Lord loves that He trains, and He whips every son whom He accepts.

6 For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.

7 εἰςM παιδείαν ὑπομένετε, ὡς υἱοῖς ὑμῖν προσ­φέρεταιN ὁ Θεός· τίς γὰρ [ἐστιν]O υἱὸς ὃν οὐ παι­δεύει πατήρ;P

7 Keep persev-ering for the purpose of train­ing. It is as to sons that God is being offered to y’all, for what son is there which a father does not train?

7 If ye endure chastening, God X dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom [the] father chasteneth not?


1According to Owen’s footnote in Calvin’s commentary, this very verse was used during the Protestant reformation as an argument against the Roman Catholic practice of denying the reading of scripture to laymen.

2cf. Chrysostom: “...murderers, robbers, sorcerers... are paying the penalty of their own wickedness, and are not scourged as sons, but punished as wicked: but ye as sons.”

3In Ephesians 6:4 God instructs earthly fathers to follow His example: “And you, fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord." (NKJV)

4cf. J. Chrysostom: “‘rebuked of Him.’ It follows that these things are of God. For this too is no small matter of con­solation, when we learn that it is God’s work that such things have power… See, from that from which they sup­posed they had been deserted [of God], from these he says they may be confident, that they have not been deserted.
cf. J. Gill: “[E]very chastening, or afflictive providence, is appointed by God, and is looked upon by believers, when grace is in exercise, as coming from him; and it is directed, and governed, and limited by him, and is overruled by him for his own glory, and their good: and this is not to be despised, as something nauseous and loathsome, or as not useful and unprofitable, or as insignificant and unworthy of notice, but should be esteemed for the good ends, which are sometimes answered, by it...”

5I am indebted to John Gill’s commentary on this verse for this application. He wrote, “[H]he suffers them sometimes to be scourged by men, and to be buffeted by Satan; and sometimes he scourges them himself with the rod of men, and with the stripes of the children of men...”

6along with the Vulgate, Syriac, Arabic, and Ethiopic

7Heb. 5:1, 3, 7; 8:3-4; 9:7, 9, 14, 25, 28; 10:1-2, 8, 11-12; 11:4, 17

8And it is spelled in the passive voice in Greek, not the active voice.

9e.g. 13:24, 22:15, 23:13

AThe Greek is the Majority text, edited by myself to follow the majority of the earliest-known manuscripts only when the early manuscript evidence is practically unanimous. My original document includes notes on the NKJV, NASB, NIV, & ESV English translations, but since they are all copyrighted, I cannot include them in my online document. Underlined words in English versions indicate a standalone difference from all other English translations of a certain word. Strikeout usually indicates that the English translation is, in my opinion, too far outside the range of meaning of the original Greek word. The addition of an X indicates a Greek word left untranslated – or a plural Greek word translated as an English singular. [Brackets] indicate words added in English not in the Greek. {Pointed Braces} indicate words added in Greek to the original. Key words are colored consistently across the chart to show correlations.

BThis verb only occurs one other place in the Greek Bible, and that is Isaiah 44:19 (“And one has not considered in his mind, nor known in his understanding, that he has burnt up half of it in the fire, and baked loaves on the coals thereof and has roasted and eaten flesh, and of the rest of it he has made an abomination, and they worship it”). The three oldest-known Greek manuscripts all spell this verb in the infinitive rather than in the imperative, making it a reason for “fixing our eyes on Jesus” instead of a separate injunctive, but the encouragement to “consider Him” is still present either way, so it doesn’t make a difference essentially.

CTraditional Greek N.T.’s follow the majority of Greek manuscripts without an epsilon to the front of this word, giving it a more straightforward meaning of “him,” but 4 of the 5 oldest-known Greek manuscripts read with the epsilon, which doesn’t change the basic meaning, but does gives the word a more reflexive or emphatic shade of meaning “himself.” Some manuscripts also add a plural genitive ending to this word, changing the referent from Christ to sinners, indicating that it is to their own harm that sinners antagonize Christ, but that doesn’t seem to fit the context as well.

DPerhaps an allusion (with change of person) to Job’s despair in the midst of suffering: Job 10:1 κάμνων τῇ ψυχῇ μου… The only other instances of this verb in the Greek Bible are: Job 17:2 (perhaps a mistranslation) & James 5:15, where it stands in parallel with ἀσθενεῖ “sick/weak/infirm.” Apocryphal Greek sources describe this verb as battle-wearyness (4 Macc. 3:8), the infirmity of old age (4 Macc. 7:13 & Wis. 4:16), and the weariness of painstaking labor (Wisdom 15:9).

EThree (P45, P13, D06) out of the five oldest-known Greek manuscripts spell this participle in the perfect tense considering it as something happening earlier than the present and continuing in the present, which doesn’t really change the gist. It is also curious that no papyrus contains the 2nd person pronoun which modifies this word (again, this doesn’t change the meaning).

FA.T. Robertson’s Grammar p.645 The adverbial preposition μεχρις in this context has the notion of “measure” or “degree.”

GAlmost a compound of the antilogia of v.3 and the euperihistaton of v.1 Unsed only two other places in the Greek Bible: Deut. 31:21 (a song that will stand in witness against waywardness) and Josh. 5:7 (sons which stood after their fathers in succession).

HHapex Legomenon (in 4 Maccabees 17:14, describing the emperor fighting against believing Jews) cf. ἀγῶνα “race/ contest” in v.1

IHapex Legomenon. cf. the root without the prepositional prefix in Heb. 13:2 (entertaining angels "unawares"), 2 Pet. 3:5-8 (they are willingly "ignorant" … but don’t you be "ignorant"), and in the LXX Lev. 4:13, 5:3-15 (unintentional sins); Num. 5:13-27; 2Sam. 17:22; 2Sam. 18:13; Job 24:1, 28:21, 34:21, and Isa.40:26 (hidden sin).

JThis is an exact quote of the Septuagint of Prov. 3:11 except that the word “my” is added. (“My” is in the Hebrew of Prov. 3:11, but the last phrase of the MT is a little different from the LXX. Calvin suggests a very plausible recon­ciliation of that difference on the principle of ellipsis in his commentary in Appendix R2.) Prov. 3:11 is also the only other place that the verb oligwrew is to be found in the Greek Bible.

KA.T. Robertson’s Grammar p.1184: The conjunction δε in this verse is not adversative, but continuative, “and punishes.”

LThis is an exact quote of the Septuagint of Prov. 3:12.

MThe traditional Greek editions (Textus Receptus from 16th century Europe and Greek Orthodox Church editions from at least 1904 to the present) do not contain the final sigma on this word, changing its meaning from “into” to “if.” The sigma (“into”) is in all 4 known manuscripts from the first millennium (not counting the Chester-Beatty Papyrus which only contains the second half of this verse), and the majority of second millennium manuscripts also have sigma, so it is kept in the contemporary critical editions of the GNT. The preposition here is considered causal “for the purpose of” (L&N#89.57) by grammarians.

NRobinson tagged this verb passive, A.T. Robertson tagged is as middle “bearing oneself towards.” Active forms also occur in Hebrews.

OThis verb of being is missing in the three oldest-known manuscripts (again,not counting P46), as well as in 3 later manuscripts, but is written in the vast majority of manuscripts dating back as far as the 6th century. Since verbs of being are so frequently not written out but assumed, this makes no difference in meaning.

PTurner’s Grammar p.174: Notice the anarthrous construction with ΄υιος… πατηρ (and it is not ‘ο πατηρ, “his father”), “a father” (cf. Blass & Debrunner p.257[3]); “what son is there whom his father, as a father, does not chasten?”).

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