Continuing the discussion of Christian life, the author of the letter draws his readers' special attention to the need for no "bitter root" to take hold among them...
Continuing the discussion of Christian life, the author of the letter draws his readers' special attention to the need for no "bitter root," as he puts it, to take hold among them. By "bitter root," taking traditional Jewish usage into account, what was usually meant was a "root of sin," that is, sin that had taken root in the human heart or in some human community. And the issue here is not only the desire, as people say, to keep the ranks pure. Nor is it even only that bad company, as even pagans knew, corrupts good morals.
The issue is that every sin that has become the norm and is perceived as the norm disrupts the normal existence of the Church as the body of Christ, whether the members of the Church notice it or not. In fact, even in pre-Christian times it was already known that sin defiles, and not only those who sin, but also those with whom the sinner is in communion. Of course, there was much that was archaic and magical in this view, especially if we are speaking about the mass religious consciousness of the pre-exilic era.
But there was also something else, something no longer so archaic, connected with the perception of the people of God as a single spiritual whole, as a kind of spiritual body. In that case it was obvious that the sin of a specific person belonging to the spiritual body turns out to be more than only his personal problem. His sin becomes a problem for the people-community to which he belongs. And all that has been said is even more true of the Church as the body of Christ, for here we are speaking of people called to the life of the Kingdom, with which no sin is compatible.
And if sin takes root in such a community and becomes the norm, then all who share in it actually cease to be part of the body of Christ. The Church then actually disappears, preserving only the appearance of its true self. Such a substitution is all the more dangerous because often, especially at first, it is barely noticeable, so that many may think everything in their church is in order. It is this danger of unnoticed spiritual corruption of the church body that the author of the letter reminds his readers about.
12
12:1 Wherefore, being encompassed with a cloud - A great multitude, tending upward with a holy swiftness. Of witnesses - Of the power of faith. Let us lay aside every weight - As all who run a race take care to do. Let us throw off whatever weighs us down, or damps the vigour of our Soul. And the sin which easily besetteth us - As doth the sin of our constitution, the sin of our education, the sin of our profession.
12:2 Looking - From all other things. To Jesus - As the wounded Israelites to the brazen serpent. Our crucified Lord was prefigured by the lifting up of this; our guilt, by the stings of the fiery serpents; and our faith, by their looking up to the miraculous remedy. The author and finisher of our faith - Who begins it in us, carries it on, and perfects it. Who for the joy that was set before him - Patiently and willingly endured the cross, with all the pains annexed thereto.And is set down - Where there is fulness of joy.
12:3 Consider - Draw the comparison and think. The Lord bore all this; and shall his servants bear nothing? Him that endured such contradiction from sinners - Such enmity and opposition of every kind Lest ye be weary - Dull and languid, and so actually faint in your course.
12:4 Unto blood - Unto wounds and death.
12:5 And yet ye seem already to have forgotten the exhortation - Wherein God speaketh to you with the utmost tenderness.Despise not thou the chastening of the Lord - Do not slight or make little of it; do not impute any affliction to chance or second causes but see and revere the hand of God in it. Neither faint when thou art rebuked of him - But endure it patiently and fruitfully. Heb 3:11, etc
12:6 For - All springs from love; therefore neither despise nor faint.
12:7 Whom his father chasteneth not - When he offends.
12:8 Of which all sons are partakers - More or less.
12:9 And we reverenced them - We neither despised nor fainted under their correction. Shall we not much rather - Submit with reverence and meekness To the Father of spirits - That we may live with him for ever. Perhaps these expressions, fathers of our flesh, and Father of spirits, intimate that our earthly fathers are only the parents of our bodies, our souls not being originally derived from them, but all created by the immediate power of God; perhaps, at the beginning of the world.
12:10 For they verily for a few days - How few are even all our day on earth! Chastened us as they thought good - Though frequently they erred therein, by too much either of indulgence or severity. But he always, unquestionably, for our profit, that we may be partakers of his holiness - That is, of himself and his glorious image.
12:11 Now all chastening - Whether from our earthly or heavenly Father, Is for the present grievous, yet it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness - Holiness and happiness. To them that are exercised thereby - That receive this exercise as from God, and improve it according to his will.
12:12 Wherefore lift up the hands - Whether your own or your brethren's.That hang down - Unable to continue the combat.And the feeble knees - Unable to continue the race. Isa 35:3.
12:13 And make straight paths both for your own and for their feet - Remove every hinderance, every offence.That the lame - They who are weak, scarce able to walk.Be not turned out of the way - Of faith and holiness.
12:14 Follow peace with all men - This second branch of the exhortation concerns our neighbours; the third, God. And holiness - The not following after all holiness, is the direct way to fall into sin of every kind.
12:15 Looking diligently, lest any one - If he do not lift up the hands that hang down. Fall from the grace of God: lest any root of bitterness - Of envy, anger, suspicion.Springing up - Destroy the sweet peace; lest any, not following after holiness, fall into fornication or profaneness.In general, any corruption, either in doctrine or practice, is a root of bitterness, and may pollute many.
12:16 Esau was profane for so slighting the blessing which went along with the birth - right.
12:17 He was rejected - He could not obtain it. For he found no place for repentance - There was no room for any such repentance as would regain what he had lost.Though he sought it - The blessing of the birth - right.Diligently with tears - He sought too late. Let us use the present time.