Reasoning about the oaths people take, the author of the letter says: if a person can swear by anything, then in any case it must be by something higher, something that represents absolute importance and value for him...
Reasoning about the oaths people take, the author of the letter says: if a person can swear by anything, then in any case it must be by something higher, something that represents absolute importance and value for him. It is no accident that in Israel the highest form of oath was considered an oath by the name of God.
Meanwhile, the Savior calls His disciples and followers not to swear at all: after all, what is absolutely important and valuable for a person does not belong to him, he cannot dispose of it, just as he cannot dispose of himself. Every person is in God's power, and therefore he cannot give anyone any guarantees about his own future. Against this background, the statement of the author of the letter that God swears by Himself because He cannot swear by anything or anyone higher sounds paradoxical. But if one thinks about it, it becomes clear that the matter here concerns one of the most important principles of spiritual life in general and Christian life in particular. Indeed, what is an oath? Swearing by someone or something, a person in a sense seeks a guarantor who will be able to ensure the fulfillment of the promise he has given.
The one or the thing called as witness, and an oath usually presupposes such a calling, is supposed to become the guarantor of the fulfillment of what was promised. It is quite understandable that if God gives a promise, no one and nothing can guarantee its fulfillment except God Himself. This appears quite obvious, and it is not very clear why the author of the letter suddenly decided to touch on the theme of oath. Meanwhile, many problems of Christians of that time were connected precisely with forgetting the most important principle of spiritual life just mentioned.
Many of them were probably inclined to see in the events then taking place some guarantee of the Messiah's swift return. After all, He had promised that after the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple He would return, which means He must return, for in AD 70 precisely what He had spoken about took place. In reality, however, His return is not conditioned by any historical events. On the contrary, it itself determines them and, to a certain degree, conditions them as the point of completion of the historical process. And no events at all could be regarded as "forcing" the Messiah's return. It is this obvious fact that the author of the letter reminds his readers about.
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6:9 But, beloved - in this one place he calls them so.he never uses this appellation, but in exhorting. We are persuaded of you things that accompany salvation - We are persuaded you are now saved from your sins; and that ye have that faith, love, and holiness, which lead to final salvation. Though we thus speak - To warn you, lest you should fall from your present steadfastness.
6:10 For - Ye give plain proof of your faith and love, which the righteous God will surely reward.
6:11 But we desire you may show the same diligence unto the end - And therefore we thus speak. To the full assurance of hope - Which you cannot expect, if you abate your diligence. The full assurance of faith relates to present pardon; the full assurance of hope, to future glory.The former is the highest degree of divine evidence that God is reconciled to me in the Son of his love; the latter is the same degree of divine evidence (wrought in the soul by the same immediate inspiration of the Holy Ghost) of persevering grace, and of eternal glory. So much, and no more, as faith every moment "beholds with open face," so much does hope see to all eternity But this assurance of faith and hope is not an opinion, not a bare construction of scripture, but is given immediately by the power of the Holy Ghost; and what none can have for another, but for himself only.
6:12 Inherited the promises - The promised rest; paradise.
6:13 For - Ye have abundant encouragement, seeing no stronger promise could be made than that great promise which God made to Abraham, and in him to us.
6:14 Gen 22:17.
6:15 After he had waited - Thirty years. He obtained the promise - Isaac, the pledge of all the promises.
6:16 Men generally swear by him who is infinitely greater than themselves, and an oath for confirmation, to confirm what is promised or asserted, usually puts an end to all contradiction. This shows that an oath taken in a religious manner is lawful even under the gospel: otherwise the apostle would never have mentioned it with so much honour, as a proper means to confirm the truth
6:17 God interposed by an oath - Amazing condescension!He who is greatest of all acts as if he were a middle person; as if while he swears, he were less than himself, by whom he swears!Thou that hearest the promise, dost thou not yet believe?
6:18 That by two unchangeable things - His promise and his oath, in either, much more in both of which, it was impossible for God to lie, we might have strong consolation - Swallowing up all doubt and fear. Who have fled - After having been tossed by many storms. To lay hold on the hope set before us - On Christ, the object of our hope, and the glory we hope for through him.
6:19 Which hope in Christ we have as an anchor of the soul - Entering into heaven itself, and fixed there. Within theveil - Thus he slides back to the priesthood of Christ.
6:20 A forerunner uses to be less in dignity than those that are to follow him. But it is not so here; for Christ who is gone before us is infinitely superior to us. What an honour is it to believers, to have so glorious a forerunner, now appearing in the presence of God for them.