NOTES for Heb 2:1-9
1 Therefore we ought to give the more earnest heed to the things which we have heard, lest at any time we should let them slip. |
2 For if the word spoken by angels was stedfast, and every transgression and disobedience received a just recompence of reward; |
3 How shall we escape, if we neglect so great salvation; which at the first began to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us by them that heard him; |
4 God also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders, and with divers miracles, and gifts of the Holy Ghost, according to his own will? |
5 For unto the angels hath he not put in subjection the world to come, whereof we speak. |
6 But one in a certain place testified, saying, What is man, that thou art mindful of him? or the son of man, that thou visitest him? |
7 Thou madest him a little lower than the angels; thou crownedst him with glory and honour, and didst set him over the works of thy hands: |
8 Thou hast put all things in subjection under his feet. For in that he put all in subjection under him, he left nothing that is not put under him. But now we see not yet all things put under him. |
9 But we see Jesus, who was made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honour; that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man. |
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While affirming the superiority of humanity over the angels, the author of the epistle nevertheless does not forget that, in the present state both of the world and of humanity itself, this superiority still turns out to be more of a spiritual and metahistorical prospect than a present reality. He understands the words of Holy Scripture that a human being is, in God's eyes, a little lower than the angels as referring more to the future than to the present (vv. 5-8). And, of course, the future in question is not the future of our world, which is being transformed but is not yet transfigured, but the fullness of the Kingdom that will be revealed to the world with the Savior's return. It is no accident that the author of the epistle speaks specifically of Jesus as the One in whom the words of the psalm that he mentions, about a human being in no way inferior to the angels, have been fulfilled (v. 9). For Jesus from the very beginning, from the moment of His conception on earth, already bore in Himself that fullness of the Kingdom which will be revealed to us only at the end of time. In a certain sense one could say that He Himself is the Kingdom, and the whole Church, as the community of people living in this Kingdom, is His continuation in the world that the Church is to transform.
Jesus, in the fullness of His transfigured human nature, reveals in Himself that image of humanity which stands above the angels. And it is He who points the way into the Kingdom for those who seek. Of course, God's revelations can be given to people through angels as well; that is why they are "ministering spirits." But no angel has ever contained the whole fullness of the Kingdom, and no angel has ever become fully part of our human world. Angels are spirits, though created spirits, and human nature is alien to them, as is any nature at all. They can be God's messengers in our world ("angel" properly means "messenger"), but by definition they cannot enter it, always remaining beings from another world in relation to it. The Messiah, however, entered the world as a Man and, despite all His uniqueness, never ceased to be precisely a Man. That is why the revelation of the Kingdom brought by Him into the world is greater than the revelation proclaimed by angels (vv. 1-4): for angels, though also sharing in the Kingdom, still could not become the living embodiment of the Kingdom opened to people. That embodiment is what the Savior became for those seeking the way.
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Readings for 18 September 2025
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