Timothy to Hebrews - The Preterist Archive

Christ lias perfectly fulfilled.
substance of things hopedfor !
Hebrews XII. 2. 559
Nay, he not merely had hut was the
Instead, however, of understanding this idea of the -niang in the
general way in which it is spoken of in the context of this section, a
number of commentators have known noother meaning to give tomaTig
than that dogmatically defined ideaof "faith in justification through
Christ," an idea which has its place in the epistle to the Komans, but
not here. They understand by it, therefore, that special form and
manifestation which the general state of mind denotedhy Trior iq takes in the
penitent sinner, in relation to his Saviour. According to this explanation
it must appear incomprehensible how faith can be ascribed
to Christ the Saviour himself, as he neither required, nor was in a
condition, to believe in the forgiveness of sins for Christ's sake. In
order now to escape this absurdity, some (Schleusner, Knapp, Kuinoel)
explained, that Christ is the " beginner" of faith, because, by
his redemp^on-work, he has made faith possible for us and for him ;
others (as Chrysostom) that he is called dp%?/y6c, because he himself,
by his spirit, works the beginnmgs of faith in us. In a similar way
it was attempted to explain reAeiwr^f, (Schulz, Tholuck, and
Bleek, who take dpxqxoq = exemplar [for us] approximate to the
true explanation ;
Olshausen, too, who indeed allows that Christ
receives those predicates in reference to his own faith, but renders
dpxqyoq by " beginner," and, instead of referring both to the series
of witnesses, rather finds in them a reference to this,—that it was necessary
even for Christ himself, to struggle on from the beginnings
of faith to its completion,)
The relative sentence 05- dvrl t%, etc, serves most fully to confirm
the explanation we have given of dpxiiyog K-al reAawr?/^. As in
the case of all those individual examples of faith in chap. xi. 4-31,
there was always specified some visible possession which they renounced,
or some earthly privation and afiiiction which they endured,
but, on the other hand, a future reward which they saw before
them—so also was it with Christ. He has endured the cross, and
counted small and light the shame of this kind of death ; for this,
however, he has sat down on the right hand of God. In him the
deepest ignominy was united with the highest absolute exaltation.
—The only question here is, how the words dvrl rijg npoiceii.isvrjg
Xapdg are to be explained. Either (with the Peshito, Luther, Calvin,
Calov, etc.) dvrl is taken in the sense of " instead of," and by
Xo-pd is understood the earthly joy which Christ renounced, or (with
Itala, Aetli., Beza, Bengel, Hunnius, Grotius, and the most of recent
commentators) dvTi is taken in the sense of " for the sake of,
for," and by j^apa is understood the heavenly joy for the gaining of
which he endured the cross. But as x^^pd has the attribute -TpoKeifiivrj,
and this is the usual term for designating that which was " set be-