An Investigation of Introductory Means

Who wrote the book of Hebrews? To whom was it addressed? At what time in history was it produced? What is the historical occasion that provoked the writing of Hebrews?

Trying to answer these questions is a difficult mystery for this book of the New Testament. There are so many questions that we have with this book, who wrote it? We don’t know who wrote it. The writing style does not fit with any of the other New Testament texts, it is not like the Pauline letters such as Romans, 1 & 2 Corinthians, and so forth. Nor like Peter, or John, Luke, James, and Jude; it is simply anonymous.

Who is it addressed to? We cannot be fully sure to who it was addressed specifically, other than a congregation of Jewish believers.

When was it written? We do not know that for sure either, but we are able to come fairly close to when it was written. It would fall within 40 A.D. to 70 A.D., if it was written later then the destruction of the Temple would have been mentioned. A clue as to prior to 70 A.D. writing is that the Temple sacrifices were still being conducted at the time of writing.

Lastly, what was the occasion that produced it? We do not know the answer to that either, but there are options.

There is a need of detective work with this book of the Bible, we will begin with its authorship. Who wrote this book? When the early church was sifting through the texts and analyzing them to see which were truly sacred scripture, most of the books in the New Testament were not hotly debated, yet there were a few that did create debate, Hebrews being one of them if not the most controversial. It was not till the fourth century that the book was received as apostolic and canonical.

No one is really debating the issue any longer of Hebrews being canonical, as when further studied the more it became evident of it being apostolic and coherent to the rest of sacred scripture. Yet, there is an irony to it, what finally persuaded the Church that the book ought to be included in the New Testament canon was the conviction that it was written by the Apostle Paul. Paul who had already written thirteen other epistles that made up the New Testament canon. For them that was enough, if it was written by Paul then it had to be included. The irony is even though the Church received this on the basis of the conviction that Paul wrote it and today the vast majority of New Testament scholars do not believe that Paul wrote this book. Yet, no one is arguing that it should not be included in the canon.

Here is a list of people who have been mentioned as possible authors of this book. Paul; in 215 A.D. an early church father named Clement of Alexandria not to be confused with an earlier church father Clement of Rome wrote of his conviction that Paul was the author, but the twist is this: that Paul wrote the book not in Greek, but in Hebrew. Paul himself was a Jew, he was writing to Jews, for Jews, about Jewish matters so in this instance he penned it in Hebrew. Then the Hebrew version according to Clement of Alexandria in 215 A.D. was then translated by one of Paul’s close associates who also had a keen mastery of Greek, his name was Luke the Physician (the author of the Gospel of Luke and Acts). This view was held by church fathers: Jerome, St. Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas, and many others.

However, by the time of the Reformation, just before it, in the High Renaissance when biblical scholarship took on a new dimension of close literary analysis. Men like Erasmus of Rotterdam, the great Humanist and biblical scholar of the 16th century challenged this tradition of Pauline authorship. He demonstrated that there were so many stylistic and literary differences between the bulk of Paul’s writings and the writing in Hebrews that these differences could not be accounted for even by translating from Hebrew into Greek. Paul’s authorship then became hotly disputed, other men and in one case a woman, were suggested as possible authors of the book of Hebrews.

Luke himself has been a frequent candidate, the richest and most eloquent Greek we find in the four Gospels is from Luke; who has a highly educated and polished style about his writings. It is generally conceited that experts of the biblical languages that far and away the highest, most eloquent Greek that is found in the New Testament is found in the book of Hebrews, it is a literary masterpiece. Which only adds to the difficulty of finding the author of this book, because if it is not written by Paul and if it is not written by Luke who are known to us and we have something to compare them to in regards to their literary output; what it means is that the highest literary production of the entire New Testament is written by someone who is virtually unknown to us, which makes the whodunit all the more intriguing.

We see similarities between Hebrews and the writing of Luke, but there is a Jewish aura about the book of Hebrews that doesn’t match Luke who was a Gentile. Two others who are frequently mentioned include Barnabas, a companion of Paul’s and who obviously was an educated person and was called the Son of Encouragement and himself had an encouraging pastoral spirit about him. The literary structure of the book of Hebrews is somewhat different than the rest of the New Testament in that it follows a Jewish pattern of the Homily, a sermon. Hebrews is an extended sermon and some renowned scholars see Hebrews as a sermon on the Old Testament Psalm 110, “the Lord said to my Lord, sit thou at my right hand.” All these chapters are simply an exposition, an explanation of the Messiah who is the great high priest and also the king who is anointed by God to rule His people. No matter on all those details we do know for certain that it follows the style of a sermon. Including strong exhortations, calls for repentance, and at the same time a strong touch of consolation. All of which would fit the personality and the style of Barnabas as we understand his portrait in the New Testament.

Others give the authorship of Hebrews to Apollos. The Bible almost never mentions Apollos, we only have a paragraph or two of him in all of the New Testament. But what the Bible does say about Apollos is significant. When Paul was struggling with the Corinthians in his first epistle to them, Apollos was one of the names who they had subscribed themselves to. Obviously, Apollos was a prominent leader, we read about him in Acts 18. Where we are told that Apollos was very eloquent, that he was Jewish, that he was Alexandrian, that he was powerful in the scripture, and that he taught the scriptures accurately. Whoever wrote Hebrews was certainly eloquent and certainly had mastery of the Old Testament scriptures.

It was Luther who suggested Apollos as a candidate as the author of Hebrews. Now, these are technical matters and we do not want to get lost in them. There is an understanding of Jewishness here that is not rank and file Palestinian Judaism, there are those who believe that the author of Hebrews had to have had some acquaintanceship perhaps even educated in Alexandria which was the central intellectual headquarters for Greek speaking Jews. For a particular variety of Judaism known as simply Alexandrian Judaism, the great philosopher Philo for example was philosopher king of Alexandrian Judaism. The early church had to deal with that particular philosophical strain on more than one occasion.

Those who argue that the entire book of Hebrews was struggling with Alexandrian Judaism insist that its author had to be acquainted with Alexandrian Judaism and what do we know, Apollos’ has his roots in Alexandria. For those who nominate him see one more clue that favors him, but these are all highly speculative guesses at best. I would like to be able to give you all sure-fire evidence that it was Barnabas or Apollos, or Luke but I am unable to.

Some other possibilities offered is Clement of Rome, who I mentioned earlier. Others think that it was put together by a team, a husband and wife team, Priscilla and Aquila; the accent on Priscilla. Yet, again all are speculative.

Now who is the book addressed to? We know that it is sent to the Hebrews, but what Hebrews? Are they Jewish Christians in Jerusalem? Are they Jewish Christians of the Diaspora, that meaning those who have been exiled out of Palestine into Greek speaking nations? Is it a Jewish colony in Alexandria that is struggling with that strange philosophy in Alexandria; being instructed on how to resist Alexandrian Judaism? All are possibilities. A significant option is that there was a Jewish Christian community in Rome that were dealing with specific problems and possibly it was this colony of Christians in Rome who needed this letter.

Why was the book written? What was the concern of the author? When we read the book of Hebrews we do know that there was some serious crisis that threatened the purity of the early church that was so severe that it provoked the writing of the book of Hebrews in general but also provoked the writing of Hebrews 6 and 10, it is because of Hebrews 6 that this book has such a hard time being accepted as sacred scripture. Chapter 6 of Hebrews is a difficult chapter, which suggests that the possibility of committing some kind of sin, that if you commit it, you're toast. That is difficult for Christians to deal with. The warning of the loss of salvation is so emphatic that we know whatever provoked this letter was a serious crisis that could have had disastrous results if not handled properly. What was the crisis? If we only knew the answer to that question it would be much easier for us to understand the difficult portions of the book and particularly chapter 6.

Some scholars have suggested that the reason the book was written was Roman persecution; which would land it with the audience being a Jewish community in Rome. The crisis being the threat if martyrdom and that some denied Jesus and escaped it then wanted to come back into full fellowship. Another option is the most common crisis in the New Testament world that of being the attack of the Judaizers, who wanted to Judaize New Testament Christianity. We see that controversy heavily in the book of Galatians, where Paul addresses those who wanted to retain all kinds of elements from the Old Testament. A Third option is that a crisis was presented in the early community, not only from the Judaizers and Greek speaking Jews using Hellenistic philosophy and blending it together. But another party was present, in the Gospels we see Jesus confronting the two main parties of the Jews that of the Pharisees and the Sadducees.

When we read Jewish historians such as Josephus for example and Philo mentioned earlier both talk about the three great parties of Jews. The third great party is never mentioned by name in the New Testament. Who were they? They were called the Essenes, who we knew nothing about till the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls in the late forties. We learned the Essenes were interested in the future, they were concerned with Eschatology (the study of last things), very disciplined, they withdrew from society. They did not only live out in the desert, there were different groups of them throughout Palestine. One of the most important beliefs of the Essenes was that God was going to send not one Messiah, but two Messiahs. One would be a priestly messiah and the other a kingly messiah and that those two messiahs would both ultimately surrender their authority and dignity to the one who ruled over both of them, that being Michael the Archangel.

This third party was running around teaching the view of two messiahs, one political another liturgical, both under the supremacy of an Angel. That idea would completely subvert the biblical portrait of Jesus the Messiah and the book of Hebrews is written to combat that heresy to show the supremacy of Christ over the angels and that the Messiah is both king and priest at the same time. Whatever the issue was and whoever wrote it and to whom it was written the central passion of this book is the supremacy of Christ.