We had a great time at Context & Cookies last night, reading the Epistle to the Hebrews, which will be the next book preached on Sunday mornings. Unlike most of the New Testament epistles, the author is not identified in the letter. For this reason, a perennial question since the time of the early church has been, “who wrote Hebrews?”
Some of the early church fathers believed the letter had the ring of Paul’s writings. According to Eusebius (an ancient Christian historian), Clement of Alexandria believed “that the Epistle to the Hebrews is the work of Paul, and that it was written to the Hebrews in the Hebrew language; but that Luke translated it carefully and published it for the Greeks, and hence the same style of expression is found in this epistle and in the Acts.”[1] Jerome and Augustine also believed that Paul wrote the book, so that Pauline authorship was the leading view of the church for most of church history.
However, some Reformers made what seems to be an insurmountable argument against Paul as the author. Both Martin Luther and John Calvin noted that Hebrews 2:3 indicates the letter could not have been written by Paul. The verse reads, “…how shall we escape if we neglect such a great salvation? It was declared at first by the Lord, and it was attested to us by those who heard…” That is, the author of the letter groups himself with those who heard the gospel, not from Jesus, but from those who heard it from Jesus. Therefore, Paul cannot be the author since Paul claims in Galatians to have received the gospel directly from Christ: “For I would have you know, brothers, that the gospel that was preached by me is not man’s gospel. For I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it, but I received it through a revelation of Jesus Christ” (Gal 1:11–12).
While this is a good enough reason to reject the notion that Paul wrote Hebrews, there are a couple of strong additional reasons to note. First, in all of Paul’s 13 canonical letters, he identifies himself as the author. That Hebrews lacks such an identification makes it unlikely that Paul wrote it. Second, the Greek style of Hebrews is highly dissimilar to that of Paul’s letters. Most intermediate Greek students would notice a marked difference between Paul’s style and that of Hebrews. Paul should simply be eliminated as a possible author of the letter.
So who did write the letter? Over the centuries numerous proposals have been made including Barnabas, Luke, Apollos, Silas, Epaphras, and Jude. At the end of the day, we simply do not know.
What we do know is that the letter is a masterfully written piece, demonstrating the author’s amazing command of the Old Testament and biblical theology. As we study and apply the letter, we will be content to refer to the writer as “the author.” Whether we know his name or not, like the other NT writers, he “spoke from God as [he was] carried along by the Holy Spirit” (2 Pet 1:21).
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[1] Eusebius, The Church History of Eusebius, 6.14.1
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