Hebrews 3:11

DEXROLL at aol.com DEXROLL at aol.com
Thu Dec 6 02:06:20 EST 2001


(This is a second posting on this passage -- I got only one short comment 
last friday)

3.11        hWS WMOSA EN TH  ORGH   MOU:  
        EI  EISELEUSONTAI   EIS THN   KATAVPAUSIVN MOU.
    In doing some work on Hebrews I  came across this use of the conditional 
as a sort of negative oath.   Now, I can understand the basic meaning here as 
" if they shall enter my rest (or will they enter my rest ?) . No -- they 
will not  ! ( understood apodosis)."  This phrase of course is repeated 
several times ( 4:3and 5).

    In 3:18 we have TISIN  DE  WMOSEN   MH   EISELEUSESQAI   EIS  THN   
KATAPAUSIN   AUTOU  EI  MH   TOIS  APEIQHSASIN…  Now this phrase seems to be 
from Numbers 14:23, although it is not the same as the Septuagint.

    The first phrase is an exact quote from the Septuagint in Psalm 95:11, 
which duplicates the Hebrew.  All of this brings a number of questions:

1. Is the conditional as negative oath  common in Greek or a Hebraism?

Robertson (p.1024) says that it is "...an imitation of the Hebrew idiom, 
though not un-Greek in itself."

2. The phrase in 3:18 makes a simple negative statement, so what is the 
difference between the two?

You have a simple conditional with the future indicative in one and  a simple 
negation with the future infinitive in the second.

There are obviously more questions, but let's start with these two.

    
David Rollins - dexroll at aol.com

    "A Christian is one who recognizes Jesus as the Christ, the Son of the 
Living God, as God manifested in the flesh, loving us and dying for our 
redemption; and who is so affected by a sense of the love of this incarnate 
God as to be constrained to make the will of Christ the rule of his 
obedience, and the glory of Christ the great end for which he lives."

Charles Hodge in John Piper’s, A Godward Life



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