Hebrews 1:3Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Therefore, when you hear Arians saying that if the Son is from the Father, He must be after Him, tell them that radiance also comes from the sun, yet is not after it. For the sun and the radiance exist at the same time.

“And the image of His hypostasis.” Having said “brightness,” and thereby shown the consubstantiality and coeternity of the Son with the Father, the Apostle again removes an improper thought from the example, since brightness is not self-subsistent. He does this so that you may not take the side of Marcellus and Sabellius, who say that the Son cannot exist in His own hypostasis with the Father. Therefore he says, “and the image (charakter) of His hypostasis.” This means that as the Father is self-subsistent and needs no one for perfection, so also is the Son.

After showing the complete likeness in all things, by these words the Apostle also shows the particular stamp (charakter) of the Archetype. For an image, in comparison with the archetype, is something other, existing in itself, though indistinguishably like the first. Gregory of Nyssa says: as by brightness he showed the Son’s communion with the Father, so by image he showed Their equality. For the mind that has grasped the greatness of the hypostasis can, through the visible image, certainly measure the hypostasis also. The image does not exceed the hypostasis, lest it be without hypostasis to the extent that it exceeds. Nor is the hypostasis greater than the image. Otherwise that part would remain without representation.

When the Apostle similarly says elsewhere that the Son exists “in the form (en morphe) of God” (Phil 2:6), he gives us to understand the same thing. Namely, morphe signifies hypostasis, and charakter signifies the Lord contemplated in this form (en morphe). In every way the Apostle shows the equality of the Son with the Father. For in the form, morphe, the greatness of the Father is discerned, not in the least exceeding this form. Indeed, what protruded beyond the form would be shapeless and uncomely, which it is improper to think concerning the Father. If the greatness of the Father is such as the form, morphe, and the imprint, charakter, is equal to the form, morphe, then the imprint, charakter, has the same greatness as is discerned in the form, morphe, of God.

“And upholding all things by the word of His power.” Before, you stopped at the expression “through whom” and considered the Son as though He were the Father’s assistant. Now listen, if you can understand, how Paul here attributes authority to the Son. He did not say, “upholding by power,” but “by the word of His power,” that is, by a word full of power and showing His might. For as you say that the Father said, “Let there be light,” and there was light (Gen 1:3), so the Son upholds all things by His word. That is, He governs all things and holds all things together.

Yet preserving what resists within itself and tends to return to non-being is far greater than bringing all things into being. He did not say “governing,” but “upholding.” This metaphor is taken from those who move something and turn it with one finger. He bears such great and extraordinary weight of creation as though it were nothing, by His almighty word alone. For God’s word is not powerless, as ours is.

After so many heresies refuted at the very beginning of the epistle, how do some dare reject it as though it did not belong to Paul, on the ground that its style differs from that of the other epistles? They must be convinced that the height of thought and the irresistible power of these thoughts belong to none other than Paul, who has Christ speaking in him. If they are offended by the style of speech, let them learn that Paul wrote the epistle in Hebrew, since he was speaking to Hebrews. It was translated into Greek, as some think, by Luke, or, as others suppose, by Clement, whose style it indeed preserves more. Therefore those who take this epistle away from Paul make a mistake like those who would take Paul away from Christ.

“Having by Himself made purification of our sins.” After speaking of the greatness of the divinity of the Word, he also speaks of His care for men through the Incarnation, which is far greater than upholding all things. Here he presents two proofs: one, that He cleansed our sins; the other, that He did this by Himself. In many places the Apostle marvels that this was accomplished by the Son Himself. For through the Cross and the death which He accepted, He cleansed us. He did so not only as the sinless One who died for our transgression, bore the punishment to which He Himself was not subject, and in general freed nature from the condemnation for Adam’s sin. He also did so as the One who gave us baptism, the likeness of His death. Through it, we who are baptized receive each time the forgiveness of sins that came to us from our ancestors, and the strength not to yield easily to sin for the rest of our life.

“He sat down at the right hand of the throne of Majesty on high.” Having recalled the Cross, he speaks of the Lord’s Resurrection and Ascension. He did not say, “He was commanded to sit,” but “He sat,” and at the right hand, and on high. This does not mean that God is limited by place. It is said to show His equality of honor with the Father. For He reached the very throne of the Father, and as the Father is on high, so exactly is He. If someone says, “Yet it is written: ‘The Lord said to my Lord: Sit at My right hand’” (Ps 109:1), we answer, first, that it does not say, “He commanded,” but “He said.” Then, so that you may not think that He has no beginning and cause in God the Father, the speech is expressed figuratively in this way.

For if we have called hypostasis the totality of distinctive properties discerned in each, and if we acknowledge concerning the Father that there is something properly contemplated in Him, through which He alone is known. And confess the same concerning the Only-begotten, then how does Scripture here attribute the name hypostasis to the Father alone, and call the Son the image of the hypostasis, marked not by His own features but by the Father’s? If hypostasis is the distinctive sign of the being of each, and if it is acknowledged as the Father’s property to be unbegotten, while the Son depicts in Himself the distinctive properties of the Father, then it no longer remains to the Father alone to be called preeminently unbegotten. This follows if the being of the Only-begotten is marked by that which distinguishes the Father.

But we affirm that here the Apostle’s word has another purpose. With this purpose in view he used the expressions “brightness of glory and image of hypostasis.” Whoever carefully understands this purpose will find nothing contrary to what we have said. He will find only that the speech is directed toward a particular thought. For the apostolic word is not discussing how the hypostases are to be distinguished from one another by visible marks. Rather, it is teaching how to understand the connaturality, inseparability, and union of the Son in relation to the Father.

Thus he did not say, “who, being the glory of the Father,” although this is truly so. He left this as something acknowledged by all. But, teaching us not to imagine one form of glory in the Father and another in the Son, he defines the glory of the Only-begotten as the brightness of the very glory of the Father. By the likeness of light he leads us to conceive the Son as inseparable from the Father. For as brightness, though from the flame, is not later than the flame, but the flame blazes forth at once and the light from it shines forth, so, according to the Apostle’s meaning, one must conceive the Son from the Father. One must not separate the Only-begotten from the being of the Father by any dividing distance, but must always conceive together with the Cause also Him who is from Him.

Therefore in the same way, as though interpreting the thought now set forth, he also calls Him the image of the hypostasis, guiding us by bodily likenesses toward the understanding of the invisible. For as a body necessarily has an outline, yet the concept of outline is one thing and the concept of body another, and whoever defines one of these two has not yet reached the definition of the other, nevertheless, although in the mind you separate outline from body, nature does not admit division. Rather, the one is presented as joined with the other.

So, the Apostle thinks, we must understand that although the teaching of faith instructs us in the unconfused and distinct difference of the Hypostases, nevertheless in the cited passage it depicts the indivisibility and, as it were, inseparability of the Only-begotten from the Father. It does so not because the Only-begotten has no hypostasis, but because in His union with the Father He admits nothing intervening. Therefore one who fixes the eyes of the soul on the image of the Only-begotten has the thought of the Father’s hypostasis, not because of any change or mingling of the distinctive properties contemplated in Them, as though imagining begottenness in the Father or unbegottenness in the Son. Rather, it is because, if One is separated from the Other, He who remains cannot be conceived by Himself alone. For it is impossible that one who names the Son should not also have the thought of the Father, since this name relationally indicates the Father as well.

Therefore, since he who has seen the Son has seen the Father, as the Lord says in the Gospel (cf. Jn 14:9), for this reason the Only-begotten is called “the image of the Father’s hypostasis.” To understand this thought better, let us add other sayings of the Apostle, in which he calls the Son “the image of the invisible God” (cf. Col 1:15), and again the image of His goodness. He does not mean that the image differs from the Archetype with respect to invisibility and goodness. Rather, he wishes to show that the Son is identical with the Archetype, though He is other. For the concept of image would not be preserved if He did not have in all things a clear and indistinguishable identity.

Consequently, one who has conceived the beauty of the image has already conceived the Archetype. And whoever has embraced in thought, as it were, the image of the Son has imprinted in himself the image of the Father’s hypostasis. In the latter he contemplates the former also, not because he sees the Father’s unbegottenness in the depiction, for then it would be wholly identical and not other, but because he contemplates unbegotten Goodness in begotten Goodness.

For as one who has looked into the representation of a face appearing in a clean mirror receives clear knowledge of the face represented, so the one who has known the Son, together with this very knowledge of the Son, has received in his heart the image of the Father’s hypostasis. For all that belongs to the Father is contemplated also in the Son, and all that belongs to the Son belongs also to the Father. The whole Son abides in the Father, and again He has the whole Father in Himself. Thus the hypostasis of the Son serves, as it were, as image and countenance for the knowledge of the Father. The hypostasis of the Father is known in the image of the Son, while the distinctive property contemplated in Them remains for the clear distinction of the Hypostases.

Since his tongue was weaker than his thought, he conformed himself to what the hearing of those attending to his mystical understanding could receive. He said as much as the word serving thought was able to express. Having understood about the divine nature all that a man can contain according to his strength, he affirms that the understanding of the supreme Essence is inaccessible and incomprehensible to human thought.

Therefore, although he speaks of the properties contemplated in it, such as peace, power, life, light, truth, and the like, he regards the understanding of it itself as wholly beyond apprehension. He affirms that no one has ever seen God (Jn 1:18), nor will see Him. For, he says, “no one has seen Him, nor can see Him” (1 Tim 6:16). Attempting to define in words what cannot be understood by thought, he found no clear name to interpret the incomprehensible. Therefore he named what surpasses every good, what cannot be thought or expressed worthily, Glory and Hypostasis.

Thus he left without a name the essence that surpasses all that exists. But explaining the kinship and inseparability of the Son with the Father, and that He is contemplated as boundless and eternal together with the boundless and eternal Father, he calls Him “the brightness of glory” and “the image of hypostasis” (Heb 1:3). By “brightness” he indicates kinship, and by “image,” equality.

For thought admits no interval between the ray and the nature that emits it, nor any diminution of the image in comparison with the hypostasis it represents. Whoever understands the nature that emits light surely understands together with it its ray. And when he conceives in the mind the greatness of the hypostasis, he surely measures the hypostasis together with the image that manifests it.

Therefore he also calls the Lord “the form of God” (Phil 2:6), not in order to diminish the Lord by the concept of “form,” but to show the greatness of God in the form in which the greatness of the Father is contemplated. This greatness nowhere goes beyond its own form and is not found outside its own form. For there is nothing in the Father that is without form and beauty, or that is not reflected in the beauty of the Only-begotten. Therefore the Lord says, “He who has seen Me has seen the Father” (Jn 14:9), signifying by this that there is neither any diminution nor any superiority.

When the Apostle says that He “upholds all things by the word of His power” (Heb 1:3), he thereby resolves the perplexity of those overbusy investigators of the incomprehensible who, trying to solve the question of matter, set no limit to their curiosity. From where, they say, does materiality come to the immaterial? How does quantity come from what has no quantity, form from what has no form, color from the invisible, and what is bounded by its measures from the boundless? If there is no quality in what is simple and uncompounded, from where does matter intrude with its qualities?

The Apostle resolves all these and similar questions by saying that the Word “upholds all things by the word of His power” (Heb 1:3), bringing them from non-being into being. These words teach us to turn our gaze to Him from whom all existing things come. For if from Him we have all been brought into being, and in Him we exist, then it is absolutely necessary to believe that nothing is hidden from the knowledge of Him in whom we exist, from whom we came, and to whom we depart.

This thought naturally requires that our life be without sin. For who, believing that he lives “from Him and through Him and in Him” (Rom 11:36), will dare make Him who contains the life of each in Himself a witness of an indecent life?

If the Son did not exist until He was begotten, then truth was not always in God. But to say this is impious. Since the Father existed, truth was always in Him, that is, the Son, who says of Himself, “I am the truth” (Jn 14:6). Since the Hypostasis existed, without doubt Its Image and imprint also had to exist at once. For the Image of God is not inscribed outside Him. God Himself is the Begetter of this Image, and, seeing Himself in Him, rejoices over Him, as the Son Himself says: “I was that in which He rejoiced” (Prov 8:30).

When did the Father not see Himself in His Image? Or when did He not rejoice, so that anyone should dare say: the Image came from non-being, and the Father did not rejoice until the Image came to be? And how could the Maker and Creator see Himself in a created and made essence? The Image must be such as His Father is.

Let us therefore examine the properties of the Father, so that we may learn about the Image, whether it truly is the Father’s image. The Father is eternal, immortal, mighty. He is Light, King, Almighty, God, Lord, Maker, and Creator. The same must also be in the Image, so that he who has seen the Son has truly seen the Father. But if the Image is not such, and, as the Arians think, the Son is created and not eternal, then He is not the true image of the Father. They must then shamelessly assert that calling the Son image is not a sign of likeness of essence, but only His name.

Yet this, O fighters against Christ, is no longer image and imprint. For what likeness is there between that which is from nothing and the Creator who brings it from nothing into being? Or what likeness can the Existing One have with non-being, which already has this defect, that it never had being and is placed among created things?

The Arians, wishing to present the Son in this way, invented their own arguments and say: “If the Son is the offspring and image of the Father and is in all things like the Father, then undoubtedly, just as the Son is begotten, so He Himself must beget and become father to a son. The one begotten by the Son must also beget, and so on to infinity. For only in this way is the likeness of the begotten to the begetter shown.”

Truly these enemies of God are inventors of blasphemies. In order not to acknowledge the Son as the Image of the Father, they imagine something bodily and earthly about the Father Himself, attributing to Him divisions, outflows, and inflows. Therefore, if God is the same as man, let Him be a parent as man is, so that the Son too may become father of another son. Then let sons proceed from one another in order, so that, according to the heretics, the succession of gods may grow into a multitude.

But if God is not the same as man, and this is indeed so, one must not imagine anything human about Him. Irrational animals and men, by the power of the formative principle, beget one another in succession. The one begotten, having been born of a begotten father, according to the order of things becomes father of another. He has this in himself from the father from whom he himself came. Therefore among them there is not, in the proper sense, a father and, in the proper sense, a son. The names “father” and “son” are not something permanent among them. The same person is son of the one who begot him and father of the one begotten by him.

But one must not understand the Godhead in this way. God is not the same as man. The Father is not from a father, and therefore He does not beget a father who will beget. The Son does not proceed from the Father by outflow, and He is not begotten of a begotten father. Therefore He is not begotten in order to beget.

For this reason, in the Godhead alone the Father is properly Father, and the Son is properly Son. For Them alone this is permanent: the Father is always Father, and the Son is always Son. Therefore let the one who asks why the Son cannot beget a son ask why the Father did not have a father. Both questions are absurd and full of every impiety.

As the Father is always Father and never was Son, so the Son is always Son and will never be Father. In this, above all, it is revealed that the Son is the imprint and image of the Father. He remains what He is and does not change, but has from the Father the identity of being.

Therefore, if the Father changes, let His Image also change. For as the One who begot is, so is His Image, and so is the Brightness. But if the Father is unchangeable and remains what He is, then necessarily His Image also remains what He is and does not change. The Son is from the Father. Therefore He is not something else, but that very thing which properly belongs to the Father’s essence. Consequently the senseless have invented this too in vain, intending to steal His Image from the Father, so as to make the Son equal to creatures.

Since the likeness of brightness sufficiently expressed coeternity and consubstantiality, but gave occasion for blasphemy to those who suffer from the disease of Sabellius and Photinus, because brightness does not have self-subsistent being, the Apostle prevents this blasphemy by another likeness. For he adds, “and the image of His hypostasis.” That is, the Son has self-subsistent being, wholly showing the Father in Himself, because He bears the Father’s features. The Lord’s words to Philip accord with this: “He who has seen Me has seen the Father” (Jn 14:9).

Thus by many names the divine Apostle showed both the most intimate character of the birth, and consubstantiality, and coeternity. Since the Divine exceeds every mind and the truth of theology cannot be explained by one likeness alone, the preachers of the truth are compelled to attain this by many likenesses.

Thus the God-wise John called the Son the Word. Since passion and time are joined to human birth, he necessarily called Him the Word. Lest anyone think that the Son is not a self-subsistent Word, as happened with Marcellus, Photinus, and Paul, he necessarily added: “and the Word was God” (Jn 1:1). By this he both indicates the Word’s own hypostasis, shows the one nature, and teaches that the birth is impassible and not temporal.

Likewise blessed Paul called the Word Son, showing that, according to His personal property as Word, He is other than the Father. He also called Him Creator of the ages, thereby teaching that the Word is eternal. He named Him “brightness of glory,” indicating by this both coeternity and identity of essence. He also added that He is “the image of His hypostasis,” teaching both things together: that He has being in Himself, and that He shows in Himself the Father’s features.

But he adds another thing: “and upholding all things by the word of His power.” For the Son not only created all things, but also orders and governs them. The Apostle showed the abundance of His power by saying that, for the creation of all things and the providential care of all things, His word is sufficient. “He said, ‘Let there be light,’ and there was light. And He said, ‘Let there be a firmament,’ and it was so” (Gen 1:3, 6). All the rest was created in like manner. So also blessed David said, “For He spoke, and they came to be; He commanded, and they were created” (Ps 32:9).

Seeing the certainty of this theology, those who think according to Arius attempted to cast this epistle out of the apostolic treasures. Therefore we also strive to show that it agrees with the evangelical teachings.

After speaking in this way about the divine nature, the divine Apostle passes to the human nature, teaching the mystery of the divine economy. “Having by Himself made purification of our sins, He sat down at the right hand of the throne of Majesty on high.” Here di’ autou must be read with the breathing, in place of di’ heautou. For this Son of the Father, coexistent with Him who begot Him, Creator and Ruler of all, who shows the Father in Himself, became man and accomplished our salvation.

The phrase, “He sat down at the right hand of the throne of Majesty on high,” is said according to His humanity. For, being most high, He humbled Himself. Being God, He became man. He was not exalted as one who had been humbled in His divinity, nor did He, as one not God, become God. Rather, as God He was always Master of all, and as man He received the glory which He had as God. He Himself said this in the holy Gospel: “Glorify Me, Father, with the glory which I had before the world was” (Jn 17:5). He did not ask to receive what He did not have, but to show what He had.

Since those unwilling to think of the Divine in a manner worthy of God suppose that He who is from God cannot be coeternal with God, because they hold the irrational opinion that the divine nature is subject to the law of human nature, they assumed that the Father is older than the Son. Therefore the divine Apostle, by means of a likeness, clearly shows that the Only-begotten Son is both from God and coeternal with God. He called Him “the brightness of glory” (Heb 1:3), and brightness has its being from fire and abides with fire. Brightness comes forth together with fire, and a ray together with the sun. For as soon as there is the sun, there are rays. Yet the sun is the cause of the rays, and fire is the cause of brightness. It is not the sun that comes from the rays, but the rays are begotten from the sun, and brightness is from fire.

Thus the Only-begotten Son, although He is begotten of the Father, is coexistent with Him who begot Him, as word is to mind, as brightness to fire, as ray to the sun. But word, brightness, and ray are not self-subsistent in themselves. They have subsistence in that from which they proceed. God the Word, the brightness of glory, is not some non-self-subsistent power of the Father, but a living, self-subsistent Hypostasis. He is called not simply Word, but God the Word, and He is not only “the brightness of glory,” but also “the image of His Hypostasis.”

Since the Divine could not be depicted clearly by one likeness, we learn this in some measure from many likenesses. The Apostle, by saying “brightness of glory,” teaches coeternity. By saying “image of His Hypostasis,” he shows exact likeness and also teaches the distinction of the Hypostases. By naming Him Word, he depicts the impassibility of the birth.

So that, hearing of the Son, we may not fall into human conjectures and think that the Creator of all things was born like us, the Evangelist called Him Word. By this he teaches that that birth is free from every passion. For our mind, in begetting a word, has no need of union with a woman, and suffers no division or flow. Being complete, it produces a complete word. Therefore by this we are taught both the impassibility of the birth and the eternity of the Only-begotten.

Contemplating this throne before the Savior's coming in the flesh, the prophet Isaiah says: "I saw the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up" (Is 6:1), and so forth. For no one has ever seen the Father.

He Who then appeared to the prophet was the Son. The psalmist also says: "Thy throne is established of old; Thou art from everlasting" (Ps 92:2). Since there are many testimonies concerning this, let these suffice for the shortness of time.

Having understood this, Paul, wise in God, as though inspired by God, rose above all earthly likenesses and defined it thus. The Son is "the radiance of the glory and the image of the hypostasis" of the Father. By the first likeness he signifies co-eternity, and by the second, hypostatic being.

In the sun we find three such constituent features. The first is the bodily essence, which is the sun itself. Then follows its radiance, which also remains in it. The third is the heat, which extends from its brightness to us and reaches us.

Thus, if an analogy with this heavenly body can help disclose anything, I think this deserves attention. What constitutes the bodily essence in the sun may be understood as the person of the Father in the Trinity.

The radiance of the sun is such as the person of the Son is in the Trinity. For the Apostle says: "Who, being the radiance of His glory" (Heb 1:3).

What constitutes heat in the sun will be, in the Trinity, the person of the Holy Spirit, as it is written: "Who shall hide himself from His heat?" (Ps 18:7 LXX).

For this very reason I also called Him heir, so that you might immediately understand the cause from which the inheritance proceeds and not consider Him, like the Father, unbegotten. Therefore I said “heir” and “appointed,” and for this reason I immediately added, “being the brightness.” If He was not appointed to be brightness, but was brightness, for I said, “who, being the brightness,” then it is clear that He was appointed heir in no other sense than what I have said above.

See how expressively and exactly the Apostle spoke, saying “brightness,” “being,” and “of glory.” By the word “brightness” he shows the Son’s procession from the Father by nature. For no brightness of anything whatsoever ever proceeds from anything by grace or appropriation, neither from the sun, nor from fire, nor from anything else from which brightness usually proceeds. By the expression “being” he shows that being brightness is not some new condition for Him, but that from eternity and always He remains such. Then, by saying “being,” he also points to His divine dignity. Likewise the Father said to Moses, “I am He who is” (Ex 3:14).

Therefore the words “brightness” and “being” can sufficiently show the Son’s procession from the Father by nature, Their consubstantiality, and Their coeternity. He adds the word “glory” so that you may say that He is greatly honored and one with the Father in essence, and that this glory is not more in the Father, since the Son is the brightness of the Father. Do you see in what manner, and of what, the Son is heir?

Then, further explaining what has been said, he adds: “and the image of His hypostasis.” That is, revealing in Himself the whole essence and self-existence, He is God, Master of all, almighty, Creator, and whatever else reflects the Father’s essence. The Son is everything, except being Father. Therefore He also brings forth, sustains, and directs all things by the word of His power. Do you see that He is truly heir, and how He possesses everything that belongs to the Father?

After saying divine and supra-natural things about the Son, he passes to the rest. On the one hand, this arouses the highest wonder and is supernatural. On the other hand, when you hear it, it seems low and contemptible: death and murder.

“Who, being the brightness.” He calls Him “brightness,” showing the procession from the Father as toward something outward, yet in no way and never separated from the Person from whom He proceeds, and not at all confused with Him. Rather, He descends, as it were, into abiding in Himself and in His own essence. Saint Cyril says the same in the fifth book On the Trinity. Brightness signifies consubstantiality and coeternity, as light from light. The Son is image, as the likeness of the Father’s glory. For the Son is like and inseparable from the Father, and is the only image in distinct Hypostases.

“Upholding all things,” that is, He upholds and governs all things invisible and visible by His word. He said “by the word” to show that He easily accomplishes and upholds all things. Having spoken of God the Word bare of humanity, he passed to the Incarnation, so that they might not be disturbed by the height of what had been said.

“By Himself,” he says. That is, He did not send some other subordinate, but by Himself accomplished purification, freeing us from sins in baptism through His Cross and death. “The throne of Majesty,” that is, of the Father. For after first accomplishing the remission of sins, He sat down with His flesh at the right hand of God. “On high.” He says that He sat above all, upon the very throne of the Father, and this indicates consubstantiality.

The word image, χαρακτήρ, means an engraving, a seal, an impress. Hypostasis, in ordinary usage and according to its derivation, means essence, the thing as it is. It is equivalent to οὐσία, essentia.

Later, when applied to the Persons of the Most Holy Trinity, it is used in the sense of person. But since it cannot be supposed that the word Hypostasis is used here in that sense, it must be understood as essence.

Thus the words "the image of His Hypostasis" repeat the words "the radiance of His glory." He is the true image of God the Father according to His very essence. He is the same God as the Father, consubstantial with Him (Phil 2:6).

According to Theodoret, the Arians tried to cast this Epistle out of the apostolic treasury precisely because it proves most clearly the consubstantiality and co-eternity of the Son of God with God the Father.

"Upholding all things by the word of His power." The Son of God is not only the Creator, or, as represented here, the mediating cause of the being of all creatures. He is also the Provider.

As by the word, the command, of His omnipotence He created all things, so by the same mighty word He preserves and sustains the whole world.

"Having by Himself made purification of our sins." The purification was accomplished by the human nature of Jesus Christ. After depicting the creative and providential activity of Jesus Christ as the Son of God, as God, the Apostle immediately depicts His activity according to His humanity.

In this way he shows that in the one person of Jesus Christ two natures were united, the divine and the human. Jesus Christ accomplished the purification mentioned as High Priest, offering Himself as a sacrifice for the sins of men.

"He sat down at the right hand of the throne of Majesty on high," that is, in the heavens, as below in Heb 8:1.

Finally, the completion of the great work of salvation accomplished by Christ was the exaltation, or glorification, of His humanity. He sat upon the throne of God's glory together with God. This signifies power and glory equal to those of God Himself.

Considering together the first three verses of Hebrews, we find in them the fullest teaching, though briefly expressed, concerning the Person of Jesus Christ. He is the Son of God, consubstantial with God the Father, co-eternal and equal to Him.

He is the Creator and Provider of all creatures, and the possessor, the heir, of all things. Being at once God and man in one person, He appeared in the world in the last days.

He revealed God and His will to men fully and finally, so that there will be no need of a new revelation. As man, He redeemed men from sins, became their High Priest and sacrifice, and for such abasement was exalted to dwell with God on the throne of majesty.