Vos on Hebrews

Geerhardus Vos is hardly light reading, and even I find him to be too dense on a fairly regular basis. But I have found that if someone really sticks with him, Vos can yield a lot of insight into how to understand Scripture in a redemptive-historical way. It's hard work, and it doesn't always pay off. But often enough, it does.

Vos really provides some fairly understandable gems regarding the book of Hebrews and its treatment of 'covenant'. Hebrews is the one book of the NT that directly uses 'covenant' language very heavily. For Vos, the deemphasis on covenant in the rest of the NT is the result of a momentous change in the development of redemption. Under the new administration, a person's whole manner of life has become determined by their relation to Christ. In most of the NT, covenant is used to refer to the old administration in contrast with the new, and this use is indeed present in Hebrews as well. Like the rest of the NT, Hebrews is magnifying the contrast between the old Mosaic legislation and the new covenant brought in by Christ. However, Hebrews goes farther than Jesus or Paul in its stress on covenant. Why? Because in Hebrews, 'covenant' becomes a valuable concept that is theologically suggestive. The covenant becomes effective as a result of the death of the covenant-maker. The covenant is certain; the death of Christ inevitably secures all the effects for which the covenant was intended.

One of the main aspects of the covenant idea in Hebrews is that of covenantal fellowship and intimacy with God. The new covenant is the ultimate and final covenant, in that the will and law of God are now internalized in a way that is beyond all previous covenants. This is part of the reason man now has no excuse before God, because he cannot claim ignorance in regards to his covenantal status before God. The new covenant has been written on the hearts of all, so that is a way, everyone is in a covenantal relationship with God in a way that Christ's death certified and solidified. This is a wonderful thing for the believer. It is decidedly not wonderful for the unbeliever.

In addition, Vos is quite good in comparing the Hebrew 'berith' with the LXX use of diatheke as its Greek equivalent. Etymologically, berith does not clearly emphasize the divine sovereignty and will in regulating the religious life of Israel, even though the OT as a whole clearly teaches this. For Vos, the diatheke etymology actually enhances the congruity between the meaning of the word itself and the conceptual idea that is being expressed in berith. Put simply, there is great congruity in the concept of covenant between the OT and NT, even though the etymology is not quite as clean.

Lastly, Vos thinks the author of Hebrews was unusually oriented toward a philosophical approach to revelation. While Paul in particular greatly stresses the practical in his writings, the author of Hebrews brings with him a very well-defined high-level doctrinal conception of the Christian faith. Hebrews is a very mature and thoroughly theological treatise from start to finish. Vos believes that unlike Paul, the author of Hebrews applies the already/not yet eschatology of Paul to the concept of covenant. The new covenant is the world to come, while the present world is equated with the old covenant. Redemptive history in Hebrews is expounded within the concept of covenant, and this makes Hebrews unique. But Hebrews actually goes farther than this. In agreeing with Paul that two ages exist side by side rather than successively, the linking of the two worlds with two covenants helps solve the problem of how the Old can prefigure the New and be identical in substance. For Hebrews, the same world of heavenly spiritual realities which has now come to light in Christ already existed under the course of the old covenant as well. This means that those under the old covenant, even though they were not privy to the grand revelation of Jesus Christ, had access and even communion with the higher world. The relation of the two covenants is not purely evolutionary, but organic. The way of salvation did not somehow change with the coming of Christ. One of the reasons this is so is because of the continuity of covenantal theology that links the OT and NT, while at the same time properly highlighting the staggering move forward in redemptive history through the Incarnation. Good stuff!