Hebrews 1:4-6
New Catholic Bible
4 So he became as far superior to the angels
as the name he has inherited is superior to theirs.
The Son of God, Superior to the Angels[a]
Messianic Enthronement.[b] For to which of the angels did God ever say,“You are my Son;
this day I have begotten you”?
Or again,
“I will be his Father,
and he will be my Son”?[c]
6 And again, when he brings his firstborn into the world, he says,
“Let all the angels of God pay him homage.”
Footnotes
- Hebrews 1:5 How can God, who is inaccessible and transcendent, communicate with human beings? Are not intermediaries needed to establish the link between the heavenly world and the terrestrial one? This was a question that preoccupied many Jewish circles after the Exile. In reply they insisted on the role and importance of beings who were neither human nor divine: angels. They even imagined that the intervention of the angels was needed to bring the Law to Moses (see Heb 2:2; Gal 3:19). However, if it is necessary to multiply intermediaries between God and humans, does not this mean that humanity remains decisively distant from the Lord? The perspective is completely reversed when one speaks of Christ.
5
No one is like him in intimacy with God, neither is anyone like him in proximity to humans. The link between heaven and earth is established in his very Person. It is the principal aim of the Letter to the Hebrews to hold to these two aspects of Christ: he is united through and through with God, and he is completely one with human beings. In this first part of the Letter, he is presented as Son of God and brother to human beings. - Hebrews 1:5 In Christ God has spoken in a definitive way (Heb 1:2), and the author sees this truth already proclaimed in the Old Testament. He cites a series of passages, almost all of which were regarded in the Jewish tradition as announcements of the Messiah. What are angels? Merely subordinates, mediators, and messengers ever being replaced. But the Son is the Firstborn. This is the title of honor reserved for Christ that includes a priority over creatures (see Col 1:15). He receives adoration, is enthroned, and partakes unceasingly in the status of God.
- Hebrews 1:5 I will be his Father,/and he will be my Son: before the coming of Christ, this text from 2 Sam 7:14 and the text of Ps 2 were acknowledged to be Messianic.
