2:5 For he did not put the world to come, 6 about which we are speaking, 7 under the control of angels.
1:13 But to which of the angels 14 has he ever said, “Sit at my right hand until I make your enemies a footstool for your feet”? 15
2:7 You made him lower than the angels for a little while.
You crowned him with glory and honor. 16
1:5 For to which of the angels did God 17 ever say, “You are my son! Today I have fathered you”? 18 And in another place 19 he says, 20 “I will be his father and he will be my son.” 21
1 sn The Greek correlative conjunctions μέν and δέ (men and de) emphasize the contrastive parallelism of vs. 7 (what God says about the angels) over against vv. 8-9 and vv. 10-12 (what God says about the son).
2 tn Grk “He who makes.”
3 sn A quotation from Ps 104:4.
4 tn Grk “having become.” This is part of the same sentence that extends from v. 1 through v. 4 in the Greek text.
5 tn Most modern English translations attempt to make the comparison somewhat smoother by treating “name” as if it were the subject of the second element: “as the name he has inherited is superior to theirs” (cf. NAB, NIV, NRSV, CEV). However, the Son is the subject of both the first and second elements: “he became so far better”; “he has inherited a name.” The present translation maintains this parallelism even though it results in a somewhat more awkward rendering.
7 sn The phrase the world to come means “the coming inhabited earth,” using the Greek term which describes the world of people and their civilizations.
8 sn See the previous reference to the world in Heb 1:6.
10 tn Grk “and the city”; the conjunction is omitted in translation since it seems to be functioning epexegetically – that is, explaining further what is meant by “Mount Zion.”
13 sn This is a vague allusion to people described in scripture and extra-biblical literature and may include Abraham and Sarah (Gen 18:2-15), Lot (Gen 19:1-14), Gideon (Judg 6:11-18), Manoah (Judg 13:3-22), and possibly Tobit (Tob 12:1-20).
16 tn Or “And again when he brings.” The translation adopted in the text looks forward to Christ’s second coming to earth. Some take “again” to introduce the quotation (as in 1:5) and understand this as Christ’s first coming, but this view does not fit well with Heb 2:7. Others understand it as his exaltation/ascension to heaven, but this takes the phrase “into the world” in an unlikely way.
17 sn A quotation combining themes from Deut 32:43 and Ps 97:7.
19 sn The message spoken through angels refers to the OT law, which according to Jewish tradition was mediated to Moses through angels (cf. Deut 33:2; Ps 68:17-18; Acts 7:38, 53; Gal 3:19; and Jub. 1:27, 29; Josephus, Ant. 15.5.3 [15.136]).
20 tn Grk “through angels became valid and every violation.”
22 sn The parallel phrases to which of the angels in vv. 5 and 13 show the unity of this series of quotations (vv. 5-14) in revealing the superiority of the Son over angels (v. 4).
23 sn A quotation from Ps 110:1.
25 tc Several witnesses, many of them early and important (א A C D* P Ψ 0243 0278 33 1739 1881 al lat co), have at the end of v 7, “You have given him dominion over the works of your hands.” Other
28 tn Grk “he”; the referent (God) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
29 tn Grk “I have begotten you.”
30 tn Grk “And again,” quoting another OT passage.
31 tn The words “he says” are not in the Greek text but are supplied to make a complete English sentence. In the Greek text this is a continuation of the previous sentence, but English does not normally employ such long and complex sentences.
32 tn Grk “I will be a father to him and he will be a son to me.”
31 tn Or “who was made a little lower than the angels.”
32 tn Grk “because of the suffering of death.”
33 tn Grk “would taste.” Here the Greek verb does not mean “sample a small amount” (as a typical English reader might infer from the word “taste”), but “experience something cognitively or emotionally; come to know something” (cf. BDAG 195 s.v. γεύομαι 2).