13:17 Obey your leaders and submit to them, for they keep watch over your souls and will give an account for their work. 3 Let them do this 4 with joy and not with complaints, for this would be no advantage for you.
3:8 “Do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion, in the day of testing in the wilderness.
3:9 “There your fathers tested me and tried me, 5 and they saw my works for forty years.
3:12 See to it, 6 brothers and sisters, 7 that none of you has 8 an evil, unbelieving heart that forsakes 9 the living God. 10
4:1 Therefore we must be wary 11 that, while the promise of entering his rest remains open, none of you may seem to have come short of it.
1 tc Most witnesses, including several important ones (א2 A C D H Ψ 0243 1739 1881 Ï lat sy bo), conclude the letter with ἀμήν (amhn, “amen”). Such a conclusion is routinely added by scribes to NT books because a few of these books originally had such an ending (cf. Rom 16:27; Gal 6:18; Jude 25). A majority of Greek witnesses have the concluding ἀμήν in every NT book except Acts, James, and 3 John (and even in these books, ἀμήν is found in some witnesses). It is thus a predictable variant. Further, there is sufficient testimony (Ì46 א* Ivid 6 33 sa) for the lack of the particle, rendering its omission the preferred reading.
2 tn Grk “which,” but showing the reason.
3 tn Or “as ones who will give an account”; Grk “as giving an account.”
4 tn Grk “that they may do this.”
4 tn Grk “tested me by trial.”
5 tn Or “take care.”
6 tn Grk “brothers.” See note on the phrase “brothers and sisters” in 2:11.
7 tn Grk “that there not be in any of you.”
8 tn Or “deserts,” “rebels against.”
9 tn Grk “in forsaking the living God.”
6 tn Grk “let us fear.”
7 sn A quotation from Prov 4:26. The phrase make straight paths for your feet is figurative for “stay on God’s paths.”
8 tn Grk “while it is said.”
9 tn Grk “today if you hear his voice.”
10 sn A quotation from Ps 95:7b-8.
9 tc Most witnesses, including some important ones (א D2 1881 Ï), read δεσμοῖς μου (desmoi" mou, “my imprisonment”) here, a reading that is probably due to the widespread belief in the early Christian centuries that Paul was the author of Hebrews (cf. Phil 1:7; Col 4:18). It may have been generated by the reading δεσμοῖς without the μου (so Ì46 Ψ 104 pc), the force of which is so ambiguous (lit., “you shared the sufferings with the bonds”) as to be virtually nonsensical. Most likely, δεσμοῖς resulted when a scribe made an error in copying δεσμίοις (desmioi"), a reading which makes excellent sense (“[of] those in prison”) and is strongly supported by early and significant witnesses of the Alexandrian and Western texttypes (A D* H 6 33 81 1739 lat sy co). Thus, δεσμίοις best explains the rise of the other readings on both internal and external grounds and is strongly preferred.
10 tn Grk “you yourselves.”
10 tn Grk “he”; the referent (God) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
11 sn Ps 95 does not mention David either in the text or the superscription. It is possible that the writer of Hebrews is attributing the entire collection of psalms to David (although some psalms are specifically attributed to other individuals or groups).
12 tn Grk “as it has been said before” (see Heb 3:7).
13 tn Grk “today if you hear his voice.”