What Does Hebrews 2:17 Mean?
Therefore he was bound to become like his brothers in all things, so that he might become a compassionate and steady high priest in the things toward God, to make a covering for the shortcomings of the people.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
Wherefore in all things it behoved him to be made like unto his brethren, that he might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make reconciliation for the sins of the people.THE KEY
The one who represents people before God is made like them, and his work meets their missing at its point of need.
THE MEANING
You are met by a high priest made like you in every way, whose mercy and steadiness do not stand at a distance from human life. He acts before God on behalf of the people’s missing, so your failure is the very thing his work addresses.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
This undoes the belief that your failures place you beyond God’s reach: the priest’s work is directed toward the people’s missing.
THE ROOT
ἱλάσκεσθαι
hilaskesthai
GROWS FROM
ἱλασκ-
To make atonement, to render propitious.
“make a covering for” in this verse is hilaskesthai. The word family joins the priest’s act of making atonement with the language of the atoning means or place. The verse presents reconciliation as an act that addresses the people’s missing before God.
ALSO GROWS
hilasmos: Atonement; propitiation.
ἱλασμός
In 1 John 2:2, the same word family names the atoning work associated with the people’s missing.
hilastērion: Mercy seat; means or place of atonement.
ἱλαστήριον
This branch links atonement with the place of mercy, deepening the priestly setting of the verse.
ἁμαρτίας
hamartias
GROWS FROM
ἁμαρτ-
To miss, or fail to reach the mark.
“shortcomings” in this verse is hamartias. The verse names what the priest addresses as the people’s missing. The word describes what is met by his work; it does not place the people beyond that work.
ALSO GROWS
hamartanō: To miss or fail.
ἁμαρτάνω
The verb shares the seed of “sins” and makes the sense of missing visible.
hamartōlos: One who misses; a sinner.
ἁμαρτωλός
This related word shows how the same root can describe a person through the experience of missing.
πιστός
pistos
GROWS FROM
πιστ-/πιστε-
Trustworthy, reliable; firm and steady.
“steady” in this verse is pistos. The priest’s faithfulness is steadiness in the work he does for the people before God. This word family connects reliable character with the trust that can rest on it.
ALSO GROWS
pistis: Trust; reliance.
πίστις
The related noun shows the trust that rests on what is reliable.
pisteuō: To trust; to rely on.
πιστεύω
The verb carries the same family into the act of placing trust.
THE PATTERN
Human frailty is met by divine care that draws close and acts for people’s good.
For on that day the priest makes a covering for you, to cleanse you, so that you may be clean from all your shortcomings before the LORD.As a father has compassion on his children, so the LORD has compassion on those in awe of him.For we do not have a high priest who cannot suffer alongside our weaknesses, but one who has been tested in every way as we are, apart from falling short.THE THREAD
And he is the covering for our shortcomings, and not for ours alone, but also for the shortcomings of the whole world.Hebrews names the priest’s act of making atonement for the people’s missing; John uses a noun from the same Greek word family to name the atoning one. The shared root reveals the work as both an action and a person.
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