What Does Hebrews 1:6 Mean?

(6) **And again**.—There seems little doubt that the true translation is, *And when He again leadeth* (literally, *shall have led*)* the Firstborn into the world He saith.* The position of “again” (in the Greek) shows that it does not indicate a new step in the argument, but must be joined with “leadeth.” The speaker (“He saith”) is God, speaking in the word of Scripture; in this Epistle quotations from the Old Testament are usually thus introduced. The quotation involves some difficulty. It cannot be *directly* taken from Psalm 97:7, “worship Him, all His angels;” for the citations from the Greek Bible in this Epistle are usually so exact that we cannot believe the writer would have so altered the form of the sentence now before us. In Deuteronomy 32:43, however, we find words identical with those of the text in most copies of the LXX.; but there is nothing answering to them in the Hebrew, and there is no sufficient reason for supposing that the clause has dropped out of the Hebrew text. There are similarities (both of subject and of diction) between the Psalm and the last section of the Song of Moses, which make it easy to see how the words could find their way into the Song. The Psalm belongs to a cycle (Psalms 93, 95-99) whose theme is the triumphant announcement of the coming of God’s kingdom, by which was denoted (as the readers of the Epistle knew) the kingdom of Christ. In the divine plan the predicted Theophany was coincident with the fulfilment of the Messianic hope. In both Psalm and Song we read of the judgment exercised and the vengeance inflicted by the enthroned King. (Comp. Psalm 2:9.) This agreement in tone and subject renders less important the question whether the Hebrew original of the Song really contained the words. The thought was familiar from Scripture, and in this very connection. When the Messiah, reigning as the Firstborn of God (see Hebrews 1:5), shall appear for judgment—that is, when God leadeth a second time His Firstborn into “the world of men” (see Hebrews 2:5), that He may receive full possession of His inheritance—He saith, And let all angels of God worship Him. The word here rendered “leadeth in” is in frequent use for the introduction of Israel (typically God’s “firstborn,” Exodus 4:22) into the land of Canaan. It should, perhaps, be noted that, though in Psalm 97:7 “angels” may not be perfectly exact as a rendering of the Hebrew *Elohim, the* verse so distinctly expresses the homage done to the King by superhuman powers, that its fitness for the argument here is obvious.