JESUS AS THE ETERNAL CREATOR IN HEBREWS

The book of Hebrews describes Jesus as the unchangeable Creator and Sustainer of all creation, even going as far as to take specific Old Testament texts about YHWH and applying them to the Son:

“God, having spoken long ago to the fathers in the prophets in many portions and in many ways, in these last days spoke to us in His Son, whom He appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds, who is the radiance of His glory and the exact representation of His nature, and upholds all things by the word of His power; who, having accomplished cleansing for sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high… And when He again brings the firstborn into the world, He says, “And let all the angels of God worship Him.’… But of the Son He says, ‘Your throne, O God (ho theos), is forever and ever, And the scepter of uprightness is the scepter of Your kingdom. You have loved righteousness and hated lawlessness; Therefore God, Your God, has anointed You With the oil of gladness above Your companions.’ And, ‘You, Lord [the Son], in the beginning founded the earth, And the heavens are the works of Your hands; They will perish, but You remain; And they all will wear out like a garment, And like a mantle You will roll them up; Like a garment they will also be changed. But You are the same, And Your years will not come to an end.’” Hebrews 1:1-3, 6, 8-12 Legacy Standard Bible (LSB)

Note how the inspired writer has the Father attributing to Jesus the following OT verses in which angels are commanded to worship YHWH,

“Rejoice with him, you heavens, and let all of God’s angels worship him. Rejoice with his people, you Gentiles, and let all the angels be strengthened in him. For he will avenge the blood of his children; he will take revenge against his enemies. He will repay those who hate him and cleanse his people’s land.” Deuteronomy 32:43 New Living Translation (NLT)

And where YHWH is described as the eternal Creator of all things:

Do Not Hide Your Face from Me A Prayer of the afflicted when he is faint and pours out his complaint before Yahweh. O Yahweh, hear my prayer! And let my cry for help come to You… But You, O Yahweh, abide forever, And the remembrance of Your name from generation to generation… I say, ‘O my God, do not take me away in the midst of my days, Your years are from generation to all generations. Of old You founded the earth, And the heavens are the work of Your hands. Even they will perish, but You will remain; And all of them will wear out like a garment; Like clothing You will change them and they will be changed. But You are the same, And Your years will not come to an end.’” Psalm 102:1, 12, 24-27 LSB  

This proves that for Hebrews, Jesus is none other than YHWH God Almighty who became a flesh and blood human being:

“But we do see Him who was made for a little while lower than the angels—Jesus, because of the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, so that by the grace of God He might taste death for everyone. For it was fitting for Him, for whom are all things, and through whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to perfect the author of their salvation through sufferings. For both He who sanctifies and those who are being sanctified are all of One; for which reason He is not ashamed to call them brothers, saying, ‘I will recount Your name to My brothers, In the midst of the assembly I will sing Your praise.’ And again, ‘I will put My trust in Him.” And again, ‘Behold, I and the children whom God has given Me.’ Therefore, since the children share in flesh and blood, He Himself likewise also partook of the same, that through death He might render powerless him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, and might free those who through fear of death were subject to slavery all their lives. For assuredly He does not give help to angels, but He gives help to the seed of Abraham. Therefore, He had to be made like His brothers in all things, so that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. For since He Himself was tempted in that which He has suffered, He is able to come to help those who are tempted.” Hebrews 2:9-18 LSB

“For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins. Therefore, when He comes into the world, He says, ‘Sacrifice and offering You have not desired, But a body You have prepared for Me; In burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin You have taken no pleasure. Then I said, “Behold, I have come, In the scroll of the book it is written of Me, To do Your will, O God.”’ After saying above, ‘Sacrifices and offerings and burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin You have not desired, nor have You taken pleasure in them’ (which are offered according to the Law), then He said, ‘Behold, I have come to do Your will.’ He takes away the first in order to establish the second. By this will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. And every priest stands daily ministering and offering time after time the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins; but He, having offered one sacrifice for sins for all time, sat down at the right hand of God, waiting from that time until His enemies are put as a footstool for His feet. For by one offering He has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.” Hebrews 10:4-14 LSB

As the late New Testament scholar F. F. Bruce explained in his commentary on Hebrews:

10-12 (f) The sixth quotation is taken from Ps. 102:25-27 (LXX 101:26-28). The psalm, which begins “Hear my prayer, O Yahweh,” is truly described in its superscription as “a prayer of one afflicted, when he is faint, and pours out his complaint before Yahweh.” Both he and Zion, his city, have experienced the judgment of God, but he makes confident supplication for mercy and restoration for himself and Zion, that men and women may assemble there once more to give praise to God. He is oppressed by a sense of the brevity of his personal span of life, with which he contrasts THE ETERNAL BEING OF GOD. In comparison with his own short life, heaven and earth are long-lived; yet heaven and earth must pass away. They had their beginning WHEN GOD CREATED THEM, and they will grow old and disappear one day; but THE GOD WHO CREATED THEM EXISTED BEFORE THEY DID, AND HE WILL SURVIVE THEIR DISAPPEARANCE. As one man in his lifetime outlives many successive suits of clothes, so God has seen and will yet see many successful material universes, BUT HE HIMSELF IS ETERNAL AND UNCHANGING.

The words in which the psalmist ADDRESSES GOD, however, ARE HERE APPLIED TO THE SON, as clearly as the words of Ps. 45:6f. were applied to him in vv. 8 and 9. What justification can be pleaded for our author’s applying them thus? First, as he has already said in v. 2, it was through the Son that the universe was made. The angels were but worshiping spectators when the earth was founded,97 but the Son was the Father’s agent in the work. He therefore can be understood as the one who is addressed in the words: 

Of old thou didst lay the foundation of the earth;

And the heavens are the work of thy hands.

Moreover, in the Septuagint text the person to whom these words are spoken is addressed as “Lord”98 (“Thou, Lord, in the beginning didst lay the foundation of the earth”); and it is God who addresses him thus. Whereas in the Hebrew text the suppliant is the speaker from the beginning of the psalm, in the Greek text his prayer comes to an end with v. 22;99 and the next words read as follows:

He answered100 him in the way of his strength:

“Declare to me101 the shortness of my days:

Bring me not up in the midst of my days.

Thy years are throughout all generations.

Thou, Lord, in the beginning didst lay the foundation of the earth….”

This is God’s answer to the suppliant; he bids him to acknowledge the shortness of God’s set time (for the restoration of Jerusalem, as in v. 13) and not summon him to act when that set time has only half expired, while he assures him that he and his servants’ children will be preserved forever.102 But to whom (a Christian reader of the Septuagint might well ask) could God speak in words like these? And whom would God himself address as “Lord,” AS THE MAKER OF EARTH AND HEAVEN?103 Our author knows of one person only to whom such terms could be appropriate, and that is the Son of God.

That our author understood this quotation from Ps. 102 as an utterance of God seems plain from the way in which it is linked by the simple conjunction “and” to the preceding quotation from Ps. 45. Both quotations fall under the same rubric: “But to104 the Son [God says].” If in the preceding quotation the Son is addressed by God as “God,” in this one he is addressed by God as “Lord.” And we need not doubt that to our author the title “Lord” CONVEYS THE HIGHEST SENSE OF ALL, “THE NAME WHICH IS ABOVE EVERY NAME.” No wonder that the Son has ascribed to him a dignity which surpasses all the names angels bear. Nor is our author the ONLY New Testament writer to ascribe to Christ THE HIGHEST OF DIVINE NAMES, or TO APPLY TO HIM Old Testament scriptures which in their primary context REFER TO YAHWEH.105 (F. F. Bruce, The Epistle to the Hebrews (New International Commentary on the New Testament) [William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, Grand Rapids, MI 1997], pp. 61-63; emphasis mine)

103. It is unlikely that this passage is primarily responsible for our author’s description of the Son in v. 2 as the one through whom God made the universe–a description which probably owes more to Prov. 8:22-31 than to any other OT passage–but it could be taken as corroborative testimony for the identification of Wisdom in Prov. 8:22ff. with the Messiah… 

105. Cf. the application to Christ of Isa. 45:23 in Phil. 2:10f. (see p. 50, n. 37), and of Isa. 8:13 (“Yahweh of hosts, him you shall sanctify”) in 1 Pet. 3:15 (“sanctify in your hearts Christ as Lord”). (Ibid., p. 63)

I cite a few more commentaries for good measure. All emphasis is mine:

In verses 10–12 the sixth citation (Ps. 102:25–27) serves to recapitulate the divine dignity of the incarnate Son of God as the Creator (v. 2) and his majesty as the eternal Yahweh. (The divine name is missing in the Hebrew text, but the Septuagint’s “O Lord” may bear witness to an earlier form of the Hebrew text. In any case, Yahweh is unmistakably being addressed, as the entire psalm demonstrates.) (Robert S. Rayburn, “Hebrews,” in Evangelical Commentary on the Bible [Baker Reference Library (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1995), Volume 3, P. 1132)

1:10–12 In vv. 10–12, the author introduced a sixth quotation, this one from Ps 102:25–27. The quotation affirms, in reference to the universe, the Son’s activity in creation (v. 10) as well as his eschatological activity (vv. 11–12), with the focus on the latter. A conceptual inclusio of beginning and ending occurs with the use of “in the beginning” (v. 10a, an allusion to Gen 1:1) and “your years will never end” (v. 12d). The eternality of the Son has already been established in the prologue, which states that it was through the agency of the Son that the universe was created, and vv. 7–8 affirm his eternality also. Now this theme is developed in vv. 10–12.

Although Psalm 102 was originally addressed to God, the author of Hebrews quoted it as addressed to the Son by virtue of the introductory “He also says,” which continues the introductory formula of v. 8. This quotation constitutes the third direct address of the Father to the Son. The Son has already been addressed by God as “God,” and now the words of Psalm 102 are addressed to the Son who is called “Lord.” The quotation is from the LXX with a few alterations, including the addition of kurios (“Lord”), the movement of su (“you”) to the clause beginning for emphasis (it could be rendered, “In the beginning it was you who …”), and the addition of the phrase “like a garment” before “and you will be changed” (v. 12b). Whether the latter was a part of an alternative LXX text used by the author or was inserted by him for clarity is unknown. Where the LXX has “and like a robe you will change [allassō] them” (Ps 101:27) in v. 12, our author has “like a robe you will roll them up [helissō],” which heightens the vivid imagery and illustrates the author’s penchant for word play.

The NIV does not reflect that su (“you”) heads its clause in v. 10a (after kai, “and”). But it was important for the author theologically, who was stressing the Son’s existence before all creation. Since he preexists all things, he can be the creator of all things. This quotation serves, by its very structure, the author’s purpose of identifying Jesus as the Son who existed eternally before all things were created and whose eternality will extend beyond all created things.

“You laid the foundations” is an idiomatic expression for the act of creation (v. 10a). That the heavens are the work of God’s “hands” is a metonymy referring to divine power. The phrase “work of your hands” (v. 10b) is placed first in the clause for emphasis just like “you” (v. 10a). All the focus is on the activity of the Son as Lord, who was God’s agent in the creation of the universe. Contrast is intended in v. 11 where both the pronouns “they” and “you” are overtly expressed to signal emphasis. The antecedent of “they” includes both the “earth” and the “heavens” (v. 10).

The point of contrast in vv. 11–12 is the perishability of the universe against the eternality of the Son, hence the simile of the worn out, rolled up garment. The main point is the twice repeated “you remain” in reference to the Son. The first (v. 11) renders the Greek word diameneis, with the prefix dia and the present tense emphasizing permanent existence, namely, eternality. The second “remain” (v. 12) is simply the present indicative of the Greek verb einai (“to be”) preceded by the emphatic use of the pronoun “you,” which the NIV renders as “you remain the same.” The contrast is underlined by the pronoun “you” with the meaning of “but you yourself (unlike the perishing universe) remain the same.” There is probably little or no distinction to be seen in the use of himation (“garment”) and peribolaion (“robe”). Both refer to an outer garment that “wears out,” which here describes the universe (v. 11) and elsewhere (8:13), interestingly enough, the first covenant (cf. Isa 50:9; 51:6).

These two verses contain a clear example of both semantic and grammatical chiasm. There are seven propositions arranged in inverse order that can be seen in both the propositional content as well as the verb tenses:

They will perish  (future tense)  
But you remain  (present tense)  
They will all wear out like a garment  (future tense)  
You will roll them up like a robe  (future tense)  
Like a garment they will be changed  (future tense)  
But you remain the same  (present tense)  
And your years will never end  (future tense)  

The point of the quotation is to stress the impermanence of creation as contrasted with the eternality of the Son. In reference to this quotation, Ellingworth stated that “future tenses refer to change, and present tenses to a permanent state.” The verb tenses in vv. 10–12 (present, aorist, and future) explicate the Son’s eternality in contrast with the created universe’s temporality. Verse 12 concludes that the Son “will remain the same” forever and that his “years will never end.” This quotation serves, by its very structure, the author’s purpose of identifying Jesus as the eternal Son

This quotation also prepares the reader for what is brought out later in 7:3, where Jesus the Son is compared to Melchizedek as the eternal, abiding high priest who “remains forever.” Finally, the transitoriness of the old covenant is a theme that the author steadily built to a climax at 8:10–13. God considers the old covenant to be “worn out” and he has already made the change to the new covenant through the blood of Jesus the Son. Psalm 102:25–27 provides the author with a text to be interpreted messianically, a text to establish the eternality of the Son in comparison to the universe, and by analogy, it provides a portent of what is to come later in the epistle with respect to the relationship of the old covenant to the new covenant—temporariness versus permanence. (David L. Allen, Hebrews, The New American Commentary [B & H Publishing Group, Nashville, TN 2010], pp. 182–184)

8 The transitory creatureliness of the angels, mighty as they are, is overshadowed by the Son’s deity and eternal sovereignty affirmed by the quotation of Pss 45:6-7 and 102:25-27 in vv. 8-12. The God who addressed the Messiah as “Son” in Ps 2:7 addresses him as “God” in Ps 45:6-7… This striking ascription of deity is repeated in v. 9 and is probably the chief factor in the pastor’s choice of this psalm.54 Like the term “Son,” this ascription has much greater significance when used to address the one at God’s right hand than when applied to the Davidic King.55 This affirmation of the Son’s deity will be substantiated and augmented in vv. 10-12 by his identification AS SOVEREIGN CREATOR and ultimate Judge. (Gareth Lee Cockerill, The Epistle to the Hebrews (New International Commentary on the New Testament (NICNT)) [William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, Grand Rapids, MI 2012], pp. 108-109)

10 After affirming that the Son was “God,” it was appropriate to ascribe Ps 102:25-27 to him. This psalm fits seamlessly with Ps 45:6-7 that the pastor uses a mere “and” to connect the two.67 He quotes Ps 102:25 in v. 10 to affirm the Son’s CREATORSHIP and Ps 102:26-27 in vv. 11-12 to affirm his sovereign deity and role as final judge of all.68 This Scripture confirms and amplifies the prologue’s description of the Son AS CREATOR, SUSTAINER, AND UNIVERSAL HEIR.

The pastor has put the pronoun “you” at the beginning of v. 10 in order to pick up the “your” at the end of v. 9.69 The title “Lord” follows naturally from the “God” of vv. 8-9 and facilitates easy application of this psalm to Christ.70 “From the beginning” IS A CLEAR REFERENCE TO THE TIME OF CREATION.71 “The earth” and “the heavens” encompass THE WHOLE CREATED ORDER. The attribution of creation directly to the Son GOES BEYOND THE AGENCY OF v. 2 AND THUS UNDERSCORES THE INCLUSION OF THE SON WITHIN THE GODHEAD.72 When Scripture speaks of the earth’s “founding,” it affirms the solidity of creation.73 Thus use of this term in v. 10 emphasizes the sovereignty of the one described in v. 11 as “rolling up” this solid creation as if it were nothing more than a piece of cloth.

11-12 By continuing the quotation from Psalm 102 the pastor contrasts THE ETERNITY OF THE SON and the mutability of the creation over which he is sovereign. What he has made he also brings to its end.

The two ways in which the pastor deviates from the LXX text are important for determining his message. First, in v. 12a he appears to have substituted “you will roll [them] up” for “you will change [them].”74

The eternity of the Son is introduced in line (b), “but you remain,” continued in line (b1), “but you are the same,” and concluded in the final line (a1), “and your years will never cease” (cf. 13:8). The Son’s role in creation makes it obvious that these verses refer to a life WHICH IS ETERNAL and not merely endless.  

Verse 12a (line d) brings both of these themes together. It is not just that the creation is temporal AND THE SON IS UNCHANGING AND ETERNAL. He is the one who will bring the creation to its end: “As a covering you [the Son] will roll them [the heaven and earth] up.”79 (Ibid., pp. 111-114)

FURTHER READING

The Book of Hebrews and Jesus as Creator

JESUS THE ETERNAL CREATOR AND SUSTAINER

THE NWT TESTIFIES THAT THE TRINITY IS THE ETERNAL CREATOR!