2. This epistle is more calmly and logically written than it was possible for the energetic Paul to have written ; all the analogies between Judaism and Christianity are calmly investigated and calmly adduced ; the materials are arranged in the strictest order, and carefully wrought out according to this disposition, and conclusion follows conclusion with the greatest regularity ; the language also is rotund and choice, and the representation unusually clear. All this is unlike Paul ' (Eichhorn, Einleit. 459). It will perhaps surprise our readers to find the au thor of the Epistle to the Romans pronounced so utterly incapable of calm, connected, and logical reasoning, that it is inconceivable he should have written the Epistle to the Hebrews. If there be one thing for which Paul's writings are more re markable than another, it is their dialectic accuracy ; and as for calmness, whilst we admit that as a whole there is less of ardour and vehemence in this epistle than in the majority of Paul's acknowledged epistles, we think this is to be ascribed to the fact that a large portion of it is occupied with remarks of an explanatory and illustrative kind—remarks which are usually made in a calmer tone than svhere the desigm of thewriter is to expose error, or to exhort to duty; and, on the other hand, we would assert that in those parts of the epistle where his subject calls the writer to the utterance of reproof, warning, or ex hortation, the language is equally ardent with that used in any analogous passages in the writings of Paul. This brings vs to the closing part of Eich horn's objection, which relates to the use in this epistle of a more rotund, elegant, and perspicuous style than we find usually in the epistles of Paul. Now, it must be admitted here that this composi tion does partake much more of the character of a flowing, continuous discourse, than is found in the apostle's acknowledged productions. The ques tion, however, is not, Whether Paul might not for some sufficient reason prefer attempting such a dis course in this particular case ? a question which it would surely be absurd to discuss ; but, Whether, suposing him to make the attempt, it is conceiv able that he should succeed in it to the extent realized by- the writer of this epistle ? Eichhorn concludes in the negative ; but on what grounds ? Apparently on the grounds that the apostle's ac knowledged writings present no specimens of such success ; so that his argument is this : Supposing Paul to have attempted to write rhetorically, it is impossible he should have succeeded so well, be cause we find that, where lie makes no such attempt, his style is far from being rhetorical ! Of such reasoning we are content to say, Valeat quantum valere potest.' We may also hint that, in our opinion, there is no passage in the Epistle to the Hebrews, imposing as it is, which might not have flowed from the same pen which composed the Sth chapter of Romans, and the 13th of 1st Corin thians. 3. Whilst we occasionally meet Pauline ternzini, we find precisely in the leaa'ing ideas of the epistle a terminology different from that of Paul' (Tholuck, i. 39, Eng. trans].) The instances spe cified by Dr. Tholuck arc the use of lepais, 7rOtild7P, and etrrocrroXos, as desigmations of Christ ; of Otto Xo-yta, which he says is confined to this epistle ; of /.-rytPerpl-c, ; and of TeXerc.iIv, with its deriva tives in the sense in which it is used, Heb. vii. 19. Now, with regard to this objection, it may be observed, 1st, That supposing all the instances ad duced by Tholuck to be unimpeachable, and sup posing no reason could be assigned why Paul should use such in writing to Hebrews, when he did not use them in writing to others, still the objection cannot have much weight with any per son accustomed to weigh evidence, because not only is the number of Pauline termini found in this epistle far greater than the number of termini which, according to Tholuck, are foreign to the apostle to the Gentiles ;' but it is always less likely that the peculiar phrases of a writer should be borrowed hy another, than that a writer noted for the use uf pecuEar words and phrases should, in a composition of a character somewhat different from his other productions, use terms not found else where in his writings. But, 2dly, let us examine the instances adduced by Tholuck, and see whether they bear out his reasoning. Paul nowhere calls Christ /Sriest.' True ; but though Paul, in writing to churches composed more or less of Gentile con vests, whose previous ideas of priests and priestly rites were anything but favourable to their receiv ing under sacerdotal terms right notions of Christ and his work, never calls Christ a priest, is that any reason for our concluding that in writing to Jews, who had amongst them a priesthood of divine organization, and writing for the express purpose of shewing that that priesthood was typical of Christ, it is inconceivable that the apostle should have applied the term priest to Christ ? To us the difficulty would rather seem to be to conceive how, in handling such a topic, he could avoid calling Christ a priest.--' Paul nowhere calls Christ a shepherd and an apostle, as the writer of this epistle does. But the whole weight of this objection to the Pauline origin of this epistle must rest on the assumption that Paul never uses figurative appella tions of Christ in his writings ; for if he do, vvhy not here as well As elsewhere ? Now, it could only be the grossest unacquaintedness with the apostle's writings which could lead any to affirm this. The very opposite tendency is characteristic of them. Thus we find Christ termed riXos v6p,ou (Rom. x. 4), aulicovoy veperouis (xv. 8), rt. micaa ill.u7.1v (1 Cor. v. 7), II werpa (x. 4), euraprii (xv. 23), &I (IA* (2 COr. Xi. 2), ltxparmatou (Eph. 20), etc. With these instances before us, why should it be deemed so utterly incredible that Paul could have called Christ cirbaroNos and rout*, that the occur rence of such terms in the epistle before us is to be held as a reason for adjudging it not to have been written by him ? With regard to the use of oicoNo -yla in the sense of religious profession, the reader may compare the passages in which it occurs in this epistle with Rom. x. 9 ; 2 COr. ix. 13 ; I Tim.
vi. 12, and judge for himself how far such a usage is foreign to the apostle. The phrase hyttew Oak) occurs once in this epistle (vii. 19), and once in James iv. 8 ; Paul also once uses the verb ac tively (Phil. ii. 3o) ; and, on the other hand, the author of this epistle once uses it intransitively (x. 25). As there is thus a perfect analogy in the usage of the verb between the two, \vhy it should be supposed improbable that Paul should use it in reference to God, or why a phrase used by James should be deemed too Alexandrian to be used by Paul, we feel ourselves utterly at a loss to conceive. With regard to the use of reXenkv, Dr. Tholuck himself contends (AppendLr, ii. 297) that it every where in this epistle retains the idea of completing; but he cannot understand how Paul could have contemplated the work of redemption under this tenn in this epistle, since in no other of his epistles is it so used. Tbis difficulty of the learned pro fessor may, we think, be very easily removed, by remarking that it does not appear to have been Paul's design elsewhere, so fully at least as here, to represent the superiority of Christianity over Juda ism, as that arises from the former being sufficient, whilst the latter was not sufficient, to complete men in a religious point of view, i.e., to supply to them all they nced, and advance them to all of which they are capable. That this is the theme of the writer, tbe passages in which the word in question occurs show : and we see no reason why such an idea might not have occurred to Paul as well as to any other man.
Such are the objections on which the more re cent impugners of the Pauline authorship of this epistle seem inclined to lay most stress. A mul titude of others have been urged by Bertholdt, Schulz, Seyffarth, etc., which have been azrefully noticed and replied to by Stuart, but which it is un necessary to adduce here, as their futility seems very generally admitted even by those who take the anti-Pauline side.
It appears, therefore, that from the epistle itself nothing can be gathered materially unfavourable to the opinion that Paul was its author, whilst there is much in it strongly tending to support that opinion. It yet remains that we should look at the external evidence bearing on this question.
Passing by, as somewhat uncertain, the alleged testimony of Peter, who is supposed (2 Pet. iii. 15, 16) to refer to the Epistle to the Hebrews as the composition of Paul, and passing by, also, the tes timonies of the apostolic fathers, which, though very decisive as to the antiquity and canonical authority of this epistle (see Forster's Inquiry, sec. 13), yet say nothing to g-uide us to the author, we come to consider the testimony of the Eastern and IVestern Churches -upon this subject. As respects the former there are two facts of much importance. The one is, that of the Greek fathers not one posi tively ascribes this epistle to any but Paul ; the other is, that it does not appear that in any part of the Eastern Church the Pauline origin of this epistle was ever doubted or suspected (comp. Olshausen, Opusc. Theolog. p. 95).
In the Western Church this epistle did not, as we have seen, meet with the same early and uni versal reception. But of what value is the state of opinion in the early churches of the West in the question of evidence now before us ? To judge of this, we must bfftr in mind that the sole amount of evidence arising from the testimony of the Latin churches is negative ; all we can conclude from it, at the most, is that they had no sufficient evidence in favour of this epistle being Paul's ; they do not seem to have had a shadow of historical evidence against its being his. The claims of Barnabas, Clement, and Luke, rest upon mere individual cozi jecture, and have no historical support. Suppos ing, then, that the rejection of this epistle by the Latins cannot be accounted for by circumstances peculiar to them, still this fact cannot diminish the weight of evidence accruing from the unanimity of the Greeks and Asiatics. Had the Latins been as unanimous in favour of Apollos or Clement as the Eastern thurches were in favour of Paul, the case would have been different. The value of Paul's claims would in that case have been equal to the difference between the value of the Eastern tradition and the value of the Western. This would have furnished a somewhat puzzling problem ; though even in that case the superiority of the Eastern witnesses to the Western would have materially advocated the claims of the apostle. As the case stands, all the positive external evidence extant is in favour of the Pauline authorship of this epistle ; and the only thin,g against it is that in the Latin churches there appears to have been no commonly received tradi tion on the subject. Under such circumstances, the claims of the apostle are entitled to be regarded as fully substantiated by the external evidence.
The result of the previous inquiry may be thus stated. 1. There is no substantial evidence, ex. ternal or internal, in favour of any claimant to the authorship of this epistle except Paul. 2. There is nothing incompatible with the supposition that Paul was the author of it. 3. The preponder ance of the internal, and all the direct external evidence, go to show that it was written by Paul.
3. Time and Place of Writing.—Assuming the Pauline authorship of the epistle, it is not difficult to determine when and where it was written. The allu sions in ch. xiii. 19, 21, point to the closing period of the apostle's two years' imprisonment at Rome as the season during the serene hours' of which, as Hug describes them (Introd., p. 603), he composed this noblest production of his pen. In this opinion almost all who receive the epistle as Paul's concur ; and even by those who do not so receive it, nearly the same time is fixed upon, in consequence of the evidence furnished by the epistle itself of its having been written a good while after those to whom it is addressed had become Christians, but yet before the destruction of the Temple.