Hebrews 3:11

11 so I swore in my wrath, If they shall enter into my rest.

Hebrews 3:11 Meaning and Commentary

Hebrews 3:11

So I sware in my wrath
Swearing is ascribed to God, to show the certainty of the thing spoken of; as of mercies, when he swears in love, and by his holiness; so here, of punishment, when he swears in wrath, in indignation, in sore displeasure, and the threatened evil is irrevocable and inevitable:

they shall not enter into my rest;
into the land of Canaan, called God's rest, because he promised it, and gave it to the Israelites as their rest; and where he himself had a place of rest; and where he gave the Messiah, the author of peace and rest; and which was a type of heaven, that rest from toil and labour, which remains for the people of God; and into which it is said this generation did not enter; for the Jews say F6,

``the generation of the wilderness have no part in the world to come:''

but this seems too harsh, for doubtless there were many who died in the wilderness, that went safe to heaven, notwithstanding all their sins and provocations.


FOOTNOTES:

F6 Tzeror Hammor, fol. 118. 1.

Hebrews 3:11 In-Context

9 where your fathers tempted [me], by proving [me], and saw my works forty years.
10 Wherefore I was wroth with this generation, and said, They always err in heart; and *they* have not known my ways;
11 so I swore in my wrath, If they shall enter into my rest.
12 See, brethren, lest there be in any one of you a wicked heart of unbelief, in turning away from [the] living God.
13 But encourage yourselves each day, as long as it is called To-day, that none of you be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.

Footnotes 1

  • [a]. A Hebraism involving a strong negative. Compare Num. 14.23; Mark 8.12.
The Darby Translation is in the public domain.