It appears that the Apostle Paul was at least a co-author of the book of Hebrews. All of the earliest Christian writers accepted him as its author, and further credence is given to that thesis in the final verse where Paul gives his official salutation: “Grace be with you all”. Paul had told the believers of Thessalonika that he would end his epistles that way in his own handwriting to authenticate his letters.

II Th 3:17-18
17 The salutation of Paul with my own hand, which is a sign in every epistle; so I write.
18 The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all. Amen. (NKJ)

We also see evidence of Paul’s authorship in the opening verses where he spoke of the preeminence of Christ.

Heb 1:1-4
1 God, who at various times and in various ways spoke in time past to the fathers by the prophets,
2 has in these last days spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things, through whom also He made the worlds;
3 who being the brightness of His glory and the express image of His person, and upholding all things by the word of His power, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high,
4 having become so much better than the angels, as He has by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they. (NKJ)

In these verses, Christ is presented as the one who created and sustains the universe, as the very image of God, and as one who is preeminent over the angels. Paul first introduced these concepts in the book of Colossians.

Col 1:15-18
15 He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.
16 For by Him all things were created that are in heaven and that are on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or powers. All things were created through Him and for Him.
17 And He is before all things, and in Him all things consist.
18 And He is the head of the body, the church, who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things He may have the preeminence. (NKJ)

Some have said that Hebrews was one of Paul’s earliest epistles. However, it seems unlikely that Paul would reveal in one of his first letters that Christ created all things and then never mention it again until one of his last letters. In fact, Hebrews seems to have been written after the prison epistles because in Philippians 2:19 Paul revealed that he was planning to send Timothy to Philippi, and Hebrews 13:23 reveals that Paul was waiting for Timothy to return from what was most likely his mission to Philippi so that they could travel together to Jerusalem.

The prison epistles do not refer specifically to the inheritance of the Abrahamic covenants while that is the primary discussion of Paul’s pre-prison epistles and the Book of Hebrews. Likewise, the pre-prison epistles and the book of Hebrews make no specific reference to the Church which is the Body of Christ or the dispensation of the Church which is the Body of Christ. This leads me to conclude that the Church which is the Body of Christ and its special dispensation are separate and apart from the truths that relate to Abraham his promises.

Furthermore, it is logical to conclude that the truths of the Church were written to a group of people who were to exist after the recipients of the pre-prison epistles but before the recipients of the book of Hebrews and that Paul’s target audience for the book of Hebrews was probably the Jewish believers of the tribulation period who would serve the Lord after the catching up of the Church.

Write me at: jimjoan77@juno.com

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