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(4) It indicates the opposite of being perfect.
`But solid food belongeth to them that are perfect'.
(5) It indicates a culpable neglect.
`Perfect, even those who by reason of use have their senses
exercised'.
(6) It indicates lack of discernment.
`Senses exercised to discern both good and evil'.
Let us take these six points and gather their lessons. Teachers are placed together with those who can take solid
food, have senses exercised and are perfect or mature. This passage comes to us very solemnly and says that the
qualification for teaching is something more than head knowledge and ready speech. In the Sermon on the Mount,
breaking the commandments and doing them are associated with teaching men so, and also with losing or gaining a
position in the kingdom of heaven. James utters the warning, `My brethren, be not many teachers, knowing that we
shall receive a greater judgment' (3:1). Instead of progress there was retrogression.
`For even when for the time ye ought to be teachers, ye have need that one teach you again certain rudiments of the
beginning of the oracles of God' (Heb. 5:12 not AV JP).
Ta stoicheia tes arches, `The rudiments of the beginning'. Stoicheia are the initial steps in knowledge, and also the
`elements' of the natural world. (See Gal. 4:3,9; Col. 2:8,20; 2 Pet. 3:10,12). The verb stoicheo comes in Acts
21:24, `Walkest orderly'; Romans 4:12, `Walk in the steps of the faith'; Galatians 5:25, `Walk by the Spirit';
Galatians 6:16; Philippians 3:16, `Walk by rule'.
These Hebrew believers had progressed no further than the initial steps of the faith, and indeed needed teaching
in these things all over again. An intellectual grasp of the teaching of men on any subject may be sufficient, but a
mere intellectual grasp of God's truth is not sufficient. The doctrine and faith of the early church was rightly called
`The Way', for it involved walk as well as word, life as well as lip.
What these `first principles' were that they needed to be retaught we shall see better when we come to Hebrews
6. The spiritual infancy of these saints is indicated by the figurative use of foods for doctrine, `Ye have need of milk
and not of solid food'. The apostle had occasion to use this same figure when writing to the Corinthian Church, and
for similar reasons:
`And I, brethren, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in Christ. I have fed
you with milk, and not with meat: for hitherto ye were not able to bear it, neither yet now are ye able' (1 Cor.
3:1,2).
The milk, the rudiments of the beginning of the oracles of God, to them had been `Jesus Christ and Him
crucified' (2:2). `Howbeit,' said the apostle, `we speak wisdom among them that are PERFECT' (2:6). The thought
is resumed and developed in chapter 13:8-13. Milk diet is natural and right for infants, but it has a purpose and a
limit. `As new-born babies desire the sincere milk of the word that ye may GROW thereby'. Peter adds a word to
this that links it with Hebrews 6. `If so be ye have TASTED that the Lord is gracious' (1 Peter 2:2,3).