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What these "first principles" were that they needed to be retaught we shall see better
when we come to Heb. 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" (I 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 Heb. 6: "If so be ye have
TASTED that the Lord is gracious" (I Pet. 2: 2, 3).
Some believe that there is a definite reference to the epistle to the Hebrews in
II Pet. 3: 15, 16, where Peter speaks of `our beloved brother Paul' who had written unto
the readers of Peter's epistles. In verse 16 there is a word very like the word `difficult to
interpret', dusermeneutos, of Heb. 5: 11, where `some things hard to be understood'
translates dusnoetos, which those that are unlearned and unstable wrest to their own
destruction are spoken of. In contrast Peter urges them to `Grow in grace, and in the
knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ' (II Pet. 3: 18). There is much in
Peter's two epistles that bears upon the teaching of the epistle to the Hebrews. Such
subjects as the saving of the soul, the `fiery trial', `suffering and glory', come to mind at
once as obvious parallels.
The outstanding feature of the babe that the Apostle mentions in Heb. 5: is that such
is `without experience'. We have drawn attention in previous articles to the place that
`temptation' occupies in the epistle of the race and the crown (see Heb. 2: 18; 11: 17, 37;
James 1: 2, 12; I Pet. 1: 6; Rev. 3: 10, etc.). The Greek word for `tempt' is peirazo.
The Greek word for unskillful is apeiros, and carries with it the thought `untested'. Solid
food belongs to the perfect or mature. These are placed in opposition to the untested. It
is one of the marks of those pressing on to perfection that they endure `temptation'. The
wilderness journey, we have seen, is the great historical type of the early part of Hebrews,
and that wilderness journey was a `day of temptation' in more than one sense.
An important note is struck in the expression `senses exercised'. In Phil. 1: 9, where
Paul prays for the saints who, like the Hebrews, were reaching forward unto perfection
(see chapter 3:), he writes:
"And this I pray, that your love may yet abound more and more in knowledge and in
all discernment, or perception."
The word is aesthesis. Luke 9: 45 uses the verb aisthanomai, `to perceive'. The
word `senses' in Heb. 5: is aistheterion. It will be seen that the senses in their capacity