Hebrews 2:16

A couple months ago, I watched the Worship Anew program for 2 February (The Purification of Mary and Presentation of Our Lord).  The epistle reading was Hebrews 2:14-18, and I noticed verse 16 in particular:  "For surely it is not angels that he helps, but he helps the offspring of Abraham."

There's a chiastic structure highlighting this difference:

It is not angels

that he helps,

but he helps

the offspring of Abraham.

Of the translations I referenced, this is unique to the ESV and my German New Testament, in which this verse is:

Denn er nimmt sich

nicht der Engel an,

sondern der Kinder Abrahams

nimmt er sich an.

Hebrews 13:8

A few months ago, I read Hebrews 13:8 in my German/English catechism (cited under "Who is Jesus Christ?" in the explanation to the second article of the creed) and noticed that there's no explicit verb in the German translation:

Jesus Christus, gestern und heute und derselbe auch in Ewigkeit.

It's something like:  "Jesus Christ, the same yesterday and today and also in eternity."

The Greek text also has no verb:

Ἰησοῦς χριστὸς ἐχθὲς καὶ σήμερον ὁ αὐτὸς καὶ εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας.

Likewise the Latin Vulgate:

Iesus Christus heri et hodie ipse et in saecula

I think it may be significant that a form of "to be" is merely implied here.  All tenses equally apply (Jesus was, is, and will be the same, as the different time elements in the verse indicate), so it's almost as if any one form would be too temporally specific.

Hebrews 9:14

Last month, I watched the Concordia University Wisconsin chapel service from the 6th:

The reading was Hebrews 9:11-14, and part of verse 14 caught my attention:  "how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish to God, purify our conscience from dead works to serve the living God" [ESV].

In the Greek, it's:  πόσῳ μᾶλλον τὸ αἷμα τοῦ χριστοῦ, ὃς διὰ πνεύματος αἰωνίου ἑαυτὸν προσήνεγκεν ἄμωμον τῷ θεῷ, καθαριεῖ τὴν συνείδησιν ὑμῶν ἀπὸ νεκρῶν ἔργων εἰς τὸ λατρεύειν θεῷ ζῶντι;

There's a sort of contrast between "from dead works" and "to serve the living God," and this is heightened by the different forms of the modifiers.  "Dead" (νεκρῶν) is just an adjective, but "living" (ζῶντι) is a participle, and since participles are verbal adjectives, there's some of the dynamic action of a verb here rather than just the static nature of a plain adjective.

The same distinction is also in the Latin Vulgate ("quanto magis sanguis Christi qui per Spiritum Sanctum semet ipsum obtulit inmaculatum Deo emundabit conscientiam vestram ab operibus mortuis ad serviendum Deo viventi"), my German New Testament ("um wieviel mehr wird dann das Blut Christi, der sich selbst als Opfer ohne Fehl durch den ewigen Geist Gott dargebracht hat, unser Gewissen reinigen von den toten Werken, zu dienen dem lebendigen Gott!"), and my French New Testament ("combien plus le sang de Christ, qui, par un esprit éternel, s'est offert lui-même sans tache à Dieu, purifiera-t-il votre conscience des œuvres mortes, afin que vous serviez la Dieu vivant!").

Hebrews 11

An-other of the readings on Worship Anew two weeks ago was from Hebrews 11.  This reminded me of something I'd previously noticed about this chapter.  Almost half of the verses begin with the phrase "by faith."  This repetition illustrates the importance of faith, and this importance is further emphasized by the phrase's position at the beginning of most of these verses.

Hebrews 4:12

Recently, I was thinking about Hebrews 4:12:  "For the word of God is living and active, sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing to the division of soul and of spirit, of joints and of marrow, and discerning the thoughts and intentions of the heart."  I had to look up the Greek text to make sure, but "living" is a participle there too:  "ζῶν γὰρ ὁ λόγος τοῦ θεοῦ καὶ ἐνεργὴς..."  I think this is significant.  Because a participle is a verbal adjective, there's some of the dynamic nature of a verb here, and this goes well with the meaning of the word "living."