On the Literary Genre of the "Epistle" To the Hebrews

Abstract

The to the Hebrews has been and is the object of so much divergent theorizing in the history of modern exegesis that one is tempted to doubt whether any substantial agreement about it is possible, at least in the foreseeable future. A happy exception to this sad state of affairs is the rather general consensus on the literary genre of the epistle. Inasmuch as the author of Hebrews himself says that his work is a X6yoq Tz'r x7apX?6?o s (xiii 22) 1), and inasmuch as this phrase denotes a homily in Acts xiii 15, the conclusion would seem to be that the Epistle to the Hebrews is basically a homily, with a few words attached at the end after the manner of a letter 2). For an understanding of the literary form of the epistle, then, it would seem advisable to study the form of the early homily. The most thorough discussion up to the present of the literary form of the homily with reference to Hebrews is that of HARTWIG THYEN, Der Stil der Jiidisch-Hellenistischen Homilie 3). It is THYEN's thesis that a number of Jewish and Christian writings in Greek in