Thursday, January 3, 2019

God Is Thy Throne (Hebrews 1:8)


"But about the Son he says, 'Your throne, O God, will last for ever and ever." New International Version

However, other Bibles have:

"God is your throne forever." NWT 1950
"God is your throne forever and ever." Smith&Goodspeed's An American Translation
"God is thy throne" Revised Standard Version margin
"God is thy throne" Brooke Foss Westcott, The Epistle to the Hebrews [Macmillan And Co., NY, 1903]
"God is your throne forever and ever." Byington's Bible in Living English
"God is your throne" New Revised Standard Version margin
"It is God who is your throne for ever and ever." God's New Covenant-A New Testament Transl., by Heinz W. Cassirer
"God is thy throne" New English Bible margin
"Your throne is God for an age of ages." Unvarnished NT
"Thy throne is God" 21st Century NT
"Thy throne is God" American Standard Version margin
"God is your Kingdom" Good News Bible margin
"Great Prince, your throne is for ever and ever" The Complete Bible in Modern English by Ferrar Fenton
"God is thy throne" Moffatt

As to the Nominative for the Vocative use "Your throne, O God," the New American Bible says in the footnote here,
"O God; the application of the name 'God' to the Son derives from the preexistence mentioned in vv. 2-3; the psalmist already used the it of the Hebrew king in the court style of the original. See the note on Ps 45, 7 [which says, "The king in courtly language, is called 'god,' i.e., more than human, representing God to the people."]"

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It ought not to be concealed, that the words, “Thy throne, O God! is for ever and ever,” may with equal propriety, both from the Greek and Hebrew, be also thus rendered, “God is thy throne,” &c.; that is, God is the support of thy throne,” &c. — Dr. SAMUEL CLARKE: Script. Doct. of the Trinity, part i. chap. ii. sect. 1, No. 542.

I had at first adopted the version, “God is thy throne,” and am still not certain that that version is incorrect. . . . . The above passages [l Cor. xi. 3. Ps. lxxiii. 26. Phil. ii. 19), ... and particularly that from the Psalms, countenance the version I have rejected. — EYRE, in loc.

After having presented to us this new king, the author proceeds to the duration of his reign: —“But of the Son it is said, “Thy throne, O God! shall be for ever and ever.” It is not thus in the original, which is, “God shall be thy throne for ever and ever.” No mode of language is more customary in Scripture than to call God our rock; and, as the address here is to a king, it figuratively employs the idea of throne, to express that he shall never be deposed; that he shall subsist eternally: —“For God himself shall be thy throne, – shall take pleasure in protecting thee: the sceptre of thy kingdom is a sceptre of righteousness: thou hast loved justice, and hated iniquity; wherefore, O God! thy God hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fellows.” Here also the version offends against the rule of the Greek language, and it is too arduous an enterprise to mean to violate at once both reason and grammar. Has one ever heard speak of God who has a God? — and the gospel, which is so wise and refined, would it teach us such language as this? But, when one ascends to the source, there one finds, – “The God who is thy God — that is, the God whom thou adorest, and who is thy Benefactor—hath shed upon thy head the sacred oil, and chosen thee preferably to the angels, who alone could dispute this advantage.” — ABAUZIT: Miscellanies, pp. 183, 184.

It is immaterial to the purpose of our present investigation to inquire whether the word God in this case is used in the nominative or the vocative case, so as to read, “God is thy throne;” or “Thy throne, O God!" The sense will be ultimately the same. Both will alike disprove the Trinity. It cannot be applied to the second person of a Trinity. The second person of a Trinity cannot have a God. The second person of the Trinity cannot be exalted on account of his moral merits, “because he had loved righteousness, and hated iniquity.” Neither can he be “anointed with the oil of gladness above his fellows.” Whoever it is who is called God, he still has a God over him, to whom he is indebted for his exaltation. This use of the word God, then, is so far from helping the Trinitarian cause, – being a clear case in which the term God is applied to Christ in an inferior sense, not involving Divinity, - that it takes from the force of those other passages where this word is thought to be applied to him. .... O God! of course, must here mean, O King! or he could not have fellows, or be called God by Jehovah. The thrones of other kings crumble; but, on account of the Messiah's peculiar merits, his throne is to be for ever. — BURNAP: Expository Lectures, pp. 105–107.

The words, “Thy throne, O God! is for ever and ever,” were originally addressed by a poetical courtier to Solomon, or some other Hebrew monarch, on his accession and marriage; nor can the slightest reason be assigned for supposing, that the ode in which the words occur had any reference more remote than the immediate occasion of its composition. The first half of the Psalm is addressed to the prince; the remainder to his bride, who is exhorted to give her undivided affection to the new relation which she has formed; to “forget her own people, and the house of her father;” and who is consoled with the hope, that “instead of her fathers she shall have her sons, whom she shall make princes through all the land.” Those who can satisfy themselves with the theological conceit, that this is a prophetic allegory, descriptive of the relation between Christ and his Church, appear to have placed themselves so far beyond the reach of all the rules of interpretation, that argument becomes fruitless: no possible media of refutation exist.— MARTINEAU: Lecture on the Proposition, “that Christ is God,” pp. 37, 38; being the fifth of a series of Lectures.

[See “Concessions,” under Ps. xlv. 1, 6, 7, Heb. i. 8, 9. Calvin says that the Psalm was composed respecting Solomon; and Professor Stuart explains the term God, as used of the Messiah, in the sense, not of the Supreme Being, but of a pre-eminent king.]


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