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Hebreus 5

ARC · Chapter 5/13

1Porque todo o summo sacerdote, tomado d'entre os homens, é constituido a favor dos homens nas coisas concernentes a Deus, para que offereça dons e sacrificios pelos peccados;

2O qual se possa compadecer ternamente dos ignorantes e errados; pois tambem elle mesmo está rodeado de fraqueza.

3E por esta causa deve elle, tanto pelo povo, como tambem por si mesmo, offerecer pelos peccados.

4E ninguem toma para si esta honra, senão o que é chamado por Deus, como Aarão.

5Assim tambem Christo se não glorificou a si mesmo, para se fazer summo sacerdote, mas aquelle que lhe disse: Tu és meu Filho, hoje te gerei.

6Como tambem diz n'outro logar: Tu és Sacerdote eternamente, segundo a ordem de Melchisedec,

7O qual, nos dias da sua carne, offerecendo, com grande clamor e lagrimas, orações e supplicas ao que o podia livrar da morte, foi ouvido quanto ao que temia.

8Ainda que era Filho, todavia aprendeu a obediencia, pelas coisas que padeceu.

9E, sendo elle consummado, veiu a ser a causa de eterna salvação para todos os que lhe obedecem;

10Chamado por Deus summo sacerdote, segundo a ordem de Melchisedec.

11Do qual muito temos que dizer, que é difficil de declarar; porquanto vos fizestes negligentes para ouvir.

12Porque, devendo já ser mestres, visto o tempo, ainda necessitaes de que se vos torne a ensinar quaes sejam os primeiros rudimentos das palavras de Deus: e vos haveis feito taes que necessitaes de leite, e não de solido mantimento.

13Porque qualquer que ainda se alimenta de leite não está experimentado na palavra da justiça, porque é menino.

14Mas o mantimento solido é para os perfeitos, os quaes, já pelo costume, teem os sentidos exercitados para discernir tanto o bem como o mal.

📖 Chapter study

Summary

The author explains the role of the high priest as someone chosen to represent the people before God, and presents Jesus as high priest according to the order of Melchizedek. He rebukes the readers for still needing basic teaching when they should already be teachers.

Explanation

In the Jewish priestly system, the high priest had to be human, compassionate, and called by God — characteristics the author applies to Jesus, who learned obedience through suffering before becoming the source of eternal salvation. The mention of Melchizedek, a mysterious figure from Genesis 14, prepares the ground for a more developed argument in chapter 7 about a priesthood different from the traditional Levitical one. The final rebuke, comparing the readers to babies who still only drink milk, shows the author's concern about the community's spiritual stagnation. Today's application is that spiritual growth requires leaving the comfort zone of basic teachings for a more mature understanding of the faith.

Fun facts

  • Melchizedek appears only briefly in Genesis 14:18-20, as king of Salem and priest of the Most High God who blesses Abraham — a figure so enigmatic that he sparked intense Jewish and Christian theological reflection over the centuries.

Verse-by-verse explanation

  1. Hebreus 5:1The letter begins explaining the role of the Jewish high priest: someone chosen from among human beings themselves to represent them before God, offering sacrifices for sins.
  2. Hebreus 5:2Being human and weak himself, the high priest was able to have patience with those who erred out of ignorance, because he knew that weakness firsthand.
  3. Hebreus 5:3Because of this shared weakness, the high priest needed to offer sacrifices both for the people's sins and for his own.
  4. Hebreus 5:4No one could take on this office by his own will; he had to be called by God, as happened with Aaron, the first high priest of Israel.
  5. Hebreus 5:5In the same way, the letter explains, Christ didn't appoint Himself high priest: it was God who called Him, using the same words already quoted in chapter 1 about His being the Son.
  6. Hebreus 5:6This is the first time the letter quotes the phrase “a priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec” — a reference that will only really be explained in chapter 7. For now, it serves to announce that Jesus' priesthood follows a different model than the Jewish custom tied to Aaron.
  7. Hebreus 5:7The scene of “strong crying and tears” describes the moment when Jesus, before dying, asked God to be delivered from death — an episode equivalent to what the Gospels tell about the garden of Gethsemane. He was heard not because He escaped death, but because He was given strength to go through it.
  8. Hebreus 5:8Saying that Jesus, “though he were a Son,” learned obedience through what He suffered doesn't mean He was disobedient before. It's a way of saying that His obedience was lived out and tested in practice, through real suffering, not just proclaimed in theory.
  9. Hebreus 5:9Having been made perfect through suffering, mentioned in the previous verse, Jesus became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey Him.
  10. Hebreus 5:10The letter repeats the phrase it will explain in detail only in chapter 7: Jesus was declared by God high priest after the order of Melchisedec, a priestly line different from the ordinary Jewish one.
  11. Hebreus 5:11The letter interrupts its reasoning to make a criticism: it would have much more to say about Melchisedec, but the readers themselves had become too lazy to keep up with this kind of deeper teaching.
  12. Hebreus 5:12Comparing the readers to those who “have need of milk, and not of strong meat” is a criticism: they should already be teaching others, but still need to be taught the basics. The image of milk, for beginners, and solid food, for those with experience, appears again in other New Testament letters with the same meaning.
  13. Hebreus 5:13Continuing the criticism, the letter says that whoever still feeds only on spiritual milk, the basics of the faith, isn't yet experienced enough to handle more mature teaching about right and wrong.
  14. Hebreus 5:14Solid food, the letter explains, is for those who are already mature in the faith, people who have trained their own ability to distinguish good from evil through practice.

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