Although the focus in 6:4-6 is upon
what a human might do, the action of God courses beneath the surface. It is God
who has enlightened the people the author is describing by speaking through the
radiant Son (1:3). It is God who gave them the heavenly gift, the Holy Spirit,
and the powers of the coming age (2:4). It is God who gives the word. There is
plausible reason to interpret the first statement of the warning to mean that
it is God who cannot renew again unto repentance once one has fallen way from
these gifts. This impossibility is not due to divine impotence, but to the fact
that the incarnate Son, who by his willing death defeated death, cannot die
again for those who have rejected his provision. Divine action is also the
focus of the nature parable in 6:7-8. God sends rain and causes vegetation. It
is God who blesses nature, and by virtue of echoes with the creation narrative
and other biblical texts (Dan 7:11; 2 Peter 3:10-12), it is also God who
administers the curse which ends in burning. In sum, the Son of God has, once and
for all, achieved salvation. God the Father (as well as the Holy Spirit) has communicated
this salvation to humans. If it makes sense to purge useless produce, then God
would be within reason to administer judgment against those who reject the salvation
that has been offered.
Notice how the author creates the
intensity of this warning. He uses four phrases to describe people who commit
this deed of rejection (those who have once been enlightened, those who have
tasted of the heavenly gift, those who have become sharers of the Holy Spirit,
and those who have tasted of the good word of God and the powers of the age to
come, 6:4-5), which connects with other descriptions of the community (1:2;
2:3; 3:1, 14; 10:32). The author describes the “falling away” as repeated
crucifixion and public shaming of the Son. In addition to the consequences
described by curses and burning, the author begins this warning in 6:4-8 with
the words, ‘Αδυνατον, “impossible,” fronting the closed
door to repentance for those who would effectively ask that Christ be crucified
again since they are rejecting his previous work. With this language he
presents for his audience the fear of falling away from the incredible goods of
being a Christ confessor and falling into God’s judgment of fruitless things.
If the warning in 3:7-4:13 propelled them to the throne of their gracious High Priest
(4:14-16), this one compels them to stay there so that they might not be guilty
of such an egregious sin of rejecting Christ’s work of forgiveness for sins and
defeat of death. As the author is asking them to hold fast to Christ, it is not
surprising that he will next turn to the divine promises that ground Christ’s
enduring priesthood (7:1-8:13).
It is important to notice that the
author does not address his listeners directly in this passage. Instead, he describes
a certain group of people who share a similar beginning with the audience but—as
the following verses (6:9-10) will show—are not to be identified with them.
Hence, although the descriptions are intense, the author allows his listeners
to contemplate the gravity of the situation but putting it at a remove from
them. If they had already turned away, he would not need to warn them. He may
not speak directly to them in this passage, but he certainly speaks directly to
them with it. They need not fear the curse of conflagration if they remain open
to the reception of the ample gifts of salvation God gives in Jesus Christ. (Amy
Peeler, “’A Fearful Thing to Fall into the Hands of a Living God’: Divine Action
in Human Salvation,” in Divine Action in Hebrews and the Ongoing Priesthood
of Jesus, ed. Gareth Lee Cockerill, Craig G. Bartholomew, and Benjamin T.
Quinn [The Scripture Collective Series; Grand Rapids, Mich.: Zondervan Academic,
2023], 177-78)