Hebrews 3:10-11
(10) That is why I was angry with that generation; I said, 'Their hearts are always going astray, and they have not known my ways.'
(11) So I declared on oath in my anger, 'They shall never enter my rest.'"[Ps 95:9-11]
Ps 95:10-11
(10) For forty years I was angry with that generation; I said, 'They are a people whose hearts go astray, and they have not known my ways.'
(11) So I declared on oath in my anger, 'They shall never enter my rest.'"
Hebrews 4:3
(3) Now we who have believed enter that rest, just as God has said, "So I declared on oath in my anger, 'They shall never enter my rest.'" And yet his works have been finished since the creation of the world
Hebrews 4:10-11
(10) for anyone who enters God's rest also rests from their works, just as God did from his.
(11) Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will perish by following their example of disobedience.
Those verses refers to unbelievers. As long as they remain unbelievers they cannot enter into God's "rest". The passages don't tell us whether or not all unbelievers will eventually become believers. So they tell us nothing about the final destiny of unbelievers & fail as out-of-context "proof texts" against Scriptural universalism.
Furthermore, those translations are misleading & have been badly translated, as the Greek word for "never", oudepote, never occurs in any of them. See the comments below by Greek scholar Marvin Vincent.
Moreover, the translation "perish" is an NIV aberration, as almost every one of dozens of versions here say "fall":
Hebrews 4:11 Let us, therefore, make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one will fall by following the same pattern of disobedience..
Vincent's Word Studies
So I swear (ὡς)
Rend. "according as I:swear": the ὡς correlating the oath and the disobedience.
They shall not enter into my rest (εἰ ἐλεύσονται εἰς τὴν κατάπαυσιν μου)
Lit. if they shall enter, etc. A common Hebraistic formula in oaths. Where God is speaking, as here, the ellipsis is "may I not be Jehovah if they shall enter." Where man is speaking, "so may God punish me if"; or "God do so to me and more if." Comp. Mark 8:12 : lxx, Genesis 14:23; Deuteronomy 1:35; 1 Kings 1:51; 1 Kings 2:8. Sometimes the ellipsis is filled out, as 1 Samuel 3:17; 2 Samuel 3:35. Κατάπαυσιν rest, only in Hebrews, and Acts 7:49. The verb καταπαύειν to lay to rest also only in Acts and Hebrews. In Class. the verb sometimes means to kill or to depose from power. In the original citation the reference is to Canaan. Paul uses κληρονομία inheritance in a similar sense.
Hebrews 3:11 Commentaries: AS I SWORE IN MY WRATH, 'THEY SHALL NOT ENTER MY REST.'"
Vincent's Word Studies
For we which have believed do enter into rest (εἰσερχόμεθα γὰρ εἰς τὴν κατάπαυσιν οἱ πιστεύσαντες)
I say by faith, for, we believers, who embraced the Christian faith when it was offered to us (note the aorist participle), do enter into the rest. Ἐισερχόμεθα categorical; not are entering or are on the way to, but entering into the rest is a fact which characterizes us as believers.
As he said (καθὼς εἴρηκεν)
We enter in accordance with the saying which follows.
As I have sworn - if they shall enter
The statement is somewhat obscure. The meaning is, we (who believed) enter into rest in accordance with God's declaration that they (who did not believe) should not enter. The point is faith as the condition of entering into the rest.
Although the works were finished (καίτοι τῶν ἔργων γενηθέντων)
This is an awkward and indirect way of saying, "these unbelievers did not enter into God's rest, although he had provided that rest into which they might have entered." The providing of the rest is implied in the completion of God's works. The writer assumes the readers' acquaintance with the narrative of the creation in Genesis.
Hebrews 4:3 Commentaries: For we who have believed enter that rest, just as He has said, "AS I SWORE IN MY WRATH, THEY SHALL NOT ENTER MY REST," although His works were finished from the foundation of the world.
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