Hebrews 11:36

ἕτεροι δέ … introducing a different class of victories achieved by faith, although ἐμπαιγμῶν καὶ μαστίγων, “mockings and scourgings” were endured by the martyrs who have just been mentioned (2Ma 7:7; 2Ma 7:1). πεῖραν ἔλαβον, see Hebrews 11:29. ἔτι δὲ δεσμῶν … “yea, moreover of bonds and prison”; as the examples in Bleek prove, ἔτι δὲ is commonly used to express a climax (cf. Luke 14:26); and such imprisonment as was inflicted, e.g., on Jeremiah (Jeremiah 38:9) was certainly even more to be dreaded than scourging. ἐλιθάσθησαν, “they were stoned,” as was Zechariah, son of Johoiada, 2 Chronicles 24:20 (Luke 11:51). There was also a tradition that Jeremiah was stoned at Daphne in Egypt. ἐπρίσθησαν, “they were sawn asunder,” a cruel death sometimes inflicted on prisoners of war (2 Samuel 12:31; Amos 1:3, ἔπριζον πρίοσι σιδηροῖς). The reference is probably to Isaiah who according to the Ascensio Is. (Hebrews 1:9; Hebrews 5:1) was sawn asunder by Manasseh with a wooden saw. Cf. Justin, Trypho, 120, (πρίονι ξυλίνῳ ἐπρίσατε) and Charles' Ascension of Isaiah. Within our own memory some of the followers of the Bâb suffered the same death. ἐπειράσθησαν, “were tempted”. Alford says, “I do not see how any appropriate meaning can be given to the mere enduring of temptation, placed as it is between being sawn asunder and dying by the sword”. He would therefore either omit the word as a gloss on ἐπρίσθησαν or substitute ἐπρήσθησαν. That is a tempting reading because not only was one of the seven brothers (2 Maccabees 6; 2Ma 7:5) fried, but those who sought to keep the Sabbath in a cave (2Ma 6:11) were all burned together by order of Philip, Antiochus' governor in Jerusalem. At the same time, the reading, “were tempted” gives quite a good sense, for certainly the most fiendish element in the torture of the seven brothers was the pressure put on each individually to recant. ἐν φόνῳ μαχαίρης ἀπέθανον, “died by sword-slaughter,” for ἐν φ. μαχ. see Exodus 17:13; Numbers 21:24, etc.; and for ἀπεθ. ἐν see Jeremiah 11:22; Jeremiah 21:9. Examples of this death abounded in the Maccabean period. περιῆλθον ἐν μηλωταῖς, “they wandered about in sheepskins,” (as the mantle of Elijah is called in 2 Kings 2:8, ἔλαβεν Ἠλιοὺ τὴν μηλωτὴν αὐτοῦ), or even “in goatskins,” a still rougher material. This dress they wore not as a professional uniform, but because “destitute,” ὑστερούμενοι as in Luke 15:14. ἤρξατο ὑστερεῖσθαι, Philippians 4:12 καὶ περισσεύειν καὶ ὑστερεἷσθαι, “hard-pressed,” θλιβόμενοι, as in 2 Corinthians 4:8 θλιβόμενοι ἀλλʼ οὐ στενοχωρούμενοι, κακουχούμενοι, “maltreated,” see Hebrews 11:25. ὧν οὐκ ἦν ἄξιος ὁ κόσμος, “of whom the world was not worthy”. “The world drove them out, thinking them unworthy to live in it, while in truth it was unworthy to have them living in it” (Davidson). Vaughan aptly compares Acts 22:22. After this parenthetical remark the description is closed with another participial clause, ἐπὶ ἐρημίαις πλανώμενοι … “wandering over deserts and mountains, and in caves and in the holes of the earth,” verified 1 Kings 18:4; 2Ma 5:27 where it is related of Judas and nine others, ἀναχωρήσας εἰς τὴν ἔρημον, θηρίων τρόπον ἐν τοῖς ὄρεσι διέζη. Cf. also 2Ma 10:6, ἐν τοῖς ὄρεσι καὶ ἐν τοῖς σπηλαίοις θηρίων τρόπον ἦσαν νεμόμενοι. In the Ascensio Isaiae, ii. 7, 12, Isaiah and his companions are said to have spent two years among the mountains naked and eating only herbage.