Therefore let us also, seeing we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, lay aside every weight and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, 2looking to ‘Isa, the author and finisher of faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of Allah. 3For consider him who has endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, that you do not grow weary, fainting in your souls. 4You have not yet had to shed your blood in striving against sin; 5and you have forgotten the exhortation which reasons with you as with children,
“My son, do not take lightly Allah’s discipline,
And do not lose heart when he rebukes you;
6For whom Allah loves, he disciplines,
And punishes everyone he accepts as a son.“[1]
7It is for discipline that you endure. Allah deals with you as with children, for what son is there whom his father does not discipline? 8But if you are without discipline, of which all have been made partakers, then are you illegitimate, and not his children. 9Furthermore, we had the fathers of our flesh to chasten us, and we paid them respect. Shall we not much rather be in subjection to the Father of spirits, and live? 10For they indeed, for a few days, punished us as seemed good to them; but he for our profit, that we may be partakers of his holiness. 11All chastening seems for the present to be not joyous but grievous; yet afterward it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it. 12Therefore, lift up the hands that hang down and the feeble knees, 13and make straight paths for your feet, so that which is lame may not be dislocated, but rather be healed. 14Pursue peace with all men, and the holiness without which no man will see the Lord, 15looking carefully lest there be any man who falls short of the grace of Allah; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and many be defiled by it; 16lest there be any sexually immoral person, or profane person, as Esau, who sold his birthright for one meal. 17For you know that even when he afterward desired to inherit the blessing, he was rejected, for he found no place for a change of mind though he sought it diligently with tears. 18For you have not come to a mountain that might be touched, and that burned with fire, and to blackness, darkness, tempest, 19the sound of a trumpet, and the voice of words; which those who heard it begged that not one more word should be spoken to them, 20for they could not stand that which was commanded, “If even an animal touches the mountain, it shall be stoned;“ 21and so fearful was the appearance, that Musa said, “I am terrified and trembling.“[2]
22But you have come to Al-Quds, to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable hosts of angels, 23to the general assembly and congregation of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, to Allah the Judge of all, to the spirits of just men made perfect, 24to ‘Isa, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling that speaks better than that of Habil.
25See that you do not refuse him who speaks. For if they didn’t escape when they refused him who warned on the earth, how much more will we not escape who turn away from him who warns from heaven, 26whose voice shook the earth, then, but now he has promised, saying, “Yet once more I will shake not only the earth, but also the heavens.“[3] 27This phrase, “Yet once more,“ signifies the removing of those things that are shaken, as of things that have been made, that those things which are not shaken may remain. 28Therefore, receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be grateful, by which we worship Allah acceptably, with reverence and awe, 29for our God is a consuming fire.
[1] 12:5-6 Quoting the Taurat in Proverbs 3:11-12.
[2] 12:20 See the Taurat, Exodus 19:12-13.
[3] 12:26 Quoting the Taurat, Haggai 2:6.