1:5 - For to which of the angels did God ever say, "You are my Son; today I have become your Father"? Or again, "I will be his Father, and he will be my Son"?

The first passage from the OT our author cites is part of Psm 2:7.1 This part of a verse was set in the psalm within a context of a rebellion by the nations and their rulers against the rule of God. In response "the One enthroned in heaven laughs" and installed his own king on Zion. In doing so, God proclaimed these words to this king. The psalms may originally have been used in the enthronement liturgy of kings of the Davidic line. Eventually these words came to be associated with the Messiah.2 Mark and Luke report that, immediately after Jesus was baptized, the Holy Spirit descended on him in the form of a dove and a voice from heaven proclaimed, "You are my Son, whom I love; with you I am well pleased." Here our author harks back to this psalm and the early Christian understanding of Jesus as the fulfillment of these words.

His question is "to which of the angels did God ever say" these words?3 The question is, of course, rhetorical. Not only does it not require an answer, the only thought that strikes the mind on hearing it is an emphatic negative.

The second passage our author cites is Sam 7:14. This passage comes in the context of David's disclosure to the prophet Nathan about his desire to built a house for Yahweh. Though Nathan had initially approved of David's plan, he had a revelation from Yahweh in the night, in which Yahweh disclosed that it was not for David to build such a house for Him; such an enterprise would belong to his son—"he will be is the one who will build a house for my Name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom for ever. I will be his father, and he shall be my son. When he does wrong, I will punish him with the rod of men, with floggings inflicted by men. But my love will never be taken away from him" (vv13-15).

Our author takes this pronouncement by Nathan and applies it messianically to the Son, in that as the promise applies to the son of David so it applies to the greater Son of David4 and, with the adverb 'again,' rides it on the same rhetorical question and inducing the same negative response.