The letter carries no name at the top, but it carries plenty of Paul: Timothy, Italy, his grace farewell, his gospel, and the memory of the early church. Here is the case, the objections, and the date.
Who wrote Hebrews? We believe the apostle Paul did. The letter has no signature at the top, but it calls Timothy our brother, sends greetings from Italy, closes with Paul's own grace farewell, and the early Eastern church handed it down as his.
He left his name off because he was writing to Jewish believers who distrusted him, and he wrote before the temple fell in AD 70.
Some scholars see it differently, and they get a fair hearing below. But the evidence points to Paul, and that is where we stand.
Hebrews has no greeting. It starts straight in with God speaking through His Son and reads like a sermon, a word of exhortation (13:22), almost to the end. Then, in the last few lines, the preacher steps out from behind the sermon, and the man we meet there looks a lot like Paul.
“I want you to know that our brother Timothy has been released. If he arrives soon, I will come with him to see you. Greet all your leaders and all the Lord's people. Those from Italy send you their greetings. Grace be with you all.”
Hebrews 13:23 to 25Paul opens 2 Corinthians, Colossians and Philemon with the same phrase, Timothy our brother. Nobody in the New Testament is closer to Timothy than Paul, and here the writer plans to travel with him.
Those from Italy send greetings. Paul spent two years in Rome under guard (Acts 28:16, 30). A letter from Paul in Italy, with Italian believers sending their love, fits.
Grace be with you all. Paul called his grace farewell the distinguishing mark in all his letters (2 Thessalonians 3:17 to 18). Titus 3:15 ends with the very same words.
My righteous one will live by faith. Outside Hebrews, the only New Testament writer who quotes Habakkuk 2:4 is Paul, in Romans 1:17 and Galatians 3:11.
The new covenant makes the old one obsolete. Paul called himself a minister of a new covenant and set it against the fading glory of the old (2 Corinthians 3). Christ interceding at God's right hand (Romans 8:34) is the priesthood of Hebrews in one line.
Then there is Peter. His second letter goes to the same readers as his first (2 Peter 3:1), believers scattered through the provinces of Asia Minor, and he tells them Paul had written to them too.
“Bear in mind that our Lord's patience means salvation, just as our dear brother Paul also wrote you with the wisdom that God gave him. He writes the same way in all his letters.”
2 Peter 3:15 to 16Paul wrote other letters into that region, so this is not proof on its own. But Peter's readers were believers from a Jewish world living far from home, and the letter of Paul that speaks most directly to Jewish believers is the one we call Hebrews.
Hebrews was read and trusted from the first century on, and the Greek speaking East remembered it as Paul's.
The letter we call 1 Clement, sent from Rome, echoes Hebrews again and again. Within a generation, Hebrews was already circulating and trusted.
As Eusebius reports him: “He says that the Epistle to the Hebrews is the work of Paul, and that it was written to the Hebrews in the Hebrew language; but that Luke translated it carefully and published it for the Greeks.” That, he said, is why it sounds so much like Acts.
The Chester Beatty papyrus known as P46, the earliest known manuscript of Paul's letters, places Hebrews directly after Romans, right in the middle of his collection. Whoever made that book read Hebrews as Paul's.
Origen heard a smoother Greek than Paul's, and he was unsure whose hand had written it down. But he was clear on the substance: “the thoughts are those of the apostle.” And he added, “For not without reason have the ancients handed it down as Paul's.”
The Latin churches hesitated longer, and Tertullian in North Africa once cited it under the name of Barnabas. By the end of the fourth century the West counted Hebrews with Paul too, and the church read fourteen letters of Paul for over a thousand years.
The Greek speaking churches that received Hebrews first handed it down as Paul's. The doubts came later and farther west, and they rest mostly on the style of the Greek.
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Manage My Giving"Each of you should give what you have decided in your heart to give, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver."2 Corinthians 9:7
Paul's other thirteen letters all open with his name. So why not this one? The oldest answer we have comes from Clement of Alexandria, again through Eusebius. Paul was writing to Hebrews “who were prejudiced and suspicious of him,” and so “he wisely did not wish to repel them at the very beginning by giving his name.”
That fits Acts 21, where thousands of Jewish believers, all zealous for the law, had been told Paul taught Jews to turn away from Moses. A letter to them that opened with his name would have been judged before the first paragraph. So he let the argument go first and signed off in ways they would recognize: Timothy, Italy, grace.
Two objections come up every time. Both are fair, and both have answers.
Hebrews has the most polished Greek in the New Testament, with long balanced sentences and careful rhythm. Paul's letters break off mid-thought and pile up questions.
Clement said Luke put Paul's words into Greek, and Luke wrote the finest Greek of anyone around Paul. Paul used scribes anyway (Romans 16:22). A crafted sermon for Jewish believers will not sound like an urgent letter to Corinth. Origen heard the difference and still called the thoughts the apostle's.
The writer says salvation was confirmed to us by those who heard the Lord. Paul insisted he received his gospel by revelation, not from any man (Galatians 1:12).
Received and confirmed are different words. Paul got his gospel from Jesus, then went up to Jerusalem to spend time with Peter and later set it before the leaders there (Galatians 1:18, 2:2). And like any preacher, he says “us” to stand with his hearers.
We believe Paul wrote Hebrews. Timothy, Italy, the grace farewell, Peter's word that Paul wrote to these same believers, the memory of the Eastern church, the oldest copy of his letters and the heart of his gospel all point to him. We count fourteen New Testament letters from Paul, and this is one of them.
We also want to be fair. Many scholars today disagree, mostly because of the Greek and the missing name. They are serious people asking a real question, and we have tried to answer them honestly rather than wave them off.
And the church received Hebrews because it shows Jesus as the full revelation of God. The Son is what carries it. You can read more about the man himself in who Paul was.
Other names have been put forward, mostly since the Reformation. Each deserves a hearing before we answer it.
Martin Luther proposed him more than fourteen centuries after the letter was written. Acts 18 calls him learned and at home in the Scriptures, which fits the Greek. Our answer: no ancient writer ever named him. It is a guess built on style alone.
Tertullian cited Hebrews under his name, and as a Levite from Cyprus (Acts 4:36) Barnabas knew the priesthood. Our answer: one voice in the Latin West, against the Greek churches that read Hebrews earliest and called it Paul's.
Some hear Luke in the Greek, and Hebrews shares vocabulary with Acts. Our answer: that is exactly Clement's point. Luke's hand in the Greek is part of the case for Paul, not a rival to it.
The German historian Adolf von Harnack suggested her, since she taught Apollos (Acts 18:26). Our answer: in 11:32 the writer uses a masculine participle for himself.
According to Clement of Alexandria, why did Paul leave his name off Hebrews?
Clement, as Eusebius reports him, said Paul wisely did not want to repel suspicious Hebrew readers at the very beginning by giving his name. He let the message be heard first.
The style argument is a real observation. But it has to outweigh Timothy, Italy, the grace farewell, Peter's witness and the memory of the Eastern church. It does not.
The date matters as much as the name, because it shapes how you read the whole letter and how you read the end of the age.
“By calling this covenant ‘new,’ he has made the first one obsolete; and what is obsolete and outdated will soon disappear.”
Hebrews 8:13Read the tenses. The writer does not say the old covenant has disappeared. He says it is obsolete, outdated and about to vanish. Something about to vanish is still standing. Throughout the letter the priests serve and offer in the present tense (8:4 to 5, 9:6 to 9, 10:11). Then chapter 10 makes an argument that only works while the altar is still in use.
“For this reason it can never, by the same sacrifices repeated endlessly year after year, make perfect those who draw near to worship. Otherwise, would they not have stopped being offered?”
Hebrews 10:1 to 2The sacrifices keep going, the writer says, because they never finished the job. That lands hard while priests are still offering in Jerusalem. After AD 70, when Rome burned the temple and the offerings ended for good, it becomes a strange question, because the obvious answer would be that they had stopped.
We hold that Hebrews was written in the 60s. Timothy is alive and travelling, the priesthood is described as working, and a letter arguing that the old covenant is finished never mentions the one event that would have proved it. If Paul wrote it, the date follows, since church tradition places his death under Nero in the 60s.
Scholars who prefer the 80s or 90s point out that Josephus and Clement of Rome described temple ritual in the present tense after the temple was gone, so tense alone does not settle it, and silence about AD 70 is an argument from silence. Fair. But the arguments stack, and they all point the same way.
If Hebrews was written with the temple standing, then 8:13 was a word its first readers watched come true. The covenant transition finished in their generation, exactly as Jesus said in Matthew 24:34. We walk through that in the new heaven and new earth and what the new covenant is.
Notice what Paul chose to leave out. No name at the top, no credentials, no appeal to his own authority. For readers who might have stopped at his name, he let the letter open with God speaking, and within three verses it is about the Son.
“The Son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his being, sustaining all things by his powerful word.”
Hebrews 1:3That is the whole letter in one sentence. Angels, Moses, Melchizedek, the priesthood and the sacrifices are all set beside Jesus and all come up short, because He is what they were pointing to. If you want to know what God is like, you look at Him. A man who believed that could afford to step out of the way.
For related reading, see how many books Paul wrote, Timothy in the Bible, Melchizedek, how many covenants are in the Bible, the 70 weeks of Daniel, who wrote the book of John and what we believe.
Paul wrote Hebrews to Jewish believers before the temple fell in AD 70, left his name off so they would hear the message first, and filled it with the Son who shows us exactly what God is like.
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We believe the apostle Paul wrote Hebrews. The letter does not open with his name, but it closes the way his letters do. It calls Timothy our brother, sends greetings from those in Italy and ends with Paul's grace farewell. Peter says Paul wrote to the same scattered believers he was writing to. The early Eastern church handed it down as Paul's, Clement of Alexandria said Luke translated it into Greek, and the oldest surviving copy of Paul's letters places it right after Romans.
Clement of Alexandria, writing in the late second century, gave the oldest answer we have. Paul was writing to Hebrews who were prejudiced and suspicious of him, so he wisely left his name off rather than lose them at the very beginning. Acts 21 shows how many Jewish believers distrusted him. Clement also passed on an older teacher's reason: Hebrews 3:1 calls Jesus the apostle, and Paul, the apostle to the Gentiles, would not claim that title for the Hebrews.
Mostly because of the Greek. Hebrews is more polished than Paul's other letters, and it has no opening greeting. Some also point to Hebrews 2:3, where the gospel was confirmed to us by those who heard the Lord. These are fair points, and we think they have good answers. Clement said Luke translated Paul's words, Paul often used scribes, a sermon sounds different from a pastoral letter, and Paul himself went to Jerusalem to confirm his gospel with Peter.
We hold that Hebrews was written before AD 70, most likely in the 60s, during Paul's lifetime. The letter speaks of priests still offering sacrifices, calls the old covenant obsolete and about to disappear in 8:13, and asks in 10:2 why the offerings have not stopped. After Rome destroyed the temple in AD 70, they had. Timothy is alive and travelling in 13:23. Some scholars prefer a later date, but 1 Clement, written in the 90s, already echoes Hebrews.
We count fourteen New Testament letters from Paul: Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians, Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1 and 2 Thessalonians, 1 and 2 Timothy, Titus, Philemon and Hebrews. The church read fourteen for over a thousand years, and the oldest surviving collection of his letters already included Hebrews. Thirteen carry his name at the top. Hebrews is the one he sent without it, to readers who needed to hear the message before they heard who sent it.