CROSS The Meaning of 'Baptisms' in Hebrews 6.2 177
Fourthly is the evidence of the use of the word alpa ('blood')^56 in
relationship to martyrdom. There are two references, one direct, the other
allusory, to 'blood' in Hebrews which have a particular bearing on our
subject—12.4 and 13.13-14.^57 Both of them refer to the possibility ofmartyrdom as the ultimate cost of discipleship and provide a possible
bridge to the similar way 'blood' is used in the book of Revelation. In
Rev. 6.10-11; 16.6; 17.6; 18.24 and 19.2, there are references to the
'blood' of the martyrs, saints, prophets and servants of God.^58 To this can
before him. Such a tradition would also have recorded the way Jesus himself referred
to his own death as a baptism (Mark 10.38-39; Luke 12.50)'; and C.K. Barrett, Paul:
An Introduction to his Thought (London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1994), p. 129. The
same argument can be used to account for Col. 2.12's 'having been buried with him
in baptism', see Dunn, Colossians and Philemon, pp. 159-60, p. 160: 'If Jesus spoke
of his coming death as a shared baptism, it is little surprise that his disciples should
speak of their baptism as a sharing in his death.'
- See F. Laubach, 'aW (haima), blood', NIDNTT, I, pp. 220-24, and J. Behm,
'alpcc', 7ZW7; I, pp. 172-77. - On 13.13-14, Lane, Hebrews, p. 543, writes, 'The exhortation to leave the camp
and to identify fully with Jesus introduces a distinctive understanding of discipleship.
Jesus' action in going "outside the camp" (v 12) set a precedent for others to follow.
The task of the community is to emulate Jesus, leaving behind the security, conge-
niality, and respectability of the sacred enclosure, risking the reproach that fell upon
him. Christian identity is a matter of "going out" now to him.'
'It entails the costly commitment to follow him resolutely, despite suffering. In the
context to the allusion to Golgotha in v 12, this summons to discipleship implies fol-
lowing Jesus on the way of the cross... The writer appears to be thoroughly familiar with
the primitive tradition that associates the "going out" of Jesus with the bearing of the
cross (Jn 19.17; Mk. 15.20-21). Since the cross is explicitly connected with "shame".. .in
Heb 12.2, the exhortation in v 13 appears to be a parenetic adaptation of the familiar call
to discipleship in terms of cross bearing (Mk 8.34; Mt. 10.38; 16.24; Lk. 14.27).'
'As enunciated by Jesus, the call to discipleship is a call to martyrdom; the phrases
"deny himself (but not Jesus!) and "take up his cross" are parallel.' After summa-
rizing the teaching on discipleship in Mt. 10.37-38 and Lk. 14.26-27; Mk 8.34, Mt.
16.24 and Lk. 9.23-26, Lane then cites J. Thuren, Das Lobopfer der Hebrder: Studien
zum Aufbau und Anliegen von Hebrderbrief 13 (Abo: Abo Akademi, 1973), pp. 49-247
(91-93,98), to the effect that the distinctive understanding of discipleship expressed in
v. 13 appears to be informed by the pre-Synoptic tradition as just outlined by Lane. - On the Old Testament and Gospel background to the use of 'blood' in these
passages, see also, e.g., D.E. Aune, Revelation 6-16 (WBC, 52B; Nashville: Thomas
Nelson, 1998), pp. 407-10; G.K. Beale, The Book of Revelation: A Commentary on the
Greek Text (NIGTC; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans; Carlisle: Paternoster Press, 1999), pp.
818-20,923-24.