Look at the situation when Paul wrote this to the HEBREWS. He was not the Apostle to the Hebrews but he still loved his people.
The city was full of Christian believers! Temple priests and sects of the Pharisees were believers! They had seen the miracles, tasted the good gift of God. Forward with Christ!
Then they balked..
Paul in Hebrews compares them to the Israelites in the wilderness who tasted the grapes, liked what they saw, were ready to go into the Holy Land and take it, then they balked, and God gave them no second chance. God allowed them 40 years to die in the wilderness.
Paul is comparing the Hebrews of his day with those in the desert and his letter is his way of pleading with them to continue forward into God’s Rest. Continue forward! Don’t retreat and don’t start over again! Don’t go over the same old ground again! If the nation balks it will be impossible to renew them to repentance even as those who balked at going into the Holy land had 40 years to die in the desert.
They balked, and 40 years after the death of Jesus, the nation and Temple ceased to exist.
If you read HEBREWS with this in mind it becomes a very understandable letter and those warnings for the nation, of losing and falling away suddenly become understandable and lose the terror for believers today.
**If you read HEBREWS with this in mind it becomes a very understandable letter**
I understand it quite alright. Nevertheless, I pulled out an old KJV bible of mine, “the Pilgrim Study Bible”, by Oxford University press (1948), which has a commentary throughout it. The teachers writing in it also don’t regard water baptism in the name of Jesus being for the remission of sins (of course, I disagree), BUT they DO say:
“The Epistle was addressed, in the first place, to Hebrew Christians of Palestine and the East, to guard them against unbelief and to strengthen their faith in the Lord Jesus Christ”.
I have no idea who wrote the commentary you are siding with.