What does it mean that Jesus learned obedience by the things He suffered (Hebrews 5:8)?

The Lord Jesus led the way in this path of faith and testing and suffering; and this is the meaning of such statements as, "In that He Himself has suffered being tempted, He is able to succour them that are tempted" (Heb. 2:18). And again, "Though He were a Son, yet learned He obedience by the things which He suffered" (Heb. 5:8). That does not mean that He learnt to obey, He never needed lessons of that sort; His very nature was wholly subject to God, but He learnt what obedience entailed in a world that was ruled by the devil, the Prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now works in the children of disobedience. He who is the Lord of hosts, came down into a life of obedience and dependence on God, and He was thoroughly tested in it. As every girder in a great bridge is tested before it is put into its destined place in the bridge, so was our Lord tested under the utmost pressure and He was never found wanting. There was no resistance to God's will in Him, no resentment, no murmuring, no fault, no flaw; the will of God did not chafe his Holy soul, He delighted to do it both day and night, and having passed through every test, and graduated in the school of suffering, He has fully qualified to be the author of eternal salvation to all who obey Him (Heb. 5:9).

(Vv. 7, 8). In the verses that follow, we learn the experiences that Christ passed through in order that He might exercise His priestly service. How necessary that He should be the glorious Person that He is — the Son — to exercise the High Priesthood in heaven. But more was needed. If He is to succour His people through their wilderness journey, He Himself must enter into the sorrows and difficulties of the way. At once, then, the Apostle recalls “the days of His flesh” when He took part in our infirmities, trod the path that we are treading, faced the same temptations that we have to meet, and was encompassed with like infirmities. The writer especially refers to the closing sufferings of the Lord, when the enemy, who, as one has said, “at the outset had sought to seduce Jesus by offering Him the things that are agreeable to man (Luke 4), was presenting himself against Him with terrible things” (J.N.D.). In Gethsemane the enemy sought to turn the Lord from the path of obedience by pressing upon Him the terror of death. In the presence of this assault the Lord acts as the perfect Man. He did not exercise His divine power and drive the devil away or save Himself from death; but as the perfectly dependent Man He found His resource in prayer, and thus met the trial and overcame the devil. Nevertheless, His very perfection as Man led Him to feel the terror of all that was before Him and to express His feelings in strong crying and tears. He met the trial in perfect dependence upon God who was able to save Him out of death.

In all this sore trial He was heard because of His piety, which brought God into every circumstance by dependence and confidence in Him. He was heard inasmuch as He was strengthened in physical weakness, and enabled in spirit to submit to taking the cup from the Father's hand. Thus He overcame the power of Satan, and though He were Son, yet learned He obedience by the things which He suffered. We have to learn obedience because we have a wicked will: He because He was God over all, who from eternity had ever commanded. We oftentimes learn obedience by the suffering we bring upon ourselves through disobedience: He learned obedience by the suffering entailed through His obedience to the will of God. He learned by experience what it cost to obey. No suffering, however intense, could move Him from the path of perfect obedience. Another has said, “He submitted to everything, obeyed in everything, and depended upon God for everything” (J.N.D.).

His suffering and death are therefore next mentioned in these verses: "Who in the days of His flesh having offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears to Him who was able to save Him out of death and having been heard for His godly fear, though He were a Son, yet learned He obedience by the things which He suffered." These words refer chiefly to the portal of the cross, Gethsemane . There He prayed with strong crying and tears, alone with His Father in deepest agony, fallen on His face, and His sweat became as great drops of blood falling down on the ground. He went into all the anguish of death, deprecating the cup He had to drink, yet in meek and perfect submission. What a terrible weight was there upon His holy soul! And He was heard for His godly fear. He was saved, not from dying, for that would have left man in his sins and unredeemed; He was saved out of death. His prayer was answered by His resurrection. it was in that agony that He learned obedience. Though Son of God, He learned obedience from the things which He suffered. Having come to obey and to suffer (which as Son of God was unknown to Him), He obeyed in everything and submitted to everything. He did not save Himself, but drank the cup and died the sinner's death.

13 Verses 7, 8. Nevertheless, if Jesus did not require to be formed in order to shew compassion, He had to learn something: "He learned obedience through the things which he suffered." He learned, not to obey, "for the law of God was in his heart," but He learned obedience, having been obedient in circumstances the lowest and most painful which it was possible for man to pass through, for He went down to death. If Jesus suffered, it was not for Him a necessity which He could not avoid: it was according to the will of God who had appointed Him that portion in the world. The Holy Ghost makes us feel the right Jesus had not to pass through death, when He says, "though he were Son." Jesus passed through all the degrees of man's sufferings, so that there is nothing in the sorrows of His saints which He does not know, and is unable to sympathise with them in. But this school of suffering He went through, before being made High Priest, "during the days of his flesh"; and now that He has gone through it all He succours us. This is a case very different from that of Aaron and his sons. It was needful that they should be in the same circumstances as their brethren, infirmity being necessary to them for the fulfilling of their functions, whilst in the new priesthood the One who exercises it is not a man in infirmity. It is the Son without weakness, who knows by past experience the whole truth as to the state of man.

He was heard because of His fear. It was proper that He who took death on Himself, as answering for others, should feel its whole weight upon His soul. He would neither escape the consequences of that which He had undertaken (compare Heb. 2), nor fail in the just sense of what it was thus to be under the hand of God in judgment. His fear was His piety, the right estimation of the position in which sinful man was found, and what must come from God because of it. For Him however to suffer the consequences of this position was obedience. And this obedience was to be perfect, and to be tried to the utmost.

The question has been raised whether our blessed Lord's learning obedience by the things which He suffered, is not confined to what He endured in Gethsemane. There is no possible doubt that v. 7 refers to His experience in the garden; and it is remarkable that the statement in v. 8 should be found between it and His resurrection. Still, the subject which the apostle is here unfolding has to be borne in mind. He is dealing with the qualifications of Christ for the priestly office; and he points out, first, that He had been divinely designated to it; and, secondly, that He possessed the personal qualifications for its exercise. And, as we understand it, Gethsemane is cited, in connection with the latter point, as showing how fully and completely He had gone through human suffering and anguish in doing the will of God. As another has written, "His glory (although it gives Him His place in honour before God, and consequent on redemption, so that He can undertake the people's cause before God according to His will) does not bring Him near to the miseries of men. It is His history on earth which makes us feel how truly able He is to take part in them." "In the days of His flesh," that is, here below, He went into all the anguish of death in dependence on God, making His request to Him who was able to save Him from it ("out of" it, that is, in resurrection.) For, being here in order to obey and to suffer, He did not save Himself. He submitted to everything, obeyed in everything, and depended on God for everything." But this equally applied to His whole life, as seen, for example, in His temptation by Satan in the wilderness. For He came to do the will of God; and this entailed upon Him suffering at every step; and we conclude therefore that He learned obedience by the things which He suffered throughout the whole of His life upon earth, but that Gethsemane is referred to as the climax of His suffering because it was connected with the pressure of death upon His soul.

The story, as given to us by Mark, moves rapidly forward. Till late in the evening the work of mercy went on, and then long before day He rose up and sought solitude for prayer. We have just noted the authority and power of God's perfect Servant. Here we see His dependence upon God without which there can be no true service. The Servant must hang upon the Master, and though He who serves is "Son," HE does not dispense with this feature: rather He is the highest expression of it in perfect obedience. We read that He learned obedience "by the things that He suffered" (Heb. 5:8); and this word doubtless covers all His pathway here and not merely the closing scenes of suffering of a more physical sort.

A. ― It was an entirely new thing for the glorious Son of God to learn obedience. He who commanded all things from all eternity came into this world of sin, and took the place of obedience, and in a pathway of suffering in which He never yielded to temptation ― "He suffered being tempted" ― never yielded ― He learned what it was in this world to obey. We learn obedience by the subjection of our wicked hearts and wills to God. He learned it as one with whom it was a new thing, and who had a perfect will, but who laid it aside ― ("not my will but thine be done") who submitted to everything, obeyed in everything, and depended on God for everything. His obedience ended in death rather than fail in faithfulness or obedience to His Father. How contrary to the first Adam was the second in all this! And the Christian is "sanctified unto the obedience … of Jesus Christ." May we have grace to be conformed to Him and to obey! Back

In His place in the Godhead, the Son had ever commanded, but He had voluntarily come as Man into the place of obedience, a place He had not known till coming into the world. We have to learn obedience because it is in our sinful nature to disobey; but it was altogether different with Christ, His only desire was to obey, and He was perfect in His obedience, but His obedience caused Him to suffer, and in His suffering He learned experimentally what obedience was.

Perfect in His Manhood, in His obedience, and in all things at all times, the Son was made perfect in His experience of suffering, and in His obedience even unto death, through which "He became the author of eternal salvation unto all them that obey Him." How great was Christ's work, and how wonderful the results for us: eternal salvation, a salvation from all our sins, from all our foes, and that will take us into the eternal blessings that God has prepared for those who trust Him. All this has been secured for us by our Great High Priest, who has been called of God.

Ans. This unfolds the truth of Christ as a man and is not related to Him as God. He learned obedience in taking the place of a man. He had been in the place of administration previously. As He had no will to break, it was not learning to obey, but obedience. Although Son, He did not presume. He entered more deeply into the experience of obedience. His faith and obedience were tested by circumstances becoming more difficult even to death! "Having been made perfect" is "perfectly fitted" or "completed" as to obedience and suffering, for His subsequent function as Priest and author (or founder) of eternal salvation.