This verse contains another contrast. The first part of it was a common saying, almost a proverb, in popular moral teaching of New Testament times.

The structure of this verse emphasizes the contrast between at the time and Later. Later may also mean “Last of all” or “In the end,” as in Matthew 21.37. This sense is suggested by references to the “last times” at the end of this verse and in the wider context.

The phrase rendered sad, not glad sounds a little heavy in the original as well as in translation. The writer is thinking back to the joy mentioned in verse 2 and uses the same Greek word here.

As Revised Standard Version shows, the verse is a contrast between the effect of discipline at the time and Later. Good News Translation expands the first part of the contrast, expressing “all discipline” (Revised Standard Version) as When we are punished. “Whenever we are punished” would have been closer to the meaning of the Greek. If Good News Bible is taken as the base for renderings in other languages, there may be some repetition in the reference to time. If so, the first sentence may be translated as “Whenever we are punished it seems to us to be something to make us sad, not glad,” deleting at the time.

Since the expression it seems to us involves some kind of reasoning or thought, it may be better to restructure the statement as “Whenever we are punished, we regard it as making us sad and certainly not glad” or “… happy.”

The second half of this verse (from Later, however) is written in a particularly impressive Greek literary style. This suggests that it is intended as a summary and conclusion of the section. This is confirmed by “Therefore” in verse 12 (Revised Standard Version) and by the change from argument to direct imperatives. common language translations (but not the UBS Greek New Testament or Traduction œcuménique de la Bible) therefore begin a new section at verse 12 rather than at verse 14.

Disciplined in 5.14 was translated through practice are able (see the comments). The idea of athletic training may be carried over from the beginning of the chapter; several translations have “trained.”

Those who have been disciplined by such punishment may be expressed as “those whom God has punished in order to show them what they have done wrong” or “those who have been corrected by the way in which God has punished them.” It may be essential to indicate that this is punishment which comes from God, especially in view of the explicit reference to God in verse 10.

Revised Standard Version suggests some confusion in this verse between the metaphors of athletic training and harvesting. The Greek for reap is in fact a dead metaphor meaning “to receive something in return” and may be translated in a nonfigurative way.

Peaceful reward is a rather strange expression. Several translations separate “peace” from reward and link it with a righteous life, literally “righteousness,” as in 1.9: Bijbel in Gewone Taal “the peace which comes from a righteous life,” Bible en français courant “peace associated with a just life,” and Translator’s New Testament “lives of peace and goodness.” These translations present a rather static view of the “good life” as one in which relationships with God and other people are what they should be. It is true that “peace” in the Bible implies total well-being (see 7.2; 13.21). However, in biblical thought, “peace,” like “righteousness,” involves action, and this aspect is brought out by Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch: “But later it appears, to all who have been brought up by this punishment, that it was good, and that they have become people who do what is right, and spread peace (around them).”

Reward is literally “fruit” (Revised Standard Version), meaning “the effect it produces” (Bible en français courant). It is not the word used for reward in 11.26, but the meaning is the same, that is, the fulfillment in men of God’s purposes (compare 11.40).

The expression a righteous life (in Greek literally “righteousness”) is in apposition to the peaceful reward. In other words this peaceful reward consists of a righteous life. But peaceful is actually a qualification of the life more than it is of the reward itself. Accordingly, one may render reap the peaceful reward of a righteous life as “obtain a reward which is a peaceful and righteous life” or “obtain the reward of living peacefully and righteously.” Righteous may be rendered as “in accordance with what God wants a person to do.”

Quoted with permission from Ellingworth, Paul and Nida, Eugene A. A Handbook on The Letter of the Hebrews. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1983. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .