Hebrews is a sermon intended to be read aloud in the Christian assembly Most New Testament epistles have at least some affinity with the sermonic genre in that they were generally designed to be read out to Christian congregations. But Hebrews calls itself a ‘word of exhortation’ (13:22), which was a term used in contemporary Judaism and early Christianity to refer to the sermon in a synagogue or church gathering. It is used in this way in Acts 13:14–15, where Paul and his companions are invited to preach in the synagogue at Pisidian Antioch: ‘After the reading from the Law and the Prophets,
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