---
title: Hebrews 1:4
url: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/hebrews-1-4/
markdown: https://jw-apologetics.app/verses/hebrews-1-4.md
type: verse
perspective: Protestant (historic Nicene) response to Jehovah's Witness teaching
reference: Hebrews 1:4
testament: NT
section: Letters
index: https://jw-apologetics.app/llms.txt
---

# Hebrews 1:4

## Text (Berean Standard Bible)

> So He became as far superior to the angels as the name He has inherited is excellent beyond theirs.

## JW Usage

"Become better than the angels" is treated as Watchtower evidence that Jesus occupies a tiered rank among created beings. He was Michael the Archangel before the incarnation; he was exalted after the resurrection; "becoming better" marks his post-exaltation status within a fundamentally angelic category. The inherited "name more excellent than theirs" is read as the acquired title "Son."

## Protestant Usage

The "becoming" in 1:4 is the post-resurrection exaltation, not an ontological upgrade. Hebrews 2:9 supplies the matching clause: Jesus was "made a little lower than the angels" in the incarnation (the voluntary kenosis of Philippians 2:6-8) and then crowned with glory and honour. The motion is down-then-up, not creature-to-exalted- creature. Jesus did not become divine by promotion; he resumed the glory he already had "before the world existed" (John 17:5). And the "name more excellent than theirs" is named in the very next verse — Son. Verse 5 rhetorically rules out any angel ever bearing it. If Jesus is Michael, Hebrews 1 self-destructs at verse 5.

## Arguments Using This Verse

- [Jesus' Eternality](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/psalm102-hebrews1.md) — Psalm 102 → Hebrews 1 [Deity of Christ]
- [Angels Do Not Share the Divine Nature](https://jw-apologetics.app/arguments/angels-not-divine-nature.md) — Hebrews 1:5-14 — the seven-fold contrast between the Son and angels [Deity of Christ]