His priesthood is perfect and unchangeable. 53 ix. 26 For such an Let us pause, therefore, and enjoy the com- SECT. High Priest became fort of so glorious a truth; for the more we us, who is holy, reflect upon it, the more consolation shall we harmless, undefiled, separate from sin. derive from it. Exactly such an High Priest vii. 26 ners, and made high- as this, indeed suited us; his character most er than the heav- perfectly corresponded to our circumstances ens; 27 Who needeth not daily, as those himself. and necessities, [who was] solemnly set apart Heb. Glorious High Priest indeed! who had not 27 high priests, to offer daily necessity, as those high priests appointed up sacrifice, first for by Moses, first to present sacrifices for his own his own sins, and sins, and then for those of the people: of the then for the people's: former of these he never had any need, nor for this he did once, could there be any room for it; and this last when he offered up he did once for all, in offering himself as a spot28 For the law less and acceptable sacrifice to God. For the 28 maketh men high law, as is well known, constitutes men high priests which have infirmity; but the priests, who have infirmities of their own, word of the oath which need expiation; but the word of the which was since the oath, which [reaches] beyond the law, and of law, maketh the Son, which I have so largely been speaking, [constitutes] to that office, the only begotten Son of God, who is consecrated for ever to the execution of it, and is the great substance of what they were only dim and imperfect shadows. who is consecrated for evermore. IMPROVEMENT. 19 LET the introduction of this better hope which we receive by verse Jesus Christ, and which bringeth the greatest perfection of happiness to those that embrace it, fill our hearts with thankfulness to God, and with a solicitous zeal to secure an interest in it. с Higher than the heavens.] Mr. Black- Beyond the law.] Our translators all, Sacred Classics, Vol. I. p. 241, 242,) render μla Tov voμor, since the law. But takes notice of this expression, as very ra often signifies beyond. Compare sublime, superior to Homer's description chap.ix. 3, and many other places. of Jupiter upon Mount Ida; and perhaps taken from Psal. cxiii. 4, 6. 54 Reflections on the priesthood of Christ. SECT. Let us draw near to God under its supporting influence, and be ix. quickened thereby to purify ourselves from all pollutions of the flesh and spirit, and to perfect holiness in the fear of God; in firm dependence upon that great High Priest, whom he hath constituted with the solemnity of an oath, as the great Surety and 20,21 Guarantee of the better covenant. verse God helps the frailty of our nature, by transmitting his promises to us through the hands of his Son, and by giving us such a 22 proof of his gracious regards, as his incarnation and sufferings afford in which it is certain, that God hath already done what is far more astonishing than any thing which he hath promised farther to do. And Jesus takes his covenant people under his care, and graciously engages to watch over them for their good, and to communicate to them all such assistances of his grace as may be sufficient to induce them to answer their part of the engagement. 24 He is possessed of an unchangeable priesthood: let us daily look to him, as knowing, that in consequence of the intercession, which he ever lives to make, he is ever able completely to save all 25 that come unto God by him. Let us every day, and every hour, have recourse to him as the Mediator of our approaches to God. And let us make the thoughts of him familiar to our minds, the thought of his sanctity, his dignity, and his love: confiding in 27 that sacrifice he hath once for all offered for his people, being above all need of sacrificing for himself. To conclude, while we cheer and strengthen our hearts with such contemplations as these, let us always consider the obligation which the character of our High Priest and our Saviour lays upon us, to be ourselves holy, harmless, and undefiled, and to maintain a separation from sinners, so far as the duties of life, in the present circumstances of the world, may admit. SECT. X. SECT. X. The apostle briefly recapitulates what he had before demonstrated of the superior dignity of Christ as the High Priest of Christians, and farther illustrates the distinguished excellence of that new covenant which was foretold by Jeremiah as established in him, and plainly enriched with much better promises than the old. Heb. VIII. 1, to the end. HEBREWS VIII. 1. HEBREWS VIII. 1. NOW the chief article of the things which have Now of the things been spoken, in the preceding parts of this discourse, [is this] that we have such a sum: we have such spoken, this is the viii. 1 great and illustrious High Priest as hath been an High Priest, who Heb. heavens ; We have an High Priest in Heaven : 55 is set on the right described, made after the order of Melchize- SECT. hand of the throne dec, and by the oath of God himself invested x. of the Majesty in the with immortal honours; who having on earth Heb. performed all that was necessary, by way of viii. 1 preparation, hath now sat down on the right hand of the majestic throne in the heavens, (compare chap. i. 3, note 1,) exalted by the Divine authority to rule over all things, for the glory of And we 2 which the Lord pitched, and 2 A minister of God, and the good of his people. the sanctuary, and of are ever to regard him under his priestly, as the true tabernacle well as his royal character, as a minister of holy not things, and of the true tabernacle, which not man, but the Lord himself, hath pitched; a sanctuary infinitely superior to any which human hands could be concerned in rearing, and proportionable to the boundless wisdom, power, and magnificence of God. man. also to offer. 3 For every high For every high priest, who ministers there, 3 priest is ordained to is constituted to offer gifts and sacrifices; thereoffer gifts and sacrifices: wherefore it is fore [it was] necessary that this man also, even of necessity that this the glorious person of whom I speak, should man have somewhat have something to present. But we may ob- 4 serve by the way, that if he were always to 4 For if he were any consiston earth, he should continue on earth, he could not, in not be a priest, see- ence with the Jewish institutions, have been a ing that there are priest, to officiate at the temple of God in Jepriests that offer rusalem ; as there are already a certain order gifts according to the law : of priests there, who offer the gifts of the people, according to the law, and it is expressly settled, that none of any other family should have access to these services; nor would it have been agreeable to the Divine schemes, that Jesus should, by extraordinary dispensation, have interfered with their peculiar func5 Who serve unto tions. These he left entirely to those priests, 5 the example and shadow of heavenly who perform divine service to an economy, things, as Moses which contains only the example and shadow of was admonished of celestial things as Moses was charged by the He could not have been a priest.] From priest ever ministered as such in the taberbence hath the great argument been taken nacle, yet sacrifices were offered by speagainst Christ's performing any sacerdotal cial Divine appointment by some (as by acts upon earth; and consequently against prophets, &c.) who were not of that order; the reasonableness of considering his death and being so offered, were accordingly as a sacrifice, though the scripture ex- accepted. pressly declares it was so. But it is evi- b The example, &c. voodigμa TWY 108dent the sense of the words given in the 'gaviv.] Dr. Sykes would explain it, the paraphrase, which undermines all such copy of what Moses saw in the mount: arguments, can alone be maintained as as if he had said, the former was but a more to be the true one; since it is plain, that under copy of the latter, and no the Jewish economy, though none but a compared with it than the shadow to the 56 viii. 5 A Mediator of a better covenant : tabernacle. For, See in the mount. SECT. oracle, when he was about to finish the taber God when he was X. nacle for see, saith he, [that] thou make all about to make the things according to the model shewn thee upon (saith he) that thou Heb. the mountain; lest an error, which may seem make all things acto thee small, should be more material than cording to the patthou art aware. (Exod. xxv. 40.) Now this tern shewed to thee exactness was required in special regard to the typical representations couched under these ordinances, the particulars of which Moses him6 self did not perfectly understand. But he, 6 But now hath that is, Christ, hath now much nobler services he obtained a more allotted to him in that heavenly sanctuary, inas- by how much also excellent Ministry, much as he is the Mediator even of a better cov he is the Mediator enant than that in which the Jewish high priest of a better covenant, mediated; which was established upon better which was establishpromises than those of the Mosaic law for ises. they only referred to the blessings of a temporal Canaan, to be enjoyed by the people, while they continued obedient to its precepts, which placed them under such a special providence, as the nature of that dispensation absolutely required, and made them a spectacle to the whole world. 7 ed upon better prom 7 For if that first faultless, then should This superior excellence of that economy which our Lord introduces, might indeed have covenant had been been concluded from its being exhibited after no place have been the Mosaic for as we know God never alters sought for the secbut for the better; if that first [covenant] had ond. been esteemed so faultless, as to have no remaining deficiency, there would have been no place sought for a second; yet we in fact see this in 8 timation of an exception taken to it: For 8 For finding fault finding fault with them, that is, with the Jews, with them, he saith to whom he was addressing, he saith by the substance. See Sykes on Christianity, p.184, Peirce in loc. I rather take it in the sense generally given, for the adumbration or sketch of Heavenly blessings. Dr. Barrow, (Vol. II. p. 205,) renders it by a very expressive word, the subindication. Finding fault with them.] This is translated by Grotius and others, finding fault he saith to them, and understood of finding fault with the former covenant. But that covenant was certainly wise and good, and adapted to the purpose for which it was designed and appointed. It seems therefore much more proper to understand it, finding fault with the Jews, (as God evidently does in the words here preced ing those quoted, Jer. xxxi. 29, 30,) for using the proverb against which he expresses so much displeasure in Ezek. xviii. 2. And in the words themselves he also finds fault with them for breaking this covenant, though he had with so much tender care brought them out of the land of Egypt. Raphelius in loc. translates the words under consideration (usupoμevos gap autors λyu,) finding fault with them he saith agreeably to our common translation; and justifies this version by the authority of Chrysostom, a Greek father, and by two passages from Herodotus, where μsuqoμevos is used with a dative case after it. come Better than the covenant made with their fathers. make a new cove saith the Lord. 10 For this is the 57 X. Heb. Behold, the days prophet Jeremiah, in that celebrated text which sECT (saith the undoubtedly refers to the gospel dispensation, Lord) when I will (Jer. xxxi. 31,) Behold, the days come, saith the nant with the house Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the vi of Israel, and with house of Israel, and with the house of Judah. the house of Judah: And he expressly mentions the superior excel- 9 9 Not according to the covenant that lence of the covenant there referred to, when I made with their fa- compared with that which was transacted on thers in the day when mount Sinai. For he adds there, The transacI took them by the hand to lead them tion shall not be according to the covenant which out of the land of I made with their fathers in the day when I took Egypt; because they them by the hand to lead them out of the land of continued not in my covenant, and I re- Egypt; (as you well know it was while the garded them not, great work of conducting them to Canaan was yet imperfect, that the law of Moses was given;) because they continued not in my covecovenant that I will nant, and I disregarded them, saith the Lord. make with the house For this [is] the covenant that I will make with 10 of Israel after those the house of Israel after those days; that is, in days, saith the Lord; the times of the Messiah, saith the Lord; I will I will put my laws into their mind, and give my laws to their soul, and I will inscribe write them in their them upon their hearts, in more lasting charachearts: And I will ters than those in which I wrote the commandbe to them a God, and they shall be to ments on the tables of stone; and I will be unto me a people. them for a God, and they shall be to me for a people: I will answer all the import of that high 11 And they shall relation to them, and they shall persist in their not teach every man obedience to me. And they shall no more 11 every man his broth. have need to teach every man his neighbour, and er saying, Know every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: the Lord: for all for they shall all know me, from the least of them the least to the even to the greatest of them. They shall have greatest. a much more certain and effectual teaching 12 For I will be than they can derive one from another. merciful to their un- I will be merciful to their unrighteous deeds, righteousness, and their sins and their various and aggravated as they are, and their his neighbour, and shall know me, from I disregarded them.] The quotation here is according to the Seventy, and by no means agreeable to the Hebrew, which reads it as we do, though I was a husband to them, saith the Lord. Mr. Peirce thinks the seventy interpreters, in their copy, either ready, or ina, instead of nya, in either of which there is only the variation of a single letter, and this will justify the translation here given. Dr. Pocock maintains that the word is capable of such a translation, as it now stands in the orig. For 12 inal. So that they seem to agree that our English version of the text in question should be altered. For I will be merciful.] Some would render or, and thereupon, that is, upon their being thus taught by me; or so that, which signification it is certain that or sometimes hath; but here it may signify that because God hath proposed to extend his pardoning mercy to them, he thus taught them by his Spirit; and therefore I have rendered it for. |