Replies

From: Hebrews 9:2-3, 11-14

The Rites of the Old Covenant Prefigure those of the New (Continuation)

[2] For a tent was prepared, the outer one, in which were the lampstand and the
table and the bread of the Presence; it is called the Holy Place. [3] Behind the
second curtain stood a tent called the Holy of Holies.

Christ Sealed the New Covenant with His Blood Once and for All

[11] But when Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come,
then through the greater and more perfect tents (not made with hands, that is,
not of this creation) [12] he entered once for all into the Holy Place, taking not the
blood of goats and calves but his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption.
[13] For if the sprinkling of defiled persons with the blood of goats and bulls and
with the ashes of a heifer sanctifies for the purification of the flesh, [14] how much
more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself with-
out blemish to God, purify your conscience from dead works to serve the living
God.

*********************************************************************************************
Commentary:

1-10. In the preceding chapters the superiority of Christ’s priesthood is discussed.
Now the epistle examines the excellence of his sacrifice. To do so, it describes
the sanctuary of the Old Covenant, the tent or tabernacle, where Yahweh dwelt
during the period when the people of Israel were making their way through the
wilderness and in the early years in the promised land. It also refers to the sacri-
fice on the great Day of Atonement or “Yom Kippur” (cf. Lev 16:1-34; 23:26-32;
Num 29:7-11), whereby Israel was reconciled with its God by purification and the
forgiveness of all those sins committed during the year for which no atonement
had been made. Both the sanctuary and the rites celebrated in it on this solemn
day are a prefigurement of the new sanctuary and new form of worship inaugura-
ted by Christ. This leads on to a discussion of the most essential and specific
function of priesthood—sacrifice.

It should be noted that in describing the sanctuary of the Old Covenant the epis-
tle does so in terms not of the temple of Jerusalem but of the tent in the desert.
In addition to having certain more traditional connotations and allowing the ark
of the Covenant to be included in the description (the ark was destroyed in 587
B.C. when Nebuchadnessar sacked the temple), reference to the tabernacle is
closely connected with an idea which underlies the entire epistle: the Christian
is making his way in a new exodus towards his homeland in heaven, entry into
which has been opened by Christ’s sacrifice (cf. 3:7-11).

3. “The second curtain”: separating the Holy Place from the Holy of Holies. It is
called the “second curtain” to distinguish it from the curtain at the entrance to the
Holy Place, which would have been the first curtain. It was not, then, that there
were two tents: there was only one, which was divided into two sections by this
“second curtain”.

For information about the tabernacle complex cf. pp. 26ff above.

11-14. The sacrifices of the Old Law could only promise ephemeral benefits,
whereas Christ’s redemptive sacrifice obtained for man, once and for all, “the
good things to come”, that is, the heavenly and eternal benefits proper to the
messianic age — sanctifying grace and entry to heaven. Like the high priest on
the Day of Atonement, Christ entered once for all into the Holy of Holies, through
the curtain. This sanctuary which he entered is the heavenly one; that is why it is
“greater and more perfect” and not made by men (cf. 8:2). Christ passed through
the heavens into the very presence of the Father (cf. 7:26) and is seated in hea-
ven at his right hand (cf. 8:1).

Many Fathers, Doctors of the Church and modern scholars see the expression
“through the greater and more perfect tent” as referring to the sacred humanity of
our Lord, virginally conceived in the womb of Mary, that is, “not made with hands”.
The tent or tabernacle would be our Lord’s body, in which the Godhead dwells.
The text then says that it is “not of this creation”, because Jesus as man was
conceived without the action of a man and without original sin: he did not follow
“the law of nature which holds sway in the created world” (Theodoret, “Interpreta-
tio Ep. ad Hebraeos, ad loc.”). In this case the inspired text would be saying that
Christ redeemed us by means of his human nature (cf. v. 12). However, the words
“through the greater and more perfect tent” can also be understood as referring to
heaven, in the sense of a greater and more perfect sanctuary. In any event, whe-
ther by passing through the heavens or through his most sacred body, Christ
achieved Redemption by offering his own blood. This does not have a temporary
value—like the blood of animals shed each year when the priest entered the Holy
of Holies: Jesus secured eternal Redemption. In the Old Law the Jews were
cleansed by the blood of sacrificed animals from legal impurities which prevented
them from taking part in the liturgy; but Christ’s blood does so much more, for it
cleanses man of his sins. “Do you want to know how effective the blood of Christ
is? Let us go back to the symbols which foretold it and remind ourselves of the
ancient accounts of (the Jews in) Egypt. Moses told them to kill a year-old lamb
and put its blood on the two doorposts and the lintel of each house [...]. Would
you like an additional way to appreciate the power of Christ’s blood? See where
it flowed from, what its source is. It began to flow from the very Cross and its
source was the Lord’s side. For, as the Gospel says, when our Lord was already
dead, one of the soldiers went up to him with a lance and pierced his side and at
once there came out water and blood—water, the symbol of Baptism; blood, the
symbol of the Eucharist. The soldier pierced his side, he opened a breach in the
wall of the holy temple, and there I discover the hidden treasure and I rejoice at
the treasure I have found” (Chrysostom, “Baptismal Catechesis”, III, 13-19).

And so the Church includes in the prayers it recommends to be said after Mass,
one which reads: “I beseech thee, most sweet Lord Jesus, may your passion be
the virtue which strengthens, protects and defends me; your wounds, food and
drink to nourish, inebriate and delight me; your death, everlasting life for me; your
cross, my eternal glory” (”Roman Missal of St Pius V”, recommended prayer of
thanksgiving after Mass).

12. “Thus securing an eternal redemption”: the Greek text uses “having found”,
here translated as “securing”. St John Chrysostom points out that the verb “to
find” in this context has a shade of meaning that implies finding something unex-
pected: the reference is to finding, “as it were, something very unknown and very
unexpected” (”Hom. on Heb, ad loc.”). However, taking into account the whole
context and the possible Hebraic background of the expression, the verb “to find”
is synonymous with “to search keenly, to reach, to attain”: in other words, Christ
eagerly sought to redeem man and he did so by his sacrifice. The verse refers to
an “eternal” redemption, in contrast to the provisional nature of Mosaic sacrifices.

13. These words refer to a ceremony of purification described in the Old Testa-
ment (cf. Num 19). To cleanse a person from certain transgressions of the Law,
the Israelites could avail of certain expiatory ablutions. There were done with wa-
ter mixed with the ashes of a heifer, which the high priest had sacrificed in front
of the tabernacle and then burned in its entirety. Into the fire cedar-wood, hyssop
and scarlet wool (9:19) had also to be thrown. Thus lustral water was only useful
for legal purification or “purification of the flesh”, as distinct from purification of
the spirit.

14. The Messiah acts “through the eternal Spirit”, which may be taken as a refe-
rence to the Holy Spirit, as St Thomas, for example, interprets it: “Christ shed
his blood, because the Holy Spirit did so; that is to say, it was by the Spirit’s in-
fluence and prompting, that is, out of love of God and love of neighbor, that he
did what he did. For it is the Spirit who purifies” (”Commentary on Heb, ad loc.”).

Pope John Paul II has referred to this text to show the presence of the Holy Spi-
rit in the redemptive sacrifice of the Incarnate Word: “In the sacrifice of the Son
of Man the Holy Spirit is present and active just as he acted in Jesus’ conception,
in his coming into the world, in his hidden life and in his public ministry. Accor-
ding to the Letter to the Hebrews, on the way to his ‘departure’ through Gethse-
mani and Golgotha, the same “Jesus Christ” in his own humanity “opened him-
self totally” to this “action of the Spirit-Paraclete”, who from suffering enables
eternal salvific love to spring forth” (”Dominum et Vivificantem”, 40).

The Son of God desired that the Holy Spirit should turn his death into a perfect
sacrifice. Only Christ “in his humanity was worthy to become this sacrifice, for
“he alone” was ‘without blemish’ (Heb 9:14). But he offered it ‘through the eternal
Spirit’, which means that the Holy Spirit acted in a special way in this absolute
self-giving of the Son of Man, in order to transform this suffering into redemptive
love” (”ibid.”).

It is also possible that “the eternal Spirit” is a more general reference to the God-
head present in Christ; in which case it would be the same as saying that Christ,
being God and man, offered himself as an unblemished victim and therefore this
offering was infinitely efficacious. Thus, as Pius XII says, Christ “labored uncea-
singly by prayer and self-sacrifice for the salvation of souls until, hanging on the
Cross, he offered himself as a victim unblemished in God’s sight, that he might
purify our consciences and set them free from lifeless observances to serve the
living God. All men were thus rescued from the path of ruin and perdition and set
once more on the way to God, to whom they were now to give due glory by co-
operating personally in their sanctification, making their own the holiness that
springs from the blood of the unspotted Lamb” (”Mediator Dei”, 1).

Christ’s sacrifice purifies us completely, thereby rendering us fit to worship the li-
ving God. As St Alphonsus puts it, “Jesus Christ offered himself to God pure and
without the trace of a fault; otherwise he would not have been a worthy mediator,
would not have been capable of reconciling God and sinful man, nor would his
blood have had the power to purify and cleanse our conscience from ‘dead works’,
that is, from sins which are given that name because (our) works are in no way
meritorious or else are worthy of eternal punishment. ‘So that you might serve the
living God”’ (”Reflections on the Passion”, 9, 2).

*********************************************************************************************
Source: “The Navarre Bible: Text and Commentaries”. Biblical text from the
Revised Standard Version and New Vulgate. Commentaries by members of
the Faculty of Theology, University of Navarre, Spain.

Published by Four Courts Press, Kill Lane, Blackrock, Co. Dublin, Ireland, and
by Scepter Publishers in the United States.