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[Heb_8:6.— íõíὶ äÝ , but now, as it is, as the case actually stands, contrasted with the case supposed Heb_8:4,— ἥôéò , as one which, characteristic, íåíïìåèÝôçôáé , has been enacted, instituted as matter of legislation, the word suggested by the legal character of the old covenant.
Heb_8:7.— ïὐê ἂí ἐæçôåῖôï , would not be sought.
Heb_8:8.— ìåìöüìåíïò , blaming, finding fault, either with it or them, or both; here, I think, mainly the former.
Heb_8:9.— å ͂ í ἡìÝñᾳ ἐðéëáâïìÝíïõ ìïõ , in the day of my taking hold of them for succor, see Heb_2:16— áὐôïß and êἀãþ placed in contrast. God divides, in His tenderness, the blame between the people and himself.
Heb_8:10.— äéäïýò giving either with ï ͂ éáèÞóïìáὶ understood from the preceding verse, or irregularly connected by êáß with the following finite verb.— ἐðéãñÜøù , I will write upon, inscribe.
Heb_8:11.— ïὐ ìὴ äéäÜîùóéí , a familiar emphatic construction: There is no fear lest they may teach=they shall by no means teach,— ôὸí ðïëßôçí = óõìðïëßôçí , fellow-citizen.— åἰäÞóù , old Ionic Fut. for åἴóïìáé , which thence past over to the later Attic.— ἀðὸ ìéêñïῦ ἔùò ìåãÜëïõ , from small unto great of them.
Heb_8:12.— ἵëåùò , propitious, gracious.— ïὑ ìὴ ìíçóèῶ ἔôé . I will no longer make mention.
Heb_8:13.— ἐí ôῷ ëÝãåῖí êáéíÞí , in saying “new.”— ðåðáëáßùêå , he hath rendered antiquated.— ðáëáéïýìåíïí êáὶ ãçñÜóêïí , becoming antiquated and growing old.—K.].
Heb_8:6. Establish.—The expression íåíïìïèÝôçôáé shows that the author regards the New Covenant partly as a fact which has been historically accomplished, partly as an economy of salvation and of life established by God, and for this reason not merely of binding authority, but also working according to fixed laws, as does also Paul, Rom_3:27; Rom_8:2; Rom_9:31.
Heb_8:7. There would no place be sought.—Bleek finds the idea expressed that God would have had no need to seek in the hearts of men for a better place for His covenant than was furnished by the tables of stone; but, although the statement that the first covenant was not faultless refers to the outward and ceremonial character of the Old Testament institutions, still the author, if Bleek’s idea had been in his mind, could hardly have omitted the words ἐí ôáῖò êáñäßáéò . Moreover the emphasis certainly not upon ôüðïò but upon äåõôÝñáò . The translation “would have been sought” (Erasm., Calv., Bez., etc.), is erroneous, as it would have demanded the pluperfect. The following passage of Scripture which contains the promise of a new covenant, would seem, according to Del., to show that God in His counsel already had a place for such a covenant, and hence sought, in the history of the world, the place for its actualization. Thol. takes the ôüðïí æçôåῖí here as= ôüðïí ëáìâÜíåéí , Act_25:16, i.e., to take occasion. Ebr. and Lün. assume a blending of the two clauses ïὐê ἄí ἦí ôüðïò äåõôÝñáò =there would have been no place for a second, and ïὐê ἂí ἐæçôåῖôï äåõôÝñá =no second would be sought.
Heb_8:8. For finding fault he saith to them.—Lachmann reads after A. D*. K., 17, 39, áὐôïῖò ,. This reference to the Israelites is, however, possible even with the better attested reading áὐôïῖò , since ìÝìöåóèáé , is constructed alike with the Acc. and the Dat. In this construction the Peshito is followed by the Vulg., Chrys., Luth., Calv., Bisp., Del., and the majority. It is a more elegant and delicate construction, however, to leave the object of the fault-finding undetermined (De W., Ebr.), and with Faber Stapul., Piscat., Schlicht., Grot., Bl., Lün., Reiche, etc., to connect áὐôïῖò with ëÝãåé . We must not, however, exactly supply áὐôÞí , and regard ìåìö . as corresponding directly with the preceding ἄìåìðôïò . This corresponds not with the citation from Jer_31:31-34, in which the positive censure falls upon the people, and strikes but indirectly the covenant which was unable to secure right conduct in the nation. The designation of it here is=not blameless ( ἄìåìðôïò ): and it is certainly inadmissible to regard the negative expression as on a level, with a positive one. On the other hand Del. goes too far in regarding the suppression of the object of the blame, as an ambiguity. The construction rather intimates the two-fold applicability of the censure, and this is entirely consonant with the facts of the case. In the citation itself which adduces the Scripture proof of the preceding statement, the author puts óõíôåëÝóù for äéáèÞóïìáé and ἐðïßçóá for äéåèÝìçí , with the evident design of indicating even in the very words of the New Testament as on the part of God accomplished.
Heb_8:10. I will give.— Äéäïýò , giving, stands not instead of äþóù , I will give (Beng., etc.), nor is either this now to be supplied (Heinr., Steng., etc.), although the Cod. Vat. of the LXX. reads äéäïὺò äþóù , or åἰìß or ἔóïìáé . If we supply any thing, it could be only äéáèÞóïìáé (Del.), with which preceding word we can also with Lün. construct the Part. (I will make a covenant, viz., in giving), unless we prefer with Winer the not unfamiliar construction which makes a transition from the Part, to the finite verb. It is grammatically possible also (with Böhme and Paulus) to connect äéäïýò with the following ἐðéãñÜøù , in which case êáß =also.
Heb_8:13. In that he saith a new covenant, etc.—From the above cited passage our author, by emphasizing the êáéíÞ , new, draws the conclusion that the Mosaic economy is even in its very origin declared as the old covenant which appears as languishing and waxing old without hope of rejuvenation. Ðáëáéïῦí means originally not to render antiquated=to do away as old and useless, to abrogate, (Bez., Erasm., etc.) but, to render ancient, or old, to deliver over to the past, and to place in contrast with the new, with that which is hitherto non-existent. This transitive signification it has also, Job_9:5; Job_32:15; Lam_3:5; which, at Dan_7:25, passes over into the sense of set aside as antiquated. For what is consigned to the past, naturally grows old (vetus), and this in the case of the living is called senescere. The intransitive signification, grow old is found only at Isa_65:22. The word belongs to later Greek, and in extra biblical literature is in use only in the Mid. or Pass. The Perf. in our passage points to the completed act.
2. The New Covenant also has its institutions and arrangements, established by the revelation of the Divine will, whose foundations are laid in the Messianic prophecies of the Old Testament. Among them particularly stands forth in the relation here adverted to the prophecy, Jer_31:31-34 (whose parallel we find in Eze_36:25-27) which, within the limits of the O. Test. itself, expresses most clearly the contrast so strongly emphasized by Paul (2Co_3:6-9) between the economies of law and gospel, and the purely disciplinary and educational, and hence transitory nature of the Mosaic institutions.
3. In this prophecy there is promised a new Covenant, which Jehovah will make with Israel and with Judah, i.e., with the collective people, whose restoration and reunion on the soil of the Promised Land is also promised by the prophet, a Covenant which shall have a different fate from that which was formed after the nation’s deliverance from Egypt. The all holy God, in His righteousness, does away with the old relation to the covenant-breaking people; but in His grace will institute a system of salvation by a new Covenant, for which He already lays the foundation by better promises.
4. The superiority of these promises consists in the fact that the Divine will is no longer as a bare command to come into mere outward contact with the people, but is to live and work in its heart; that in consequence of this a living knowledge of God is to be the common blessing of all the members of the Covenant, and the distinction between prophets and non-prophets, priests and non-priests, to fall away; and that finally the ground of this will be the forgiveness of sins wrought without any human merits by the grace of God. Precisely for this reason could Jer_3:16-17 even predict that the entire legal economy, nay, the very ark of the Covenant itself, would no more be an object of longing to the people. Intimations of this state of things are found, Joe_3:1 ff.; Isa_11:9; Isa_54:13; Eze_11:19.
5. From the disparagement of sacrificial worship which comes out frequently and strongly within the limits of the O. Test. itself (1Sa_15:22 ff.; Psa_40:7 ff; Psalms 50; Psa_51:18 ff.; Hos_6:6; Jer_7:21-23; Pro_21:3), we may not, however, conclude that the idea of the death of Jesus Christ as an expiatory offering is a relapse into Judaism—a sentiment in accordance with which Holdheim (on the Ceremonial Law in the Kingdom of the Messiah, 1845) says: “The Rabbinical doctrine stands in this near relation to Christianity that they both rest on the common conviction that the principle of expiation contained in the Mosaic law is to be maintained as of perpetual truth and validity. Christianity bases on this the fact that by a single great sacrifice the work of expiation has been once for all accomplished for all who believe in it, while Rabbinical Judaism, holding the same fundamental idea, regards the sacrificial ritual as only temporarily done away, and looks forward to its restoration.” This modern Judaism is as far removed from faith in the Old Testament as from faith in the gospel, and hence is equally incapable of comprehending both the one and the other. An arbitrary, self-willed and self-seeking separation from the legal worship is sharply rebuked by those same prophets who, turning away from the external character of the legal ceremonial and its meritorious works, demand and predict the fulfilment of that Divine will which is revealed in the law. But God, in the law, gave, on the one hand, not merely moral precepts, but also such as were intended to regulate the collective social relations of His people, and on the other, ordained, in a way which was unconditionally binding on the Israelites, the means for the fulfilment of these precepts, and for expiating their transgressions of His law. To these means belonged preëminently the system of worship whose central point is the sacrificial service. But in the position which God gave to the O. Test. in the economy of salvation, all its arrangements have a partly educational or disciplinary, partly a typical and symbolical character. It is hence equally erroneous to deny, on the one hand, the reality of the idea which at this stage could be expressed only in type and figure, and in the period of fulfilment, to turn back, on the other, to the types and symbols of that earlier period, whether this be done by Rabbins, who look forward to a simple restitution of the Mosaic ritual, or by Mormons, who have recently proposed the introduction of animal sacrifices into the Christian worship. Until the arrival of the period of perfection, it is true that even Christianity itself cannot dispense with symbols, and still bears a character which represents in the temporal and earthly the eternal and the heavenly. But its symbols have no longer the appearance of any independent value, and its type is the type of the completion of revelation.
6. The circumstance is of special importance that not without, but within the Old Covenant itself, and indeed only by undoubted words of God, was declared that capital defect of the Covenant mediated by Moses, which consisted in its want of provisions for effecting a real forgiveness of sin, and genuine communion with God, and that by the promise of a new Covenant the existing Covenant was already in the time of Jeremiah stamped as an institution no longer satisfactory, and destined to pass away. To Christians, then, the mere continued outward existence of Judaism can have no such import as to engender doubts of that abrogation of the Old Covenant which has historically taken place. Decay and superannuation clear to utter extinction are the inevitable destiny of that Covenant, allotted to it by the decision of God on the ground of its intrinsic nature.
Starke:—How blessed are we in the New Covenant! We have so great a Mediator, such glorious promises, such glorious possessions! Is it not our shame that we still remain under the dominion of sin?—The Levitical law is to be sure in itself full of Divine goodness and wisdom, yet not adequate to our happiness; but only a shadow in comparison with the substance of the Messianic priesthood and kingdom.—God adheres faithfully to His covenant and promise; men are covenant-breakers. Woe unto them!—So tender is still God’s love toward His people, that He brings them into danger and need as a father his child, then takes them by the hand and brings them into security.—On contempt of the Divine words follows the Divine punishment.—Put to thyself the question: Perceivest thou that the law of God has been traced by the pen of the Holy Spirit upon thy mind and heart? Recognizest thou also the Lord thy Saviour in living faith and obedience?—Believers, as God’s covenant-people, are a blessed people.—The forgiveness of sins is the greatest treasure; without it the rich man has nothing, and with it the poorest man has all things.—Man, take God at these His words and sigh: Lord be gracious to my transgressions!—Thou seeker after vengeance, art thou not ashamed to say, “I will remember it of him!” when God says, “I will not remember it?”—Ceremonies which are not superstitious and sinful, can perhaps be endured for a season, although they have no special utility.
Rieger:—The function of a high-priest in heaven is for himself more dignified and noble, and better and more blessed for those in whom he is to execute the promises.—Those who were under the Old Testament said: We will! and did not know that they could not. Now that the grace of the New Testament has made it possible, many shield themselves under the pretext of a cannot, while yet there is a real will not.
Heubner:—God most honors and distinguishes Himself when He associates and deals with us not as a constraining Lord and Ruler, but as a Father with children. How are we put to shame by that announcement and awaiting of the New Covenant, which we linger so far behind!—The Old Covenant is past. Would to God that the old spirit of slavish service were gone with it, and the new spirit of willingness and love reigned in all!
Footnotes:
Heb_8:6.—The Attic form ôåôý÷çêå instead of the Rec. ôÝôåõ÷å is found in the Minusc, 47, 72, 73, 74. The form ôÝôõ÷åí however, is best supported on the authority of A. D*. K. L., 80, 116, 117. The Sin. has ôÝôõ÷å , but a second hand has put ôÝôåõ÷å .
Heb_8:10.—A. D. E. add ìïõ which is also found in many Codd. of the LXX. But it is wanting in the cod. Alex. of the LXX. and the Sin.
Heb_8:11.—Instead of ôὸí ðëçóßïí , according to all authority, should be read ôὸí ðïëßôçí .
Heb_8:11.— Áὐôῶí after ἀðὸ ìéêñïῦ is to be erased after Sin. A. B. D*. E*. K. 17, 31, 61, 73, 80.
Heb_8:12.—The retaining of the words êáὶ ôῶí Üíïìéῶí áὐôῶí is sustained by A. D. E. K. L. The Sin., however, has them only from the later hand. In B. 17, 23, Vulg. and other versions they are wanting.