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Heb_8:13. The author derives the result from the Scripture testimony, Heb_8:8-12.
ἐν τῷ λέγειν καινήν ] in that He (sc. God) saith: a new (covenant). Comp. ἐν τῷ λέγεσθαι , Heb_3:15, and ἐν τῷ ὑποτάξαι , Heb_2:8.
πεπαλαίωκεν τὴν πρώτην ] He hath made the first old (contrary to linguistic usage, Ebrard: “relatively older”), i.e. has declared it to be out of date, outworn, and no longer serviceable.
παλαιοῦν ] a word belonging to a later period of the Greek language, elsewhere ordinarily used in the intransitive sense: “to grow old,” and generally in the middle voice (as a little below, and Heb_1:11); is found likewise in the transitive sense, “to make old,” in Lam_3:4; Job_9:5. To abolish or render obsolete the word itself does not signify; but rendering obsolete is the natural consequence of pronouncing out of date or outworn. The author accordingly does not directly express notion of abrogation by πεπαλαίωκεν in this place,—a sense, moreover, which, on account of the following παλαιούμενον , would here be inappropriate,—but leaves the reader to divine it.
τὸ δὲ παλαιούμενον καὶ γηράσκον ἐγγὺς ἀφανισμοῦ ] but that which is growing ancient and is becoming infirm with years, is near to disappearing or perishing.
γηράσκειν ] ordinarily said of human beings (to become enfeebled with age, senescere); then, however, also of things, comp. e.g. Xenoph. Ages. Heb_11:14 : ἡ μὲν τοῦ σώματος ἰσχὺς γηράσκει , ἡ δὲ τῆς ψυχῆς ῥώμη … ἀγήρατός ἐστιν .
The author says sparingly: near to disappearing (comp. κατάρας ἐγγύς , Heb_6:8), in that he takes his standpoint at the time of the divine promises just quoted. But if God in the time of Jeremiah already designated the Old Covenant as that which is nigh unto ruin, it was therein necessarily declared by implication, that now, after so long a time is passed and the New Covenant has already been in reality brought in, the Old Covenant, as to its essence (if not yet as to its external manifestation), must have been already entirely abrogated, must have entirely lost its force and validity.