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Heb_9:1. Εἰχεν μὲν οὖν καὶ ἡ πρώτη ] sc. διαθήκη . Against the supplementing of σκηνή (Cameron, Peirce, Whitby, Wetstein, Semler), see the critical remark.
εἶχεν ] had. ἔχει is not written by the author, although the cultus of the Old Covenant was still continuing at the time when he wrote, not so much because—as is shown by Heb_9:2—it was his intention to describe the primitive arrangement thereof (comp. Heb_8:5), which is the opinion of Böhme, Kuinoel, Stengel, and Tholuck, as, what is more naturally suggested by the coherence with Heb_8:13, because the Old Covenant had already been declared by God in the time of Jeremiah to be feeble with age and nigh unto disappearing, and consequently now, after the actual appearance of the promised New Covenant, has no longer any valid claim to existence. Chrysostom: ὡσεὶ ἔλεγε , τότε εἶχε , νῦν οὐκ ἔχει · δείκνυσιν ἤδη τούτῳ αὐτὴν ἐκκεχωρηκυῖαν · τότε γὰρ εἶχε , φησίν . Ὥστε νῦν , εἰ καὶ ἕστηκεν , οὐκ ἔστιν .
μὲν οὖν ] now truly. Admission that that which the author is about to detail is indeed something relatively exalted. The antithesis, by which again this admission is deprived of its value and significance, is then introduced by Heb_9:6 (not first with Heb_9:11, as is supposed by Piscator, Owen, Carpzov, Cramer, Stuart, Bloomfield, Bisping, Maier, M‘Caul, and others); yet in such wise that the material antithesis itself is first contained in the statement, Heb_9:8, which is connected syntactically only as a parenthetic clause.
καΐ ] also. Indication that with the Old Covenant the New is compared, and possessions of the former are enumerated, which also (although, it is true, in a more perfect form) are proper to the latter.
δικαιώματα λατρείας ] legal ordinances[87] in regard to worship, i.e. regulations made by virtue of divine authority respecting the cultus.
λατρείας ] is genitive. To take the expression as accusative (Cameron, Grotius, Hammond, al.), according to which δικαιώματα , λατρείας , and τὸ ἅγιον κοσμικόν would as three members be made co-ordinate with each other, is untenable; because the signification of δικαιώματα in itself would be too extensive to fit in with the further development of Heb_9:1, to which the author himself at once passes over, from Heb_9:2 onwards. For as the statement τό τε ἅγιον κοσμικόν receives its more full explication by means of Heb_9:2-5, so does the discourse in Heb_9:6-7 return to the unfolding of the twofold δικαιώματα λατρείας , blended as this is in a logical respect into a unity of idea.
τό τε ἅγιον κοσμικόν ] and the mundane sanctuary. Since, in accordance with the καί , possessions of the Old Covenant are to be mentioned, such as this has in common with the New,—while to the New Covenant there pertains no mundane, earthly sanctuary,
τό τε ἅγιον κοσμικόν must be regarded as a concise mode of designation for καὶ ἅγιόν τι , τὸ κοσμικόν , “and a sanctuary, namely the mundane.” That such is the meaning of the author, is indicated by the fact that the article is placed before this second member, although it ought properly to have been inserted before κοσμικόν also. Yet the omission of the article in the case of adjectives placed after their substantives is not a thing unknown among other writers of the later period. See Bernhardy, Synt. p. 323; Winer, Gramm., 7 Aufl. p. 126. Forced is the explanation of Delitzsch, with the adherence of Kurtz and Woerner, that κοσμικόν as an adjectival predicate is to be taken in association with εἶχεν : “the first covenant had likewise δικαιώματα λατρείας , and its sanctuary as mundane, i.e. a sanctuary of mundane nature.” Had the author intended the readers to suppose such a conjoining, he would also—equally as Heb_7:24, Heb_5:14—have indicated the same to them by the position of the words. He must, in order to be understood, at least have written: εἶχεν μὲν οὖν καὶ ἡ πρώτη δικαιώματα λατρείας κοσμικόν τε τὸ ἅγιον . Under an entire misapprehension, further, does Hofmann (Schriftbew. II. 1, p. 408 f., 2 Anfl.) suppose that τό τε ἅγιον κοσμικόν is not to be taken as a second object attaching itself to the δικαιώματα λατρείας , but as a second subject joining itself on to ἡ πρώτη ,—a construction which, upon the presupposition of the Recepta ἡ πρώτη σκηνή being the correct reading, already Olearius adopted (comp. Wolf ad loc.), and upon the same supposition also more recently M‘Caul maintained, in connection with which, however, τό τε ἅγιον κοσμικόν would limp behind in an intolerable manner, and would afford evidence of a negligence of style, such as the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews would least of all have been guilty of.
The view of Thomas Aquinas, Luther, Zeger, Carpzov, and others, that ἅγιον is to be taken not in the local sense (sanctuary), but in the ethical sense (holiness, ἁγιότης , sanctitas, mundities), is altogether erroneous; since the expression chosen would be a remarkable one, the immediate sequel does not point thereto, and the more exalted seat of the cultus of the New Covenant forms the theme of the fresh train of thought opened up with the beginning of chap. 8
Quite as much to be disapproved is the opinion of Wolf, who will have ἅγιον to mean “vasa sacra totumque apparatum Leviticum.”
κοσμικός ] means: belonging to the world, worldly, mundanus. Comp. Tit_2:12. The expression is equivalent to ἐπίγειος , and to it ἐπουράνοις stands opposed, as in general ὁ κόσμος in the N. T. very frequently has its tacit contrast in ὁ οὐρανός . Τὸ ἅγιον κοσμικόν is consequently nothing else than ἡ σκηνή , ἣν ἔπηξεν ἄνθρωπος (comp. Heb_8:2), or ἡ σκηνὴ χειροποίητος , τουτέστιν ταύτης τῆς κτίσεως (comp. Heb_9:11), or τὰ χειροποίητα ἅγια (Heb_9:24), and a twofold idea is expressed in the adjective, first, that the sanctuary of the Old Covenant is one existing in the terrestrial world, then, that it is accordingly something only temporary and imperfect in its nature. Remote from the connection are the suppositions of Chrysostom, Theophylact, Erasmus, and others: that the Jewish sanctuary was called κοσμικόν , because the access to the same stood open to the κόσμος , i.e. the Gentiles; a statement, moreover, which possesses historic truth only with reference to a part thereof, the court of the Gentiles (comp. Josephus, de Bello Jud. v. 5. 2; Act_21:28), while here the sanctuary as a whole must be indicated;—of Theodorus Mopsuesten., Theodoret,[88] Grotius, Hammond, Wetstein, Böhme, Paulus, and others: because the Jewish sanctuary symbolically represented the universe; the holy place, earth; the most holy, heaven; and the curtain before the latter, the firmament;—of Kypke, because the sense is: toto terrarum orbe celebratum (comp. Josephus, de Bello Jud. iv. 5. 2, where the Jerusalem high priests, Ananus and Jesus, are represented as τῆς κοσμικῆς θρησκείας κατάρχοντες , προσκυνούμενοί τε τοῖς ἐκ τῆς οἰκουμένης ), which, however, could only be said with reference to the temple, not with reference to the tabernacle itself, of which the author is here specially thinking.
Entirely baseless, finally, is the opinion of Homberg, that ΚΟΣΜΙΚΌΝ is to be apprehended in the sense of “adorned, well-ordered.” For only ΚΌΣΜΙΟς , ΚΟΣΜΗΤΙΚΌς , and ΚΟΣΜΗΤΌς are used for the expression of this notion; never is ΚΟΣΜΙΚΊς put for it. See the Lexicons.
[87] Wrongly Stengel: “Means of justification.”
[88] Τὴν σκηνὴν οὕτως ἐκάλεσε , τύπον ἐπέχουσαν τοῦ κόσμου παντός . Καταπετάσματι γὰρ μάσῳ διῃρεῖτο διχῆ , καὶ τὰ μὲν αὐτῆς ἐκαλεῖτο ἅγια , τὰ δὲ ἅγια τῶν ἁγίων . Καὶ ἐμιμεῖτο τὰ μὲν ἅγια τὴν ἐν τῇ γῇ πολιτείαν , τὰ δὲ ἅγια τῶν ἁγίων τὸ τῶν οὐρκνῶν ἐνδιαίτημα . Αὐτὸ δὲ τὸ καταπέτασμα τοῦ στερεώματος ἐπλήρου τὴν χρείαν .