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Heb_9:19-20. Historic proof for the assertion, Heb_9:18, with a free reference to Exo_24:3-8.
κατὰ τὸν νόμον ] is taken by Schlichting, Calov, Jac. Cappellus, Seb. Schmidt, Bengel, Storr, Böhme, Bleek, Bisping, al., along with πάσης ἐντολῆς : “every precept according to the law, i.e. as it was contained in the law.” So already the Vulgate: lecto enim omni mandato legis. But against this construction the absence of the connecting article and the strangeness of the preposition κατά . Rightly, therefore, have Oecumenius, Faber Stapulensis, Erasmus, Vatablus, Calvin, Beza, Grotius, Wittich, Braun, Schulz, Kuinoel, Klee, Bloomfield, Delitzsch, Alford, Maier, Moll, Hofmann, and others referred κατὰ τὸν νόμον to λαληθείσης . Only we must not explain, as is ordinarily done, “in accordance with the commandment received of God,” but the sense is: after, in accordance with the law received of God, every precept had been proclaimed by Moses to the whole people. The standard for the proclamation of the ἐντολαί was the νόμος , since it contained these ἐντολαί .
παντὶ τῷ λαῷ ] Exo_24:3 stands only διηγήσατο τῷ λαῷ . But παντί resulted from the ἀπεκρίθη δὲ πᾶς ὁ λαός there immediately following.
καὶ τῶν τράγων ] and of the goats. Of goats slain in sacrifice the underlying narrative of Exodus says nothing. Schlichting, Jac. Cappellus, Grotius, Bengel, Böhme, and others therefore suppose that the author had in view the burnt-offerings mentioned before the thank-offerings of oxen, Exo_24:5; inasmuch as, according to Lev_1:10 ff; Lev_4:23 ff; Lev_9:2-3, Num_6:10-11; Num_7:27, rams and he-goats, as well as other smaller animals, might be selected for burnt-offerings. Nevertheless, it is also possible that, as conjectured by Bleek, de Wette, and Bisping, there was present to the mind of the author that sacrifice of bullocks and goats already referred to, Heb_9:12-13, which the high priest was to offer on the great day of atonement.
μετὰ ὕδατος καὶ ἐρίου κοκκίνου καὶ ὑσσώπου ] along with water and crimson wool and hyssop. With regard to this also, nothing is stated in the corresponding passage of Exodus. But all three things are elsewhere mentioned in connection with legally enjoined aspersions for purification. Comp. Num_19:6; Num_19:17 f.; Lev_14:2 ff., Lev_14:49 ff. In accordance therewith, a mixture of fresh spring water in some cases with the ashes of the red heifer, in others with the blood of a slain bird, was prescribed in the case of aspersions which were appointed for the cleansing of one defiled by contact with a corpse or by leprosy. In like manner, according to the passages above referred to, hyssop ( àÅæåÉá , comp. on this plant, Winer, Bibl. Realwörterb. Bd. II. 2 Aufl. p. 819 f.) and crimson wool. With the latter the hyssop stem was probably bound round, and this served as a brush for sprinkling the blood. Comp. this use of hyssop in Exo_12:22.
αὐτό τε τὸ βιβλίον καὶ πάντα τὸν λαὸν ἐράντισεν ] he sprinkled as well the book itself as also the whole people. τὸ βιβλίον is the βιβλίον τῆς διαθήκης , Exo_24:7. Of a sprinkling likewise of this book of the covenant, nothing, however, is told us in Exodus. It has therefore been proposed, by way of removing the difference, to make τὸ βιβλίον still dependent upon the preceding λαβών . So, after the precedent of the Coptic and Armenian versions, Grotius, Wittich, Surenhus, Cramer, Bengel, Michaelis, Storr, Morus, Ewald, and others. But the καί following βιβλίον renders this impossible. For the setting aside of this καί by pronouncing it spurious (Colomesius, Valckenaer), or by the assumption of a pleonasm (so ordinarily), is an act of violence; while we are prevented from placing it, with Bengel and Ewald, in correspondence with the καί , Heb_9:21, as “et … et vero,” or “non modo … vero etiam,”—apart from the clumsiness of construction thus arising, and leaving out of consideration the inconvenient δέ ,—by the twice occurring of the verb ἐράντισεν , Heb_9:19; Heb_9:21.
πάντα τὸν λαόν ] LXX. Heb_9:8 : Λαβὼν δὲ Μωϋσῆς τὸ αἷμα κατεσκέδασε τοῦ λαοῦ . Schlichting: Omnem autem populum conspersisse dicitur, quia qui ex proxime astantibus conspersi fuerant, universi populi personam hac in parte gessere, ita ut totus populus conspersus fuisse censeretur.
ἐράντισεν ] sc. for consecration and purification.