Matthew Poole Commentary - Hebrews 8:1 - 8:1

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Matthew Poole Commentary - Hebrews 8:1 - 8:1


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This Chapter Verse Commentaries:

HEBREWS CHAPTER 8



Heb_8:1-5 Christ, our great High Priest in the heavens, hath a

more excellent ministry than the priests on earth,

Heb_8:6-13 as he is also the Mediator of a better covenant than

that which was given to Moses.



The Spirit having cleared the doctrine of the priesthood of the great gospel Minister, now proceeds to show how he executed that office; and that therein as he far excelled, so he was to be valued and used before, the Aaronical priests. He introduceth it with a reflection on his foregoing discourse.



Now of the things which we have spoken this is the sum; the sum then of the things spoken, is kefalaion some read, the head, i.e. the scope in a discourse driven at; others, the chief of all the excellencies of the priesthood hitherto held forth; as if it were palmarium argumentum, the highest and choicest of all that hitherto had been spoken; and it is proportionably true, as will be seen in what followeth: but it must necessarily join the foregoing and following discourse together, and so it notes a sum, contract, or epitome; a breviate of the heads formerly discoursed on and largely, Heb_7:1-28; and so shows the dependence of the matter remaining to be handled on what went before, when many things are summed up in a few words; as Christ’s priesthood, largely opened before from Psa_110:4, is, as to the substance of it, briefly handled in this verse.



We have such an High Priest, who is set on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens; we Paul, and believing Hebrews, opposed to the infidel Jews, have not only a right to, and interest in, but actual possession of, Christ, God-man, as our High Priest, while their infidel brethren had only a sinful man: He who hath eminent power above, and though crucified by men, yet thereby became victorious over sin, death, and hell, and the lord of them the devil, led principalities and powers in triumph, when he passed through their kingdom in the air, Col_2:15, entered into the heaven of heavens, and there sat him down and settled himself, as was his right, on the right hand of God, as he sat on his throne, invested with all power and dignity, as God’s royal Priest, near to him, and the great manager of all our concerns with him; while the sinful priest at Jerusalem stood trembling before the shadow of this heavenly temple on earth, Heb_1:3.