Hebrews 8:1-6 – The Original vs. The Copy

Translation & Sermon by Nate Wilson for Christ the Redeemer Church of Manhattan, KS, 7 Apr. 2019

Intro: Pictures of famous persons, dollar bills, and imitations of them

• The original is the one that’s valuable. That’s the one you want to hang on to, not the imitation.

• In a similar way, the book of Hebrews helps us see that Jesus, rather than being the weak imitation of Moses that the Jews made him out to be, is actually the original that is more valuable that all cherished religious traditions!

• Hebrews chapter 8 starts with a summary statement of the main point:

v.1 Now the sum of what is being said is: we have such a high priest who took office at the right hand of the throne of the Greatest One in the heavens

• cf. Hebrews 1:3 “Who being the radiance of His glory and the stamp of His substance and carrying all things by the word of His power, having made purification from our sins with His own self, He took office at the right hand of the Greatest One in the heights."

• I have explained before that even though “sitting down” means stopping or resting in our culture, “sitting down” in Biblical culture means “getting down to business” with official duties.

• The point is that Christians actually have, actually possess, actually have rights to a high priest who is perfect forever and who is serving us from heaven’s most-favored position!

  • When you are feeling threatened by powerful people, you have a more powerful ally that you can call upon to fix the problem. You have Jesus.

  • When you are feeling beat down by evil and lost in sinful things, you have your own personal priest on standby 24 hours a day to free you. You have Jesus.

  • When everything is going wrong, you have someone at God’s right hand who can make everything right. You have Jesus.

  • And when everything is going great and you’re on top of the world, you still have someone to thank and praise for it. You have Jesus.

  • Never forget it. You have Jesus!

• He is described in v.2 as...

v.2 a minister of the holy things and of the true tabernacle which the Lord constructed and not man.

• A λειτουργὸς/minister is one who performs certain acts of service, usually in the court of a king – or, in this case, in the heavenly courts of God.

• V.2 mentions 2 objects that describe the context of Jesus’ priestly ministry: the “holy things” (or “saints” or “sanctuary,” depending on which translation you’re reading) and the “true tabernacle/tent.”

1. ...of the hagiwn/Holy things/sanctuary

• Later in 9:2 it says that the hagia (literally “the holy things” - neuter plural) is the holy place, that is, the room just before the holy of holies,

• but the priests tended to more than just that one room in the tabernacle; for instance, Nehemiah 10:39 mentions “...the treasuries... and... the holy vessels, and the priests, and the ministers, and the porters, and the singers...[in] the house of our God.” There’s a lot of holy stuff the priests attended to.

• Also, the prepositions in this verse are genitive, which are more accurately translated “of the holy things and of the tabernacle” not “in” them.

• Although the “and” could be introducing a parenthetical phrase explaining that the sanctuary was the tabernacle, I see no need for this to be explained (or repeated) to Jews, so I think the “and” is adding to the list of things concerning which they ministered – the particular holy things and the whole tabernacle in general.

• At any rate, all that is holy is under the supervision of Jesus, and that includes...

2. ...And of the σκηνῆς – literally the “tent,” but, in the context of the worship of a god, this Greek word means more than the poles and skin-walls of a tent; it denotes a place that is holy to that god where that his special presence dwells (or tabernacles), and where God and man can connect. Jesus serves in the place where God and man connect!

• Hebrews 9:1-14 “...even the first covenant had ordinances of divine service and the earthly sanctuary. 2 For a tabernacle was prepared: the first part, in which was the lampstand, the table, and the showbread, which is called the sanctuary; 3 and behind the second veil, the part of the tabernacle which is called the Holiest of All, 4 which had the golden censer and the ark of the covenant overlaid on all sides with gold, in which were the golden pot that had the manna, Aaron's rod that budded, and the tablets of the covenant; 5 and above it were the cherubim of glory overshadowing the mercy seat. Of these things we cannot now speak in detail. 6 Now when these things had been thus prepared, the priests always went into the first part of the tabernacle, performing the services. 7 But into the second part the high priest went alone once a year, not without blood, which he offered for himself and for the people's sins committed in ignorance; 8 the Holy Spirit indicating this, that the way into the Holiest of All was not yet made manifest while the first tabernacle was still standing. 9 It was symbolic for the present time in which both gifts and sacrifices are offered which cannot make him who performed the service perfect in regard to the conscience— 10 concerned only with foods and drinks, various washings, and fleshly ordinances imposed until the time of reformation. 11 But Christ came as High Priest of the good things to come, with the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made with hands, that is, not of this creation. 12 Not with the blood of goats and calves, but with His own blood He entered the Most Holy Place once for all, having obtained eternal redemption. 13 For if the blood of bulls and goats and the ashes of a heifer, sprinkling the unclean, sanctifies for the purifying of the flesh, 14 how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?” (NKJV)

• Now, there are two phrases further used to describe this tabernacle:

1. It is “true” ἀληθινῆς

• Heb. 9:24 “For Christ has not entered the holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us" (NKJV)

• The word “true” is consistently used throughout the Greek Bible to refer to God’s character, beginning with Exodus 34:6 “And the Lord passed by before his face, and proclaimed, The Lord God, pitiful and merciful, longsuffering and very compassion­ate, and true" (Brenton)

• The true tabernacle is the place where the true God connects with man.

• Various Bible scholars throughout the centuries have identified the “true tabernacle” as Jesus Himself, or, by extension, with the church (as the body of Christ)¹, but I am inclined toward this “true temple” (which is later described as “not of this created-order”) as being the location of God’s presence.

• One ramification of this doctrine is that the temple of Herod, which the Jews still idolize, is not the place to go to connect with God anymore! If the true tabernacle is in heaven, then the temple in Jerusalem cannot be considered by Christians to be the true tabernacle. If you want to get close to God, don’t buy a ticket to the “wailing wall” in Jerusalem, go into your own prayer closet and talk to Jesus!

• The prophet Azariah told the Jews of his day, 2 Chronicles 15:3 “Israel has been a long time without the true God, and without a priest to expound the truth, and without the law." (Brenton)

• But in Jesus we have a priest who brings us near to the true God and who has shared the truth with us through His word!

• Zechariah 8:3 Thus saith the Lord; I will return to Sion, and dwell in the midst of Jerusalem: and Jerusalem shall be called a true city, and the mountain of the Lord Almighty a holy mountain." (Brenton)

• Jesus told the Samaritan woman at Mt. Gerazim, “...The hour is coming when you will neither on this mountain, nor in Jerusalem, worship the Father... the hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for the Father is seeking such to worship Him. God is Spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth." (John 4:21-24, NKJV)

• The second phrase describing the tabernacle context in which Jesus ministers is:

2. It was Pitched/erected/constructed/set up by God and not by man

• The tabernacle in Moses’ time was pitched by a man: Exodus 33:7 “And Moses took his tabernacle and pitched it without the camp, at a distance from the camp; and it was called the Tabernacle of Testimony: and it came to pass that every one that sought the Lord went forth to the tabernacle which was without the camp." (Brenton)

• The tabernacle in David’s time was pitched by men: 2 Samuel 6:17 “And they bring the ark of the Lord, and set it in its place in the midst of the tabernacle which David pitched for it..." (Brenton)

• But the heavenly temple, the real thing, the object of our attention, is set up by God:

  • “I go to prepare a place for you,” said Jesus (John 14:2).

  • And John got to see it so that he could start describing it to us in Revelation 15:5 “After these things I looked, and behold, the temple of the tabernacle of the testimony in heaven was opened." (NKJV)

• Church buildings, therefore, are not the focus of Christianity. Jesus is the focus of Christianity.

  • There can certainly be a use for buildings, but they are not the true tabernacle.

  • We Christians, in our persons, are the temple which God is building, and His presence in Heaven is where we are destined to spend eternity.

  • Every brick-and-mortar building we invest in is going to crumble or burn away, but every soul we invest in - and every treasure we lay up in heaven (Mt. 6:20) - will last forever to be enjoyed forever.

  • Don’t make the earthly your focus; “...seek the things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God!” (Col. 3:1, NASB)

v.3 Because every high priest is enstated in order to offer both gifts and sacrifices, it follows of necessity that this one also have something which He might offer.

• According to Hebrews 7:27, it is “NOT necessary [for Jesus] to offer up sacrifices [day] after day like those high priests, first for their own sins, then for those of the people...” (NAW) but Heb. 8:3 says it IS necessary, nevertheless, that He have an offering.

• This hearkens back to the beginning of chapter 5 as well, where it says, “For every high-priest taken from among men is enstated on behalf of men regarding their issues before God in order that he might offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins... ⁷ This [Anointed] One, in the days of His flesh, offered both pleas and petitions with a mighty cry - and tears - to the One able to save Him from death, and He was listened-to as a result of His devotion...” (Heb. 5:1&7, NAW)

• Jesus, remember from chapter 7, was “enstated/appointed” by means of God’s oath, “I will make you a priest forever.”

• But what did He offer as a sacrifice? Heb. 7:27b “...He offered up Himself!”

• The singularity of His offering is underscored by

  • the singular pronoun “something”

  • and by the aorist (punctiliar) tense of the verb describing Jesus’ offering in contrast to the continual present tense form of the same verb in v.4 describing the offerings of the Levite priests.

• Now, at this point, our apostle may be answering an argument from the Jews of his day that Jesus was not a legitimate priest because He never offered a sacrifice in the temple.

  • I mean, what kind of priest is that? He never officiated in the temple of the one true God in Jerusalem! You Christians are crazy if you think that this imposter named Jesus is some kind of priest great enough to replace the whole Levitical priesthood!

  • The next verse argues backward from a hypothetical situation against this criticism. The second-class conditional Greek grammar in v.4 indicates that when the author says “if,” he means it is not the case in actuality – he’ll get to the actual case in v.6, but for now in v.4 it says,

v.4 Now if, on the one hand, He were upon the earth, He’d never be a priest - as long as there were those who offer these gifts according to the law,

• In other words, if Jesus had waltzed into the temple in Jerusalem on passion week two thou­sand years ago and said, “Hey guys, let me show you how to do a burnt offering!” The temple guards would have thrown him out on His ear before you could say, “Oy vey!” And they would have been doing the right thing, because the rules were that only descendants of Levi could offer sacrifices there. There were plenty of properly-qualified priests already there in the temple with legitimate lineage from Aaron, following the rules God laid down through Moses.

• About 500 years previous, King Uzziah, of the tribe of Judah, had tried to burn incense like a priest in the temple, and things had not gone well for him. Azariah went in after him with eighty other priests and said, "Not your job, Uzziah, to burn incense to Yahweh! It belongs to the priests, the sons of Aaron, who are consecrated to burn incense. Get out of the sanctuary, because you have crossed the line! ... [A]nd then leprosy broke out on Uzziah’s forehead, and they threw him out of the place. Truth to tell, he was also hurrying to get out, because Yahweh had struck him. King Uzziah was a leper until the day of his death... cut off from the house of the LORD.” And he could no longer reign as king either; his son Jotham had to take over for him (2 Chron. 26:17-21, NAW).

• That’s the kind of thing that would have happened to Jesus too, if He, as a non-Levite, had tried to take over the sacrifices in the temple.

• So nobody should expect the “priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek” to offer sacrifices in the Levitical way in the temple. How ridiculous! It only stands to reason that the eternal priest raised up upon the oath of God from the tribe of Judah would not take over doing the same sacrifices that had been done for a thousand years in the Jewish tabernacles; no, it should have been obvious that the Messiah would do something different. Sure, it’s the nature of priests to bring gifts and sacrifices near to God, but nobody should expect the Messiah to do it the same way Aaron did.

• Verse 5 points out what sort of differences to expect. The heavenly priest from God should be expected to act in original, arch-typical ways, instantiating heavenly realities rather than serving derivatively with typological actions.

• The Levites who offered gifts according to the law are those...

v.5 who are ministering in a copy and a shadow of the heavenly things, just as Moses was informed/admonished/ instructed² when he was about to finish up the tabernacle, for He declared, “Look, you are going to make all according to the pattern which was shown to you on the mountain.”

• The word for “copy” here

  • is only found in one place in the Old Testament, and that is in Ezekiel 42:15, where God is giving Ezekiel a blueprint to pass down to Ezra and Zerubbabel to rebuild the temple after Nebuchadnezzar destroyed the temple Solomon had built. “So the measurement of the house within was accomplished: and he brought me forth by the way of the gate that looks eastward, and measured the pattern/ example/ὑπόδειγμα of the house round about in order.” (Brenton)

  • Zerubbabel’s temple was torn down and later rebuilt by Herod, and it was that Herodian temple which stood in Jerusalem at the time of the book of Hebrews.

  • The point is, that God had a particular way He wanted the temple built. He gave very particular instructions to Ezekiel and He also gave very particular instructions to Moses way back in the book of Exodus, and here Hebrews quotes from:

    • Exodus 26:30 "And you shall raise up the tabernacle according to its pattern which you were shown on the mountain.” (NKJV)

    • Steven, the first Christian martyr, also attested: Acts 7:44 "Our fathers had the tabernacle of witness in the wilderness, as He appointed, instructing Moses to make it according to the pattern that he had seen...” (NKJV)

  • So if the tabernacle of Moses and the temple of Solomon and Ezra and Herod were built using blueprints dictated by God Himself, the origin of these patterns was in the presence of God. The real original is in heaven. These temple buildings were all just copies of something which previously existed in heaven, therefore the people of God should have expected a transition from the earthly replica to the heavenly original at some point³.

  • I like the way the modern commentator P. E. Hughes put it, “[T]he antitype is also the archetype. The reality comes not only after but also before the copy and the shadow. Jesus Christ is the first as well as the last (cf. 13:8). Every earthly entity is preceded by the mind and the purpose of God.”

• The other word describing the location of the ministry of the Levites is skia – literally “in a shadow”

  • Most of the occurrences of this word in the Bible have to do with earthly existence which ends in death (e.g. Matt. 4:16 “shadow of death”).

  • A shadow is not substantial - it’s not something you can pick up in your hands and keep.

  • A shadow is also temporary - it flits alongside you, and when the light changes, it’s gone.

  • The only passage in the Bible which uses the word “shadow” to explain more fully what is being talked about her in Hebrews is Colossians 2:13-17 “And you, being dead in your trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He has made alive together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses, having wiped out the handwriting of requirements that was against us, which was contrary to us. And He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross... So let no one judge you in food or in drink, or regarding a festival or a new moon or sabbaths, which are a shadow of things to come, but the substance is of Christ.”

    • The Mosaic food laws, and the Jewish feasts and calendar system are called a shadow.

    • Shadows are very accurate representations, but they lose a lot of the detail because they are:

      • representing a three-dimensional object in two dimensions,

      • furthermore, the shadow is greyscale, whereas the original is in color,

      • and the shadow is an inanimate thing, whereas the person casting the shadow is living and can be related to as a person.

    • Colossians 2:17 pictures Jesus Christ walking along in the light of His Father, but the Jews are focusing on the shadow cast on the ground, failing to understand the fullness of what it represents and failing to look at and relate to the real person who is right there casting the shadow, but...

    • Hebrews 10:1 “...the law, having a shadow of the good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with these same sacrifices, which they offer con­tinually year by year, make those who approach perfect.” (NKJV)

  • Heb. 9:19-24 “For when Moses had spoken every precept to all the people according to the law, he took the blood of calves and goats, with water, scarlet wool, and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book itself and all the people, saying, "This is the blood of the covenant which God has commanded you." Then likewise he sprinkled with blood both the tabernacle and all the vessels of the ministry. And according to the law almost all things are purified with blood, and without shedding of blood there is no remission. Therefore it was necessary that the copies of the things in the heavens should be purified with these, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. For Christ has not entered the holy places made with hands, which are copies of the true, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us...” (NKJV)

• Jesus is no second-rate, Johnny-come-lately, without credentials, as the Judiazers tried to make Him out….

v.6 But actually He has turned out to have a more distinguished ministry, inasmuch as He is also the media­tor of a better coven­ant which has been legally-instituted upon better promises.

• The only other place in the N.T. that the last verb appears is Heb. 7:11, where it says that the people of Israel were “legally-instituted… through the agency of the Levite priesthood”

• You can read between the lines and hear the traditional Jews saying, “Forget this Jesus thing. We have a much more excellent system that is superior to the crude religion you Christians have.” (Actually the Greek word diaphorw has more to do with different-ness, so I like the translation “distinguished”) “Our priests look so much more distinguished than your ragamuffin apostles.”

• “Surprise!” Says Hebrews 8:6. “Our Jesus turns out to be the more distinguished personage!” (The Greek verb τέτευχε here is not focused so much on what Jesus did to “obtain” or “receive” this great distinction so much as that this outcome happened.) There He is, the Son of God, ordained by oath from God, never to lose His status of priest, ministering in the real presence of God in heaven, not in some earthly pile of stones. And Jesus is also the one with the better promises and the better covenant. (We’ll get into that new covenant next time.) Anyone who still thinks that the Mosaic ceremonies are where it’s at is the loser!

Conclusion

• Once again, it is a challenge to apply this exhortation, originally aimed at first century Jews, to us. But think of it in this way:

  • The first century Jews wanted a religious experience which they could see with their eyes, touch with their hands, smell with their noses – and not merely see, touch, and smell, but be impressed by.

  • Apostolic and Biblical Christianity, by comparison, was not very impressive.

    • It wasn’t earthly in orientation, so it didn’t have political power;

    • it didn’t have impressive buildings;

    • it didn’t have rich decorations and smells;

    • no bulls and rams to wrangle and stroke their fur and plunge a knife into and see blood spurt out;

    • no impressive priests with special holy robes and ephods and censors.

  • Christianity was just plain-Jane folks meeting in average homes (or corners of the synagogue) talking about a Son of God who wasn’t there anymore.

  • Christianity offered very little to impress the senses, whereas Judiasm did.

• In a similar way, today, the majority religion around us of Secular Humanism, since it is an earthly-oriented religion, offers us all sorts of ways to dazzle our physical senses and crowd out faith in Jesus.

  • I was just in the theater last week to see the movie Unplanned, and I was impressed at amount of vibration the woofers were putting out. They made the whole building shake when the soundtrack had a “Boom” moment!

  • I’ve driven by casinos with almost-impossibly huge-looking edifaces. They’re truly impressive; they look like that’s where the excitement is!

  • And then there are the things pushed into our homes which are very small but powerful to the senses:

    • I’m told the street drug Fentanyl comes the size of a grain of rice, but is so powerful that it’s enough for a drug dealer to sell drug experiences to maybe a hundred clients... and people are buying!

    • Porn is another past-time which creates intense experiences of hormone rushes that are addictive and mind-crippling.

    • We also can get powerful hormone rushes from a real flesh-and-blood relationship.

  • The question may well be asked, “What does Christianity offer that can be compared with that?” The answer that comes from Hebrews 8 is that intense physical experiences and impressive sensations to the eyes and ears and body are not to even be expected in a heavenly-oriented religion like Christianity which offers eternal joy instead of cheap thrills.

  • People who look for Christianity to top the sensory pleasures of this world are like the children that C.S. Lewis talked about, who are playing in a mud puddle in a filthy city street, and calling out to a person on his way to the beach saying, “Where do you think you’re going? Nothing could top this ball of mud!” They’ve never seen the beach; they’ve never seen the ocean, and there’s nothing you can say to explain that making a bigger mudball is completely unattractive to you now that you are on your way to the beach.

• I was intrigued by how a Medical Doctor I read about last week described a component of this phenomenon. In his book The Hacking of the American Mind, Dr. Robert Lustig wrote, “if we don’t understand what’s actually happening to our brains, we become prey to industries that capitalize on our addictions in the name of selling happiness” (7).

  • Now I haven’t read the book, so I don’t know what all is in it, but the summary I read about the distinctions he drew between pleasure and contentment seem a very practical application of the exhortation of Hebrews 8. Dr. Lustig wrote:

  • Pleasure is a sensation driven by the hormone dopamine in the brain.
    Contentment is a sensation driven by the hormone serotonin in the brain (8).

  • Pleasure can be activated through consuming substances (added sugar, caffeine, cocaine).
    Contentment cannot be activated with any substance and requires actions or experiences (graduating college, the birth of a child, introducing someone to Christ).

  • Pleasure occurs through the act of “taking” and the thrill is gone quickly (buying a gadget or bauble, winning a video or casino game).
    Contentment occurs through the act of giving and is long-lasting (time or money to a worthy project, care and attention to a spouse or friend).

  • Pleasure-seeking unchecked can lead to addictions (compulsive behaviors such as shopping, TV watching, porn, and, in the case of food addiction, metabolic syndrome).
    Contentment is not addictive, and is supportive of physical health (eating vegetables, walks through nature, playing with grandchildren) (9-11).

• The result of a life oriented around what impresses our physical senses? “We spend money on hedonistic pleasures, trying to make ourselves happy, and in the process we drive dopa­mine, reduce dopamine receptors [our brain’s ability to register pleasure decreases], we in­crease cortisol [a stress hormone], and reduce serotonin, to ever further distance ourselves from our goal” (152). “[W]e’re prosperous but not happy.”

• Don’t go chasing pleasure in the earthly tabernacle with its inferior promises! “We have... a high priest who took office at the right hand of the throne of the Greatest One in the heavens, a minister of the holy things and of the true tabernacle which the Lord constructed and not man.”

APPENDIX: Side-by-side Greek Text & English Versions of Heb. 8:1-6^A