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NOTES for Heb 9:16-17

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16 For where a testament is, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator.
17 For a testament is of force after men are dead: otherwise it is of no strength at all while the testator liveth.
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Talking about the renovation of the union with God, the author of the epistle connects it to the death of the One, Who made possible this renovation. And as argumentation of his words, he quotes for example with the testament, which comes into force only after the death of the testator. At first sight, the link is not obvious: because the union with God, quite as any other union, can not be transmitted by inheritance, as goods transfer, it is not a matter of property here, but of relationship, that each has to establish again and himself.

But all the same, if it is impossible to establish for man a relation with God, or with people, it is at least possible to put him into a well-known group of people, where to establish such relations is easier. The environment doesn’t certainly define completely the fate of man, but gives in certain cases such possibilities, that in another case the same person would never have received.

That is exactly what Jesus did for all of us together and for each in particular: He led us into His Kingdom, in this environment, where love to God and to the neighbor is a natural habitat. And, having led, He ended His earthly way: it is not by chance if the day before His death, the last thing He did, was the Last Supper, Passover seder, becoming thereby the messianic wedding, which was the first sacred meal of the Kingdom.

And then He goes away after the resurrection and the Ascension, somehow moving away, dissolving in the depths of the Kingdom, which coming into the world, becomes wider and more spacious. He leaves, granting us the possibility of living in the Kingdom He left. To live one life with Him, and at the same time be completely independent, free and responsible. So that at the end of time, when the Kingdom will be revealed in all its plenitude, we would meet again with Him. This time not like slaves or mercenaries, but as friends.

Other notes

 
For Heb 9:11-28
11 But Christ being come an high priest of good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this building;
12 Neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us.
13 For if the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to 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, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?
15 And for this cause he is the mediator of the new testament, that by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the first testament, they which are called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance.
16 For where a testament is, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator.
17 For a testament is of force after men are dead: otherwise it is of no strength at all while the testator liveth.
18 Whereupon neither the first testament was dedicated without blood.
19 For when Moses had spoken every precept to all the people according to the law, he took the blood of calves and of goats, with water, and scarlet wool, and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book, and all the people,
20 Saying, This is the blood of the testament which God hath enjoined unto you.
21 Moreover he sprinkled with blood both the tabernacle, and all the vessels of the ministry.
22 And almost all things are by the law purged with blood; and without shedding of blood is no remission.
23 It was therefore necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified with these; but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these.
24 For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the true; but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us:
25 Nor yet that he should offer himself often, as the high priest entereth into the holy place every year with blood of others;
26 For then must he often have suffered since the foundation of the world: but now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.
27 And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment:
28 So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation.
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Everyone has heard of Christ's Second Coming, but not all of us can immediately say what its purpose is. Was not everything...  Read more

Everyone has heard of Christ's Second Coming, but not all of us can immediately say what its purpose is. Was not everything needed for our salvation accomplished at His First Coming? Has redemption not taken place? Of course it has. But redemption is only part of what God has intended. By offering Himself in sacrifice, Christ brought liberation from slavery to sin into the world and gave people the possibility—but not the obligation!—of uniting with Him and ascending towards salvation. Yet evil is still present in the world, and not only in people. Redemption is the beginning of the victory over evil, the pledge of that victory, but the victory must still be fully manifested in time and space, in this world. It is precisely for this final victory that Christ will come in power and glory, revealing Himself to everything and everyone at once as absolute and all-conquering Good. That moment will be judgement upon the world and the end of this world. Everything redeemed, everything that has accepted this gift of redemption, will gather to the victorious Christ, while everything that has no share in redemption will cease to exist. Then Christ will truly be all and in all.

Thus what began at the First Coming finds its final fulfilment at the Second. But notice the parallel drawn by the author of the Epistle. In the same way, something begins during a person's life that receives its final determination and completion after death, at judgement. Note that Scripture here speaks quite clearly of a person dying only once: there is no ‘multiple’ life, no reincarnation. Indeed, between death and judgement there are no ‘events’; through physical death a person is ‘transported’ to judgement. However much time, by our earthly reckoning, may pass between their death and the Second Coming, to them it is like a single instant. For time matters only for bodily existence; thus, in a person's own experience, there is no time between physical death and bodily resurrection.

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For Heb 9:11-22
11 But Christ being come an high priest of good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this building;
12 Neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us.
13 For if the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to 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, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?
15 And for this cause he is the mediator of the new testament, that by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the first testament, they which are called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance.
16 For where a testament is, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator.
17 For a testament is of force after men are dead: otherwise it is of no strength at all while the testator liveth.
18 Whereupon neither the first testament was dedicated without blood.
19 For when Moses had spoken every precept to all the people according to the law, he took the blood of calves and of goats, with water, and scarlet wool, and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book, and all the people,
20 Saying, This is the blood of the testament which God hath enjoined unto you.
21 Moreover he sprinkled with blood both the tabernacle, and all the vessels of the ministry.
22 And almost all things are by the law purged with blood; and without shedding of blood is no remission.
Hide
“Service to the living and true God.” As the Apostle says, the very possibility of such labor exists only because...  Read more

“Service to the living and true God.” As the Apostle says, the very possibility of such labor exists only because Christ’s Blood was shed for the redemption of our sins. And in the Gospel we read that following, directly imitating Christ’s path, is our only way to the Kingdom of Heaven. The Lord will deal with us as He did with Isaac, whom Abraham was ready to slay on the altar. What did Isaac think and know for the rest of his life after the events on Moriah? Most likely, he always thanked the Lord for stopping his father’s hand. The miracle of his salvation happened to him, a miracle that God worked upon him. So too for Christians: even if they are not called to ascend the cross, their hearts should hold the same joy and gratitude to Christ for having done this for us. And if the world should need the Gospel to be proclaimed in it once again through torture and the cross, then every Christian will hear the question addressed to him: “Are you able to drink the cup that I drink, and be baptized with the baptism with which I am baptized?” Until then, through repentance and Communion we can cleanse our conscience, serve, and be servants to the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ.

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For Heb 9:11-22
11 But Christ being come an high priest of good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this building;
12 Neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us.
13 For if the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to 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, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?
15 And for this cause he is the mediator of the new testament, that by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the first testament, they which are called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance.
16 For where a testament is, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator.
17 For a testament is of force after men are dead: otherwise it is of no strength at all while the testator liveth.
18 Whereupon neither the first testament was dedicated without blood.
19 For when Moses had spoken every precept to all the people according to the law, he took the blood of calves and of goats, with water, and scarlet wool, and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book, and all the people,
20 Saying, This is the blood of the testament which God hath enjoined unto you.
21 Moreover he sprinkled with blood both the tabernacle, and all the vessels of the ministry.
22 And almost all things are by the law purged with blood; and without shedding of blood is no remission.
Hide
Continuing the theme of the Messiah as High Priest, the author of the letter gives his main attention to sacrifice as a form...  Read more

Continuing the theme of the Messiah as High Priest, the author of the letter gives his main attention to sacrifice as a form of communion with God that connects a person with God through purification and sanctification. It is no accident that he speaks of Christ as the One who passed through a greater and more perfect sanctuary, made not by human beings but by God Himself, calling Him "the high priest of the good things already manifested" (v. 11; in the Synodal translation, "High Priest of the good things to come"; the Greek text can mean not only "coming with a greater and more perfect tabernacle," but also "passing through a greater and more perfect tabernacle"). The former sacrifices purified a person from the outside, touching first of all his external, bodily, natural component (v. 13). Such purification could free the one being purified from the consequences of a particular sin, if that sin had been committed unintentionally or in ignorance, but it could not free a person completely from the power of sin. That is no surprise: external purification was directed not at the root cause of human sinfulness, but only at its concrete manifestations.

Jesus, however, makes "eternal redemption" possible, complete liberation from sin, after which it no longer has power over a person (v. 12). This becomes possible because the Kingdom that He brought into the world, paying for it by His death on the cross, changes a person not partially, touching only his nature, but completely, transforming his heart and therefore his spiritual and moral life, "purifying the conscience from dead works to serve the living God" (v. 14).

Since the time of Moses, sacrificial blood had sanctified both individual persons and a whole people, joining to God those who wanted this. It also purified a person from the consequences of sins he had committed, freeing him from the power of the evil in which the world lies (vv. 19-22). Such liberation was sometimes called ransom, or redemption, comparing a person's liberation from the power of worldly evil, and therefore from death, with the ransom and freeing of a fellow tribesman who had fallen into slavery, something that in every age was considered a righteous deed. But formerly the ransom was temporary, the liberation relative. Now the One has come into the world who, at the price of His own blood, ransoms forever everyone who is ready to accept His authority, finally and definitively freeing His faithful ones from the power of sin and death (v. 15). The former covenant required sacrificial blood for the purification and sanctification of those who had made it with God (v. 18); the new covenant unites the faithful with God not through sacrificial blood, but through that life of the Kingdom which the Risen One gives to everyone ready to believe Him and follow Him.

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