Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Hebrews 9:20
saying, This [is] the blood of the testament which God hath enjoined unto you.
20. This is ] In the Hebrew “Behold!” Some have supposed that the writer adopted the variation from a reminiscence of our Lord’s words “This is my blood of the new covenant which is shed for many for the remission of sins” (Mat 26:28). But if such a reference or comparison had been at all present to his mind, he would hardly have been likely to pass it over in complete silence.
which God hath enjoined unto you ] Rather, “which God commanded with regard to you,” i.e. which (covenant) Jehovah commanded me to deliver to you.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Saying, This is the blood of the testament – Of the covenant; see notes on Heb 9:16-17. That is, this is the blood by which the covenant is ratified. It was the means used to confirm it; the sacred and solemn form by which it was made sure. When this was done, the covenant between God and the people was confirmed – as a covenant between man and man is when it is sealed.
Which God hath enjoined unto you – In Exo 24:8, which God hath made with you. The language used by Paul, which God hath enjoined – eneteilato – commanded – shows that he did not regard this as strictly of the nature of a covenant, or compact. When a compact is made between parties, one does not enjoin or command the other, but it is a mutual agreement. In the transactions between God and man, though called beriyt, or diatheke, the idea of a covenant or compact is so far excluded that God never loses his right to command or enjoin. It is not a transaction between equals, or an agreement; it is a solemn arrangement on the part of God which he proposes to mankind, and which he enjoins them to embrace; which they are not indeed at liberty to disregard, but which when embraced is appropriately ratified by some solemn act on their part; compare notes on Heb 8:6.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 20. This is the blood of the testament] (covenant.) Our Lord refers to the conduct of Moses here, and partly quotes his words in the institution of the eucharist: This is my blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins, Mt 26:28. And by thus using the words and applying them, he shows that his sacrificial blood was intended by the blood shed and sprinkled on this occasion, and that by it alone the remission of sins is obtained.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Moses, after his sprinkling the altar, book of the covenant, and all Israel, taught them the meaning of it; saying: This that is the blood wherewith I have sprinkled you, is a sign or a seal of the testament, the blood by which it is ratified and confirmed. The blood typified and represented by it, was that of Christ the Testator, by which all the new testament is ratified to all penitent, believing sinners that look to it, without which it could never have been made good. The blood of Christ is the immovable foundation of this testament, Exo 24:8; compare 1Co 11:25; even the testamental covenant which Jehovah had made with them, and which he enjoined them by such a rite as this to ratify and confirm.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
20. Ex24:8, “Behold the blood of the covenant, which theLord has made with you concerning all these words.” Thechange is here made to accord with Christ’s inauguration of the newtestament, or covenant, as recorded in Lu22:20, “This cup (is) the new Testament in My blood, whichis shed for you”: the only Gospel in which the “is”has to be supplied. Luke was Paul’s companion, which accountsfor the correspondence, as here too “is” has to besupplied.
testament(See on Heb9:16, 17). The Greek “diathece” meansboth “testament” and “covenant”: the term”covenant” better suits the old dispensation, though theidea testament is included, for the old was one in its typicalrelation to the new dispensation, to which the term “testament”is better suited. Christ has sealed the testament with His blood,of which the Lord’s Supper is the sacramental sign. The testator wasrepresented by the animals slain in the old dispensation. In bothdispensations the inheritance was bequeathed: in the new by One whohas come in person and died; in the old by the same one, onlytypically and ceremonially present. See ALFORD’Sexcellent Note.
enjoined untoyoucommissioned me to ratify in relation to you.In the old dispensation the condition to be fulfilled on the people’spart is implied in the words, Ex24:8, “(Lord made with you) concerning all these words.“But here Paul omits this clause, as he includes the fulfilment ofthis condition of obedience to “all these words” in the newcovenant, as part of God’s promise, in Heb 8:8;Heb 8:10; Heb 8:12,whereby Christ fulfils all for our justification, and will enable usby putting His Spirit in us to fulfil all in our now progressive, andfinally complete, sanctification.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
Saying, this is the blood of the testament,…. The first testament or covenant; this proves what the apostle had asserted in Heb 9:18 that it was dedicated with blood, or confirmed by it; compare with this Mt 26:28
which God hath enjoined unto you; the people of Israel, to observe, and which they promised to do; see Ex 24:7.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
This is (). Instead of of the LXX (Ex 24:8), just like our Lord’s words in Mr 14:24, a possible reminiscence of the Master’s words (Dods). The author also has (he commanded) for of the LXX.
Fuente: Robertson’s Word Pictures in the New Testament
1) “Saying this is the blood of the testament,” (legon touto to haima tes disthekes) “Saying, this is the blood of the covenant; of this Exo 24:8 reads, “Behold the blood of the covenant; O that men might behold its real meaning today, not of the shadow-blood of the first covenant, but the blood of the sinless Son of God who intercedes with his own blood at heaven’s mercy seat today, Mat 26:28.
2) “Which God hath enjoined unto you,” (hes eneteilato pros hemas hotheos) “Which the God enjoined to you all,” to Israel concerning all his words, Psa 119:160; It is the intercessory blood of Jesus, the blood of the new covenant, the second covenant, the better covenant than that between Moses and Israel, that is preeminent, most to be desired, respected today, 1Co 11:25; As God enjoined Israel to offer the blood of animals, signifying their need of continual cleansing, moral cleansing from the broken law of Moses, so should children of God in his new covenant church acknowledge their daily need of cleansing, by the blood of Jesus Christ, at the throne of his daily, continual intercession for his own, Heb 7:25; Heb 9:24; They may do this in observance of the Lord’s supper which depicts his broken body and shed blood for the whole world, and his church in a special way, 1Ti 2:5-6; Mat 26:28; Luk 22:20.
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
20. Saying, This is the blood of the testament, (154) etc. If that was the blood of the testament, then neither the testament was without blood ratified, nor the blood without the testament available for expiation. It is hence necessary that both should be united; and we see that before the explanation of the Law, no symbol was added, for what would a sacrament be except the word preceded it? Hence a symbol is a kind of appendage to the word. And mark, this word was not whispered like a magic incantation, but pronounced with a clear voice, as it was destined for the people, according to what the words of the covenant express, which God hath enjoined unto you. (155) Perverted, then, are the sacraments, and it is a wicked corruption when there is no explanation of the commandment given, which is as it were the very soul of the sacrament. Hence the Papists, who take away the true understanding of things from signs, retain only dead elements.
This passage reminds us that the promises of God are then only profitable to us when they are confirmed by the blood of Christ. For what Paul testifies in 2Co 1:20, that all God’s promises are yea and amen in Christ — this happens when his blood like a seal is engraven on our hearts, or when we not only hear God speaking, but also see Christ offering himself as a pledge for those things which are spoken. If this thought only came to our minds, that what we read is not written so much with ink as with the blood of Christ, that when the Gospel is preached, his sacred blood distills together with the voice, there would be far greater attention as well as reverence on our part. A symbol of this was the sprinkling mentioned by Moses!
At the same time there is more stated here than what is expressed by Moses; for he does not mention that the book and the people were sprinkled, nor does he name the goats, nor the scarlet wool, nor the hyssop. As to the book, that it was sprinkled cannot be clearly shown, yet the probability is that it was, for Moses is said to have produced it after he had sacrificed; and he did this when he bound the people to God by a solemn compact. With regard to the rest, the Apostle seems to have blended together various kinds of expiations, the reason for which was the same. Nor indeed was there anything unsuitable in this, since he was speaking of the general subject Or purgation under the Old Testament, which was done by means of blood. Now as to the sprinkling made by hyssop and scarlet wool, it is evident that it represented the mystical sprinkling made by the Spirit. We know that the hyssop possesses a singular power to cleanse and to purify; so Christ employs his Spirit to sprinkle us in order to wash us by his own blood when he leads us to true repentance, when he purifies us from the depraved lusts of our flesh, when he imbues us with the precious gift of his own righteousness. For it was not in vain that God had instituted this rite. David also alluded to this when he said,
“
Thou wilt sprinkle me, O Lord, with hyssop, and I shall be cleansed.” (Psa 51:7.)
These remarks will be sufficient for those who wish to be soberminded in their speculations.
(154) Both Calvin and our verse retain the word “testament” as derived from Heb 9:17; but as that verse and the preceding are to be viewed as parenthetic, the word “covenant” is the term used by Moses. The latter is the word adopted by Beza, Doddridge, Macknight, and Stuart, “This is the blood of the covenant,” etc. — Ed.
(155) The Apostle here follows neither the Hebrew nor the Septuagint. The Hebrew is “which the Lord (Jehovah) hath made with you;” and the Septuagint, “Which the Lord hath covenanted ( διέθετο) with you.” And instead of “Behold the blood of the covenant,” (the same in both) we have here, “This is the blood of the covenant.” But though the words are different, yet the meaning is essentially the same, — the main things regarded by the Apostles in their quotations. — Ed
Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary
(20) The testament which God hath enjoined unto you.Better, the covenant which God commanded in regard to you. Commanded, see Heb. 8:6 : in the LXX. the word is covenanted.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
20. Blood of the testament Or bequest. The blood indicating the death of the testator, and thereby certifying the validity of the testament and the security of the inheritance.
Which Referring to testament.
Unto you Rather, in regard to you; in your behalf. This blood-bought bequest is enjoined in our behalf by God the Father Almighty. Compare these quoted words with the language of our Saviour. Luk 22:20.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Heb 9:20. Saying, This is the blood of the testament Of the covenant, that is, the blood by which the covenant between God and this people is ratified and confirmed. Our blessed Saviour seems to have had the passage of Moses here referred to in view, when he gave to his disciples the cup in his last supper: This, said he, is my blood, even that of the new testament, which is shed for many, for the remission of sins; Mat 26:28. The apostle, in the words before us, follows neither the Hebrew nor the LXX; but only gives the sense of what he found in the Old Testament, as he does in many other parts of this epistle. It is undeniably plain from hence, (if there wanted further proof,) that he uses the word for a covenant, and not for a testament; not only from the Hebrew word , berith, which he here translates, but from the thing itself, the old law having nothing of the nature of a testament in it. See the Reflections on this chapter, where I treat the subject according to our common translation.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
Heb 9:20 . Exo 24:8 , LXX.: , .
] Bengel: “praecepit mihi, ut perferrem ad vos.”
Fuente: Heinrich August Wilhelm Meyer’s New Testament Commentary
20 Saying, This is the blood of the testament which God hath enjoined unto you.
Ver. 20. Saying, This is the blood, &c. ] A tropical and sacramental expression, whereunto our Saviour seemeth to allude in those words of his, “This cup is the new testament in my blood,” &c. The sacraments of the Old Testament had a resemblance unto the New; but that was for works of the law, this is for remission of sins.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
20 .] This is the blood of the testament (LXX, . It has been suggested, first it would appear by Bhme, that the change has been made by the Writer after the tenor of the N. T. inauguration of the testament by our Lord, , Luk 22:20 , the only Gospel in which fails) which God (LXX, : changed apparently to preserve more completely the O. T. character of the saying) commanded (LXX , which would seem at first sight more appropriate to Heb 9:16 . But is a common LXX expression elsewhere, see besides reff. Deu 4:13 ; Deu 29:1 ; Ps. 110:9; Jer 11:3 ) in regard to you (it is much disputed, how the logic of this passage can cohere: seeing that, how properly soever the latter may be spoken of and argued on as being a testament, the former one could have no such character, and consequently cannot be thus argued on. And the question is very variously answered according to the standing-point of different Commentators. Even such as Tholuck, Lnemann, and Bleek, question the applicability of the Writer’s argument. But, I believe, wrongly. The matter seems to stand thus. The word has the double sense of a covenant and a testament. Both these senses may be applied to both : to the latter more properly belongs the testamentary sense, but to the former also in as far as it was typical of and foreshadowed the other. In the latter, all is clear. Christ, the heir of all things, has bequeathed to us His people an everlasting inheritance; has died, sealing the testament with His blood. In the former all this is formally, though inadequately represented. The , faintly shadowed forth by temporal possessions, had yet a recognized blessed meaning far beyond those possessions: the testator was imperfectly, but still was formally represented by the animals slain in sacrifice: there was a death, there was a sprinkling of and sealing by blood: and surely it requires no more stretch of concession to acknowledge the victim in sacrifice to represent the Lamb of God in his sonship and his heritorship, than it does in his innocence and propitiatory power. The one idea is just as poorly and inadequately set forth by it as the other. But in both cases there is an inheritance, and in both it is the same. In both it is bequeathed: in the latter actually by One who has come in person and died: in the former, only typically, by the same One ceremonially present. So that, if our in Heb 9:18 were to be filled up, it would be, ‘Whence, i. e. since the former covenant also had its testamentary side, and thus was analogous to as well as typical of the latter.’
The charge brought against the Writer on account of his transition of meaning in , is equally without foundation. He is thinking in Greek. In Greek, has these two meanings: not divided off from one another by any such line of demarcation as when expressed by two separate words, but both lying under one and the same word. What more common, or more ordinarily accepted, than to educe out of some one word its various shades of meaning, and argue on each separately as regards the matter in hand? Take the very word ‘Testament’ as an example. In our common parlance it now means a book : the Old Testament , the book of the former covenant, the New Testament , the book of the latter. But we do not therefore sink the other and deeper meaning; nay we rather insist on it, that it may not become lost in that other and more familiar one. I cannot see how the Writer’s method of procedure here differs essentially from this).
Fuente: Henry Alford’s Greek Testament
This, &c. Quoted from Exo 24:8.
enjoined = commanded.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
20.] This is the blood of the testament (LXX, . It has been suggested, first it would appear by Bhme, that the change has been made by the Writer after the tenor of the N. T. inauguration of the testament by our Lord, , Luk 22:20, the only Gospel in which fails) which God (LXX, : changed apparently to preserve more completely the O. T. character of the saying) commanded (LXX , which would seem at first sight more appropriate to Heb 9:16. But is a common LXX expression elsewhere, see besides reff. Deu 4:13; Deu 29:1; Ps. 110:9; Jer 11:3) in regard to you (it is much disputed, how the logic of this passage can cohere: seeing that, how properly soever the latter may be spoken of and argued on as being a testament, the former one could have no such character, and consequently cannot be thus argued on. And the question is very variously answered according to the standing-point of different Commentators. Even such as Tholuck, Lnemann, and Bleek, question the applicability of the Writers argument. But, I believe, wrongly. The matter seems to stand thus. The word has the double sense of a covenant and a testament. Both these senses may be applied to both : to the latter more properly belongs the testamentary sense, but to the former also in as far as it was typical of and foreshadowed the other. In the latter, all is clear. Christ, the heir of all things, has bequeathed to us His people an everlasting inheritance; has died, sealing the testament with His blood. In the former all this is formally, though inadequately represented. The , faintly shadowed forth by temporal possessions, had yet a recognized blessed meaning far beyond those possessions: the testator was imperfectly, but still was formally represented by the animals slain in sacrifice: there was a death, there was a sprinkling of and sealing by blood: and surely it requires no more stretch of concession to acknowledge the victim in sacrifice to represent the Lamb of God in his sonship and his heritorship, than it does in his innocence and propitiatory power. The one idea is just as poorly and inadequately set forth by it as the other. But in both cases there is an inheritance, and in both it is the same. In both it is bequeathed: in the latter actually by One who has come in person and died: in the former, only typically, by the same One ceremonially present. So that, if our in Heb 9:18 were to be filled up, it would be, Whence, i. e. since the former covenant also had its testamentary side, and thus was analogous to as well as typical of the latter.
The charge brought against the Writer on account of his transition of meaning in , is equally without foundation. He is thinking in Greek. In Greek, has these two meanings: not divided off from one another by any such line of demarcation as when expressed by two separate words, but both lying under one and the same word. What more common, or more ordinarily accepted, than to educe out of some one word its various shades of meaning, and argue on each separately as regards the matter in hand? Take the very word Testament as an example. In our common parlance it now means a book: the Old Testament, the book of the former covenant, the New Testament, the book of the latter. But we do not therefore sink the other and deeper meaning; nay we rather insist on it, that it may not become lost in that other and more familiar one. I cannot see how the Writers method of procedure here differs essentially from this).
Fuente: The Greek Testament
Heb 9:20. , ) LXX., , .- ) commanded me to bring to you.
Fuente: Gnomon of the New Testament
This: Heb 13:20, Zec 9:11, Mat 26:28
testament: Rather, covenant. Heb 9:16, and Heb 9:17, may be better rendered, “For where a covenant is, there must necessarily be the death of that by which it is confirmed; for a covenant is confirmed over dead victims, and does not avail while that by which it is confirmed liveth.” Deu 29:12, Jos 9:6
Reciprocal: Exo 24:8 – Behold Deu 4:13 – And he Heb 10:29 – the blood
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Heb 9:20. This language is similar to that spoken by Jesus when he was instituting the ceremony that was to symbolize the dedicating virtue of the New Testament. (See Mat 26:28 and 1Co 11:25.)
Fuente: Combined Bible Commentary
Heb 9:20. The design of this sprinkling is now explainedSaying, This is the blood of the covenant which God (the Hebrew is Jehovah, and the Greek the Lord; probably God is used to preserve the O. T. character of the quotation; the N. T. covenant, the Supper especially, is connected with the Lord) commanded to you-ward.
Fuente: A Popular Commentary on the New Testament
Verse 20
Hebrews 9:20; Exodus 24:8.