Timothy to Hebrews - The Preterist Archive

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Hebrews IX. 11, 12. 505
(Mos. holy of holies : heavenly holy of holies. = Mos. holy place : X.)
The Mosaic holy place symbolically represented that relative,
temporary, outward, purity, conformity to the law and holiness
which was described in ver. 10. The true, moral, inward holiness
must form the antithesis to the symbolically holy place—the thing
to its emhlem. Is the holy of holies into which Christ entered not
the place in heaven viewed as a place, but the act of his exaltation
and the time of his being exalted, then will also the Trpcjr?/ (tkt/v?/,
through which he passed into his state of exaltation, be not a place
but an act and a time. In ver. 9 the Mosaic holy place was actually
called a figure of the time of the old covenant. Through that time
in which the old covenant with its ordinances still subsisted Christ
has passed, inasmuch as he was made under the law; his act of
passing through this state, his act of living in a state of humiliation,
i. e., therefore, his perfect inward fulfilment of the laio, or his holy
life, was the reXeioripa gktjv?] through which he passed into his state
of exaltation.* The real fact of holiness (in the life of Jesus upon
earth) stands opposed to the symbolical repi^esentation of holiness in
the Mosaic Trpwr?/ cKr]vri. AU that was emblematically represented in
Was
the Mosaic holy place has by him been actually accomplished.
the earthly shewbread laid out there—he was the bread of life that
came down from heaven; did the candlestick burn there with earthly
oil
he was the light of the world. Nay, we can now, for the first
time, rightly understand why the author at ver. 4 has not omitted
to mention also the pot of manna and Aaron's rod. Did the pot of
manna in the holy of holies point to a better bread than the earthly
shewbread, to a bread from heaven—Christ was this better bread
from heaven. Did Aaron's rod reviving again from a state of death
point to a new life out of death—Christ brought, and was, this life
which arose out of death, and gave life again to dead humanity.
The third idea, not by blood, etc., does not need here a more
detailed explanation, as the author himself developes it, in the form
of a new theme, in the verses which follow. The following points
only, are briefly to be noticed. Side by side with the absolutely
holy life of Christ as the passage through the reXetortpa rrpwr?/ okt/^tJ
stands the holy death of Christ (together with his resurrection and
ascension) as the entrance into the eternal holy of holies. The 6td
is, of course, not to be taken in a local sense here (as if Christ had
passed to the Father through his blood poured out, and then everywhere
diffused, as certain old Lutheran theologians have explained);
this is inadmissible, already on the ground, that in the words Si'
alixarog rpdycov aal ii6ax