Hebrews 10:1Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

He rightly called the sacrifices antitypes. Indeed, they were only a prefiguration and had no power. So in pictures, the image has the form of a man, but not his power.

The original and the image have something in common. In the image there is likeness, but not power.

So it is with heaven and the tabernacle. The tabernacle was an image resembling it, since it was holy. Yet its power and everything else were not the same.

Thus he indicates that the Apostle calls the law a shadow. He calls what is now performed in the Church an image, as a reflection of other, more perfect blessings that the worthy will receive in the age to come.

These are what the Apostle now calls the things themselves. Therefore, as an image differs in some way from the original reality, so the present Mysteries differ from the more perfect realities of the age to come.

And as much as an outline falls short of an image, so much does the law fall short of the New Covenant.

“With the same sacrifices, which they offer continually year by year, it can never make perfect those who draw near.” The meaning of this passage is as follows.

If the legal sacrifices had power, they would not have been offered continually. Having once been offered and having brought benefit, they would have ceased.

But since they were offered every year, continually, it is clear that they had no power to perfect. Therefore, after the first sacrifice they offered a second, and then a third.

So it is also with medicines. Those that cure after being used once are effective. But those that are used often show by this very fact their weakness.

But one may ask: what then? Do we not also continually offer bloodless sacrifices? Certainly, always. Yet we celebrate the remembrance of Christ’s death.

And this sacrifice is one, not many, because it was offered once. We continually offer one and the same Lamb. Or rather, we celebrate the remembrance of that offering, as though it were being accomplished now.

Therefore the sacrifice is one. As for the sacrifice being offered in many places, are there then many Christs? No. He is one everywhere, whole there and whole here, His one Body.

As He who is offered in many places is one Body and not many bodies, so the sacrifice is one. For we offer the sacrifice that was offered then.

There, however, the lamb offered yesterday was different from the one offered today. And the lamb offered today was not offered in remembrance of yesterday’s, but as constituting a sacrifice in itself.

In what sense, then, does the Apostle say “with the same sacrifices”? The sacrifices were the same because the same kinds of sacrifices were offered, as when today there is a lamb and tomorrow a lamb.

Yet they were different in number. Some said that the sacrifices were the same according to the manner of offering, that is, they were performed through slaughter or whole burnt offering.

But according to kind they differed, such as sheep, bulls, turtledoves, and doves.

The expression δύναται, “can,” although found in the manuscripts with the letter ν, I have found a note requiring it without the letter ν.

“The law,” he says, “having a shadow of the good things to come, never can make perfect those who draw near.” Indeed, according to grammatical precision, it is necessary to preserve the Scripture so that no error appears in it.

But since Scripture says nothing about rules of speech, we shall understand this passage as the manuscripts contain it: “they can never,” that is, those who offer, “make perfect those who draw near.”

In the Old Covenant, in which the Spirit inscribed the members of Christ, He clearly showed in mysteries His hidden form. He signified many things by names, and set forth what was hidden by means of what was manifest.

He marked times and indicated numbers. He established hours and moments, enclosed the secret in names, and placed wisdom in explanations.

The wisdom of the ancients was distinguished more by deeds than by words. They preferred an abundance of wisdom with silence to the exercise of the tongue.

By shadow he means the things under the law. By image he means our Christian realities. By the good things to come and the true realities he means those of the age to come.

As far as the image falls short of the truth, so far does the shadow fall short of the image.

For the image, even if it does not possess truth itself, is nevertheless a clear representation of the truth. Through colors it preserves the form, the proportion of the parts, and the color of the object.

But a shadow is a weak likeness of the image, showing nothing of that whose image it is. I think that Gregory, who is among the saints, said this under the influence of these apostolic sayings.

Many other Fathers also spoke in a manner similar to Gregory.

As the Apostle says elsewhere, “All these things happened to them as figures” (1 Cor 10:11). Instead of the shadow came the light of truth. Instead of the image of the law came the very image of the realities symbolized in the law.

Christ revealed this when, by the given grace of the Spirit, He opened to His disciples the capacity to understand the Holy Scriptures.

The law of Moses was given so that the people might be cleansed by sprinkling with the blood of a lamb. The grace and truth symbolized by the law were fulfilled in Christ.

This happened when He Himself endured suffering on the Cross and washed us from our sins by His Blood.

We have already explained that, according to Orthodox teaching, the sacrifice once offered by Christ is not repeated, but only continuously preserves its action. The Body and Blood of Christ likewise continuously preserve their intercessory significance, with which they appear in the mystery of the Eucharist.

But we must have recourse without number or measure to this universal sacrifice. In this way we preserve the forgiveness we have received and do not lose the reconciliation with God obtained for us through new falls into sin.

We have recourse to the Great High Priest and Lamb in many ways: sometimes by faith alone, and sometimes by faith strengthened through prayer (Mt 26:41), prostrations (Lk 22:41), offerings in the temple (Lk 21:1-4), and almsgiving (Lk 19:8).

All these ascetic labors do not have the meaning or property of a redeeming offering for sins. Only the sacrifice of Christ was such.

They express only our love for Christ (Lk 7:47) and the zeal with which we strive to preserve His eternal redemption.

Of course, no one will say that the forgiveness of sins acquired for us by Christ’s sacrifice cannot be lost by us through our negligence and sinfulness.

In general, when the Apostle contrasts the multiplicity of Old Testament offerings with the unity of Christ’s sacrifice, he does not intend to teach that the latter no longer acts after once accomplishing all that depends on it.

Nor does he teach that it does not continue its intercessory action in the Eucharist, or that it leaves no room for expressions of our love for Christ and our care for salvation.

He shows his Hebrew readers only that the multitude of lambs offered according to the law testifies to the impossibility of obtaining justification through them.

He also shows that the sacrifice of Christ is fully sufficient for this, and therefore is one.

After repeating several earlier observations about the insufficiency of the Levitical priesthood and the powerlessness of the Old Testament sacrifices according to their essence, the Apostle dwells chiefly on Old Testament prophecies concerning the abolition of the Old Testament sacrifices and priesthood.

“For the law, having a shadow of the good things to come, and not the very image of the realities, can never by the same sacrifices year by year,” that is, on the Day of Atonement, “which they offer continually, make perfect those who approach.”

That means it can never make them perfect, or grant inward cleansing.

“Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered, since the worshipers, once cleansed, would have had no more consciousness of sins?” (Heb 10:1-2).

The Apostle’s thought is this. If the sacrifice of atonement offered by the Israelite high priest had power to produce perfect cleansing, as the sacrifice of Jesus Christ does, then its offering would have ceased.

Those who offered it and those for whom it was offered, once cleansed, would have ceased, like Christians, to be conscious of their sinful guilt.

Granted, Christians at the present time also know themselves to be sinful people. They are carried away by the force of sinful desires, which continue to live in them even after gracious regeneration. They too can fall, and do fall, into various sins.

Yet this in no way troubles them to the degree that there would be need again for the repetition of Christ’s bloody sacrifice for their sins.

On the contrary, they know and feel in their souls that by the death of Jesus Christ their responsibility and punishment for sins have been removed once for all.

In general, for those who appropriate the merits of Christ the Savior through active faith in Him, sin as it were ceases to exist, and therefore is driven from their consciousness.