| 1 | Now the main point in what we are saying is this: we have such a high priest, one who is seated at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens, |
| 2 | a minister in the sanctuary and the true tent that the Lord, and not any mortal, has set up. |
| 3 | For every high priest is appointed to offer gifts and sacrifices; hence it is necessary for this priest also to have something to offer. |
| 4 | Now if he were on earth, he would not be a priest at all, since there are priests who offer gifts according to the law. |
| 5 | They offer worship in a sanctuary that is a sketch and shadow of the heavenly one; for Moses, when he was about to erect the tent, was warned, “See that you make everything according to the pattern that was shown you on the mountain.” |
| 6 | But Jesus has now obtained a more excellent ministry, and to that degree he is the mediator of a better covenant, which has been enacted through better promises. |
| 7 | For if that first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no need to look for a second one. |
| 8 | God finds fault with them when he says: “The days are surely coming, says the Lord, when I will establish a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah; |
| 9 | not like the covenant that I made with their ancestors, on the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; for they did not continue in my covenant, and so I had no concern for them, says the Lord. |
| 10 | This is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the Lord: I will put my laws in their minds, and write them on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. |
| 11 | And they shall not teach one another or say to each other, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know me, from the least of them to the greatest. |
| 12 | For I will be merciful toward their iniquities, and I will remember their sins no more.” |
| 13 | In speaking of “a new covenant,” he has made the first one obsolete. And what is obsolete and growing old will soon disappear. |