9. Fourthly, Other priests, who never entered into the sanctuary, were types of Christ in their office and the execution of it; which if he was not a priest on earth, nor thereon offered his sacrifice or executed his office, they could not be; for nothing they did repre- sented the appearance of Christ in heaven. And this is evident in
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his principal type, Melchizedek; for he did so eminently represent him above Aaron and his successors as that he is peculiarly called a priest after his order. Now, Melchizedek discharged his office entirely, and an end was put unto his priesthood, before there was any sanctuary erected, to be a resemblance of the holy place where- into Christ, our high priest, was to enter. And whereas our adver- saries say that he is called a high priest because of an allusion that was between what he doth for the church and what was done by them, if his priesthood and sacrifice consisted in his entrance into heayen and presenting or offering himself there in glory unto God, there was no allusion at all between it and what was done by him whom the Scripture expresseth as his principal type, namely, this Melchizedek, who had no sanctuary to enter into, whereby there might be any allusion between what he did and what was done by Jesus Christ. Moreover, all the priests according to the law, in all their sacrifices, especially those that were solemn and stated for the whole people, were types of Christ; for whereas the original insti- tution of all expiatory sacrifices, or sacrifices to make atonement for sin, was merely with respect unto, and to prefigure, the sacrifice which Christ was to offer, without which they would have been of no use nor signification, nor had ever been instituted, as being a kind of worship no way suiting the divine nature without this rela- tion; and whereas the Lord Christ, with respect unto them, is called the “ Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the world,” and a “Lamb slain from the foundation of the world,” as I have proved elsewhere ; the priests that offered these sacrifices must of necessity be types of him in his.
Crellius replies hereunto: “ Vult Socinus (1.) publica et stata sacrificia, atque imprimis anniversarium, figuram fuisse sacrificii Christi; caetera vero sacrificiorum nostrorum spiritualium. (2.) Nam et nos istiusmodi sacrificia, quibus intervenientibus peccata expiantur, ‘seu remissio peccatorum ex Dei benignitate obtinetur, offerimus: (3.) sacerdotem etiam summum esse verum Christi summi sacer- dotis typum, (4.) ceeteros vulgares sacerdotes nobis qui etiam sacer- dotes sumus, censet respondere; qua de re mirum est si quisquam dubitet, cap. x. ad Grot. part. 21, p. 413.”
(1.) It is acknowledged that other stated and solemn sacrifices besides the anniversary expiation were types of the sacrifice of Christ. But these were offered by the ordinary priests, as Num. xxviii. 15, 22, 30, xxix. 5, 11, 16, 19, 22, and were completed without the most holy place, no entrance into it ensuing thereon; for they consisted entirely in the death and blood-shedding of the sacrifices themselves, with their oblation on the altar. How, then, could they typify Christ and his sacrifice, if that consisted not at all in his death and
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blood-shedding, which they did represent, but in his entrance into heaven, and presenting himself there unto God, which they did not re- present at all? This concession, therefore, that the sacrifice of Christ was typified by any sacrifices whereof no part nor remembrance was carried into the sanctuary, destroys the whole hypothesis of our ad- versaries. (2.) Nothing that we do is, in any sense, such a sacrifice as whereby sin is expiated. And although our faith is the means whereby we are interested in the one sacrifice of Christ by which our sins are expiated once and for ever, and we thereby, according unto God’s appointment, obtain the forgiveness of our sins, yet no duties of ours are anywhere called sacrifices, but such as are fruits of grati- tude for the pardon of sin, received by virtue of that one sacrifice of Christ. (3.) The high priest was a true, real type of Christ, but not his only type; Melchizedek was so also, and so were all the ordinary priests of the house of Aaron, who served at the altar. (4.) He is greatly mistaken in his last assertion, whereof he gives no other proof but only ‘Qua de re mirum est si quisquam dubitet ;” and this is, that the priests under the law were types of all Chris- tians, and their sacrifices of ours, and that “this belongeth unto the economy of the new covenant.” For I do not only doubt of it, but also expressly deny it, and that on such grounds as will leave none for admiration in any sober person; for,—[1.] All the priests of the house of Aaron were of the very same office with the high priest. Aaron and his sons were at the same time called to the same office, and set apart in the same manner, Exod. xxviii. 1 and xxix. 9. If, therefore, the high priest was in his office the type of Christ, the other priests in their office could not be types of us, un- less we have the same office with Christ himself, and are made mediators with him. [2.] The sacrifices offered by the other priests were of the same nature with that or those which were offered by the high priest himself; for although the entrance once a year into the most holy place was peculiar unto him, yet he had no sacrifice of any especial kind, as burnt-offering, dincoffening. or trespass-offering, peculiar unto him, but the other priests offered the same. If, there- fore, the sacrifice of the high priest was a type of the sacrifice of Christ, the sacrifices of the other priests could not be types of ours,