Secondly, The principal truth asserted is confirmed by what Moses said, as well as what he did:—
Ver. 20,—“ Saying, This [7s] the blood of the testament which God hath enjoined unto you.”
The difference between the words of Moses and the repetition of them by the apostle is not material, as unto, the sense of them. N37, “behold,” in Moses, is rendered by rodro, “ this;” both demon- strative notes of the same thing. For in pronouncing of the words Moses showed the blood unto the people; and so, “ Behold the blood,” is all one as if he had said, “ This is the blood.” The mak- ing of the covenant in the words of Moses is expressed by 72, “hath cut,’ “divided,” solemnly made, This the apostle renders by évere/- raro, “hath enjoined” or “commanded you.” And this he doth _ partly to signify the foundation of the people’s acceptance of that covenant, which was the authority of God enjoining them or requir- ing them so to do; partly to intimate the nature of the covenant it- self, which consisted in precepts and injunctions principally, and not absolutely in promises, as the new covenant doth. The last words of Moses, “ Concerning all these words,” the apostle omits; for he in- cludes the sense of them in that word, “ Which God hath com- manded you.’ For he hath respect therein both unto the words themselves written in the book, which were precepts and injunctions, as also the command of God for the acceptance of the covenant. _ That which Moses said is, “This is the blood of the testament.” Hence the apostle proves that death, and the shedding —qyiiey x) af. of blood therein, was necessary unto the consecration ## ras duati- and establishment of the first testament. For so Moses *” expressly affirms in the dedication of it, “This is the blood of the covenant;” without which it could not have been a firm covenant between God and the people. Not, I confess, from the nature of a covenant in general, for a covenant may be solemnly established without death or blood; but from the especial end of that covenant, ‘which in the confirmation of it’was to prefigure the confirmation of
362 AN EXPOSITION OF THE [CHAP. IX.
that new covenant which could not be established but with the blood of a sacrifice. “ And this adds both force and evidence unto the apostle’s argument. For he proves the necessity of the death and blood-shedding or sacrifice of Christ in the confirmation of the new covenant from hence, that the old covenant, which in the dedi- cation of it was prefigurative hereof, was not confirmed without blood. Wherefore, whereas God had solemnly promised to make a new covenant with the church, and that different from, or not ac- cording unto the old (which he had proved in the foregoing chapter), it follows unavoidably that it was to be confirmed with the blood of the mediator (for by the blood of beasts it could not be); which is that truth wherein he did instruct them. And nothing was more cogent to take off the scandal of the cross and of the sufferings of Christ.
For the enunciation itself, “This is the blood of the covenant,” it is figuratwe and sacramental. The covenant had no blood of its own; but the blood of the sacrifices is called “the blood of the cove- nant,’ because the covenant was dedicated and established by it. Neither was the covenant really established by it; for it was the truth of God on the one hand, and the stability of the people in their professed obedience on the other, that the establishment of the covenant depended on. But this blood was a confirmatory sign of it, a token between God and the people of their mutual engage- ment in that covenant. So the paschal lamb was called “the Lorp’s passover,” because it was a sign and token of God’s passing over the
_houses of the Israelites when he destroyed the HKgyptians, Exod, xii. 11,12. With reference it was unto those sacramental expressions which the church under the old testament was accustomed unto, that our Lord Jesus Christ, in the institution of the sacrament of the supper, called the bread and the wine, whose use he appointed therein, by the names of his body and blood; and any other inter- pretation of the words wholly overthrows the nature of that holy ordinance. .
Wherefore this blood was a confirmatory sign of the covenant. And it was so, 1. From God’s institution; he appointed it so to be, as is express in the words of Moses. 2. From an amplication of the interest of both parties in the blood of the sacrifice; God, unto whom it was offered; and the people, on whom it was sprinkled. For it being the blood of beasts that were slain, in this use of it each party as it were engaged their lives unto the observation and performance of what was respectively undertaken by them. 3. Typically, in that it represented the blood of Christ, and fore-signified the necessity of
~ it unto the confirmation of the new covenant. See Zech. ix. 11;
Matt. xxvi. 28; Luke xxii. 20; 1 Cor. xi. 25. So was it “the blood
of the covenant,” in that it was a sign between God and the people