(1.) Nothing can be more alien from the design of the apostle and scope of the context. They are both of them to prove that the
sacrifices of the law could not expiate sins, could not make atone-
ment for them, could not make reconciliation with God,—could not produce the effect which the sacrifice of Christ alone was appointed and ordained unto. They were only signs and figures of it. They could not effect that which the Hebrews looked for from them and by them, And that which they expected by them was, that by them they should make atonement with God for their sins. Wherefore the apostle denies that it was possible they should effect what they
looked for from them, and nothing else. It was not that they
should be arguments to turn them from sin unto newness of life, so as they should sin no more. By what way, and on what consider- ation they were means to deter men from sin, I have newly de-
clared. But they can produce no one place in the whole law to
give countenance unto such an apprehension that this was their end; so that the apostle had no need to declare their insufficiency with respect thereunto. Especially, the great anniversary sacrifice on the day of expiation was appointed so expressly to make atonement for sin, to procure its pardon, to take away its guilt in the sight of God, and from the conscience of the sinner, that he should not be
_ punished according unto the sentence of the law, as that it cannot
be denied. This is that which the apostle declares that of them-
selves they could not effect or perform, but only typically and by
way of representation.
el US lit Sa ee
Adc AN PXPOSITION OF THE [CHAP. x.
(2.) He declares directly and positively what he intends by this taking away of sins and the ceasing of legal sacrifices thereon, verses 17, 18, “ Their sins and their iniquities will IT remember no more, Now where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin.” The cessation of offerings for sin follows directly on the remission of sin, which is the effect of expiation and atonement; and not upon the turning away of men from sin for the future. It is therefore our justification, and not our sanctification, that the apostle dis- courseth of,
(3.) The words themselves will not bear this sense. For the ob- ject of d&pasped, that which it is exercised about, is éwapria, Ib is an act upon sin itself, and not immediately upon the sinner. Nor can it signify any thing but to take away the’guilt of sin, that it should not bind over the sinner unto punishment; whereon conscience of sing is taken away. But to return.
4. The manner of the negation is, that “it was im- possible” that it should be otherwise. And it was so,— —
(1.) From divine institution. Whatever the Jews apprehended, thoy were never designed of God unto that end; and therefore had no virtue or efficacy for it communicated unto them, And all the virtue of ordinances of worship depends on their designation unto their end, The blood of bulls and goats, as offered in sacrifice, and carried into the most holy place, was designed of God to represent the way of taking away sin, but not by itself to effect it; and ib was. therefore impossible that so it should do,
(2.) It was impossible from the natwre of the things themselies, inasmuch as there was not a condecency unto the holy perfections of the divine nature that sin should be expiated and the church perfected by the blood of bulls and goats. For, [1.] There would not have been so unto his infinite wisdom. For God having de- clared his severity against sin, with the necessity of its punishment unto the glory of his righteousness and sovereign rule over his “creatures, what condecency could there have been herein unto in- finite wisdom? what consistency between the severity of that decla- — ration and the taking away of sin by such an inferior, beggarly means, as that of the blood of bulls and goats? A great appearance — was made of infinite displeasure against sin, in the giving of the fiery law, in the curse of it, in the threatening of eternal death; but should all have ended in an outward show, there would have been — no manner of proportion to be discerned between the demerit of sin and the means of its expiation. So that, [2.] It had no conde- — ceney unto divine justice, For, 1st. As I have elsewhere proved at — large,* sin could not be taken away without a price, a ransom, a
"Addvaroy,
' Dissertation on Divine Justice, vol. x. p. 481,—Ep,
VER. 4.] EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 445
compensation and satisfaction made unto justice for the injuries it received by sin. In satisfaction unto justice, by way of compensa- tion for injuries or crimes, there must be a proportion between the injury and the reparation of it, that justice may be as much exalted and glorified in the one as it was depressed and debased in the other. But there could be no such thing between the demerit of sin and the affront put on the righteousness of God on the one hand, and a reparation by the blood of bulls and goats on the other. No man living can apprehend wherein any such proportion should lie or consist. - Nor was it possible that the conscience of any man could be freed from a sense of the guilt-of sin, who had nothing to trust unto but this-blood to make compensation or atonement for it. 2dly. The apprehension of it (namely, a suitableness unto divine justice in the expiation of sins by the blood of bulls and goats) must needs be a great incentive unto profane persons unto the commission of sin. Jor if there be no more in sin and the guilt of it but what may be expiated and taken away at so low a price, but what may have atonement made for it by the blood of beasts, why should they not give satisfaction unto their lusts by living in sin? 3dly. It would have had no consistency with the sentence and sanc- tion of the law of nature, “In the day thou eatest thou shalt die.” For although God reserved unto himself the liberty and right of substituting a surety in the room of a sinner, to die for him,—