Letter to the Hebrews – Part Two

The Letter to the Hebrews presents Jesus Christ as a priest and develops an original theme in the New Testament. We have already seen in the previous video how the author has reflected on the life of Jesus, on his present situation as risen Lord and the biblical foundation of the doctrine of the priesthood of Christ. We had stopped at the idea of mediation.

Let's take it from here to deepen the concept. In biblical language, the priest is the mediator between God and man and between man and God. Now, to be a mediator, you have to be on good terms with both parties. Imagine you have to be an intermediary between two people who have been arguing. To reach an agreement you have to have a good relationship with both of them; if one of the two does not like you, does not appreciate you, does not consider you, then you cannot be a mediator.

A particular form of mediation is translation; to be able to translate, that is to say, for two people to understand Each other, the one who speaks the two different languages, the translator, must know both languages, not just one. If he does not know both, he cannot act as a mediator. He has to understand both languages to place the two people in contact. Translation is a linguistic mediation. Now, our author reasoned precisely on this principle of mediation; and understood that Jesus, by virtue of his nature, was naturally the mediator.

That is, God made man had in himself both characteristics to be able to be a mediator between man and God and between God and man. He speaks both languages. He is the one who brings together divinity and humanity, but this mediation is developed in a priestly way. The author refers to the rites of ancient Israel, in particular to two great celebrations: the priestly institution, that is, the rite by which a priest was consecrated, and the rite of Kippur, which is the rite of atonement, the most important task entrusted to a priest.

In these two rituals of the Old Testament, the author of the letter to the Hebrews finds a reference to what Christ did, or rather, he sees the work of Christ as the fulfillment of these ancient rituals. Jesus fulfilled what the ancient rites meant. In these ancient rites, it was foreseen the sacrifice of an animal and the shedding of its blood; by virtue of that blood, the priest was consecrated; he was enabled to enter into contact with God. And his fundamental task was to offer the sacrifice of atonement to bring God's forgiveness to man.

Let us try to summarize it simply. The sacrifice of investiture makes a man qualified to enter the world of God. The sacrifice of atonement enables the priest to bring forgiveness, from God's world to humankind. We find the typical mediation movement: from man to God and from God to man. The priest is the element in the middle. In the ritual of Israel, the bloody sacrifice, that is, the shedding of blood was decisive for both. Our author reasoned by applying this scheme to the life of Christ, where the decisive element was precisely his bloody death, his death on the cross, with the shedding of his blood.

Although the priestly terminology was not employed, from the beginning, the Eucharist was presented as the sacrament of the blood shed for the remission of sins. In the ancient Christian community, Jesus was considered the Lamb slain as our Passover. The elements were already present. The brilliant author of the letter to the Hebrews started from that elementary doctrine and developed it in the great theological treatise of the priesthood of Christ.

Jesus is not a priest since ever before, he is not a priest according to the Levitical order. The foundation of his priesthood is the incarnation. He did not become a priest with the incarnation, but at the moment when God became man, the indispensable condition was made to have a mediator. When Jesus, the God-man, offers himself in sacrifice, he becomes a priest. Christ becomes priest in the Paschal mystery, that is, at the moment of the offering of his own life, in his death and his resurrection.

Through death, he has entered the world of God with his blood, not with the blood of animals. He has entered the sanctuary. Not in that closed environment of the temple of Jerusalem where only the high priest could enter once a year, but he has entered heaven itself. He entered the world of God. He became in all things in solidarity with his brethren to become a high priest, worthy of faith and merciful, guaranteed from God's point of view, because God is merciful because he is in solidarity with his brothers, truly united with them, flesh of the same flesh, and became mediator with the offering of himself.

Thus, he has entered into the heavenly sanctuary and, with the resurrection, brought eternal redemption to humankind. He has been able to convey to humankind ultimate forgiveness. In substance, the author of the letter to the Hebrews says with priestly categories, the same thing that the apostolic tradition had already said about Jesus, but the great advantage is to have shown Christ as the fulfillment of all liturgical and priestly traditions of the Old Testament, offering a fundamental reflection on the fulfillment of the work of salvation.

The letter to the Hebrews is structured in a splendid but highly complex way. Father Albert Vanhoye offered the structure that shows the beauty with which the author organized his teaching. Starting from a deepening of the traditional Christology, showing the Lord Jesus superior to angels, and then developing the common elements that the Christ is like Moses in charge of his entire household, he is like Aaron in solidarity with his brothers and sisters, but then he gets to the central point by saying that Jesus is a priest differently, according to the order of Melchizedek.

And here the author explains the symbolism of Melchizedek as the priest spoken of in the Old Testament, superior to Abraham, superior to the Levitical world, descendant of Abraham; so, Jesus is like the ancient priests, but more than the ancient priests; he completes perfectly that ancient tradition.

At the heart of the letter, the main point of what we are saying is the text which our liturgy proposes that we read every year on Good Friday, the very heart of meditation on the paschal mystery. In chapter 9, verse 11, it says: "But when Christ came as high priest of the good things that have come to be, passing through the greater and more perfect tabernacle not made by hands, that is, not belonging to this creation, (the abode of his flesh, his humanity... not the veil of the temple that separated the most holy place) he entered once for all into the sanctuary (that is, into heaven) not with the blood of goats and calves but his own blood, thus obtaining eternal redemption.”

This is the authentic Christian Kippur, the definitive atonement. Thus, the Christian community has interpreted the Kippur rite as a prophecy of the death of the Messiah. We do not have the feast of Kippur, although we have taken the whole structure from the Jewish world because the Christian feast of Kippur is Good Friday. An example of correspondence in the biblical tradition is the day of Kippur, a day of fasting, absolute and penitential fasting.

Therefore, in the Christian tradition, Good Friday is a day of fast, precisely because of this liturgical continuity with the Kippur, showing in Jesus, the priest who does not offer the lamb, but offers himself, he enters freely and consciously into the world of God with his blood and, offering himself, obtains the reconciliation between God and man.

The author argues that, if we believe, considering the whole Jewish tradition, it is this: "For if the blood of goats and bulls and the sprinkling of a heifer’s ashes can sanctify those who are defiled so that their flesh is cleansed, how much more will the blood of Christ, who through the eternal spirit offered himself unblemished to God, cleanse our consciences from dead works to worship the living God.” It is not simply a rite of omen, but it is reality. The offering of self, through the eternal Spirit, becomes how humankind is redeemed from dead works; that is, it obtains a vital force to live spiritually.

The fire transformed the victims until it consumes them, and thus the author explains that Jesus has offered himself in the power of an eternal Spirit. It is the Spirit of God that has transformed the life of Jesus into a sacrifice pleasing to God, and this sacrifice has obtained the effect, reconciled, and created a good relationship between God and man. The work of mediation is accomplished, so Jesus was a priest, has effectively fulfilled the priestly mediation. Now, the resurrected Christ is alive and intercedes for us.

A little further on, in chapter 10, we find another particularly significant statement which reads: "For by one offering he has made perfect forever those who are being consecrated.” We find the word 'perfect' is a term that appears several times in the letter to the Hebrews, especially in the form of the noun 'perfection.' It is a difficult concept; it does not mean what we think of it in our language. If we look it up in the dictionary, we won't find the correct answer. Therefore, this word has to be understood in the Jewish liturgical context. Christ made perfect, or the perfection of Christ means the priestly ordination of Christ.

It is the technical language used in the book of Leviticus to speak of the institution of the priesthood: a man is enabled to approach God. In this sense it is said to be made perfect, it is completed; we say 'ordained.' Let's think a little bit: our sacramental theological concept of ordination is something completely different than putting a room in order; an 'ordained' person can simply mean that he is accurate, that he puts all things in order, but if used in the theological concept, an ordained person means a person who has received the sacrament of ordination; therefore, one who has intervened in the sacrament of ordination, an event of grace that has marked that person making him capable of doing something that is beyond his own human strength.

What we call 'ordination' in the technical sense is called 'perfection' in the letter to the Hebrews, according to the Levitical language. So, the Christ made perfect is the Christ ordained priest, made capable of authentic mediation. In verse 14 of chapter 10, it says that Christ, with the offering of his life has made us also perfect, he has made us priests like himself, and it uses an expression which signifies a definitive fulfillment; with one offering he has completed our consecration, and yet it is specified that we are sanctified. Therefore, sanctification is a work in progress, while perfection is an initial gift made by Christ.

In other words, in baptism, precisely because we are united to Jesus Christ, we have become with him kings, prophets and priests. He has made us partakers of his kingship, of his prophetic mission and his priesthood. The term 'priest' in our theological language is the competence of all the baptized; Christians insofar as they are united to Christ, are priests, made perfect by his Passover, but still on the way of sanctification.

That all Christians may live their baptismal priesthood of self-offering and mediation of salvation to the world, some are constituted presbyters. The technical term is 'presbyter' to indicate the ministry which some of the baptized perform in the service of the common priesthood. All the baptized are priests, some are presbyters, deacons, or bishops in the service of this common priesthood.

It is a very important doctrine; it is an original and primary teaching that this wise author has transmitted to the community of the Church. And he concludes his splendid work with a wish that we carry as a promise and guarantee of formation in the way of sanctification: “May the God of peace, who brought up from the dead the great shepherd of the sheep by the blood of the eternal covenant, Jesus our Lord, furnish you with all that is good, that you may do his will. May he carry out in you what is pleasing to him through Jesus Christ, to whom be glory forever and ever. Amen.