{"author":null,"canonical_references":[],"database_sha256":"8cfbe7284c6936871d57c02dc6aa63ebbdfd4722422d539dd9f716e46e91112e","date_end":null,"date_start":null,"edition_year":null,"id":"sermonindex-ecf-6667","native_reference":{"book_number":650,"chapter_from":5,"chapter_to":5,"system":"MyBible module coordinates (mapping unverified)","verse_from":1,"verse_to":1},"public_import_allowed":false,"record_kind":"verse-keyed-module-record","review_required":["English edition and exact text","author/work attribution","dating","verse mapping and citation kind","reuse and attribution","split author quotations and deduplicate"],"review_status":"unreviewed","source_html":"<p><b>Ignatius of Antioch</b>: \"Honour widows that are widows indeed.\" Be the friend of orphans; for God is \"the Father of the fatherless, and the Judge of the widows.\" Do nothing without the bishops; for they are priests, and thou a servant of the priests. They baptize, offer sacrifice, ordain, and lay on hands; but thou ministerest to them, as the holy Stephen did at Jerusalem to James and the presbyters. Do not neglect the sacred meetings [of the saints]; inquire after every one by name. \"Let no man despise thy youth, but be thou an example to the believers, both in word and conduct.\"<br/><i>— Epistle of Pseudo-Ignatius to Hero, a Deacon of Antioch</i></p><p><b>John Chrysostom</b>: The blessed Paul wishes to show in the next place that this covenant is far better than the old. This then he does by first laying down remote considerations. For inasmuch as there was nothing bodily or that made a show, no temple for instance, nor Holy of Holies, nor Priest with so great apparel, no legal observances, but all things higher and more perfect, and there was nothing of bodily things, but all was in things spiritual, and things spiritual did not attract the weak, as things bodily; he thoroughly sifts this whole matter.</p><p>And observe his wisdom: he makes his beginning from the priest first, and continually calls Him an High Priest, and from this first point shows the difference of the two Dispensations. On this account he first of all defines what a Priest is, and shows whether He has any things proper to a Priest, and whether there are any signs of priesthood. It was however an objection in his way that He Christ was not even well-born, nor was He of the sacerdotal tribe, nor a priest on earth. How then was He a Priest? some one may say.</p><p>And just as in the Epistle to the Romans having taken up an argument of which they were not easily persuaded, that Faith effects that which the labor of the Law could not, nor the sweat of the daily life, he betook himself to the Patriarch and referred the whole question to that time: so now here also he opens out the other path of the Priesthood, showing its superiority from the things which happened before. And as, in the matter of punishment, he brings before them not Hell alone, but also what happened to their fathers, so now here also, he first establishes this position from things present. For it were right indeed that earthly things should be proved from heavenly, but when the hearers are weak, the opposite course is taken.</p><p>Up to a certain point he lays down first the things which are common to Christ and their High Priests, and then shows that He is superior. For comparative excellence arises thus, when in some respects there is community, in others superiority; otherwise it is no longer comparative.</p><p>\"For every High Priest taken from among men,\" this is common to Christ; \"is ordained for men in things pertaining to God,\" and this also; \"that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for the people,\" and this too, yet not entirely: what follows however is no longer so: \"who can have compassion on the ignorant, and on them that are out of the way,\" from this point forward is the superiority, \"inasmuch as himself also is encompassed with infirmity; and by reason hereof he ought as for the people, so also for himself, to offer for sins.\"<br/><i>— Homily on Hebrews 8</i></p><p><b>Oecumenius</b>: He wants to show here that the New Testament is greater than the Old. And this he does by introducing a comparison from the priests. That one had priests taken from among men, but this one has Christ.<br/><i>— The Pseudo-Oecumenian Catena on Hebrews</i></p><p><b>Oecumenius</b>: \"taken from among men.\" That is, being presented. If the one deals gently with those who are ignorant and going astray, how much more will the one who is both man and God deal gently with those who are ignorant and going astray? If this is understood, then the term \"being taken\" will be more readily accepted instead of \"being set apart.\" As one of the men, and being taken from them as a priest, he says...<br/><i>— The Pseudo-Oecumenian Catena on Hebrews</i></p><p><b>Oecumenius</b>: \"among men is appointed on behalf of men in things pertaining to God.\" Among men, he says, being appointed on behalf of men in things pertaining, he becomes in the things pertaining to God. And what are the things pertaining to God? He himself says, in order to offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins of the people.<br/><i>— The Pseudo-Oecumenian Catena on Hebrews</i></p><p><b>Theodoret of Cyrus</b>: Even under the law it was not an angel that was appointed to act as priest for human beings but a human being for human beings, with the same nature, affected by the same passions, understanding the weakness of nature, assigning pardon to the recalcitrant, offering a hand to sinners, treating what affects the neighbor as his own. This is the very reason he is appointed to offer sacrifices not for the people alone but also for himself.<br/><i>— INTERPRETATION OF Hebrews 5</i></p>","source_html_sha256":"8a58090f8345f8da2d057c0930e65682b5102ef2a1539057f5694d3068a3d55a","source_module":"ECF","source_row_id":6667,"source_url":"https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/ecf/","text_sha256":"e0bd8109a2b706ed6eaff63f83c70de6e99c880b606c53e8e560262d6c7d8a99","translator":null,"work":null}