Hebrews 9
Christ Our High Priest — Hebrews 9
Heb 9:11-14 presents Christ entering "the greater and more perfect tent... by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption." The earthly tabernacle was a copy; Christ ministers in the true sanctuary. Aquinas read Christ's priesthood as the perfect fulfillment of the Levitical types, and Owen built his entire theology of the atonement on Hebrews' priestly logic. The once-for-all sacrifice of 9:26 ends the cycle of repeated offerings. The chapter is a sustained meditation on the Day of Atonement in Lev 16:14-15, and its new-covenant frame fulfills Jer 31:31. The blood that inaugurates the new covenant reappears at the Lord's Supper in 1Cor 11:25.
The Day of Atonement — Leviticus 16
Lev 16:14-22 prescribes the Day of Atonement: blood sprinkled on the mercy seat, and a second goat sent into the wilderness bearing the people's iniquities. Propitiation and removal of sin are enacted in one rite. Aquinas read the two goats as together prefiguring Christ's one sacrifice, and Owen drew on this chapter for the nature of substitution. The mercy seat (kapporet) is the meeting place of holiness and mercy. Hebrews makes this the controlling type for Christ's priesthood in Heb 9:11-14, and Paul calls Christ the hilasterion — the mercy seat — in Rom 3:25. The scapegoat's burden anticipates the Servant of Isa 53:6.