Hebrews 9:13

PROOF OF AND ENLARGEMENT ON, THE "ETERNAL REDEMPTION" MENTIONED IN Heb 9:12. (Heb. 9:13-28) if--as we know is the case; so the Greek indicative means. Argument from the less to the greater. If the blood of mere brutes could purify in any, however small a degree, how much more shall inward purification, and complete and eternal salvation, be wrought by the blood of Christ, in whom dwelt all the fulness of the Godhead? ashes of an heifer-- (Num 19:16-18). The type is full of comfort for us. The water of separation, made of the ashes of the red heifer, was the provision for removing ceremonial defilement whenever incurred by contact with the dead. As she was slain without the camp, so Christ (compare Heb 13:11; Num 19:3-4). The ashes were laid by for constant use; so the continually cleansing effects of Christ's blood, once for all shed. In our wilderness journey we are continually contracting defilement by contact with the spiritually dead, and with dead works, and need therefore continual application to the antitypical life-giving cleansing blood of Christ, whereby we are afresh restored to peace and living communion with God in the heavenly holy place. the unclean--Greek, "those defiled" on any particular occasion. purifying--Greek, "purity." the flesh--Their effect in themselves extended no further. The law had a carnal and a spiritual aspect; carnal, as an instrument of the Hebrew polity, God, their King, accepting, in minor offenses, expiatory victims instead of the sinner, otherwise doomed to death; spiritual, as the shadow of good things to come (Heb 10:1). The spiritual Israelite derived, in partaking of these legal rights, spiritual blessings not flowing from them, but from the great antitype. Ceremonial sacrifices released from temporal penalties and ceremonial…

The apostle, having declared the Old Testament dispensation antiquated and vanishing away, proceeds to let the Hebrews see the correspondence there was between the Old Testament and the New; and that whatever was excellent in the Old was typical and representative of the New, which therefore must as far excel the Old as the substance does the shadow. The Old Testament was never intended to be rested in, but to prepare for the institutions of the gospel. And here he treats, I. Of the tabernacle, the place of worship (Heb 9:1-5). II. Of the worship and services performed in the tabernacle (Heb 9:6, Heb 9:7). III. He delivers the spiritual sense and the main design of all (Heb 9:8 to the end).

9:13 The ashes of a heifer were used with water to cleanse people’s bodies from ceremonial impurity (see Num 19).