Chapter 8

  Now of the things which we have spoken [this is] the sum: We have such an high priest, who is set on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens; 

  A minister of the sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man. 

  For every high priest is ordained to offer gifts and sacrifices: wherefore [it is] of necessity that this man have somewhat also to offer. 

  For if he were on earth, he should not be a priest, seeing that there are priests that offer gifts according to the law: 

  Who serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things, as Moses was admonished of God when he was about to make the tabernacle: for, See, saith he, [that] thou make all things according to the pattern shewed to thee in the mount. 

  But now hath he obtained a more excellent ministry, by how much also he is the mediator of a better covenant, which was established upon better promises. 

  For if that first [covenant] had been faultless, then should no place have been sought for the second. 

  For finding fault with them, he saith, Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah: 

  Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because they continued not in my covenant, and I regarded them not, saith the Lord. 

  For this [is] the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people: 

  And they shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest. 

  For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more. 

  In that he saith, A new [covenant], he hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old [is] ready to vanish away.