Hebrews 8:5

Heb_8:5

According to the pattern shewed to thee

Plan and pattern and purpose

Moses, when he went down from God on Sinai, knew what he was going to build, and how he was going to build it.

The thought of a thing, the conception of it, is its first and largest half. It is easier to pour in the molten iron than to make in the sand the mould into which it is to be poured. I want, first, to say something generally about plan and pattern and purpose. As I look through Scripture I discover that the men who did the best work and the most of it first wrought out in thought what they were afterwards going to work out in act and word. The Creator Himself wrought out first His creative designs. In that sense the world is as old as God. When at the end of the first week He said All very good, He meant that things had now become in fact what they had first and for ever been in idea. Nothing, perhaps, comes nearer Gods workmanship in this respect than art; hence our ha it of speaking of the creations of art. The modern architect, like the one on Sinai, sees the building he is going to construct before the timber has been cut or the ground broken. Gerard von Rile, six hundred years ago, saw the cathedral which has just been completed at Cologne. Slowly since the year 1200, German artisans have been copying into stone Von Riles thought, working from his plan, and the cathedral is perfect to-day because it was perfect then. All that God does is in prosecution of a plan, an eternal idea come to utterance. The tree ripens to the grade of a purpose that was ripe before the tree, and before the third day. It is all one whether we say that the plan is deposited in the seed, or that God builds the plant each moment against the pattern of His thought, as the mason lays bricks close to the plumb-line. It all sums up into the same result. With such examples of pattern and purpose before us, I want to go on and say that there are at least three advantages that come from having a plan in our life and work, and working and living from that plan.

1. One is, that in an open field and with a long prospect our purposes will lay themselves out in a larger and wiser proportion than when framed at close quarters and at the dictation of momentary impulse. The captain brings his ship to Liverpool in less time by having the whole course settled at the outset than by settling a little of it every day. A mans longest purposes will be his best purposes. Immediate results are meagre results. The men who are doing most for their own day are such as are working toward an aim that is a score or a century of years away. In the days of American slavery the poor fugitive reached liberty by walking towards the stars.

2. Not only shall we think wiser and grander purposes when we mature them in advance; there is also a solidifying and invigorating power in a long purpose clearly defined. You can generally tell from a mans gait whether he has a purpose. Plan intensities. Pursuance of a purpose makes our life solid and consecutive. Plan concentrates energies as a burning-glass does sunbeams. We cannot do to-morrows work to-day, but we can have to-days work shaped and but ressed by what we are intending to do to-morrow. In a life which has meaning in it, past and future sustain each other.

3. Then, in the next place, knowing with definiteness what we are attempting to do is a moral safeguard. Purposelessness is the fruitful toothier of crime. When men live only in conference with circumstances lying next them, they lose their bearings. A drifting boat always drifts down-stream. Young aimlessness is the seminary of old iniquity. Out of 904 convicts received at the Michigan State in the three years ending 1880. 822 (91 per cent.) were unskilled labourers--prison had never been taught how to work. Such facts challenge the attention of the Church as well as of the political economists. Character, purpose, and apprenticeship will never get far apart from each other, whether among immigrants or native population. But Moses not only approached his work with a purpose and a pattern, but brought down his pattern from on high. This teaches that there are celestial ways of doing earthly, things, and that human success consists in getting into the secrecies of Gods mind and working in the direction o! His method. Human success is a quotation from overhead. Men are enriched with presentiments of the way God would work if placed in our stead. These presentiments we call ideals. We discover, not invent, them. In the mount we reach after them and ascend to them. They are a continuous firmament that overarches us, but a clouded firmament that yields itself to us only in broken hints. (C. H. Parkhurst, D. D.)

Character-building according to pattern

All of us are builders--builders for time and for eternity. The building of the sacred edifice of character, which is to be a holy temple for God to dwell in; the raising of the stately structure of a lifework which shall be enduring as the years of God; the laying of secure foundations for that heavenly home in which we all hope to dwell--these are the high and heaven-appointed employments of our earthly years.

I. THE DIVINE PATTERN IS GIVEN TO US ALL. Not blindly nor ignorantly do we pursue our life vocation. Up into the mount of privilege God calls each of us, and there reveals the heavenly pattern of our life work. The yearning of all true hearts to hear the voice of God and to know His thought and will concerning us is fully met in these Divine revealings. What are these holy heights where God reveals to you the heavenly plan according to which you are to build?

1. The mount of Divine illumination, where cons, fence sits enthroned, and utters her authoritative voice as she summons you to her tribunal. That voice of warning and restraint, of persuasion and guidance, is often heard above the Babel of earthly voices that press their urgent pleas. That voice, sanctioning the right, condemning the wrong, is Gods own call to a life of fidelity to Him.

2. There is also the mount of Divine revelation through the inspired word. In the pages of Bonier and Virgil, of Shakespeare and Milton, you are invited to the mount of communion with these illustrious men. Great, indeed, is that privilege. You live in their immediate presence; you breathe the atmosphere which surrounded them; you listen to their voices; you think their thoughts, and learn the priceless lessons garnered from their lives. In the Bible you are permitted to commune with the eternal God, to hear His voice as certainly as Moses heard it on the quaking mount. And here God reveals to each of us His own plan for all our earthly building and work. The plan reveal d is set before us with sufficient distinctness, completeness, and fulness of detail. It is given to us not only in doctrine and in precept, but it is clearly illustrated in the histories and biographies with which the sacred book abound, and which, as their subjects follow or disregard the Divine direction, always secure or miss lifes highest good; and thus, in a peculiar sense, they serve as guides or guards to us who are favoured with the inspired record of their successes and failures.

3. But in a preeminent sense is the pattern revealed to us on ,he mount of Divine manifestation. Moses saw only in vision the plan of the tabernacle which be was to build, but we, more privileged than was he, are permitted to behold the glorious pattern which we are to follow, clothed in concrete and tangible form, taking on our own humanity, standing before our ravished eyes incarnated in the person of Jesus Christ. Looking at this incarnation of truth, purity, duly, sacrifice, and love, we hear the heavenly voice calling to us, See that thou make all things according to this pattern showed to thee in this most sacred mount of Divine manifestation.

4. There are also given to us all seasons of special revelation, times when the height to which we are lifted is greater, and earth with its blinding atmosphere seems farther removed--its strife and clamour more faint and ineffectual--while Gods voice sounds clearer, and the heavenly vision is brighter. There are times when the soul seems more susceptible of good influences, and the powers of evil relax their grasp, and tender memories steal in upon the mind, and the thoughts of anothers love, and a lathers prayers, and a teachers counsels, and a Saviours sympathy, and the Spirits gentle wooings, hold the entire being for one supreme hour under their hallowing spell. Cherish these favoured seasons. As travellers in mountainous regions, climbing to some high eminence where the glories of the entrancing view ravish the soul, carry the glorious vision with them, through all the future years of life; so take with you these clearest visions of the heavenly pattern, these best thoughts and holiest purposes and lofty ideals, down into the lowest valley of temptation and strife.

II. THE DIVINE PATTERN MUST BE FOLLOWED IN ORDER TO A TRUE AND SUCCESSFUL LIFE.

1. Let it be kept in mind that this is Gods plan for your life-work. Gods ideal life for you. Whether a life-pattern coming to us from such a source is worth our acceptance, whether it can be rejected or neglected without wreck of all worthy hopes, none but a madman can ever pause to question. Once let the thought that Gods ideal of your life has been really revealed to you actually possess the mind, with all its legitimate force, and nothing can prevent your yielding to its sway. Henceforth, your fife has a significance in it which belongs to nothing merely human; it is a Divine thing; it is Gods propose and Gods thought taking on a human form incarnated in you. You think Gods thoughts, you utter His words, you crystallize His will into actual deeds; you project into this needy and sinful world of humanity a life that is heaven planned and heaven-inspired, the copy of a Divine ideal given to you by the Almighty World-Builder.

2. All the lessons from analogy teach us the majesty of Divine law--the penalty of violating, and the profit of obeying, its behests. See everywhere in nature a perfect adjustment of part to complementary part, an adaptation of means to ends. Everything shows purpose and plan. Law reigns; order and harmony are the universal resultants. Attempt to disregard one of the laws which God has ordained, and you pay the penalty. Despise or forget the law of gravitation; step from the roof of a house or the edge of a precipice as though the air were like the solid pavement for your feet, and, quickly dashed to the ground below, your mutilated body attests the foolhardiness of your lawless act. What have you done but violated Gods order--set aside His laws? Can you, then, disregard no single part of His plan, in nature, without peril, and yet expect to set at naught His entire plan for the government of your life with immunity from evil consequences?

3. And this Divine pattern must be followed in its completeness and comprehensiveness, with all its particularity of detail. Three perils lie in ambush, even for those who, with more or less strength of purpose, regard themselves as accepting the revealed plan for their life-building. The first is the peril of accepting it in part, but not in its completeness; the second is that of accepting it theoretically, but rejecting it practically; the third is the peril of accepting it for a time, but abandoning it before the life-work is completed. (C. H. Payne, D. D.)

Our hours of vision

I. There comes to us all TIMES OF EXCEPTIONAL INSIGHT, of moral elevation, yes, of inspiration, when in a special way our spirits are touched by the spirit of truth and goodness--times when we are, so to speak, upon the mount, and see heavenly only things clearly, and a higher pattern of life is shown to us. These hours of vision may be associated with the utmost variety of circumstances giving occasion to them. It may be simply interruption of our ordinary work. We have been going on from day to day in the regular customary routine. Each day has been so filled with its multiplicity or engagements, its interests, its distraction, its pleasures, its annoyances, as to leave little leisure and less inclination for that quiet and serious thought in which we seek to see life steadily, and see it whole. We need to stand a little back from it, as an artist has to do to judge of the effect of the picture he is painting. And sometimes God compels a man to stand aside and look upon his life and his work from a little distance. He takes him apart from the multitude that He may open his ears to voices that cannot be heard amid the bustle of the crowd. In the confinement of his chamber his spirit chafes at first as he thinks of the great tide of men with eager interests which flows every morning citywards and ebbs at evening, and of all the busy life from which he is excluded; by-and-by a change has come over his spirit--the roar of that loud stunning ride sounds faint and far off; his interest in it has become strangely weakened; other visions are opening out before his mind; he is seeing deeper than the surface stir and bustle of life, its ambitions and its rivalries, into the meaning of life itself, its possibilities and its purpose. He is learning to see things in their true proportions, and is waking up to the discovery that he has been exaggerating terribly certain aspects of them. A diviner pattern of life is being shown to him--an ideal higher in its aims, its methods, and its motives; and when he comes back to take up again among men his daily tasks, surely it is with an earnest purpose to make all things according to the nobler pattern that has been shown him. But there are experiences tending towards similar results that enter much more frequently into life than such as that. To all men, and most of all to those who have youth and hope on their side, a period of leisure and recreation and contact with nature is not more a rest than an inspiration, a time of sanguine and earnest forecasting of the future, a time of forming of plans and contemplating ideals, of storing up impulse and stimulus, of girding up the loins of the mind with strenuous self-denying purpose. There are other times-sadder times--which have worked to the same effect: hours, not of elevation, but of deep depression, when we saw things after the pattern of the heavenly. It may have been an hour of stern self-rebuke, of humiliation and shame, when conscience justly scourged and spared not, or when you felt yourself baffled and helpless in the presence of a great perplexity; or the day you came back from standing beside a new-filled grave, and realised that the world was emptier and poorer than it had been a week before. Men looking up from deep places, it is said, see stars at noon-day; and sometimes it is when it is sighing its De Profundis that the soul catches its vision of God. There are countless hours of vision which we need not stay to classify. We wake up one day to feel as if all our previous knowledge of God had been but hearsay: we feel, I have heard of Thee by the hearing of the ears, but now mine eye seeth Thee. Life seems to begin anew from times like that. We have accepted truth upon the authority of others; the time comes when we say, We see. The entrance of Gods Word gives light, and so certifies itself. Our own hold of truth is never satisfactory until we thus see. The man who is to influence others must first himself see heavenly things upon the mount.

II. These times of vision leave behind them RESPONSIBILITIES. We cannot command those higher moments--at least not directly--not otherwise than by habitual obedience to the laws of Christs spiritual kingdom. To him that hath shall be given. The seeing may be special times; the acting out what we have seen belongs to our common life. That is the only possible way of keeping the vision clear--of retaining it as our lasting possession. For

Tis the most difficult of tasks to keep

Heights which the soul is competent to gain.

It is so very easy to be a seer as well as a hearer, and not a doer, to be like the man who beholdeth his natural face in a glass, to whom there comes a bright perception of truth, which reveals him to himself, with all his blots and stains and flaws, and who assents to it, and goeth his way, and forgetteth what manner of man he is. It is possible to do even worse: to use that kind of experience--even visions and revelations of the Lord--for our own self-deception. It is one of the great dangers of what may be called the religious temperament, to care a great deal more about what it can see and feel upon the mount than about faithfulness in commonplace duty on the ordinary levels of life. It is a frequent temptation after we have been touched by admiration for some aspects of duty, and mate to thrill at the thought of seeing ourselves doing it--especially if we have been led to speak warmly about it--to indulge in a soft, self-complacent, feeling, as if we had really done it or were doing it, although we may not have touched it with one of our fingers. Is not this the difference between the man of mere emotion and the man of principle--between the man of feeling and the man of faith--that the one can be thrilled with high ideals, and can proceed to work them out while the glory is upon him, and continue only so long as the excitement or emotion lasts; while the other, who has hid in his heart that which he has seen, will toil on steadily along the dull, flat levels, keeping to the path of duty when the brightness has faded from the sky? It is a great thing, an unspeakable privilege, to have seen the beauty of the Lord that our heart and conscience have said to Jesus, My Lord and my God; and yet it is His word, Not every one that saith unto Me, Lord, Lord! shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of My Father which is in heaven--not be that seeth and even prophesieth in My name, but he that maketh his life according to the pattern that hath been showed to him. (A. O. Johnston, M. A.)

The pattern in the mount

As the old Tabernacle, before it was built, existed in the mind of God, so all the unborn things of life, the things which are to make the future, are already living in their perfect ideas in Him, and when the future comes, its task will be to match those Divine ideas with their material realities, to translate into the visible and tangible shapes of terrestrial life the facts which already have existence in the perfect mind. Surely in the very statement of such a thought of life there is something which ennobles and dignifies our living. A child is born into the world thus morning. Its lessons are unlearned, its tasks untried, its discoveries unmade, its loves unloved, its growth entirely ungrown, as the little newborn problem lies unsolved on this the first day of its life. Is that all? Is there nowhere in the universe any picture of what that childs life ought to be, and may he? Surely there is. If God is that childs Father, then in the Fathers mind, in Gods mind, there must surely be a picture of what that child with his peculiar faculties and nature may become in the completeness of his life. Years hence, when that baby of today has grown to be the man of forty, the real question of his life will be, what? Not the questions which his fellow-citizens of that remote day will be asking, What reputation has he won? What money has he earned? Not even, What learning has he gained? But, How far has he been able to translate into the visible and tangible realities of a life that idea which was in Gods mind on that day in the old year when he was born? How does the tabernacle which he has built correspond with the pattern which is in the mount? All this is true not merely of a whole life as a whole, but of each single act or enterprise of life. We have not thought richly or deeply enough about any undertaking unless we have thought of it as an attempt to put into the form of action that which already has existence in the idea of God. You start upon your profession, and your professional career in its perfect conception shines already in Gods sight. You set yourself down to some hard struggle with temptation, and already in the fields of Gods knowledge you are walking as possible victor, clothed in white, and with the crown of victory upon your head. You build your house, and found your home. It is an attempt to realise the picture of purity, domestic peace, mutual inspiration and mutual comfort, which God sees already. The distinction between ideas and forms is one which all men need to know, which many men so often seem to miss. The idea takes shape in the form, the form expresses the idea. The form, without the idea behind it, is thin and hard. The form, continually conscious of its idea, becomes rich deep, and elastic. If all that I have said be true, then it would seem as if there ought to be in the world three kinds of men--the men of forms; the men of limited ideals, or of ideals which are not the highest; and the men of unlimited ideals, or the highest ideas, which, are the ideals of God. And three such kinds, f men there are, very distinct and easy of discovery. First, there are the men of forms, the men whom all their self-questionings about what they ought to do, and in all their judgments about what they have done, never get beyond the purely formal standards which proceed either from the necessity of their conditions or from the accepted precedents of other people. They never get into the regions of ideas at all. How many such men there are! To them the question of their business life never comes up so high as to mean, What is the best and loftiest way in which it is possible for this business of mine to be done? It never gets higher than to mean, How can I best support myself by my business? or else, What are the ways and rules of business which are most accepted in the business world? To such men the question of religion never becomes: What are the intrinsic and eternal relations between the Father God and man the child? but only, By what religious observances can a man get into heaven? or else, What is the most current religion of my fellow-men? It would be sad, indeed, to think that there is any man here to-day who has not at least sometimes in his life got a glimpse into a richer and fuller and more interesting sort of life than this. There is a second sort of man who does distinctly ask himself whether his deed is what it ought to be. He is not satisfied with asking whether it works its visible result or not, whether other men praise it or not. There is another question still, Does it conform to what he knew before he undertook it that it ought to be? If it does not, however it may seem successful, however men may praise it, the doer of the deed turns off from it in discontent. If it does, no matter how it seems to fail, no matter how men blame it, he thanks God for it and is glad. Here is a true idealism; here is a man with an unseen pattern and standard for his work. He lives a loftier, and likewise a more unquiet life. He goes his way with his vision before his eyes. I know something of what this piece of work ought to have been, he says, therefore I cannot be satisfied with it as it is. What is the detect of such an idealism as that? It is, that as yet the idea comes only from the mans own self. Therefore, although it lies farther back, than the mere form, it does not lie entirely at the back of everything. It is not final; it shares the incompleteness of the man from whom it springs. Therefore it is that something more is needed, and that only the third mans life is wholly satisfactory. Literally and truly he believes that the life he is to live, the act he is to do, lies now, a true reality, already existent and present, in the mind of God; and his object, his privilege, is not simply to see how he can live his life in the way which will look best or produce the most brilliant visible result, not simply to see how he can best carry out his own personal idea of what is highest and best, but how he can most truly reproduce on earth that image of this special life or action which is in the perfect mind. This is the way in which he is to make all things according to the pattern which is in the mount. What quiet independence, what healthy humility, what confident hope there must be in this man who thus goes up to God to get the pattern of his living. To-morrow morning to that man there comes a great overwhelming sorrow. What shall he do, what shall he be in this new terrible life, terrible not least because of its awful newness, which has burst upon him? Where shall he find the pal tern for his new necessity? Of course he may look about and copy the forms with which the world at large greets and denotes its sorrow, the decent dreadful conventionalities of grief. That does not satisfy him. The world acknowledges that he has borne his grief most properly, but he is not satisfied. Then behind all that, he may reason it over with himself, think out what death moans, make his philosophy, decide how a man ought to behave in the terrible shipwreck of his hopes. That is a better thing by air means than the other. But this man does something more. The pattern of his new life is not in the world. It is not in himself. It is in God. To get up, then, into God, and find that image of his grieved and sorrowing life, and then come back and shape his life after it patiently and cheerfully, that is the struggle of the Christian idealist in his sorrow, of the man who tries to make all things according to the pattern which is in the mount. Can we not see what quiet independence, what healthy humility, what confident hope there must be in that mans struggle to live out through his sorrow the new life which his sorrow has made possible? But now it is quite time for us to ask another question. Suppose that all which we have said is true; suppose that there is such a pattern of the truest life, and of each truest act of every man lying in Gods mind, how shall the man know what that pattern is? Is not Christ the mountain up into which the believer goes, and in which he finds the Divine ideal of himself? As a mountain seems to be the meeting-place of earth and heaven, the place where the bending skies meet the aspiring planet, the place where the sunshine and the cloud keep closest company with the granite and the grass: so Christ is the melting-place of divinity and humanity; He is at once the condescension of divinity and the exaltation it humanity; and man wanting to know Gods idea of man, any man wanting to know Gods idea of him, must go up into Christ, and he will find it there. All kinds of men have found their ideals in Jesus. Entering into Him, the timid soul has seen a vision of itself all clothed in bravery, and known in an instant that to be brave and not to be cowardly was its proper life. The missionary toiling in the savage island, and thinking his whole life a failure, has gone apart some night into his hut and climbed up into Christ, and seen with perfect sureness, though with most complete amazement, that God counted his life a great success, and so has gone out once more singing to his glorious work. Martyrs on the night before their agony; reformers hesitating at their tasks; scholars wondering whether the long self-denial would be worth their while; fathers and mothers, teachers and preachers whose work had grown monotonous and wearisome, all of these going to Christ have found themselves in Him, have seen the nobleness and privilege of their hard tires, and have come out from their communion with Him to live their lives as they had seen those lives in Him, glorious with the perpetual sense of the privilege of duty, and worthy of the best and most faithful work which they could give. This, then, is the great truth of Christ. The treasury of life your life and mine, the life of every man and every woman, however different they are from one another, they are all in Him. In Him there is the perfectness of every occupation: the perfect trading, the perfect housekeeping, the perfect handicraft, the perfect school teaching, they are all in Him. To go to Him and get the perfect idea of his, and of every action of life, and then to go forth, and by His strength fulfil it, that is the New Testament conception of a strong successful life. How simple and glorious it is! We are like Moses, then--only our privilege is so much more than his We are like a Moses who at any moment, whenever the building of the tabernacle flagged and hesitated, was able to turn and go up into the mountain and look once more the pattern in the face, and come down strong, ambitious for the best, and full of hope. (Bp. Phillips Brooks.)

Heavenly visions

As we read the story with which this passage has to deal, we feel how great are the tasks which are committed to great souls. None but a great soul could have mounded a horde of slaves into a nation, could have inspired them with national ideals, or could have kept the ideal of their future clear and bright before his own soul. Never was heavier task committed to man; and broad must have been the heart and constant the fidelity which sustained the load through the greater part of a hundred years. Great tasks like these are either easy or impossible--easy, while the deer is sustained by the inspiration which pricked and goaded his heart to perform it; impossible, when he labours in his native strength, or leans for support upon anything short of the Eternal. The Divine power which called Moses to this work, and which originated in him the genius to conceive it, m st sustain him in every turn and juncture of its execution. All great ideas like his widen and expand with the expanding visions of the growing soul. The grand outlines of such a vision, indeed, come to the soul in a flash of inspiration, but the details are filled in as the soul broods over the great revelation. Hence the worlds great teachers, its prophets and seers, have been ever given to solitude, to self-communion, and to prayer, that in silence they might hear that Voice which speaks only to the listening ear. On a certain day, says Plato, in one of his deepest books, all the gods mount to the topmost heaven, and gaze upon the reams of pure truth, and all noble souls that can do so follow in their train and gaze upon the fair outlook; then they sink to earth, and all the worthiest part of their lives thenceforward is but the endeavour to reproduce what they have seen: their highest moral achievements are wrought by the power of remembered truth. This wonderful passage is an intuition of one of the foundational truths of our highest life, and one of the greatest truths of revelation. Once or twice only does Moses gain an insight into the life of things. and then only when his eyes are purged of their grossness; but these rare occasions are sufficient to inspire him, and his noblest work is wrought out in obedience to his vision. As he moved about the camp, or when consulted by captains and artificers as to the manner of their labour, daily he would hear the Divine imperative admonishing him to shape it thus and thus; to remember what he had seen; to make his vision take actual shape in gold, or precious stones, or carved work. For him, too, there would be shining the seven lamps of architecture--the lamp of sacrifice and the lamp of truth, of power, beauty, life, and obedience, and, not the least, the lamp of memory. Great tasks, we say, are committed to great souls; but is it not true that great tasks are committed to us also, whether we be small or great? Is not the shaping of our scattered and sundered life into a habitation for God to dwell in a task as sacred and as imperative as that which was committed to Moses? And do we not see that the first thing which we need for this work is that which Moses had--a great ideal? Do we not know by experience what a difference there is between living and working with such a pattern and without one? There are no Mount Sinais now, we say, scaling which we might gain such a vision as Moses had to equip him for his work. We have no Mount Sinai, but there still stands Mount Calvary, from which a brighter glory streams and a rarer loveliness, and from which, too, a Voice still reaches us, saying: See that thou make all things according to the pattern showed to thee in the mount. That utterly surrendered life gives us indeed the pattern which we need, the ideal to which our own life should be conformed. We know how flawless it was, and how significant; how He did those things which He had seen with His Father. This was the secret of the perfect unity of His life, of His patience, dignity, and peace. Shall we not confess, then, that we, too, have received our heavenly vision? We have, indeed, confessed it to be most beautiful and Divine, but we have allowed it to fade from our memory. Yes, and the finer our sensibility and the quicker our imagination, the greater will be the temptation to allow it to fade out into mist for all strong emotion avenges itself by exhaustion. Thus Moses, before he had well reached the camp, descending the rugged slopes of Sinai, half-blinded by the splendours he had gazed upon, dashed down in anger the tables of stone written by the finger of God. So a man may cast away in sorrowful anger the very records which he has received with fear and trembling. Sometimes in anger and sometimes in disgust, when surrounded by a herd of howling idolaters who do not enter into his thought, or through indolence, or the pressure of sordid care, a man is tempted to let his vision go, and account it but as such stuff as dreams are made of. It is a temptation especially besetting men who work in the things of the imagination and the things of the Spirit. Many men lower their ideal--as they will tell you frankly--for the sake of their wives and children. How bitter it will be hereafter if these same children grow up to be sweet, and pure, and unworldly, and despise the crooked means which have been employed for their elevation, and to be filled with sad pity for the founder of their fortune, who, like Lot, chose the well-watered country, and for the sake of it disowned every noble ambition! Thus, are we severally tempted to disobey the admonishing Voice which bids us make all things according to the pattern which has been revealed to us. But who will be left to rear Gods tabernacle if they fail who have had vision of its ideal beauty and hope of its foundation among men? It is in such an hour of temptation that we need to renew the old impressions, to revive the faded tints of the picture, and to trace the lost meaning of the vanishing lines of the pattern of heavenly things, once so clear to us. And do we ask, How can our lost impressions be renewed? Then the store before us supplies us with the suggestion. And the Lord said unto Moses, Hew thee two tables of stone like unto the first, and I will write upon these tables the words that were in the first tables which thou breakest. Yes; He who first gave us the great conception of noble life can renew it when it fades away if with all our hearts we truly seek Him; it may not be with all the early glow of our first inspiration, nor with such glad announcements of its coming to our bosoms: but what we gain the second time more painfully may be cherished more religiously, watched over more prayerfully, and kept with diligence even to the end. (G. Littlemore.)

The pattern in the mount

I shall consider, in the first place, the fact that all men have ideals--have some kind of spiritual conceptions; and in the second place, I shall urge the results of consistent action upon those conceptions.

I. Consider, for a moment, and you will see that this is the great characteristic of the man--THAT HE IS THE CONSTRUCTOR OF THINGS FASHIONED AFTER AN INWARD IDEAL OR PATTERN, and thus he transforms the outward world according to his mental and spiritual conceptions. Here, on one part, stands vast, unshaped matter--rock, wood, stream, fluent, air: on the other part is the human agent who is to work upon this world of matter. You may say that the beaver or the bee works upon matter. The one proceeds with the utmost accuracy to build its neat, and the other to construct its dam; but there is a point at which each of them stops. They do not go a jot beyond the line of instinct; they do nothing more wonderful, nothing different from what has been done for six thousand years. But see, out of this same world of matter, man makes houses, weapons, ships, printing presses, steam engines, and telegraphs. He makes implements, and produces combinations that did not exist in nature, but that stood first as shadows on the horizon of his own thought--patterns that were shown him in the mount of intellectual and spiritual elevation. But if this power which man has of working from inward conceptions is expressed in the ways in which he pours his thought into matter, it is still more apparent in the ways in which his thought, so to speak, overrides matter--as he appears not merely in inventions, but in creations. The work of art, for instance--the great work of genius--whence comes that? Something that you do not see in nature, something that can nut be interpreted as a mere combination of matter--a mere putting together of the elements of the physical world; but something that has flowed out of the ideal springs of a mans own soul, until we have the splendours of the sunset sky woven in the fibres of the canvas, and the stones of the quarry heaved up in an architectural ant m of grandeur and aspiration. But the main conclusion to which I would lead your thought is this: than a most every man has conceptions higher and better than he realises, or than he even endeavours to make real. Before every man there hovers a high conception--or one more or less high--certainly above the level of his present conduct--of virtue, of moral action, of duty, of righteousness, of truth; and the more h-looks at that, the more vivid it becomes to him. Although he may, at the same time, not move a jot or a hair toward it, nor even endeavour, for a single instant, to come up to it, yet it stands before him, and he sees it clear and bright, kindling upon his thought, and ready to move hi heart. And you see this fact revealed m this remarkable manner by every man. If he does ever so bad an act, he tries to justify it in some way--tries to reconcile it to some ideal of virtue. So that from his own showing, his own confession, there is an ideal standard in his mind higher than that from which he has acted. What better advice, then, could be given to any man than just this? Work out your highest conceptions--the noblest standard of truth and duty that comes to you. It may not be the highest possible, nor the highest conceivable by other men, but that which seems to you the highest possible or conceivable, work up to, and live up to, and endeavour to make it the rule. And so especially it is in regard to the matter of faith about which many are much troubled and perplexed. They say they cannot believe that the Bible is divinely inspired; they are not fully convinced about the immortality of the soul, and they even sometimes incline to doubt the existence of a God. What then are you to do, my be low-men? To throw aside all faith and live outside of its circle, merely as an animal, in a coarse, material existence? No--no; some shred of faith you have. Every man has some. Some conceptions of spiritual things dawn upon every mind; live up to the faith you have. Have you a faith that it is good to do good? Live up to that. Have you a faith that charity is a blessed thing? Live up to that. Work out to the extreme limit of your conception here, and just so sure as you do it, the wider will your circle open before you.

II. In the next place, let us proceed to see WHAT WILL RESULT IF A MAN ACTUALLY ATTEMPTS THUS TO WORK UP TO HIS HIGHEST AND BEST SPIRITUAL CONCEPTIONS. In the first lace, I think he will acquire some comprehension of the worth and certainty of spiritual being, and of the reality of his own soul. Let a man think, when he endeavours to carry out the best conception of duty, how much that is all-controlling and supreme in his life, let him think that the highest claim in his life is from within; hst him think how mind will after all control and master the body. The moment you think of this power to control and master material things, you fall back upon the consciousness theft you have a soul, and that there is more evidence than you have supposed of its existence. In fact, there is more proof of a soul than of a body. When a man asks me what proof I have of a soul, I reply by asking him, What proof have you of a body? You have more logical difficulty to prove an outward world than a soul. Spiritual consciousness, mounting aspiration, ideal influences have controlled you all through life. But more than this; not only will a man, as he begins to work from his best spiritual conceptions upward, begin to comprehend the worth of spiritual things and of the soul, but he will begin to acquire right standards of action. I hardly need say that in the calculations of men, very generally they do not start from the ground of the soul. If you look at a great many of the social fallacies of our time, at a great many of the social faults and errors of men in business, in politics, and in life generally, you will find that the fallacy or error consists in the fact that they do not start from the ground of the soul as a standard, but from outward things. They estimate all outward things by their bulk or glitter. Let a man take up the subject of immortality--of the spirit of man enshrined in time, and working through sense, as destined to live beyond the stars, when banks and warehouses, cities and continents, shall have melted with fervent heat, and crumbled to ashes; when this world shall be dashed from its orbit as a speck of dust from a flying wheel--let him take the grand calculus of the immortality of the soul, and start with that, and then worldly good and gain will take their proper attitude, temporary expediency will sink down, and right will assert its proper place; then he will have a true standard by which to estimate all things. In the next place, if a man really endeavours to work according to his highest a-d best inward conception, he will come to perceive the need of Christ and the worth of Christianity. Working from his best and highest, he gains a better and a higher still, until at length he will come to feel that spiritual aspirations are boundless. And when, from the yearnings of his educated soul, he wants a perfect ideal, he will ask, Where is the excellence that will answer my highest ideal? where is that which will begin to fill up this boundless thirst of the soul, which has only been increased by drinking from narrow cisterns? And Jesus Christ comes out upon the horizon of history, and stands before him in the gospel, and answers that inquiry. He says virtually to man, I am the ideal for which you aspire; in Me behold a perfect reflection of that which you now must seek; in Me behold that which continually fills up your yearning want, and makes that want the deeper, that it may fill it with more. Here stands man on one side, with a sense of imperfection and sin, asking, What is there that will help me in, what is there that will deliver me from the power of sin? No mere man, no mere teacher, like Plato or Seneca, can do it. Man needs some spirit of Divine goodness to enter into him, to cure him of his sin and Jesus Christ embodies that Divine spirit. He comes before man to assure him of mercy, with the encouragement that the vilest sin may be cast off, and that man may throw himself upon the Divine mercy which He represents, and be lightened of his load. And here, on the other hand, are limitless wants and desires; and how does Jesus Christ gratify them? By exhibiting perfect Father; by showing an ideal to us that we never can compass, but can always aspire to. (E. H. Chapin, D. D.)

Of the right manner of doing duty

1. The same Lord who enjoins the matter, prescribes the manner.

2. As great respect is manifested to God in the manner of doing what He requires, as in matter. In this was David commended 2Ki_3:6). This was it that Hezekiah pleaded before God 2Ki_20:3).

3. Herein lieth a main difference between the upright and the hypocrite, instance the difference between Abels and Cains offering (Gen_4:4-5).

4. That which is good is altered and perverted by failing in the manner. Good is thereby turned into evil, and duty into sin.

5. Failing in the manner makes God reject that which in the matter He requireth (Isa_1:11).

6. God detests things commanded by Himself when they are done in an ill manner (Isa_66:3).

7. In this case he that doth the work of the Lord is accursed Jer_48:10).

1. This giveth just cause of examining ourselves even about the good things that we do. This use is the rather to be observed because every one best knoweth his own failings in the manner of what he doth (1Co_2:11).

2. Upon due examination we cannot but be deeply humbled ever for our failings in the manner of doing good things. The glory of our reading, hearing, praying, singing, partaking of the sacrament, alms-deeds, and other duties, is hereby taken away, which if profane men knew, they would insult over professors.

3. This giveth just occasion of abnegation, and of renouncing all confidence even in our best works, for we must fail therein (1Sa_3:2). Did justiciaries well understand this, it would make them cast down their gay peacocks feathers. They would not be so conceited of themselves, as the proud Pharisee, but rather as the humble publican (Luk_18:11-13). There is nothing of such force to work in us This lesson of denying ourselves as a consideration of the manner of doing the good things we do. This consideration would soon put an end to all conceits of fulfilling the law, of meriting, of doing works of supererogation, and undry other proud apprehensions.

4. Upon the aforesaid ground be exhorted to learn as well as to do, what we enterprise, as what we do. God loves adverbs. We were as go d be ignorant of the duty itself as of the manner of performing it. To know what ought to be done, and not to know how it ought to be done, will be a great aggravation of sin.

6. For well-doing that which, is good observe these few rules;

(1) Exercise thyself in Gods Word, diligently read it, hear it, and meditate upon it. This is an excellent help and the best that I can prescribe. For Gods Word doth expressly and distinctly declare both what is to be done and how it is to be done (Psa_119:105).

(2) Think on duty before hand, and endeavour to prepare thyself thereto. Sudden, rash, unprepared enterprising a sacred duty is one occasion of failing in the manner of doing it (Ecc_5:2).

(3) Consider with whom thou hast to do in all things; even with Him who is the searcher of the heart. This will make thee circumspect in every circumstance. Conceits that we have to do with man alone, make us look only to the outward duty (2Co_2:17).

(4) In penitent confessions, acknowledge thy failing in the manner of doing duty.

(5) Pray for ability even about the manner of doing duty (2Co_3:5). The work of the Spirit is herein specially manifested; we know not what we should pray for as we ought. But none can do good in a right manner except the regenerating Spirit be in him and help him.

6. For comfort in this case we must have our eye upon our Surety in whom was no failing at all (Heb_6:26). (W. Gouge.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Heb 8:5. Who serve — Which priests, according to the Jewish institutions, serve in the temple, which was not yet destroyed; unto, or, after, the example, or, pattern, and shadow of heavenly things — Of gospel mysteries, even of Christ himself, with all that he did and suffered, and still continues to do, including spiritual, evangelical worship, and everlasting glory. In other words, The whole ministry of the Jewish priests was about such things as had only a resemblance and obscure representation of things of the gospel. The word υποδειγμα, rendered example, or pattern, means somewhat expressed by the strokes pencilled out upon a piece of fine linen, which exhibit the figures of leaves and flowers, but have not yet received their splendid colours and curious shades; and σκια, the word rendered shadow, is that shadowy representation which gives some dim and imperfect idea of the body; but not the fine features, not the distinguishing air, none of those living graces, which adorn the real person. Yet both the pattern and shadow lead our minds to something nobler than themselves; the pattern to those spiritual and eternal blessings which complete it, the shadow to that which occasions it. Of the shadow, see on Heb 10:1. As Moses was admonished of God — Κεχρηματισται, an expression which sometimes signifies to receive an oracle, or a revelation, or divine direction: as Heb 11:7, By faith Noah, χρηματισθεις, being directed by a revelation. Sometimes it denotes a direction from an angel, as Act 10:22, Cornelius, χρηματισθεις υπο αγγελου αγιου, being warned by a holy angel. In the active voice it signifies to deliver an oracle, asAct_Heb 10:25, If they did not escape who refused, τον χρηματιζοντα, him delivering oracles on earth. Here the expression means that Moses was divinely instructed, when he was about to make the tabernacle, concerning every part of it, by a model which was shown him in the mount, and which exhibited the form, fashion, dimensions, and all the utensils of it. For see, saith he, that thou make all things according to the pattern, &c. — “The strictness of this charge implying that the tabernacle and its services were intended to be representations of heavenly things, may we not suppose that this purpose was discovered to Moses as the reason of the exactness required, and that the knowledge thereof was preserved among the Jews by tradition. God’s direction to Moses to make all according to the pattern showed him, is here appealed to by the apostle with great propriety, as a proof that the priests worshipped God in the tabernacle with a representation and shadow of heavenly things. For, since by this admonition Moses was required not only to make the tabernacle, and all the vessels of the ministry, exactly according to the pattern showed him in the mount, but also, and indeed chiefly, to appoint the services of the priests in the tabernacles according to that pattern, the strictness of the injunction implied that there was some important reason for this exactness. Now what could that reason be, unless the one assigned by the apostle; namely, that the tabernacle was intended to be a shadow of the heavenly holy place, and the services of the tabernacles to be representations of the ministrations of Messiah as a priest in heaven?” Accordingly the tabernacles are called, Act 10:23, τα υποδειγματα, the patterns, or representations, of the holy places in the heavens. And Act 10:24, the holy places made with hands are called αντιτυπα, antitypes of the true. The ministry of the priests in the earthly tabernacles is represented as typical of the ministrations of Christ in heaven, Act 10:7; and by the absolute exclusion of the priests and people from the most holy place, the representation of heaven, (Act 10:8,) the Holy Ghost signified that the way into the holiest of all was not yet made manifest while the first tabernacle was yet standing; and (Act 10:9) that the outward tabernacle with its services was a figure for the time then present, by which figure the Jews were taught the inefficacy of all the atonements made by men on earth for cleansing the conscience. To which add, that (Act 10:11-12) Christ is called a High-Priest of good things to come, is said to have entered once into the holy place, and to have obtained eternal redemption for us. “These things show that the ministrations of the Levitical high-priests in the inward tabernacle on earth, were typical of the ministrations of Christ in the true tabernacle, that is, in heaven.” — Macknight.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Hebrews

THE TRUE IDEAL

Heb 8:5

I DO not intend to deal with the original bearing of these words, nor with the use made of them by the writer of Hebrews. Primarily they refer to the directions as to the Tabernacle and its furniture, which are given at such length, and with such minuteness, in Leviticus, and are there said to have been received by Moses on Sinai. The author of this Epistle attaches an even loftier significance to them, as supporting his contention that the whole ceremonial worship, as well as the Temple and its equipment, was a copy of heavenly realities, the heavenly sanctuary and its altar and priest. I wish to take a much humbler view of the injunction, and to apply it, with permissible violence, as a maxim for conduct and the great rule for the ordering of our lives. ‘See that thou,’ in thy shop and office, and wherever thou mayst be, ‘make all things according to the pattern shewed to thee in the mount.’ A far-reaching, high-soaring commandment, not to be obeyed without much effort, and able to revolutionise the lives of most of us. There are three points in it: the pattern, its universal applicability, and the place where we get to see it.

I. The pattern.

The difference between noble and ignoble lives is very largely that the one has - and seeks, however partially and interruptedly, to follow - an ideal and the other has not. Or, to put it into plainer words, the one man regulates his life according to momentary inclinations and the obvious calls of sense, business and the like, and the other man has, far ahead and high up, a great light burning, to which he is ever striving to attain. The one has an aim to which he can only approximate, and the other largely lives from hand to mouth, as circumstances and sense, and the recurring calls of material necessities, or temptations that are put in his way every day, may dictate. And so, the one turns out a poor creature, and the other - God helping him - may turn out a saint. Which are you? Which we are depends very largely on the clearness with which we keep before us - like some great mountain summit rising above the mists, and stirring the ambition of every climber to reach the peak, where foot has never trod - the ideal, to use modern language, or to fall back upon the good old- fashioned Bible words, ‘the pattern shewed to us.’

You know that in mountain districts the mists are apt to gather their white folds round the summits, and that often for many days the dwellers in the plains have to plod along on their low levels, without a glimpse of the calm peak. And so it is with our highest ideal. Earth-born mists from the undrained swamps in our own hearts hide it too often from our eyes, and even when that is not the case, we are like many a mountaineer, who never lifts an eye to the sacred summit overhead, nor looks higher than his own fields and cattle-sheds. So it needs an effort to keep clear before us the pattern that is high above us, and to make very plain to ourselves, and very substantial in our thoughts, the unattained and untrodden heights. ‘Not in vain the distance’ should ‘beckon.’ ‘Forward, forward, let us range,’ should always be our word. ‘See that thou make all things after the pattern,’ and do not rule your lives according to whim, or fancy, or inclination, or the temptations of sense and circumstances.

To aim at the unreached is the secret of perpetual youth. No man is old as long as he aspires. It is the secret of perpetual growth. No man stagnates till he has ceased to see, or to believe in great dim possibilities for character, as yet unrealised. It is the secret of perpetual blessedness. No man can be desolate who has for his companion the unreached self that he may become. And so artist, poet, painter, all live nobler lives than they otherwise would, because they live, not so much with the commonplace realities round them, as with noble ideals, be they of melody or of beauty, or of musical words and great thoughts. There should be the same life with, and directed towards, attaining the unstrained in the moralist, and above all in the Christian.

But then, do not let us forget that we are not here in our text, as I am using it in this sermon, relegated to a pattern which takes its origin, after all, in our own thoughts and imaginations The poet’s ideal, the painter’s ideal, varies according to his genius. Ours has taken solidity and substance and a human form, and stands before us, and says: ‘If any man serve Me, let him follow Me.’ ‘See that thou make all things according to the pattern,’ and be thankful that we are not left to our own thoughts, or to our brethren’s teachings, or to abstract ideas of the true and the beautiful and the good for our pattern and mould of life, but that we have the law embodied in a Person, and the ideal made actual, in our Brother and our Saviour. There is the joy and the blessedness of the Christian aim after Christian perfection. There is something unsubstantial, misty, shadowy, in an ideal which is embodied nowhere. It is ghost-like, and has little power to move or to attract. But for Christians the pattern is all gathered into the one sweet, heart. compelling form of Jesus, and whatever is remote and sometimes cold in the thought of an unattained aim, changes when we make it our supreme purpose to be like Jesus Christ. Our goal is no cold, solitary mountain top. It is the warm, loving heart, and companionable purity and perfectness of our Brother, and when we can, even in a measure, reach that sweet resting-place, we are wrapped in the soft atmosphere of His love.

We shall be like Him when we see Him as He is; we grow like Him here, in the measure in which we do see Him, even darkly. We reach Him most surely by loving Him, and we become like Him most surely by loving Him, for love breeds likeness, and they who live near the light are drenched with the light, and become lights in their turn.

There is another point here that I would suggest, and that is

II. The universal applicability of the pattern - ‘See that thou make all things.’

Let us go back to Leviticus There you will find page after page that reads like an architect’s specification. The words that I have taken as my text are given in immediate connection with the directions for making the seven-branched candlestick, which are so minute and specific and detailed, that any brass-founder in Europe could make one to-day ‘after the pattern.’ So many bowls, so many knops, so many branches; such and such a distance between each of them; and all the rest of it - there it is, in most prosaic minuteness. Similarly, we read how many threads and fringes, and how many bells on the high priest’s robe. Verse after verse is full of these details; and then, on the back of them all, comes, ‘See that thou make all things according to the pattern.’ Which things are a parable - and just come to this, that the minutest pieces of daily life, the most commonplace and trivial incidents, may all be moulded after that great example, the life of Jesus Christ.

It is one of the miracles of revelation that it should be so. The life of Jesus Christ, in the fragmentary records of it in these four Gospels, although it only covered a few years, and is very imperfectly recorded, and in outward form was passed under conditions most remote from the strange complex conditions of our civilisation, yet fits as closely as a glove does to the hand, to all the necessities of our daily lives. Men and women, young men and maidens, old men and children, professional men and students, women in their houses, men of business, merchants, and they that sail the sea and they that dig in the mine; they may all find directions for everything that they have to do, in that one life.

And here is the centre and secret of it. ‘Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone.’ Therefore that which is the law for Jesus is the law for us, and the next verse goes on; ‘he that loveth hie life shall lose it,’ and the next verse hammers the nail farther in: ‘If any man serve Me, let him follow Me.’ - Take that injunction and apply it, in all the details of daily life, and you will be on the road to reproduce the pattern. But remember the ‘all things.’ It is for us, if we are Christian people, to bring the greatest principles to bear on the smallest duties, ‘Small duties?’ ‘ Great’ and ‘small’ are adjectives that ought never to be tacked on to ‘ duty.’ For all duties are of one size, and while we may speak, and often do speak, very mistakenly about things which we vulgarly consider ‘great,’ or superciliously treat as ‘small,’ the fact is that no man can tell what is a great thing, and what is a small one. For the most important crises in a man’s life have a strange knack of leaping up out of the smallest incidents; just as a whisper may start an avalanche, and so nobody can tell what are the great things and what the small ones. The tiniest pin in a machine drops out, and all the great wheels stop. The small things are the things that for the most part make up life. You can apply Christ’s example to the least of them, and there is very small chance of your applying it to the great things if you have not been in the way of applying it to the small ones. For the small things make the habits which the great ones test and require.

So ‘thorough’ is the word. ‘See that thou make all things according to the pattern.’

I remember once going up to the roof of Milan Cathedral, and finding there stowed away behind a buttress - where I suppose one man in fifty years might notice it, a little statuette, as completely chiselled, as perfectly polished, as if it had been of giant size, and set in the facade for all the people in the piazza to see. That is the sort of way in which Christian men should carve out their lives. Finish off the unseen bits perfectly, and then you may be quite sure that the seen bits will take care of themselves. ‘See that thou make all things’ - and begin with the small ones - ‘according to the pattern.’

Lastly,

III. Where we are to see the pattern. - ‘Shewed to thee in the mount.’

Ay, that is where we have to go if we are to see it. The difference between Christian men’s convictions of duty depends largely on the difference in the distance that they have climbed up the hill. The higher you go, the better you see the He of the land. The higher you go, the purer and more wholesome the atmosphere. And many a thing which a Christian man on the low levels thought to be perfectly in accordance with ‘the pattern,’ when he goes up a little higher, he finds to be hopelessly at variance with it. It is of no use to lay down a multitude of minute, red-tape regulations as to what Christian morality requires from people in given circumstances. Go up the hill, and you will see for yourselves.

Our elevation determines our range of vision. And the nearer, and the closer, and the deeper is our habitual fellowship with God in Christ, the more lofty will be our conceptions of what we ought to be and do. The reason for inconsistent lives is imperfect communion, mad the higher we go on the mountain of vision, the dearer will be our vision. On the other hand, whilst we see ‘the pattern’ in the mount, we have to come down into the valley to ‘make’ the ‘things.’ The clay and the potter’s wheels are down in Hinnom, and the mountain top is above. You have to carry your pattern- book down, and set to work with it before you. Therefore, whilst the way to see the pattern is to climb, the way to copy it is to descend. And having faithfully copied what you saw on the Mount of Vision, you will see more the next time you go back; for ‘to him that hath shall be given.’

Alexander MacLaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (1904–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

8:5 a copy, a shadow: The earthly place of worship was an imitation that pointed to the real one in heaven. That is why God warned Moses to make it according to the pattern (see Exod 25:40; 26:30; cp. Acts 7:44). Judaism and early Christianity both spoke of a heavenly Temple within a heavenly Jerusalem, which would come down to earth at the end of the age (see Rev 21:2). Hebrews suggests that this heavenly place of worship was shown to Moses so he would know how to build the earthly Tabernacle. It is the heavenly Temple, however, in which Jesus ministers as High Priest.

Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Heb 8:5. Ὑποδείγματι καὶ σκιᾷ) A Hendyadys. The latter is added, lest the former should be understood in too august a sense: each is repeated apart, chap. Heb 9:23, Heb 10:1. But it is the ablative in this passage, after the example and shadow. So ὑποδείγματι, ch. Heb 4:11.—λατρεὑουσι, serve) The same verb, ch. 9, often; Heb 10:2, Heb 13:10. He speaks in the present tense, as the temple was not yet destroyed, ch. Heb 9:6, Heb 13:11.—τῶν ἐπουρανίων, of heavenly things) which are both more ancient in design and more far-reaching in the finishing. Comp. Rev 11:19. The mentioning of the mount accords with heaven.—κεχρημάτισται) he was commanded by God.—ὅρα, γάρ φησι, ποιήσῃς πάντα κατὰ τὸν τύπον τὸν δειχθέντα σοι ἐν τῷ ὄρει) Exo 25:40, LXX., is the same as the above, with the exception of τὸν δεδειγμένον instead of τὸν δειχθέντα, and so ibid. Exo 8:9; Exo 26:30; Exo 27:8.

Bengel's Gnomon of the New Testament — English translation (T&T Clark, Edinburgh, 1860) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Heb_8:5. The author at once attaches to the proof given, Heb_8:4,that Christ must be High Priest in the heavenly sanctuary,the testimony of Scripture that the earthly sanctuary, in which the Levitical priests officiate, is a mere copy of the heavenly, thus only an imperfect sanctuary. Schlichting: Vel rationem quandam div. autor his verbis exprimit, cur Christus, si in terris esset, sacerdos esse non posset, nempe quia sacerdotes illi, qui in terris degentes offerunt, umbrae tantum serviunt coelestium; vel tantum a contrario illustrat id, quod de pontifice nostro dixerat, nempe eum esse veri tabernaculi ministrum, legales vero pontifices umbrae tantum et exemplari illius coelestis tabernaculi servire. Not to enclose within a parenthesis (Griesbach, Schulz, Scholz, al.), since the same easily joins on syntactically to Heb_8:4, and διαφορωτέρας, Heb_8:6, points back to its subject-matter.

οἵτινες] nimirum qui.

ὑποδείγματι καὶ σκιᾷ] a copy and shadow. ὑποδείγματι corresponds to the δειχθέντα σοι in the ensuing citation, and denotes here (otherwise Heb_4:11) that which is shown only by way of hints, or only in its general outlines (comp. τὰ ὑποδείγματα, Heb_9:23), has thus the notion of a merely imperfect sketch or copy. Yet more emphatically is the notion of imperfection brought out by means of καὶ σκιᾷ. For σκιά stands not merely opposed to the σῶμα, as the unsubstantial to the substantial (Col_2:17; Josephus, de Bello Jud. ii. 2. 5 : σκιὰν αἰτησόμενος βασιλείας, ἧς ἥρπασεν ἑαυτῷ τὸ σῶμα, Philo, de confus. linguarum, p. 348; with Mangey, I. p. 434), but also to the εἰκών, as the shadowy image melting into obscurity, and only to be recognised in its exterior outlines to the likeness distinctly struck off, containing light and colour, and enabling one to recognise the original. Comp. Heb_10:1 : σκιὰν … οὐκ αὐτὴν τὴν εἰκόνα τῶν πραγμάτων; Achilles Tatius, i. p. 47 (in Wetstein ad Heb_10:1): οὕτω τέθνηκεν καὶ τῆς εἰκόνος ἡ σκιά; Cicero, de Officiis, iii. 17: Sed nos veri juris germanaeque justitiae solidam et expressam effigiem nullam tenemus; umbra et imaginibus utimur.

λατρεύουσιν] is taken unnaturally by Calvin, Pareus, Bengel, Peirce, Schulz, and others in the absolute sense: who serve God in a copy and shadow. The datives ὑποδείγματι καὶ σκιᾷ τῶν ἐπουρανίων form the object of the verb (comp. Heb_13:10): who minister (as priests) to that which is but a copy and shadow of the heavenly.

λατρεύειν here, by virtue of the connection, entirely equivalent to λειτουργεῖν; in general, however, of wider signification, and differing from λειτουργεῖν as the Hebrew עָבַד from שֵׁרֵת.

τῶν ἐπουρανίων] not of the heavenly things (Luther), of the heavenly relations and facts of redemption (Ebrard), of the heavenly relations and divine thoughts (Moll), of the ideal possessions in general, belonging to the kingdom of God (Tholuck); but: of the heavenly sanctuary. Comp. the citation immediately following, as also Heb_8:2; Heb_9:23-24.

καθὼς κεχρημάτισται Μωϋσῆς] according to the response, or divine revelation, which Moses received. The passive χρηματίζεσθαι in this sense only in the N. T. (Heb_11:7; Mat_2:22; Act_10:22, al.) and in Josephus (Antiq. iii. 8. 8, xi. 8. 4).

ἐπιτελεῖν] denotes here not the completion of that which is already begun. What is meant is the execution of that which had previously only been resolved on.

The citation is from Exo_25:40. The γάρ, even as φησίν, belongs to the author of our epistle, on which account ὅρα γάρ φησιν is to be written without placing a comma after γάρ.

φησίν] sc. ὁ χρηματισμός, the divine response, or, since in Exodus (Exo_40:1) God is expressly named as the speaker: ὁ θεός (Heinrichs, Bleek, Stengel, Delitzsch, Alford, Maier, Kurtz, al.), not ἡ γραφή (Böhme).

πάντα] is wanting with the LXX.

κατὰ τὸν τύπον] in accordance with the pattern (תַּבְנִית), i.e. corresponding to the archetype presented to the contemplation of Moses in the manner of a revelation, or by means of a vision. Comp. Act_7:44. Over-refined, indeed, although linguistically not less admissible than the other, is the interpretation of Faber Stapulensis, Rivetus, Schlichting, Grotius, Limborch, Storr, Bleek, and Maier, that in connection with τύπος we have to think of a mere copy of the archetype, so that the Levitical priests served in priestly guise the copy of a copy.

τὸν δειχθέντα] LXX.: τὸν δεδειγμένον.

ἐν τῷ ὄρει] upon the mount, namely Sinai.

Meyer — Critical and Exegetical Commentary on the New Testament — English translation by Peter Christie, edited by Frederick Crombie (T&T Clark, 1880) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Heb 8:5 . οἵτινες ὑποδείγματι … “priests who serve a suggestion and shadow of the heavenly things even as Moses when about to make the tabernacle was admonished, for ‘See,’ He says, ‘that thou make all things after the pattern shown thee in the Mount’ ”. οἵτινες with its usual classifying and characterising reference, priests distinguished by the fact that they serve a shadow. λατρεύουσιν , originally to work for hire, from λάτρις , a hired servant (Soph., Trach. , 70, etc.), but used especially in classics, LXX, and N.T. of service of God. It is followed by the dative of the person served (see reff.) Heb 9:14 ; Heb 12:28 ; Heb 13:10 as here οἱ τῇ σκηνῇ λατρεύοντες . ὑποδείγματι , Phrynichus notes. ὑπόδειγμα · οὐδὲ τοῦτο ὀρθῶς λέγεται · παράδειγμα λέγε . To which Rutherford adds, “In Attic ὑποδείκνυμι was never used except in its natural sense of show by implication ; but in Herodotus and Xenophon it signifies to mark out, set a pattern ”. The meaning of ὑπόδειγμα accordingly is “a sign suggestive of anything,” “a delineation,” “outline,” perhaps “suggestion” would satisfy the present passage. σκιᾷ , “an adumbration of a reality which it does not embody” (Vaughan). A shadow has no substance in itself, no independent existence. It merely gives assurance that there is a reality to cast it, but itself is nothing solid or real. So the tabernacle gave assurance of the existence of a real dwelling of God which itself was not. Cf. Heb 10:1 , and Col 2:17 . τῶν ἐπουρανίων , as in Heb 9:23 τὰ ὑποδείγματα τῶν ἐν τοῖς οὐρανοῖς … αὐτὰ δὲ τὰ ἐπουράνια , heavenly things, in a comprehensive sense. καθὼς κεχρημάτισται … καθὼς , i.e. the description of the Mosaic tabernacle as a shadow of the heavenly accords with the directions given to Moses in its erection. κεχρημάτισται , χρηματίζω (from χρῆμα ) originally means “to transact business,” “to advise” or “give answer to those asking advice”; hence “to give a response to those who consult an oracle”; then, dropping all reference to a foregoing consultation, it means “to give a divine command” and in passive to be commanded; see Thayer. The perfect tense is explained by Delitzsch thus: “as thou Moses hast received (in our Scriptures) the divine injunction (which we still read there)”. But cf. Burton, M. and T. , 82. ἐπιτελεῖν , not, to complete what was already begun; but to realise what was determined by God; cf. Num 23:23 , and Heb 9:6 ; so that it might be rendered “to bring into being”. Ὅρα γάρ φησιν … He now cites the authoritative injunction referred to and which determines that the earthly tabernacle was but a copy of the heavenly. γάρ of course belongs to the writer, not to the quotation, and φησιν has for its nominative the Θεός implied in κεχρημάτισται . ποιήσεις .… The words are quoted from Exo 25:40 (adding πάντα and substituting δειχθέντα for δεδειγμένον ) and are a literal rendering of the Hebrew, so that nothing can be gathered from them regarding N.T. usage. The future indicative being regularly used as a legal imperative (an unclassic usage) it naturally occurs here. κατὰ τὸν τύπον , a stamp or impression ( τύπτειν ) struck from a die or seal; hence, a figure, draft, sketch, or pattern. How or in what form this was communicated to the mind of Moses we do not know. “In the Mount,” i.e. , in Sinai where Moses retired for communion with God, he probably pondered the needs of the people to such good purpose that from suggestions received in Egypt, together with his own divinely guided conceptions, he was able to contrive the tabernacle and its ordinances of worship. It is his spiritual insight and his anticipation of his people’s wants which give him his unique place in history. And it is both to trifle and to detract from his greatness to say with some of the Rabbis ( vide Schoettgen) that models of the Ark and the candlestick and the other equipment descended from heaven, and that Gabriel in a workman’s apron showed him how to reproduce the articles shown.

The Expositor's Greek Testament, edited by W. Robertson Nicoll (1897–1910) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Who--namely, the priests.

serve unto the example--not "after the example," as BENGEL explains. But as in Heb 13:10, "serve the tabernacle," that is, do it service: so "serve (the tabernacle which is but) the outline and shadow." The Greek for "example" is here taken for the sketch, copy, or suggestive representation of the heavenly sanctuary, which is the antitypical reality and primary archetype. "The mount" answers to heaven, Heb 12:22.

admonished--The Greek especially applies to divine responses and commands.

to make--"perfectly": so the Greek.

See--Take heed, accurately observing the pattern, that so thou mayest make, &c.

saith he--God.

the pattern--an accurate representation, presented in vision to Moses, of the heavenly real sanctuary. Thus the earthly tabernacle was copy of a copy; but the latter accurately representing the grand archetypical original in heaven (Exo 25:40).

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Verse 5. Who serve] Οἱτινες λατρευουσι. Who perform Divine worship.

Unto the example and shadow] Υποδειγματι και σκιᾳ, WITH the representation and shadow; this is Dr. Macknight's translation, and probably the true one.

The whole Levitical service was a representation and shadow of heavenly things; it appears, therefore, absurd to say that the priests served UNTO an example or representation of heavenly things; they served rather unto the substance of those things, WITH appropriate representations and shadows.

As Moses was admonished] Καθως κεχρηματισται Μωσης. As Moses was Divinely warned or admonished of God.

According to the pattern] Κατα τον τυπον. According to the type, plan, or form. It is very likely that God gave a regular plan and specification of the tabernacle and all its parts to Moses; and that from this Divine plan the whole was constructed. See on "Ex 25:40".

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

5. Who serve unto the example, etc. The verb λατρεύειν to serve, I take here to mean the performing of sacred rites; and so ἐν or ἐπὶ is to be understood. This is certainly more appropriate than the rendering given by some, “Who serve the shadow and example of heavenly things; and the construction in Greek will admit naturally of the meaning I have proposed. In short, he teaches us that the true worship of God consists not in the ceremonies of the Law, and that hence the Levitical priests, while exercising their functions, had nothing but a shadow and a copy, which is inferior to the prototype, for this is the meaning of the word ὑποδείγμα, exemplar. And he thus anticipates what might have been raised as an objection; for he shows that the worship of God, according to the ancient sacrifices, was not superfluous, because it referred to what was higher, even to heavenly realities.

As Moses was admonished by God, etc. This passage is found in Exodus 25:40; and the apostle adduces it here on purpose, so that he might prove that the whole service, according to the Law, was nothing more than a picture as it were, designed to shadow forth what is found spiritually in Christ. God commanded that all the parts of the tabernacle should correspond with the original pattern, which had been shown to Moses on the mount. And if the form of the tabernacle had a reference to something else, then the same must have been the case as to the rituals and the priesthood; it hence follows that there was nothing real in them.

This is a remarkable passage, for it contains three things entitled to special notice.

First, we hence learn that the ancient rituals were not without reason appointed, as though God did by them engage the attention of the people as with the diversions of children; and that the form of the tabernacle was not an empty thing, intended only to allure and attract the eyes by its external splendor; for there was a real and spiritual meaning in all these things, since Moses was commanded to execute every thing according to the original pattern which was given from heaven. Extremely profane then must the opinion of those be, who hold that the ceremonies were only enjoined that they might serve as means to restrain the wantonness of the people, that they might not seek after the foreign rites of heathens. There is indeed something in this, but it is far from being all; they omit what is much more important, that they were the means of retaining the people in their expectation of a Mediator.

There is, however, no reason that we should be here overcurious, so as to seek in every nail and minute things some sublime mystery, as Hesychius did and many of the ancient writers, who anxiously toiled in this work; for while they sought refinedly to philosophize on things unknown to them, they childishly blundered, and by their foolish trifling made themselves ridiculous. We ought therefore to exercise moderation in this respect, which we shall do if we seek only to know what has been revealed to us respecting Christ.

Secondly, we are here taught that all those modes of worship are false and spurious, which men allow themselves by their own wit to invent, and beyond God’s command; for since God gives this direction, that all things are to be done according to his own rule, it is not lawful for us to do anything different from it; for these two forms of expression, “see that thou do all things according to the patterns,” and, “See that thou do nothing beyond the pattern,” amount to the same thing. Then by enforcing the rule delivered by himself, he prohibits us to depart from it even in the least thing. For this reason all the modes of worship taught by men fall to the ground, and also those things called sacraments which have not proceeded from God.

Thirdly, let us hence learn that there are no true symbols of religion but those which conform to what Christ requires. We must then take heed, lest we, while seeking to adapt our own inventions to Christ, transfigure him, as the Papists do, so that he should not be at all like himself; for it does not belong to us to devise anything as we please, but to God alone it belongs to show us what to do; it is to be “according to the pattern” showed to us.

John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.

(5) Who serve unto . . .—Better, men who serve a copy and shadow of the heavenly things. So in Heb_13:10 we read of those who “serve the tabernacle.” On the connection of thought, see Heb_8:3. “Copy,” not in the sense of perfect resemblance, but rather a token suggesting and designed to suggest the original. (See Note on Heb_9:23, where the same word is used.) “Shadow,” as the shadow has no substance or independent existence, but represents only the outline of an object. (Comp. Heb_10:1, where “shadow” is contrasted with “the very image”; and Col_2:17, where it is opposed to “the body.”) We must not confound these words, “token” and “shadow,” with “the pattern” mentioned in Exo_25:40, quoted later in this verse. The “heavenly things” are “the sanctuary” and “the tabernacle “of Heb_8:2, the realities to which the true earthly tabernacle corresponded; their nature can be understood only when Christ has come as High Priest of the good things to come. (See Heb_9:11; Heb_10:1.) That every part of God’s earthly house might be a fitting emblem of spiritual truth to be afterwards revealed. Moses was charged in all respects to follow the pattern which had been shown him in the mount (Exo_25:40). Jewish tradition understood these words to imply the presentation of a heavenly tabernacle to the sight of Moses, as a model to be imitated with exactness; and Stephen’s words in Act_7:44, “according to the pattern” (the same word is here used) “which he had seen,” convey the same meaning. In itself, Exo_25:40, when compared with Heb_8:9 in the same chapter, does not necessarily involve a visible representation. But whether we think of a pattern shown in vision, or merely of explicit direction received by Moses, the meaning of “the heavenly things” remains the same. The view here presented of the Jewish tabernacle involves no depreciation, except in comparison with “the good things to come.” It was only a shadow; but it rises above all temples and symbols of man’s art and device as being a shadow of the heavenly things.

Was admonished of God.—The words “of God” are not in the text, but are implied in “admonished.” (See the Note on Luk_2:26.) “Hath been admonished:” another example of the writer’s characteristic mode of regarding Scripture (Heb_4:9).

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

5. who serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things] Namely, the priests—who are ministering in that which is nothing but an outline and shadow (Heb_10:1; Col_2:17) of the heavenly things. The verb “minister” usually takes a dative of the person to whom the ministry is paid. Here and in Heb_13:10 the dative is used of the thing in which the service is done. It is conceivable that there is a shade of irony in this—they serve not a Living God, but a dead tabernacle. And this tabernacle is only a sketch, an outline, a ground pattern (1Ch_28:11) as it were—at the best a representative image—of the Heavenly Archetype.

of heavenly things] Perhaps rather “of the heavenly sanctuary” (Heb_9:23-24).

as Moses was admonished …] “Even as Moses, when about to complete the tabernacle has been divinely admonished”.… On this use of the perfect see note on Heb_4:9, &c. The verb is used of divine intimations in Mat_2:12; Luk_2:26; Act_10:22 &c.

all things] This expression is not found either in the Hebrew or the LXX. of the passages referred to (Exo_25:40; Exo_26:30); it seems to be due to Philo (De Leg, Alleg. iii. 33), who may, however, have followed some older reading.

according to the pattern shewed to thee in the mount] Here, as is so often the case in comments on Scripture, we are met by the idlest of all speculations, as to whether Moses saw this “pattern” in a dream or with his waking eyes; whether the pattern was something real or merely an impression produced upon his senses; whether the tabernacle was thus a copy or only “a copy of a copy and a shadow of a shadow,” &c. Such questions are otiose, because even if they were worth asking at all they do not admit of any answer, and involve no instruction, and no result of the smallest value. The Palestinian Jews in their slavish literal way said that there was in Heaven an exact literal counterpart of the Mosaic Tabernacle with “a fiery Ark, a fiery Table, a fiery Candlestick,” &c, which descended from heaven for Moses to see; and that Gabriel, in a workman’s apron, shewed Moses how to make the candlestick,—an inference which they founded on Num_8:4, “And this work of the candlestick” (Menachoth, f. 29. 1). Without any such fetish-worship of the letter it is quite enough to accept the simple statement that Moses worked after a pattern which God had brought before his mind. The chief historical interest in the verse is the fact that it was made the basis for the Scriptural Idealism by which Philo and the Alexandrian Jews tried to combine Judaism with the Platonic philosophy, and to treat the whole material world as a shadow of the spiritual world.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Who serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things,.... Things respecting the person, office, and grace of Christ; the priests themselves were types of him; the places they ministered in were an exemplar of the heavenly places, as the word may be rendered, where Christ is; and the things they ministered were shadows of the good things which are by Christ; and the shadows were mere representations; dark, obscure, glimmering ones, and were fleeting and transitory:

as Moses was admonished of God; by an oracle; he was a peculiar favourite of God, and was the mediator between God and the people of Israel, and what he received was oracle wise; what he delivered to the people was what he received from God; and what was thus delivered ought to be received as from God: and this admonition or oracle was given him

when he was about to make the tabernacle; the Levitical one, with everything appertaining to the worship of God in it: this is ascribed to Moses, though it was made by others, because it was by his direction, and under his care and oversight; and he had this admonition at the beginning of it; and at the finishing of it he looked upon it, and saw that it was all done as the Lord had commanded; Exo 25:40,

for see, saith he, that thou make all things according to the pattern showed to thee in the Mount; Moses was taken up into a mountain with God, even Mount Sinai; and while he was there, a pattern was given him of the tabernacle and all its utensils; this was not a device of his own, but was shown him by God; and this pattern reached to every particular thing; and great care and circumspection were used that the most minute thing answered to it. The Jews think this pattern was given him by the ministry of angels; Gabriel, they say (f), girt himself with a girdle, and showed to Moses the work of the candlestick; and they further say, that an ark of fire, and a table of fire; and a candlestick of fire, descended from heaven, and Moses saw them, and made according to them: from whence it may be observed that the tabernacle, and tabernacle worship, were of divine institution; the ceremonious rites of the Jews were not, as some have affirmed, borrowed from the Egyptians; nor were they given as diversions to that people, nor only to preserve them from idolatry, and keep them separate from others, but were designed to lead them to Christ, whom they were typical of; wherefore the abuse, and not the use of them, were condemned under the former dispensation; though they were to continue no longer than till Christ came, and suffered and died; and now they are abolished: moreover, it may be gathered from hence, that whatever is done in a way of religious worship, should be according to a divine rule; a church of Christ ought to be formed according to the primitive pattern, and should consist, not of all that are born in a nation, province, or parish; nor should all that are born of believing parents be admitted into it; no unholy, unbelieving, and unconverted persons, only such as are true believers in Christ, and who are baptized according as the word of God directs; the officers of a church should be only of two sorts, bishops, elders, pastors or overseers, and deacons; the ordinances are baptism, which should only be administered to believers, and by immersion, and the Lord's supper, of which none should partake, but those who have tasted that the Lord is gracious; and this should be performed as Christ performed it, and as the Apostle Paul received it from him; the discipline of Christ's house should be regarded, and all the laws of it carefully and punctually in execution; and a conversation becoming the Gospel should be attended to.

(f) T. Bab. Menachot, fol. 29. 1.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

5 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.

Ver. 5. Of heavenly things] So he calleth the mystery of Christ, showed hereby to Moses in the mount, and shadowed out to the people by the services of the tabernacle. All which were Christ in figure; the ceremonial law was their gospel; indeed then all was in riddles, Moses was veiled, and that saying was verified, Et latet et lucet.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Who serve unto the example - Who perform their service by the mere example and shadow of the heavenly things; or in a tabernacle, and in a mode, that is the mere emblem of the reality which exists in heaven. The reference is to the tabernacle, which was a mere “example” or “copy” of heaven. The word rendered here “example” - ὑποδείγμα hupodeigma - means a “copy, likeness, or imitation.” The tabernacle was made after a pattern which was shown to Moses; it was made so as to have some faint resemblance to the reality in heaven, and in that “copy,” or “example,” they were appointed to officiate. Their service, therefore, had some resemblance to that in heaven.

And shadow - That is, in the tabernacle where they served there was a mere shadow of what was real and substantial. Compared with what is in heaven, it was what the shadow is compared with the substance. A shadow - as of a man, a house, a tree, will indicate the form, the outline, the size of the object; but it has no substance, or reality. So it was with the rites of the Jewish religion. They were designed merely as a shadow of the substantial realities of the true religion, or to present the dim outlines of what is true and real in heaven; compare the Col 2:17 note; Heb 10:1 note. The word “shadow” here - σκιᾶ skia - is used in distinction from the body or reality - σῶμα sōma - (compare Col 2:17), and also from εἰκών eikōn - a perfect image or resemblance; see Heb 10:1.

Of heavenly things - Of the heavenly sanctuary; of what is real and substantial in heaven. That is, there exists in heaven a reality of which the service in the Jewish sanctuary was but the outline. The reference is, undoubtedly, to the service which the Lord Jesus performs there as the great high priest of his people.

As Moses was admonished of God - As he was divinely instructed. The word used used - χρηματίζω chrēmatizō - means properly to give oracular responses; to make communications to people in a supernatural way - by dreams, by direct revelations, etc.; see Mat 2:12, Mat 2:22; Luk 2:26; Act 10:22; Heb 11:7.

For, see, saith he - Exo 25:9, Exo 25:40; Exo 26:30. In Exo 11:1-10, it is also repeatedly said that Moses executed all the work of the tabernacle as he had been commanded. Great care was taken that an exact copy should be exhibited to him of all which he was to make, and that the work should be exactly like the pattern. The reason doubtless was, that as the Jewish service was to be typical, none but God could judge of the form in which the tabernacle should be made. It was not to be an edifice of architectural beauty, skill, or taste, but was designed to adumbrate important realities which were known only to God. Hence, it was needful that the exact model of them should be given to Moses, and that it should be scrupulously followed.

That thou make all things - Not only the tabernacle itself, but the altars, the ark, the candlestick, etc. The form and materials for each were specified, and the exact pattern shown to Moses in the mount.

According to the pattern - Greek τύπον tupon - “type;” that is, figure, form. The word τύπος tupos, “type,” means properly anything produced by the agency or means of “blows” (from τύπτω tuptō, “to strike”); hence, a mark, stamp, print, impression - as that made by driving nails in the hands Joh 20:25; then a figure or form, as of an image or statue Act 7:43; the form of a doctrine or opinion Rom 6:17; then an example to be imitated or followed 1Co 10:6-7; Phi 3:17; 1Th 1:7; 2Th 3:9; and hence, a pattern, or model after which anything is to be made; Act 7:44. This is the meaning here. The allusion is to a pattern such as an architect or sculptor uses; a drawing, or figure made in wood or clay, after which the work is to be modelled. The idea is, that some such drawing or model was exhibited to Moses by God on mount Sinai, so that he might have an exact idea of the tabernacle which was to be made. A similar drawing or model of the temple was given by David to Solomon; 1Ch 28:11-12. We are not indeed to suppose that there was in the case of the pattern shown to Moses, any miniature model of wood or stone actually created and exhibited, but that the form of the tabernacle was exhibited to Moses in vision (note, Isa 1:1), or was so vividly impressed on his mind that he would have a distinct view of the edifice which was to be reared.

In the mount - In mount Sinai; for it was while Moses was there in the presence of God, that these communications were made.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Who serve unto, &c. The priesthood of the law and its functions were a kind of an example, and shadow of what is done by Christ in his Church militant [on earth] and triumphant [in heaven], of which the tabernacle was a pattern. (Challoner)

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

Who serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things; these Aaronical priests and their service in the literal tabernacle, were only subservient, as the model in the mind, to represent the truth, as the platform of a tabernacle serves toward the making and pitching of it. Υποδειγματι is an obscure and underhand resemblance, the first draught, that which is the rough part of what is to be represented, Heb 11:23, such as the shadow is to the natural body, a dark resemblance of it: such were these of Christ’s person, ministry, and those heavenly things performed by him; they were leading them to, and instructing them in, Christ and his work, though the veil on their mind and hearts hindered them from discerning it. So true is that, Joh 1:17. Moses’s law was the shadow, Christ the truth of all; compare Heb 9:6,23; 10:11. And it is not unlikely, that both the literal tabernacle and temple economy are but grosser and obscurer discoveries of that form and manner of the manifestation of God in glory, and the most excellently regulated service and ministry in the economy there.

As Moses was admonished of God when he was about to make the tabernacle; κεχρηματισται. Moses was in the mount, from God’s own mouth, (the best of oracles), charged and admonished about, and infallibly guided in, his duty, Exo 25:1-40, confirmed by the Spirit in Act 7:44; when he had his commission for the work resolved to enter on and perfect it according to God’s charge, then was this oracle given out about the earthly tabernacle, priesthood, and service.

For, See, saith he; look you to it, observe this, take heed and beware, saith he, who is Jehovah, the Sovereign Lord of him and Israel, a Being of power to enjoy, and command, and to require any neglect, Exo 25:1-40.

That thou make all things according to the pattern showed to thee in the mount; thou shalt make, frame, and work, by enjoining Israel what they are to make, and perfect what thou art to do, all those things of the vessels, parts, and structure of the tabernacle for officers and service, for conjoining, rearing, and pitching of it, Exo 25:1-40:38; all after the type, copy, pattern, exemplar, showed thee by me, and seen and viewed by thee, when thou wert with me in the top of the Mount Sinai forty days and forty nights. This tabernacle was framed by its type, and was to be an ordinance resembling, figuring, and typifying a spiritual tabernacle and ministry of Christ that was to succeed and fulfil it, being different in the whole kind from this type; it being spiritual and heavenly, this a gross, material, earthly fabric. Moses was most exact in framing all as God commanded, after his own pattern; he did not add, diminish, nor alter any thing in it, Exo 40:1-38.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

5. And, curiously enough, this whole order of priests and tabernacle are but a copy on earth of this true priest, who is no priest on earth, but really sole, real, original priest, whether on earth or in the heavens.

Unto— For. The earthly and the heavenly tabernacle correspond to each other. Moses was shown the pattern… in the mount. Exo_25:9; Exo_25:40; Act_7:44. Not that the eye of Moses was so enlarged in its scope of vision as to see the vast, original heavens. But such a pattern was exhibited as enabled the mind of Moses to construct a material frame to symbolize its nature.

That the sanctuary below was but a small model of the glorious sanctuary in the heavens is the doctrine of this and the following chapters, as of other scriptures. So even the earthly Jerusalem was type of a heavenly Jerusalem above. See note on Gal_4:26. While below are the earthly sanctuary, ritual, and priesthood, above are the true tabernacle, the heavenly things, and the high priest on the right hand of God. See our note on Heb_9:1.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Who (i.e. being such as do so; oitinev) serve a copy and shadow of the heavenly things (upodeigma here, as in Heb_9:23, means" representation," in the way of copy, not of pattern. "Shadow" (skia) is opposed in Heb_10:1 to eikwn , which denotes the reality, and in Col_2:17 to swma), even as Moses is admonished of God when about to make the tabernacle (literally, to complete ; but net in the sense of finishing a thing begun, but of carrying out a design to entire completion); for, See, saith he, that thou make all things according to the pattern that was showed thee in the mount. For the sense of kecrhmatistai , according to Hellenistic usage, cf. Mat_2:22, "Being warned of God in a dream (crhmatisyei kat onar)." The reference here is to Exo_25:40; the words which "the LORD spake unto Moses." Rabbinical writers, holding the view of an actual heavenly tabernacle, the prototype of the earthly one, have concluded from the passage in Exodus that Moses had a vision of it, or that a visible representation of it was exhibited to him on the mount. All that is necessarily implied is that he was divinely admonished to make the tabernacle after the fashion conveyed, in whatever way, to his apprehension when on the mount, so that it might be a true representation of some heavenly reality. (cf. Act_7:44)

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Who serve - The temple, which was not yet destroyed. After the pattern and shadow of heavenly things - Of spiritual, evangelical worship, and of everlasting glory. The pattern - Somewhat like the strokes pencilled out upon a piece of fine linen, which exhibit the figures of leaves and flowers, but have not yet received their splendid colours and curious shades. And shadow - Or shadowy representation, which gives you some dim and imperfect idea of the body, but not the fine features, not the distinguishing air; none of those living graces which adorn the real person. Yet both the pattern and shadow lead our minds to something nobler than themselves: the pattern, to that holiness and glory which complete it; the shadow, to that which occasions it. Exod. xxv, 40.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

5. Who serve unto the example and shadow, etc. The service of the priests and of the temple is after the example of, and a shadowing forth of heavenly things. See … that thou make all things, etc. A pattern was shown Moses. All must be made after that pattern (Exod. 25:40). Hence the tabernacle made according to that plan shadowed forth heavenly things. The earthly high priest was a type of the great high priest in the heavens.

B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.

5. οἵτινες κ.τ.λ. Namely, the priests—who are ministering in that which is nothing but a copy and shadow (Heb 10:1; Col 2:17) of the heavenly things. The verb λατρεύειν usually takes a dative of the person to whom the ministry is paid. Here and in Heb 13:10 the dative is used of the thing in which the service is done. It is conceivable that there is a shade of irony in this—they serve not a Living God, but a dead tabernacle. And this tabernacle is only a sketch, an outline, a ground pattern (1Ch 28:11) as it were—at the best a representative image—of the Heavenly Archetype.

τῶν ἐπουρανίων. “Of the heavenly things,” R.V. Perhaps rather “of the heavenly sanctuary” (Heb 9:23-24).

κεχρημάτισται. “Even as Moses, when about to complete the tabernacle, has been divinely admonished …” On this use of the perfect see note on Heb 4:8, &c. χρηματίζω is used of Divine intimations in Mat 2:12; Luk 2:26; Act 10:22, &c.

Ὅρα … ποιήσεις. This is not a classical idiom, though not absolutely unknown to classical Greek (Lobeck, Phryn. p. 734). It is here taken from the LXX. (Exo 25:40). Ποιήσῃς would be better Greek.

πάντα. This expression is not found either in the Hebrew or the LXX. of the passages referred to (Exo 25:40; Exo 26:30); it seems to be due to Philo (De Leg. Alleg. III. 33), who may, however, have followed some older reading.

κατὰ τὸν τύπον κ.τ.λ. Here, as is so often the case in comments on Scripture, we are met by the idlest of speculations, as to whether Moses saw this “pattern” in a dream or with his waking eyes; whether the pattern was something real or merely an impression produced upon his senses; whether the tabernacle was thus a copy or only “a copy of a copy and a shadow of a shadow,” &c. Such questions are otiose, because, even if they were worth asking at all, they do not admit of any answer, and involve no instruction, and no result of the smallest value. The Palestinian Jews in their slavish literal way said that there was in Heaven an exact literal counterpart of the Mosaic Tabernacle with “a fiery Ark, a fiery Table, a fiery Candlestick,” &c., which descended from heaven for Moses to see; and that Gabriel, in a workman’s apron, shewed Moses how to make the candlestick,—an inference which they founded on Num 8:4, “And this work of the candlestick” (Menachoth, f. 29. 1). Without any such fetish-worship of the letter it is quite enough to accept the simple statement that Moses worked after a pattern which God had brought before his mind. The chief historical interest in the verse is the fact that it was made the basis for the Scriptural Idealism by which Philo and the Alexandrian Jews tried to combine Judaism with the Platonic philosophy, and to treat the whole material world as a shadow of the spiritual world. It is one of several narrow points on which were built huge inverted pyramids of inference, which even when it was intrinsically tenable, could still not be deduced from the passages quoted.

Cambridge Greek Testament for Schools and Colleges (Cambridge University Press, 1896; 21 vols, various authors incl. Carr, Maclear, Plummer, Farrar, Lumby, Moule, M. R. James, Simcox) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

5.] men who (ἱερεῖς τῶν Ἰουδαίων φησί, Œc. By οἵτινες is pointed out the class, or official description: mean those who’) serve (λατρεύειν occurs eight times in St. Luke, four times in St. Paul, and six times in this Epistle, It has more the general sense of ‘serving,’ either God, as almost always, or some especial portion of divine service or sacred things, as here and ch. 13:10. λειτουργεῖν is the more proper word for priestly ministration. On the construction, see below) the delineation (ὑπόδειγμα cannot as in ch. 4:11 mean, a pattern, or example: but must be taken, less usually but more strictly as answering to ὑποδεικνύναι, ‘oculis subjicere,’ here and in ch. 9:23, as meaning a suggestive representation, or sketch. So Thl., ὑποδείγματα, τουτέστιν ἀμυδρὰ δείγματα καὶ οἷον σκιαγραφήματα τὰ ἐν τῇ παλαιᾷ ὑποδειχθέντα τῷ Μωυσεῖ. It corresponds to δειχθέντα σοι in the following citation) and shadow (‘adumbration,’ σκιαγράφημα. See on ch. 10:1, where σκιά and εἰκών are contrasted. As regards the construction: Calvin, Bengel, al. take λατρεύουσιν absolutely, and ὑποδείγματι κ.τ.λ. ablatively: “who serve (God) in a delineation and shadow” &c. But this is far-fetched, and unnecessary, especially in the presence of ch. 13:10, where it is hardly possible to regard τῇ σκηνῇ otherwise than as the objective dative to λατρεύοντες) of the heavenly things (i. e. the things in heaven, in the heavenly sanctuary: correspondent to τὸν τύπον τὸν δειχθέντα σοι ἐν τῷ ὄρει: see also ch. 9:23, 24. Chrys. understands it of spiritual things: τίνα λέγει ἐνταῦθα τὰ ἐπουράνια; τὰ πνευματικά· εἰ γὰρ καὶ ἐπὶ γῆς τελεῖται, ἀλλʼ ὅμως τῶν οὐρανῶν εἰσιν ἄξια,—and then goes on to instance the work of the Spirit in baptism, the power of the keys, the utterance of Christian praise, &c. And Luther renders, der himmlischen Guter. But the context clearly requires the other view): even as Moses was commanded (“admonished of God,” E. V., an excellent rendering. χρηματίζω is used in the later classics, but as early as Demosthenes, for to give a decisive answer, “responsum ex deliberatione reddere,” as Reiske. Hence it came afterwards to be appropriated mainly to responses, warnings, commands, given from the Deity: so Diod. Sic. iii. 6, τοὺς γὰρ θεοὺς αὐτοῖς ταῦτα κεχρηματικέναι; xv. 10, περὶ δὲ τῶν χρησμῶν ἔφησε, μὴ χρηματίζειν τὸν θεὸν καθόλου περὶ θανάτου. And so constantly in the Scriptures both LXX and N. T. reff. and Jer_32(25):30; 37(30):2; Luk 2:26. The earlier classical verb is χράω of the deity giving the oracle, χράομαι of the person consulting it. Observe the perfect, not the aor., giving a fine distinction not reproducible in English: viz. that these figures of the heavenly things were still subsisting as ordained to Moses, when the Epistle was written) when about to complete (not in distinction from beginning, as if he were about to put the finishing stroke to the work already nearly ended: but involving the whole work: ‘to take in hand and carry on to completion’) the tabernacle: for (γάρ justifies the assertion by the following citation) Take heed, He says (supply ὁ θεός; there can be no doubt of this here, where the words following are God’s own), that thou makest (ποιήσῃς and ποιήσεις give a like sense, and in English must be expressed by the same. The former is better Greek; the latter according to the LXX: manuscript authority must prevail) all things (πάντα is not in the LXX, nor in the Heb., but is supplied also by Philo, Legg. Allegor. iii. 33, vol. i. p. 108, κατὰ τὸ παράδειγμα τὸ δεδειγμένον σοι ἐν τῷ ὄρει πάντα ποιήσεις) according to the pattern which was shewn (LXX, δεδειγμένον) thee in the mount. If now we ask what this τύπος was, we are met with various replies. Faber Stapulensis says, “Arbitror id insinuare, non nudam veritatem in monte Mosi fuisse ostentatam, sed veritatis adumbrationem et remotam quandam ideam. Et quomodo etiam vidisset veritatem, nisi per speciem nude et revelate divina conspexisset, quod viatorum et adhuc in vita mortali peregrinantium non est. Typus igitur erat quod videbat, nondum ipsa veritas et archetypus.” And so Schlichting, concluding, “adeo ut tabernaculum antiquum exemplar tantum fuerit exemplaris, et umbra umbræ.” This view, which is that also of Bleek and Storr, is strongly controverted by Delitzsch, who takes the τύπος to be the veritable heavenly things themselves, not seen however by Moses directly and naturally, which would be impossible, but made visible to him in a vision. I do not see that there is much to choose between the two views. If the latter be taken, then surely the vision thus vouchsafed to Moses was itself only an intermediate representation, and so this view comes much to the same as the other.

Henry Alford, The Greek Testament (1849–1861) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Who serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things [οιτινες υποδειγματι και σκια λατρευουσιν των επουρανιων] . The connection is, "there are those who offer the gifts according to the law, such as [οιτινες] serve," etc. For latreuousin serve, see on 2Ti 1:3. Omit unto. Rend. serve the copy and shadow, etc., or, as Rev., that which is a copy and shadow. For uJpodeigma copy, see on 1Pe 5:3; 2Pe 2:6. Comp. Heb 9:23. Twn ejpouraniwn "of heavenly things." Ta ejpourania in N. T. usually "heavenly places." See Eph 1:3; Eph 2:6; Eph 3:10; Eph 6:12 : "heavenly things," Joh 3:12; Phi 2:10; Heb 9:23. 203 As Moses was admonished [καθως κεχρηματισται μωυσης] . By God. This, and the remainder of the verse, explain the words copy and shadow. For crhmatizein see on Mt 2:12; Luk 2:26; Act 11:26. Comp. crhmatismov answer (of God), Rom 11:4. In Exo 40:1, where Moses is commanded to make the tabernacle, God is expressly named.

To make [επιτελειν] . The margin of Rev. complete may easily convey a wrong idea. The sense is to carry out or execute the plan given to him. For, See [ορα γαρ] . Gar for is not a part of the quotation, but is argumentative. Moses was admonished, for God said "See," etc.

That thou make [ποιησεις] . A direct command. "See, thou shalt make." Pattern [τυπον] . See on 1Pe 5:3. The meaning is that, in all essential features, the Levitical system of worship was a copy of a heavenly reality. This was pressed into an absurd literalism by the Rabbins, who held that there were in heaven original models of the tabernacle and of all its appurtenances, and that these were shown to Moses in the Mount. The writer draws out of this vulgar conception the thought that the material tabernacle was an emblem of a spiritual, heavenly sanctuary. The Levitical priests, therefore, serve only a copy and shadow.

Marvin R. Vincent, Word Studies in the New Testament (1887–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

5. οἵτινες...) The qualitative relative (comp. c. ik. 3 note; 6. 6 Fris)

emphasises the charactor of the Levitical priesthood: priests such as serce that which is α -copy and shadow ... Latt. qui exemplari οἱ umbraw (serviunt) deserviunt. The Mosaic system was not complote in itself, original and iudependont: it was a copy of an archetype. It had no spiritual substance: it was only a shadow. Comp. John i 17.

Like our word ‘copy’ tho word ὑπόδειγμα exprosscs uot ΟἿ tho image which is made by imitation (us hore and 6. ix. 23) but alsu the model which is offerod for imitation. (John xiii. 15; James v. 10; 2 Pot. ii. 6; comp. 2 Maco, vi. 28, 31; Ecclus. xliv. 16. Comp. . iv. 11 note.)

ii. 17 (contrasted with σώμα). Tho word λατρεύονσι is not to be tukou absolutely (‘serve God in, aftor, u copy...’). The priest can rightly bo said to serve the system. Oomp. c. xiii. 10 ol τῇ σκηνῇ λατρεύοντες. Kzck. Σὶν. ς (οἴκῳ). Clom. R. i. 32. For λατρεύειν soo Additional Note on 9. 2.

τῶν ἐπουρανίων) of the heavenly order. The Tabernacle presented in figures the ideas of the Divine Presence aud the realities of heaven.

The phrase is to bo taken generally

and not to be defined by the addition of ἁγίων or the like. . Tho range of the ocourronce of τὰ ἐπουράνια in the N. T. is limited. It is found in St John: iii. 12; in tho Ep. to Ephesians: i. 3, 20; ii. 6; iii. 10; vi. 12; and in this Epistle, here and in ix. 23.

The general idca of the phrase is that of ‘ the heavenly ordor,’ the acono of the spiritual life with tho realities which belong to it. The abstract term is used here and in ix. 23 to guard (as it seems) against the danger

Plant. Now § 6 (i. 333 M.). Seo Additional Note.

Brooke Foss Westcott (1825–1901), The Epistle to the Hebrews (1889) and The Epistles of St John (1883) — public domain (pre-1929). Text recovered from Internet Archive / Google Books OCR scans. Westcott’s Gospel of John commentary is not included (its OCR lost the chapter running-heads required for reliable verse-keying). Some Greek quoted in the Hebrews volume is imperfectly rendered by the OCR.