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Bluethread -> RE: Abrahamic covenant & Davidic covenant (10/2/2008 4:31:43 PM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: DaveW
While not in that specific verse, "new" kainos is and ties it back to verse 8 and the phrase kainos diatheke - new covenant.
Diatheke also appears in verses 9 and 10, so it is a pretty safe bet that "new" refers to the covenant. Try reading the english out loud and leave 'covenant' out of v 13, It still seems to fit the statement - that covenant would be understood.
Because finding fault with them, He says: "Behold, the days are coming, says the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah-- "not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because they did not continue in My covenant, and I disregarded them, says the LORD. "For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, says the LORD: I will put My laws in their mind and write them on their hearts; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people. "None of them shall teach his neighbor, and none his brother, saying, 'Know the LORD,' for all shall know Me, from the least of them to the greatest of them. "For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their lawless deeds I will remember no more." In that He says, "new," He has made the first obsolete. Now what is becoming obsolete and growing old is ready to vanish away.
My comment on Rashi was on his reputation as "King of Peshat" - that one must take the plain meaning of scriptural text as paramount. It was not to say he himself was inspired or infallable.
6 But the ministry Jesus has received is as superior to theirs as the covenant of which he is mediator is superior to the old one, and it is founded on better promises. 7 For if there had been nothing wrong with that first, no place would have been sought for another.
In verse six ministry is the subject and covenant is part of a comparative clause. By making a comparision, it is presumed that "new" covenant is superior to the "old" covenant. I see this "new/old" as a literary tool that the Creator used to differentiate between the ways in which the covenant was communicated. In fact, many have presented the idea that the term might be better translated as renewed rather than new.
However, back to the main point, the verses that follow are an elaberation of this comparison, but the main point is the priesthood. He then continues the comparison in chapter 9 pointing out the stipulations related to the preisthood and in verse 9:11 he then ties it back to The Messiah.
Now, these chapters do go back and forth between the terms preisthood and covenant. Is the entire Covenant the preisthood. No, the preisthood is part of the covenant. This is consistant with my view of the term covenant. It can be used as the entire Covenant or as certain stipulations thereof. How one determines how the term is being used is dependant on the context.
Regarding the principle of the simplest meaning being the best, which you attribute to Rashi, I would say, Paul does not write in a simple fashion. In fact, it is nearly possible to translate the entire epistle of Hebrews as one sentence. Therefore, it is very difficult to draw many conclusions regarding what Paul means by a word or phrase without reading the larger context, if not the entire epistle.
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