Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to Hebrews · About this commentary
Once at the End of the Ages
Hebrews 9:23-28
23 It was necessary therefore that the copies of the things in the heavens should be cleansed with these, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. · WEB
Three appearances organize the paragraph — he appears before God now, appeared once to put away sin, and will appear a second time for those waiting.
It was necessary therefore that the copies of the things in the heavens should be cleansed with these, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these.
The first half is straightforward — the copies were cleansed with animal blood, as the sprinkling of the tent just showed Hebrews 9:21. The second half is the verse readers slide past and should not: the heavenly things themselves require cleansing. The sentence says what it says, and no reading that turns the heavenly sanctuary into a figure of speech survives it — a metaphor does not need a better sacrifice. What the cleansing there consists of, the writer does not unpack; that it is real, his grammar insists.
Verse 24 states the entry a third time, now with its purpose in the present tense: Christ hasn't entered into holy places made with hands, which are representations of the true, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us.
The phrase for us carries the office. He appears in the presence of God as representative — the intercession that never adjourns Hebrews 7:25 — and now makes it a current appointment, not a past achievement.
Verses 25 and 26 close off the repetition question with an argument from absurdity: if his offering worked the way the annual entries did, he must have suffered often since the foundation of the world. An offering that expires needs renewing forever backward as well as forward. Instead: now once at the end of the ages, he has been revealed to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. The word for put away is annulment — sin dealt with as a standing arrangement, canceled.
Then the comparison that ends the chapter, and it runs on the one appointment every reader keeps: inasmuch as it is appointed for men to die once, and after this, judgment, so Christ also, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin, but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.
Die once, then judgment — the shape of a human life, with nothing between death and the verdict except the verdict. And his career matches the shape: offered once, then the return. The second appearing has no sin work left in it, because the first left none undone. What remains is retrieval — and the ones retrieved are described not as the deserving but as those who are eagerly waiting, which is the posture this whole letter was written to keep its readers in Hebrews 10:25 Hebrews 10:36.
settled What this mark means