19. For, &c.--justifying his calling the law weak and
unprofitable
(Heb 7:18).
The law could not bring men to: true justification or sanctification
before God, which is the "perfection" that we all need in order to be
accepted of Him, and which we have in Christ.
nothing--not merely "no one," but "nothing." The law brought
nothing to its perfected end; everything in it was introductory to its
antitype in the Christian economy, which realizes the perfection
contemplated; compare "unprofitableness,"
Heb 7:18.
did--rather connect with
Heb 7:18,
thus, "There takes place (by virtue of
Ps 110:4)
a repealing of the commandment (on the one hand), but (on the other) a
bringing in afterwards (the Greek expresses that there is
a bringing in of something over and above the law; a
superinducing, or accession of something new, namely,
something better than the good things which the pre-existing law
promised [WAHL]) of a better hope," not one weak
and unprofitable, but, as elsewhere the Christian dispensation is
called, "everlasting," "true," "the second," "more excellent,"
"different," "living," "new," "to come," "perfect." Compare
Heb 8:6,
bringing us near to God, now in spirit, hereafter both in spirit
and in body.
we draw nigh unto God--the sure token of "perfection."
Weakness is the opposite of this filial confidence of access.
The access through the legal sacrifices was only symbolical and through
the medium of a priest; that through Christ is immediate, perfect, and
spiritual.
JFB.
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