It has been shown then that a change of priesthood (and consequently of the law also) was involved in the priest addressed by God in Psalm 110. As the subject of the Psalm is confessedly Messiah and so of necessity David's son, He must spring out of Judah, not out of Levi as did the house of Aaron. But there is another and far weightier difference to which he next proceeds: He was David's Lord. No wonder that singular dignity of office attached to a person so glorious. He was no priest according to the law.
“And it is yet more abundantly evident if (or since) according to the similitude of Melchizedek ariseth a different priest who hath been made, not according to the law of fleshly commandment but according to power of indissoluble life. For it is witnessed, Thou art a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek. For there is a putting away of a foregoing commandment because of its weakness and unprofitableness (for the law perfected nothing), and an introduction of a better hope, through which we draw nigh to God” (Heb. 7:15-19).
It was conceivable that a more exalted being might have taken up, in the sovereign will of God, the priesthood of Aaron, and shed new luster on it according to His superior glory. But the Holy Spirit here leads the writer to press, not only the change already urged, but the still more striking distinction of a different (ἕτερος, not ἅλλος merely) priest to arise according to the likeness of Melchizedek. This leaves Aaron or any successor of his, and the law with which they were bound up, completely aside. Thus the great weight of the testimony extracted from Psalm 110 comes more and more into evidence. Of Messiah it speaks beyond controversy, of His intermediate position at the right hand of God, of the divine recognition of His priesthood after the order, not of Aaron but, of Melchizedek, and not only of His Kingdom introduced as it is here and elsewhere shown to be, by divine power and judgment of His foes. And the more intelligently that Psalm and others are read, the more convergent the light on Christ, and the more indubitable the inference in the Epistle to the Hebrews, the truth alike of Jewish hopes for the future and of Christianity at present.
For it is the rejected Messiah that we see all through the Psalms, opposed by the nations and peoples, by kings and rulers; but God declares His decree not only on Zion to set His anointed, but to give Him the nations for His inheritance and the uttermost parts of the earth for His possession, when He will rule them with a rod of iron and break them in pieces like a potter's vessel. Clearly this is not yet accomplished; nor has Messiah yet asked for it. He is waiting on the Father's throne; He will at His coming sit on His own throne, when those who are now being called shall reign with Him in glory. Meanwhile we have to pray that our hearts be directed into God's love and the patience of Christ (2 Thess. 3:5). We keep the word of His patience (Rev. 3:10). As He is waiting on high, so are we below, knowing that He that shall come will come and will not tarry. If made a little lower than the angels, He is because of the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor in a higher and larger sphere than David's Son in Zion; He is the suffering but exalted Son of Man in heavenly glory, and about to come with the clouds of heaven, invested with universal dominion, that all the peoples, nations, and languages should serve Him: an everlasting dominion and a kingdom which shall not be destroyed.
But while He waits on high, He is active as a priest in sustaining His own suffering ones, tried as they are on earth. And the order of His priesthood is not after the likeness of Aaron but of Melchizedek. It was not the day of His power when He came the first time. He was crucified in weakness then. So only could there be reconciliation to God by His blood. Redemption otherwise was impossible, and that glorification of God concerning sin without which there could be no righteous, no stable, blessing for any one or anything. Now the infinite work of atonement is wrought and accepted; and He Who was delivered for our offenses was raised for our justification, is at the right hand of God, and also maketh intercession. He died for the nation too, as well as to gather together into one the children of God that are scattered abroad, though the application of His work to “the nation” awaits the hour of their repentance and faith in Him, their own Messiah, Whom they slew by the hand of lawless men. He will sit as a priest on His throne when Jehovah shall send the rod of Messiah's strength out of Zion.
But He discharges priestly functions, a priest for us now, and He only is competent and all-sufficient, and must needs be so; as the very essence of His order is that, like Melchizedek, He stands alone with no companion in it nor subordinates, with neither predecessor nor successor, the one sole priest after the order of Melchizedek. The day of His wrath is future and introduces His kingdom; and He is Jehovah as well as Messiah. Thus it is that Jehovah shall be king over all the earth; in that day shall Jehovah be one and His name one: never till then a universal religion and universal kingdom, but all this then of the God of Israel in the person of the Lord Jesus.
And the heavens shall no longer be aloof but be united in homage to the King of kings and Lord of lords. Then He will have the glorified, who shall reign with Him. The suffering church will be manifested by His heavenly Bride. Nor is anything more opposed to all truth than that they are so reigning now: one of the evil roots of popery and of other self-exalting delusions. On the contrary now is the time to suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together. It is an error as old as the ease and honor loving Corinthians, in the germ at least. See how nobly the apostle dissipates it as chaff in 1 Cor. 4:8-16, comparing 6:1-9; 7:29-31; 9:24-25; 15:23-24,42-58. But in fact where is not this truth underlying if not on the surface? The reign of Christ and His heavenly ones will take in the heavens, but be over (not on) the earth.
But to return to our chapter, the reasoning is conclusive. The change to a different priest of unique and surpassing glory is the teaching of that O.T. which every Jew owns to be divine. The infirmity of the Levitical priesthood is thereby demonstrated, and Christ alone answers to the type of Melchizedek. He is beyond controversy the other and different priest that arises, Who has been so made or constituted, not after a law of fleshly commandment, but after a power of indissoluble life. For he is testified of, Thou art a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek. What can be conceived plainer or more conclusive? Even the royal priest who blessed Abraham was but typical and shadowy. The body is Christ's. Aaron's priesthood was fleshly, Christ's according to power of an imperishable life. It is as risen and in heaven that He is Melchizedek priest.
Our chapter however draws a still larger deduction, not only an incomparably higher priesthood, to which Aaron's gives place, but disannulling of a foregoing commandment as weak and unprofitable; for, as he adds parenthetically, the law perfected nothing. Christ is not only perfect Himself but brings in perfection, and in every way. And this is what was exhorted in Hebrews 6:1, “let us go on unto perfection.” It really is Christianity in contradistinction from Judaism, wherein even the heirs were under age (Gal. 4:1-3). The Christian is a son and heir of God, and we know it by the Spirit of His Son sent forth into our hearts and crying, Abba, Father. Compare also Rom. 8.
Thus the change of the priesthood from the order of Aaron to that of Melchizedek is shown to be exceeding deep and wide and permanent. Even now, whatever glorious results are in the womb of the future, there is on one hand an abolishing of antecedent injunction because of its weakness and unprofitableness, but on the other an inbringing of a better hope, the parenthesis simply summing up and clenching in a few pithy words the failure of the law to perfect one thing. Perfection is in and by Christ alone; and this by grace so fully as to glorify God and meet the believer's need in everything—even in the body at His coming again.
But meantime “we draw near to God.” How blessed! It is the standing truth of access: never true even of Aaron, save once a year and then with solemn rite “lest he die.” Now it is alike and always true of the Christian family. For here is no question of differing gift or of special position or local charge. It is the common blessedness of all, due to the work and blood, the person and priesthood, of Christ. “We draw near to God.” To assert difference in this is to resuscitate the abolished injunction, and to despise the introduced better hope. It is to set aside the gospel and go back to that law which, if God's word is to be believed, made nothing perfect. This is what is seen in much the greater part of Christendom. It was the wedge of Tractarianism; it is the flag of Ritualism. And it is the weakness of true Christians which leaves the door open for all such dark rebellions against divine grace and truth. For to say that there are no priests now on earth is but half a truth. The truth is that Christ is the great Priest on high, and that believers now on earth and since Pentecost are free of the sanctuary. “We draw near to God.” How so if we have not priestly nearness of access? To claim, to allow, that some have it for others virtually denies Christianity.
But the perfection goes far beyond our being now made of age, in contrast with legal minority, as we shall find throughout this Epistle and in what remains no less than what we have had; so that this need not be more than noticed according to the brief allusion in the text.
Only it is well to observe that the A. V. of the passage is untenable, and so are the various antecedent translations. Thus Wiclif muddles the entire context, though he is right as to the last clause. It is the more curious as the Vulgate is correct, which helped the Rhemish, though their English is here clumsy, and their punctuation cuts all thread of sense. Tyndale, by failing to see the parenthesis, led the way into the strange error of understanding (seemingly for it is preposterous) that “the law made nothing perfect: but was an introduction” &c. Cranmer followed in his wake. The English version of Geneva erred in another way of like misapprehension by giving, “the law made nothing perfect: but the bringing in of a better hope made perfect” &c. The A. V. followed this by inserting “did.” The truth is that no verb is needed other than the text supplies in the beginning of ver. 18, which stretches over to ver. 19 also. There is a doing away of a foregoing commandment, and an introduction of a better hope, by which we draw near to God; the legal state is annulled, and a better hope supervenes now. It is Christianity, and by it we draw near to God, instead of standing at a distance as is essentially Jewish. There is nothing more characteristic of the gospel, as the result of Christ's cross and blood-shedding by which we are brought to God. All priesthood for us save Christ's vanishes away; and Christ's is to maintain us in that nearness which His work gives us even now, all Christians being priests.