These garments are all of the same materials (bad) before referred to pp. 304, 415. No directions are given as to their being made: they are rather abruptly introduced, as if the high priest had understanding respecting them. They are also peculiarly specified as holy garments: and the coat is called a holy linen coat, or tunic ver. 4, 32. Therefore the high priest was to wash his flesh in water before he put them on.
These holy linen garments, seem to prefigure the perfectly holy and righteous standing of the high priest before God-clean and spotless from head to foot-a foreshadowing of Him, whom God raised from the dead, and who would enter the holiest as the justified and righteous One, standing in His own intrinsic holiness before God, in order to make atonement for the sins of others. These garments for atonement were not of a representative character. The names of Israel were not upon the shoulders or breast of the High Priest graven in precious stones; and no golden plate on behalf of others adorned His forehead. It was like the commencement of a new order of priesthood in which the High Priest should first accomplish full atonement, and afterward take a representative standing for glory and beauty on behalf of others.