¹ The principal point of all that we have said is that we have a high priest of exactly this kind. He has taken his seat at the right of the throne of divine Majesty in the heavens,

² and he is the minister of the sanctuary and of the true Tent which the Lord, and not any man, set up.

³ Every high priest is constituted to offer gifts and sacrifices, and so this one too must have something to offer.

⁴ In fact, if he were on earth, he would not be a priest at all, since there are others who make the offerings laid down by the Law,

⁵ though these maintain the service only of a model or a reflection of the heavenly realities; just as Moses, when he had the Tent to build, was warned by God who said: See that you work to the design that was shown you on the mountain.

⁶ As it is, he has been given a ministry as far superior as is the covenant of which he is the mediator, which is founded on better promises.

⁷ If that first covenant had been faultless, there would have been no room for a second one to replace it.

⁸ And in fact God does find fault with them; he says: Look, the days are coming, the Lord declares, when I will make a new covenant with the House of Israel and the House of Judah,

⁹ but not a covenant like the one I made with their ancestors, the day I took them by the hand to bring them out of Egypt, which covenant of mine they broke, and I too abandoned them, the Lord declares.

¹⁰ No, this is the covenant I will make with the House of Israel, when those days have come, the Lord declares: In their minds I shall plant my laws writing them on their hearts. Then I shall be their God, and they shall be my people.

¹¹ There will be no further need for each to teach his neighbour, and each his brother, saying 'Learn to know the Lord!' No, they will all know me, from the least to the greatest,

¹² since I shall forgive their guilt and never more call their sins to mind.

¹³ By speaking of a new covenant, he implies that the first one is old. And anything old and ageing is ready to disappear.