And his holy prophet had before declared, "Hath the Lord as great delight in burnt" offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the "voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is "better than sacrifice, and to hearken than "the fat of rams." + I could wish next to point out a few of those Jewish sacrifices and ceremonies, which bear a reference to the great sacrifice and oblation of Christ. The lamb chosen for such purposes, was, as an eminent type of our Saviour, to be without spot or blemish ; the body of the victim was to be burnt without the camp, as Jesus suffered without the gate. The author of the epistle to the Hebrews, has clearly shewn the resemblance, not only of the sacrifices themselves, to Christ, but even that of the high priest : "Into the " second tabernacle went the high priest, " alone, once every year, not without blood, " which + 1 Sam. xv. 22. "which he offered for himself, and for the " errors of the people. The Holy Ghost "this signifying, that the way into the " holiest of all was not yet made manifest, " while as the first tabernacle was yet stand" ing, which was a figure for the time then " present, in which were offered both gifts " and sacrifices, that could not make him that " did the service perfect, as pertaining to "the conscience, which stood only in meats, " and drinks, and divers washings, and "carnal ordinances, imposed on them, until "the time of reformation. But Christ being " come an high priest of good things to come, by a greater and more perfect ta"bernacle, not made with hands, that is to 66 66 say, not of this building, (not of this " lower creation), neither by the blood of "goats and calves, but by his own blood, he " entered in once into the holy place, having " obtained eternal redemption for us; for if "the "the blood of bulls and of goats, and the " ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean, "sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh, " how much more shall the blood of Christ, "who, through the eternal spirit, offered " himself without spot to God, purge your "conscience from dead works to serve the "living God? And almost all things are by "the law purged with blood; and without " shedding of blood, there is no remission. "It was therefore necessary, that the pat"terns of things in the Heavens should be " purified with these; but the heavenly "things themselves, with better sacrifices " than these; for Christ is not entered into "the holy places made with hands, which "are the figures of the true, but into "Heaven itself, now to appear in the pre"sence of God for us; nor yet that he " should offer himself often, as the high " priest entereth into the holy place every 66 year, " year, with the blood of others, for then "must he often have suffered since the "foundation of the world: but now once in "the end of the world, hath he appeared, " to put away sin by the sacrifice of him"self."* Undoubtedly all the Jewish sacrifices were types of Christ, and none more so than the Passover. God struck the first-born son in every family, to signify before hand the death of his only begotten and beloved son, the heir of all things, who is called the first-born of God and of his mother: the whole assembly of the congregation were to kill the paschal lamb, as the whole Jewish Sanhedrim, nay the whole body of the Jewish people, condemned our Saviour to death. Nothing of it was to remain until the morning; so the Jews "besought Pilate, "that his body should not remain on the " Cross till the morrow, but that his legs " might be broken, and that he might be "taken away." * But the divine prophecy had declared "not a bone of him shall be " broken," as the divine injunction had forbidden the Jews to break a bone of the Lord's passover. * St. Paul, Heb. ix. + Matt. 1. 25.-Luke ii. 7.-Heb. 1. 6. "Cross * John xix. 31, + John iii. 14, 15. The brazen serpent was also another type of Christ; for our Saviour says, "As Moses " lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, " even so must the son of man be lifted up, "that whosoever believeth in him should " not perish, but have eternal life."† Now it is hardly to be supposed, that God would have made that very animal which was the cause of disease, at once the means of cure; or, knowing how prone the Jews were to idolatry, would have encouraged them to look up with hope and confidence to a sensible and material object, without further explanation. |