And every priest standeth daily ministering and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins:
Parallel translations
- WEB Every priest indeed stands day by day serving and often offering the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins,
- BSB Day after day every priest stands to minister and to offer again and again the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins.
- NKJV And every priest stands ministering daily and offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins.
- NASB Every priest stands daily ministering and offering time after time the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins;
- NLT Under the old covenant, the priest stands and ministers before the altar day after day, offering the same sacrifices again and again, which can never take away sins.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Every old-covenant priest stood daily offering the same sacrifices that could never remove sins. Their work was endless and ineffective.
Overview
The author pictures the priests perpetually standing and repeating offerings that 'can never take away sins'. The standing posture and constant repetition signal unfinished work. This deliberately contrasts with the seated, finished posture of Christ in the next verse.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 17
- Heb 10:4For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away sins.
- Num 28:3And thou shalt say unto them, This is the offering made by fire which ye shall offer unto the LORD; two lambs of the first year without spot day by day, for a continual burnt offering.
- Heb 5:1For every high priest taken from among men is ordained for men in things pertaining to God, that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins:
- Ps 50:8–13I will not reprove thee for thy sacrifices or thy burnt offerings, to have been continually before me.
- Heb 7:27Who needeth not daily, as those high priests, to offer up sacrifice, first for his own sins, and then for the people’s: for this he did once, when he offered up himself.
- Heb 10:1For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect.
- Isa 1:11To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices unto me? saith the LORD: I am full of the burnt offerings of rams, and the fat of fed beasts; and I delight not in the blood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he goats.
- Dan 9:27And he shall confirm the covenant with many for one week: and in the midst of the week he shall cause the sacrifice and the oblation to cease, and for the overspreading of abominations he shall make it desolate, even until the consummation, and that determined shall be poured upon the desolate.
- Luke 1:9–10According to the custom of the priest’s office, his lot was to burn incense when he went into the temple of the Lord.
- Dan 12:11And from the time that the daily sacrifice shall be taken away, and the abomination that maketh desolate set up, there shall be a thousand two hundred and ninety days.
- Dan 8:11Yea, he magnified himself even to the prince of the host, and by him the daily sacrifice was taken away, and the place of his sanctuary was cast down.
- Dan 9:21Yea, whiles I was speaking in prayer, even the man Gabriel, whom I had seen in the vision at the beginning, being caused to fly swiftly, touched me about the time of the evening oblation.
- Dan 11:31And arms shall stand on his part, and they shall pollute the sanctuary of strength, and shall take away the daily sacrifice, and they shall place the abomination that maketh desolate.
- Num 28:24After this manner ye shall offer daily, throughout the seven days, the meat of the sacrifice made by fire, of a sweet savour unto the LORD: it shall be offered beside the continual burnt offering, and his drink offering.
- Ezek 45:4The holy portion of the land shall be for the priests the ministers of the sanctuary, which shall come near to minister unto the LORD: and it shall be a place for their houses, and an holy place for the sanctuary.
- Num 29:6Beside the burnt offering of the month, and his meat offering, and the daily burnt offering, and his meat offering, and their drink offerings, according unto their manner, for a sweet savour, a sacrifice made by fire unto the LORD.
- Exod 29:38–39Now this is that which thou shalt offer upon the altar; two lambs of the first year day by day continually.
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Christ at the center
Hebrews is sustained worship of Christ: better than angels, Moses, and the priests; the great High Priest after Melchizedek who by one sacrifice perfects forever those he saves.
How Hebrews 10:11 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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