For every high priest is ordained to offer gifts and sacrifices: wherefore it is of necessity that this man have somewhat also to offer.
Parallel translations
- WEB For every high priest is appointed to offer both gifts and sacrifices. Therefore it is necessary that this high priest also have something to offer.
- BSB And since every high priest is appointed to offer both gifts and sacrifices, it was necessary for this One also to have something to offer.
- NKJV For every high priest is appointed to offer both gifts and sacrifices. Therefore it is necessary that this One also have something to offer.
- NASB For every high priest is appointed to offer both gifts and sacrifices; so it is necessary that this high priest also have something to offer.
- NLT And since every high priest is required to offer gifts and sacrifices, our High Priest must make an offering, too.
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 high priest is appointed to offer gifts and sacrifices, so Christ too must have something to offer. His priesthood requires a genuine offering.
Overview
Since the essential task of a high priest is to present offerings, Christ as high priest must also have an offering. That offering, as the letter has shown, is himself, given once for all. This verse links his heavenly ministry to the sacrifice he made, the basis of his intercession.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 7
- Eph 5:2And walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us, and hath given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweetsmelling savour.
- 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:
- Heb 9:14How 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?
- Heb 10:9–12Then said he, Lo, I come to do thy will, O God. He taketh away the first, that he may establish the second.
- 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.
- Titus 2:14Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.
- John 6:51I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.
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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 8:3 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
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Greek word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.