1. Now the main point of what is being said is this: we have this kind of high priest, who sat down at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens,
2. a minister of the sanctuary and the true tabernacle, which the Lord set up, and not man.
3. For every high priest is appointed to offer gifts and sacrifices; therefore it was necessary for this [priest] also to have something to offer.
4. Now if He were on earth, He wouldn't be a priest, since there are those offering the gifts prescribed by the law.
5. These serve as a copy and shadow of the heavenly things, as Moses was warned when he was about to complete the tabernacle. For He said, Be careful that you make everything according to the pattern that was shown to you on the mountain.
6. But Jesus has now obtained a superior ministry, and to that degree He is the mediator of a better covenant, which has been legally enacted on better promises.
7. For if that first [covenant] had been faultless, no opportunity would have been sought for a second one.
8. But finding fault with His people, He says: "Look, the days are coming," says the Lord, "when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah--
9. not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day I took them by their hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt. Because they did not continue in My covenant, I disregarded them," says the Lord.
10. "But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days," says the Lord: "I will put My laws into their minds, and I will write them on their hearts, and I will be their God, and they will be My people.
11. And each person will not teach his fellow citizen, and each his brother, saying, 'Know the Lord,' because they will all know Me, from the least to the greatest of them.
12. For I will be merciful to their wrongdoing, and I will never again remember their sins."
13. By saying, a new [ covenant], He has declared that the first is old. And what is old and aging is about to disappear.