thou hast loved justice and hated lawlessness, therefore God, thy God, has consecrated thee with the oil of rejoicing beyond thy comrades' ??10 and, 'Thou didst found the earth at the beginning, O Lord, and the heavens are the work at thy hands;

Are not all angels merely spirits in the divine service, commissioned for the benefit of those who are to inherit salvation?

Besides, while Moses was faithful in every department of God's house as an attendant ??by way of witness to the coming revelation ??6 Christ is faithful as a Son over God's house. Now we are this house of God, if we will only keep confident and proud of our hope.

Therefore I grew exasperated with that generation, I said, 'They are always astray in their heart': They would not learn my ways;

Though by this time you should be teaching other people, you still need someone to teach you once more the rudimentary principles of the divine revelation. You are in need of milk, not of solid food.

For land which absorbs the rain that often falls on it, and bears plants that are useful to those for whom it is tilled, receives a blessing from God;

Those sons of Levi who receive the priestly office are indeed ordered by law to tithe the people (that is, their brothers), although the latter are descended from Abraham;

Were he on earth, he would not be a priest at all, for there are priests already to offer the gifts prescribed by Law

For as the Law has a mere shadow of the bliss that is to be, instead of representing the reality of that bliss, it never can perfect those who draw near with the same annual sacrifices that are perpetually offered.

As it is, they are an annual reminder of sins

He begins by saying, thou hast no desire for, thou takest no delight in, sacrifices and offerings and holocausts and sin-offerings (and these are what are offered in terms of the Law);

And it is by this will that we are consecrated, because Jesus Christ once for all has offered up his body.

to wait until his enemies are made a footstool for his feet.

Now where these are remitted, an offering for sin exists no longer.

We are not the men to shrink back and be lost, but to have faith and so to win our souls.

Now faith means we are confident of what we hope for, convinced of what we do not see.

Now people who speak in this way plainly show they are in search of a fatherland.

Discipline is the portion of all; if you get no discipline, then you are not sons but bastards.

Discipline always seems for the time to be a thing of pain, not of joy; but those who are trained by it reap the fruit of it afterwards in the peace of an upright life.

Remember prisoners, as if you were in prison yourselves; remember those who are being ill-treated, since you too are in the body.

For the bodies of the animals whose blood is taken into the holy Place by the high priest as a sin-offering, are burned outside the camp;

Do not forget beneficence and charity, either; these are the kind of sacrifices that are acceptable to God.

Obey your leaders, submit to them; for they are alive to the interests of your souls, as men who will have to account for their trust. Let their work be a joy to them and not a grief ??which would be a loss to yourselves.