You have been a lover of righteousness and a hater of evil; and so God, your God, has put the oil of joy on your head more than on the heads of those who are with you.

Are not all these ministering spirits, having been sent forth unto ministration for the sake of those who are about to inherit salvation?

For this cause, it behoveth us, with unwonted firmness, to be holding fast unto the things that have been heard, lest, at any time, we drift away.

For if the word having been spoken by angels was stedfast, and every disobedience and transgression received a just recompense of reward;

how shall we escape, if we neglect so great a salvation? which having at the first been spoken through the Lord, was confirmed unto us by them that heard;

But one has [solemnly] testified somewhere [in Scripture], saying,

“What is man, that You are mindful of him,
Or the son of man, that You graciously care for him?

You placed everything under his feet [Note: This is true of both mankind (Gen. 1:26-28) and of Jesus (Eph. 1:22-23)]. For in subjecting everything to him, God did not leave anything that is not subject to him. But at the present time we do not see what all has been subjected to him.

But we behold him who hath been made a little lower than the angels, even Jesus, because of the suffering of death crowned with glory and honor, that by the grace of God he should taste of death for every man .

Because it was right for him, for whom and through whom all things have being, in guiding his sons to glory, to make the captain of their salvation complete through pain.

and might set at liberty all those who through fear of death had been subject to lifelong slavery.

For inasmuch as He has Himself felt the pain of temptation and trial, He is also able instantly to help those who are tempted and tried.

Therefore, holy brothers [and sisters], who have been called [by God] to share in heaven, think about Jesus, the Apostle and Head Priest, whom we have confessed [as Savior].

has been to the God who appointed him, just as Moses was, in all the house of God.

For he hath been counted worthy of more glory than Moses, by so much as he that built the house hath more honor than the house.

for we have been made partakers of Christ, if indeed we may hold fast the beginning of confidence firm unto the end.

As it has been said [Psa. 95:7], "Today, if you hear His [i.e., God's] voice, do not have a stubborn heart like you did when you provoked [God]."

And to whom sware he that they could not come into his rest, if not to them having been disobedient?

Then let us fear, lest at some time, the promise to enter into his rest having been left, some of you may appear to have come short.

For Good News has been brought to us as truly as to them; but the message they heard failed to benefit them, because they were not one in faith with those who gave heed to it.

For we enter into the rest who have believed; as he said, As I have sworn in my wrath, If they shall enter into my rest; although the works had been completed from the foundation of the world.

even though his actions had been finished since the creation of the world. Somewhere he has spoken about the seventh day as follows: "On the seventh day God rested from all his actions,"

he again defineth a certain day, To-day, saying in David so long a time afterward (even as hath been said before), To-day if ye shall hear his voice, Harden not your hearts.

For, if, unto them, Joshua had given rest, it had not in that case, concerning another day, been speaking, after, these things.

For the one who has once entered His rest has also rested from [the weariness and pain of] his [human] labors, just as God rested from [those labors uniquely] His own.

For God's word is alive and active and sharper than any double-edged sword. It penetrates [deep enough] even to divide [a person's] soul [from his] spirit, and his joints [from his] bone marrow [Note: This is figurative language describing the penetrating effect of God's word into a person's spiritual, inner being] and is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of a person's heart.

And no creature is hidden in his presence: but all things are naked and have been laid open to the eyes of him to whom the word is unto us.

For we have not a high priest that cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but one that hath been in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.

Nor does any one take that high office upon himself, till he has been called to do so by God, as Aaron was.

Who in the days of his flesh, having offered up prayers and supplications with strong crying and tears unto him that was able to save him from death, and having been heard for his godly fear,

And though he was a Son, through the pain which he underwent, the knowledge came to him of what it was to be under God's orders;

and having been made perfect, he became unto all them that obey him the author of eternal salvation;

having been addressed by God a chief priest, according to the order of Melchisedek,

Of whom great is the word to us, and difficult of interpretation to speak, since ye have been sluggish in the hearing.

For although, considering the long time you have been believers, you ought now to be teachers of others, you really need some one to teach you over again the very rudiments of the truths of God, and you have come to require milk instead of solid food.

But solid food is for the mature—for those whose senses have been trained to distinguish between good and evil.

of teaching about washings (ritual purifications), the laying on of hands, the resurrection of the dead, and eternal judgment. [These are all important matters in which you should have been proficient long ago.]

For it is impossible to renew again to repentance those once enlightened, and who have tasted of the heavenly gift, and have been made partakers of the Holy Spirit,

And producing thorns and briers is rejected, after having been tried, and near cursing; whose end for destruction.

And we have been persuaded of you, dearly beloved, of better things, and connected with salvation, if we also thus speak.

that ye be not sluggish, but imitators of those who through faith and patience have been inheritors of the promises.

And so, when he had been waiting calmly for a long time, God's word to him was put into effect.

So that we, who have gone in flight from danger to the hope which has been put before us, may have a strong comfort in two unchanging things, in which it is not possible for God to be false;

whither Jesus the forerunner has entered in our behalf, having been made a high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.

without father, without mother, without genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but having been made like the Son of God, remains a priest continually.

Now think how great this priest-king must have been to whom Abraham the patriarch gave a tenth part of the best of the spoil.

and, so to speak, through Abraham, Levi also, who received tithes, has been made to pay tithes.

for when Melchizedek met him, he was still in Abraham's body [i.e., Levi had not yet been born as a descendant of Abraham].

Now if perfection [a perfect fellowship between God and the worshiper] had been attained through the Levitical priesthood (for under it the people were given the Law) what further need was there for another and different kind of priest to arise, one in the manner of Melchizedek, rather than one appointed to the order of Aaron?

For he, of whom these things are said, belongs to a different tribe, of which no one has ever been attached to the service of the altar.

who hath been made, not after the law of a carnal commandment, but after the power of an endless life:

For it has been testified:

You are a priest forever
in the order of Melchizedek.

Indeed, because it was weak and ineffective, the former commandment has been annulled,

(for they indeed have been made priests without an oath; but he with an oath by him that saith of him, The Lord sware and will not repent himself, Thou art a priest for ever);

insomuch that Jesus has also been made the mediator of a better covenant.

And they indeed have been made priests many in number, because that by death they are hindered from continuing:

For such a high priest was indeed appropriate unto us, holy, free from sin, undefiled, having been separated from the sinners, and being higher than the heavens;

for the law doth appoint men chief priests, having infirmity, but the word of the oath that is after the law appointeth the Son -- to the age having been perfected.

Now [this is] the main point in what has been said: we have a high priest such as this, who sat down at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in heaven,

If he had been on earth he would not have been a priest at all, because there are other priests who make the offerings ordered by the law;

(who serve the representation and shadow of heavenly things, according as Moses was oracularly told when about to make the tabernacle; for See, saith He, that thou make all things according to the pattern which has been shewn to thee in the mountain.)

But now hath he obtained a ministry the more excellent, by so much as he is also the mediator of a better covenant, which hath been enacted upon better promises.

For if that first covenant had been faultless, then should no place have been sought for the second.

Now these things having been thus prepared, the priests go in continually into the first tabernacle, accomplishing the services;

the Holy Spirit this signifying, that the way into the holy place hath not yet been made manifest, while the first tabernacle is yet standing;

But Christ appeared as a High Priest of the blessings that are soon to come by means of the greater and more perfect Tent of worship, a tent which has not been built with hands--that is to say does not belong to this material creation--

For if the blood of goats and bulls, and the ashes of a heifer sprinkling them that have been defiled, sanctify unto the cleanness of the flesh:

And for this cause he is the mediator of a new covenant, that a death having taken place for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the first covenant, they that have been called may receive the promise of the eternal inheritance.

For a testament is of force where there hath been death: for it doth never avail while he that made it liveth.

Wherefore even the first covenant hath not been dedicated without blood.

For when every commandment had been spoken by Moses unto all the people according to the law, he took the blood of the calves and the goats, with water and scarlet wool and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book itself and all the people,

For Christ did not go into a holy place which had been made by men's hands as the copy of the true one; but he went into heaven itself, and now takes his place before the face of God for us.

else must he often have suffered since the foundation of the world: but now once at the end of the ages hath he been manifested to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.

so Christ also, having been once offered to bear the sins of many, shall appear a second time, apart from sin, to them that wait for him, unto salvation.

Else would they not have ceased to be offered? because the worshippers, having been once cleansed, would have had no more consciousness of sins.

then I said, Lo, I come, (in a volume of the book it hath been written concerning me,) to do, O God, Thy will;'

By which will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

And has been waiting there from that time, till all who are against him are made a foot-rest for his feet.

But where these have been forgiven no further offering for sin is required.

Let us approach with a genuine heart, in full assurance of faith, having been sprinkled, as to our hearts, from an evil conscience, and bathed, as to our bodies, with pure water;

of how much worse punishment, think ye, shall he be judged worthy who has trodden under foot the Son of God, and esteemed the blood of the covenant, whereby he has been sanctified, common, and has insulted the Spirit of grace?

But call to mind the earlier days in which, having been enlightened, ye endured much conflict of sufferings;

Sometimes, in consequence of the taunts and injuries heaped upon you, you became a public spectacle; and sometimes you suffered through having shown yourselves to be the friends of men who were in the very position in which you had been.

For ye have been fellow-sufferers with my bonds, and received with joy the plundering of your properties, knowing in yourselves that you have in the heavens a better substance, and permanent.

Steady patience is what you need, so that after doing the will of God you may get what you have been promised.

By faith we understand that the worlds have been framed by the word of God, so that what is seen hath not been made out of things which appear.

By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death; and he was not found, because God translated him: for he hath had witness borne to him that before his translation he had been well-pleasing unto God:

By faith Noah, having been divinely warned concerning the things not yet seen, having feared, did prepare an ark to the salvation of his house, through which he did condemn the world, and of the righteousness according to faith he became heir.

Through faith he came and made his home for a time in a land which had been promised to him, as if in a foreign country, living in tents together with Isaac and Jacob, sharers with him in the same promise;

Wherefore also there have been born of one, and that of one become dead, even as the stars of heaven in multitude, and as the countless sand which is by the sea shore.

In faith died all these, not having received the promises, but from afar having seen them, and having been persuaded, and having saluted them, and having confessed that strangers and sojourners they are upon the earth,

And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned.

By faith Abraham made an offering of Isaac, when he was tested: and he with whom the agreement had been made gave up as an offering the only son of his body,

as to whom it had been said, In Isaac shall thy seed be called:

concluding that God was able to raise him up, even from the grave; from whence, in a figurative sense, be may be said to have been recover'd.

By faith Moses, having been born, was hid three months by his parents, because they saw the child comely, and were not afraid of the decree of the king;

Feeling that it was better to undergo pain with the people of God, than for a short time to have a taste of the pleasures of sin;

by faith he left Egypt behind, not having been afraid of the wrath of the king, for, as seeing the Invisible One -- he endured;

By faith they went through the Red Sea as if it had been dry land, though the Egyptians were overcome by the water when they made an attempt to do the same.

By faith the walls of Jericho fell down, after they had been compassed about for seven days.

Put out the power of fire, got safely away from the edge of the sword, were made strong when they had been feeble, became full of power in war, and put to flight the armies of the nations.