Hebrews 10:3

3 But year by year there is a memory of sins in those offerings.

Hebrews 10:3 Meaning and Commentary

Hebrews 10:3

But in those sacrifices
The Arabic version reads, "but in it"; that is, in the law; but the Syriac version reads, and supplies, as we do, (Nwhb axbdb) , "in those sacrifices", which were offered every year on the day of atonement:

there is a remembrance of sins made again every year;
of all the sins that were committed the year past, and even of those that were expiated typically by the daily sacrifice, and others that had been offered; which proves the imperfection and insufficiency of such sacrifices: there was a remembrance of sins by God, before whom the goats were presented, their blood was sprinkled, and the people cleansed, ( Leviticus 16:7 Leviticus 16:14 Leviticus 16:15 Leviticus 16:30 ) and there was a remembrance of them by the people, who, on that day, afflicted their souls for them, ( Leviticus 16:29 Leviticus 16:31 ) and there was a remembrance of them by the high priest, who confessed them over, and put them upon the head of the goat, ( Leviticus 16:21 ) by which it was owned, that these sins were committed; that they deserved death, the curse of the law; that the expiation of them was undertook by another, typified by the goat; that this was not yet done, and therefore there was no remission, but a typical one, by these sacrifices; but that sins remained, and required a more perfect sacrifice, which was yet to be offered up. Legal sacrifices were so far from inducing an oblivion of sins, that they themselves brought them to remembrance, and were so many acknowledgments of them. Though Philo the Jew thinks the contrary, and gives this as a reason why the heart and brain were not offered in sacrifice, because

``it would be foolish, that the sacrifices should cause, not a forgetfulness of sins, but a remembrance of them ^F17.''

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FOOTNOTES:

F17 De Victimis, p. 841.

Hebrews 10:3 In-Context

1 For the law, being only a poor copy of the future good things, and not the true image of those things, is never able to make the people who come to the altar every year with the same offerings completely clean.

2 For if this had been possible, would there not have been an end of those offerings, because the worshippers would have been made completely clean and would have been no longer conscious of sins?

3 But year by year there is a memory of sins in those offerings.

4 Because it is not possible for the blood of oxen and goats to take away sins.

5 So that when he comes into the world, he says, You had no desire for offerings, but you made a body ready for me;