⁴ Marriage is honorable in every respect; and, in particular, sex within marriage is pure. But God will indeed punish fornicators and adulterers.

¹³ For if sprinkling ceremonially unclean persons with the blood of goats and bulls and the ashes of a heifer restores their outward purity; ¹⁴ then how much more the blood of the Messiah, who, through the eternal Spirit, offered himself to God as a sacrifice without blemish, will purify our conscience from works that lead to death, so that we can serve the living God!

¹⁵ It is because of this death that he is mediator of a new covenant [or will].^[a] Because a death has occurred which sets people free from the transgressions committed under the first covenant, those who have been called may receive the promised eternal inheritance. ¹⁶ For where there is a will, there must necessarily be produced evidence of its maker’s death, ¹⁷ since a will goes into effect only upon death; it never has force while its maker is still alive.

¹⁸ This is why the first covenant too was inaugurated with blood. ¹⁹ After Moshe had proclaimed every command of the Torah to all the people, he took the blood of the calves with some water and used scarlet wool and hyssop to sprinkle both the scroll itself and all the people; ²⁰ and he said, “This is the blood of the covenant which God has ordained for you.”^{[b] 21} Likewise, he sprinkled with the blood both the Tent and all the things used in its ceremonies. ²² In fact, according to the Torah, almost everything is purified with blood; indeed, without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness of sins.

²³ Now this is how the copies of the heavenly things had to be purified, but the heavenly things themselves require better sacrifices than these. ²⁴ For the Messiah has entered a Holiest Place which is not man-made and merely a copy of the true one, but into heaven itself, in order to appear now on our behalf in the very presence of God.