²⁸ One of the Torah-teachers came up and heard them engaged in this discussion. Seeing that Yeshua answered them well, he asked him, “Which is the most important mitzvah of them all?” ²⁹ Yeshua answered, “The most important is,

³¹ The second is this:

There is no other mitzvah greater than these.” ³² The Torah-teacher said to him, “Well said, Rabbi; you speak the truth when you say that he is one, and that there is no other besides him; ³³ and that loving him with all one’s heart, understanding and strength, and loving one’s neighbor as oneself, mean more than all the burnt offerings and sacrifices.” ³⁴ When Yeshua saw that he responded sensibly, he said to him, “You are not far from the Kingdom of God.” And after that, no one dared put to him another sh’eilah.

⁴⁷ So the head cohanim and the P’rushim called a meeting of the Sanhedrin and said, “What are we going to do? — for this man is performing many miracles. ⁴⁸ If we let him keep going on this way, everyone will trust in him, and the Romans will come and destroy both the Temple and the nation.” ⁴⁹ But one of them, Kayafa, who was cohen gadol that year, said to them, “You people don’t know anything! ⁵⁰ You don’t see that it’s better for you if one man dies on behalf of the people, so that the whole nation won’t be destroyed.” ⁵¹ Now he didn’t speak this way on his own initiative; rather, since he was cohen gadol that year, he was prophesying that Yeshua was about to die on behalf of the nation, ⁵² and not for the nation alone, but so that he might gather into one the scattered children of God.

⁵³ From that day on, they made plans to have him put to death. ⁵⁴ Therefore Yeshua no longer walked around openly among the Judeans but went away from there into the region near the desert, to a town called Efrayim, and stayed there with his talmidim.

⁵⁵ The Judean festival of Pesach was near, and many people went up from the country to Yerushalayim to perform the purification ceremony prior to Pesach. ⁵⁶ They were looking for Yeshua, and as they stood in the Temple courts they said to each other, “What do you think? that he simply won’t come to the festival?” ⁵⁷ Moreover, the head cohanim and the P’rushim had given orders that anyone knowing Yeshua’s whereabouts should inform them, so that they could have him arrested.

12 I exhort you, therefore, brothers, in view of God’s mercies, to offer yourselves as a sacrifice, living and set apart for God. This will please him; it is the logical “Temple worship” for you. ² In other words, do not let yourselves be conformed to the standards of the ‘olam hazeh. Instead, keep letting yourselves be transformed by the renewing of your minds; so that you will know what God wants and will agree that what he wants is good, satisfying and able to succeed.

¹⁴ Therefore, my dear friends, run from idolatry! ¹⁵ I speak to you as sensible people; judge for yourselves what I am saying. ¹⁶ The “cup of blessing” over which we make the b’rakhah — isn’t it a sharing in the bloody sacrificial death of the Messiah? The bread we break, isn’t it a sharing in the body of the Messiah? ¹⁷ Because there is one loaf of bread, we who are many constitute one body, since we all partake of the one loaf of bread. ¹⁸ Look at physical Isra’el: don’t those who eat the sacrifices participate in the altar? ¹⁹ So, what am I saying? That food sacrificed to idols has any significance in itself? or that an idol has significance in itself? ²⁰ No, what I am saying is that the things which pagans sacrifice, they sacrifice not to God but to demons; and I don’t want you to become sharers of the demons! ²¹ You can’t drink both a cup of the Lord and a cup of demons, you can’t partake in both a meal of the Lord and a meal of demons. ²² Or are we trying to make the Lord jealous? We aren’t stronger than he is, are we?

²³ “Everything is permitted,” you say? Maybe, but not everything is helpful. “Everything is permitted?” Maybe, but not everything is edifying.

²³ Moreover, the present cohanim are many in number, because they are prevented by death from continuing in office. ²⁴ But because he lives forever, his position as cohen does not pass on to someone else; ²⁵ and consequently, he is totally able to deliver those who approach God through him; since he is alive forever and thus forever able to intercede on their behalf.

²⁶ This is the kind of cohen gadol that meets our need — holy, without evil, without stain, set apart from sinners and raised higher than the heavens; ²⁷ one who does not have the daily necessity, like the other cohanim g’dolim, of offering up sacrifices first for their own sins and only then for those of the people; because he offered one sacrifice, once and for all, by offering up himself. ²⁸ For the Torah appoints as cohanim g’dolim men who have weakness; but the text which speaks about the swearing of the oath, a text written later than the Torah, appoints a Son who has been brought to the goal forever.

8 Here is the whole point of what we have been saying: we do have just such a cohen gadol as has been described. And he does sit at the right hand of HaG’dulah in heaven.^{[a] 2} There he serves in the Holy Place, that is, in the true Tent of Meeting, the one erected not by human beings but by Adonai.

³ For every cohen gadol is appointed to offer both gifts and sacrifices; so this cohen gadol too has to have something he can offer. ⁴ Now if he were on earth, he wouldn’t be a cohen at all, since there already are cohanim offering the gifts required by the Torah. ⁵ But what they are serving is only a copy and shadow of the heavenly original; for when Moshe was about to erect the Tent, God warned him, “See to it that you make everything according to the pattern you were shown on the mountain.”^[b]

⁶ But now the work Yeshua has been given to do is far superior to theirs, just as the covenant he mediates is better. For this covenant has been given as Torah on the basis of better promises.

8 Here is the whole point of what we have been saying: we do have just such a cohen gadol as has been described. And he does sit at the right hand of HaG’dulah in heaven.^{[a] 2} There he serves in the Holy Place, that is, in the true Tent of Meeting, the one erected not by human beings but by Adonai.

³ For every cohen gadol is appointed to offer both gifts and sacrifices; so this cohen gadol too has to have something he can offer. ⁴ Now if he were on earth, he wouldn’t be a cohen at all, since there already are cohanim offering the gifts required by the Torah. ⁵ But what they are serving is only a copy and shadow of the heavenly original; for when Moshe was about to erect the Tent, God warned him, “See to it that you make everything according to the pattern you were shown on the mountain.”^[b]

⁶ But now the work Yeshua has been given to do is far superior to theirs, just as the covenant he mediates is better. For this covenant has been given as Torah on the basis of better promises.