Who serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things, as Moses was admonished of God when he was about to make the tabernacle: for, See, says he, that you make all things according to the pattern showed to you in the mount.
All Commentaries on Hebrews 8:5 Go To Hebrews 8
John Chrysostom
AD 407
Here we must apply our minds attentively, and consider the Apostolic wisdom; for again he shows the difference of the Priesthood. Who (he says) serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things.
What are the heavenly things he speaks of here? The spiritual things. For although they are done on earth, yet nevertheless they are worthy of the Heavens. For when our Lord Jesus Christ lies slain [as a sacrifice], when the Spirit is with us, when He who sits on the right hand of the Father is here, when sons are made by the Washing, when they are fellow citizens of those in Heaven, when we have a country, and a city, and citizenship there, when we are strangers to things here, how can all these be other than heavenly things? But what! Are not our Hymns heavenly? Do not we also who are below utter in concert with them the same things which the divine choirs of bodiless powers sing above? Is not the altar also heavenly? How? It has nothing carnal, all spiritual things become the offerings. The sacrifice does not disperse into ashes, or into smoke, or into steamy savor, it makes the things placed there bright and splendid. How again can the rites which we celebrate be other than heavenly? For when He says, Whose soever sins ye retain they are retained, whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted John 20:23 when they have the keys of heaven, how can all be other than heavenly?
Who (he says) serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things, as Moses was admonished of God, when he was about to make the tabernacle, for see, says He, that you make all things according to the pattern showed to you in the mount. Inasmuch as our hearing is less ready of apprehension than our sight (for the things which we hear we do not in such wise lay up in our soul, as those which we see with our very eyes), He showed him all. Either then he means this by the example and shadow, or else he [speaks] of the Temple. For, he went on to say, See (His words are), that thou make all things according to the pattern showed to you in the mount. Was it then only what concerned the furniture of the temple that he saw, or was it also what related to the sacrifices, and all the rest? Nay, one would not be wrong in saying even this; for The Church is heavenly, and is nothing else than Heaven.
