Albert Barnes Commentary Hebrews 10:19

"Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holy place by the blood of Jesus," — Hebrews 10:19 (ASV)

Having therefore, brethren. The apostle, in this verse, begins the exhortatory part of his epistle, which continues to its end.

He had conducted an extensive examination of the Jewish and Christian systems. He had compared their Founders — Moses and the Son of God — and shown how far superior the latter was to the former. He had compared the Christian great High Priest with the Jewish high priest, demonstrating His superiority. He had also compared the sacrifices under the two dispensations, showing that in all respects the Christian sacrifice was superior to the Jewish — that it was an offering that cleansed from sin, and that it was sufficient when offered once, without needing repetition, while the Jewish offerings were only typical and were unable to put away sin. And he had shown that the great High Priest of the Christian profession had opened a way to the mercy-seat in heaven, and was Himself now seated there.

Having shown this, he now exhorts Christians to avail themselves fully of all their advantages, and to enjoy, to the widest extent, all the privileges now conferred on them. One of the first of these benefits is that they now have free access to the mercy-seat.

Boldness to enter into the holiest. The marginal reading is liberty. The word rendered boldness — parrhsian — properly means boldness of speech, or freedom, where one speaks all that one thinks (see the notes on Acts 4:13); and then it means boldness in general, license, authority, or pardon. Here the idea is that before Christ died and entered into heaven, there was no such access to the throne of grace as humanity needed. No one had an offering they could bring that would make them acceptable to God. But now the way was open. Access was free for all, and all might come with the utmost freedom.

The word holiest here is taken from the holy of holies in the temple (see the notes on Hebrews 9:3) and is there applied to heaven, of which that was the emblem. The entrance into the most holy place was forbidden to all but the high priest; but now access to the real "holy of holies" is granted to all, in the name of the great High Priest of the Christian profession.

By the blood of Jesus. The blood of Jesus is the means by which this access to heaven is procured. The Jewish high priest entered the holy of holies with the blood of bullocks and of rams (see the notes on Hebrews 9:7); but the Saviour offered His own blood, and that became the means by which we may have access to God.