Expositor's Bible Commentary Commentary Hebrews 9:14

"how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish unto God, cleanse your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?" — Hebrews 9:14 (ASV)

The “how much more” argument stresses the incomparable greatness of Christ and his work for us. “The blood of Christ” means Christ’s death regarded as a sacrifice to God for sin. Atonement must be seen in the light of God’s demand for uprightness in a world where people sin constantly. No view of atonement can be satisfactory that does not regard the divine demand. “Unblemished” (GK 320) is the word used technically of animals approved for sacrifice, animals without defect of any kind.

There is a problem in the way we should understand “the eternal Spirit.” It may refer to the Holy Spirit, but the Holy Spirit is nowhere else referred to in this way. Thus many commentators prefer to see the “spirit” as Christ’s own spirit. But perhaps we ought to see the “Servant of the Lord” imagery behind this whole passage, who is introduced in Isaiah with “I will put my Spirit on him” (Isaiah 42:1). Just as the prophet sees the Servant as accomplishing his entire ministry in the power of the divine Spirit, so we should see Christ as winning our salvation by a mighty act performed in the power of the Spirit of God. There is, in other words, an allusion to the Trinity here. Christ’s own spirit was indeed involved in his voluntary sacrifice, but so is the divine Spirit. The writer seems to have chosen this unusual way of referring to the Holy Spirit to bring out the truth that there is an eternal aspect to Christ’s saving work.

Christ, then, offered himself in sacrifice, the aim being “to cleanse our consciences.” His saving work operates on quite a different level from that of the Levitical sacrifices. These latter were external and material, as the author repeatedly emphasizes. But Christ was concerned with the sins that trouble the human conscience (see comment on v.9). Thus, his sacrifice was directed to cleansing the conscience, something that the OT sacrifices could never do (cf. 10:2). This cleansing is “from acts that lead to death,” and the final result of those purified by Christ is that they “serve the living God” . The Christian way is positive, not negative.