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We now proceed with the statement of Jer. 31::--
"Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took
them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt" (verse 32).
Here we see the close connection between the old covenant made at Sinai, and the
new covenant to be made in the future. The reference to the Exodus from Egypt is
important. Every year this deliverance was remembered by the observance of the feast of
the passover. Israel remembered that old covenant in the very year that our Lord was
crucified. It was at the passover that Christ instituted the memorial of another and greater
exodus, by another and greater passover lamb, and established another and better
covenant:--
"They made ready the passover . . . . . and He took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave
it to them, saying, DRINK YE ALL of it; for this is My blood of the NEW COVENANT,
which is shed for many for the remission of sins" (Matt. 26: 19-30).
The Lord's supper is a memorial feast exactly similar to the passover, but differing in
this, that the Passover was a typical memorial connected with the old covenant, whereas
the Lord's supper is connected with the new covenant. For Gentile believers to partake
of this new covenant memorial while unassociated with Israel appears to us to be an
unwarranted intrusion. Jer. 31: continues regarding the first covenant:--
"Which My covenant they break, although I was an husband unto them, saith the
Lord" (verse 32).
The LXX reads "I regarded them not" instead of "I was an husband unto them". This
reading is followed by the N.T. quotation in Heb. 8: 9, which proves that this is the
true interpretation. The Hebrew ba'al has two meanings (1) to be lord, master, or
husband; (2) to disdain, reject, or disregard. The A.V. of Jer. 31: chose the wrong
meaning. The inspired writer of "Hebrews" gives the true meaning. Israel broke the old
covenant, and they were disdained, disregarded, all hope being henceforth centred in the
Messiah:--
"But this shall be the covenant that I shall make with the house of Israel; After those
days, saith the Lord, I will put My law in their inward parts, and write it in their hearts:
and will be their God, and they shall be My people" (Jer. 31: 33)
It is impossible to read these words without remembering Paul's argument in
II Cor. 3: and 4::--
"Written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not in tables of stones,
but in the fleshly tables of the heart . . . . . . . God . . . . . . . has made us able ministers of
the NEW COVENANT" (II Cor. 3: 3-6).
The Corinthians were already instructed regarding their connection with the new
covenant, as I Cor. 11: 25 will show. Here in the second epistle the apostle feels under