Page:Complete Works of Count Tolstoy - 13.djvu/304

 Christ was the Redeemer of sins, chose an obscure comparison with Melchisedec, and that the church, who accepted all the Epistles of Paul and those that are ascribed to him as writings of the Holy Ghost, has stuck to the word “high priest,” which explains nothing and gets things mixed up. The sense is that Christ brought himself as a sacrifice for men. To elucidate it, there are quoted the words of St. Gregory the Divine, St. Epiphanius, and others.

“(b) St. Gregory the Divine: ‘He was the victim and also the high priest; a priest, but also God; he presented his blood to God, but purified the whole world; he was raised to the cross, but nailed sin to the cross.’ (c) St. Epiphanius: ‘He sacrificed himself in order that, by bringing a most perfect and living sacrifice for the whole world, he might make void the sacrifices of the Old Testament; himself the victim, himself the sacrifice, himself the sacrificer, himself the king, himself the high priest, himself the sheep, himself the lamb, who became everything for our sake.’”

150. How did our Lord Jesus perform his sacerdotal ministration? His sacerdotal ministration consisted in this, that (1) men fell by their pride and disobedience. He was humble and obedient, and (2) since men had become worthy of the wrath of God, Christ took upon himself the whole wrath of God (suffered and died), and became the curse. It is impossible to express what is meant by it,—it is necessary to read the article as it is written.

“Here, as the high priest, he really sacrificed himself on the cross as an expiatory victim to God for the sins of the world, and redeemed us with his precious blood (1 Peter i. 19), so that his incarnation and his whole life on earth served only as a preparation and, as it were, a gradual ascent toward that great sacrifice. Consequently, in the Word of God and in the teaching of the church is represented to us—