“Hear, O my people, and I will speak; O Israel, and I will testify against thee: I am God, even thy God. I will not reprove thee for thy sacrifices or thy burnt offerings, to have been continually before me. I will take no bullock out of thy house, nor he goats out of thy folds.” Here God plainly excepts the offerings of bulls and goats, and thereby overthrows the exposition of Rashi and others, who say that the covenant and sacrifices here alluded to are the same as those described at the giving of the law, when Moses said, “Behold the blood of the covenant,” &c. (Exod. xxiv. 8.) The sacrifices then offered were “burnt-offerings and peace-offerings of oxen,” which God here declares that he will not accept. Besides, God is not speaking of many sacrifices, but of one sacrifice אלי זבח . He is moreover speaking of one great sacrifice, by virtue of which sinful men may stand before him as saints at the great day of judgment, and obtain mercy. This certainty cannot mean the sacrifices of the Mosaic covenant at Sinai, for by reason of that sacrifice, they will appear as guilty sinners who have broken God’s covenant, as he himself says— אשר המה הפרו את ברית ׃ “Which my covenant they brake.” (Jer. xxxi. 32.) At that solemn hour the Mosaic covenant will only condemn, and therefore cannot be meant here. Indeed the rabbies appear to have felt the untenableness of this exposition, and therefore invented another figurative one— ויש דרש כי על ברית מילה שהחזיקו בה ישראל בגלות ׃ “There is also an allegorical interpretation referring it to the covenant of circumcision, which Israel has faithfully adhered to in the captivity.” (Kimchi, in loc.) But this exposition is as unfounded as the former. Circumcision is never called a sacrifice in Scripture. Neither will it serve a man in the day of judgment. What then is the sacrifice which is here intended? We answer, the true Passover, the blood of the Messiah, whereby the new covenant is ratified. Some object that the shedding of blood is altogether unnecessary—that if God will forgive at all, he can forgive without atonement or sacrifice. But this objection will equally affect the sacrifice of the first Passover. On the very same grounds, we may say, What necessity was there for killing a lamb, and sprinkling its blood upon the door-posts? The directions given by Moses are very striking—“Kill the passover. And ye shall take a bunch of hyssop, and dip it in the blood that is in the bason, and strike the lintel and the two side posts with the blood that is in the bason; and none of you shall go out at the door of his house until the morning. For the Lord will pass through to smite the Egyptians; and when he seeth the blood upon the lintel, and on the two side posts, the Lord will pass over the door, and will not suffer the destroyer to come in unto your houses to smite you.” (Exod. xii. 21-23.) Surely the blood was not necessary to make known to him which house belonged to an Israelite. He