also states Joseph's descent from David, not Mary's. So there is more justification from the New
78 SAINT A UG USTINE - SERMONS in the whole course of time our one and only high priest entered the true, not the figurative, holy of holies, beyond the veils of heaven; our Lord Jesus Christ rising from the dead, offering himself for us.1 2 3 4 5 6
He entered, and there he still is. But the people still stand outside with us; we haven't yet risen to go to meet Christ,7 and to remain inside with him for ever, when he is going to say to the good servant, Enter into the joy of your Lord (Mt 25:21). So what was symbolized in those days by the one high priest alone entering the holy of holies and the people standing outside, has now been fulfilled through our Lord Jesus Christ alone entering the secret places of the heavens above, and the people still groaning and sighing outside, saved in hope, awaiting the redemption of their bodies, which is going to be achieved in the resurrection of the dead.8
The high priest offers up our prayers
3. It is the high priest himself, who offered himself as a holocaust for us, that offers up our prayers. He is the one who leads through to the end, intervening, not to block us off but to direct us; not to separate but to reconcile us, not to hinder us, but to break up all hindrance. He is the one and only pontiff, the one and only high priest, who was prefigured in the priests of old. That is why they used to look for a priest without bodily blemish, because he alone ever lived without the blemish of sin, even in his mortal flesh. For what was prefigured in their bodies pointed to what would be the reality of his life.
NOTES
1. These three fragments about the priesthood of Christ offer no internal evidence whatever for their being preached either on 1 January or against the pagans. On what the editor, Quinot, based the connection I do not know, nor on how he calculated the date. Personally, the fragments strike me as being quite un-Augustinian in style and tone, heavy and unimaginative; so I seriously question their authenticity. I would attribute them to a much later disciple, possibly of the sixth century; perhaps our old friend Caesarius of Arles.
2. In the sacrament of confirmation, which in those days always accompanied baptism.
3. See Lk 1:32. But Luke only says, in verse 27, that Joseph was of the house of David. Matthew also states Joseph's descent from David, not Mary's. So there is more justification from the New Testament for linking Mary, through Elizabeth her cousin, with the house of Aaron, as the preacher goes on to do, than with the house of David.
4. Sed quo genus in Maria ?; a very difficult phrase to construe; literally, "but whither race (line) in Mary?"
5. Actually, "a chosen race, a royal priesthood," 1 Pt 2:9.
6. See Heb 9:24-28.
7. See 1 Thes 4:17.
8. See Rom 8:23-24.