Bible Strands
Hebrews 10:5
Therefore, when Christ came into the world, He said: “Sacrifice and offering You did not desire, but a body You prepared for Me.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — The author of Hebrews addresses Jewish believers tempted to revert to temple worship, at the climax of his argument that animal blood cannot remove sins (v. 4). He quotes Christ's own words from Psalm 40 to show God's design was never for repeated offerings.
The words — θυσίαν (thusian), "sacrifice," is the noun God explicitly does not desire; its negation is the hinge on which the entire argument turns.
The thread — The quotation is drawn from Psalm 40:6, and the same rejection of sacrificial ritual appears in Isaiah 1:11, where God declares himself full of burnt offerings.
Why it lands — It removes any residual claim the old system has on the believer's conscience: if God did not desire sacrifice, no amount of ritual can substitute for what Christ's body accomplished.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Greek words
King James Version
Wherefore when he cometh into the world, he saith, Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me:
Cross-references
- Psalms 40:6 Sacrifice and offering You did not desire, but my ears You have opened. Burnt offerings and sin offerings You did not require.
- Isaiah 1:11 “What good to Me is your multitude of sacrifices?” says the LORD. “I am full from the burnt offerings of rams and the fat of well-fed cattle; I take no delight in the blood of bulls and lambs and goats.
- Isaiah 7:14 Therefore the Lord Himself will give you a sign: Behold, the virgin will be with child and give birth to a son, and will call Him Immanuel.
- 1 Peter 2:24 He Himself bore our sins in His body on the tree, so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness. “By His stripes you are healed.”
- Matthew 1:20 But after he had pondered these things, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, “Joseph, son of David, do not be afraid to embrace Mary as your wife, for the One conceived in her is from the Holy Spirit.
- Hebrews 10:7 Then I said, ‘Here I am, it is written about Me in the scroll: I have come to do Your will, O God.’”
- Galatians 4:4 But when the time had fully come, God sent His Son, born of a woman, born under the law,
- Hebrews 1:6 And again, when God brings His firstborn into the world, He says: “Let all God’s angels worship Him.”
- Hebrews 2:14 Now since the children have flesh and blood, He too shared in their humanity, so that by His death He might destroy him who holds the power of death, that is, the devil,
- Hebrews 10:10 And by that will, we have been sanctified through the sacrifice of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.