Maman

Picard's Mother 

TNG Older Explained 

Star Trek Picard

Picard and his mother.

Yeeeers -- That'll be 

The Trauma : He's clearly not 

remembering Her 

very well.....

 our son.

[Chez Picard]

(Picard is making inroads into a bottle of the family produce when Robert comes in with flowers for the house) 

BOB : 

Careful. You're not used to drinking the real thing. This synthehol never leaves you out of control, is that so? 

Johnny : That's so. 

BOB : This will. (pours himself the last dregs) Now there is something I'd like to see. 

Johnny : What's that? 

BOB : 

The gallant Captain out of Control. Mind if I ask you 

A Question? What the devil happened to you up there? 

Johnny : 

Is this brotherly concern? 

BOB : 

No. Curiosity. What did 

They Do to you? 

Johnny : 

You know what happened. 

BOB : 

Not precisely. I gather you were hurt. Humiliated. I always thought you needed 

a little humiliation. 

Or was it humility? 

Either would do. 

(Jean-Luc storms out of the house) 

[Garden]

BOB : Why do you walk away? That isn't your style. 

Johnny : I'm tired of fighting with you, Robert. 

BOB : Tired? 

Johnny : That's right. 

BOB : Yes. Tired of the Enterprise too? The great Captain Picard of Starfleet falls to Earth, ready to plunge into the water with Louis. That isn't the brother that I remember. Still, I suppose it must have seemed like the ideal situation, hmm? Local boy makes good. Returns home after twenty years to a hero's welcome. 

Johnny : I'm not a hero. 

BOB : Of course you are. Admit it. You'd never settle for less than that and you never will. 

Johnny : That's not true. 

BOB : Cancel the parade? In your favour? 

Johnny : No! I never sought that rubbish. 

BOB : Never sought? Never sought president of the school, valedictorian, athletic hero with your arms raised in victory? 

Johnny : Valedictorian? Arms raised in victory? Were you so jealous? 

BOB : Yes, damn it. I was always so jealous, I had a right to be. 

Johnny : Right? 

BOB : I was always your brother, watching you receive the cheers, watching you break every rule our father made and get away with it. 

Johnny : Why didn't you break a few rules? 

BOB : Because I was the elder brother, the responsible one. It was my job to look after you. 

Johnny : Look after me? You? You were a bully. 

BOB : Sometimes. Maybe. Sometimes I even enjoyed bullying you. 

Johnny : All right. Try it now. 

BOB : Did you come back, Jean-Luc? Did you come back because you wanted me to look after you again? 

Johnny : Damn you! 

(And he punches his brother, sending him flying over some barrels into the vineyard proper. There they fight in the muddy irrigation ditches, through the vines until they finally fall back laughing) 

Johnny : 

You were asking 

for it, you know. 

BOB : 

Yes, but you needed it. 

You have been terribly 

hard on yourself. 

Johnny : You don't know, Robert. You don't know. They took everything I was. They used me to kill and to destroy, and I couldn't stop them. I should have been able to stop them! I tried. I tried so hard, but I wasn't strong enough. I wasn't good enough. I should have been able to stop them. I should! I should! 

BOB : 

So, my brother is a human being after all. This is going to be with you a long time, Jean-Luc. A long time. You have to learn to live with it. You have a simple choice now. Live with it below the sea with Louis, or above the clouds with the Enterprise. 

Johnny : You know, I think you were right after all. I think I did come back so that you could help me. 

BOB : You know what? I still don't like you, Jean-Luc.

[Chez Picard]

(There's mud, and muddy boots, on the carpet, and drunken voices singing 'Aupres de ma blonde, qu'il fait bon, fait bon, fait bon' dum, dum, dum. Marie enters from outside) 

Mrs. BOB : What in the world? What happened here? 

BOB : Ah 

Johnny : It's entirely my fault, Marie. 

BOB : Yes, I fell down, then he fell and then 

Johnny : We both fell down. 

BOB : We both fell down. 

Johnny : Together. 

BOB : We both fell down together. 

Mrs. BOB : Have you two been fighting? 

BOB : Fighting? No, certainly not. 

Mrs. BOB : Shame on you both. What would your father say if he saw you like this? 

Johnny : He'd probably send us both to bed without our supper. 

Mrs. BOB : Well, perhaps it's just as well you got it out of your systems. 

Johnny : Perhaps it was, Marie. Perhaps it was. I'll contact Louis and cancel the meeting with the Board of Governors. It's time that I was going. 

Mrs. BOB : 

Already, Jean-Luc? 

Johnny : 

The ship will be ready to leave orbit soon, and I belong on board. If I should ever doubt that again, I know where to come. 

Picard - Sheer Fucking Hubris

[Patio]

(Arranging flowers in a vase in the evening.)

MORITZ: 

He said I'd find you out here.

Johnny : Moritz.

MORITZ: Hello, Jean-Luc.

Johnny : It's been a very long time.

MORITZ: Too long.

Johnny : I know there was a bit of trouble with the remote medscan, but I hardly expected a house call. Let me just er... (picks up tea tray) Your office told me they would be forwarding the certificate for interstellar service as soon as you had seen the results. (silence) Oh, I see.

MORITZ: You might want something stronger.

(A little later.)

MORITZ: Your medscan came in at or above Starfleet minimums in every category. Cardiovascular, metabolic, cognitive. For a relic, you're in excellent shape. Just that little abnormality in the parietal lobe.

Johnny : I was told a long time ago that it might cause a problem eventually.

(Irumodic Syndrome? See All Good Things.)

MORITZ: Loss of appetite, mood swings, unsettling dreams? Inappropriate displays of anger on interplanetary news holos?

Johnny : What do you think it is?

MORITZ: I'd need to run more tests. It could be one of a number of related syndromes.

Johnny : Prognosis? Come on. Let's have it, Doctor Benayoun.

MORITZ: A few are treatable, but they all end the same way. Some sooner than others.

Johnny : I see. I need you to certify me to Starfleet as fit for interstellar service. Now, will you do it?

MORITZ: I don't suppose you'd condescend to tell me why. Secret mission? We certainly had our share of those on the Stargazer, didn't we? Remember that time in the fireforest on Calyx, we

Johnny : Doctor Benayoun. Forgive me.

MORITZ: You really want to go back out into the cold, knowing

Johnny : More than ever, knowing.

MORITZ: I don't know what kind of trouble you're planning to get into. Maybe if you're lucky, it will kill you first.

[Starfleet HQ]

(Picard beams in through one of a line of arches in the plaza. Humans and aliens with a mixture of DS9 and Voyager style uniforms throng the area.)

COMPUTER: All visitors must report to the main security desk. All visitors must report to the main security desk.

(A large hologram of NCC1701 hangs over the foyer, then it changes to NCC1701D.)

MAN [OC]: Admiral Gurdy, please report to Conference Room B. Admiral Gurdy, please report to Conference Room B.

Johnny : Hello. I er, have a meeting with the CNC. I have an appointment.

ENSIGN: Of course, sir. May I have your name, please, sir?

Johnny : Oh. Er, Picard. P-I-C-A-R-D. Jean-Luc.

(The Ensign puts a visitor badge on the reception desk.)

ENSIGN: Ah. It's nice to see you up and around, Admiral. Welcome back.

[Admiral Clancy's office]

(Doorbell.)

Fleet Admiral Kirsten Clancy , 

C-in-C, Starfleet : 

Come. (door opens) 

Ah. Jean-Luc.

Johnny : 

Kirsten. Hello. 

May I? (he sits)

Fleet Admiral Kirsten Clancy , 

C-in-C, Starfleet : 

Apparently, you have 'urgent 

Federation Business'. 

I understood you to have left 

affairs of state behind.

Johnny :

 I am staying as far 

from it all as I can.

Fleet Admiral Kirsten Clancy , 

C-in-C, Starfleet : 

So then what can I do for you?

Johnny : 

Bruce Maddox.

Fleet Admiral Kirsten Clancy , 

C-in-C, Starfleet : 

What about him?

Johnny : 

I believe that he is using neurons 

from the late Commander Data 

to create a new race of

organic synthetics.

Fleet Admiral Kirsten Clancy , 

C-in-C, Starfleet : 

Well, that's not far from all 

of it, it is all of it.

Johnny : 

The Romulans are involved.

Fleet Admiral Kirsten Clancy, 

C-in-C, Starfleet : 

This gets better and better.

Johnny : 

Commander Data was 

not only my colleague, he was 

my dear friend, and he gave 

his life, body and soul, 

to The Federation.

 And if there is a chance that some part of him 

still exists, then I think we have 

an obligation to investigate.

Fleet Admiral Kirsten Clancy,

C-in-C, Starfleet : 

There is no 'We', 

Jean-Luc --

Johnny : 

Kirsten, I know we have not always seen eye to eye. Nevertheless, I have a request to make. Based on my years of service, I want you to reinstate me, temporarily, for one mission. I will need a small warp-capable reconnaissance ship with a minimal crew, and if you feel that my rank makes me too conspicuous, well then, I am content to be demoted to Captain.

Fleet Admiral Kirsten Clancy ,

 C-in-C, Starfleet : 

....sheer fucking hubris --

You think you could just waltz back in here 

and be entrusted with taking men 

and women into space? 

Do you think I wasn't 

watching the holo 

the other day along 

with everyone else 

in The Galaxy?

Johnny : I should not have spoken in public.

Fleet Admiral Kirsten Clancy , C-inC, Starfleet : The Romulans were our enemies, and we tried to help them for as long as we could, but even before the synthetics attacked Mars, 14 species within the Federation said, cut the Romulans loose, or we'll pull out. It was a choice between allowing the Federation to implode or letting the Romulans go.

Johnny : 

The Federation does not get to decide 

if a species lives or dies...!

.

Fleet Admiral Kirsten Clancy , 

C-in-C, Starfleet : 

Yes, We Do. 

We absolutely Do. 

Thousands of other species depend 

upon Us for unity, for cohesion. 

We didn't have enough ships left. 

We had to make choices. 

But The Great 

Captain Picard didn't 

like His Orders.

Johnny : 

I was standing-up 

for The Federation, for 

what it represents, for what 

it should still represent!!

Fleet Admiral Kirsten Clancy , 

C-in-C, Starfleet : 

How dare you 

lecture me?

Johnny : 

Ignore me again 

at your cost.

Fleet Admiral Kirsten Clancy , 

C-in-C, Starfleet : 

My cost?

Johnny : 

You are in 

peril, Admiral.

Fleet Admiral Kirsten Clancy , 

C-in-C, Starfleet : 

There's no peril here...!!
Only the pitiable delusions 

of a once-great man 

desperate to matter. 

This is no-longer Your 

House, Jean-Luc. 

So do What You're

Good at : Go Home. 

Request Denied.

The Black Sheep

Genesis 25:29–34

29. Once when Jacob 

was cooking a stew, Esau 

came in from the field, and 

he was famished. 

30. Esau said to Jacob, 

“Let me eat some of that 

red stuff, for I am famished!” 

(Therefore he was called Edom.) 

31. Jacob said, “First sell 

Me your birthright.”

32. Esau said, “I am about to die; of 

what use is a birthright to Me?”

33. Jacob said, “Swear to Me 

first.” So he swore to him, and 

sold his birthright to Jacob. 

34. Then Jacob gave Esau bread and lentil stew, and he ate and 

drank, and rose and went his way. 

Thus Esau despised his birthright.

The Black Sheep :

NO, NO,' said my mother, "Jacob was the good son :

But I preferred Esau. Is there a child who can hear 'Bless me, even me also, O My Father’ and does not groan for Esau? And what, after all had the poor Man  done? It is a bad thing to be hungry.

It's a good thing to a shed deathe pomp, the responsibility. the burden of setting a good example. What firstcomer, with a combative, ambitious brother at his heel, does not sometimes long to forget it all and settle for lentil soup?

Besides, there was that business of the goatskins. "Wasn't that cheating?" I asked my mother. And she, ever honest, squirmed and twisted, struggling with her sense of justice, her wish not to set herself up against authority and her natural irritation with an. argumentative child. She could not explain, if indeed she realized it, that Jacob was the great fox of history, the crafty turner of all moral tables, the man of paradox who by stealing a thing that was not his, came to consort with angels - those going up and those going down — and by struggling with one of them, made that thing his own.

She cast around in her pool of maxims and thankfully fished neup. 'Esau,' she said, as though settling the matter for ever, 'Esau was the black sheep of the family. Well, that was something I could accept - and without disloyalty. If Esau was a black sheep, so were all my best-loved friends - Ishmael and the Prodigal Son, Dan in Jo's Boys, Peter Rabbit, my Uncle Cecil and Major Battle.

Uncle Cecil's blackness was a grown-up secret, a thing of nods and becks and hints. All we really knew of it was that he had married — a last straw apparently - a lady whom my mother described as 'some sort of Hindoo. But we well understood Major Battle's weakness. 'Not before the children, said the gossips, tossing their heads and sipping the air in the manner of thirsty geese, And thehildren, neither shocked nor surprised, said to What wasa black sheep lao. mimatio brously, in the general view, one full of iniquity. If so, might I not be one myself, in spite of the tireless efforts of parents, teachers and friends? But wasthe general view the right one? Can leopard change his pots - and it he can, should he? Was a black sheep just a white sheep dirtied or black in his own right - accepting his colour, proud of it and his three bags full of wool? Did there exist another world where black sheep thought of their erring lambs as the white sheep of The Family?

No answer came. Perhaps the question was its own answer and would drop its truit when it ripened. was still many years away from discovering the Chinese symbol of the Great Ultimate, black fish with white eye, white fish with black, the opposites reconciled to themselves and to each other within the encompassing circle.

It was in my future, however, and because it was there it sent back messengers from time to time as a river at its sea-mouth sends back news to the source.

One thing seemed certain - even the nursery rhymes declared it - that for white to be truly white, lily and snow, it needed its dark opposite. Frost and jet between them - attraction, repulsion and interaction - brought forth the ten thousand colours. Good, it seemed, in life as in story, was pallid and colourless. It needed to be touched by bad to blush and know itself. Where would poor Cock Robin have been - an ordinary bird in an ordinary bush - if he had not met the sparrow? All unknown to history; and his funeral dirge - oh, the birds of the air a-sighing and a-sobbin - unwritten and unsung. Who cares about the goodness of Flopsy, Mopsy and Cottontail until it is contrasted with the behaviour of their brother Peter? It does not exist till then.

Indeed, Peter Rabbit in his own miniscule way is one of the true black sheep of literature. Like Alcott's Dan, he retains his integrity against all odds, refusing firmly to conform, withstanding every genteel effort to sickly him o'er with white. Poets are made of the same stuff. There is no easy way home for them, either. They must cut their own path through thorn and thicket, like Uncle Ceci and Major Battle.

No matter on how small a scale — Homer in a paragraph, the world in a grain of sand — the relation between the antagonists con date at the he inconcede on tend gentleman, lom Kitten merely a kitten till Samuel Whiskers and Anna Maria wrapped him up in the dough.

And when I came to the fairy tales there was no change in the established pattern, the landscape merely widened. 'I can't think; said my mother, 'what makes you so fond of Rumpelstiltzkin! The miller's daughter is so much nicer.'

Much nicer, but much less interesting. There were, however, certain maidens who were something more than comely ciphers, those like the Goose Girl and Little Two-Eyes, brave and defenceless as wounded hares; and the peerless, fearless Sleeping Beauty, grasping her fateful spindle. But I care for them and their lovely princes far more now than I did then. If I am true to my memory, the heroes and heroines have all one face, bland and featureless. It is the lineaments of the villains - dwarf, giant and stepmother, wicked fairy, dragon, witch - that leap to me now across the years. Each one is different, each is its own - pitted, grained and cicatriced, battered by passion and power.

Can I have been one of the Devil's party, as Blake said of Milton, finding Adam and Eve so tenuous, Satan so solid, in 'Paradise Lost'? Was I, like Blake's Black Boy, 'bereaved of light'?

It was possible. And if so it had to be borne. What hero - and I, too, was the hero of a story, my own - could do without a villain?

It was the dark ones, after all, on whom everything depended.

They awoke the virtues, imposed the conflict and, by strictly throwing the story forward, brought it to its strict end - the achievement of Happy Ever After. Their frightfulness, for me, had a kind of splendour, absolute and without spot, as it were. It was something one could completely count on, even, in a way, respect.

You, monsters who are about to die, I salute you!

This uncompromising black and white of the fairy tales was what I needed as a child. It gave me a kind of reassurance. Children, beneath their conforming skins, have aboriginal hearts, savage, untutored, magic-ridden. When the old drums beat below the surface, their feet cannot help stamping. It can be frightening, even appalling, to a child to meet in himself the ancestral ghosts. 'Who am I he will ask, in this situation - caught between the world of the sun and the dark corroboree? Am I alone, unique, eccentric, the only one of my kind?'

No, you are not, say the fairy tales. And they bring out their comforting brood of dragons, each with a paladin prince to match.

They put the thing in its proper perspective; for every inner insubstantial shadow they provide a palpable counterpart that will bear examination. Cut out the spectres from the tales — there are those I hear, who would gladly do this while sticking to Herod and the atom bomb - and you cut out their healing meaning.

When one knows that the outer world has dragons — a couple, perhaps, at every corner — it is easier to contemplate the ones within oneself.

Neither Grimm's stories nor any myth frightened me as a child

- not gorgon, Minotaur nor chimera, nor the terrible, beautiful

'Juniper Tree. But the sea-captain behind my door, limping on his left leg and tapping the wall with a pencil — he was another matter.

"You see, said my mother every night, grandly flinging the door wide, 'he's not there — and you know it! I did, indeed, but she was speaking of a real captain. Mine was, alas, inside my head, and that door she couldn't open.

But Grimm is so coarse and blood-bespattered - can you bear the cruelty?' people ask me. I can and could. These stories have grown and are not invented; they are old trees rooted in the folk, massive and monolithic. There is nothing in them that is subjective, or personal or neurotic. Simple, tribal crypto-grams, their cruelty is not for cruelty's sake but to show that life is cruel. 'This is how things are, they say — and how mellifluously they say it! 'The battle of black and white is joined and must be fought to the end. Sit under our shade or go your way, it is all the same to us.'

They make no requirements. One can choose. And how much rather would I see wicked stepmothers boiled in oil — all over in half a second - than bear the protracted agony of the Little Mermaid or the girl who wore the Red Shoes. There, if you like, is cruelty, sustained, deliberate, contrived. Hans Andersen lets no blood. But his tortures, disguised as piety, are subtle, often demoralizing. It is all subjectivity here, a great performer playing the organ, with emphasis on the Vox Humana. Ah, how pleasant to be manipulated, to feel one's heartstrings pulled this way and that - twang, twang, again and again, longing, self-pity, nostalgia, remorse — and to let fall the fullsome tear that would never be shed for Grimm.

I enjoyed it. I even wallowed in it, yet I never could quite understand why I felt no better for it. Perhaps I missed the pagan world with its fortitude and strong contrasts. I and my soul were one there, but Andersen seemed to separate us. He suggested instead - how coaxingly - that I should not try to fight with dragons but just be a dear good child. He reminded me, sweetly, of the rewards and what, alas, awaited me if I should happen to fail. But his characters were so enervating, I needed more bracing companionship - a giant, perhaps, and a witch or two. There were no black sheep in Andersen - he would have found the idea distasteful. (You can't count the Ugly Duckling, for he was really a swan.) They were all white sheep, some clean, some dirty, but a homogeneous flock.

Nor could Hans Andersen have invented, I thought - he wouldn't even have wanted to — a villain strong and dark and lovely and worthy to be loved. For me there was such a one in Grimm, the 13th Wise Woman in 'Little Briar Rose, or, as she is more popularly known, the Wicked Fairy in 'The Sleeping Beauty.' To begin with, she was a victim of chance. The King had only 12 gold plates. Someone had to be left out. It might have been any of the others but it happened to be she. And because of that, to the end of time, men would scorn and point at her and spit upon her shadow. None of them would stop to think that if she had not brought her gift of death, Beauty would neither have slept nor awakened. There had, I knew, to be instruments - things were made wrong that they might come right - and the lot had fallen to her. For this unluck I pitied her, and because I pitied her floved her, and because I loved her she had to be blameless.

'You love the Wicked Fairy?' said my parents, raising their eyebrows at each other. Had they a crow in a swan's nest? It seemed only too likely. I had to bear the opprobrium, since I couldn't deny what my heart said. And because I bore it, the Wicked Fairy - or so it seemed to me then - loosed for me many many secrets.

I saw that she and her 12 sisters, constantly exchanging roles, played every part there was. Myth, fairy-tale, life — it was all the same. The 13 wise women were nymph, mother, crone, goddess;

Kore, Demeter and Astarte, the Witches, the Fates and the Furies.

They birthed the babe, blessed the bride-bed and swaddled the corpse for its clay cradle.

Their business was the whole of life. And in another story on another day, the 13th would perhaps be the Good Fairy and another sister would turn the key that set the wheel in motion.

She did not need my love and pity, but I had to feed them both in myself in order to see her plain.

Plain? She was crystal! A tall, glass, shiny mountain from which I could see with a new eye the world of fairy tale Hero apositions. white sheep and black, there they stood in their fixed positions, opposite and separate and yet not unrelated. Rather, they were two ends of the stick, thrust away from and drawn to each other because of the stick itself.

And what of the stick, the space between, that divides and also connects? Here again was my old question and I carry it with me still. Somewhere, I thought, in my childishness, there is a place between North and South, where all opposing brothers meet, where black and white meet, where black and white sheep lie down together, where St George has no enmity to the dragon and the dragon agrees to be slain.

* What happened to Esau?' I asked my mother.

She smiled as one bringing good news.

* After Jacob wrestled with the angel, Esau came to him with his arms wide and fell on his neck and kissed him.' So - the wheel had turned. The story had run its full course, through discord to harmony, through conflict to Happy Ever After.

‘O my shadow, I said to myself, I will not let thee go except thou bless me'

First published in The New York Times: 1965.

Melchisedec, King of Salem

Hebrews Chapter 7

1 For this Melchisedec, King of Salem, Priest of The Most-High God, who met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings, and blessed him;

2 To whom also Abraham gave a tenth part of all; first being by interpretation King of righteousness, and after that also King of Salem, which is, King of peace;

3 Without father, without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of days, nor end of life; but made like unto the Son of God; abideth a priest continually.

4 Now consider how great this man was, unto whom even the patriarch Abraham gave the tenth of the spoils.

5 And verily they that are of the sons of Levi, who receive the office of the priesthood, have a commandment to take tithes of the people according to the law, that is, of their brethren, though they come out of the loins of Abraham:

6 But he whose descent is not counted from them received tithes of Abraham, and blessed him that had the promises.

7 And without all contradiction the less is blessed of the better.

8 And here men that die receive tithes; but there he receiveth them, of whom it is witnessed that he liveth.

9 And as I may so say, Levi also, who receiveth tithes, payed tithes in Abraham.

10 For he was yet in the loins of his father, when Melchisedec met him.

11 If therefore perfection were by the Levitical priesthood, (for under it the people received The Law,) what further need was there that another Priest should rise after The Order of Melchisedec, and not be called after the order of Aaron?

12 For The Priesthood being changed, there is made of necessity a change also of The Law.

13 For he of whom these things are spoken pertaineth to another tribe, of which no man gave attendance at the altar.

14 For it is evident that our Lord sprang out of Juda; of which tribe Moses spake nothing concerning priesthood.

15 And it is yet far more evident: for that after the similitude of Melchisedec there ariseth another Priest,

16 Who is made, not after the law of a carnal commandment, but after the power of an endless life.

17 For he testifieth, Thou art a priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec.

18 For there is verily a disannulling of the commandment going before for the weakness and unprofitableness thereof.

19 For the law made nothing perfect, but the bringing in of a better hope did; by the which we draw nigh unto God.

20 And inasmuch as not without an oath he was made priest:

21 (For those priests were made without an oath; but this with an oath by him that said unto him, The Lord sware and will not repent, Thou art a priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec:)

22 By so much was Jesus made a surety of a better testament.

23 And they truly were many priests, because they were not suffered to continue by reason of death:

24 But this man, because he continueth ever, hath an unchangeable priesthood.

25 Wherefore he is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make intercession for them.

26 For such an high priest became us, who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens;

27 Who needeth not daily, as those high priests, to offer up sacrifice, first for his own sins, and then for the people's: for this he did once, when he offered up himself.

28 For the law maketh men high priests which have infirmity; but the word of the oath, which was since the law, maketh the Son, who is consecrated for evermore.

Page 2 of 7

1 Now of the things which we have spoken this is the sum: We have such an high priest, who is set on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens;

2 A minister of the sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man.

3 For every high priest is ordained to offer gifts and sacrifices: wherefore it is of necessity that this man have somewhat also to offer.

4 For if he were on earth, he should not be a priest, seeing that there are priests that offer gifts according to the law:

5 Who serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things, as Moses was admonished of God when he was about to make the tabernacle: for, See, saith he, thatthou make all things according to the pattern shewed to thee in the mount.

6 But now hath he obtained a more excellent ministry, by how much also he is the mediator of a better covenant, which was established upon better promises.

7 For if that first covenant had been faultless, then should no place have been sought for the second.

8 For finding fault with them, he saith, Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah:

9 Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt; because they continued not in my covenant, and I regarded them not, saith the Lord.

10 For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people:

11 And they shall not teach every man his neighbour, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for all shall know me, from the least to the greatest.

12 For I will be merciful to their unrighteousness, and their sins and their iniquities will I remember no more.

13 In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away.

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1 Then verily the first covenant had also ordinances of divine service, and a worldly sanctuary.

2 For there was a tabernacle made; the first, wherein was the candlestick, and the table, and the shewbread; which is called the sanctuary.

3 And after the second veil, the tabernacle which is called the Holiest of all;

4 Which had the golden censer, and the ark of the covenant overlaid round about with gold, wherein was the golden pot that had manna, and Aaron's rod that budded, and the tables of the covenant;

5 And over it the cherubims of glory shadowing the mercyseat; of which we cannot now speak particularly.

6 Now when these things were thus ordained, the priests went always into the first tabernacle, accomplishing the service of God.

7 But into the second went the high priest alone once every year, not without blood, which he offered for himself, and for the errors of the people:

8 The Holy Ghost this signifying, that the way into the holiest of all was not yet made manifest, while as the first tabernacle was yet standing:

9 Which was a figure for the time then present, in which were offered both gifts and sacrifices, that could not make him that did the service perfect, as pertaining to the conscience;

10 Which stood only in meats and drinks, and divers washings, and carnal ordinances, imposed on them until the time of reformation.

11 But Christ being come an high priest of good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this building;

12 Neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us.

13 For if the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh:

14 How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God?

15 And for this cause he is the mediator of the new testament, that by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the first testament, they which are called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance.

16 For where a testament is, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator.

17 For a testament is of force after men are dead: otherwise it is of no strength at all while the testator liveth.

18 Whereupon neither the first testament was dedicated without blood.

19 For when Moses had spoken every precept to all the people according to the law, he took the blood of calves and of goats, with water, and scarlet wool, and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book, and all the people,

20 Saying, This is the blood of the testament which God hath enjoined unto you.

21 Moreover he sprinkled with blood both the tabernacle, and all the vessels of the ministry.

22 And almost all things are by the law purged with blood; and without shedding of blood is no remission.

23 It was therefore necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified with these; but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these.

24 For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the true; but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us:

25 Nor yet that he should offer himself often, as the high priest entereth into the holy place every year with blood of others;

26 For then must he often have suffered since the foundation of the world: but now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.

27 And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment:

28 So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation.

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1 For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very image of the things, can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect.

2 For then would they not have ceased to be offered? because that the worshippers once purged should have had no more conscience of sins.

3 But in those sacrifices there is a remembrance again made of sins every year.

4 For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and of goats should take away sins.

5 Wherefore when he cometh into the world, he saith, Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me:

6 In burnt offerings and sacrificesfor sin thou hast had no pleasure.

7 Then said I, Lo, I come (in the volume of the book it is written of me,) to do thy will, O God.

8 Above when he said, Sacrifice and offering and burnt offerings and offering for sin thou wouldest not, neither hadst pleasure therein; which are offered by the law;

9 Then said he, Lo, I come to do thy will, O God. He taketh away the first, that he may establish the second.

10 By the which will we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

11 And every priest standeth daily ministering and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins:

12 But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat down on the right hand of God;

13 From henceforth expecting till his enemies be made his footstool.

14 For by one offering he hath perfected for ever them that are sanctified.

15 Whereof the Holy Ghost also is a witness to us: for after that he had said before,

16 This is the covenant that I will make with them after those days, saith the Lord, I will put my laws into their hearts, and in their minds will I write them;

17 And their sins and iniquities will I remember no more.

18 Now where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin.

19 Having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus,

20 By a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for us, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh;

21 And having an high priest over the house of God;

22 Let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, having our hearts sprinkled from an evil conscience, and our bodies washed with pure water.

23 Let us hold fast the profession of our faith without wavering; (for he is faithful that promised;)

24 And let us consider one another to provoke unto love and to good works:

25 Not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as the manner of some is; but exhorting one another: and so much the more, as ye see the day approaching.

26 For if we sin wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth no more sacrifice for sins,

27 But a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries.

28 He that despised Moses' law died without mercy under two or three witnesses:

29 Of how much sorer punishment, suppose ye, shall he be thought worthy, who hath trodden under foot the Son of God, and hath counted the blood of the covenant, wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and hath done despite unto the Spirit of grace?

30 For we know him that hath said, Vengeance belongeth unto me, I will recompense, saith the Lord. And again, The Lord shall judge his people.

31 It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

32 But call to remembrance the former days, in which, after ye were illuminated, ye endured a great fight of afflictions;

33 Partly, whilst ye were made a gazingstock both by reproaches and afflictions; and partly, whilst ye became companions of them that were so used.

34 For ye had compassion of me in my bonds, and took joyfully the spoiling of your goods, knowing in yourselves that ye have in heaven a better and an enduring substance.

35 Cast not away therefore your confidence, which hath great recompence of reward.

36 For ye have need of patience, that, after ye have done the will of God, ye might receive the promise.

37 For yet a little while, and he that shall come will come, and will not tarry.

38 Now the just shall live by faith: but if any man draw back, my soul shall have no pleasure in him.

39 But we are not of them who draw back unto perdition; but of them that believe to the saving of the soul.

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1 Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.

2 For by it the elders obtained a good report.

3 Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.

4 By faith Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain, by which he obtained witness that he was righteous, God testifying of his gifts: and by it he being dead yet speaketh.

5 By faith Enoch was translated that he should not see death; and was not found, because God had translated him: for before his translation he had this testimony, that he pleased God.

6 But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him.

7 By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house; by the which he condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith.

8 By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went.

9 By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise:

10 For he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God.

11 Through faith also Sara herself received strength to conceive seed, and was delivered of a child when she was past age, because she judged him faithful who had promised.

12 Therefore sprang there even of one, and him as good as dead, so many as the stars of the sky in multitude, and as the sand which is by the sea shore innumerable.

13 These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.

14 For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a country.

15 And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned.

16 But now they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for he hath prepared for them a city.

17 By faith Abraham, when he was tried, offered up Isaac: and he that had received the promises offered up his only begotten son,

18 Of whom it was said, That in Isaac shall thy seed be called:

19 Accounting that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead; from whence also he received him in a figure.

20 By faith Isaac blessed Jacob and Esau concerning things to come.

21 By faith Jacob, when he was a dying, blessed both the sons of Joseph; and worshipped, leaningupon the top of his staff.

22 By faith Joseph, when he died, made mention of the departing of the children of Israel; and gave commandment concerning his bones.

23 By faith Moses, when he was born, was hid three months of his parents, because they saw he wasa proper child; and they were not afraid of the king's commandment.

24 By faith Moses, when he was come to years, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh's daughter;

25 Choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God, than to enjoy the pleasures of sin for a season;

26 Esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt: for he had respect unto the recompence of the reward.

27 By faith he forsook Egypt, not fearing the wrath of the king: for he endured, as seeing him who is invisible.

28 Through faith he kept the passover, and the sprinkling of blood, lest he that destroyed the firstborn should touch them.

29 By faith they passed through the Red sea as by dry land: which the Egyptians assaying to do were drowned.

30 By faith the walls of Jericho fell down, after they were compassed about seven days.

31 By faith the harlot Rahab perished not with them that believed not, when she had received the spies with peace.

32 And what shall I more say? for the time would fail me to tell of Gedeon, and of Barak, and ofSamson, and of Jephthae; of David also, and Samuel, and of the prophets:

33 Who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions,

34 Quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the aliens.

35 Women received their dead raised to life again: and others were tortured, not accepting deliverance; that they might obtain a better resurrection:

36 And others had trial of cruelmockings and scourgings, yea, moreover of bonds and imprisonment:

37 They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword: they wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented;

38 (Of whom the world was not worthy:) they wandered in deserts, and in mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.

39 And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise:

40 God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect.

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1 Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us,

2 Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.

3 For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds.

4 Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin.

5 And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him:

6 For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth.

7 If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not?

8 But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons.

9 Furthermore we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence: shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and live?

10 For they verily for a few days chastened us after their own pleasure; but he for our profit, that we might be partakers of his holiness.

11 Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby.

12 Wherefore lift up the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees;

13 And make straight paths for your feet, lest that which is lame be turned out of the way; but let it rather be healed.

14 Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord:

15 Looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled;

16 Lest there be any fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright.

17 For ye know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected: for he found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears.

18 For ye are not come unto the mount that might be touched, and that burned with fire, nor unto blackness, and darkness, and tempest,

19 And the sound of a trumpet, and the voice of words; which voicethey that heard intreated that the word should not be spoken to them any more:

20 (For they could not endure that which was commanded, And if so much as a beast touch the mountain, it shall be stoned, or thrust through with a dart:

21 And so terrible was the sight, that Moses said, I exceedingly fear and quake:)

22 But ye are come unto mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels,

23 To the general assembly and church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect,

24 And to Jesus the mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling, that speaketh better things than that of Abel.

25 See that ye refuse not him that speaketh. For if they escaped not who refused him that spake on earth, much more shall not we escape, if we turn away from him that speaketh from heaven:

26 Whose voice then shook the earth: but now he hath promised, saying, Yet once more I shake not the earth only, but also heaven.

27 And this word, Yet once more, signifieth the removing of those things that are shaken, as of things that are made, that those things which cannot be shaken may remain.

28 Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear:

29 For our God is a consuming fire.

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1 Let brotherly love continue.

2 Be not forgetful to entertain strangers: for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.

3 Remember them that are in bonds, as bound with them; andthem which suffer adversity, as being yourselves also in the body.

4 Marriage is honourable in all, and the bed undefiled: but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge.

5 Let your conversation be without covetousness; and be content with such things as ye have: for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.

6 So that we may boldly say, The Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me.

7 Remember them which have the rule over you, who have spoken unto you the word of God: whose faith follow, considering the end of their conversation.

8 Jesus Christ the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever.

9 Be not carried about with divers and strange doctrines. For it is a good thing that the heart be established with grace; not with meats, which have not profited them that have been occupied therein.

10 We have an altar, whereof they have no right to eat which serve the tabernacle.

11 For the bodies of those beasts, whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest for sin, are burned without the camp.

12 Wherefore Jesus also, that he might sanctify the people with his own blood, suffered without the gate.

13 Let us go forth therefore unto him without the camp, bearing his reproach.

14 For here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to come.

15 By him therefore let us offer the sacrifice of praise to God continually, that is, the fruit of ourlips giving thanks to his name.

16 But to do good and to communicate forget not: for with such sacrifices God is well pleased.

17 Obey them that have the rule over you, and submit yourselves: for they watch for your souls, as they that must give account, that they may do it with joy, and not with grief: for that is unprofitable for you.

18 Pray for us: for we trust we have a good conscience, in all things willing to live honestly.

19 But I beseech you the rather to do this, that I may be restored to you the sooner.

20 Now the God of peace, that brought again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great shepherd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting covenant,

21 Make you perfect in every good work to do his will, working in you that which is wellpleasing in his sight, through Jesus Christ; to whom be glory for ever and ever. Amen.

22 And I beseech you, brethren, suffer the word of exhortation: for I have written a letter unto you in few words.

23 Know ye that our brother Timothy is set at liberty; with whom, if he come shortly, I will see you.

24 Salute all them that have the rule over you, and all the saints. They of Italy salute you.

25 Grace be with you all. Amen. (Written to the Hebrews from Italy, by Timothy.)