New Covenant

New Covenant [Heb. berit khadashah; Grk. kainē diathēkē]. Covenant announced by the prophet Jeremiah (31:31-34), and initiated by Jesus (Luke 22:20).

The OT abounds in covenants of various types, between peoples, families, and human beings, but especially between God and His people Israel. This abundance is telling. It is due to sin that undermines any covenant. It implies that it is often broken, it becomes ineffective and must be therefore renewed. Thus, King Josiah "made a covenant before the LORD, to follow the LORD and to keep His commandments and His testimonies and His statutes, with all his heart and all his soul, to perform the words of this covenant that were written in this book. The people took a stand for the covenant" (2 Kgs 23:3). But the prophet Jeremiah describes the unfaithful people as a "harlot with many lovers" (Jer 3:1) who "has not turned to [God] with her whole heart, but in pretense" (Jer 3:10). The Lord sent all His servants the prophets, but they "have not listened nor inclined [their] ear to hear" (Jer 25:4; cf. 37:2). Since the people did not regard God, He also did not regard them. So the Lord called in "Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon, My servant" (Jer 25:9) against the land. In this disastrous situation, the Lord makes His voice heard again, through the prophet. In what is called the "book of consolation," Jeremiah gives a series of oracles that describes a wonderful future for the people (cf. Jer 31:31). It is in this context that the promise of the new covenant is set (Jer 31:31-34).
In the OT, the expression "new covenant" features only in Jeremiah. The Lord emphasizes its difference from the Sinaitic covenant: it is "not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to lead them out of the land of Egypt" (Exod 24:32; Jer 31:32). However, bits and pieces of this new covenant are scattered throughout prophetic books, emphasizing the continuity between the different covenants. Isaiah, for example, announces that "the former things have come to pass" in favor of "new things" (Isa 42:9). The Lord announces, "I will do a new thing" (Isa 43:19). He promises the people: "I have blotted out, like a thick cloud, your transgressions, and like a cloud, your sins" (Isa 44:22). "Laws will be written in the hearts of people" (Isa 51:7). "A perpetual covenant will be made" (Isa 55:3). Through the prophet Ezekiel, the Lord also announces, "I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; I will take the heart of stone out of your flesh and give you a heart of flesh" (Ezek 36:26).
The first characteristic of the new covenant in Jeremiah 31 is seen in the accumulation of the verb "I will," which occurs five times in all. This is a response to the pretentious commitment of the Israelites at Sinai, "We will do," but which they could not keep (Exod 24:7). The Lord is at the center of this new covenant, which in itself is enough to guarantee its continuity. Through a process of interiorization, the law is now written in minds and hearts. The link with the people is reaffirmed: He is their God; they are His people. The covenant is no longer exclusive. All will know the Lord, whether they are of Israel or Judah, or beyond. Finally, and most importantly, this covenant does not point to the performance, the good deeds, or the works of the people. Iniquity is included in the covenant because it is part of the human lot. Therefore, the Lord's response is not to record iniquity. In this new covenant, God asserts Himself as the God of grace, resolutely. This disposition is manifested in forgiveness, that is, in forgetting one's faults. Because God is the guarantor of this covenant based on His forgetting human faults, it cannot fail. There will be no other covenant. This is undoubtedly why the OT speaks not only of a new covenant but of the "everlasting covenant" (cf. Isa 55:3; Ezek 16:60). This is the covenant that the Messiah will "confirm . . . with many" (Dan 9:27).
This new covenant is introduced by the typical expression "behold, the days are coming" (Jer 31: 31), which functions as a warning. The prophet announces this covenant, and at the same time underlines its special time frame. The new covenant is, as it were, on hold, but not yet manifested until it is fully and definitively established. In Second Temple Judaism, the Essene community claimed to be the people of the covenant (1QS 1:8). To enter the community was to enter the covenant (CD 2:2). Each year, the community gathered to celebrate the renewal of the covenant (1QS 1:16-2:25). For the Essenes, this renewed covenant was not a new one but the renewal of the commitment to the Torah.
In the NT, the expression "new covenant" first appears in the account of the Lord's Supper's institution (Luke 22:20; 1 Cor 11:25). Paul refers to what was handed down to him by the Lord Himself. In these texts, it is not the terms of the covenant—the conditions imposed on the people—that are emphasized. "This cup is the new covenant in my [Jesus'] blood" (1 Cor 11:25). This statement points clearly to the conditions of the inauguration of this new covenant, i.e., the death of Jesus. In the communion, the church proclaims the death of Jesus, until His return (1 Cor 11:26). With this new covenant, now the days of salvation through Jesus Christ have come.
In 2 Corinthians 3:6 Paul contrasts the covenant of the letter, which kills, with the new covenant of the Holy Spirit, which gives life. His ministry is therefore to proclaim that Christ Jesus is the Lord (2 Cor 4:5).
It is especially the sermon to the Hebrews that takes up and develops the theme of the new covenant. It does so first by an in extenso reiteration of Jeremiah 31:31-34, the longest quotation from the OT in the NT (Heb 8:7-12). But curiously, from this long quote, the text retains only the adjective "new" which asserts that the first covenant is obsolete, growing old, and will soon disappear (8:13). Later, in chapter 10, Hebrews repeats the quotation in abbreviated form, emphasizing that the new covenant is characterized by the Lord who will never remember sins and lawless deeds again (10:17). This theme of forgetting echoes the ritual of the Day of Atonement, mentioned in 10:3. According to Hebrews, in this ceremonial, there was a reminder (Grk. anamnēsis) of sin year after year. But in the new covenant, God's forgetting (10:17; Grk. mnēsthēsomai) makes any sacrifice for sin obsolete: "There is no longer any offering for sin" (10:18). Assuredly, this new covenant is a better one (Heb 8:6), the final one, after which there cannot be any other covenants.
Between these two quotations from Jeremiah, in 9:15-22, the sermon to the Hebrews addresses the theme of the covenant by using the more common meaning of the Greek word diathēkē, translated as testament (or will) as in Galatians 3:15-17. Salvation is compared to an inheritance, which can only be acquired on the condition that the death of the testator is established: "Where there is a testament, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator" (9:16). The superiority of the new covenant is therefore based on the fact that Christ is the guarantee (7:22), the mediator (8:6), and the testator (Grk. diathemenos). The Sinai covenant was inaugurated by the shedding of blood, including the sacrificial death of an animal. Likewise, the new covenant was inaugurated by another death, the death of the testator. The sermon to the Hebrews refers to the theme of the covenant one last time (12:24), giving it an unusual qualifier (Grk. nea) to emphasize its unique novelty. The blood of the new covenant conveys a better message (Heb 12:24).
When giving a title to the NT canon, the church retained the Latin word Testamentum (translation of the Heb. berit and the Grk. diathēkē). The NT is nothing less than a powerful reminder that salvation rests on the new covenant proclaimed by Jeremiah, by which the Lord takes upon Himself—Jesus Christ—the salvation of humanity. See also Covenant; Mosaic Covenant.