Published online by Cambridge University Press: 06 September 2007
A consistent feature of the argument of Hebrews is the claim that Christ offered himself ‘once for all’, which the author develops with the qualitative distinction between the one and the many priests (7.23–28) and sacrifices (9.23–10.18). In placing this distinction of the one and the many within the metaphysical dualism of the two spheres of reality, the author reflects assumptions that are also present in the claim of both Philo and Plutarch that the deity is above the principle of multiplicity (Philo Spec. III.180; Abr. 122; Leg. II.2; Deus 82; Plutarch E. Delph. 393e).