Priest

A priest, in Scripture, is a person set apart to stand between God and a community — representing God to the people and the people before God — chiefly through sacrifice, purification, and teaching. The Hebrew word is kohen and the Greek hiereus, both used consistently for this mediatorial office (established linguistic fact). In Israel's law and narrative the office is hereditary and tied to the sanctuary and its sacrifices; the New Testament assumes that framework even where it argues about it.

The sacrificial character of the office is stated most compactly in Hebrews 9:22: "According to the law, nearly everything is cleansed with blood, and apart from shedding of blood there is no remission." What the priest does, on this account, is inseparable from blood and cleansing. Acts 5:31 describes God exalting Jesus "with his right hand to be a Prince and a Savior, to give repentance to Israel, and remission of sins" — the giving of forgiveness, which is the priestly function in its most concentrated form.

Scripture also speaks of priesthood as a calling of an entire people, not only of a class within it. At Sinai God says of the whole nation, "you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation" (Exodus 19:6). 1 Peter 2:9 applies the same language to the church: "you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God's own possession, that you may proclaim the excellence of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light." Revelation 1:6 and 5:10 likewise describe the redeemed as "priests to his God and Father" who will reign on the earth. Both strands — an appointed priesthood and a corporate priestly identity — are present in the biblical text.

Christian traditions read the relationship between these two strands differently. Catholic and Orthodox teaching holds that a distinct ordained priesthood, conferred sacramentally and standing in a line of ministerial succession, continues the biblical priesthood alongside the common priesthood of all the baptized, and understands the Eucharist as a sacrificial act. Reformation traditions emphasize the priesthood of all believers and generally describe ordained ministers as ministers of the Word and sacraments rather than as sacrificing priests, though Lutheran and Anglican positions occupy intermediate ground and differ among themselves. Nearly all traditions agree that the royal priesthood of 1 Peter 2:9 and Revelation 1:6 belongs to the whole people of God; the disagreement concerns whether a separate ordained priesthood is a legitimate continuation of the scriptural office or a later development.

AI-generated reference entry, grounded in the passages where this term appears — history and Scripture stated as such, interpretation labeled as interpretation. Not a substitute for the text itself.