the sanctuary: the space set apart as God's own, where he is present and where worshippers are brought to him
This is the ordinary Greek word for "holy" (ἅγιος) standing on its own as the name of a place: "the holy [place]." Greek could do that with almost any adjective, and here the habit hardened into a fixed term for the sanctuary. It is usually written in the plural, closer to "the holy things," even when a single room is in view, a pattern carried over from the Greek translation of the Hebrew scriptures, where it renders the Hebrew word for holiness (קֹדֶשׁ).
Every use of the word in the New Testament falls in the letter to the Hebrews, in the long comparison between the old tent of worship and what Jesus has done. Within those few chapters the one word points at four different things:
- the outer room, where the lamp burned and the bread was set out before God
- the room behind the second curtain, entered once a year and only by the high priest
- the whole earthly structure, described as a sanctuary built by human hands
- heaven itself, the sanctuary that the earthly one was only a copy of
That range is not sloppiness. The writer is arguing that the earthly rooms were always a model of something else, so he uses one word for the model and for the reality and lets the reader feel the two slide together. The turn of the argument comes when Jesus goes in: not with the blood of animals and not year after year, but once, with his own blood, into the sanctuary that was never made by hand. What follows from that is an invitation, since the readers are told they may now walk in themselves.
The word names the holy space, not the building around it. Hebrews 8:2 sets the two side by side, calling Jesus a servant of the sanctuary and of the true tent (σκηνή), and Hebrews 9:2 uses the tent word for the structure and this word for what the structure encloses.
Nuances
Disputed
Whether τὰ ἅγια in Hebrews (esp. 9:8, 9:12, 9:25, 10:19, 13:11) designates the inner sanctuary, the Most Holy Place, or functions as a general designation for the sanctuary as a whole.
- contestedA general term for the sanctuary as such, taken over from Septuagintal usage; the plural does not single out a compartment, and the letter's typology works at the level of the sanctuary rather than its rooms.; Paul Ellingworth, The Epistle to the Hebrews (New International Greek Testament Commentary); Craig R. Koester, Hebrews (Anchor Bible 36)
- contestedThe inner sanctuary specifically. The Day of Atonement framework of Hebrews 9 requires the adyton, so the entry of Christ is presented as entry behind the curtain.; Harold W. Attridge, The Epistle to the Hebrews (Hermeneia); William L. Lane, Hebrews 9-13 (Word Biblical Commentary 47B)