but only a certain fearful expectation of judgment and a fury ¹  of fire that will consume God’s enemies. ² 

Someone who rejected the law of Moses was put to death ¹  without mercy on the testimony of two or three witnesses. ² 

See to it that no one comes short of the grace of God, that no one be like a bitter root springing up ¹  and causing trouble, and through him many become defiled.

Therefore we must be wary ¹  that, while the promise of entering his rest remains open, none of you may seem to have come short of it.

And no one assumes this honor ¹  on his own initiative, ²  but only when called to it by God, ³  as in fact Aaron was.

Endure your suffering ¹  as discipline; ²  God is treating you as sons. For what son is there that a father does not discipline?

And see to it that no one becomes ¹  an immoral or godless person like Esau, who sold his own birthright for a single meal. ² 

Instead someone testified somewhere: “What is man that you think of him ¹  or the son of man that you care for him?

But exhort one another each day, as long as it is called “Today,” that none of you may become hardened by sin’s deception.

Thus we must make every effort to enter that rest, so that no one may fall by following the same pattern of disobedience.

So if perfection had in fact been possible through the Levitical priesthood – for on that basis ¹  the people received the law – what further need would there have been for another priest to arise, said to be in the order of Melchizedek and not in Aaron’s order?