Hebrews 8:10
Hebrews 8:1010For this is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the Lord. I will put My laws in their minds and inscribe them on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they will be My people.
Jehovah's Witnesses teach that the new covenant described in applies only to "spiritual Israel" — the 144,000 anointed class. The promise that God will put his laws in their minds and write them on their hearts is restricted to those with a heavenly calling. The great crowd of "other sheep" are not parties to this covenant; they merely benefit indirectly by associating with the anointed remnant. This reading supports the Watchtower's restriction of the Memorial emblems to the anointed alone, since the cup represents "the new covenant in my blood" (). The organisation teaches that if you are not in the new covenant, you should not partake — resulting in 99.88% of Memorial attendees passing the bread and wine untouched.
Protestants read as the New Testament restatement of , applied to every believer without restriction. The writer of Hebrews quotes the Jeremiah passage in full, preserving the phrase "from the least of them to the greatest" (v. 11) — a phrase that explicitly rules out a two-tier system. The covenant promise is comprehensive: God writes his law on hearts, becomes their God, and makes them his people. The stated purpose of the new covenant is forgiveness of sins (v. 12), which every human being needs. If the great crowd is excluded from this covenant, they are excluded from the forgiveness it provides — an impossible position. Jesus himself said "drink from it, all of you, for this means my blood of the covenant" (), extending the covenant cup to every disciple without qualification. says Christ mediates a "better" covenant than the old one — better cannot mean more restrictive. The new covenant includes every believer who trusts in Christ, and its blessings — transformed hearts, direct knowledge of God, full forgiveness — belong to all of God's people without exception.