Heb 9:17

“For a testament is of force after men are dead,.... The necessity of Christ's death is here urged, from the nature and force of a testament or will, among men, which does not take place, and cannot be executed, till a man is dead. Otherwise it is of no strength at all whilst the testator liveth; no claim can be made by the legatees for the part they have in it, nor can any disposition be made by the executor of it; not that hereby is suggested, that the testament or will of God was uncertain and precarious till the death of Christ, and subject to change and alteration as men's wills are till they die; nor that the inheritance could not be enjoyed by the Old Testament saints; for it is certain, it was entered upon by them before the death of Christ; but the sense is, that there was a necessity of it, that the saints right unto it, upon the foot of justice, might be evident by it.”

“after--literally, "over," as we say "upon the death of the testators"; not as THOLUCK, "on the condition that slain sacrifices be there," which the Greek hardly sanctions. otherwise--"seeing that it is never availing" [ALFORD]. BENGEL and LACHMANN read with an interrogation, "Since, is it ever in force (surely not) while the testator liveth?"”