Leviticus 16--The Day of Atonement

Leviticus 16
English Standard Version

The Day of Atonement
16 The Lord spoke to Moses after the death of the two sons of Aaron, when they drew near before the Lord and died, 2 and the Lord said to Moses, “Tell Aaron your brother not to come at any time into the Holy Place inside the veil, before the mercy seat that is on the ark, so that he may not die. For I will appear in the cloud over the mercy seat. 3 But in this way Aaron shall come into the Holy Place: with a bull from the herd for a sin offering and a ram for a burnt offering. 4 He shall put on the holy linen coat and shall have the linen undergarment on his body, and he shall tie the linen sash around his waist, and wear the linen turban; these are the holy garments. He shall bathe his body in water and then put them on. 5 And he shall take from the congregation of the people of Israel two male goats for a sin offering, and one ram for a burnt offering.

6 “Aaron shall offer the bull as a sin offering for himself and shall make atonement for himself and for his house. 7 Then he shall take the two goats and set them before the Lord at the entrance of the tent of meeting. 8 And Aaron shall cast lots over the two goats, one lot for the Lord and the other lot for Azazel. 9 And Aaron shall present the goat on which the lot fell for the Lord and use it as a sin offering, 10 but the goat on which the lot fell for Azazel shall be presented alive before the Lord to make atonement over it, that it may be sent away into the wilderness to Azazel.

11 “Aaron shall present the bull as a sin offering for himself, and shall make atonement for himself and for his house. He shall kill the bull as a sin offering for himself. 12 And he shall take a censer full of coals of fire from the altar before the Lord, and two handfuls of sweet incense beaten small, and he shall bring it inside the veil 13 and put the incense on the fire before the Lord, that the cloud of the incense may cover the mercy seat that is over the testimony, so that he does not die. 14 And he shall take some of the blood of the bull and sprinkle it with his finger on the front of the mercy seat on the east side, and in front of the mercy seat he shall sprinkle some of the blood with his finger seven times.

15 “Then he shall kill the goat of the sin offering that is for the people and bring its blood inside the veil and do with its blood as he did with the blood of the bull, sprinkling it over the mercy seat and in front of the mercy seat. 16 Thus he shall make atonement for the Holy Place, because of the uncleannesses of the people of Israel and because of their transgressions, all their sins. And so he shall do for the tent of meeting, which dwells with them in the midst of their uncleannesses. 17 No one may be in the tent of meeting from the time he enters to make atonement in the Holy Place until he comes out and has made atonement for himself and for his house and for all the assembly of Israel. 18 Then he shall go out to the altar that is before the Lord and make atonement for it, and shall take some of the blood of the bull and some of the blood of the goat, and put it on the horns of the altar all around. 19 And he shall sprinkle some of the blood on it with his finger seven times, and cleanse it and consecrate it from the uncleannesses of the people of Israel.

20 “And when he has made an end of atoning for the Holy Place and the tent of meeting and the altar, he shall present the live goat. 21 And Aaron shall lay both his hands on the head of the live goat, and confess over it all the iniquities of the people of Israel, and all their transgressions, all their sins. And he shall put them on the head of the goat and send it away into the wilderness by the hand of a man who is in readiness. 22 The goat shall bear all their iniquities on itself to a remote area, and he shall let the goat go free in the wilderness.

23 “Then Aaron shall come into the tent of meeting and shall take off the linen garments that he put on when he went into the Holy Place and shall leave them there. 24 And he shall bathe his body in water in a holy place and put on his garments and come out and offer his burnt offering and the burnt offering of the people and make atonement for himself and for the people. 25 And the fat of the sin offering he shall burn on the altar. 26 And he who lets the goat go to Azazel shall wash his clothes and bathe his body in water, and afterward he may come into the camp. 27 And the bull for the sin offering and the goat for the sin offering, whose blood was brought in to make atonement in the Holy Place, shall be carried outside the camp. Their skin and their flesh and their dung shall be burned up with fire. 28 And he who burns them shall wash his clothes and bathe his body in water, and afterward he may come into the camp.

​29 “And it shall be a statute to you forever that in the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, you shall afflict yourselves and shall do no work, either the native or the stranger who sojourns among you. 30 For on this day shall atonement be made for you to cleanse you. You shall be clean before the Lord from all your sins. 31 It is a Sabbath of solemn rest to you, and you shall afflict yourselves; it is a statute forever. 32 And the priest who is anointed and consecrated as priest in his father's place shall make atonement, wearing the holy linen garments. 33 He shall make atonement for the holy sanctuary, and he shall make atonement for the tent of meeting and for the altar, and he shall make atonement for the priests and for all the people of the assembly. 34 And this shall be a statute forever for you, that atonement may be made for the people of Israel once in the year because of all their sins.” And Aaron did as the Lord commanded Moses.

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This is such a powerful foreshadowing of everything that was going to be happening at the cross of Christ!  It is one of my favorite reasons to study and teach Leviticus because studying this passage alone shows us that God has always been about pointing people to the cross and that it has been His plan from the beginning.  Much like when we studied the story of Abraham and Isaac on Mount Moriah when we studied Genesis and how that story of substitutionary atonement was integral to the giving and renew of the Abrahamic Covenant, this high holy day for the nation of Israel was a day, along with Passover, kept their minds focused on the need for a better sacrifice, substitutionary atonement, and redemption.

As mentioned yesterday, we're going to see where the term "scapegoat" came from as we study this passage today and we'll discuss how Jesus was both the scapegoat and the lamb that was slain for us.  As for something we'll see that is different here, the high priest here could not make atonement for the people until he had first made atonement for himself (and all the sin of the congregation that he had taken upon himself by eating of His portion of the sacrifices).  While it is similar that Jesus took the sin of not just the nation of Israel, but the whole world upon Himself at the cross, He had no sin of His own to atone for first.  If that was the case, then He could not be our penal substitutionary atonement.  This is why Moses could not die for his people so that they would be saved when they sinned against God, because Moses had his own sin to pay for.

​This was the one and only day when anyone was allowed to go into the Most Holy Place or Holy of Holies (some translations say different things here).  No one other than the high priest could enter and only by way of the blood.  There were also special garments for the high priest to wear this day.  Normally the priests would wear a robe that were a dark color (I think it was a shade of blue) that would hide the blood stains fairly well--they would be seen, but were not nearly as visible as they were against the white robes that the high priest wore on this day.  By the time he was done with all of the sacrifices, he would be covered, head-to-toe, in blood.

The priest would first offer for himself first a bull as a sin offering and a ram as a burnt offering.  After he had made atonement for himself, he would put on the white linen garments (showing that positionally before God, he was pure and righteous)--we too will receive white robes like this one day when we are dressed in the righteousness of Christ in heaven and they too will be "washed in the blood of the Lamb" so that we too are going to look very much like this high priest at the time that He is finished, covered in the blood of the Lamb.  These garments should also remind us of the way that Jesus is described in the book of Daniel and the book of Revelation--though we talked about that in the book of Exodus and I posted pictures for that, so I won't go into that much detail here again.  Today, I'm going to focus more on the sacrifices and how Jesus fulfilled them all.  And Aaron was supposed to be washed and made clean before putting on these garments.  That seems to be an "afterthought" here, but it was very important as we've studied here in Leviticus that everything is about cleanliness and holiness and might be where some people mistakenly get the idea that "cleanliness is next to godliness" is something the Bible teaches.  That's not directly in the Bible, but we do see that we do need to be made "clean" before approaching God due to His holiness, but never is taking a bath enough to make us clean because it is the inside of man that is the true issue and not the dirt that is on the outside--the only thing that can deal with the issue of our sinful hearts is the death of a substitutionary atonement--just like God did in the Garden of Eden when he covered Adam and Eve with animal skins after their sin to show them that the wages of sin is death, and when He did so again by the death of His own Son, Jesus, on the cross.

In addition to the sin offering and burnt offering that Aaron made for himself, he was to take two male goats and one ram (a male sheep) so that he could make atonement for the congregation.  The two male goats are extremely important here.  Lots were cast (a way to determine the will of the LORD in the Old Testament, usually using the white and black stones that were part of the breastplate of the priests that we discussed when we studied the priestly garments in the book of Exodus).  One of the lots would fall to the LORD (probably the white stone) and the other for Azazel (while the meaning of this is unclear, one possible translation would be "the strength of God," probably referring to His judgment or wrath.  While I honestly don't know the meaning it makes the most sense to me that one one lot fell towards atonement while the other fell towards wrath and that both needed to be satisfied, so that is how I will translate this today).  The one on which the lot to Azazel fell would become the "scapegoat" I mentioned earlier.  The one one which the lot fell to be for the LORD was killed as a sin offering for the people and the nation, but the one on which the lot fell the Azazel would be kept alive and the hands of the priest would be laid on it to transfer the sins of the people which he had taken upon himself to lay them on the scapegoat so that the scapegoat would carry away the sins of the nation.  The people would tie a bell around the neck of such a scapegoat so they would know to say away from it, because it was carrying the sins of the people and was marked for the wrath of God as there can be no forgiveness of sins without the wrath of God being satisficed as well.  We see at the cross that Jesus took the wrath that we deserved so that by His blood we could receive atonement, the forgiveness of sin, and the mercy and grace that we don't deserve.  This goat that we call the "scapegoat" was driven off away from the people into the wilderness to suffer and die alone.

While we've already talked about it a bit, it is now time for Aaron to make atonement for himself and his family with the bull that was given as a sin offering.  His sin and the sin of his family must be dealt with before Aaron (or the high priest that served in Aaron's place) could enter the Most Holy place.  He will take some of the coals from the altar so that these coals that are covered in the blood here will be the source of heat that will burn the incense that will represent the prayers of the people and make them a pleasing aroma to the LORD, but this cloud of incense also offered a barrier between God and man so as to not fully look on the holiness of God--while Aaron was going to go behind the veil, he was still not going to be able to fully see God and needed the incense to burn to created a cloud of covering (again, there's the idea of atonement again) so that the LORD would not "see" his imperfection, so we've come to God so far through laying our sins on a scapegoat, having a sin offering made for us personally and corporately, being dressed in the white garments that represent the righteousness that God clothes us in, being covered in the blood of those sacrifice, and by the holiness of God being covered by the sweet incense and the blood of the sacrifice being sprinkled on the Mercy Seat of the Ark of the Covenant.

This is the only time that a blood sacrifice to to be made anywhere inside the Tabernacle.  The last remaining sacrifice to be made that day--the ram (a male "lamb" that represents The Lamb of God) would be killed behind the veil--representing that this is actually something that takes place in heaven in the very presence of God.  We are told in the New Testament that Jesus is the Lamb that was slain from before the foundations of the world, and we see in Isaiah 53 that it pleased the Father to "bruise" or "crush" the Son (again, depending on translation).  We have already seen this in the picture of Mount Moriah, but it is the father (Abraham, representative of God the Father) that raises the knife to slay the son of the promise (Isaac, representative of Jesus) and the son laid his life down willingly and no one took it from him, though it is also true that there was another who raised the knife to slay him, and we see the substitutionary atonement made in that case too where there was a ram in the thicket (see how there is also a ram offered here?  I don't think that's an accident!)  The ram is killed here in the presence of the LORD and its blood is sprinkled on the Mercy Seat, but the purpose of this offering is to cleanse the Holy Place which not only represents heaven, but also represents the "throne room" of every person (the "heart" as we like to say).  What good does it do to clean the outside of the cup of the inside is dirty?  It is the heart of man that needs cleansing so that God can dwell there within us as He did in the Ark of the Covenant through as we remember His Law (the stone tablets), His provision (an omer of manna), and His miracles, signs and wonders (the budding rod of Aaron)--especially the one of making that which was dead alive, but also a remembrance of all the ways in which He led us out of our slavery and redeemed us through His power..  These things are kept deep in our hearts in the Most Holy Place that no one has access--at least, not until Jesus' death on the cross tore the veil from top to bottom and then not only did the separation between God and man no longer exist, but these things that we simply treasured in our hearts were now on full display and fully accessible to anyone who had permission to enter the Holy Place--any of the priests.  Everyone who is in Christ and part of His royal priesthood now understands these things, but the world still does not fully understand them.

No one was to go into the Tabernacle during this special time that Aaron was making atonement for himself and for the people.  There was fear that the high priest might mess something up and that he would be impure and that God would kill him, so they would listen for the bells that were woven into his garment to be sure that he was still moving and ministering to the LORD and they would tie a rope around him so that if he should stop moving and die in the Most Holy Place that they could pull him out without violating the sanctity of the Most Holy Place.  When Aaron would come out from making atonement here he would be in full view of the people and his white robes would be covered in blood from top to bottom.  He would then lay the sins of himself and the people on the scapegoat, which was to be driven away into the wilderness by a man that we ready to do so.

It's hard to follow the process here as the instructions are kind of given in s circular manner but it seems like there is process of selection, then time of preparation and cleansing when Aaron puts on the white garments, then there is a bull that is killed for the high priest and his family and a goat that is killed for the sins of the rest of the congregation.  Then incense is offered as Aaron takes the blood of the bull and the living ram into the Most Holy place and he makes atonement for Tabernacle, specifically the Most Holy Place, himself, his family and the nation by sprinkling the blood of the bull and and blood of the ram on the Mercy Seat of the Ark of the Covenant.  After this, he lays his hands on the scapegoat that was chosen by lot and it is driven into the wilderness.  We have looked at each of these parts individually and seen how Christ fulfilled all of these sacrifices in and of Himself at the cross, and He is also our Great High Priest that is in heaven right now making atonement before the throne of God (see the book of Hebrews), but unlike the high priest here who had to come back year after year and many bulls and goats and rams needed to be killed, Jesus offered Himself one time as the propitiation our sins (the satisfaction of the price that was required and the satisfaction of the wrath of God).

After this Aaron would bathe and put on his regular priestly garments and offer the burnt offerings according to the Law and the carcasses of the sin offerings that were offered earlier would be disposed of according to the Law, and the process of making atonement for the people on a day-by-day, hour-by-hour basis as required by the Law would start all over again.  The man who was responsible for driving the goat out into the wilderness would also be unclean and would have to bathe and change his clothes as would the person who went outside the camp to burn the carcasses of the sin offerings.

This was a high holy day where no one--not even the strangers or foreigners among them--were allowed to do any work.  The day of atonement was a holy Sabbath day no matter what day of the week it fell on and was always to be celebrated on the 10th day of the 7th month (I think celebrating it in the seventh month, exactly seven months after they celebrate the Passover--celebrated on the 10th day of the 1st month--was probably significant because seven is a number representing the holiness of God in to the Jewish people).  This was the only time we see it said that atonement was made this special day for ALL the sins of the people--even their intentional sins.  While this event had to happen annually, I think it is important to remember that Jesus came to deal with all of our sins, not just the little sins, not just the big sins, but all of them--even the ones that we don't know that we commit and had been yet to be confessed.  "Jesus paid it all, all to Him I owe.  Sin had left a crimson stain, He washed it white as snow."