Levitico 16:10 Commento

In this chapter we have the institution of the annual solemnity of the day of atonement, or expiation, which had as much gospel in it as perhaps any of the appointments of the ceremonial law, as appears by the reference the apostle makes to it, Heb 9:7, etc. We had before divers laws concerning sin-offerings for particular persons, and to be offered upon particular occasions; but this is concerning the stated sacrifice, in which the whole nation was interested. The whole service of the day is committed to the high priest. I. He must never come into the most holy place but upon this day (Lev 16:1, Lev 16:2). II. He must come dressed in linen garments (Lev 16:4). III. He must bring a sin-offering and a burnt-offering for himself (Lev 16:3), offer his sin-offering (Lev 16:6-11), then go within the veil with some of the blood of his sin-offering, burn incense, and sprinkle the blood before the mercy-seat (Lev 16:12-14). IV. Two goats must be provided for the people, lots cast upon them, and, 1. One of them must be a sin-offering for the people (Lev 16:5, Lev 16:7-9), and the blood of it must be sprinkled before the mercy-seat (Lev 16:15-17), and then some of the blood of both the sin-offerings must be sprinkled upon the altar (Lev 16:18, Lev 16:19). 2. The other must be a scape-goat (Lev 16:10), the sins of Israel must be confessed over him, and then he must be sent away into the wilderness (Lev 16:20-22), and he that brought him away must be ceremonially unclean (Lev 16:26). V. The burnt-offerings were then to be offered, the fat of the sin-offerings burnt on the altar, and their flesh burnt without the camp (Lev 16:23-25, Lev 16:27, Lev 16:28). VI. The people were to observe the day religiously by a holy rest and holy mourning for sin; and this was to be a statute for ever (Lev 16:29, etc.).

INTRODUCTION TO LEVITICUS 16 This chapter treats of the day of atonement, and of the rites, sacrifices, and services of it, directs when Aaron should come into the holy of holies, Lev 16:1; and in what habit he should then appear, and with what offerings both for himself, and for the people, Lev 16:3; and that having slain his own sin offering, and that for the people, he should offer incense before the mercy seat, and sprinkle that with the blood of both, Lev 16:11; and by these offerings make atonement for the holy place, the tabernacle of the congregation, and the altar, Lev 16:16; and having done this, he was to take the live goat, lay his hands on it, confess over it, and put upon it all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and then send it away by a fit man into the wilderness, Lev 16:20; upon which he was to put off his linen garments, wash his flesh, and put them on again, and offer the burnt offering for himself, and for the people, Lev 16:23; also he that let go the goat, and he that carried and burnt the sin offerings without the camp, were to wash themselves and clothes also, Lev 16:26; the observance of this day, once a year, which was on the tenth of the seventh month, as a day of affliction and atonement, was to be a statute for ever to the children of Israel, Lev 16:29.

But the goat on which the lot fell to be the scapegoat,.... Or for Azazel, of which more hereafter in the latter part of the verse: shall be presented alive before the Lord; this seems to be a second presentation; both the goats were presented before the Lord before the lots were cast, Lev 16:7; but this was afterwards, when one of the goats, according to the lot, being presented, was ordered to be killed for a sin offering, and the other according to the lot being presented alive, was ordered to remain so: to make an atonement with him; to make an atonement for the sins of the people of Israel along with the other, for they both made one sin offering, Lev 16:6; and this, though spared alive for a while, yet at length was killed; and how, the Jewish writers relate, as will be after observed: and to let him go for a scapegoat into the wilderness; or, unto Azazel into the wilderness; which, some understand of a mountain in the wilderness called Azazel, to which the Targum of Jonathan has respect, which paraphrases the word,"to send him to die in a place strong and hard, which is in the wilderness of Zuck;''and so Saadiah Gaon, Jarchi, Kimchi, and others; and one in Aben Ezra says, it was near Mount Sinai; but as it is rightly observed by some, was this the name of a mountain, Moses would have called it the mountain Azazel, as he does other mountains by their names: nor is there any account of any such mountain in those parts, by such who have travelled in it, and if near Sinai, it was a long way to send it from Jerusalem; and for which there seems to be no reason, since there were many deserts between those two places: Aben Ezra suggests, there is a secret or mystery in the word Azazel, and says, you may know it and the mystery of his name, for he has companions in Scripture; and I will reveal to you, says he, part of it by a hint, when you are the son of thirty three, you may know its meaning, that is, by reckoning thirty three verses from Lev 16:8; where this word is first mentioned, which will fall on Lev 17:7; "they shall no more offer unto devils"; and so R. Menachem interprets Azazel of Samael, the angel of death, the devil, the prince that hath power over desolate places: there are several Christian writers of great note, that understand this of the devil, as Origen (b), among the ancients; and of the moderns, Cocceius (c), Witsius (d), and Spencer (e), who think that by these two goats is signified the twofold respect of Christ our Mediator; one to God, as a Judge, to whom he made satisfaction by his death; the other to the devil, the enemy with whom he conflicted in life; who, according to prophecy, was to be delivered up to Satan, and have his heel bruised by him; and who was to come, and did come into the wilderness of this world, and when Jerusalem was a desert, and became a Roman province; and who was led by the Spirit into wilderness of Judea, in a literal sense, to be tempted of the devil, and had a sore conflict with him in the garden, when he sweat, as it were, drops of blood; and upon the cross, when he submitted to the death of it; during which time he had the sins of all his people on him, and made an end of them, so as to be seen no more; all which agrees with Lev 16:21; of which see more there; and it must be owned, that no other sense seems so well to agree with the type as this; since the living goat had all the sins of the people on him, and was reckoned so impure, that he that led him into the wilderness stood in need of washing and cleansing, Lev 16:21; whereas, when Christ was raised from the dead, he was clear of all sin, being justified in the Spirit; and in his resurrection there was no impurity, nor could any be reckoned or supposed to belong to him, as Witsius well observes, no, not as the surety of his people; nor in his resurrection was he a sin offering, as this goat was; nor could his ascension to heaven, with any propriety, be represented by this goat being let go into the wilderness: as for the notion of Barabbas, as Origen (f), being meant by Azazel, or the rebellious people of the Jews, carried into the wilderness, or into captivity by Nebuchadnezzar, and which is the sense of Abarbinel, and in which he is followed by many Christian writers, they need no confutation. (b) Contr. Cels. 1. 6. p. 305. (c) Comment. in Heb. 9. sect. 25, &c. (d) De Oeconom. Faederum, l. 4. c. 6. sect. 71, 72, 73. (e) De Leg. Heb. l. 3. Dissert. 8. c. 1. sect. 2. and of the same mind was our English poet Milton, that Azazel was a demon:His mighty standard: that proud honour claim'd Azazel as his right, a cherub tall. --Milton's Paradise Lost, B. 1. l. 533, 534. (f) In Lev. Homil. 10. c. 16. fol. 82.

The solemn yearly expiation for the high priest, who must not come at all times into the holy place, Lev 16:1, Lev 16:2. He must take a bullock for a sin-offering, and a ram for a burnt-offering, bathe himself, and be dressed in his sacerdotal robes, Lev 16:3, Lev 16:4. He shall take two goats, one of which is to be determined by lot to be a sacrifice; the other to be a scapegoat, Lev 16:5-10. He shall offer a bullock for himself and for his family, Lev 16:11-14. And shall kill the goat as a sin-offering for the people, and sprinkle its blood upon the mercy-seat, and hallow the altar of burnt-offerings, Lev 16:15-19. The scapegoat shall be then brought, on the head of which he shall lay his hands, and confess the iniquities of the children of Israel; after which the goat shall be permitted to escape to the wilderness, Lev 16:20-22. After this Aaron shall bathe himself, and make a burnt-offering for himself and for the people, Lev 16:23-28. This is to be an everlasting statute, and the day on which the atonement is to be made shall be a Sabbath, or day of rest, through all their generations, Lev 16:29-34.

To be the scape-goat - עזאזל azazel, from עז az, a goat, and אזל azal, to dismiss; the dismissed or sent away goat, to distinguish it from the goat that was to be offered in sacrifice. Most ancient nations had vicarious sacrifices, to which they transferred by certain rites and ceremonies the guilt of the community at large, in the same manner in which the scapegoat was used by the Jews. The white bull that was sacrificed by the Egyptians to their god Apis was of this kind; they cut off the head of the victim which they had sacrificed, and after having loaded it with execrations, "that if there be any evil hanging over them or the land of Egypt, it may be poured out upon that head," they either sold it to the Greeks or threw it into the Nile - See Herod. Euterp., p. 104, edit. Gale. Petronius Arbiter says that it was a custom among the ancient inhabitants of Marseilles, whenever they were afflicted by any pestilence, to take one of the poorer citizens who offered himself for the purpose, and having fed him a whole year with the purest and best food, they adorned him with vervain, and clothed him with sacred vestments: they then led him round their city, loading him with execrations; and having prayed that all the evils to which the city was exposed might fall upon him, they then precipitated him from the top of a rock - Satiricon, in fine. Suidas, under the word περιψημα, observes that it was a custom to devote a man annually to death for the safety of the people, with these words, Περιψἡμα ημων γενου, Be thou our purifier; and, having said so, to throw him into the sea as a sacrifice to Neptune. It was probably to this custom that Virgil alludes when speaking of the pilot Palinurus, who fell into the sea and was drowned, he says: - Unum pro multis dabiter caput - Aen., lib. v., ver. 815. "One life is given for the preservation of many." But the nearest resemblance to the scapegoat of the Hebrews is found in the Ashummeed Jugg of the Hindoos, where a horse is used instead of a goat, the description of which I shall here introduce from Mr. Halhed's Code of Gentoo Laws; Introduction, p. xix. "That the curious," says he, "may form some idea of this Gentoo sacrifice when reduced to a symbol, as well as from the subsequent plain account given of it in a chapter of the Code, sec. ix., p. 127, an explanation of it is here inserted from Darul Shekh's famous Persian translation of some commentaries upon the four Beids, or original Scriptures of Hindostan. The work itself is extremely scarce, and it was by mere accident that this little specimen was procured: - "The Ashummeed Jugg does not merely consist in the performance of that ceremony which is open to the inspection of the world, namely, in bringing a horse and sacrificing him; but Ashummeed is to be taken in a mystic signification, as implying that the sacrificer must look upon himself to be typified in that horse, such as he shall be described; because the religious duty of the Ashummeed Jugg comprehends all those other religious duties to the performance of which the wise and holy direct all their actions, and by which all the sincere professors of every different faith aim at perfection. The mystic signification thereof is as follows: The head of that unblemished horse is the symbol of the morning; his eyes are the sun; his breath, the wind; his wide-opening mouth is the bish-waner, or that innate warmth which invigorates all the world; his body typifies one entire year; his back, paradise; his belly, the plains; his hoof, this earth; his sides, the four quarters of the heavens; the bones thereof, the intermediate spaces between the four quarters; the rest of his limbs represent all distinct matter; the places where those limbs meet, or his joints, imply the months, and halves of the months, which are called peche, (or fortnights); his feet signify night and day; and night and day are of four kinds: 1. The night and day of Brihma; 2. The night and day of angels; 3. The night and day of the world of the spirits of deceased ancestors; 4. The night and day of mortals. These four kinds are typified in his four feet. The rest of his bones are the constellations of the fixed stars, which are the twenty-eight stages of the moon's course, called the lunar year; his flesh is the clouds; his food, the sand; his tendons, the rivers; his spleen and liver, the mountains; the hair of his body, the vegetables; and his long hair, the trees; the forepart of his body typifies the first half of the day, and the hinder part, the latter half; his yawning is the flash of the lightning, and his turning himself is the thunder of the cloud; his urine represents the rain, and his mental reflection is his only speech. The golden vessels which are prepared before the horse is let loose are the light of the day, and the place where those vessels are kept is a type of the ocean of the east; the silver vessels which are prepared after the horse is let loose are the light of the night, and the place where those vessels are kept is a type of the ocean of the west. These two sorts of vessels are always before and after the horse. The Arabian horse, which on account of his swiftness is called Hy, is the performer of the journeys of angels; the Tajee, which is of the race of Persian horses, is the performer of the journeys of the Kundherps, (or good spirits); the Wazba, which is of the race of the deformed Tazee horses, is the performer of the journeys of the Jins, (or demons); and the Ashov, which is of the race of Turkish horses, is the performer of the journeys of mankind: this one horse which performs these several services on account of his four different sorts of riders, obtains the four different appellations. The place where this horse remains is the great ocean, which signifies the great spirit of Perm-Atma, or the universal soul, which proceeds also from that Perm-Atma, and is comprehended in the same Perm-Atma. The intent of this sacrifice is, that a man should consider himself to be in the place of that horse, and look upon all these articles as typified in himself; and conceiving the Atma (or Divine soul) to be an ocean, should let all thought of self be absorbed in that Atma." This sacrifice is explained, in sec. ix., p. 127, of the Code of Hindoo Laws, thus: - "An Ashummeed Jugg is when a person, having commenced a Jugg, (i. e., religious ceremony), writes various articles upon a scroll of paper on a horse's neck, and dismisses the horse, sending along with the horse a stout and valiant person, equipped with the best necessaries and accoutrements to accompany the horse day and night whithersoever he shall choose to go; and if any creature, either man, genius, or dragon, should seize the horse, that man opposes such attempt, and having gained the victory upon a battle, again gives the horse his freedom. If any one in this world, or in heaven, or beneath the earth, would seize this horse, and the horse of himself comes to the house of the celebrator of the Jugg, upon killing that horse he must throw the flesh of him upon the fire of the Juk, and utter the prayers of his deity; such a Jugg is called a Jugg Ashummeed, and the merit of it as a religious work is infinite." This is a most curious circumstance; and the coincidence between the religious rites of two people who probably never had any intercourse with each other, is very remarkable. I would not however say that the Hindoo ceremony could not have been borrowed from the Jews; (though it is very unlikely); no more than I should say, as some have done, that the Jewish rite was borrowed from the Egyptian sacrifice to Apis mentioned above, which is still more unlikely. See particularly Clarke's note on Lev 1:4 (note).

HOW THE HIGH PRIEST MUST ENTER INTO THE HOLY PLACE. (Lev. 16:1-34) after the death of the two sons of Aaron, when they offered before the Lord, and died--It is thought by some that this chapter has been transposed out of its right place in the sacred record, which was immediately after the narrative of the deaths of Nadab and Abihu [Lev. 10:1-20]. That appalling catastrophe must have filled Aaron with painful apprehensions lest the guilt of these two sons might be entailed on his house, or that other members of his family might share the same fate by some irregularities or defects in the discharge of their sacred functions. And, therefore, this law was established, by the due observance of whose requirements the Aaronic order would be securely maintained and accepted in the priesthood.

The Day of Atonement - Leviticus 16 The sacrifices and purifications enjoined thus far did not suffice to complete the reconciliation between the congregation of Israel, which was called to be a holy nation, but in its very nature was still altogether involved in sin and uncleanness, and Jehovah the Holy One-that is to say, to restore the perfect reconciliation and true vital fellowship of the nation with its God, in accordance with the idea and object of the old covenant - because, even with the most scrupulous observance of these directions, many sins and defilements would still remain unacknowledged, and therefore without expiation, and would necessarily produce in the congregation a feeling of separation from its God, so that it would be unable to attain to the true joyousness of access to the throne of grace, and to the place of reconciliation with God. This want was met by the appointment of a yearly general and perfect expiation of all the sins and uncleanness which had remained unatoned for and uncleansed in the course of the year. In this respect the laws of sacrifice and purification received their completion and finish in the institution of the festival of atonement, which provided for the congregation of Israel the highest and most comprehensive expiation that was possible under the Old Testament. Hence the law concerning the day of atonement formed a fitting close to the ordinances designed to place the Israelites in fellowship with their God, and raise the promise of Jehovah, "I will be your God," into a living truth. This law is described in the present chapter, and contains (1) the instructions as to the performance of the general expiation for the year (vv. 2-28), and (2) directions for the celebration of this festival every year (Lev 16:29-34). From the expiation effected upon this day it received the name of "day of expiations," i.e., of the highest expiation (Lev 23:27). The Rabbins call it briefly יומא, the day κατ ̓ ἐξοχήν.