- Sep 6, 2003
- 21,343
- 1,805
- Country
- United States
- Gender
- Female
- Faith
- Marital Status
- Widowed
- Politics
- US-Constitution
Date: Wed, 22 Sep 2004 14:13:01 -0700 (PDT)
From: Ariel ben-Lyman HaNaviy
Subject: Yom Kippur: Day of Atonement
Shalom Chaverim!
Yom Kippur begins at sundown on Friday, September 24,
2004 (a double Shabbat!).
------------
MIKRA'EY KODESH
"Holy Convocations"
Author: Messianic Rabbi Ariel ben-Lyman HaNaviy
(Note: all quotations are taken from the Complete Jewish Bible, translation by David H. Stern, Jewish New Testament Publications, Inc., unless otherwise
noted)
"ADONAI said to Moshe, "Tell the people of Isra'el:
'The designated times of ADONAI which you are to
proclaim as holy convocations are my designated
times."
(Leviticus 23:1)
YOM KIPPUR
"Day of Atonement"
"ADONAI said to Moshe, "The tenth day of this seventh
month is Yom-Kippur; you are to have a holy
convocation, you are to deny yourselves, and you are
to bring an offering made by fire to ADONAI. You are
not to do any kind of work on that day, because it is
Yom-Kippur, to make atonement for you before ADONAI
your God."
(Leviticus 23:26-28)
Introduction
'Olah
Minchah
Sh'lamim
Chata'at
'Asham
Apologetics - Part One
Apologetics - Part Two
Talmudic Quotes
Scriptural Quotes
Yeshua's Bloody Atonement Sacrifice and Leviticus
17:11
Leviticus 18:5 - Torah Observance Equals Eternal Life?
Conclusions
Introduction
With the arrival of Yom Kippur, comes another one of
the central aspects of our relationship with our Holy
God: atonement. Why is atonement so important to
HaShem? Apparently, ever since the incident in the
Garden of Eden, mankind has carried within himself the
sinful propensity of that first act of disobedience,
and consequently, the sinful results as well. Our sin
nature is in direct conflict with the holy nature of
HaShem. As a result, we cannot fathom approaching him
without first making some sort of restitution that
would satisfy HaShem's righteous requirement. His
nature demands that there be atonement for sin, for
indeed, sin cannot exist in his sight.
The word kippur connotes "atonement" or "expiation".
Related to this word is the Hebrew word kapporet,
which is what we call the cover to the Ark of the
Covenant. It is a fitting connection, since the lid of
the Ark (Mercy Seat) is where HaShem spoke to Moshe
face to face. This was also where the blood of the
atoning animal was offered once a year during Yom
Kippur (Leviticus 16:14-16). Most students of the
Bible have been taught that it was in this way the
blood of the sacrifice "covered" the sin of the person
bringing it. Popular Christian theology regularly
teaches that this type of atonement only covers the
sin; it doesn't allow it to be completely erased. In a
very true way, this practice was temporary, awaiting
its fullness when Messiah arrived. We shall examine
these details at length later on.
You might ask, "If HaShem knew the temporal aspect of
this sacrificial system, why did he institute it in
the first place? Why not just send the Messiah from
the beginning, and skip all of those elaborate "middle
steps"? This is a good and valid question, not
entirely unlike those that I hear from most non-Jewish
believers and a few Jewish folks as well.
In order to gain a fuller appreciation for the Yom
Kippur rituals, we should do a short study on the
other types of sacrifices that took place in and
around the Mishkan of that time. I shall go backward
in the book of Leviticus and briefly study these
korbanot (offerings).
These five are the types of offerings introduced in
the opening pages of Leviticus:
'Olah (Burnt Offering) - Lev. 1:1-17
Minchah (Grain Offering) - Lev. 2:1-16
Sh'lamim (Peace Offering) - Lev. 3:1-17
Chata'at (Sin Offering) - Lev. 4:1-35; 5:1-13
'Asham (Guilt Offering) - Lev. 5:14-26
The first three could easily be considered "freewill
offerings", brought before HaShem by anyone at various
times in the life of anyone in the community. The
last two were required to make restitution for various
sins. Such korbanot (chata'at and 'asham) are
referred to as "expiatory". The expiatory korbanot
shall occupy the bulk of the latter part of this
commentary.
'Olah (Burnt Offering)
As we open the pages of Sefer Vayikra (Book of
Leviticus) we firstly encounter the 'Olah. The daily
offering was an 'Olah, completely consumed by fire on
the altar during the night. What was done with the
ashes? A priest placed one shovelful of ashes next to
the altar. To dispose of the rest, he changed into
less important clothes, and brought the ashes to a
ritually clean place outside the camp.
The Torah concludes by instructing that the fire on
the altar burn continuously. "The priest will kindle
wood on it each morning." (Lev 6:2-5)
Upon analysis, we see that the daily 'Olah service
involved three different locations, in descending
holiness:
*On top of the altar.
*Next to the altar.
*A ritually clean place outside the camp.
For Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook (1865-1935), first Chief
Rabbi of the Land of Isra'el, the completely burnt
offering was a metaphor for the very highest level of
contact between man and God. The fire on the altar
reflects sublime experiences of inspiration and
prophecy. At this level, the material world is of no
consequence. The fire totally consumes the flesh of
the offering, freeing man from the shackles of his
physical reality.
The kindling of the holy flames on man's soul is
outside the framework of normal life. Such Divine
interaction is beyond the ordinary structures of human
existence, both individual and collective. The 'Olah
offering burns on the altar itself.
Minchah (Grain Offering)
The writers over at YashaNet have done a wonderful job
of explaining the next two types of offerings and
their functions. I have enhanced their comments with
my own excerpts from various rabbinical insights.
The Minchah offering was an offering of flour, about 5
lbs. The flour was placed in a special pan into which
some oil had been poured. More oil was poured over the
flour and mixed with a sweet spice. The pan was then
handed to the cohen who brought the pan to the altar
where it was measured out, three hands full, which was
burnt on the alter. The flour was not allowed to rise,
could not be sweetened and must be salted. The person
offering this sacrifice eats none of his offering. The
priests do eat the leftovers. It was taught that when
the priests eat of this sacrifice, God forgave the
sins of Israel.
Rashi makes the comment concerning the Minchah:
"Minchah is the only voluntary sacrifice that begins
'WHEN A TRANQUIL SOUL'.
Rabbi Baruch Halevi Epstein, in Tosefet Bracha,
relates the word Minchah to the "Korban Minchah - a
flour offering." The Torah (Vayikra 2:1) introduces
this offering in a unique way. It says, "Venefesh Ki
Takriv Minchah" which literally means, "When a soul
sacrifices a Minchah offering." All other sacrifices
are introduced with the words "When a man sacrifices"
or "when a person sacrifices," but regarding the
Minchah offering, it says, "When a soul sacrifices."
The rabbis (Menachot 104b) explain that a Minchah
offering was sacrificed by someone who was poor, and
the Torah uses the phrase "when a soul sacrifices" to
mean that when a poor person offers a Minchah, HaShem
considers it as if they had sacrificed their soul.
That, says the Tosefet Bracha, is the secret of the
word Minchah.
Sh'lamim (Peace Offering)
The Shelamim, or peace offering was not brought to
atone for sin, but instead to express happiness and
gratitude to God. An ox or cow, ram or female sheep
were used as an offering. They were slaughtered in the
same fashion as the Olah, except the person would give
thanks to God and sing praises when he laid his hands
on the animal's head. The blood that was collected was
sprinkled on the four corners of the altar. Part of
the animal was burned on the altar while the owner and
the cohanim ate the rest. This sacrifice was also
offered whenever God rescued you from a dangerous
situation (Shalmay Toda) specifically:
*Recovering from a serious illness
*Crossing the desert safely
*Returning safely from an ocean voyage
*Freed from prison
Our sages in Sifra156 (Lev. 3:1) express different
views. We shall cite some of them:
Rabbi Yehuda said: Whoever brings Shelamim brings
shalom/peace into the world. Another explanation: It
harbors "peace" for all parties; the blood and inward
parts-for the altar, the breast and shoulder-for the
priests, the skin and meat-for the owners. R. Naphtali
Herz Weisel elaborates on this theme in his Biur (The
Biur is a digest of literal and/or p'**** options as
to what various words and passages mean, not
drash-like at all):
It is, as our Rabbis maintained, an expression of
peace.Plural in form, it should read shelomim, as in
Psalm 69; 23: "Let their table before them become a
snare, and when they are in peace (shelomim) let it
become a trap." The current form (Sh'lamim) serves to
designate the sacrifice. Language searches for
different forms in which to express different nuances.
Semantically, however, it corresponds to shalom.and
Sh'lamim. In the singular, shalom expresses prosperity
and well being (cf. Gen. 37:14 and 43:27). Troubles
afflict the soul and once the soul is delivered from
trouble and suffering, it is at peace. The peace
offering reflects an abundance of joy, of gratitude to
God for one's well being, or for deliverance from
trouble. By thanking God for his goodness, man brings
on himself Divine grace that ensures his welfare. Not
so the godless who say "The might of my own has gotten
me this wealth" (Deut. 8:17), or: "It was a chance
that happened to us" (I Sam. 6:9). They will be tossed
about like the sea. there is no peace for the wicked,
says the LORD" (Is. 57:20-21).
Chata'at (Sin Offering)
The sin offering proper is a sacrifice consisting of
either a beast or a fowl and offered on the altar to
atone for a sin committed unwittingly. The rules
concerning the sin offering are as follows: If the
anointed priest or the whole congregation commits a
sin through ignorance, the sin offering is a young
bullock without blemish. Should the ruler so sin, his
offering is a male kid without blemish. But when a
private individual sins, his offering must be either a
female kid or a female lamb without blemish, or, if he
is too poor to provide one of these, a turtledove.
Sin offerings were brought on other occasions also. On
the Day of Atonement the high priest inaugurated the
festival with two sin offerings-a bullock as his own
offering, and a male kid for the congregation. The
flesh of these was not eaten, but after the fat had
been removed the carcasses were burned outside the
camp (Lev. 26:3, 5, 10-11, 25, 27). A woman, after the
days of her purification had been fulfilled, was
required to bring a dove for a sin offering, in
addition to a burnt offering. A leper, on the day of
his cleansing, was required to bring, besides other
offerings, a female lamb or, if he were too poor, a
dove for a sin offering (Lev. 12:6; 14:10, 19, 22).
'Asham (Guilt Offering)
Torah.org makes this note concerning the 'Asham:
The Asham offering has many applications. Like the
Chatas, it is a sin offering, however, the Asham
atones for intentional sinning. Swearing falsely is
one such example. "G-d is the unseen Third Party Who
is present wherever and whenever one man has dealings
with another, even if no other witnesses are on hand.
G-d Himself is the Guarantor for the honest dealings
between men. If therefore this guarantor is invoked as
a witness when any factor in these dealings has been
disavowed, it is not merely an act of ordinary
faithlessness. For in this case the offender has
pledged his priestly character, his relationship to
G-d, as surety for his honesty".
A standard Judaic definition of the 'Asham might read
something like this: A guilt offering is an offering
to atone for sins of stealing things from the altar,
for when you are not sure whether you have committed a
sin or what sin you have committed, or for breach of
trust. The Hebrew word for a guilt offering is
'asham. When there was doubt as to whether a person
committed a sin, the person would bring an 'asham,
rather than a chata'at, because bringing a chata'at
would constitute admission of the sin, and the person
would have to be punished for it. If a person brought
an 'asham and later discovered that he had in fact
committed the sin, he would have to bring a chata'at
at that time. An 'asham was eaten by the cohanim.
Apologetics - Part One
Let us turn now to a discussion of the expiatory
offerings and their bearing on Jews and Christians
today. To be sure, this will be the central topic of
my commentary. For the sake of this next apologetic
section I would like to create two imaginary groups:
the Missionary and the Anti-missionary. In reality
both of these groups really exist but my commentary
will of necessity be structuring their respective
arguments for my readers. I would like to start by
citing some somewhat "standard answers" to a few
"Christian" objections, here presented as the
"missionaries", concerning the sacrifices and
atonement. A sample missionary question will appear
first with a "standard Jewish" answer, here read as
the "anti-missionaries", following. Later in the
commentary I will take my own shot at rebutting the
"standard" anti-missionary answers.
First we shall list two questions from the
missionaries and allow the anti-missionaries to
answer:
Q: How do Jews obtain forgiveness without sacrifices?
A: Forgiveness is obtained through repentance, prayer
and good deeds.
In Jewish practice, prayer has taken the place of
sacrifices. In accordance with the words of Hosea, we
render instead of bullocks the offering of our lips
(Hosea 14:3) (please note: the KJV translates this
somewhat differently). While dedicating the Temple,
King Solomon also indicated that prayer can be used to
obtain forgiveness (I Kings 8:46-50). Our prayer
services are in many ways designed to parallel the
sacrificial practices. For example, we have an extra
service on Shabbat, to parallel the extra Shabbat
offering. For more information about this, see Jewish
Liturgy.
It is important to note that in Judaism, sacrifice was
never the exclusive means of obtaining forgiveness,
was not in and of itself sufficient to obtain
forgiveness, and in certain circumstances was not even
effective to obtain forgiveness. This will be
discussed further below.
Q: But isn't a blood sacrifice required in order to
obtain forgiveness?
A: No. Although animal sacrifice is one means of
obtaining forgiveness, there are non-animal offerings
as well, and there are other means for obtaining
forgiveness that do not involve sacrifices at all.
The passage that people ordinarily cite for the notion
that blood is required is Leviticus 17:11: "For the
soul of the flesh is in the blood and I have assigned
it for you upon the altar to provide atonement for
your souls; for it is the blood that atones for the
soul." But the passage that this verse comes from is
not about atonement; it is about dietary laws, and the
passage says only that blood is used to obtain
atonement; not that blood is the only means for
obtaining atonement. Leviticus 17:10-12 could be
paraphrased as "Don't eat blood, because blood is used
in atonement rituals; therefore, don't eat blood."
Apologetics - Part Two
Now I would like to supply some Messianic answers to
these issues posed by my imaginary missionary and his
imaginary anti-missionary opponent. This time the
question could feasibly be posed by either a
missionary or an anti-missionary, but the answers are
definitely my [missionary] answer.
Q: Is there atonement without the sacrifices? And if
there is atonement, is such atonement offered for both
intentional and unintentional sins?
A: First of all, what are intentional and
unintentional sins? Renni S. Altman of the Union of
American Hebrew Congregations (UAHC) says this about
such sins:
In Leviticus 4 we read about the chatat, the sin
offering, that the Israelites were required to bring
when they had transgressed a known commandment as well
as when they had committed an unintentional sin,
either because of their ignorance of the commandments
or through carelessness or oversight. In the latter
instance, everyone in the Israelite community was
obligated to bring a sin offering, even the High
Priest.
In contrast to many of us today, our ancestors
understood that they were responsible for all their
actions, whether intentional or not. In his commentary
on Leviticus, Baruch Levine explains that according to
ancient cultic belief systems, guilt exists regardless
of the perpetrator's awareness of having committed a
sin. Guilt, as it were, has a life of its own, and
only an act of expiation can wipe it away. Thus we
learn in Sefer Hachinuch, a thirteenth-century work
that discusses the commandments and their purpose,
"When a man [sic] sins, he cannot cleanse his heart
merely by uttering, between himself and the wall, 'I
have sinned and will never repeat it.' Only by doing
an overt act to atone for his sin, by taking rams from
his enclosures and troubling himself to bring them to
the Temple, give them to the priest, and perform the
entire rite as prescribed for sin offerings, only then
will he impress upon his soul the extent of the evil
of his sin and take measures to avoid it in the
future."
Let us now turn to a discussion about the efficacy of
the animal sacrifices themselves, comparing popular
Christian theology against the Torah. For this
section I will provide the readers with an extended
quote from a work by Walter C. Kaiser, Jr. His book
'Toward Rediscovering The Old Testament' has proven to
be invaluable in helping to uncover the truth behind
this crucial topic of discussion.
WERE THE OLD TESTAMENT SACRIFICES PERSONALLY AND
OBJECTIVELY EFFECTIVE?
The repeated statement of the Law of Moses on the
effects of the sacrifices offered for sin in the
Levitical law is "and he shall be forgiven" (Lev 1:4;
4:20, 26, 31, 35; 5: 10, 16). So effective and so
all-embracing was this forgiveness that it availed for
such sins as lying, theft, fraud, perjury, and
debauchery (Lev 6:1-7). In David's case the list
extended to adultery and complicity in murder (Pss 32
and 51). In fact, in connection with the Day of
Atonement, what is implicit in these other lists is
clearly stated: "all their sins" were atoned (Lev
16:21, 22; my emphasis). Thus, instead of limiting the
efficacy of this forgiveness to ceremonial sins, all
the sins of all the people who were truly repentant
were included. It is important to note that the
qualification of a proper heart attitude is clearly
stated in Leviticus 16:29 and 31 where the people are
asked to "afflict ('anah) their souls" (KJV).
Accordingly, only those who had inwardly prepared
their hearts were eligible to receive the gracious
gift of God's forgiveness (cf. also 1 Sam 15:22).
Nevertheless, a major problem appears whenever the
Christian introduces the argument of Hebrews 9-10 into
this discussion. The writer of Hebrews states in no
uncertain terms that:
The law is only a shadow of the good things. that are
coming-not the realities themselves. For this reason
it can never, by the same sacrifices repeated
endlessly year after year, make perfect those who draw
near to worship. . . because it impossible for the
blood of bulls and goats to take away sins (Heb 10: 1,
4).
This surely seems to diminish the high claims that we
just finished attributing to the writer of Leviticus.
In fact, Hebrews 9:9 adds that the gifts and
sacrifices being offered were not able to clear the
conscience of the worshiper." What shall we say then
about the forgiveness offered in the Torah? It would
be too much to contend that the O[ld] T[estament]
offer of forgiveness repeated so often in the
Levitical institution of the sacrifices was only
symbolic and offered no actual cleansing from or
removal of sin.
The only solution is to take both the O[ld]
T[estament] and N[ew] T[estament] statements
seriously. We conclude then, with Hobart Freeman, that
the O[ld] T[estament] sacrifices were subjectively
efficacious, in that the sinner did receive full
relief based on the clear declaration of God's
appointed servant. But it is just as clear that the
sacrifices of bulls and goats were not in themselves
expiatory and efficacious. The most these sacrifices
could do was to point to the need for a perfect,
living substitute who would, in the timing of God,
ransom and deliver all from the debt, guilt, and
effects of their sin. Thus, the O[ld] T[estament]
sacrifices were not objectively efficacious; but then
neither did the O[ld] T[estament] ever claim that the
blood of these bulls and goats was inherently
effective.
Geoffrey Grogan would not solve the problem by using
the distinction Freeman has used here; in fact, he
believes that the O[ld] T[estament] sacrifices were
ineffective both objectively and subjectively. He
cites two reasons for the ineffectiveness of the
sacrifices: (1) they had to be repeated, and (2) they
were animal sacrifices and thus could not truly act as
substitutes for humans. But when the natural question
is put to Grogan, "Did they effect nothing then?" he
answers that their true function was provisional,
"imposed until the time of reformation" (Heb 9:9-10
RSV). In the meantime, the O[ld] T[estament]
sacrifices typified the sacrifice that was to come in
Christ, and thus they were a means of grace by which
the sacrifice of Christ could be channeled even to
O[ld] T[estament] worshippers.
We believe that both Freeman and Grogan end up with
the same position, though Freeman has the advantage in
treating the fact that real forgiveness was effected
in connection with a proper use of the sacrifices and
with a declaration that their sins were gone and
remembered against them no more.
The efficacy of the O[ld] T[estament] sacrifices,
then, rested in the Word of God, who boldly announced
that sacrifices done in this manner and with this
heart attitude (Ps 50:8, 14; 51: 16 [Heb 10:8]; Prov
15:8, 21:3; Isa 1:11-18; 66:3; Jer 7:21-23; Hos 6:6;
Amos 5:21; Mic 6:6-8) would receive from God a genuine
experience of full forgiveness. Of course, everything
depended on the perfect payment for this release, a
payment that would occur sometime in the future.
Therefore, not the blood of bulls and goats but the
"blood" (Le., the life rendered up in violent death)
of a perfect sacrifice finally made possible all the
forgiveness proleptically enjoyed in the O[ld]
T[estament] and retrospectively appreciated in the
N[ew] T[estament]. Only the lamb of God could have
provided objective efficacy, even though the
subjective efficacy that had preceded it was grounded
on the authority and promised work of Christ.
Until the death of Christ happened, the sins of the
O[ld] T[estament] saints were both forgiven and
"passed over" (paresis, Rom 3:25) in the merciful
grace of God until the expiatory death of Christ
provided what no animal ever could do and what no
O[ld] T[estament] text ever claimed it could do.
During the O[ld] T[estament] period, sins were
forgiven and remembered against men and women no more
(Ps 103:3, 10-12)-in fact, removed as far from the
O[ld] T[estament] confessor as the east is from the
west! Thus, the O[ld] T[estament] saint experienced
sins forgiven on the basis of God's Word and sins
forgotten (i.e., "remembered against him no more,"
(Ezek 18:22, my translation) on the same basis
(Kaiser, pp. 133-135).
I think it is safe to say that both missionaries and
anti-missionaries would agree that atonement is made
available for sin in general, but would simply (and
sharply) disagree on the methods of procuring such
atonement. So what exactly is the big issue at stake
here? Perhaps at least two issues: Exactly which sins
are atoned for? And by what method are they atoned?
Since our parashah centers on the Yom Kippur ritual,
it is there that I shall turn first for support of my
detailed answer on these issues. I firmly believe
that the Torah clearly teaches that the Yom Kippur
ritual was intended for both intentional and
unintentional sins. Before I show my answer, let me
show you another anti-missionary answer.
Some anti-missionaries would readily disagree with my
above statement about Yom Kippur, teaching that there
is no atonement for intentional sins. A well-known
anti-missionary organization by the name of Jews for
Judaism agrees with the notion of atonement for
intentional and unintentional sins, but the means of
such atonement is radically different than the
accepted missionary approach.
Observe their answer:
"Biblically, the optimum means for attaining atonement
consists of both animal sacrifices and sincere
confessionary repentant prayer used in conjunction
with each other. Traditional Judaism looks forward to
the restoration of the dual system working
simultaneously--animal sacrifice and contrite prayer.
"The rabbis under the leadership of Yohanan ben Zakkai
did not make an unscriptural substitution when they
emphasized sincere confessionary repentant prayer as a
means of obtaining atonement. The Bible already
mandated sincere confessionary repentant prayer, as a
proper vehicle for attaining forgiveness. In the
biblical period atonement prayer was used with full
divine sanction, with or without animal offerings
(even for non-Jews--Jonah 3:5-10).
"Sincere confessionary repentant prayer is the primary
biblical prescription for obtaining atonement when
animal sacrifices cannot be offered concurrently.
Animal sacrifices are only prescribed for unwitting or
unintentional sin (shogeg)--Leviticus 4:2, 13, 22, 27;
5:5, 15 (cf. Numbers 15:30). The one exception is if
an individual swore falsely to acquit himself of the
accusation of having committed theft (Leviticus
5:24-26). Intentional sin can only be atoned for
through repentance, unaccompanied by a blood
sacrifice- Psalms 32:5, 51:16-19.
"Giving charity is a material expression of this inner
repentance that is articulated in the rabbinic
formula: "Prayer, repentance, and charity avert the
evil decree" (T.J. Ta'anit 2:1, 65b). This is based on
the verse: "If My people, upon whom My name is called,
shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek My face,
and turn from their evil ways; then will I hear from
heaven, and I will forgive their sin, and I will heal
their land" (2 Chronicles 7:14)."
Firstly it must be recognized that HaShem's
forgiveness, as enacted in the korbanot, are reserved
for those whose hearts are pure, that is, for those
with the intention of turning from their sin and
making restitution for sinning against God. The
anti-missionaries correctly quoted 2 Chronicles in an
effort to demonstrate this, but again I will disagree
that the focus of such "t'shuvah" (repentance) is the
prayers, charity, and repentance alone (more on these
three later in this commentary). I maintain that our
focus today can only be upon the Spotless Lamb offered
for atonement, Yeshua our Yom Kippur! The Renewed
Covenant will bear this out later as well.
Talmudic Quotes
The ancient Rabbis agreed that sacrifice without true
repentance invalidates the sacrifice itself! The
Talmud in Tractate Yoma clearly teaches this:
MISHNA: Sin-offerings and trespass-offerings atone.
Death and the Day of Atonement, if one is penitent,
atone. Penitence atones for slight breaches of
positive or negative commandments; for grave sins, it
effects a suspension, till the Day of Atonement
completes the atonement. To him who says: "I will sin,
repent, sin again, and repent again," is not given the
opportunity to repent. For him who thinks, "I will
sin; the Day of Atonement will atone for my sins," the
Day of Atonement does not atone. A sin towards God,
the Day of Atonement atones for; but a sin towards his
fellowman is not atoned for by the Day of Atonement so
long as the wronged fellowman is not righted. R.
Eliezer b. Azariah lectured: It is written [Lev. xvi.
30]: "From all your sins before the Lord shall ye be
clean." (This is our tradition.) The sin towards God,
the Day of Atonement atones for; but sins toward man,
the Day of Atonement cannot atone for till the
neighbor has been appeased.
Said R. Aqiba: Happy are ye, O Israel. Before whom do
ye cleanse yourselves, and who cleanses you? Your
Father who is in Heaven. For it is written [Ezek.
xxxvi. 25]: "Then will I sprinkle clean water upon
you, and ye shall be clean "; and it is also written:
"The Migveh (hope, or legal bath) of Israel is the
Lord." As a legal diving-bath purifies the unclean, so
does the Holy One, blessed be He, cleanse Israel.
GEMARA: "Death and the Day of Atonement," etc. Only
when one is penitent, but otherwise they do not atone?
Shall we assume that the Mishna is not in accordance
with Rabbi, in the following Boraitha: "Rabbi says:
All sins mentioned in the Bible, whether one is
penitent or not, are atoned by the Day of Atonement,
except throwing off the yoke (of God), expounding the
Torah falsely, and abolition of circumcision (and
mocking a fellowman). These sins are atoned for by the
Day of Atonement, if one is penitent, but not
otherwise." It may be said even that the Mishna is in
accordance with Rabbi: Penitence is supplemented by
the Day of Atonement or Death, but the Day of
Atonement does atone alone.
"Penitence atones for slight breaches, if positive or
negative," etc. Why has it to be told, positive? If
negative, so much the more positive? Said R. Jehudah:
The Mishna meant to say, a positive commandment, or a
negative commandment inferred from a positive. But a
real negative commandment is not atoned? There is a
contradiction from the following Boraitha: What are
called slight sins? A breach of a positive and
negative commandment, except the negative commandment
[Ex. xx. 7]: "Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord
thy God in vain"; and all things equal to this: since
this, which is a real negative commandment, is
excepted, the other negative commandments are atoned
for? Come and hear another contradiction: It is
written [Ex. xxxiv. 7]: "And he will clear of sins."
We might think, from this sin, the breach of the
negative commandment, "Thou shalt not take the name of
the Lord," etc., he will also clear. Therefore it is
further written, "by no means." Shall we assume, that
from the breaches of all negative commandments he will
not clear? Therefore it is written [Ex. xx. 7]: "For
the Lord will not hold him guiltless (the Hebrew term
is the same) that taketh His name in vain." Infer from
this, that breaches of other negative commandments he
does atone for? (How, then, does Jehudah say that the
breaches of real negative commandments are not atoned
for?) There is a difference of opinion among the
Tanaim, as we have learned in the following Boraitha:
"What does penitence atone for? For breaches of
positive, and negative inferred from positive,
commandments. And for which does penitence only gain a
suspension, and the Day of Atonement atones? The sins
for which the penalties are Karoth, death by Beth Din,
and real negative commandments."
The Master has said: Because it is written [Ex. xxxiv.
7]: "He will clear of sins," how is it to be
understood? That is as we have learned in the
following Boraitha: R. Elazar said: We cannot say it
means, He clears of sins, because it is written
further, "by no means" does He clear. We cannot say,
He does not, because it is written "clear of sins."
We must therefore explain the verse: He clears of sins
those who do penance; and does not, those who are not
penitent.
Scriptural Quotes
This concept of intentional and unintentional sin and
of penitence and rebellion is touched upon in the
Torah at Sefer B'midbar (the Book of Numbers):
Version: KJV
Num 15:26 - Num 15:36
26. And it shall be forgiven all the congregation of
the children of Israel, and the stranger that
sojourneth among them; seeing all the people [were] in
ignorance. 27. And if any soul sin through ignorance,
then he shall bring a she goat of the first year for a
sin offering. 28. And the priest shall make an
atonement for the soul that sinneth ignorantly, when
he sinneth by ignorance before the Lord, to make an
atonement for him; and it shall be forgiven him. 29.
Ye shall have one law for him that sinneth through
ignorance, [both for] him that is born among the
children of Israel, and for the stranger that
sojourneth among them. 30. But the soul that doeth
[ought] presumptuously, [whether he be] born in the
land, or a stranger, the same reproacheth the Lord;
and that soul shall be cut off from among his people.
31. Because he hath despised the word of the Lord, and
hath broken his commandment, that soul shall utterly
be cut off; his iniquity [shall be] upon him.
The very same concept is taught in the B'rit Chadashah
(the Renewed Covenant, i.e., the New Testament) in the
book of Hebrews!
Version: RSV
Heb 10:26-31
26. For if we sin deliberately after receiving the
knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a
sacrifice for sins, 27. but a fearful prospect of
judgment, and a fury of fire which will consume the
adversaries. 28. A man who has violated the law of
Moses dies without mercy at the testimony of two or
three witnesses. 29. How much worse punishment do you
think will be deserved by the man who has spurned the
Son of God, and profaned the blood of the covenant by
which he was sanctified, and outraged the Spirit of
grace? 30. For we know him who said, "Vengeance is
mine, I will repay." And again, "The Lord will judge
his people." 31. It is a fearful thing to fall into
the hands of the living God.
Thus we see that atonement for sins, both intentional
and unintentional, must be accompanied by a penitent
heart. Now does Leviticus teach that the Yom Kippur
atones for all of these sins? Let us quote the text
of Leviticus 16:17-24 from the 1917 JPS version:
16
And he shall make atonement for the holy place,
because of the uncleannesses of the children of
Israel, and because of their transgressions, even all
their sins; and so shall he do for the tent of
meeting, that dwelleth with them in the midst of their
uncleannesses.
17
And there shall be no man in the tent of meeting when
he goeth in to make atonement in the holy place, until
he come out, and have made atonement for himself, and
for his household, and for all the assembly of Israel.
18
And he shall go out unto the altar that is before
HaShem, and make atonement for it; and shall take of
the blood of the bullock, and of the blood of the
goat, and put it upon the horns of the altar round
about.
19
And he shall sprinkle of the blood upon it with his
finger seven times, and cleanse it, and hallow it from
the uncleannesses of the children of Israel.
20
And when he hath 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 upon the head of
the live goat, and confess over him all the iniquities
of the children of Israel, and all their
transgressions, even all their sins; and he shall put
them upon the head of the goat, and shall send him
away by the hand of an appointed man into the
wilderness.
22
And the goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities
unto a land which is cut off; and he shall let go the
goat in the wilderness.
23
And Aaron shall come into the tent of meeting, and
shall put off the linen garments, which he put on when
he went into the holy place, and shall leave them
there.
24
And he shall bathe his flesh in water in a holy place
and put on his other vestments, and come forth, and
offer his burnt-offering and the burnt-offering of the
people, and make atonement for himself and for the
people.
Look again at verse 16!
"And he shall make atonement for the holy place,
because of the uncleannesses of the children of
Israel, and because of their transgressions, even all
their sins; and so shall he do for the tent of
meeting, that dwelleth with them in the midst of their
uncleannesses" (emphasis mine).
And again at verse 21!
"And Aaron shall lay both his hands upon the head of
the live goat, and confess over him all the iniquities
of the children of Israel, and all their
transgressions, even all their sins; and he shall put
them upon the head of the goat, and shall send him
away by the hand of an appointed man into the
wilderness" (emphasis mine).
It is not difficult to understand the import of the
passages quoted. "All" means "all"! The Yom Kippur
sacrifice, if presented by the priest with a right
heart on behalf of the people with right hearts atoned
for all of their sins.
Again I cite the RaMBaM (Rabbi Moshe ben-Maimon,
a.k.a., Maimonides) for ancient support. In his
Mishneh Torah chapter one deals with the Laws of
Repentance:
The goat sent to Azazel on the Day of Atonement is an
atonement for all of Israel. The High Priest confesses
verbally over it for all Jews, as it is written,
"..and confesses over it all the iniquities of the
Children of Israel". This goat atones for all
transgressions of whatever severity of any of the
Torah's commandments, whether they were committed
deliberately or accidentally, whether the transgressor
had confessed or not, provided that the guilty parties
had repented, for without repentance the goat sent to
Azazel repents only for the less-severe
transgressions. Severe transgressions are those which
a Court of Law can punish by death, or which carry a
penalty of excision, and also false oaths and
falsehood, even though they do not bear a penalty of
excision. Transgressions of negative commandments or
other transgressions the transgression of which does
not carry a penalty of excision are considered less
severe.
Of course any good Jew can go on to read that in
section three immediately following section two he
clarifies his position on repentance by teaching:
In this day and age we have only repentance, for we
don't have the Temple and Altar. This repentance [that
we have to do nowadays] can atone for all sins.
This is where the RaMBaM and I part ways.
In chapter 16 of our portion, we find the divine
instructions for the sacred day of assembly known as
Yom Kippur. HaShem has very explicit and important
details that he expects Aharon the cohen gadol (high
priest) to carry out. To be sure, as we shall find
out, they had a very significant and far-reaching
impact not just on the physical offspring of Avraham,
but as the fullness of God's timetable would
demonstrate, on the rest of humanity as well.
Yeshua's Bloody Atonement Sacrifice and Leviticus
17:11
In an attempt to continue explain the matter, we need
to understand the plans and purposes of HaShem as
expressed in the whole of the Torah. From our vantage
point and using twentieth century hindsight, it makes
perfect sense to send the Messiah to atone for our
sinful nature. After all, if God left things in the
hands of mankind, each individual man would have to
atone for his own personal sins and consequently every
man would eventually have to die for such a payment.
But what does the Torah say?
"Here is how it works: it was through one individual
that sin entered into the world, and through sin,
death; and in this way death passed through to the
whole human race, inasmuch as everyone sinned."
(Romans 5:12)
With the entrance of sin came the punishment for
sin-death. So we see that HaShem is perfectly
righteous when he says that the wages for our sin is
death; every man does deserve to die. But here is
where the mercy of HaShem comes in! He has lovingly
provided a means by which mankind can redeem himself.
In the period of the TaNaKH, the sacrificial system
was that means! Even though it pointed towards
something greater, it was authentically God's
solution. No Jew living in that time period was able
to circumvent this system, and remain officially
within the community. To answer the question posed
above, if we take HaShem seriously, them we will
accept his provision-no matter what means, or how
temporal that provision is! This is our first lesson
in "Torah logic".
This brings us to the current situation facing every
man and woman and child, Jew or non-Jew, living today:
"Since the sacrificial system used in the TaNaKH has
been dissolved, what is his means of atonement today?"
As we have already observed from the anti-missionary's
position above, the modern rabbis would have us to
believe that the three ways by which we appease HaShem
today are "T'shuvah" (repentance), "T'fillah"
(prayer), and "Tzedekah" (righteous acts). To be sure,
all of these principles are found in the teachings of
the Torah! And each and every one of them has valid
merit. For our God is highly interested in our
repentance from sin, and he is very supportive of a
prayer time, and he is enthusiastic of our righteous
acts done in his name! But what does our Torah portion
say?
"For the life of the creature is in the blood, and I
have given it to you on the altar to make atonement
for yourselves; for it is the blood that makes
atonement because of the life." (Leviticus 17:11)
Moving into chapter 17, we encounter one of our chair
passages. This single verse of the Torah has caused no
small disagreement between Christian missionaries and
anti-missionaries. The missionaries use this verse as
a launching point by which to propagate the necessity
of the atonement of Yeshua the Messiah for the
forgiveness of sin. The rabbis teach that according to
further insight (usually provided for them by the
Talmud, this verse is not exclusively addressing the
issue of sin atonement. Since we are studying the
arguments and responses of both camps, we should not
be ashamed to provide an authoritative answer.
First of all, the rabbis have a somewhat valid point
to make; the Torah does address the issue of atonement
in other sections. Likewise, HaShem did use the blood
of animals in other types of sacrificial requirements,
where sin is not the primary issue. But what the
rabbis seem to misunderstand is that the above quoted
verse was not intended to confuse the average reader!
Citing the rules of standard grammatical-historical
exegesis: When the plain sense of Scripture makes
common sense, seek no other sense; therefore, take
every word at its primary, ordinary, usual, literal
meaning unless the facts of the immediate context,
studied in the light of related passages and axiomatic
and fundamental truths, indicate clearly otherwise. In
other words, did the average unlearned reader, living
in the time period of the TaNaKH, understand what
HaShem was asking of him? Of course he did. If he did
not, I imagine we would have read about the difference
in interpretation somewhere else in the Torah. But our
verse here in Leviticus contains little or no
ambiguity. The immediate recipients of the context of
chapter 17 are as given: to Moshe (vs. 1), to Aharon
and his sons (vs. 1), to 'Am Isra'el (vs. 1), and
finally someone from the community of Isra'el or one
of the foreigners living with you (vs. 8, 10). The
chapter even leaves off addressing "anyone" in verse
15.
Were all of these individuals learned people? Did they
study in the most brilliant theological schools of
their day? Was HaShem secretly cloaking this important
information in mystery only to be understood by the
future rabbis and Torah teachers of the people of
Isra'el? I am not reluctant to place the blame on
over-examination. Because of this, we sometimes miss
the simple explanation that the Torah is trying to
teach us. To use modern language "We miss the forest
for the trees!" Another rather obvious cause for the
disagreement here is the fact that most non-Messianic
rabbis don't consider the New Covenant Scriptures
authoritative, and therefore, they usually ignore it's
teaching. Woe unto those unfaithful teachers during
the coming day of reckoning (Yom haDin)!
But the Torah, as revealed by the Messiah and his
first century followers, is authoritative concerning
this issue, so it is there that we will settle the
issue:
"But God demonstrated his own love for us in that the
Messiah died on our behalf while we were still
sinners. Therefore, since we have now come to be
considered righteous by means of his bloody
sacrificial death, how much more will we be delivered
through him from the anger of God's judgment!" (Romans
5:8, 9)
Yeshua has now become the means by which all men must
satisfy the righteous atoning requirement of the Holy
One! This type of atonement is not the kind that is
repeated year after year! Our sins are not meted out
into animals, only to be repeated the next year at Yom
Kippur. This type of atonement is based on better
promises with a better sacrifice! What does the Torah
say?
"No longer will any of them teach his fellow community
member or his brother, 'Know ADONAI'; for all will
know me, from the least of them to the greatest;
because I will forgive their wickedness and remember
their sins no more." (Jeremiah 31:34)
Even righteous King David recognized the mercy of a
God who "covers" and "forgives" the transgressors' sin
using the substitute blood of animals (in this passage
the Hebrew word for "cover" is "kasah" [literally
"conceal", "hide"], while the Hebrew word for
"forgive" is "nassa" [literally "carry", "bear",
"take"]; see chapter thirty-two of the book of Psalms.
Interestingly, in the first few p'sukim the words
"cover" and "forgive" function as synonyms in poetic
parallelism! This is also where we see a good example
of the validity and necessity of the system used
during those days. But the covenant spoken about by
the prophet Jeremiah is surely a superior system. When
HaShem says that he will remember our sins no more,
that's something to rejoice about! Why would anyone
want to attempt to revert back to the former system,
if it were possible? Unfortunately, today, many of my
brothers according to the flesh are doing something
similar to this. When a person rejects Yeshua
HaMashiach as the final atonement for their sin, they
are really rejecting the One who sent the Messiah in
the first place! In other words, to reject Yeshua is
to reject HaShem! This is where the corporate
blindness of my people lies.
The second important aspect of the sending of Yeshua
at the appointed time has to do with order. HaShem has
a perfect plan for everything. According to the
purpose of God, sin seems to have run it's course
until the ideal time for sending the Messiah into the
world came. Yeshua therefore demonstrated his
obedience to the Father by surrendering his life as a
sacrifice only when the time set by his Father was
perfect. Not sooner. Not later. We must accept this
Biblical truth and live by it. In a way, you could say
that if Messiah Yeshua had provided himself for
atonement at a much earlier time, then, because of
community dynamics, the majority of Am Yisra'el would
have accepted him, yet the majority of the surrounding
Gentile Nations would have missed out. Of course this
is speculative, yet it does contain an element of
truth. Read Romans chapter eleven, specifically verse
twenty-five sometime, and you'll notice that the Torah
is hinting at this very aspect!
Leviticus 18:5 - Torah Observance Equals Eternal Life?
Moving on into chapter 18, we find our second chair
passage.
"You are to observe my laws and rulings; if a person
does them, he will have life through them; I am
ADONAI." (Leviticus 18:5)
A few years ago I had the unique opportunity of
engaging in a lengthy debate with a non-Messianic
rabbi over the important implications behind this
single verse. Since the debate was via the medium of
e-mail, I have decided to share a selected portion
with you here in this commentary. A word of caution:
my apologetics (Scriptural defensive reasoning) were
aimed at the gross error that exists within the
scholarship of the Jewish learned. My comments were
intended to expose that error in an effort to showcase
the Truth of the Torah to a man whose eyes were
blinded by defensive (not passive) unbelief, as well
as a man bent on ill-feelings towards the Christian
community of which he believes is in serious
disobedience to the Torah of the very God that they
claim to serve. My comments should not be understood
as being applied to the Jewish people as a whole, nor
am I singling out any particular Christian group.
Truth cuts to the heart of the issue for those who
walk in disobedience. To use modern vernacular "If
the shoe fits..then wear it!"
I have not posted any of his comments, as I do not
permission to do so. Mixing only my own comments with
those of noted author and translator David H. Stern,
as found in his Jewish New Testament Commentary, I
wrote:
" Moshe spoke of the righteousness that is grounded in
trust, in Vayikra 18:5, "That the person who does
these things will attain life through them." Rashi
(quoting the Sifra) comments: "It refers to the world
to come; for if you say it refers to this world,
doesn't everyone die sooner or later?" I understand
the Torah then to be talking about eternal life.
"That many Christians don't believe that the Torah
teaches eternal life through the Teachings of the
Mitzvot is irrelevant! If they have made a serious
error in their theology, they must answer to HaShem
for misunderstanding His Torah. Why do we become so
"caught up in the middle" over false teaching? Is it
because of the fence that we have built around Torah,
that we defend it so fervently? In any case, they are
wrong about Torah.... it is to be kept, not
disregarded. It is the goal of the Torah to lead its
followers to the righteousness grounded in trust. But
have you ever stopped to think that they (the minim)
may have understood a central part that our people,
the Jewish community, miss?
"The lesson in logic goes like this: the person who
practices "the righteousness grounded in the Torah
will necessarily have the trust in Yeshua the Messiah
that the B'rit Chadashah proclaims. Why? Because
legalism is the exact opposite of trust! The heresy of
legalism, when applied to the Torah, says that anyone
who does these things, that is, anyone who
mechanically follows the rules for Shabbat, kashrut,
etc., will attain life through them, will be saved,
will enter the Kingdom of HaShem, will obtain eternal
life. No need to trust HaShem, just obey the rules!
The problem with this simplistic ladder to Heaven is
that legalism conveniently ignores the "rule" that
trust must underlie all rules following which HaShem
finds acceptable. But trust necessarily converts mere
rule-following into something altogether different, in
fact, into its opposite, genuine faithfulness to
HaShem. Therefore, "legalistic obedience to Torah
commands" (that is, "works of the Law") is actually
disobedience to the Torah!
"As a Jew, who follows the Torah as given by Him,
through Moshe Rabbenu, I challenge you once again:
legalism - that is, legalistic obedience to Torah
commands - is disobedience to the Torah! One could be
obeying every single mitzvah (except, by assumption,
the mitzvah of trust), but if these things are being
done without heartfelt trust in the God who is there,
the only God there is, the God who sent his Son Yeshua
to be the atonement for sin, then all this outward
"obedience" is hateful to HaShem (Yesha'yahu 1:14),
and the person doing it, the legalist, "lives under a
curse," because he is not "doing everything written in
the Scroll of the Torah" (D'varim 27:26).
"Now here's the sad truth! The evidence that
non-Messianic Jews "have not submitted themselves to
HaShem's way of making people righteous", which itself
shows that their "zeal for HaShem" is "not based on
correct understanding", is that they have not grasped
the central point of the Torah and acted on it. Had
they seen that trust in HaShem - as opposed to
self-effort, legalism, and mechanical obedience to the
rules - is the route to the righteousness which the
Torah itself not only requires but offers, then they
would see that, "the goal at which the Torah aims is
[acknowledging and trusting in] the Messiah, who
offers [on the ground of this trusting the very]
righteousness (they are seeking). They would see that
the righteousness, which the Torah offers, is offered
through him and only through him. They would also see
that he offers it to everyone who trusts - to them and
to the Goyim as well!"
Conclusions
The thrust of this week's commentary has been
presented in an effort to educate the two camps, both
Jews and Gentile Christians. Many Messianic as well as
non-Messianic Jews still struggle with the intended
meaning of "what it means to be a new creation in
Messiah, walking out his Torah in our lives";
moreover, many non-Jewish Christians struggle with
this issue as well. By default, the world does not
struggle with these issues since it has not accepted
HaShem on his grounds in the first place.
While my heart reaches out to non-Jewish believers
with these important instructions concerning the Torah
of HaShem, it is my desire to make a heartfelt plea to
the Jewish Community to consider accepting HaShem on
his terms alone! This is our second lesson in
"Torah-logic": if HaShem renews the terms of his
original covenant, we as partners must agree with his
improved establishment, especially since it was
faithlessness on our part that necessitated the
renewal! Apart from being superior to the sacrificial
system because of its Guarantor, Yeshua's atonement
also brought about the power to maintain a change of
heart. To be sure, the famous passage quoted from
Jeremiah contains in it, a promise from HaShem to put
the Torah in the inward parts of the people-i.e. on
the heart. This means a change in the spiritual makeup
of the individual. A change that transforms the sinner
into the status of righteous heir! Now because of
Yeshua's death, HaShem no longer considers death as
our wage (Romans 8:1)! Even if not corporately, each
individual Jewish person can now proclaim: Our Yom
Kippur has come! Our final Day of Atonement has
already arrived! Our effectual sacrifice has been
offered once and for all!
For further study, read: Leviticus chs. 16, 17;
Numbers 29:7-11; Isaiah 57:14-58:14; Jonah 1-4; Micah
7:18-20; Romans 3:21-26; Hebrews chs. 7-10.
Messianic Rabbi Ariel ben-Lyman HaNaviy
yeshua613@hotmail.com
To visit the "weekly-parasha" group on the web, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/weekly-parashah/
From: Ariel ben-Lyman HaNaviy
Subject: Yom Kippur: Day of Atonement
Shalom Chaverim!
Yom Kippur begins at sundown on Friday, September 24,
2004 (a double Shabbat!).
------------
MIKRA'EY KODESH
"Holy Convocations"
Author: Messianic Rabbi Ariel ben-Lyman HaNaviy
(Note: all quotations are taken from the Complete Jewish Bible, translation by David H. Stern, Jewish New Testament Publications, Inc., unless otherwise
noted)
"ADONAI said to Moshe, "Tell the people of Isra'el:
'The designated times of ADONAI which you are to
proclaim as holy convocations are my designated
times."
(Leviticus 23:1)
YOM KIPPUR
"Day of Atonement"
"ADONAI said to Moshe, "The tenth day of this seventh
month is Yom-Kippur; you are to have a holy
convocation, you are to deny yourselves, and you are
to bring an offering made by fire to ADONAI. You are
not to do any kind of work on that day, because it is
Yom-Kippur, to make atonement for you before ADONAI
your God."
(Leviticus 23:26-28)
Introduction
'Olah
Minchah
Sh'lamim
Chata'at
'Asham
Apologetics - Part One
Apologetics - Part Two
Talmudic Quotes
Scriptural Quotes
Yeshua's Bloody Atonement Sacrifice and Leviticus
17:11
Leviticus 18:5 - Torah Observance Equals Eternal Life?
Conclusions
Introduction
With the arrival of Yom Kippur, comes another one of
the central aspects of our relationship with our Holy
God: atonement. Why is atonement so important to
HaShem? Apparently, ever since the incident in the
Garden of Eden, mankind has carried within himself the
sinful propensity of that first act of disobedience,
and consequently, the sinful results as well. Our sin
nature is in direct conflict with the holy nature of
HaShem. As a result, we cannot fathom approaching him
without first making some sort of restitution that
would satisfy HaShem's righteous requirement. His
nature demands that there be atonement for sin, for
indeed, sin cannot exist in his sight.
The word kippur connotes "atonement" or "expiation".
Related to this word is the Hebrew word kapporet,
which is what we call the cover to the Ark of the
Covenant. It is a fitting connection, since the lid of
the Ark (Mercy Seat) is where HaShem spoke to Moshe
face to face. This was also where the blood of the
atoning animal was offered once a year during Yom
Kippur (Leviticus 16:14-16). Most students of the
Bible have been taught that it was in this way the
blood of the sacrifice "covered" the sin of the person
bringing it. Popular Christian theology regularly
teaches that this type of atonement only covers the
sin; it doesn't allow it to be completely erased. In a
very true way, this practice was temporary, awaiting
its fullness when Messiah arrived. We shall examine
these details at length later on.
You might ask, "If HaShem knew the temporal aspect of
this sacrificial system, why did he institute it in
the first place? Why not just send the Messiah from
the beginning, and skip all of those elaborate "middle
steps"? This is a good and valid question, not
entirely unlike those that I hear from most non-Jewish
believers and a few Jewish folks as well.
In order to gain a fuller appreciation for the Yom
Kippur rituals, we should do a short study on the
other types of sacrifices that took place in and
around the Mishkan of that time. I shall go backward
in the book of Leviticus and briefly study these
korbanot (offerings).
These five are the types of offerings introduced in
the opening pages of Leviticus:
'Olah (Burnt Offering) - Lev. 1:1-17
Minchah (Grain Offering) - Lev. 2:1-16
Sh'lamim (Peace Offering) - Lev. 3:1-17
Chata'at (Sin Offering) - Lev. 4:1-35; 5:1-13
'Asham (Guilt Offering) - Lev. 5:14-26
The first three could easily be considered "freewill
offerings", brought before HaShem by anyone at various
times in the life of anyone in the community. The
last two were required to make restitution for various
sins. Such korbanot (chata'at and 'asham) are
referred to as "expiatory". The expiatory korbanot
shall occupy the bulk of the latter part of this
commentary.
'Olah (Burnt Offering)
As we open the pages of Sefer Vayikra (Book of
Leviticus) we firstly encounter the 'Olah. The daily
offering was an 'Olah, completely consumed by fire on
the altar during the night. What was done with the
ashes? A priest placed one shovelful of ashes next to
the altar. To dispose of the rest, he changed into
less important clothes, and brought the ashes to a
ritually clean place outside the camp.
The Torah concludes by instructing that the fire on
the altar burn continuously. "The priest will kindle
wood on it each morning." (Lev 6:2-5)
Upon analysis, we see that the daily 'Olah service
involved three different locations, in descending
holiness:
*On top of the altar.
*Next to the altar.
*A ritually clean place outside the camp.
For Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook (1865-1935), first Chief
Rabbi of the Land of Isra'el, the completely burnt
offering was a metaphor for the very highest level of
contact between man and God. The fire on the altar
reflects sublime experiences of inspiration and
prophecy. At this level, the material world is of no
consequence. The fire totally consumes the flesh of
the offering, freeing man from the shackles of his
physical reality.
The kindling of the holy flames on man's soul is
outside the framework of normal life. Such Divine
interaction is beyond the ordinary structures of human
existence, both individual and collective. The 'Olah
offering burns on the altar itself.
Minchah (Grain Offering)
The writers over at YashaNet have done a wonderful job
of explaining the next two types of offerings and
their functions. I have enhanced their comments with
my own excerpts from various rabbinical insights.
The Minchah offering was an offering of flour, about 5
lbs. The flour was placed in a special pan into which
some oil had been poured. More oil was poured over the
flour and mixed with a sweet spice. The pan was then
handed to the cohen who brought the pan to the altar
where it was measured out, three hands full, which was
burnt on the alter. The flour was not allowed to rise,
could not be sweetened and must be salted. The person
offering this sacrifice eats none of his offering. The
priests do eat the leftovers. It was taught that when
the priests eat of this sacrifice, God forgave the
sins of Israel.
Rashi makes the comment concerning the Minchah:
"Minchah is the only voluntary sacrifice that begins
'WHEN A TRANQUIL SOUL'.
Rabbi Baruch Halevi Epstein, in Tosefet Bracha,
relates the word Minchah to the "Korban Minchah - a
flour offering." The Torah (Vayikra 2:1) introduces
this offering in a unique way. It says, "Venefesh Ki
Takriv Minchah" which literally means, "When a soul
sacrifices a Minchah offering." All other sacrifices
are introduced with the words "When a man sacrifices"
or "when a person sacrifices," but regarding the
Minchah offering, it says, "When a soul sacrifices."
The rabbis (Menachot 104b) explain that a Minchah
offering was sacrificed by someone who was poor, and
the Torah uses the phrase "when a soul sacrifices" to
mean that when a poor person offers a Minchah, HaShem
considers it as if they had sacrificed their soul.
That, says the Tosefet Bracha, is the secret of the
word Minchah.
Sh'lamim (Peace Offering)
The Shelamim, or peace offering was not brought to
atone for sin, but instead to express happiness and
gratitude to God. An ox or cow, ram or female sheep
were used as an offering. They were slaughtered in the
same fashion as the Olah, except the person would give
thanks to God and sing praises when he laid his hands
on the animal's head. The blood that was collected was
sprinkled on the four corners of the altar. Part of
the animal was burned on the altar while the owner and
the cohanim ate the rest. This sacrifice was also
offered whenever God rescued you from a dangerous
situation (Shalmay Toda) specifically:
*Recovering from a serious illness
*Crossing the desert safely
*Returning safely from an ocean voyage
*Freed from prison
Our sages in Sifra156 (Lev. 3:1) express different
views. We shall cite some of them:
Rabbi Yehuda said: Whoever brings Shelamim brings
shalom/peace into the world. Another explanation: It
harbors "peace" for all parties; the blood and inward
parts-for the altar, the breast and shoulder-for the
priests, the skin and meat-for the owners. R. Naphtali
Herz Weisel elaborates on this theme in his Biur (The
Biur is a digest of literal and/or p'**** options as
to what various words and passages mean, not
drash-like at all):
It is, as our Rabbis maintained, an expression of
peace.Plural in form, it should read shelomim, as in
Psalm 69; 23: "Let their table before them become a
snare, and when they are in peace (shelomim) let it
become a trap." The current form (Sh'lamim) serves to
designate the sacrifice. Language searches for
different forms in which to express different nuances.
Semantically, however, it corresponds to shalom.and
Sh'lamim. In the singular, shalom expresses prosperity
and well being (cf. Gen. 37:14 and 43:27). Troubles
afflict the soul and once the soul is delivered from
trouble and suffering, it is at peace. The peace
offering reflects an abundance of joy, of gratitude to
God for one's well being, or for deliverance from
trouble. By thanking God for his goodness, man brings
on himself Divine grace that ensures his welfare. Not
so the godless who say "The might of my own has gotten
me this wealth" (Deut. 8:17), or: "It was a chance
that happened to us" (I Sam. 6:9). They will be tossed
about like the sea. there is no peace for the wicked,
says the LORD" (Is. 57:20-21).
Chata'at (Sin Offering)
The sin offering proper is a sacrifice consisting of
either a beast or a fowl and offered on the altar to
atone for a sin committed unwittingly. The rules
concerning the sin offering are as follows: If the
anointed priest or the whole congregation commits a
sin through ignorance, the sin offering is a young
bullock without blemish. Should the ruler so sin, his
offering is a male kid without blemish. But when a
private individual sins, his offering must be either a
female kid or a female lamb without blemish, or, if he
is too poor to provide one of these, a turtledove.
Sin offerings were brought on other occasions also. On
the Day of Atonement the high priest inaugurated the
festival with two sin offerings-a bullock as his own
offering, and a male kid for the congregation. The
flesh of these was not eaten, but after the fat had
been removed the carcasses were burned outside the
camp (Lev. 26:3, 5, 10-11, 25, 27). A woman, after the
days of her purification had been fulfilled, was
required to bring a dove for a sin offering, in
addition to a burnt offering. A leper, on the day of
his cleansing, was required to bring, besides other
offerings, a female lamb or, if he were too poor, a
dove for a sin offering (Lev. 12:6; 14:10, 19, 22).
'Asham (Guilt Offering)
Torah.org makes this note concerning the 'Asham:
The Asham offering has many applications. Like the
Chatas, it is a sin offering, however, the Asham
atones for intentional sinning. Swearing falsely is
one such example. "G-d is the unseen Third Party Who
is present wherever and whenever one man has dealings
with another, even if no other witnesses are on hand.
G-d Himself is the Guarantor for the honest dealings
between men. If therefore this guarantor is invoked as
a witness when any factor in these dealings has been
disavowed, it is not merely an act of ordinary
faithlessness. For in this case the offender has
pledged his priestly character, his relationship to
G-d, as surety for his honesty".
A standard Judaic definition of the 'Asham might read
something like this: A guilt offering is an offering
to atone for sins of stealing things from the altar,
for when you are not sure whether you have committed a
sin or what sin you have committed, or for breach of
trust. The Hebrew word for a guilt offering is
'asham. When there was doubt as to whether a person
committed a sin, the person would bring an 'asham,
rather than a chata'at, because bringing a chata'at
would constitute admission of the sin, and the person
would have to be punished for it. If a person brought
an 'asham and later discovered that he had in fact
committed the sin, he would have to bring a chata'at
at that time. An 'asham was eaten by the cohanim.
Apologetics - Part One
Let us turn now to a discussion of the expiatory
offerings and their bearing on Jews and Christians
today. To be sure, this will be the central topic of
my commentary. For the sake of this next apologetic
section I would like to create two imaginary groups:
the Missionary and the Anti-missionary. In reality
both of these groups really exist but my commentary
will of necessity be structuring their respective
arguments for my readers. I would like to start by
citing some somewhat "standard answers" to a few
"Christian" objections, here presented as the
"missionaries", concerning the sacrifices and
atonement. A sample missionary question will appear
first with a "standard Jewish" answer, here read as
the "anti-missionaries", following. Later in the
commentary I will take my own shot at rebutting the
"standard" anti-missionary answers.
First we shall list two questions from the
missionaries and allow the anti-missionaries to
answer:
Q: How do Jews obtain forgiveness without sacrifices?
A: Forgiveness is obtained through repentance, prayer
and good deeds.
In Jewish practice, prayer has taken the place of
sacrifices. In accordance with the words of Hosea, we
render instead of bullocks the offering of our lips
(Hosea 14:3) (please note: the KJV translates this
somewhat differently). While dedicating the Temple,
King Solomon also indicated that prayer can be used to
obtain forgiveness (I Kings 8:46-50). Our prayer
services are in many ways designed to parallel the
sacrificial practices. For example, we have an extra
service on Shabbat, to parallel the extra Shabbat
offering. For more information about this, see Jewish
Liturgy.
It is important to note that in Judaism, sacrifice was
never the exclusive means of obtaining forgiveness,
was not in and of itself sufficient to obtain
forgiveness, and in certain circumstances was not even
effective to obtain forgiveness. This will be
discussed further below.
Q: But isn't a blood sacrifice required in order to
obtain forgiveness?
A: No. Although animal sacrifice is one means of
obtaining forgiveness, there are non-animal offerings
as well, and there are other means for obtaining
forgiveness that do not involve sacrifices at all.
The passage that people ordinarily cite for the notion
that blood is required is Leviticus 17:11: "For the
soul of the flesh is in the blood and I have assigned
it for you upon the altar to provide atonement for
your souls; for it is the blood that atones for the
soul." But the passage that this verse comes from is
not about atonement; it is about dietary laws, and the
passage says only that blood is used to obtain
atonement; not that blood is the only means for
obtaining atonement. Leviticus 17:10-12 could be
paraphrased as "Don't eat blood, because blood is used
in atonement rituals; therefore, don't eat blood."
Apologetics - Part Two
Now I would like to supply some Messianic answers to
these issues posed by my imaginary missionary and his
imaginary anti-missionary opponent. This time the
question could feasibly be posed by either a
missionary or an anti-missionary, but the answers are
definitely my [missionary] answer.
Q: Is there atonement without the sacrifices? And if
there is atonement, is such atonement offered for both
intentional and unintentional sins?
A: First of all, what are intentional and
unintentional sins? Renni S. Altman of the Union of
American Hebrew Congregations (UAHC) says this about
such sins:
In Leviticus 4 we read about the chatat, the sin
offering, that the Israelites were required to bring
when they had transgressed a known commandment as well
as when they had committed an unintentional sin,
either because of their ignorance of the commandments
or through carelessness or oversight. In the latter
instance, everyone in the Israelite community was
obligated to bring a sin offering, even the High
Priest.
In contrast to many of us today, our ancestors
understood that they were responsible for all their
actions, whether intentional or not. In his commentary
on Leviticus, Baruch Levine explains that according to
ancient cultic belief systems, guilt exists regardless
of the perpetrator's awareness of having committed a
sin. Guilt, as it were, has a life of its own, and
only an act of expiation can wipe it away. Thus we
learn in Sefer Hachinuch, a thirteenth-century work
that discusses the commandments and their purpose,
"When a man [sic] sins, he cannot cleanse his heart
merely by uttering, between himself and the wall, 'I
have sinned and will never repeat it.' Only by doing
an overt act to atone for his sin, by taking rams from
his enclosures and troubling himself to bring them to
the Temple, give them to the priest, and perform the
entire rite as prescribed for sin offerings, only then
will he impress upon his soul the extent of the evil
of his sin and take measures to avoid it in the
future."
Let us now turn to a discussion about the efficacy of
the animal sacrifices themselves, comparing popular
Christian theology against the Torah. For this
section I will provide the readers with an extended
quote from a work by Walter C. Kaiser, Jr. His book
'Toward Rediscovering The Old Testament' has proven to
be invaluable in helping to uncover the truth behind
this crucial topic of discussion.
WERE THE OLD TESTAMENT SACRIFICES PERSONALLY AND
OBJECTIVELY EFFECTIVE?
The repeated statement of the Law of Moses on the
effects of the sacrifices offered for sin in the
Levitical law is "and he shall be forgiven" (Lev 1:4;
4:20, 26, 31, 35; 5: 10, 16). So effective and so
all-embracing was this forgiveness that it availed for
such sins as lying, theft, fraud, perjury, and
debauchery (Lev 6:1-7). In David's case the list
extended to adultery and complicity in murder (Pss 32
and 51). In fact, in connection with the Day of
Atonement, what is implicit in these other lists is
clearly stated: "all their sins" were atoned (Lev
16:21, 22; my emphasis). Thus, instead of limiting the
efficacy of this forgiveness to ceremonial sins, all
the sins of all the people who were truly repentant
were included. It is important to note that the
qualification of a proper heart attitude is clearly
stated in Leviticus 16:29 and 31 where the people are
asked to "afflict ('anah) their souls" (KJV).
Accordingly, only those who had inwardly prepared
their hearts were eligible to receive the gracious
gift of God's forgiveness (cf. also 1 Sam 15:22).
Nevertheless, a major problem appears whenever the
Christian introduces the argument of Hebrews 9-10 into
this discussion. The writer of Hebrews states in no
uncertain terms that:
The law is only a shadow of the good things. that are
coming-not the realities themselves. For this reason
it can never, by the same sacrifices repeated
endlessly year after year, make perfect those who draw
near to worship. . . because it impossible for the
blood of bulls and goats to take away sins (Heb 10: 1,
4).
This surely seems to diminish the high claims that we
just finished attributing to the writer of Leviticus.
In fact, Hebrews 9:9 adds that the gifts and
sacrifices being offered were not able to clear the
conscience of the worshiper." What shall we say then
about the forgiveness offered in the Torah? It would
be too much to contend that the O[ld] T[estament]
offer of forgiveness repeated so often in the
Levitical institution of the sacrifices was only
symbolic and offered no actual cleansing from or
removal of sin.
The only solution is to take both the O[ld]
T[estament] and N[ew] T[estament] statements
seriously. We conclude then, with Hobart Freeman, that
the O[ld] T[estament] sacrifices were subjectively
efficacious, in that the sinner did receive full
relief based on the clear declaration of God's
appointed servant. But it is just as clear that the
sacrifices of bulls and goats were not in themselves
expiatory and efficacious. The most these sacrifices
could do was to point to the need for a perfect,
living substitute who would, in the timing of God,
ransom and deliver all from the debt, guilt, and
effects of their sin. Thus, the O[ld] T[estament]
sacrifices were not objectively efficacious; but then
neither did the O[ld] T[estament] ever claim that the
blood of these bulls and goats was inherently
effective.
Geoffrey Grogan would not solve the problem by using
the distinction Freeman has used here; in fact, he
believes that the O[ld] T[estament] sacrifices were
ineffective both objectively and subjectively. He
cites two reasons for the ineffectiveness of the
sacrifices: (1) they had to be repeated, and (2) they
were animal sacrifices and thus could not truly act as
substitutes for humans. But when the natural question
is put to Grogan, "Did they effect nothing then?" he
answers that their true function was provisional,
"imposed until the time of reformation" (Heb 9:9-10
RSV). In the meantime, the O[ld] T[estament]
sacrifices typified the sacrifice that was to come in
Christ, and thus they were a means of grace by which
the sacrifice of Christ could be channeled even to
O[ld] T[estament] worshippers.
We believe that both Freeman and Grogan end up with
the same position, though Freeman has the advantage in
treating the fact that real forgiveness was effected
in connection with a proper use of the sacrifices and
with a declaration that their sins were gone and
remembered against them no more.
The efficacy of the O[ld] T[estament] sacrifices,
then, rested in the Word of God, who boldly announced
that sacrifices done in this manner and with this
heart attitude (Ps 50:8, 14; 51: 16 [Heb 10:8]; Prov
15:8, 21:3; Isa 1:11-18; 66:3; Jer 7:21-23; Hos 6:6;
Amos 5:21; Mic 6:6-8) would receive from God a genuine
experience of full forgiveness. Of course, everything
depended on the perfect payment for this release, a
payment that would occur sometime in the future.
Therefore, not the blood of bulls and goats but the
"blood" (Le., the life rendered up in violent death)
of a perfect sacrifice finally made possible all the
forgiveness proleptically enjoyed in the O[ld]
T[estament] and retrospectively appreciated in the
N[ew] T[estament]. Only the lamb of God could have
provided objective efficacy, even though the
subjective efficacy that had preceded it was grounded
on the authority and promised work of Christ.
Until the death of Christ happened, the sins of the
O[ld] T[estament] saints were both forgiven and
"passed over" (paresis, Rom 3:25) in the merciful
grace of God until the expiatory death of Christ
provided what no animal ever could do and what no
O[ld] T[estament] text ever claimed it could do.
During the O[ld] T[estament] period, sins were
forgiven and remembered against men and women no more
(Ps 103:3, 10-12)-in fact, removed as far from the
O[ld] T[estament] confessor as the east is from the
west! Thus, the O[ld] T[estament] saint experienced
sins forgiven on the basis of God's Word and sins
forgotten (i.e., "remembered against him no more,"
(Ezek 18:22, my translation) on the same basis
(Kaiser, pp. 133-135).
I think it is safe to say that both missionaries and
anti-missionaries would agree that atonement is made
available for sin in general, but would simply (and
sharply) disagree on the methods of procuring such
atonement. So what exactly is the big issue at stake
here? Perhaps at least two issues: Exactly which sins
are atoned for? And by what method are they atoned?
Since our parashah centers on the Yom Kippur ritual,
it is there that I shall turn first for support of my
detailed answer on these issues. I firmly believe
that the Torah clearly teaches that the Yom Kippur
ritual was intended for both intentional and
unintentional sins. Before I show my answer, let me
show you another anti-missionary answer.
Some anti-missionaries would readily disagree with my
above statement about Yom Kippur, teaching that there
is no atonement for intentional sins. A well-known
anti-missionary organization by the name of Jews for
Judaism agrees with the notion of atonement for
intentional and unintentional sins, but the means of
such atonement is radically different than the
accepted missionary approach.
Observe their answer:
"Biblically, the optimum means for attaining atonement
consists of both animal sacrifices and sincere
confessionary repentant prayer used in conjunction
with each other. Traditional Judaism looks forward to
the restoration of the dual system working
simultaneously--animal sacrifice and contrite prayer.
"The rabbis under the leadership of Yohanan ben Zakkai
did not make an unscriptural substitution when they
emphasized sincere confessionary repentant prayer as a
means of obtaining atonement. The Bible already
mandated sincere confessionary repentant prayer, as a
proper vehicle for attaining forgiveness. In the
biblical period atonement prayer was used with full
divine sanction, with or without animal offerings
(even for non-Jews--Jonah 3:5-10).
"Sincere confessionary repentant prayer is the primary
biblical prescription for obtaining atonement when
animal sacrifices cannot be offered concurrently.
Animal sacrifices are only prescribed for unwitting or
unintentional sin (shogeg)--Leviticus 4:2, 13, 22, 27;
5:5, 15 (cf. Numbers 15:30). The one exception is if
an individual swore falsely to acquit himself of the
accusation of having committed theft (Leviticus
5:24-26). Intentional sin can only be atoned for
through repentance, unaccompanied by a blood
sacrifice- Psalms 32:5, 51:16-19.
"Giving charity is a material expression of this inner
repentance that is articulated in the rabbinic
formula: "Prayer, repentance, and charity avert the
evil decree" (T.J. Ta'anit 2:1, 65b). This is based on
the verse: "If My people, upon whom My name is called,
shall humble themselves, and pray, and seek My face,
and turn from their evil ways; then will I hear from
heaven, and I will forgive their sin, and I will heal
their land" (2 Chronicles 7:14)."
Firstly it must be recognized that HaShem's
forgiveness, as enacted in the korbanot, are reserved
for those whose hearts are pure, that is, for those
with the intention of turning from their sin and
making restitution for sinning against God. The
anti-missionaries correctly quoted 2 Chronicles in an
effort to demonstrate this, but again I will disagree
that the focus of such "t'shuvah" (repentance) is the
prayers, charity, and repentance alone (more on these
three later in this commentary). I maintain that our
focus today can only be upon the Spotless Lamb offered
for atonement, Yeshua our Yom Kippur! The Renewed
Covenant will bear this out later as well.
Talmudic Quotes
The ancient Rabbis agreed that sacrifice without true
repentance invalidates the sacrifice itself! The
Talmud in Tractate Yoma clearly teaches this:
MISHNA: Sin-offerings and trespass-offerings atone.
Death and the Day of Atonement, if one is penitent,
atone. Penitence atones for slight breaches of
positive or negative commandments; for grave sins, it
effects a suspension, till the Day of Atonement
completes the atonement. To him who says: "I will sin,
repent, sin again, and repent again," is not given the
opportunity to repent. For him who thinks, "I will
sin; the Day of Atonement will atone for my sins," the
Day of Atonement does not atone. A sin towards God,
the Day of Atonement atones for; but a sin towards his
fellowman is not atoned for by the Day of Atonement so
long as the wronged fellowman is not righted. R.
Eliezer b. Azariah lectured: It is written [Lev. xvi.
30]: "From all your sins before the Lord shall ye be
clean." (This is our tradition.) The sin towards God,
the Day of Atonement atones for; but sins toward man,
the Day of Atonement cannot atone for till the
neighbor has been appeased.
Said R. Aqiba: Happy are ye, O Israel. Before whom do
ye cleanse yourselves, and who cleanses you? Your
Father who is in Heaven. For it is written [Ezek.
xxxvi. 25]: "Then will I sprinkle clean water upon
you, and ye shall be clean "; and it is also written:
"The Migveh (hope, or legal bath) of Israel is the
Lord." As a legal diving-bath purifies the unclean, so
does the Holy One, blessed be He, cleanse Israel.
GEMARA: "Death and the Day of Atonement," etc. Only
when one is penitent, but otherwise they do not atone?
Shall we assume that the Mishna is not in accordance
with Rabbi, in the following Boraitha: "Rabbi says:
All sins mentioned in the Bible, whether one is
penitent or not, are atoned by the Day of Atonement,
except throwing off the yoke (of God), expounding the
Torah falsely, and abolition of circumcision (and
mocking a fellowman). These sins are atoned for by the
Day of Atonement, if one is penitent, but not
otherwise." It may be said even that the Mishna is in
accordance with Rabbi: Penitence is supplemented by
the Day of Atonement or Death, but the Day of
Atonement does atone alone.
"Penitence atones for slight breaches, if positive or
negative," etc. Why has it to be told, positive? If
negative, so much the more positive? Said R. Jehudah:
The Mishna meant to say, a positive commandment, or a
negative commandment inferred from a positive. But a
real negative commandment is not atoned? There is a
contradiction from the following Boraitha: What are
called slight sins? A breach of a positive and
negative commandment, except the negative commandment
[Ex. xx. 7]: "Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord
thy God in vain"; and all things equal to this: since
this, which is a real negative commandment, is
excepted, the other negative commandments are atoned
for? Come and hear another contradiction: It is
written [Ex. xxxiv. 7]: "And he will clear of sins."
We might think, from this sin, the breach of the
negative commandment, "Thou shalt not take the name of
the Lord," etc., he will also clear. Therefore it is
further written, "by no means." Shall we assume, that
from the breaches of all negative commandments he will
not clear? Therefore it is written [Ex. xx. 7]: "For
the Lord will not hold him guiltless (the Hebrew term
is the same) that taketh His name in vain." Infer from
this, that breaches of other negative commandments he
does atone for? (How, then, does Jehudah say that the
breaches of real negative commandments are not atoned
for?) There is a difference of opinion among the
Tanaim, as we have learned in the following Boraitha:
"What does penitence atone for? For breaches of
positive, and negative inferred from positive,
commandments. And for which does penitence only gain a
suspension, and the Day of Atonement atones? The sins
for which the penalties are Karoth, death by Beth Din,
and real negative commandments."
The Master has said: Because it is written [Ex. xxxiv.
7]: "He will clear of sins," how is it to be
understood? That is as we have learned in the
following Boraitha: R. Elazar said: We cannot say it
means, He clears of sins, because it is written
further, "by no means" does He clear. We cannot say,
He does not, because it is written "clear of sins."
We must therefore explain the verse: He clears of sins
those who do penance; and does not, those who are not
penitent.
Scriptural Quotes
This concept of intentional and unintentional sin and
of penitence and rebellion is touched upon in the
Torah at Sefer B'midbar (the Book of Numbers):
Version: KJV
Num 15:26 - Num 15:36
26. And it shall be forgiven all the congregation of
the children of Israel, and the stranger that
sojourneth among them; seeing all the people [were] in
ignorance. 27. And if any soul sin through ignorance,
then he shall bring a she goat of the first year for a
sin offering. 28. And the priest shall make an
atonement for the soul that sinneth ignorantly, when
he sinneth by ignorance before the Lord, to make an
atonement for him; and it shall be forgiven him. 29.
Ye shall have one law for him that sinneth through
ignorance, [both for] him that is born among the
children of Israel, and for the stranger that
sojourneth among them. 30. But the soul that doeth
[ought] presumptuously, [whether he be] born in the
land, or a stranger, the same reproacheth the Lord;
and that soul shall be cut off from among his people.
31. Because he hath despised the word of the Lord, and
hath broken his commandment, that soul shall utterly
be cut off; his iniquity [shall be] upon him.
The very same concept is taught in the B'rit Chadashah
(the Renewed Covenant, i.e., the New Testament) in the
book of Hebrews!
Version: RSV
Heb 10:26-31
26. For if we sin deliberately after receiving the
knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a
sacrifice for sins, 27. but a fearful prospect of
judgment, and a fury of fire which will consume the
adversaries. 28. A man who has violated the law of
Moses dies without mercy at the testimony of two or
three witnesses. 29. How much worse punishment do you
think will be deserved by the man who has spurned the
Son of God, and profaned the blood of the covenant by
which he was sanctified, and outraged the Spirit of
grace? 30. For we know him who said, "Vengeance is
mine, I will repay." And again, "The Lord will judge
his people." 31. It is a fearful thing to fall into
the hands of the living God.
Thus we see that atonement for sins, both intentional
and unintentional, must be accompanied by a penitent
heart. Now does Leviticus teach that the Yom Kippur
atones for all of these sins? Let us quote the text
of Leviticus 16:17-24 from the 1917 JPS version:
16
And he shall make atonement for the holy place,
because of the uncleannesses of the children of
Israel, and because of their transgressions, even all
their sins; and so shall he do for the tent of
meeting, that dwelleth with them in the midst of their
uncleannesses.
17
And there shall be no man in the tent of meeting when
he goeth in to make atonement in the holy place, until
he come out, and have made atonement for himself, and
for his household, and for all the assembly of Israel.
18
And he shall go out unto the altar that is before
HaShem, and make atonement for it; and shall take of
the blood of the bullock, and of the blood of the
goat, and put it upon the horns of the altar round
about.
19
And he shall sprinkle of the blood upon it with his
finger seven times, and cleanse it, and hallow it from
the uncleannesses of the children of Israel.
20
And when he hath 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 upon the head of
the live goat, and confess over him all the iniquities
of the children of Israel, and all their
transgressions, even all their sins; and he shall put
them upon the head of the goat, and shall send him
away by the hand of an appointed man into the
wilderness.
22
And the goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities
unto a land which is cut off; and he shall let go the
goat in the wilderness.
23
And Aaron shall come into the tent of meeting, and
shall put off the linen garments, which he put on when
he went into the holy place, and shall leave them
there.
24
And he shall bathe his flesh in water in a holy place
and put on his other vestments, and come forth, and
offer his burnt-offering and the burnt-offering of the
people, and make atonement for himself and for the
people.
Look again at verse 16!
"And he shall make atonement for the holy place,
because of the uncleannesses of the children of
Israel, and because of their transgressions, even all
their sins; and so shall he do for the tent of
meeting, that dwelleth with them in the midst of their
uncleannesses" (emphasis mine).
And again at verse 21!
"And Aaron shall lay both his hands upon the head of
the live goat, and confess over him all the iniquities
of the children of Israel, and all their
transgressions, even all their sins; and he shall put
them upon the head of the goat, and shall send him
away by the hand of an appointed man into the
wilderness" (emphasis mine).
It is not difficult to understand the import of the
passages quoted. "All" means "all"! The Yom Kippur
sacrifice, if presented by the priest with a right
heart on behalf of the people with right hearts atoned
for all of their sins.
Again I cite the RaMBaM (Rabbi Moshe ben-Maimon,
a.k.a., Maimonides) for ancient support. In his
Mishneh Torah chapter one deals with the Laws of
Repentance:
The goat sent to Azazel on the Day of Atonement is an
atonement for all of Israel. The High Priest confesses
verbally over it for all Jews, as it is written,
"..and confesses over it all the iniquities of the
Children of Israel". This goat atones for all
transgressions of whatever severity of any of the
Torah's commandments, whether they were committed
deliberately or accidentally, whether the transgressor
had confessed or not, provided that the guilty parties
had repented, for without repentance the goat sent to
Azazel repents only for the less-severe
transgressions. Severe transgressions are those which
a Court of Law can punish by death, or which carry a
penalty of excision, and also false oaths and
falsehood, even though they do not bear a penalty of
excision. Transgressions of negative commandments or
other transgressions the transgression of which does
not carry a penalty of excision are considered less
severe.
Of course any good Jew can go on to read that in
section three immediately following section two he
clarifies his position on repentance by teaching:
In this day and age we have only repentance, for we
don't have the Temple and Altar. This repentance [that
we have to do nowadays] can atone for all sins.
This is where the RaMBaM and I part ways.
In chapter 16 of our portion, we find the divine
instructions for the sacred day of assembly known as
Yom Kippur. HaShem has very explicit and important
details that he expects Aharon the cohen gadol (high
priest) to carry out. To be sure, as we shall find
out, they had a very significant and far-reaching
impact not just on the physical offspring of Avraham,
but as the fullness of God's timetable would
demonstrate, on the rest of humanity as well.
Yeshua's Bloody Atonement Sacrifice and Leviticus
17:11
In an attempt to continue explain the matter, we need
to understand the plans and purposes of HaShem as
expressed in the whole of the Torah. From our vantage
point and using twentieth century hindsight, it makes
perfect sense to send the Messiah to atone for our
sinful nature. After all, if God left things in the
hands of mankind, each individual man would have to
atone for his own personal sins and consequently every
man would eventually have to die for such a payment.
But what does the Torah say?
"Here is how it works: it was through one individual
that sin entered into the world, and through sin,
death; and in this way death passed through to the
whole human race, inasmuch as everyone sinned."
(Romans 5:12)
With the entrance of sin came the punishment for
sin-death. So we see that HaShem is perfectly
righteous when he says that the wages for our sin is
death; every man does deserve to die. But here is
where the mercy of HaShem comes in! He has lovingly
provided a means by which mankind can redeem himself.
In the period of the TaNaKH, the sacrificial system
was that means! Even though it pointed towards
something greater, it was authentically God's
solution. No Jew living in that time period was able
to circumvent this system, and remain officially
within the community. To answer the question posed
above, if we take HaShem seriously, them we will
accept his provision-no matter what means, or how
temporal that provision is! This is our first lesson
in "Torah logic".
This brings us to the current situation facing every
man and woman and child, Jew or non-Jew, living today:
"Since the sacrificial system used in the TaNaKH has
been dissolved, what is his means of atonement today?"
As we have already observed from the anti-missionary's
position above, the modern rabbis would have us to
believe that the three ways by which we appease HaShem
today are "T'shuvah" (repentance), "T'fillah"
(prayer), and "Tzedekah" (righteous acts). To be sure,
all of these principles are found in the teachings of
the Torah! And each and every one of them has valid
merit. For our God is highly interested in our
repentance from sin, and he is very supportive of a
prayer time, and he is enthusiastic of our righteous
acts done in his name! But what does our Torah portion
say?
"For the life of the creature is in the blood, and I
have given it to you on the altar to make atonement
for yourselves; for it is the blood that makes
atonement because of the life." (Leviticus 17:11)
Moving into chapter 17, we encounter one of our chair
passages. This single verse of the Torah has caused no
small disagreement between Christian missionaries and
anti-missionaries. The missionaries use this verse as
a launching point by which to propagate the necessity
of the atonement of Yeshua the Messiah for the
forgiveness of sin. The rabbis teach that according to
further insight (usually provided for them by the
Talmud, this verse is not exclusively addressing the
issue of sin atonement. Since we are studying the
arguments and responses of both camps, we should not
be ashamed to provide an authoritative answer.
First of all, the rabbis have a somewhat valid point
to make; the Torah does address the issue of atonement
in other sections. Likewise, HaShem did use the blood
of animals in other types of sacrificial requirements,
where sin is not the primary issue. But what the
rabbis seem to misunderstand is that the above quoted
verse was not intended to confuse the average reader!
Citing the rules of standard grammatical-historical
exegesis: When the plain sense of Scripture makes
common sense, seek no other sense; therefore, take
every word at its primary, ordinary, usual, literal
meaning unless the facts of the immediate context,
studied in the light of related passages and axiomatic
and fundamental truths, indicate clearly otherwise. In
other words, did the average unlearned reader, living
in the time period of the TaNaKH, understand what
HaShem was asking of him? Of course he did. If he did
not, I imagine we would have read about the difference
in interpretation somewhere else in the Torah. But our
verse here in Leviticus contains little or no
ambiguity. The immediate recipients of the context of
chapter 17 are as given: to Moshe (vs. 1), to Aharon
and his sons (vs. 1), to 'Am Isra'el (vs. 1), and
finally someone from the community of Isra'el or one
of the foreigners living with you (vs. 8, 10). The
chapter even leaves off addressing "anyone" in verse
15.
Were all of these individuals learned people? Did they
study in the most brilliant theological schools of
their day? Was HaShem secretly cloaking this important
information in mystery only to be understood by the
future rabbis and Torah teachers of the people of
Isra'el? I am not reluctant to place the blame on
over-examination. Because of this, we sometimes miss
the simple explanation that the Torah is trying to
teach us. To use modern language "We miss the forest
for the trees!" Another rather obvious cause for the
disagreement here is the fact that most non-Messianic
rabbis don't consider the New Covenant Scriptures
authoritative, and therefore, they usually ignore it's
teaching. Woe unto those unfaithful teachers during
the coming day of reckoning (Yom haDin)!
But the Torah, as revealed by the Messiah and his
first century followers, is authoritative concerning
this issue, so it is there that we will settle the
issue:
"But God demonstrated his own love for us in that the
Messiah died on our behalf while we were still
sinners. Therefore, since we have now come to be
considered righteous by means of his bloody
sacrificial death, how much more will we be delivered
through him from the anger of God's judgment!" (Romans
5:8, 9)
Yeshua has now become the means by which all men must
satisfy the righteous atoning requirement of the Holy
One! This type of atonement is not the kind that is
repeated year after year! Our sins are not meted out
into animals, only to be repeated the next year at Yom
Kippur. This type of atonement is based on better
promises with a better sacrifice! What does the Torah
say?
"No longer will any of them teach his fellow community
member or his brother, 'Know ADONAI'; for all will
know me, from the least of them to the greatest;
because I will forgive their wickedness and remember
their sins no more." (Jeremiah 31:34)
Even righteous King David recognized the mercy of a
God who "covers" and "forgives" the transgressors' sin
using the substitute blood of animals (in this passage
the Hebrew word for "cover" is "kasah" [literally
"conceal", "hide"], while the Hebrew word for
"forgive" is "nassa" [literally "carry", "bear",
"take"]; see chapter thirty-two of the book of Psalms.
Interestingly, in the first few p'sukim the words
"cover" and "forgive" function as synonyms in poetic
parallelism! This is also where we see a good example
of the validity and necessity of the system used
during those days. But the covenant spoken about by
the prophet Jeremiah is surely a superior system. When
HaShem says that he will remember our sins no more,
that's something to rejoice about! Why would anyone
want to attempt to revert back to the former system,
if it were possible? Unfortunately, today, many of my
brothers according to the flesh are doing something
similar to this. When a person rejects Yeshua
HaMashiach as the final atonement for their sin, they
are really rejecting the One who sent the Messiah in
the first place! In other words, to reject Yeshua is
to reject HaShem! This is where the corporate
blindness of my people lies.
The second important aspect of the sending of Yeshua
at the appointed time has to do with order. HaShem has
a perfect plan for everything. According to the
purpose of God, sin seems to have run it's course
until the ideal time for sending the Messiah into the
world came. Yeshua therefore demonstrated his
obedience to the Father by surrendering his life as a
sacrifice only when the time set by his Father was
perfect. Not sooner. Not later. We must accept this
Biblical truth and live by it. In a way, you could say
that if Messiah Yeshua had provided himself for
atonement at a much earlier time, then, because of
community dynamics, the majority of Am Yisra'el would
have accepted him, yet the majority of the surrounding
Gentile Nations would have missed out. Of course this
is speculative, yet it does contain an element of
truth. Read Romans chapter eleven, specifically verse
twenty-five sometime, and you'll notice that the Torah
is hinting at this very aspect!
Leviticus 18:5 - Torah Observance Equals Eternal Life?
Moving on into chapter 18, we find our second chair
passage.
"You are to observe my laws and rulings; if a person
does them, he will have life through them; I am
ADONAI." (Leviticus 18:5)
A few years ago I had the unique opportunity of
engaging in a lengthy debate with a non-Messianic
rabbi over the important implications behind this
single verse. Since the debate was via the medium of
e-mail, I have decided to share a selected portion
with you here in this commentary. A word of caution:
my apologetics (Scriptural defensive reasoning) were
aimed at the gross error that exists within the
scholarship of the Jewish learned. My comments were
intended to expose that error in an effort to showcase
the Truth of the Torah to a man whose eyes were
blinded by defensive (not passive) unbelief, as well
as a man bent on ill-feelings towards the Christian
community of which he believes is in serious
disobedience to the Torah of the very God that they
claim to serve. My comments should not be understood
as being applied to the Jewish people as a whole, nor
am I singling out any particular Christian group.
Truth cuts to the heart of the issue for those who
walk in disobedience. To use modern vernacular "If
the shoe fits..then wear it!"
I have not posted any of his comments, as I do not
permission to do so. Mixing only my own comments with
those of noted author and translator David H. Stern,
as found in his Jewish New Testament Commentary, I
wrote:
" Moshe spoke of the righteousness that is grounded in
trust, in Vayikra 18:5, "That the person who does
these things will attain life through them." Rashi
(quoting the Sifra) comments: "It refers to the world
to come; for if you say it refers to this world,
doesn't everyone die sooner or later?" I understand
the Torah then to be talking about eternal life.
"That many Christians don't believe that the Torah
teaches eternal life through the Teachings of the
Mitzvot is irrelevant! If they have made a serious
error in their theology, they must answer to HaShem
for misunderstanding His Torah. Why do we become so
"caught up in the middle" over false teaching? Is it
because of the fence that we have built around Torah,
that we defend it so fervently? In any case, they are
wrong about Torah.... it is to be kept, not
disregarded. It is the goal of the Torah to lead its
followers to the righteousness grounded in trust. But
have you ever stopped to think that they (the minim)
may have understood a central part that our people,
the Jewish community, miss?
"The lesson in logic goes like this: the person who
practices "the righteousness grounded in the Torah
will necessarily have the trust in Yeshua the Messiah
that the B'rit Chadashah proclaims. Why? Because
legalism is the exact opposite of trust! The heresy of
legalism, when applied to the Torah, says that anyone
who does these things, that is, anyone who
mechanically follows the rules for Shabbat, kashrut,
etc., will attain life through them, will be saved,
will enter the Kingdom of HaShem, will obtain eternal
life. No need to trust HaShem, just obey the rules!
The problem with this simplistic ladder to Heaven is
that legalism conveniently ignores the "rule" that
trust must underlie all rules following which HaShem
finds acceptable. But trust necessarily converts mere
rule-following into something altogether different, in
fact, into its opposite, genuine faithfulness to
HaShem. Therefore, "legalistic obedience to Torah
commands" (that is, "works of the Law") is actually
disobedience to the Torah!
"As a Jew, who follows the Torah as given by Him,
through Moshe Rabbenu, I challenge you once again:
legalism - that is, legalistic obedience to Torah
commands - is disobedience to the Torah! One could be
obeying every single mitzvah (except, by assumption,
the mitzvah of trust), but if these things are being
done without heartfelt trust in the God who is there,
the only God there is, the God who sent his Son Yeshua
to be the atonement for sin, then all this outward
"obedience" is hateful to HaShem (Yesha'yahu 1:14),
and the person doing it, the legalist, "lives under a
curse," because he is not "doing everything written in
the Scroll of the Torah" (D'varim 27:26).
"Now here's the sad truth! The evidence that
non-Messianic Jews "have not submitted themselves to
HaShem's way of making people righteous", which itself
shows that their "zeal for HaShem" is "not based on
correct understanding", is that they have not grasped
the central point of the Torah and acted on it. Had
they seen that trust in HaShem - as opposed to
self-effort, legalism, and mechanical obedience to the
rules - is the route to the righteousness which the
Torah itself not only requires but offers, then they
would see that, "the goal at which the Torah aims is
[acknowledging and trusting in] the Messiah, who
offers [on the ground of this trusting the very]
righteousness (they are seeking). They would see that
the righteousness, which the Torah offers, is offered
through him and only through him. They would also see
that he offers it to everyone who trusts - to them and
to the Goyim as well!"
Conclusions
The thrust of this week's commentary has been
presented in an effort to educate the two camps, both
Jews and Gentile Christians. Many Messianic as well as
non-Messianic Jews still struggle with the intended
meaning of "what it means to be a new creation in
Messiah, walking out his Torah in our lives";
moreover, many non-Jewish Christians struggle with
this issue as well. By default, the world does not
struggle with these issues since it has not accepted
HaShem on his grounds in the first place.
While my heart reaches out to non-Jewish believers
with these important instructions concerning the Torah
of HaShem, it is my desire to make a heartfelt plea to
the Jewish Community to consider accepting HaShem on
his terms alone! This is our second lesson in
"Torah-logic": if HaShem renews the terms of his
original covenant, we as partners must agree with his
improved establishment, especially since it was
faithlessness on our part that necessitated the
renewal! Apart from being superior to the sacrificial
system because of its Guarantor, Yeshua's atonement
also brought about the power to maintain a change of
heart. To be sure, the famous passage quoted from
Jeremiah contains in it, a promise from HaShem to put
the Torah in the inward parts of the people-i.e. on
the heart. This means a change in the spiritual makeup
of the individual. A change that transforms the sinner
into the status of righteous heir! Now because of
Yeshua's death, HaShem no longer considers death as
our wage (Romans 8:1)! Even if not corporately, each
individual Jewish person can now proclaim: Our Yom
Kippur has come! Our final Day of Atonement has
already arrived! Our effectual sacrifice has been
offered once and for all!
For further study, read: Leviticus chs. 16, 17;
Numbers 29:7-11; Isaiah 57:14-58:14; Jonah 1-4; Micah
7:18-20; Romans 3:21-26; Hebrews chs. 7-10.
Messianic Rabbi Ariel ben-Lyman HaNaviy
yeshua613@hotmail.com
To visit the "weekly-parasha" group on the web, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/weekly-parashah/
Okay, no more visits to the internet for me, now. I'm out of printer ink, again. 
