God has made a way that our sins not keep us from Him.
Bible Study Ideas and Commentary for Leviticus 16
The Day of Atonement was the high point of Jewish sacrificial law, a day in which the High Priest went into the Most Holy Place to make an annual sacrifice that would push the sins of the people back for another year. That event pointed to Jesus, the one true eternal sacrifice. Do we take that for granted?
Aaron is to enter the most holy place in this way... (Lev 16:3)
Getting Started: Things to Think About
Strictest Entrance Procedures/Requirements.
I’m still trying to workshop this idea, but if you follow me and think you can make it work, go for it. This week’s lesson focuses on the The Day of Atonement, of central importance to Jews and Christians. You want to spend most of your time on that! But it also covers the passage describing how Aaron must prepare to enter the Most Holy Place. So that has me thinking: what are the places today that are the most difficult to enter?
Airports. I remember when anyone could walk back to the gates. Not any more! Ask your group about all the different steps to get into an airport. Why is the process so complicated? Is it worth it? (yes)
Elite Colleges. The Coast Guard Academy only accepts 9.6% of applicants. Harvard and Princeton: 11.4%. What are the schools, clubs, or institutions that are the most difficult to get into (in your experience) and why do they make such a fuss?
Certain Medical Wards. St. Jude Children’s research Hospital posts an extensive list of “Inpatient Visiting Guidelines”. If you can’t guess what they are, do a Google search and share with your group. What is the purpose of such restrictions? Safety, safety, safety! But at least there we’re talking about people you can visit.
I read an article on US News and World Report, “When You're Put in Hospital Isolation”, that covers even stricter rules. In addition to the gloves and gowns, “droplet isolation” requires the use of masks and goggles, and “airborne isolation” requires full hoods or respirators. The article does a nice job or explaining the why. If someone in your group has been through that with a loved one, their story might be insightful for you. The precautions really put a sense of urgency in the visit and can be unsettling.
Certain Workplaces (Bio and Nuclear). And then there are people who for their jobs have to go through intense prep/deprep (including decontamination). And I think you can add to this list people like firefighters and bomb squad who wear special gear all the time.
What’s the point of this discussion? Aaron had to do very special things to be prepared to enter into the Most Holy Place. Why? Well, why all those procedures above? Safety. Respect. Urgency. Maybe those illustrations will help your group see.
This Week's Big Idea: Entering the Most Holy Place
There are lots of regulations for the priests and the Tabernacle—here’s a summary that you might find helpful. Only certain priests were allowed to enter the Holy Place. They had to be bathed, specially clothed (fine linen and sashes), anointed with oil, and consecrated with drops of blood from the sacrifice (that happened at “ordination”). In the Holy Place, their daily job was to keep incense burning before the veil (on the altar of incense) and the keep the lamps burning every night. On the Day of Atonement, however, the altar of incense became the place for the blood of the annual sin offering.
The High Priest and the Most Holy Place. Only one person could enter the Most Holy Place, and that only once a year on the Day of Atonement. The High Priest, a descendant of Aaron, was not allowed to leave the sanctuary precinct—he was holy to the Lord. He wore a special garment, a blue robe with gold bells, a fine white linen undergarment, a special breastplate with ornamentations representing the 12 tribes, and a gold and linen turban. But on the Day of Atonement, that changed. The High Priest had to bathe and put on a pure, plain white linen garment. No opulence for a human in the presence of God! Then there were the sacrifices we’ll talk about in the lesson. Finally, he came out, sent away the scapegoat, bathed and put back on his High Priest garb, and offered one more set of sacrifices for the people.
An interesting legend surrounding this day is that the High Priest had a rope tied around his foot so he could be pulled out in the case that he died. I love that story! But there’s nothing in the Bible or ancient Jewish literature to corroborate it, so it may just be legend. One scholar pointed out that the curtain would be so heavy that it would be nigh impossible to drag a body under it. Some scholars have estimated that the curtain was multiple feet thick, and it was a very heavy weave. Remember that the curtain was literally protecting the priests in the Holy Place from the glory of God (God-allowed), so it must have been substantial.
Where We Are in Leviticus
Highlights of Leviticus
The main thing in the chapters we skip are rules about clean/unclean (aren’t you glad we skip these?). There are rules about what the people could eat. Rules about skin disease and bodily discharges. Rules about mold and mildew. (I'm not sure what this graphic artist has against pork, but he sure doesn't hide his disdain.)
Doctors have pointed out good medical reasons for each of these regulations—they would have made the people safer. (Indeed, history has shown that Jewish communities were much more resilient to things like plague and epidemic.) But there are two things to point out (if anyone in your group flips back a page and asks you about them): (1) things were clean and unclean only because God said so. God could have made any rules, and they would have been absolute. (2) All things are “clean” for Christians today because Christ has made them clean. We can choose to follow these rules today out of good hygiene (and most of these rules are really valuable), but we don’t have to. Being sick with a skin disease doesn’t cut us of from God. Jesus demonstrated that by going to the lepers and the sick. In Christ, we have immediate access to God, no matter what.
Quick Aside: Incense Offerings
The incense altar in the Tabernacle wasn’t very big—18 inches square on top and 3 feet tall. The priests were supposed to burn incense on it twice a day: when the lamps were trimmed in the morning and lit in the evening. The incense was supposed to be composed of four very expensive ingredients: stacte, onycha, galbanum, and frankincense. Those were to be “seasoned” with salt. What the priests would do is take coals from the outside altar of burnt offering, place them on the incense altar, grind down the incense into powder, and sprinkle it on the burning coals. That might sound like a cleaning nightmare, but there’s where it matters that God had the Israelites cover the altar with a layer of pure gold, a material that could handle the caustic materials and still be cleaned easily (not unlike those crazy copper pans that are As Seen on TV!).
We know that the incense symbolized the prayers of the saints. It was custom in that day for kings to have incense burning during dinners/visits. The smell would cover up the more unpleasant smells that lingered in the air (think of all of the burning animal flesh just outside the tent). The King of kings would expect no less special treatment from His people.
On the Day of Atonement, the High Priest would put some of those coals on a censer, sprinkle on some incense, and carry it before him into the Most Holy Place with the blood of the sacrifice, which he would then sprinkle on the mercy seat. Here, the incense served not only as a smell but also to create a cloud that would shield the priest’s eyes from God’s consuming presence.
Part 1: Preparing to Sacrifice (Leviticus 16:3-6)
“Aaron is to enter the most holy place in this way: with a young bull for a sin offering and a ram for a burnt offering. He is to wear a holy linen tunic, and linen undergarments are to be on his body. He is to tie a linen sash around him and wrap his head with a linen turban. These are holy garments; he must bathe his body with water before he wears them. He is to take from the Israelite community two male goats for a sin offering and one ram for a burnt offering. “Aaron will present the bull for his sin offering and make atonement for himself and his household.”
The Day of Atonement here in chapter 16 is the high point of the entire book of Leviticus. Because of this sacrificial ritual, the people were “made right” with God for another year. We have since learned that it was just pointing to Jesus, the one true sacrifice of atonement, but the Jews didn’t know that. By performing this ritual year after year, God was “pushing ahead” the punishment their sins deserved and “saving it up” for Jesus. The entire process of this ritual is a fascinating look into what Jesus accomplished for us when He died on that cross.
The only furniture in the Most Holy Place is the ark of the covenant. On top of the ark is the “mercy seat” (I included a graphic below that has it designed to look like an actual “seat”; it doesn’t need to look like that because God didn’t “sit” in it like people do a chair!). The mercy seat was designed in such a way as to have offerings placed on it (remember that ark was lined with gold, so it could handle just about anything). The High Priest had a special, simple outfit to wear on this day.
The Day of Atonement took place in Sept/Oct; it (with the Feast of Trumpets and the Feast of Tabernacles) was the last of the three annual feasts, together with Passover and the Feast of Weeks/Harvest. Jesus fulfilled all of these feasts, so that’s why we don’t celebrate “the Day of Atonement” anymore (see the back page). These verses cover the special preparation the High Priest has to make just to be a part of it. Linen is a white fabric, white symbolizing purity. He would sacrifice a bull on the altar in the courtyard for his own sin (and that of his family) followed by a ram for the sin of the people. He would take blood from those sacrifices and sprinkle it on the mercy seat.
One study guide recommended that you move quickly through those details and focus talk on why the Israelites needed to make these sacrifices. You can illustrate this with the pepper and dish soap experiment (Google that if you haven’t done it before). The pepper can represent sin. After what happened to Nadab and Abihu, we know that it is not safe to approach God with sin. Well, these purification rituals and sacrifices are like touching your finger in the pepper—the soap pushes the pepper away, creating a “clean space”. That “clean space” allows the High Priest safe access to God. And symbolically, the atonement sacrifice made it safe for God to dwell in the midst of the people for another year. Again, we know it’s actually because of Jesus that any of this works. In our group last week, we talked about how Christians can take for granted everything that Jesus accomplished for us. Ask: how seriously do you take sin and purity? Do you care more about the stain of sin in your life or a stain on your shirt?
Part 2: The Chosen Goat (Leviticus 16:7-10)
Next he will take the two goats and place them before the Lord at the entrance to the tent of meeting. After Aaron casts lots for the two goats, one lot for the Lord and the other for an uninhabitable place, he is to present the goat chosen by lot for the Lord and sacrifice it as a sin offering. But the goat chosen by lot for an uninhabitable place is to be presented alive before the Lord to make atonement with it by sending it into the wilderness for an uninhabitable place.
See the aside on “Azazel”. This is one of the most profound images in the Bible—a simple, innocent goat carrying the weight of the sin of the people into a wilderness where death awaited. Utterly profound. You might argue that it’s better than being burned on the altar, and I guess that depends on what God let happen to the scapegoat. By lot, God would choose one of the two goats for the offering and one for the scapegoat, further cementing that God is sovereign in these decisions. Also note that “atonement” here is a two-part event: the death of one representative and the sending away of another.
I think that guilt and scapegoat make for your discussion points. When was the guiltiest you’ve felt? Have you ever knowingly blamed someone else for a mistake/failure that was really yours (like a sibling or a coworker)? This is pretty common. Why do we do it? How do we handle true guilt—our guilt before God?
Aside: “Azazel”?
In verse 8, the two goats are described as being set apart one for God and one for “Azazel”. The meaning of that word has been sharply debated. The CSB makes it’s interpretation clear by saying that one ram has been designated “for an uninhabitable place”. Here are the major views: (1) the word is a combination of “goats” (ez) and “to go away” (azal), ergo “the goat that departs” or the scapegoat. In other words, one goat is designated to be driven away. (2) Some believe the word is related somehow to the Arabic term for wilderness, azazu. (3) The most common view is that this is the proper name for a particular demon, probably the demon of the wilderness. Translations that take that view leave the word “Azazel” in the text. Obviously, the biggest concern with that understanding is that the Israelites have set up some kind of rival demon to God that they have to appease, which would be practically pagan. Conservative Christians who hold this view insist that there is nothing pagan about the use of the name, that it simply represents the wasteland and all evil spirit that would dwell in it.
The CSB, on the other hand, clearly takes a variation of the first view, that “Azazel” means “the goat to be sent away” or it names the place to which the goat is to be sent. Admittedly, that leads to a redundancy in verse 10: “the goat that has been chosen to be ‘the goat that is sent out’ must be sent away to the goat that is sent out in the wilderness.” That’s why scholars choose the “proper name” view. But, a clunky English translation is not the final arbiter in such decisions!
Bonus Aside: What Is a Scapegoat?
If you wanted to, you could easily do your opening discussion on “famous scapegoats” (like Jews, Marie Antionette, and Millennials). The actual scapegoat symbolically carried the sins of the people away from the camp. The point was that the goat was not responsible in any way for those sins; it was an innocent victim. Today, “scapegoats” are people/things that we blame for wrongs; they receive an inordinate or unreasonable amount of the blame. An important difference is that those people might be complicit in the wrongdoing. Have you ever been a scapegoat? Or made someone else one? How did that feel?
Part 3: Day of Atonement (Leviticus 19:29-30)
This is to be a permanent statute for you: In the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month you are to practice self-denial and do no work, both the native and the alien who resides among you. Atonement will be made for you on this day to cleanse you, and you will be clean from all your sins before the Lord.
Do the dish soap experiment again. Did the soap make the pepper disappear? No, the “sin” is still there—it’s just been pushed away. That’s why this cycle never ended. But Jesus actually made an end of our sin, not in making us stop sinning, but in providing a way in which they can be truly, eternally forgiven. The key word in this passage is “clean”; it actually refers to ritual purity more than moral purity because the people could not maintain moral purity. These rituals would make it possible for the people to be allowed to live safely in God’s presence for just a little while longer. But Jesus’ atonement actually makes us right with God, in spite of our sin. So, what is our response to that as Christians. In the last two sermons, David has contrasted two approaches people have tried to take from the New Testament: (1) because it’s all about faith, our works don’t matter, so we may as well keep sinning; (2) because God instituted the Jewish laws, He still expects Christians to keep them. Both ideas are wrong. We can never be good enough to be worthy of Christ’s sacrifice. But we should be so grateful for Jesus that we live every day as His devoted followers. We should care about our moral purity. We should care about our witness for Jesus to the people around us. If you haven’t used these recently, these Bible Project videos on “Atonement” and “Holiness” help put a Christian perspective in these topics:
Wrap up with a series of Jesus questions: “how did the scapegoat point to Jesus?” “how did the burnt offerings point to Jesus?” “how did the rest of these rituals point to Jesus?” “what is different about what Jesus did on Calvary from these sacrifices?” “what do you need to change in your life this week to live just a little more grateful to Jesus?”
This is a good evangelistic lesson. Make an appeal to salvation to everyone in attendance—ask if they have trusted Jesus as their only hope of salvation and heaven. Then, ask them to think about people they know who are likely not Christian. What have they learned in this lesson that might help them share the gospel with those people?
Closing Thoughts: Is There a Christian Equivalent to the Day of Atonement?
The biggest questions I’m getting on this subject is what to do with it as a Christian. Is there a Christian equivalent to the Day of Atonement? A Christian equivalent to a high priest? The answer to both questions is no. The Roman Catholic tradition celebrates something called “The Mass”. In that, they literally “re-present” Christ on the cross to God for the sins they’ve committed since their last Mass. That would be an equivalent to the Day of Atonement. But it’s wrong-minded.
There is no more Day of Atonement or anything like it. The one and only true Day of Atonement was Good Friday some 2000 years ago. Jesus presented a once-for-all sacrifice. And that was that. We remember it on Good Friday, but even then we more focus on the celebration of the Resurrection on Easter.
The High Priest question is a little different. People have the idea that the High Priest was “holier” than the other people—he was closer to God. He was able to enter the Most Holy Place. Christians today wonder “how do we enter the Most Holy Place?” You can Google those questions and find a lot of spiritual/metaphysical mumbo-jumbo. It sounds good because we all want to be closer to God. The problem with that train of thought is it eventually leads to Gnosticism—that there’s some kind of special path you take to God, and there are steps of enlightenment and moments of illumination, etc. We really don’t have anything like that in the Christian life. Paul spoke of a vision he had when he was caught up into the “third heaven”. That sounds important. But he wasn’t bragging about it, and he never said how or why it happened. We are better off thinking of the Christian life as a steady process that we should all be “marching toward God” together, growing in our faith. Each one of us has access to “the Most Holy Place” and by that I mean the presence of God in prayer—that access comes to us through Jesus Christ and not by ourselves. We could never purify ourselves enough to earn that access. So each one of us is like that old High Priest in that way.
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