The Jewish Feasts: Part 13, Yom Kippur Factoids

Cross section of Herod’s Temple, looking south. ©2012 Bristol Works, Inc. Rose Publishing Inc.

Interesting Facts and Misconceptions:

Where is the Ark of the Covenant now?

Based primarily on research done by Dr. Randall Price (Searching for the Ark of the Covenant and The Lost Ark and the Last Days: In Search of Temple Treasures) I believe that the Ark is in a cave beneath the Temple Mount. It was accessible and possibly seen after the 1967 “6-Day War” prior to the sealing of Warren’s Gate by the Jordanian Waqf.

When was the Ark ever in Herod’s Temple?

Never! Leviticus 16 describes God’s commandments for Yom Kippur in the Tabernacle. These were followed with appropriate modifications in the days of Solomon’s Temple, but when that Temple was destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar, the Ark disappeared. Old Jewish traditions hold that Jeremiah hid it somewhere before the destruction.

How did Yom Kippur work without an Ark?

The problem was bigger than that: not only was the Ark gone, but as prophesied in Ezekiel 9 and 10, so was God’s Sh’khinah (Divine Presence), and even the two large cherubim statues were missing. There was nothing in there except haShetiya, the Foundation Stone on which the Ark sat. What was sprinkled with blood? Just the stone. There is, to this day, a shallow niche carved into the stone that is the exact dimension, location and orientation to have supported the Ark, so that is where the High Priest’s attention was focused.

How did it work with no Temple at all?

Some Jewish congregations still attempt to offer a blood sacrifice by wringing the neck of a chicken, but this is a minority practice. In the late 1st century, rabbis decided that the Temple ritual could be replaced by Tefilah (prayer), Teshuva (repentance), and Tzedakah (charity). Those are all good things, surely, but one might say, “Why not just accept your own Messiah?” What about the interval of the Babylonian Captivity, when there was also no Temple? I would ask you to remember that salvation was never a result of sacrifice! Sacrifice was a response of faith in a gracious God!

How did the High Priest accomplish so much in the Holy of Holies on Yom Kippur if he could enter only once a year?

It is not true that the High Priest went into the Holy of Holies only once a year. He went only on Yom Kippur, but on that day he went in four times: (1) He entered to lay coals from the altar, and to burn incense. (2) He entered again to sprinkle the bull’s blood for his own atonement. (3) He entered yet again to sprinkle the goat’s blood for the people’s atonement. (4) Finally, he entered to remove the spent coals at the close of the ceremony.

Given the unrighteousness of many High Priests, how many were struck dead entering the Holy of Holies?

None, as far a we know. But righteousness was not required, or none would have survived; only “ritual cleanness” kept them alive. There was a long process that was required to achieve this ceremonial virtue. It began four days earlier, and involved many washings, immersions, and changes of attire. Part of this procedure was Biblical, part was traditional.

Was a rope really tied to the High Priest’s leg so that he could be pulled out if his attendants quit hearing the tinkling of his bells and pomegranates?

Pure myth! To begin with, there were no bells and pomegranates, because Scripture required him to enter in pure white linens, with no decoration. In the second place, during the key moments of his entry, no other humans were allowed into even the inner Temple courts, let along into the Temple itself. Thirdly, it would have been impossible to pull him through the veil in any case. It was not one veil, it was actually two very heavy veils stretching from side to side and ceiling to floor, with no space on any side. There was a space of one cubit separating the two veils. The outer one was pinned to the left doorpost and the inner to the right doorpost so that they might never reveal what lay beyond. When entering the Holy of Holies, the Priest would pass below the pin on the left side of the outer curtain, walk between the curtains, pass beneath the pin on the right side of the inner curtain, and then walk beside that curtain until he reached the Ark. To exit, he reversed the route. It is impossible for me to conceive of a rope with a body attached being pulled through that circuitous route. Nor would this have been needed; see below regarding cleaning of the Holy of Holies.

Are the scarlet thread stories true?

I have heard two versions. One holds that a scarlet thread was attached to the wall beside the outer veil. If by the next day the thread was found to have turned snow white, then God had accepted the sacrifice. Otherwise, the sacrifice had been rejected and Israel’s sins were unforgiven. The continuation of this story holds that after Jesus’ crucifixion, and up to the AD 70 destruction of the Temple, the thread never changed color. This isn’t absurd on its face, like the rope theory, but if it were true, we would find volumes of lamentations over those 40 years of rejection. This would be known as the greatest national calamity ever to strike Israel. I think even more so than the Temples’ destruction. The second version is the same, except that the thread was attached to a horn of the Scapegoat. I reject this version as well. I think that this one is probably a corruption of a story in rabbinical literature which records that a scarlet strand of some sort was tied across both horns of the goat and used to secure a heavy rock so that the sure-footed goat would be pulled over the cliff to its destruction.

How far out of the Temple was the goat taken?

According to rabbinical sources, 90 ris. After five separate unit conversions, I worked this out to about 7 miles. Watchers were stationed at key locations between Temple and cliff so that successful completion of the goat’s assassination could be signaled back by means of flags, and the next steps of the ceremony begun.

Would the Ark with its poles even have fit into the Holy of Holies?

Very astute question! We know the dimensions of the room, of the Ark, and even of the poles. Yet almost every depiction of these things shows the Ark oriented with its poles parallel to the veil, which cannot be! In reality, the Ark went in like a car into a garage. And on either side of it stood a very large statue of a stylized cherub.

How was the Holy of Holies kept clean, or did it never get dirty?

Of course, it got dirty! Hundreds of years of dust bunnies, charcoal dust, incense smoke, insects, and mouse droppings, not to mention hundreds of years of bullock and goat blood! And, potentially, dead High Priests. Before you ask, no, the High Priest didn’t do the cleaning. Above the Holy of Holies was a “drop ceiling” consisting of wooden rectangular tiles set into a framework. Referring to the attached diagram, there was a large chamber over the Holy of Holies, and the ceiling below could be accessed from there. Workmen could, after suitable cleansing, be lowered on ropes to work using tools with long handles. The rules prevented them from touching anything in the room with their own bodies, nor were they allowed to dally or “sight-see”.

Table of Contents: The Jewish Feasts
Start of Series: The Jewish Feasts: Part 1, Chapter Introduction
Previous in Series: The Jewish Feasts: Part 12, Atonement
Next in Series: The Jewish Feasts: Part 14, Tabernacles

The Jewish Feasts: Part 12, Atonement

Yom Kippur, not Passover, is the most important of the Jewish Feasts!

The Days of Awe are the most somber period of the Jewish Year, and Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, is the capstone of the Days of Awe. The correct form of the Feast name is Yom HaKippurim, (the Day of Coverings); but Yom Kippur is the more common name.

I have heard it said many times that Passover is the most important Jewish Feast. That is simply not true. With no Temple to worship in, Passover has certainly become the most well known and faithfully celebrated of the Feasts, but for sheer spiritual impact, Yom Kippur is by far the most vital. it is a recognition of personal and national sin, and a plea for salvation.

Christians celebrate Easter as a salvation event, and rightly so, because Easter celebrates specifically the time and actuality of Jesus’ death, burial and resurrection. Jews celebrate Passover at roughly the same time as Easter, but not at all as a salvation event. As stated in earlier parts of this series, Passover is a celebration of redemption from slavery and resurrection as a people.

In AD 325, Emperor Constantine and the Council of Nicaea officially severed Easter from Passover. This was unfortunately done for explicitly anti-Semitic reasons; however, given the salvation emphasis placed on Easter by non-Jews, it was probably best to do so.

Recall that the ten Days of Awe are all about repentance and reconciliation. On the final day, on Yom Kippur, one’s deeds will be judged by God, and his or her state of salvation determined for the coming year. As you can see from Leviticus 23, above, the day is a Sabbath. Not only that, but the phrases “you are to deny yourselves” (stated twice) and “Anyone who does not deny himself on that day is to be cut off from his people” are regarded as a command to fast, on pain of excommunication. The Hebrew terms used here literally mean to “humble, or afflict one’s soul”. Traditionally they are taken to include fasting, abstinence from sex, and refraining from personal grooming. Yom Kippur is the only Biblically mandated fast day, though rabbinic Judaism does recognize certain other somber days as fast days, and Zechariah 8:19 mentions several months when ancient fasts were practiced.

The ritual of Yom Kippur for Tabernacle observance is described in more detail in Leviticus 16. It is quite complicated. More so in Temple days, and still more after the addition of Oral Traditions. There are very strict and detailed regulations regarding the attire of the High Priest (Heb. Cohen HaGadol), his multiple cleansings, and who and at what times other people could enter the Temple precincts. The actual Temple/Tabernacle observance included the following, in brief:

The High Priest would cast lots over two male goats: one, designated as Chatat, was to be sacrificed; the other was to set aside “for Azazel”; this one would be “brought before the people” so that their sins would symbolically be laid upon him.
The Priest would sacrifice a young bull to atone for, or “cover”, his own sin and that of his household, and the sacrificial goat, to atone for the sins of the people.
Under smoke from incense, blood from these sacrifices was to be sprinkled, with his finger, inside the Holy of Holies, on the Mercy Seat, the front of the Ark, and “toward the east”, that is, between the Ark and the Veil.
Outside the Holy of Holies, blood was also to be sprinkled on the Horns of the Altar.
Having completed these actions, the High Priest was to lay his hands on the head of the live goat and “confess over it all the transgressions, crimes and sins of the people of Isra’el” (CJB). This, the “Scapegoat” now carrying all the sins of the people, was then to be led out of the city to an uninhabited area about 7 miles away, by a fit man appointed to the task. Ostensibly, this goat was to be released, but in practice, it was usually pushed off a cliff to prevent it from wandering back with the people’s sins. Accomplishment of this task was then signaled back to the Temple.
The bullock and the goat were then cut open; the fat and fatty organs were burned on the altar, and the rest of the carcass taken out and burned (on the Mount of Olives in Temple times).
The High Priest would then read from Torah in the Court of Prayer (aka, the Court of women).
Next, the Priest would sacrifice his ram, the ram for the people and seven additional rams.
Finally, he would remove the incense pan and ladle from the Holy of Holies.

For a really good description of the Temple ritual, derived from rabbinical documents, refer to this excellent article by a knowledgeable rabbi: The Service of the High Priest

Important Concepts

As seen previously, the Passover Lamb or Kid was a fellowship offering, to be killed and shared as a meal between friends or family.
The bull and goat sacrificed on Yom Kippur were sin offerings. As such, they could atone for (temporarily cover over), but not permanently remove, the sins of the people. Sin offerings had to be completely burned, not eaten. You don’t want to re-ingest your sins!
The rams were burnt offerings. They were consumed completely in fire, with the rising smoke symbolizing righteous prayer and thanksgiving.
The goat for Azazel was symbolically innocent, vicariously taking on itself the sins of the people and carrying them away. Its killing was not a sacrifice; it was merely a disposal.

Note especially: Hebrews 9:22 says that, “according to the Torah, almost everything is purified with blood“ (CJB, emphasis mine). The context is speaking specifically about ritual vessels and implements, but the same is true with people. The Torah provides atonement through sacrifice for “unintentional sin”, i.e., for sins committed thoughtlessly, accidentally, negligently, or perhaps even in passion. No place in the entire Bible do we ever find a sacrifice for intentional disobedience or rebellion against God! There is no atonement for intentional sin! The theme of Yom Kippur is “regeneration”, that is, salvation. So how is any human being saved? Under Torah, it is by God’s grace, through faith–as pictured in the Scapegoat. Under the New Covenant, by God’s grace, through faith–as delivered for all times past or future by Jesus, the antitype of the Scapegoat!

Table of Contents: The Jewish Feasts
Start of Series: The Jewish Feasts: Part 1, Chapter Introduction
Previous in Series: The Jewish Feasts: Part 11, Trumpets
Next in Series: The Jewish Feasts: Part 13, Yom Kippur Factoids

The Jewish Feasts: Part 10, The Days of Awe

As Israel’s hot summer months come to a close, we enter the Fall Feast season. The first two of these Feasts define the most solemn days of the Jewish year, and the final one, the most joyous. The first two are intimately connected: Yom Teruah, the Day of Trumpets (also known as Rosh Ha-Shanah, Head of the Year, the Jewish secular New Year), on Tishri 1, and Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement on Tishri 10. These two days and the intervening eight days are called, collectively, the Days of Awe (Heb. Yamim Noraim). The entire 10-day period is devoted to intense personal, individual repentance, prayer and righteous deeds (Heb. T’shuvah, tefilla, and tzedakah) and to acts of reconciliation. Joyous celebrations such as weddings and bar and bat mitzvahs do not take place during these days.

The “Book(s) of Life” are a concept that most Christian denominations don’t give much attention to, though there are quite a few somewhat obscure scriptures about them. There are mentions in Exodus, 1 Samuel, Daniel, Psalms, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Malachi, Luke, Romans, 1 Corinthians, Philippians, Hebrews, and of course, Revelation. Plus several Apocryphal and Pseudepigraphal books. I won’t go into the Christian theology here, but I must talk about the Jewish, because it is extremely relevant to the Days of Awe.

The Book of Life (or Book of the Living, Heb. Sefer Hayyim) have taken on huge significance in the writings of Rabbi Akiva, and the Jewish Talmud states that,

“Three books are opened in Heaven on Rosh Ha-Shanah, one for the thoroughly wicked, one for the thoroughly righteous, and one for the intermediate. The thoroughly righteous are forthwith inscribed in the Book of Life, and the thoroughly wicked in the Book of Death, wile the fate of the intermediate is suspended until the Day of Atonement.”

Most people would certainly have considered themselves among the intermediate, but who really knows, so pretty much everyone must consider themselves as such. Thus, the 10-day span of the Days of Awe are marked by ritual cleansing (immersion), prayer and fasting, intense introspection, acts of repentance and, frankly, fear. But wait; the consequences are so dire for those not written in the Book of Life, that the rabbis very early decided than 10 days was not enough, and the tradition grew of starting a month early, on Elul 1.

©Ron Thompson 1008. On Masada, a typical Jewish baptistry (Heb. *mikvah*).

So here is what the period looked like: On Elul 1, all Jews went to the most convenient mikvah (ritual baptistery), spring or river for immersion and cleansing from sin, then, for 40 days, the process of virtual self-flagellation would proceed, culminating in the Pilgrim Festival of Yom Kippur, to be covered in Part 12. Of course, all intervening Sabbaths and the Day of Trumpets/Rosh Ha-Shanah Feast were scrupulously observed. At the conclusion of the 40 days, Jews from around Israel and the Diaspora convened at the Temple Mount for the most important Feast of the year.

The Parapet of the Temple, adapted from Rose Guide to the Temple,
© Copyright 2012 Bristol Works, Inc.

Consider now a late summer in AD 29. It is Elul 1, and John the Baptizer is standing by the water near the village of Bethany Beyond the Jordan, not too far from Jericho (Luke 3). He is baptizing devout Jewish men and women from the district, and chastising those simply obeying their legalistic impulses. He raises his head and sees, walking towards him, his cousin Jesus of Nazareth, who some 33 years earlier had caused him to jump in his mother’s womb. Jesus speaks to John, then steps into the water and is baptized, not for His own sin, but in order to conform to the ritual necessities expected of Him, and to receive the blessing given Him by Father and Spirit that day.

Following His baptism, Jesus is led by the Spirit into the wilderness for the requisite 40 days of prayer and fasting. At the end of this time, on Yom Kippur, Satan appears to Him and tests Him in three ways:

Luke 4:1-12 (CJB)
[4:1] Then Yeshua*, filled with the Ruach HaKodesh* [Holy Spirit], returned from the Yarden* [Jordan] and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness [2] for forty days of testing by the Adversary. During that time he ate nothing, and afterwards he was hungry. [3] The Adversary said to him, “If you are the Son of God, order this stone to become bread.” [4] Yeshua* answered him, “The Tanakh* [Old Testament] says, ‘Man does not live on bread alone.’”

[5] The Adversary took him up, showed him in an instant all the kingdoms of the world, [6] and said to him, “I will give you all this power and glory. It has been handed over to me, and I can give it to whomever I choose. [7] So if you will worship me, it will all be yours.” [8] Yeshua* answered him, “The Tanakh* says, ‘Worship ADONAI* your God and serve him only.’”

[9] Then he took him to Yerushalayim*, set him on the highest point of the Temple and said to him, “If you are the Son of God, jump from here! [10] For the Tanakh* says,

‘He will order his angels
to be responsible for you and to protect you.
[11] They will support you with their hands,
so that you will not hurt your feet on the stones.’”

[12] Yeshua* answered him, “It also says, ‘Do not put ADONAI* your God to the test.’”

The Gospels differ in the order presented, but I think that Luke is most likely chronologically correct by putting Him last on the “highest point of the Temple“, the parapet on the southeastern corner of Solomon’s Porch (see diagram). Yom Kippur being a required Pilgrim Festival, as many as a million people would have been below him in the Temple courts, the Plaza outside, or down in the City of David or its surroundings. Many would have only to raise their eyes to see the drama if Jesus had failed this test.

The Temptation of Jesus does not get the attention it deserves! It is, in my opinion, one of the key events in all of human history.

Jesus, just like Adam, was placed on earth without a sin nature, meaning that they did not have the innate propensity to challenge God’s will. But both were human, and both could be persuaded by temptation. Adam and his mate were tempted by Satan in three ways that we have come to call, The Lust of the Flesh, The Lust of the Eyes, and The Pride of Life. They failed this test and condemned all their descendants to a life of sin. Jesus was tempted in the same fashion and resisted on all counts! He passed all three tests. Had He not done so, we would have no Savior!

Table of Contents: The Jewish Feasts
Start of Series: The Jewish Feasts: Part 1, Chapter Introduction
Previous in Series: The Jewish Feasts: Part 9, Weeks
Next in Series: The Jewish Feasts: Part 11, Trumpets

The Jewish Feasts: Part 6, The Lamb of God

“Theology” is the study of God, and “Soteriology” is the study of, or theology of, salvation.

As an Evangelical Christian and a Calvinist, I believe, with Ephesians 2, that God’s Salvation is by God’s Grace, through God’s Faith acting in us. I believe that Salvation has always been by Grace, through Faith. In Temple times, yes, certainly there were many legalists, but the sages always understood that the sacrifices were a response of faith to Salvation, not a means of it. And if not, were Jews of the Babylonian Captivity forever lost because they had no temple and therefore no sacrifices? No, they had their faith and a gracious God!

We understand that Salvation is, in one sense, a process (personal conviction of sin), culminating in an event. Not, I think, a result of following some yellow brick road through random verses in Romans with a well-meaning friend or stranger, and then repeating back a magic prayer. The best statement I know of to explain salvation is:

Hebrews 11:6 (ESV)
[6] And without faith it is impossible to please him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.

While the Salvation event is a jewel to be sought, it is in reality a jewel with many separate facets (see slide, below): It gathers us into fellowship with likeminded believers; in fact, usually, God brings us into contact with believers in order to introduce us to the reality of His existence. The key facet is regeneration, replacement of our old nature by the new. This results in short- and long-term joy. It also brings redemption from slavery to sin. As we live among God’s people and learn God’s will, we experience sanctification, a turning from sin towards a purer life. Eventually, we all die, but we look forward to ultimate resurrection, followed by revelation of all truth.

So, these facets of Salvation are typified by the recognized themes of the Jewish Feasts! The order is precisely that of the feasts, on Israel’s civil calendar beginning in the fall.

It is important, and the reason for this article, that you recognize that

Jesus is not just the archetype of the Passover Lamb; He is also typified by, and fulfills the prophetic vision of, all Biblical Jewish Feasts and Sacrifices!

In1 Peter 1:18-19 (ESV), the Apostle tells us, “You were ransomed … with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb… without blemish or spot” The emphasis on “like” is mine, and I removed a comma that is not in the Greek. Peter is here comparing Jesus with, really, all of the efficacious sacrificial animals, not just the Passover Lamb.

John the Baptizer, in John 1:29 (ESV), said, “Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world.” But, what does it mean to call Him “The Lamb of God“? Was John prophesying that Jesus would be crucified during the Passover Feast, some 3-1/2 years in the future? The people hearing John in that day, in that place, would have missed that point and immediately known that John was pointing out to them the person who he believed to be the promised Messiah!

Prior to Jesus’ appearance, the Jewish rabbis taught that personifications of “the Lamb” in the Old Testament were speaking of the coming Messiah. Take, for example,

Isaiah 53:7 (ESV)
[7] He was oppressed, and he was afflicted,
yet he opened not his mouth;
like a lamb that is led to the slaughter,
and like a sheep that before its shearers is silent,
so he opened not his mouth.

At the bottom of Part 4, I mentioned some reasons that many theologians mistakenly think that the Gospel of John conflicts with the synoptics, and thus proves that the Last Supper could not have been a Passover Seder. Part of their belief is that Jesus must have been crucified at the time of the Passover sacrifices because “He was the Passover Lamb of God who took away the sins of the world.” That, too, is a misreading of John.

Here is a list of some things that I think make it impossible for Jesus to have died on Nisan 14, at the same time as the sacrifices:

Most importantly, a proper understanding of the scriptures and the cultural traditions make the narrative of the four Gospels clear and consistent. The sacrifices were on Nisan 14, the Crucifixion on Nisan 15.
In Exodus, the killing of the sacrifice was of little importance; what mattered is what happened in the home that night—the smearing of the blood on the doorposts and the sharing of the final meal in slavery. Followed, of course by the passing over by the angel of death. In the commemoration, the sacrifice was governed by ritual, but it was still not a holiday occurrence—the meal was now the essential feature and made more-so by Jesus. During that one, all-important twilight, at the Passover Seder, Jesus proclaimed for all time the New Covenant in His body and blood!
If Jesus had died alongside the Passover sacrifices, His death would have been forever connected with that one sacrifice alone. In fact, His death represented every other sacrifice as well!

The key take-home from this lesson is that, while Jesus was certainly the ultimate Passover Lamb, it was not as the Passover Lamb that He saved us! Passover lambs were never sin offerings. A sin offering became a symbolic receptacle for the sins of the people, and could not be eaten, because one would be symbolically re-ingesting the same sins. The Passover lambs were a type of fellowship offering, a remembrance of redemption from slavery, and a celebratory meal between family and/or friends. It not only could be eaten, but it must be eaten.

So, where did salvation truly lie? In Jesus, the Scapegoat of Yom Kippur! Stay tuned for a future instalment.

Table of Contents: The Jewish Feasts
Start of Series: The Jewish Feasts: Part 1, Chapter Introduction
Previous in Series: The Jewish Feasts: Part 5, Passover
Next in Series: The Jewish Feasts: Part 7, Unleavened Bread

Easter Myths, part 3

Updated 9/12/2022

I’ll deal here, briefly, with just three more Easter myths.

Myth: By dying on Passover, Jesus became our Passover Lamb. I touched on this in Part 1 of this series. I suspect that the vast majority of Christian theologians would say that, at the very least, it is foundational that Jesus died on the same day as the Passover lamb or lambs, because He had to be seen as the fulfillment of the prophetic purposes of the Feast. If that were the case, then I ask why His throat wasn’t slit inside the Temple precincts and His blood splashed on the altar as required by Torah? How is it permissible that He died in a completely different manner, nailed to a Roman cross way over on the other side of the Tyropoeon Valley?

Sheep grazing near Jerusalem. Source unknown.

My contention, on the contrary, is that Jesus did not die on the Feast of Passover, and more particularly, He did not die at the same time as “the Passover Lamb”, of which there were many thousands. In fact, I think that it was theologically necessary that Jesus did not die on the same day or in the same way as the Passover lamb! Had He done so, would He not have linked Himself prophetically to that sacrifice alone, to the exclusion of all others? The truth is that Jesus was the prophetic fulfillment of all of the sacrifices! And in terms of Soteriology, Passover is less important by far than, say, Yom Kippur!

Myth: As our Passover Lamb, Jesus brought salvation to the world. In a word, no! But didn’t Yochanan the Immerser—John the Baptizer—tell his followers to “Behold the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world” (John 1:29)? And what about Paul, who called Him “Christ, our Passover” (1 Cor. 5:7). Those are accurately reported sayings but mind the context! John was urging immersion as part of a ritual of repentance, connected, I’m sure, to the onset of the Days of Awe on that very day and Yom Kippur, just 40 days in the future. He was making no claim to offer salvation! Instead, he was pointing to the Messiah, often referred to in Scripture as “the Lamb of God”, or just “the Lamb.” Jesus didn’t die until some 3½ years later. And Paul was not talking about salvation at all, but rather separation of the Corinthian Church from the “leaven of sin.”

Yes, Jesus died on the cross to save us from our sins, but His sacrifice encompassed and surpassed all of the daily and seasonal sacrifices, not just the Passover lamb. The Passover sacrifice was not even a sin offering! It was a type of fellowship offering. Sin offerings could not be consumed by the people, but they were required to eat their Passover sacrifice to symbolize their freedom from the bondage of sin and the resulting right to sup at God’s table, in fellowship with Him. The Yom Kippur sacrifices were far more to the point of salvation, but even sin offerings only deal with incidental sin—not deliberate, malicious, God-defying sin. There was only one hope for that. Not a specific blood sacrifice, but simply the Grace of God, as symbolized at Yom Kippur by the Scapegoat, which wasn’t even killed! (Well, it was, but not as part of the ceremony; it was driven over a cliff in the wilderness so that it couldn’t come wandering back to town with the sins of the people.)

It was, then, as a goat—the Scapegoat—that “the Lamb of God” took away the sin of the world!

Myth: Peter accidentally cut off Malchus’ ear while taking a wild swing with his sword in an effort to protect Jesus. This quote from the Complete Jewish Bible, my personal favorite translation, sets the stage:

Then Shim‘on Kefa [Simon Peter], who had a sword, drew it and struck the slave of the cohen hagadol [high priest], cutting off his right ear; the slave’s name was Melekh [Malchus].
—John 18:10 CJB

Short sword similar to what Peter would have used to maim Malchus.

First, it is unlikely that Peter was carrying a military sword that night after the Seder. Neither he, nor Malchus, was a soldier. Peter was a fisherman by trade and would be accustomed to carrying a knife for tending nets and lines, and for gutting fish. The Greek term here is machaira, which was probably a double-edged knife or dirk, a shorter version of a sword design that had been introduced into Israel by the Phoenician Sea Peoples. Nor do I think Peter was a trained fighter. We know he was impetuous, but was he an idiot? Did he think he could mow down a band of trained Roman soldiers and Temple guards? Was he distraught and attempting to commit “suicide by Roman soldier”? I think that if he had attempted a frontal assault in Jesus’ protection, he would have been reflexively cut to pieces before he drew a drop of blood, and quite likely the slaughter would have extended to the other apostles present, as well.

What I think really happened was that Peter took advantage of the soldiers’ preoccupation with Jesus, slipped around behind Malchus—his intended target—and deliberately sliced off his ear. Why Malchus? Because Malchus was the High Priest’s servant and right-hand man. The High Priest was protected by bodyguards, but nobody was paying attention to Malchus. At any rate, harming the High Priest would have resulted in quick execution. By taking Malchus out, Peter would be insulting and effectively crippling the High Priest and, to some extent, the Sanhedrin. But then, why an ear, of all things? Because Peter wasn’t a killer, and taking an ear did the job! Priests, Levites and all other Temple officials were required to be more or less physically perfect. With a missing ear, he would be considered deformed and unfit for Temple service.

Yes, Peter was impulsive. But he was also smart.

Easter Myths, Part 1
Easter Myths, Part 2

For a complete series on the Principle Jewish Feasts, as specified in Leviticus 23, please see The Jewish Feasts–The Back of My Mind.

Corruption in the Most Holy Place

Yom Kippur in the Tabernacle, ©Temple Institute, Jerusalem

How could corrupt High Priests like Annas and Caiaphas enter into God’s presence in the Holy of Holies on Yom Kippur? Why didn’t they die in the attempt?

The short answer is that God did not demand personal purity for this function—only ritual purity!

Annas and Caiaphas were certainly corrupt, but they were not the most corrupt of high priests by a long shot. They were political appointees whose loyalties were divided between Rome, the nation of Israel, Torah and their own ambitions. Among earlier high priests, some bought their appointments, and others killed for them. Some were motivated by absolutely nothing other than personal gain. Though some high priests were clearly “better” than others, none was free from some degree of corruption. Indeed, if the high priestly office required total purity, no human being would have survived an entry into the Holy of Holies. More importantly, their ministrations on behalf of the people would have been of no effect. In fact, no priestly sacrifice or function could work!

The essence of Jewish and Christian existence is that, in our fallenness and corruption, nothing we do on our own can meet God’s standards.

Sometimes, the best we can do is to follow a check list. Leviticus 16 describes an elaborate set of ritual preparations that the cohen hagadol, or high priest, had to accomplish before entering the Most Holy Place (the Holy of Holies). If he correctly accomplished each and every step in exactly the way scripture required, then he would survive his encounter with God and would atone for the sins of the nation for another year, no matter how much evil was in his heart. If his preparations erred in any manner whatsoever, he would die behind the veil and atonement would fail. We have no evidence in scripture or history that any high priest did die in the Holy of Holies. That is not too surprising given the care that each high priest and his attendants took to assure that no mistakes were made.

This once again illustrates a truth that we see over and over again in scripture: that God is able to, and completely willing to, accomplish His purpose even at the hands of fallen people.

Atonement vs Expiation

The term “atonement” is used over and over in the Old Testament to describe the purpose for and result of the Sinaitic (or Mosaic) sacrificial system. Many Christian theologians extrapolate the Old Testament concept into the New Testament setting and speak of the “atoning work of Christ on the cross.” This usage, however, obscures the very real difference between Old Testament atonement and New Testament expiation, propitiation and reconciliation. Atonement, in the Biblical sense, is a temporary covering up of sin, or guilt. A “stay of execution”, so to speak. Expiation means “to extinguish guilt incurred”. Propitiation is roughly the same, but with the additional dimension of appeasement of anger. Reconciliation means to “reestablish a close relationship” between two entities or concepts. Expiation and propitiation accurately describe what the death of Messiah did, while reconciliation, an accounting term, describes the resulting balance of our relationship with God. Cause and effect. Sin is paid for in full and permanently expunged from the record, God is appeased, and of our relationship with Him is restored.

Model of the Ark of the Covenant. ©Leen Ritmeyer

The Hebrew terms for “atonement” are variations from the root kaphar, which all carry the idea of “covering”; for example, covering a ship’s hull with bitumen to prevent leakage, or covering a stain in a hardwood floor with a rug. Orthodox Jewish males today cover their heads with kippot, the skullcaps or yarmulkes (Yiddish) that we have all seen. The “lid” of the Arc of the Covenant was called the kapporah, and it, too, is a covering. Atonement for sin, then, becomes a means of covering, or obscuring, it from sight, without actually expunging or removing it. The guilt remains, but God has provided a means of temporarily “sweeping it under the rug” pending permanent expungement by means of Messiah’s crucifixion.

Aside from references to the Jewish feast, the Day of Atonement, the words atone, or atonement appear seldom or not at all in most translations of the New Testament. In the Septuagint (LXX, the Greek version of the Old Testament used by Paul, translated, apparently, by 70 Jewish scholars in Elephantine, Egypt, in the 2nd Century, BC), the word “atonement” is rendered as hilasterion, because there apparently was not a Greek equivalent for “atonement”. Where the feast day is intended, the Greek hilasterion is thus also used in the New Testament for “atonement”, or even for “Mercy Seat”, referring to the covering of the Ark of the Covenant; otherwise, hilasterion is correctly translated as expiation or propitiation. Where the Greek katallagē is used, the proper translation is reconciliation.

Though most New Testament translations are generally okay in this respect, Christian writers and speakers continue to refer to phrases like, “the atoning blood of Christ”, which is a theological non-sequitur. Atonement is decidedly not what His crucifixion accomplished! The confusion arises because most Christians believe that the sacrifices were means of salvation under the Jewish Torah. But this is taught nowhere in scripture. Atonement by means of the sacrificial system is never said to make anybody “at one with Christ” or with God. Atonement is not “at-one-ment” as many have claimed. Salvation is permanent, whereas atonement is only temporary.

In discussing the superior sacrifice of Jesus, Heb 10:4 states that

Hebrews 10:4 (CJB)
[4] …it is impossible that the blood of bulls and goats should take away sins.

Many passages in the Tanach (Old Testament) also discuss the inadequacy of sacrifice in the presence of a sinful heart. For example

1 Samuel 15:22 (CJB)
[22] Sh’mu’el* [Samuel]said,
“Does ADONAI* take as much pleasure
in burnt offerings and sacrifices
as in obeying what ADONAI* says?
Surely obeying is better than sacrifice,
and heeding orders than the fat of rams.

Psalms 40:7 (CJB)
7Sacrifices and grain offerings you don’t want;
burnt offerings and sin offerings you don’t demand.
Instead, you have given me open ears;

Psalms 51:18 (CJB)
18For you don’t want sacrifices, or I would give them;
you don’t take pleasure in burnt offerings.

Proverbs 15:8 (CJB)
[8] ADONAI* detests the sacrifices of the wicked
but delights in the prayers of the upright.

Isaiah 1:11 (CJB)
[11] “Why are all those sacrifices
offered to me?” asks ADONAI*.
“I’m fed up with burnt offerings of rams
and the fat of fattened animals!
I get no pleasure from the blood of bulls,
lambs and goats!

Jeremiah 6:20 (CJB)
[20] What do I care about incense from Sh’va* [Sheba]
or sweet cane from a distant land?
Your burnt offerings are unacceptable,
your sacrifices don’t please me.”

Hosea 6:6 (CJB)
[6] For what I desire is mercy, not sacrifices,
knowledge of God more than burnt offerings.

Hosea 8:13 (CJB)
[13] They offer me sacrifices of flesh and eat them,
but ADONAI* does not accept them.
Now he will recall their crimes and punish their sins—
they will return to Egypt.

Hosea 9:4 (CJB)
[4] They will not pour out wine offerings to ADONAI*;
they will not be pleasing to him.
Their sacrifices will be for them like mourners’ food—
everyone eating it will be polluted.
For their food will be merely to satisfy their appetite;
it will not come into the house of ADONAI*.

Why did God not want the sacrifices that He, Himself, had demanded? Just as we believe that baptism and the Lord’s Supper are a response of obedience by someone already saved, and useless to the unsaved, so were the sacrifices a response of obedience. Salvation then, as now, was “by grace through faith.” Sacrifice had no efficacy except to those who were already the recipients of God’s grace. The purpose of the sacrifices was to ritually “cover”, or hide from God’s eyes, the guilt of the sinner who, by his obedient sacrifice, was “making amends.”

But notice this: that every single one of the atoning sacrifices was for incidental, or unintentional, sin; in other words, for sins committed in ignorance, accidentally, or under duress. There was absolutely no means of sacrificial atonement for willful sin—except for God’s grace! On Yom Kippur, the “Day of Atonement” the Cohen HaGadol (high priest) would lay his hands on the forehead of Azazel, the scapegoat, symbolically transferring to the goat all further, willful, sin.

When Jesus was crucified, He fulfilled not just the Passover sacrifice, but all other sacrifices, thus permanently expunging guilt for all unintentional sin. More than this, He also brought God’s full grace, by removing sin “from the camp” on the back of the scapegoat. The goat would be led outside the “camp”, never to be seen again!

The Fall Feasts and the Rapture

Updated February 2022; original posted January 2013.

1 Thes 4:16
For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first.

Most of the modern world celebrates the new year with revelry and decadence. Not so among devout Jews, for whom Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, heralds God’s judgment of His chosen people for their deeds, both good and bad, committed during the preceding year. Yamim Noraim, the ten “Days of Awe” beginning with Rosh Hashanah and ending with Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, are devoted to sincere individual and national confession of sins and t’shuvah, or repentance. While the temple stood, on Yom Kippur all the people gathered on the Temple Mount for the ritual sacrifices that would roll the sins of the truly repentant back for another year. Since there is no temple now, and thus no legitimate place for blood sacrifices, the gatherings are in the synagogues, and what is offered are “sacrifices of prayer.” After Yom Kippur, there is an immense sense of relief, as the people begin preparations for the joyous eight-day Feast of Tabernacles that begins on the 15th of the month of Tishri.

Since long before Yeshua’s (Jesus’) day, the Days of Awe have, in practice, begun thirty days earlier, on the first day of the Jewish month Elul. T’shuvah is too important to put off until the last minute, so forty days are devoted to it, rather than the ten required by Torah. On Elul 1, Jews would flock to the mikvot (baptisteries) of the temple and synagogues, and to the “living waters” of streams and rivers like the Yarden (Jordan), to immerse themselves for ritual purification. Then would follow forty days of prayer, fasting and introspection. In the years preceding AD 30, it seems that many had become preoccupied with the politics and woes of the Roman occupation, and such customs were being neglected. Into this scene stepped Yochanan, who we now call John the Baptizer, calling Jews to baptism and t’shuvah.

5416_1038757307694_1937647_a — The Pinnacle of the Temple: the “Place of Trumpeting”, above the Royal Porch and Robinson’s Arch.

I believe that the events of Mt 3:13-17, describing Yeshua’s baptism and anointing by the Holy Spirit, took place on Elul 1. Though of course He was sinless, His baptism, followed by forty days of prayer and fasting, were consistent with and required by the customs of the season. Interestingly, this theory places Him on the Pinnacle of the Temple (Lk 4:9-12) on Yom Kippur. This was the highest and most visible structure on the Temple Mount; either the southeast corner, which was the highest structure above the ground level as it dropped off into the Kidron Valley to the east, or the southwest corner (the “Place of Trumpeting”), almost as high, and overlooking the shops and gathering areas near the entrance gates used by most worshipers. If He had accepted Satan’s temptation to throw Himself off and allow the angels to catch Him, all the Jewish world would have witnessed the destruction of His public ministry on the very day it began! Certainly, this was Satan’s plan!

As mentioned above, Rosh Hashanah, also known as Yom Teruah (The Feast of Trumpets), is the Jewish “judgment day”. On this day, Jews believe that God judges among his people, dividing them into three groups. One group is the “wholly righteous”, whose names will certainly be written in the Book of Life. A second is the “wholly wicked”, who will be written into the Book of Death. The final group is comprised of “those in between”, whose fate will be sealed by the quality of their t’shuvah over the next ten days, with final judgment reserved until Yom Kippur.

While this doctrine is certainly not Biblical, the fact that the holiday recognizes a separation of people from people is very significant since it prophetically depicts the coming day of Rapture. In this regard, and in light of 1 Thes 4:16, the blowing of the trumpet (actually, a shofar, or ram’s horn) on Yom Kippur is particularly interesting. The shofar (accompanied by actual metallic trumpets in temple days) is blown at mid-morning after the morning prayers, in three series of four distinctive notes: tekia (“blast”); shevarim (“broken notes”); teruah (“shout”—thought of as “the shout of an archangel”); and tekia gedolah (the “great blast”). The first series is tekia, shevarim, teruah, tekia, repeated three times. The second is tekia, shevarim, tekia, repeated three times. The final series is tekia, teruah, tekia, repeated three times, followed immediately by tekia gedolah, referred to in 1 Cor 15:52 as “the last trumpet”.

I am forever thrilled at the beauty of God’s timing! I believe that many of the events connected with Jeshua’s First and Second Advents actually occurred or will occur on the precise day of the Feast that pictures the event. Could it be that He will return for his Church at the exact moment of the “Last Trump” on the Feast of Trumpets (as God indeed said He would!), which is prophetic of the Rapture? Is it possible that He will return in judgment at the end of Tribulation on the Day of Atonement, the very day when God is thought to seal His judgment of His people? I am convinced it is so!