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The Fall Festivals Of Israel
Yom Kippur
The Day of Atonement
by haRold Smith
from Jerusalem, Israel
Today, the streets are quiet as the entire country of Israel has shut down for the holiest day of the year, Yom Kippur. Jewish people everywhere have been greeting each other with the phrase - "May You Be Sealed for a Good Life".
"On the tenth day of this seventh month is the Day of Atonement; it shall be a holy gathering for you, and you shall afflict yourselves and present an offering by fire to the Lord. And you shall do no work on this day, for it is a day of atonement for you before the Lord your God." (Leviticus 23:27-28).
Starting at sundown the night before and continuing until they see three stars in the next evening sky, Jews all over the world will begin a 25 hour complete fast - no food, no water - and spend the day in prayer and reflection. There is no driving, public transport is suspended and even the roads are completely closed. There are no phone calls. Places of entertainment are closed - there are no television and radio broadcasts (not even the news), The police and IDF are on high alert as they always are at holiday times . Its solemnity is reinforced by memories of the surprise attack launched by Egypt and Syria agains Israel on Yom Kippur, 1973.
The days from Rosh Hashana to Yom Kippur are called the 10 days of penance, when through good deeds, prayer and repentance, we can soften a bad fate. The major precepts of Yom Kippur - lengthy devotional services and the 25-hour fast - are observed even by much of the otherwise secular population. The level of public solemnity on Yom Kippur surpasses that of any other festival, including Rosh Hashana. The pre-fast meal is eaten in the early evening and should end one hour before sundown. After a day of prayer and introspection, the end of the fast is marked with the blowing of the shofar at the Neila (closing) prayer service in the synagogue. This is when Heaven’s gate is considered closed, sealing our fate for the new year.
The Bible does not make any definitive connection between Yom Kippur and any historic event, but one tradition holds that it was on the tenth of Tishri that Moses came down from Mount Sinai to find Aaron and the Israelites dancing and reveling and worshipping the golden calf
(Exodus 32).
Moses was so enraged that he threw down the tablets of the Ten Commandments and broke them. He ground the idol to powder, sprinkled it on the water, and made the people drink it. He called for them to repent of their wickedness and went back to God to beg forgiveness for their sins. We find the first inkling of the Book of Life when Moses asks to be stricken from "the Book you have written" (verse 32) if God would not make an atonement for his people. Whether or not this story really has anything to do with the origin of Yom Kippur, it illustrates the spirit of the holy day, which emphasizes confession of sin and restoration of a relationship with God. The willingness of Moses to be "stricken from the book" on the people's behalf is a powerful illustration of the mediating role of Messiah.
Yom Kippur is considered the holiest of the Jewish holy days. When the temple was still standing, the Kohen Gadol, or high priest, would leave home seven days before Yom Kippur to live in the temple chamber. There he would practice the Yom Kippur ritual, in order to be sure he had it down perfectly. It was complex: first he had to remove his ordinary priestly robes and take a ritual bath in a place set aside for that purpose. Then he would put on special white clothes. After offering the ordinary morning sacrifice, he would offer a young bullock to atone for his own sins, (since he can't intercede for the people until his own sins are dealt with); then, using coals from the altar, he would carry incense into the Dvir (Holy of Holies.) Then he would return to the altar for blood from the sacrifice, which he would sprinkle on the mercy seat (i.e., the lid of the ark of the covenant) and seven times on the ground in front the ark. After this he would sacrifice a goat for the sins of the people, and sprinkled its blood on the ark and in front of it, as he had done with the blood of the bullock. This made atonement for the Holy of Holies. Next was to atone for the tabernacle, which he did by sprinkling the blood of both animals on the horns of the altar once, and seven times on the ground around it. Finally, he would expiate the altar of burnt offering by putting the blood on the horns and sprinkling it seven times on the ground. In this way the tabernacle -- and, in later times, the temple -- was atoned for.
The Azazel - After this, the high priest would go out into the court of the tabernacle (or temple) and lay his hands over the head of the scapegoat, confessing over it the sins of the people. Then the goat would be taken outside the camp (or in later times, the city) and be let go. This symbolized the removal of the sins from the people. According to the Talmud, a scarlet cord was tied around the neck of the scapegoat. This cord was reported to have turned white as the goat was led away from city. Following this, the priest would go back into the tabernacle to change out of the special white clothes to put on his usual priestly attire. The offerings were then completed by burning the fat on the altar, and the remains were burned outside the camp. The feast offering was next in line, and included a goat, a bullock, a ram, several lambs and corresponding meat and drink offerings, followed by the ordinary evening sacrifice.
A Break in the Pattern - How is atonement to be achieved now that the Temple is destroyed? Before the First Hurban, prophets were sent to warn the people of the coming destruction, to call them to repentance, and to promise that a remnant would survive to inherit the promises of the Brit. What prophet came before the Second Hurban? There was one called Yohanan ha-Matbil (John the Baptist), who testified of one called Yeshua. He called Yeshua "the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world" (John 1:29) thereby identifying him as the ultimate Atonement. Yeshua himself predicted the Hurban. If the claims of Yohanan and Yeshua are true, then God's commitment to Israel remains unbroken, because he has not left his people perplexed. Otherwise, what can we say? Did God forget about Israel and allow the Temple to be destroyed without warning and with no instruction what to do without it?
The Babylonian Talmud records that for the last forty years before the Second Hurban (destruction of the Temple), the red cord around the neck of the scapegoat failed to change color. The temple was destroyed in 70 A.D. Forty years before that would have been just about the time Messiah Yeshua offered the ultimate sacrifice. This could explain why God was no longer interested in scapegoats. Those who appropriate the atonement of Yeshua ha-Mashiach will be forgiven and inscribed in the book of life, not for a year only but for eternity!
We who believe in Yeshua as Messiah can easy see his ministry reflected in the temple service. The priest begins his day with a special bath, or mikveh, immersing himself in water, just as Yeshua began his ministry by being baptized by John the Baptist, or in a larger sense, by being born into human flesh ("born of water" -- John 3:5). The priest laid aside his usual ornate priestly garb for simple white attire. Yeshua "made himself of no reputation," (Philippians 2:7) but laid aside his divine privileges to accomplish his earthly mission of expiating human sin. The white kittel speaks of sinless purity, as he was pure and without sin. It is also reminiscent of the burial shroud. The high priest made a special sacrifice for his own sin (Leviticus 16:11), in order to be seen by God as a sinless mediator, as Yeshua was sinless by his own virtue. Sprinkling the blood upon the Kapporeth (i.e., the cover of the Ark of the Covenant, which served as a sort of earthly throne for the Almighty) seems to represent presentation of the sacrifice to God the Father. Sprinkling the blood in front of the ark may indicate the opening of a way of approach to the Father. (The Ark was ordinarily unapproachable. The people in general were never allowed to enter the Holy of Holies, where the ark was. Even the high priest was allowed to enter only on Yom Kippur) The sacrifice "covered" ("Kippur" literally means "covering") the sins of the people and made God approachable to sinful man. The Holy of Holies was closed off by a veil (parokhet). When Yeshua died on Golgotha, the parokhet was literally torn in two (Matthew 27:51) indicating the beginning of the New Covenant and a new path of relationship between God and humanity.
The high priest had to enter every year with a new sacrifice. The sacrifice of Yeshua ("a high priest forever" (Hebrews 5:6) is good forever. The old high priest entered a symbolic Holy of Holies, made with human hands. Yeshua entered the real Holy of Holies -- the very throne of God in Heaven (Hebrews 9:11). The scapegoat carried away the sins of the people. In Yeshua ha-Mashiach, all our sins are carried away "as far as east is from west" (Psalm 103:12). Once all the expiatory (sin-forgiving) sacrifices are done, the priest puts on his priestly robes again. When Yeshua had accomplished his sacrificial mission, he put back on the glory of his divinity. When the priest returned from the tabernacle (as Yeshua will return from Heaven), he offered the festival sacrifice. When Yeshua returns, it will be for the full and final redemption of his people Israel (Ezekiel 16:63).
| For if you were cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and were grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these, who are natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree? For I do not desire, brethren, that you should be ignorant of this mystery, lest you should be wise in your own opinion, that blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written: "The Deliverer will come out of Zion, And He will turn away ungodliness from Jacob; For this is My covenant with them, When I take away their sins." Romans 11:24-27 |