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Here we have heaven itself instead of the tabernacle made with hands; here we have
"His own blood" instead of the blood of bulls and goats; and here we have no need for
an offering for His own sins, for this High Priest was holy, harmless, undefiled, separate
from sinners.
The immediate cause for the great symbolic rite of the Day of Atonement was the
action of Nadab and Abihu in offering strange fire unto the Lord. While access to the
presence of the Lord is a most blessed privilege of the redeemed, unholy familiarity must
not be allowed, lest it breed contempt, and consequently
"The Lord spake unto Moses, after the death of the two sons of Aaron, when they
offered before the Lord, and died: and the Lord said unto Moses, speak unto Aaron thy
brother, that he come not at all times into the holy place within the vail before the mercy
seat, which is upon the ark; that he die not" (Lev. 16: 1, 2).
"That he die not" has allusion to the fate of the two sons, Nadab and Abihu. It is
repeated in verse 13, where, in contrast with the strange fire that called down judgment,
Aaron was to take
"A censer full of burning coals of fire from off the altar before the Lord, and his hands
full of sweet incense, beaten small, . . . . . that he die not" (Lev. 16: 12, 13).
Our earlier studies of the offerings will have prepared us to appreciate more readily a
good deal that is written in Lev. 16:, and as the scapegoat has become the most
controversial subject in the passage, we shall at once devote ourselves to its
consideration.
The goat for Azazel.
The peculiar feature of this atonement is that, not one, but two, goats are presented
before the Lord, one being subsequently slain and the other, the living goat sent away and
let go in a land not inhabited. The margin of the A.V. draws attention to the fact that the
word rendered "scapegoat" is the Hebrew word Azazel, and further investigation shows
that, placed in juxtaposition, are the expressions "one lot for the Lord" and "the other lot
for Azazel", which has lent colour to the suggestion that Azazel must be a person. We do
not think that it would be edifying to indicate the many different explanations of the
allocations of these lots that have, from time to time, been put forward, but we give a few
in order that the reader may be able to judge of the matter for himself:--
NEWBERRY gives a note explanatory of Azazel, "Heb. Hazah-zeel, from hez a goat,
and ahzal to depart".
ROTHERHAM says: "Azazel is a title of an evil being, opposed to Jehovah, to
whom, on the great day of propitiation, the live goat was sent, not as a sacrifice to Satan,
but rather because of the death of the other goat, in virtue of which he cries aloud to
Satan, `Slay me if thou durst, I claim to live! I have already died in my companion
whose death is accounted mine'."
THE OXFORD GESENIUS translates Azazel, "entire removal", which is very
similar to the view of Tholuck and Bahr, who take the word as a form of azal, to remove.