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pieces down the rocky slope. Sadly enough, some Christian expositors have enlarged
upon this imagination as though it were resident in the type. The truth is all the other
way. There can be no second sacrifice for the same sins in a type like this. The live goat
carries away confessed sins, atoned sins, into a land of "separation". The live goat is
"let go".
In Lev. 14: we have the same words used in connection with another double symbol.
There, two birds, one dead and one living, instead of two goats, one dead and one living,
the words "let loose" and "let go" in Lev. 14: 7 and 53 being the same as are used of the
live goat. The living bird is dipped in the blood of the bird that was slain, and then
"let loose". In the case of the live goat, sins that have been atoned for are confessed over
it instead, and it, too, is then "let go".
The word "forgiveness" in Eph. 1: 7 is aphesis, which, in works outside the
Scriptures, is variously translated "let go", "to set free", "quittance", "discharge",
"divorce".
Luke 4: 18 this word "forgiveness" occurs twice in the phrases
"deliverance to the captive", "to set at liberty them that are bruised".
The scapegoat seems to be in the mind's eye of the prophets when they wrote:--
"I will forgive their iniquity (the goat slain) and I will remember their sins no more"
(the goat set free) (Jer. 31: 34).
"Who is a God like unto Thee, that pardoneth iniquity? (the goat slain) . . . . . Thou
wilt cast all their sins into the depths of the sea" (the goat set free) (Micah 7: 18, 19).
"Thou hast, in love to my soul, delivered it from the pit of corruption (the goat slain),
for Thou hast cast all my sins behind Thy back" (the goat set free) (Isa. 38: 17).
We have touched upon the symbol and pledge of resurrection, in the live goat, for
though it may be deduced, it is not prominent, the complete removal of sin being the
immediate purpose of this glorious type. Let us all thank God for the sacrifice slain--"let
us not omit praise for Azazel, "the goat that was sent away".