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Feasts and festivals
Day of Atonement
Hebrew Yom Kippur · 10 Tishri, September or October · a day of fasting and rest
On the 10th day of the seventh month, five days before the Feast of Booths, Israel kept its most solemn day of the year. Leviticus 16 describes what the high priest did. He bathed and put on plain linen garments instead of his colored robes. He offered a young bull for himself and his household, then went behind the veil into the Most Holy Place with a censer of burning coals and incense, so that the smoke covered the mercy seat, and sprinkled the bull’s blood there. It was the one day of the year he entered.
Then lots were cast over two goats. One was sacrificed and its blood also taken inside; over the other the high priest, with both hands on its head, confessed the people’s sins, and a man led it away into the wilderness (Leviticus 16:21). The Hebrew word for this goat, Azazel, is unclear: by one view it means “the goat that goes away”, by another it is the name of a place or figure of the wilderness. No one worked, and the people were to “humble yourselves” (Leviticus 16:29), long understood as fasting; Acts calls the day “the Fast” (Acts 27:9).
Key verses
He is to wear the sacred linen tunic, with linen undergarments. He must tie a linen sash around him and put on the linen turban. These are holy garments, and he must bathe himself with water before he wears them.Then he must take a censer full of burning coals from the altar before the LORD, and two handfuls of finely ground fragrant incense, and take them inside the veil. He is to put the incense on the fire before the LORD, and the cloud of incense will cover the mercy seat above the Testimony, so that he will not die.After Aaron casts lots for the two goats, one for the LORD and the other for the scapegoat, he shall present the goat chosen by lot for the LORD and sacrifice it as a sin offering. But the goat chosen by lot as the scapegoat shall be presented alive before the LORD to make atonement by sending it into the wilderness as the scapegoat.Then he is to lay both hands on the head of the live goat and confess over it all the iniquities and rebellious acts of the Israelites in regard to all their sins. He is to put them on the goat’s head and send it away into the wilderness by the hand of a man appointed for the task.This is to be a permanent statute for you: On the tenth day of the seventh month, you shall humble yourselves and not do any work—whether the native or the foreigner who resides among you—By now much time had passed, and the voyage had already become dangerous because it was after the Fast. So Paul advised them,Sources
Adapted and shortened from the Tyndale Open Bible Dictionary · CC BY-SA 4.0
Tyndale Open Bible Dictionary © 2023 Tyndale House Publishers · CC BY-SA 4.0 — Atonement, Day of; Calendars, Ancient and Modern: Jewish Festivals; Offerings and Sacrifices: Expiation
Adapted from Tyndale Open Bible Dictionary: articles chosen, shortened and retold in our own words (history, nature and daily life only) and, in languages other than English, machine-translated. The original work by Tyndale House Publishers is available for free at tyndaleopenresources.com.
