Day of Cleansing

Jan 14, 2025

This information was originally part of an article about the offerings in Leviticus, but it became too large, so I have pulled it out into a separate article for convenience.

Big Day Out

One of the important annual celebrations that God commanded Israel to fulfil is usually called the Day of Atonement. The Hebrew expression is “yom kippur”. Translating the Hebrew word “kippur” as “atonement” smuggles too much religious baggage into the word. Words like “propitiation” and “expiation” have the same problem. The word means “covering/cleansing”, so we will understand what is happening on this day better, if we think of it as the Day of Cleansing.

Leviticus 23:26-32 gives the date on which this occasion is to be celebrated. It was to be a holy day, a day of total rest from work (Sabbath), when the people were to humble themselves. The celebration is to be held once a year (Ex 30:10; Lev 16:34).

Process

Leviticus 16 gives a detailed description of what must happen on this day.

The high priest is to bring a bullock as a Decontamination Offering and a ram for an Ascending Offering (Lev 16:3).
The high priest is to wash his body and then put on the sacred garments (Lev 16:4). This ensures that he is ritually clean. It is also an expression of worship for God.
The high priest must bring two male goats given by the people of Israel. At the entrance to the tabernacle courtyard, he is to cost lots over the goats, one for Yahweh and one for Azazel. The one chosen for Yahweh is to be presented as a decontamination offering (Lev 16:5-10).
The people must also give a ram for an Ascending Offering (Lev 16:5).
Leviticus does not say when the two rams should be offered as an Ascending Offering, but I am sure this happens throughout the day while the priest is going into the tabernacle. The purpose of offering the rams is to bless and honour God with a pleasing odour.
The high priest must slaughter the bull as a decontamination offering for him and his family (Lev 16:11).
The high priest must slaughter the decontamination goat (Lev 16:15).
The priest takes the blood of the bull into the tabernacle (Lev 16:14).
Nobody is to go into the tabernacle while he is in there (Lev 16:17).
The priest takes a censor for of coals of fire from the golden altar with a handful of finely-ground fragrant incense and passes through the curtain into the holy of holies (Lev 16:12).
The High Priest puts incense on the fire in the censor so that a cloud of incense covers the covenant box. This provides spiritual protection for him (Lev 16:13).
The High Priest priest sprinkles some of the blood of the bull on the top cover of the covenant box with his finger seven times. This provides cleansing/covering for him and all his family (Lev 16:14).
The High Priest priest sprinkles some of the blood of the goat on the top cover of the covenant box with his finger seven times. This cleanses the Holy Place of the effects of the sins and transgressions of the people (Lev 16:15).
This cleanses the Holy Place from the effects of the impurities of the people (Lev 16:16).
The High Priest goes out to the golden altar and puts some of the blood of the bull and some of the blood of the goat and puts on the horns of the altar. He sprinkles them seven times to cleanse and consecrate it from the impurities of the people (Lev 16:18-19).
When the high priest has finished purifying the Holy Place, the tabernacle tent and the altar, he is to present the live goat (Lev 16:20).
The high priest is to lay two hands on the head of the live goat and confess all the iniquities and transgressions of the Israelites (Lev 16:21). The goat is to bear them into the wilderness (Lev 16:22).
The priest must then enter the tabernacle and remove the holy garments and wash himself (Lev 16:23-24).
He then goes out and makes his Ascending Offering for himself and one for the people (Lev 16:24).
The fat of the Decontamination Offering is to be offered on the bronze altar (Lev 16:25).
The person who took the goat for Azazel must wash his clothes and bathe his body before he can re-enter the camp (Lev 16:26).
The hide, the meat, and the dung of the bull and the goat offered for the Decontamination Offering must be taken outside the camp and burned there (Lev 16:27).
The person who burns this material must wash his clothes and bathe his body before he re-enters the camp.

Main Activities

The key actions on the Day of cleansing were as follows.

The animals to be offered were brought by the priests and the people. A goat was chosen by lot for Yahweh.
The priest offered a Decontamination Offering for himself, so he would be cleansed before going into the Holy of Holies.
The priest cleansed the covenant box, the golden altar and the tabernacle with blood (from the bull and the goat) from uncleanness that came from the uncleanness of the people. (These articles of furniture cannot choose to act, so they cannot sin. Therefore, the blood is for their cleansing, not a punishment for their sin). The purpose of the blood was to cleanse the holy of holies (Lev 16:16,20).
The priest released the goat carrying the people’s transgressions and depravities into the wilderness to Azazel, returning them to where they had come from.
The priest washed in water and changed his clothes.
An Ascending Offering was offered on behalf of the priests and the people. This ended the day with an act of worship. This offering provided covering for the people, not atonement. Leviticus 16:17 describes this offering as the final step in the Day of Cleansing events. It occurs on the bronze altar outside the tabernacle. After this offering has been made, the ceremonies of the day are completed, so people can go back into it as required. (The high priest does not make an offering to cleanse the people on the golden altar).

Several important points should be noted about the day of cleansing.

Incense Enough

When the High Priest went into the holy of holies, he offered a cloud of incense to God. That kept him safe in the presence of God. The incense was all God needed from him to be acceptable. He did not need to appease God with blood or some other sacrifice to be acceptable.

Covering and Cleansing

The High Priest put blood on the cover of the covenant box and the golden altar. This was not done to appease God, but to cleanse them from the effects of the people's impurities. Many English translations use the word “atonement”, but the Hebrew word is “kipper”. As noted, it means to cleanse or cover. The covenant box and the golden altar are physical things, so they could not commit sins, so they didn’t need their sins to be atoned for.

Leviticus 16:16 refers to the “impurities” of the people needing to be cleansed because the tabernacle dwelt in the midst of the people’s impurities. The Hebrew word is “toomah”, which means impurity or uncleanness. Because the people were often impure, it seems that the tabernacle also picked up some spiritual impurities during the year, despite frequent Decontamination and Reparation Offerings. (I presume this uncleanness gave the spiritual powers of evil a right to come closer).

The tabernacle did not need to be atoned for, because it does not sin, but it did need to be cleansed of the impurity that had affected it. The blood of the bull and the goat offered as a Decontamination Offering spiritually cleansed the tabernacle. Like the blood of the Passover, the blood on the covenant box and the golden altar was a warning to the spiritual powers of evil to stay away from the tabernacle and its furniture.

Blood cleanses and purifies when sprinkled on physical objects that may have been subject to spiritual contamination (Lev 16:19). The Hebrew word translated “cleanse” is “taher”, which literally means to be made bright, and by implication, to make pure or make clean. Hebrews 9:22 confirms that “almost all things are cleansed/purified with blood”.

Leviticus 16:30 summarises the objective of the Day of Cleansing. The objective of making a covering over the people is to “cleanse/purify" them from all their wrongdoings so they will be clean/pure before Yahweh. The place where they come before Yahweh is the tabernacle, so it is what is purified on the Day of Cleansing.

Azazel and the Wilderness

The second goat is for Azazel. Many English translations call this goat the scapegoat, but the correct translation of the Hebrew word “azazel” is debated. The most common view is that Azazel was the name of a ruler-demon who controlled the wilderness areas. The wording of Leviticus 16:8 suggests two contrasting spiritual beings: Yahweh and Azazel.

Deuteronomy 8:15 describes it as “the great and terrible wilderness, with its fiery serpents and scorpions, and its thirsty ground”. For the Israelites trekking through it towards the Promised Land, it was a dangerous place where they came under intense spiritual attack. The tabernacle offerings provided protection for them. Azazel was probably the controlling spirit organising these attacks.

Depravities and Transgressions

The High Priest confessed the depravities and transgressions of the Israelites over the head of the goat for Azazel. These are really strong words. The Hebrew word translated depravity is “avon”, which comes from a root meaning twisted or bent. It means depravity, perversity or iniquity. The Hebrew word translated transgression is “pasha”, which comes from a root meaning breaking away. It means transgression or rebellion. These words indicate serious perversity and rebellion, which is quite different from the sins dealt with by the Decontamination Offering and the Reparation Offering. They were for sins committed by mistake or without realising something was being done wrong. Hebrews calls them sins committed in ignorance (Heb 9:7).

The sins confessed over the goat for Azazel were really of a different order, because they were done deliberately by people choosing to disobey God. Examples could be hatred, anger, cheating, pride, etc. These serious sins were not dealt with by tabernacle offerings because they were more serious than the Decontamination Offering or Reparation could deal with. Instead, they are placed on the head of this goat, which is sent out into the wilderness to die. A domestic goat would not survive being sent into a wilderness where predators abound.

The Goat was assigned to Azazel, who is a demonic ruler of the spiritual powers of evil that operated in the wilderness. The depravities and transgression were sent back to him, because he was responsible for them. The spiritual forces he controlled were constantly harassing the children of Israel and persuading them to rebel against God. The reason that they rebelled was that their spiritual protection was incomplete, and the powers of evil were able to manipulate them.

God sent these serious depravities and transgressions back where they came from. Because he understood why they had fallen, he was willing to forgive them. All he required from them was a Decontamination Offering to remove any residual influence of the spiritual powers of evil from the tabernacle.

The Day of Cleansing could not deal with serious sins that polluted the land (sexual immorality, bloodshed, and idolatry). The only solution for these most serious sins was community exclusion. If that was not carried out, the entire people would eventually be exiled from the land. Allowing the land a set of Sabbaths would purify it from the influence of the spiritual powers of evil.

Order and Timing

The order and timing of activities are not clear in Leviticus 16. The chapter describes the various animals that must be selected first (Lev 16:3,7-10). The rest of the chapters describe various offerings and activities. One possibility is that the priest killed the bull, the ram and the goat, before he washed and changed his garments, as it would be difficult to slaughter them without getting blood splattered on his special clothes. The other possibility is that other priests helped him with the slaughter process so he did not get dirty.

It is not clear when the ram bought by the people is killed and offered. It might have been left until the goat had been sent into the wilderness and the priest had changed his clothing. Or the ram might have been killed at the same time as the bull, and its fat offered as an Ascending Offering throughout the day, along with the bull's fat.

The text suggests that the priest slaughtered the goat after he had been into the tabernacle with the bull’s blood, but that might not be right. He might have slaughtered the bull and the goat together and then taken their blood into the tabernacle one after the other.

An entire day was allocated for the activities, so there was no need for the priest to do them in the quickest possible way. He had time to go in and out of the tabernacle twice, once with the bull’s blood and once with the goat’s blood. Anyway, the order has no effect on the significance of what happened.

Fit for Purpose

The Old Testament offerings were effective (Heb 9:13), but their effect did not last because the spiritual powers of evil are tricky and refuse to give up in the face of setbacks. The tabernacle offerings fulfil their purpose, but not permanently, so they have to be repeated again and again (Heb 10:1). The effect of the Day of Cleansing was not permanent either, but it was sufficiently effective that it only needed to be repeated once a year. And I presume that timetable had a margin for safety.

The Old Testament offerings could not make people perfect, but that was not their purpose. It is not fair to expect them to complete a task that only the Holy Spirit can do. The purpose of the tabernacle offerings was to provide protection from the spiritual powers of evil, and they did that well. They could not do it perfectly, but they did the job well enough to allow God to accomplish his purposes for his people. The tabernacle sacrifices were fit for purpose.

See Offerings in Leviticus and Pure and Impure for background information.