Leviticus 16

The ritual of the day of atonement where the scapegoat carries away the sins of the people. Its not quite clear if Azazel, which is named owner of the goat is a fallen angel or a name for oblivion.  Either way, the sins are gone and Marvel got a great supervillan name.

I don’t know why having sacrificed animals all year, the Israelites would also need a day of atonement, but God knows we love festivals and annual rhythms… may be one reason. I do relate to this one emotionally better than the sacrifices on the altar, which seem a bit pagan and ghastly to my modern sensibility.

Other ancient religions had similar rituals at the time, and its an example of God adopting a tangible event to symbolise an intangible spiritual message, which is sort of the theme of this whole book not to mention the messiah.  The Greeks had a somewhat meaner version where they would pick on a beggar or disabled person after a natural disaster and drive them out of the community.

For christians Jesus is the ultimate scapegoat of course. For jewish people the day of atonement carries over as Yom Kippur which is the great nominal Jewish day that everyone who rarely otherwise goes to synagogue attends, like easter for christians. It is a day of abstinence and praying for forgiveness, followed by a festive meal to break the fast.  What, no chocolate eggs?

This gives me a chill because the concept is one of the great foundations of the bible, undeserved grace, punishment on another, running through the whole thing.

And I can’t get Holman Hunt’s odd image out of my mind