A Day But No Atonement

Clarity, truth and tradition. We need to unpack these essential elements if we want to know what Yom ha-Kippurim (or the Day of Atonements, as it is called in Hebrew in Leviticus 23:27) is all about. Five questions should be answered:

A rabbinic Yom Kippur

Jewish perspectives on the Ten Days of Awe and the Day of Atonements go back to just after the Second Temple was destroyed by Imperial Rome. Hopes for its speedy rebuilding were not fulfilled. Rabbinic Judaism then ‘rebuilt itself,’ establishing non-biblical atonement ceremonies which were not based on Jerusalem-centered animal sacrifices. This massive religious restructuring eventually morphed into what is today called Orthodox Judaism – a step-child of Second Temple Judaism, and one which has departed from the atonement-based biblical foundations of Moses and Messiah Yeshua.

Rabbi Judah son of Shimon ben Gamliel II was born in 135 AD and grew up in the Western Galilee village of Usha. Circa 200 AD he is quoted as stating:

Sixty-five years later (circa 265 AD) in the central Lower Galilee town of Sepphoris (Zippori), Rabbi Judah’s pupil Rabbi Yochanan bar Nappaha declared:

Nearly one thousand years later still, the Mikra’ot Gedolot commentary on Leviticus quotes the explanation of Rambam (Rabbi Moshe ben Maimon or Maimonides) as to what he thought was the spiritual basis behind Judah’s and Yochanan's decisions. He stated:

Without biblical warrant, a whole new Judaism was created after the destruction of the Second Temple, and a novel understanding was given to both the Feast of Trumpets and Yom ha-Kippurim. The biblical New Year was moved from Aviv/Nisan in the Springtime to Eitanim/Tishrei in the Fall, and a new creation labeled the ‘Ten Days of Awe’ (the ‘yamim nora’im’) was fashioned, proclaiming that each Jew’s spiritual destiny is to be decided and written down once a year in either the Book of Life (nichtavin l’chayim) or the Book of Death (nichtavin l’mitah). These less-than-biblically based perspectives have been embraced by most Jewish people over the centuries.

Have a happy Yom Kippur!

There is only one verse in the entire Bible which mentions blowing a shofar on Yom ha-Kippurim, and it is in the Book of Leviticus.  It’s part of a discussion concerning the Year of Jubilee (a joyous occasion) when, once every fifty years, each individual Israelite gets all his debts forgiven and his ‘spiritual bank account’ balanced:

Every fifty years the Day of Atonement ended with a shofar blast, declaring the wiping away of the nation’s and of the family’s fiscal debt. In Zechariah 3:1-9 YHVH wipes away the spiritual sins of all Israel on Yom ha-Kippurim, in the same way like He proclaims economic release and freedom to the whole people of Israel on the same day every semicentennial:

The national response of the Jewish people to this Jubilee removal of economic debt every 50th Yom ha-Kippurim was seen in their sober and thankful heart, filled with overflowing joy. The national gates of praise swung open as the entire Jewish people began preparations for the upcoming pilgrim feast of Sukkot, the Harvest Feast better known as ‘Tabernacles.’

The exchange-of-life principle

My dear friend Dr. Louis Goldberg (former Professor of Jewish Studies at Moody Bible Institute) often stressed that, at the heart of the sacrificial system in the Mosaic Covenant was something called ‘the exchange-of-life principle.’ When the High Priest would lay his hands on the live sacrificial animal, the sins of the guilty sacrificer would go (as it were) into the innocent animal, and the innocent life of the animal would be accredited to the one laying his hands on the sheep or goat – thus granting him atonement:

This principle was echoed by the Apostle Paul in reference to Messiah Yeshua’s atoning sacrifice:

Blood = body and soul

God’s perspective is that blood is what ties body and soul together. It symbolizes life. Indeed, without the existence of blood in the body, there is no life: “For the life of the flesh is in the blood, and I have given it to you on the altar to make atonement for your souls. For it is the blood by reason of the life that makes atonement . . .  For as for the life of all flesh, its blood is identified with its life. Therefore, I said to the sons of Israel, ‘You are not to eat the blood of any flesh, for the life of all flesh is its blood; whoever eats it shall be cut off’” (Leviticus 17:11,14)

Blood has a special purpose in the Scriptures: It is to be used to honor God who has given us the gift of life. With God as our witness, blood is not to be eaten, but to be used to atone for human sins. According to the Bible, the eating of blood is a serious spiritual offense. YHVH says that the blood and the fat of the sacrifice – the most significant part which represents precious life – belong only to the God of Jacob, and to no other deity or creation (see also Exodus 13:2; Leviticus 17; 27:9,26). To take what God claims as His alone is to rob and plunder the Lord Himself.

The Apostle Paul adds a New Covenant perspective here:

These concepts form part of the biblical background for Yom Ha-kippurim, the Day of Atonements.

To be cut off from one’s people

YHVH entrusted the rite of male circumcision on the eighth day after birth to Abraham in Genesis 17:14. Disobedience on this point entailed being cut off from the Abrahamic Covenant and from the Jewish people:

The Hebrew term karath used in Genesis 17 means ‘to cut down,’ ‘to cut off’ or ‘to destroy’. It has a secondary meaning ‘to cut’ (as in ‘to make a covenant’). When the term is used with the sense ‘to cut off,’ it can refer to one of three possible meanings:

Excommunication from the Jewish nation is the punishment for not keeping Yom ha-Kippurim according to the rules of the Mosaic Covenant: “You shall afflict your souls … For any person who does not afflict his soul on that same day shall be cut off from his people” (Leviticus 23:26-29)

Excommunication from the Jewish nation is the punishment for eating blood: “I said to the sons of Israel, ‘You are not to eat the blood of any flesh, for the life of all flesh is its blood; whoever eats it shall be cut off’” (Leviticus 17:11, 14)

Excommunication from the Body of Messiah is the punishment for rejecting belief in the gospel: “See then the kindness and severity of God: to those who fell, severity, but to you, God’s kindness, if you continue in His kindness; for otherwise you too will be cut off” (Romans 11:22-23)

The following are 14 examples of activities which result in ‘being cut off,’ according to Moses:

Some of these above-listed judgments were capital offences, while other would involve exclusion from the Israelite community – either open-ended or limited in time (a ban). Numbers 27:14 refers to the rebellion at Kadesh, yet YHVH did not destroy Israel. Instead, His discipline entailed a national delay in entering the Promised Land – though most of that generation did die in the wilderness (Numbers 26:65).  When the Mosaic Covenant allows no atoning sacrifice for sin, and yet God graciously does not cut our people off, there is definitely room for humble giving of thanks:

In 1 Corinthians 5:5 and 11:28-32 Paul points out how God can bring judgment on believers who highhandedly violate biblical commands. Though prosecutable evidence may escape human judges’ detection, God who sees everything will bring His justice about in His own time. The fear of the Lord is meant to have an effect on community behavior, so that all will know that YHVH will not tolerate hypocrisy and hidden sin in Israel’s private lives or in their public worship, praise and celebration (see Jude 1:12).

Messiah our Righteousness is cut off for the sake of His people

Yom ha-Kippurim ties the threat of ‘being cut off’ to each Jewish person’s heart attitude regarding God’s atonement. At the same time, the term ‘to be cut off’ is also used in connection with each Jewish person’s heart-attitude to Messiah Yeshua’s atoning work on behalf of His Jewish people:

Isaiah adds a corresponding thought, using a similar Hebrew verb to karath (‘nigzar’): “By oppression and judgment He was taken away. And as for His generation, who considered that He was cut off from the land of the living for the wrongdoing of my people, to whom the blow was due?” (Isaiah 53:8).

God’s redemptive decision to ‘cut off’ the Messiah is the climax in the history of atonement!

Divine thunder

The Bible connects trumpets and shofars to some powerful contexts – past, present and future. The fear-inspiring voice of the God of Israel sounded like a shofar:

God’s shofar-like voice was unbearable in power – “The blast of a trumpet and the sound of words which sound was such that those who heard begged that no further word be spoken to them” (Hebrews 12:19)

The Scriptures tell us that the God of Jacob rides upon the highest heavens. He rides on the clouds of heaven and through the desert. He rides on the cherubim: “YHVH of armies, God of Israel, who is enthroned above the cherubim – You are the God, You alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth. You made heaven and earth” (2 Kings 19:15)

In Moses’ Tent of Meeting and Solomon’s Temple, YHVH’s manifest presence hovered or rode above the two cherubim (Psalm 80:1), those golden representations of angels (see Genesis 3:24) who stand before God’s presence at all times:

In the Holy of Holies, on Yom ha-Kippurim, the God of Jacob would actually appear to Aaron (Exodus 30:10; Leviticus 16) and later to the High Priest (both descended through Levi), manifesting His Glory above the gold-covered sacred chest known in Hebrew as the kapōret or place of atonement (translated into Greek as hilastērion – i.e., to appease or make favorable; and into Latin as propriatorium – i.e., a place of reconciling or atoning).

 

A prophetic future for Yom ha-Kippurim

 In Zechariah 3:9, in the Holy of Holies on Yom Ha-Kippurim, YHVH of armies prophesies to Joshua the High Priest in the days of Zechariah the prophet. The God of Jacob announces that, in the same way as He takes away all debts from Israel on every 50th Day of Atonements, so will He “will remove the guilt of that [Israeli] land in one [future] day.” 

At the very close of his biblical book, the prophet Micah also speaks of what YHVH will do on that Day of Atonements: “He will again have compassion on us. He will trample on our wrongdoings. You will cast all their sins into the depths of the sea! (Micah 7:19)

Jeremiah adds his seer’s voice to the prophetic choir:

Other prophets of Israel and Judah stress the prophetic reality that the restored Jewish people will be celebrating the following Jewish calendar feasts after their Final Return from Exile: YHVH’s appointed feasts, New Moon celebrations, weekly Shabbatot, etc. (Isaiah 33:20; Isaiah 66:23; Nahum 1:15; Ezekiel 36:38; Ezekiel 44:24; Ezekiel 45:17). Amazing days lie ahead of us!

 

How can Messianic believers relate to Yom Kippur?

Clearly, we who believe in Yeshua are under the New Covenant; our atonement is through Messiah. We are not looking for our names to be inscribed once yearly in heavenly books, for as Messiah Yeshua said: “Nevertheless, do not rejoice in this, that the spirits are subject to you, but rejoice that your names are recorded in heaven” (Luke 10:20). 

If we choose to fast and to humble our souls, it is not for the purpose of avoiding the God of Jacob’s punishment: it is in intercession for our beloved Jewish people, that they would turn to Messiah Yeshua and receive His atonement – and not that our fasting would atone for our sins. These have already been atoned for by Yeshua.

It may be of interest to note that the Apostle Paul seems to have kept the fast on Yom ha-Kippurim: “When considerable time had passed and the voyage was now dangerous, since even the Fast was already over” (Acts 27:9).

We who follow Messiah are called to confess our sins before God on a daily basis, and to experience our personal Yom ha-Kippurim each day, as the blood of Messiah Yeshua cleanses us from all sin:

As Yom ha-Kippurim draws near, it encourages our souls to remember all these shofar-related events. The shofar gives voice to our praise and to our intercession. It accompanies our request for God to remember Israel in times of war (Numbers 10:9) and to grace our spiritual gatherings with His amazing presence (Numbers 10:7). The shofar blast is His clarion call to the Jewish people, emphasizing that YHVH never forgets a promise.

 

How shall we then pray?

Your prayers and support hold up our arms and are the very practical enablement of God to us in the work He has called us to do.

In Messiah Yeshua,

Avner Boskey

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