Yoma: The Day of Atonement
by James Jacob Prasch
Luke 4:14-26: And Jesus returned to Galilee in the power
of the Spirit; and news about Him spread through all the
surrounding district. 1And He
began teaching in their synagogues and was praised by all. [He was an itinerate rabbi]. And He came to Nazareth, where He
had been brought up; and as was His custom, He entered the synagogue on the Sabbath,
and stood up to read. And the Book of
the prophet Isaiah was handed to Him. And He opened the book, and found the
place where it was written, [And he reads from
Isaiah 61, actually it would been a scroll, a
megillah, not a codex, not a book.] "The
Spirit of the Lord is upon Me, because He anointed Me
to preach the gospel to the poor. He has
sent Me to proclaim release to the captives, And
recovery of sight to the blind, To set free those who are downtrodden, To
proclaim the favorable year of the Lord."
And He closed the book, [or as it were, rolled up the scroll] and gave it back to the attendant, and sat
down; and the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed upon Him. And He began to say to them, "Today this
Scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing." And all were speaking well of Him, and
wondering at the gracious words which were falling from His lips; and they were
saying, "Is this not Joseph's son?" And He said to them, "No
doubt you will quote this proverb to Me, 'Physician,
heal yourself! Whatever we heard was done at Capernaum, do here in your home
town as well.'" And He said, "Truly I say to you, no prophet is
welcome in his home town. "But I
say to you in truth, there were many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah,
when the sky was shut up for three years and six months, when a great famine
came over all the land; and yet Elijah was sent to none of them, but only to
Zarephath, [which has to do with the purification by fire in Hebrew] in the land of Sidon, to a woman who was a
widow. "And there were many lepers
in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet; and none of them was cleansed, but
only Naaman the Syrian." And all in
the synagogue were filled with rage as they heard these things; and they rose
up and cast Him out of the city, and led Him to the brow of the hill on which
their city had been built, in order to throw Him down the cliff. But passing through their midst, He went His
way.
Something we will be talking about at the conference this
week is this: Obviously, there is one Messiah,
two comings, and this is how we understand in large part, the 69th
and 70th week abridgment in the Book of Daniel, but we see it
here. He comes into the synagogue and
notice certain things; it refers to him as the “Son of Joseph,” other places he
is called “Son of David,” here he is called “Son of Joseph” in the town where
he grew up. Now, most of you know “HaMashiach
ben Yosef,” HaMashiach ben David,” “the Messiah the Son of Joseph, the Messiah
the Son of David.”
Here he is called “Son of Joseph.” Now remember, Joseph was accepted by Gentiles
but rejected by his Jewish brothers. He
was rejected in his own land and they threw him out, they got rid of him and Gentiles
accepted him. So it is here when Jesus
is identified as “Son of Joseph” where he begins telling two stories of Elijah
and Elisha, whom the Gentiles accepted when the Hebrew people rejected
them. He is making that comparison of himself
to them which has the people quite indignant.
Yet his words were gracious. But once he told them the truth about
himself, they were not so gracious. Once
they found out where he was really coming from, they became indignant and
became angry. It is the same thing
today. You can preach a good sermon or
present a good gospel message, teach an interesting Bible study and people will
like it, but once you begin to deal with what is wrong with the church and what
is wrong with them, those same people will very
quickly turn on you like a rat with rabies, in an instant. Now what happened here in Nazareth was a
foreshadowing of what would happen to him in Jerusalem after the triumphal
entry. He compares himself to Elijah and
Elisha and what took place with them.
The three and a half years mentioned, the three years and
6 months, puts it into an eschatological framework. It tells us that whatever is happening here
in some way relates to the two times, time and a half time in Daniel and in
Revelation. It relates to the three and
a half years, half of the final seven years at the end of the age or something related
to that involving three a half years eschatologically. Jesus has three and a half years of public
ministry; Satan will demand the same equal time and he will get it through the Antichrist. The Antichrist will seek to change the law
and the times and it will be given into his hand a two times, a time and a half
time. Now it is more complicated than this,
we will be dealing with it again at the conference, but understand when you see
that three and a half years in a given pericope, in a given story, in a given
narrative, it has some kind of future eschatological application. It is not just what was happening then. But then we have to deal with this question,
of course, in case you don’t know why he rolled up the scroll. Look with me please to the Book of Isaiah,
chapter 61, that which he was reading from:
Isaiah 61:1: The
Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the LORD has anointed me [now
the word anointed there is where you get the word Mashiach, messiah] to bring good news [this word is “basar,” the Hebrew word for gospel. In Greek, that is in the Septuagint, it would
be euaggelion] to the afflicted; He has sent me to bind up
the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to captives, and freedom to prisoners;
To proclaim the favorable year of the LORD, And the day of vengeance of our
God.
When he reads that passage in the synagogue in Nazareth,
he only reads the first half of verse two:
To proclaim the favorable year of the Lord. He does not read the rest of the verse “The
day of vengeance of our God.” He rolls
up the scroll, or as it were, he closes the book. He reads half the verse, not the whole
verse. He is only going to fulfil the
first half of that prophecy in his first coming as the ‘son of Joseph,’ the one
who brings salvation. He will fulfil the
second half of that prophecy in his coming, “The Day of Vengeance.” In his first coming, he comes with grace and
truth; he comes to show mercy. In his
second coming, he comes to bring the judgment of God, the wrath of God. Now we see other precedents for this, very
briefly. Look with me please to the Book
of Zechariah, chapter 12:
Zechariah 12:10: "And I will
pour out on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Spirit
of grace and of supplication, so that they will look on Me whom they have
pierced; and they will mourn for Him, as one mourns for an only son, and they will
weep bitterly over Him, like the bitter weeping over a first-born.
Look with me please to the Gospel of Saint John, John’s Nativity
narrative:
John 19:37: And again another Scripture says,
"They shall look on Him whom they pierced."
Notice again, it only gives the first half of the
verse. Why does it not say “They will
mourn for Him, as one mourns for an only son?”
He fulfils that in his second coming.
Look with me please to Revelation 1, it tells us that directly:
Revelation 1:7: Behold, He is
coming with the clouds, and every eye will see Him, even those who pierced Him;
and all the tribes of the earth will mourn over Him. Even so.
Amen.
They will look upon him who they have pierced and mourn
for him in his second coming, not his first coming; they yelled “Crucify
him.” It cuts the verses in half. That is how we explain the Book of Daniel but
that is only a foretaste of our conference that is coming. I am only dealing with it in brief because it
is in the text of Luke 4.
So they take him to Nazareth. Now you have to understand something about
Nazareth if you have not been there. If
you go up above Nazareth, there is Nazareth “illit” where the original
Nazareth was. Nazareth is a rather
depressing place. It is largely an Arab
community illit is a Jewish community where the brow of
the hill is and you see it is directly opposite on the north side of the Valley
of Armageddon, the plain of Jezreel opposite Megiddo. On the south side is a mountain called
Megiddo, “Har Megiddo,” Armageddon is
not a valley, it is a mountain. The valley is called Jezreel. On the north side, opposite Megiddo is
another mountain, Har Tabor, Mount Tabor where the song of Deborah took
place. Look with me please to the Book
of Judges 5:
We see in the Song of Deborah something that is recycled
from the Septuagint text that is the Greek Old Testament into the Magnificat
and in the Song of Deborah. We are told
about her “Blessed are you among women, you shall be called blessed by
all.” Now, Nazareth, of course, is where
Mary, Miriam, would have lived as a little girl skipping rope or whatever
little girls did in those days, she would have grown up looking from Nazareth
across to Mount Tabor and she would have known, certainly as everyone would
have known, that is where the story of Deborah took place. That is where the story of Jael took place, where victory was given over Sisera and it says:
Judges 5:7: until I, Deborah, arose, until I arose, a mother in
Israel.
And it goes on about riding on a donkey in verse 10 and
it uses all kinds of language about being blessed, “Blessed are you among women,
they shall call you blessed.”
Judges 5:24 "Most blessed of women is Jael…”
Little would Mary from Nazareth have thought that one day
the angel Gabriel would say to her “Blessed are you among women.” She grows up in the shadow of Mount Tabor,
overlooking Nazareth Illit,
“Blessed are you among women.” That is
where it was said, but it would one day be said to her. It is right in the same location. This is Nazareth. On the east side of Nazareth, perpendicular
to the Valley of Jezreel is a steep embankment.
You would not want to go off it; it has several cliff faces on it, or escarpments
on it. It is more than a 45-degree
angle, it is steeper than that but it has several cliff faces and escarpments
on it. Why do they want to throw Jesus
off the cliff? That is what we are going
to look at tonight. Why did they want to
throw him off the cliff? Why didn’t they
try to stone him to death? Why didn’t
they kill him by some other means?
Normally they would have stoned someone to death. Why did they try to throw him off the cliff
instead of just stoning him to death since they were determined to kill him,
and more importantly, why could they not do it?
Why was he protected? Obviously,
it was not yet his time to die but there is more to it than that. That is what we are going to look at. Why did they try to toss him off the cliff
instead of killing him by stoning, which was the normal means, and why did he
escape, other than the obvious factor, it was not yet his time to die for our
sin. With these things in view, turn
with me please to Leviticus 16.
The Day of Atonement, Yom Kippur. It relates to the Hebrew word “kapporah.” Kapporah means a sacrifice, from the Hebrew
word or the infinitive “lehakreem”. Man would be at one with God. The unity that was lost through sin would be
restored when the Messiah came. Under
the Law the sin of the Jewish people was forgiven thusly: If they had real faith and genuine repentance,
the blood of the Yom Kippur scapegoat would make kapporah, it would temporarily cover the sin of the people until
the Messiah came and removed it. It was
like a temporary cover note to drive a vehicle until you got the proper
insurance certificate. It made kapporah. It was a temporary covering. The Old Testament saints could not go to
heaven until the Messiah came. They went
to the bosom of Abraham to wait for the Messiah. The Old Testament saints could only be saved
by the blood of Jesus, the same as we can.
There is no other name under heaven by which we can be saved. As it says in the Epistle to the Hebrews, the
blood of these animals could not take away sin, they could simply make kapporah. They were symbols of what the Messiah would do. We all know about the blood of the lamb, but
we have the blood of the goat on Yom Kippur.
It is all the blood of Jesus, but the blood of these animals is efficacious
in different ways. All of the animals
sacrificed in the Temple, the blood is all pictures of the blood of Christ from
different aspects. The blood of the
lamb—the lamb was without blemish. The
innocent would die for the guilty. One
man without sin is worth more than all the men with sin, thus one could die for
all; that is the blood of the lamb.
Then there is the blood of the bulls, the strong would
die for the weak, just as the innocent would die for the guilty. The birds, they would have to sacrifice the
bird under running water. It is a
picture of washing with the blood. All
of these things reveal different aspects of the blood of Jesus, but the blood
of the goat has its own unique properties.
What is that? Well, for one thing
in Greek you have two words for sin: “Hamartia” and “hamartano.” They are almost
the same but in Hebrew these words are quite different. ‘Het and pesha.” Het
means missing the mark, shooting an arrow at a target and failing to hit
it. Pesha means going too far. Pesha is transgression; het
is failure. Pesha is sin of commission; het
is sin of omission. We sin both by doing
things we should not, but we also sin by failing to do what we should. Remember King
Saul--his first sin was not doing things he should not; he became a murderer of
the High Priest, Abithar, he became a practicer of
necromancy and witchcraft later on. He
tried to murder David later on. He began
doing things he shouldn’t later on. His
first sin was failing to do things he should—getting rid of Amilech,
handing over all of the booty for it to be destroyed; it was given to a pagan
God. When somebody backslides, when
somebody falls away from the Lord, backsliding rarely begins, if ever, by
failing to act, but by doing something we shouldn’t, that comes later. It usually begins by failing to do what we
should. When someone’s prayer life,
scripture reading, fellowshipping with other believers, witnessing, when people
stop doing the things they should, it is only a matter of time before the old
nature will take over and we will begin doing the things we should not, okay?
The blood of the lamb is chiefly concerned with pesha. The blood of the goat is more concerned with het.
The blood of the lamb is more concerned with things we did before we
were a believer. The blood of the goat
is more concerned with things we did after.
The blood of Christ cleanses from all sin. Additionally, pesha has to do with sin of which
we are cognizant. Het has to do with sins of what we call in Hebrew “barut,”
ignorance. Let us look, turn with me
please, to the Epistle to the Hebrews:
Hebrews 9:7: “but into the second only the High Priest enters, once a year,
not without taking blood, which he offers for himself and for the sins of the
people committed in ignorance. [Coming from the Hebrew, barut.”]
It is all the blood of Jesus. All of these animals are pictures of Christ
but his blood is efficacious in different ways, okay? The blood of Christ cleanses from all sin,
past and present. We have to understand
it is efficacious in different ways. It
is efficacious for things we do that we should not, but it is also efficacious
for the things we should have done and do not.
It is efficacious for the sins we cognizantly commit, but it is also
efficacious for things we do in ignorance.
Christians can sin in ignorance.
I have seen Christians in ignorance do things that are a sin. I will give you an example: People will allow children who have not been
baptized and who are not yet saved to take the Lord’s Supper. That is completely wrong. The Lord’s supper is for baptized believers
only. It says in Exodus you should let
your children see you take the Passover so they will ask the question “Why do
you do this.” Not allowing a child to
take the Lord’s Supper is a way to teach them about their need for salvation. The Lord’s Table is perhaps innocently, not
being shown the reverence it should be shown.
Now, I am not saying it is being defiled in the way an immoral person
would take the Lord’s supper but it is wrong.
That kid does not know they are sinning and it is the parent’s
responsibility, but the way the Church is now the parents probably don’t even
know. It is a sin anyway. Somebody had to pay for the sin. He pays for the sins even committed in
ignorance, even for the sin committed in ignorance. Every time a Roman Catholic prays to the dead
they are committing the sin of necromancy.
They do not see it that way but they are calling on spirits of the
dead. That is necromancy, okay? It is necromancy. Now, there are true believers in the Roman
Catholic Church, but of course if they are truly saved, the Holy Spirit will
show them to get out of it. Nobody would
say you could not be a Roman Catholic and be saved, but it you are a Roman Catholic
who is saved, you cannot remain in that church.
The Holy Spirit will show you to get out of it. Still, the blood cleanses them from all sin,
even sins committed in ignorance. Every
time a Catholic prays to the dead or genuflects before transubstantiated
elements that is a sin of idolatry. It
is a sin committed in ignorance. We have
to understand, we all need the blood of the lamb. “Are you washed in the Blood of the
Lamb?” That is true, but it is no less
true we must be washed in the blood of the goat; it is no less true.
The question becomes, why is, as it were, there are two feasts
of blood atonement, Passover in the Spring and Yom Kippur in the autumn? Why
are there two? That is an important
question. Let us understand why there
are two. Remember, Jesus fulfils the
Spring holy days in his first coming. He
fulfils the autumn holy days in His second coming. The autumn holy days are only partially
fulfilled in his first coming. He
fulfils Passover, First Fruits when He raised from the dead, and Weeks, which
is Pentecost, in His first coming, and you’ve got the summer, which corresponds
to the Time of the Gentiles, the period between the 69th and 70th
week of Daniel’s vision. But then you
have Trumpets, you have Yom Kippur, Atonement, and you have Tabernacles, or
Booths. Now you have a partial
fulfilment of these holy days in his first coming. When he dies he partially fulfils Yom
Kippur. He is our High Priest who makes
the perfect atonement. The Temple veil
was torn. Sinful man is no longer
separated from a Holy God. He partially
fulfils it. We will see how he has not
fulfilled it in a moment, except partially.
Tabernacles is partially fulfilled in John 7, but the full fulfilment of
Ezekiel 47 takes place in the Millennium.
Zechariah 14 tells us in the Millennium Jesus will be worshiped in
Jerusalem. He fulfils the Spring
holidays in His first coming but the autumn holidays are only partially
fulfilled in His first coming; these are to be fulfilled in his second
coming. Yom Kippur, the Day of
Atonement, has a future meaning.
There were two goats.
Turn with me please to Leviticus 16:
Leviticus 16:1-10: Now the LORD spoke to Moses after the death of the two
sons of Aaron, when they had approached the presence of the LORD and died. And
the LORD said to Moses, "Tell your brother Aaron that he shall not enter
at any time into the holy place inside the veil, before the mercy seat which is
on the ark, lest he die; for I will appear in the cloud over the mercy seat.
"Aaron shall enter the holy place with this: with a bull for a sin
offering and a ram for a burnt offering. "He shall put on the holy linen
tunic, and the linen undergarments shall be next to his body, and he shall be
girded with the linen sash, and attired with the linen turban (these are holy
garments). Then he shall bathe his body in water and put them on. "And he
shall take from the congregation of the sons of Israel two male goats for a sin
offering and one ram for a burnt offering. "Then Aaron shall offer the bull for the
sin offering which is for himself, that he may make atonement for himself and
for his household. "And he shall take the two goats and present them
before the LORD at the doorway of the tent of meeting. "And Aaron shall cast lots for the two
goats, one lot for the LORD and the other lot for the scapegoat. "Then Aaron shall offer the goat on
which the lot for the LORD fell, and make it a sin offering. "But the goat on which the lot for the
scapegoat fell, shall be presented alive before the LORD, to make atonement
upon it, to send it into the wilderness as the scapegoat.
This
obviously brings to mind the picture of one dying so one could live and also
being released to take away the sin. At
some point in Israel’s history this other goat, the scapegoat, returned. So by the time of Jesus they had a practice. They would take it into the wilderness and push it off a cliff. This other goat is called the “Azazel,” “Sier Azazel,” the
scapegoat. They would be chosen by
lot. If it came in the right hand, that
would be seen as a favorable sign. If
the lot came in the right hand, the one for the Lord, that would be seen as a
favorable sign for the people being forgiven; that is having kaporah for their
sin. The High Priest would wear special
garments, special garments that he only wore that time of year. These garments were a white tunic with a red
sash or a scarlet colored sash, only worn once a year. He would go through an elaborate ritual
called Mekudesh,
being made holy or being sanctified or set apart, from the Hebrew word “kodesh.” It is the same word for being married. When you marry somebody you say “mekudesh” and these special garments he put on,
on Yom Kippur resembled a wedding garment.
Understand the thinking, only the person who is mekudesh is allowed to go
in. After Aaron’s son’s die, the Lord
warns Moses “Don’t let anybody else go in.”
With his white tunic and red sash that had bells on it. You can know objectively “la daat”, but when you know subjectively
it is different. In Greek, the term is “ginosko,” “to
know a woman.” Joseph “knew not” Mary
until Jesus was born. You can know something
objectively but that is not the same as knowing it subjectively. Right from the beginning, Adam and Eve were
put in the garden and told to subdue it.
They were to know what sin was objectively. They were to know there was a devil. They were to know what it is objectively but
they were not to know what it is subjectively.
They were not to know what it was by experience. They were not to know it within themselves. They were to know what it was, but they were
not to know what it was like to do it.
So too, holy matrimony. The way I
explain it, to consummate a marriage in Hebrew, you have heard me explain
it--the term is “miknas bah”—“and he went into her,” one person
goes inside of another and a third is procreated. It teaches about the Trinity. We have separate teachings explaining that in
depth including the High Priestly prayer of Jesus. Nonetheless, let us understand this.
Anybody can look at a copy of Grey’s Text Book of Medical
Anatomy and look at fallopian tubes and ovarian tissue all day long. Anybody could know what was in there. But only the person who was mekudesh, set
apart by God, sanctified for the purpose, was to know what it was like to go in
there, to know a woman. Or a Jew could
read the Torah, they could know about the Holy Ark, they could know about the Shewbread, they could know about the Decalogue, they could
know what was in there, but only the High Priest was to know what it was like
to go in there. If someone other than
the bride’s husband sleeps with her it is an abomination. If someone other than, because he is the one
who is mekudesh,
he is the one who God has set apart.
Well this is the same thing. If
somebody other than the High Priest, the one who is mekudesh goes in there, it is an
abomination. It was to be a mystery, you
were not to know. You were to know
objectively, but you were not to know experientially. It would be an abomination if you knew,
okay? Now there is more to it than this
but this is the essence of what it was.
The High Priest was to know what it was like. Remember, the Hebrew term for the
sanctification of the High Priest on Yom Kippur is the same as the Hebrew term
for the sanctification of a husband to a bride,
mekudesh. With this ring I wed thee according to the
laws of Moses and Israel, and that is it!
Well, then you step on a wine glass and that is it, then you are
married. I often tell people it is the
last time you ever put your foot down!
And then you have had it brother!
He looked different on that day. He did not look like the same person. He went through this elaborate ritual the mekudesh and he
said a prayer of sanctification, a prayer of mekudesh before he went in, but
he put on a costume, as it were, that made him look like a different person
than he was. You would not have
recognized him at first; he looked like somebody who was different. Then it continues:
Leviticus 16:11-16: Then Aaron shall
offer the bull of the sin offering which is for himself, and make atonement for
himself and for his household, and he shall slaughter the bull of the sin offering
which is for himself. "And he shall take a firepan
full of coals of fire from upon the altar before the LORD, and two handfuls of
finely ground sweet incense, and bring it inside the veil. "And he shall
put the incense on the fire before the LORD, that the cloud of incense may
cover the mercy seat that is on the ark of the testimony, lest he die.
"Moreover, he shall take some of the blood of the bull and sprinkle it
with his finger on the mercy seat on the east side; also in front of the mercy
seat he shall sprinkle some of the blood with his finger seven times. "Then
he shall slaughter the goat of the sin offering which is for the people, and
bring its blood inside the veil, and do with its blood as he did with the blood
of the bull, and sprinkle it on the mercy seat and in front of the mercy seat.
"And he shall make atonement for the holy place, because of the impurities
of the sons of Israel, and because of their transgressions, in regard to all
their sins; and thus he shall do for the tent of meeting which abides with them
in the midst of their impurities. [This, of course by
the time of Jesus would have been the second Temple.]
It begins with the idea that it is perpetual, a perpetual
commandment to have this blood. There is
a convocation but not a pilgrim convocation; people did not have to come to
Jerusalem the way they did for Passover.
It could be celebrated locally; it could be observed locally, it could
be observed in Nazareth, it did not have to be observed in Jerusalem. Passover, Pentecost, Feast of Tabernacles had
to be observed in Jerusalem. Hanukkah
would be observed in Jerusalem, Yom Kippur did not have to be observed in
Jerusalem except by the Levitical priests.
He goes through this.
There would be no work and the Hebrew says in preparation for it, la anot na shotem, literally torment
or “torture your souls over your sin.”
He would go through the ritual washing and then it would be three kinds
of sacrifices, the regular Temple sacrifices that took place every day, a
separate sacrifice for the priest that we read about in Hebrews, the High
Priest had to first make atonement for his own sin. That is why Jesus had to be a priest of a
different order, of Melchizedek, he had no sin and then the goat, which was for
the sin of the people, three offerings. These goats were chosen again by lot. Let us look at verses 21 and 22:
Leviticus 16:21-22: "Then Aaron shall lay both of his hands on the
head of the live goat, and confess over it all the iniquities of the sons of
Israel, and all their transgressions in regard to all their sins; and he shall
lay them on the head of the goat and send it away into the wilderness by the
hand of a man who stands in readiness.” And the goat shall bear on itself all their
iniquities to a solitary land; and he shall release the goat in the wilderness. [Which by Jesus’ time they pushed it backward off a cliff.]
The High Priest would put the sins of the people onto the
goats. The goats would be paraded
through the streets of Jerusalem. The
people would spit on them, kick them, throw stones at them, beat them with
sticks and curse them for their sin. One
would be released, one would be sacrificed in the Temple and the High Priest
would go in back of the veil once a year.
We see this when Jesus was born.
The father of John the Baptist, that was Yom Kippur, that is what John
the Baptist was doing. That is one of
the ways that people try to calculate the birth of Jesus, if John was six
months older than Jesus and if the pregnancy of Elizabeth, the wife of
Zechariah was revealed at that time, that is one of the ways that people try to
count out the actual month that Jesus was born but this is a very different
subject. I only mention it is passing,
that is what John the Baptist’s father would have been doing.
Nonetheless, the sin would be put on the goat. In the Apocrypha, in the Book of Enoch, we
read that the Azazel
corresponds to Satan and it has the root of “zaz”in it, that is to move or to
take away. There are two goats, the same
as there were two birds in Leviticus 14; one dies, one would initially go
free. But the Jews considered the two
goats to be one offering. In the time of
Christ, the distance in the wilderness was broken down into districts known as
deputations, until they finally got to the cliff. The High Priest would put on these clean
garments with the bells, a purple robe and make a personal confession. Now, remember, when they crucified Jesus,
what did they put on him? A purple robe. He was our High Priest going to make a
perfect sacrifice. He would have a
silver sensor in his hand. Remember incense, we are told in Revelation 8 and in
Ezekiel, incense is a picture of the prayers of the saints. The Lord would sniff the odors or the fragrances
of the people. God says in Isaiah “I
will not sniff your fragrances if you do not repent.” He would not accept the prayers or worship of
the wicked. Wicked people can go to
church and play at religion but God will not sniff the incense. More than that, he only sniffs the incense if
the High Priest brings it in. Only
prayer in the name of Jesus God will recognize.
The only prayer God recognizes is the prayer in the name of Jesus. People can say the rosary all they want, God
does not recognize that. Moslems can
pray to Allah all day but first of all, Allah is not even our God, and even if
he was God would not recognize it. It
has to be in the sensor of the High Priest.
It is only prayer in the name of Jesus that God will recognize. There is no other name. No, God does not hear the prayers of unsaved
people unless they are praying for salvation, unless they are seeking God. In His grace he will draw them to the way of
salvation but they will have to pray in the name of Jesus to get the
salvation. It is only the sensor in the
hand of the priest is the only fragrance that God will sniff and take pleasure
in. But it goes on. The High Priest waited in the Temple, when
they took this other goat out, a distance of what is known as 90 “ris” which is 12
miles, but before that he took off the scarlet sash and cut it in half. One half would be hung before the Holy of
Holies, the other half would be tied between the horns of the scapegoat before
it was paraded for 90 “ris.” Now the Catholics say there are 14 stations
of the cross, no there are 90 and it is not inside the city, it is outside, he
was crucified outside. Then it goes on;
that is why Jesus had to be crucified outside the city. He waited in the Temple. The lot was cast, the goats were selected, he
put his hands on them for the sin of the people, the parade took place, the
scapegoat was taken to the wilderness and the one that was for the Lord was
sacrificed.
A number of things happened though, from the time of
Jesus onward. We know this from Jewish
history, from the Mishnah. It was not
written by people with any Christian prejudice.
If the people’s sins were forgiven, based on Isaiah 1:18, the scarlet
sash would turn white, hung before the Holy of Holies. “Though your sins are
like scarlet, they shall be white as snow.”
Judaism teaches in the Mishnah for 40 years before the Temple was
destroyed, from 70 AD counting backwards, from the time of Jesus onward it
never turned white. The sins of the
Jesus people were never forgiven again.
The laws of probability said if you took a lot or a coin, head or tails
and you threw it up 40 times, you kept throwing it up eventually you are going
to get an equal amount of heads and tails.
It is mathematically demonstrable with probability theories. The odds of throwing a lot 40 times and it
not coming to the right hand 40 times in a row are statistically very, very
remote, just like throwing a coin up and not coming down tails or not coming
down heads after 40 tosses—that is very, very remote, but it did not. The sins of the people were no longer
forgiven. The western-most light of the
candelabra in the Temple kept going out and the doors of the Temple, which took
24 men to open and close, opened by themselves.
That also happened according to Josephus before the events of 70 AD when
the Temple was destroyed. There was a
following ceremony called the “Mosoph.” The High
Priest would them put on his normal clothes and take of his other ones and he
would look the way he always did. He
would attempt to go home into what was known as the upper city from the Temple
and the people would flock to him, who lived in Jerusalem and they would hold
onto him and try to stop him from going home.
They would physically try to prevent him or persuade him from going
home, once they saw who he was when he took off those garments. So it was with Jesus. When he entered the Holy of Holies, he did so
as God. When he came back as the one
they were able to finally recognize, they did not want him to leave,
remember? “Don’t leave, don’t go away.” They tried to persuade him to stay. The entire ceremony was a picture of the Lord
Jesus.
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We will come back to this in a moment, but the way it is
celebrated now is you go to the synagogue and you eat these ritual foods,
called “Kreplach”
and chicken soup and “sinis”, which is like a sweet kind of meat
dish. Ultra-Orthodox Jews up until not
very many years ago practiced something called the “macoat”. They put on a heavy “macheel” or several, overcoats
and they would beat the guy 39 times with a belt. Not having a proper priest, a proper Temple
or a proper goat, they began swinging chickens by the neck. Today in the synagogue they will begin with a
prayer called the Kol Nidre, an
Aramaic prayer that must be ancient because it is Aramaic. It is properly attributed to the Spanish
Inquisition when Jews were forced to convert to Catholicism but because it is
Aramaic it had to be older than that. Kol Nidre means
“All Vows” the broken promises made to God.
Why? Because the blood of the goat has to do with sins of omission.
They say the right stuff but they do not know why. They then read the Book of Jonah. The Gentiles repent when the Jews do
not. Unbelievable! Then they go through an acrostic poem, which
is actually sung, which is called Yaaleh Tachanuneinu “May we in treaty, rise and selachti, forgive
us, “anu ammecha” we
are your people. Then they have
something called the “Yizkor” the memory for the dead, and finally
something called the “nega”.
They are fasting now, they are doing all this other stuff but they do not have
the scapegoat. The Judaism of today is
not the Judaism of Moses. They do things
instead. So you’ve got these two
goats. One is the one that is for the
Lord and is sacrificed in the Temple; the other one is the Seir Azazel thrown off the cliff. You don’t get this stuff in Bible colleges or
seminaries, pay attention! He fulfils Pesach, Passover. He fulfils first fruits. He fulfills Weeks, that is Pentecost in his
first coming. The autumn holy days,
Trumpets, which today the Rabbis foolishly call Rosh Hashanah, they are saying
“Happy New Year,” that is not the real meaning in the scriptures of Rosh Hashanah,
it is “Set the trumpet to thy mouth; when the people hear the trumpet will they
not tremble?”, the impending convocation of Israel for the great
tribulation. You’ve got a 10-day period
known as the “Days of Awe” “Yomim HaNoraim” corresponding to that period when the
Antichrist will be on the rampage, followed by Yom Kippur and lastly, Booths or
Tabernacles, corresponding to the Millennium.
This was only partially fulfilled in his first coming. He was indeed our High Priest and he was the
goat that was for the Lord. The other
goat was not killed, yet. The other goat
had to die later. Remember, the Azazel is the
picture of Satan. The Son of Man came
that the works of Satan will be destroyed.
Why could they not throw Jesus off the cliff? He was the other goat! They had the wrong goat. They didn’t want to stone him, they wanted to
throw him off the cliff, but they had the wrong goat. He was the one who was for the Lord. When he comes back, that other goat is going
off the cliff. Satan will eventually be
destroyed. Yom Kippur will be fulfilled
in the return of Jesus. The Antichrist
will have his rampage, Yomim HaNoraim, the
days of awe. Notice the number is ten,
like in the Church of Symrna, remember? “Satan will put you in prison 10 days.” Daniel 1 there is 10 days. Yomim HaNoraim is 10, it does not necessarily mean ten
literal days but well it does for here, ten, that he will fulfil Yom
Kippur. That other goat has to die. Satan is doomed. He has been cast out but he is not yet
destroyed. Jesus took our sin, it is
true, but that goat was for the Lord, the other goat is the Azazel. That goat is going to be destroyed. It is going to die. That is why they could not throw Jesus off
the cliff. They had the wrong goat and
they do not even know it.
It is very sad that Jewish people have all of these
precious truths. They were called by God
to be custodians of these precious truths.
“To them belongs the oracles of God” Paul said. They have got all this stuff and they do not
know what it even means. But Christians
should know what it means, but even most Christians don’t understand this
stuff. And Jews who do not believe in
Jesus are even more blind. They are even
more blind than the non Jews. It is
terrible. We are not supposed to be
blind. Paul said “I would not have you
be ignorant brethren.” As Arnold Fruchtenbaum
says, “You can be Gratham Brethren, you can be Grace
Brethren, you can be Plymouth Brethren, but just don’t be Ignorant
Brethren! We have got a lot of ignorant
brethren! That is why they could not
throw Jesus off the cliff; they had the wrong goat. He is the other goat. When he comes back, Satan will be destroyed. He will totally fulfil Yom Kippur in His
return.
The fact that you see the Jews regathered to Israel; the
trumpet has blown, it is the convocation of Israel. Antichrist is coming. Satan will have his final fling but he is
going off the cliff. The works of Satan
will be destroyed. That is what is going
to happen. Just think about it. Those Jews in Nazareth had no clue what they
were doing. Jews in the synagogue to
this day do not have a clue, they do not have a clue! They are blind! The word for blind ones in Hebrew is “Evrim”, the word in Hebrew for Hebrews is Ivrim it is
almost the same word. Paul says “When
the Torah is read they are blind, hell is before them and they do not see
it. It is all there, it is their
religion, it is their heritage, it is their culture but they just do not see
it. They had the wrong goat! Now they have got the wrong everything! This is frightening. Because if the Azazel can bamboozle the Jews, I assure you he can bamboozle the
Christians. If the Azazel was able to deceive Israel, I assure you he will have no problem
deceiving the Church, at least most of the Church. This was their book, this was their faith and
they did not get it. If he can con them
who can’t he con? Well he has conned
them and he has conned most of the Church.
Do not let him con you. God
Bless!