Leviticus episode 5 - Atonement Explained

A single day each year, one man stepped behind the curtain with trembling hands, and an entire nation held its breath. We unpack Leviticus 16 with clear eyes and full hearts, exploring why the Day of Atonement sits at the centre of the Bible’s story about holiness, sin, and mercy. From the cube-shaped Holy of Holies to the cloud of presence and the incense that veils glory, we show how the tabernacle is a living model of heaven’s reality and a map for approaching God without being consumed.

Together with Dr Paul Blackham and Rev Joseph Steinberg, we trace the two-goat ritual that coined the word scapegoat and still shapes our moral imagination. One goat dies and cleanses; the other carries confessed sins into the wilderness, the realm outside the camp. That pairing reveals the full meaning of atonement: guilt paid for, defilement removed. Then we make the bridge to Jesus, the true high priest who needs no borrowed dignity and no sacrifice for himself. He fulfils both goats at the cross—his blood purifies the true sanctuary and his bearing of our sin outside the city removes our guilt for good.

We dig into Hebrews to consider why Jesus sat down at the Father’s right hand, why a seated priest means finished work and ongoing mediation, and how a resurrected man in heaven secures our access with confidence. We also face a pressing question: if the sacrifice is done, why hasn’t he returned? Drawing on 2 Peter, we consider divine patience, not delay, and the open door of repentance. The result is a grounded hope and a practical shift from do to done: not self-salvation by ritual, but trust in the finished work of Christ that frees us to live holy, grateful, and bold.

If this conversation helped you see atonement with fresh clarity, subscribe, share it with a friend, and leave a review telling us which image—blood, scapegoat, or veil—struck you most.

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Transcript

Setting The Scene In Leviticus 16

SPEAKER_02 0:30

Ah, book by book, and I'm Richard Buse, greeting you once again as we come to number five in our series of studies on the Book of Leviticus. We're at Standon Park, beautiful place here in Surrey, England, and I'm joined by Dr. Paul Blackham here, and also by the Reverend Joseph Steinberg. And Joseph is our international guest on this occasion, and it's wonderful to have you here with us, Joseph. What we're doing is number five. And so we come to Leviticus and chapter 16 on this occasion, and it is the famous Day of Atonement. Here we go. The Lord spoke to Moses after the death of the two sons of Aaron who died when they approached the Lord. The Lord said to Moses, Tell your brother Aaron not to come whenever he chooses into the most holy place behind the curtain, in front of the atonement cover on the ark, or else he will die. Because I appear in the cloud over the atonement cover. This is how Aaron is to enter the sanctuary area with a young bull for a sin offering and a ram for a burnt offering. He is to put on the sacred linen tunic with linen undergarments next to his body. He is to tie the linen sash around him and put on the linen turban. These are sacred garments, so he must bathe himself with water before he puts them on. From the Israelite community, he is to take two male goats for a sin offering and a ram for a burnt offering. This is a famous day in the whole of the Jewish community. And we come to it now with the thought. The Day of Atonement, Joseph Steinberg, I'm going to ask you, very important day at the tabernacle. Could you remind us of some of the aspects that relate to the Day of Atonement in the Tabernacle?

SPEAKER_00 2:16

Yeah, I mean the Tabernacle itself is an amazing structure, and just a little plug for the Exodus series that we've done because we really go into detail.

SPEAKER_02 2:24

But uh the tabernacle.

SPEAKER_00 2:27

Yeah, the model we looked at the uh layout and structure. Uh amazing, really. But we it we would lose all our time if we went through all that. So we'll just focus on actually the holy of holies.

Inside The Holy Of Holies

SPEAKER_00 2:36

This um it's amazing because this part of the tabernacle, if you go to Revelation and you see what um heaven is like, you see this great cube structure, something like what, 1400 miles wide and tall and and so on. An amazing, you know, we get our minds around.

SPEAKER_02 2:50

Any other page of the Bible where there's a cube?

SPEAKER_00 2:52

Yes, and here's a cube again in the tabernacle. And in in the walls, you know, I mean, the inner curtains that that are in this room are covered in cherubim. Yeah. And then you've got, of course, the cherubs there in the middle, uh, well, not in the middle, but where the, in a sense, the the ark is, which is in a sense symbolic. I wanted to say the throne of God, because really it's a picture of that and talks about the cloud. We have the presence of the Lord there. There's all sorts of incense burning to create this this atmosphere of um uh something almost to hide in, and where the high where the when the high priest comes in, he's got sort of something to shield him from the presence of God. But everything in there is a picture really of that which is happening in the greater reality of heaven and where we're headed to. But of course, again, as unholy, you think about Aaron, he's just a man, and yet he's gone through this whole process over seven days to become the high priest, but he's still going to be coming into the presence of the holy God, even after seeing his sons killed by the Lord. So imagine the fear that he had, and yet he's going into this holy place, which is very much structurally a picture of the place that ultimately we'll see soon in a few minutes, Christ has gone to on our behalf. So amazing symbolism here.

SPEAKER_02 4:05

It's it it's wonderful, and there's a lot of uh action here. I mean, the two goats, for example. Why were two goats selected on this day? We're reading this chapter. I mean, one as the Lord and one as well, there's a footnote, isn't there, about Azazil.

SPEAKER_01 4:18

Yeah, like the the goat of removal. And it's funny because this word scapegoat, it's people use that. I th I just the other day on there was a newspaper, and I was on a train and I could see on a headline there was someone was being described as a scapegoat. And I just thought from here. All from here, because the story was about how someone was being made to take the blame for something that had gone wrong. And it's it's takes us back to this that there are these two goats, and there's one. And again, I remember when we were thinking about all the different sacrifices, and we thought there had to be five of them to give us the full picture of what it was that Jesus was going to do when he died. It's the same with this goat, you can't just one of them is not enough to help to explain how the great high priest would accomplish

The Two Goats And The Scapegoat

SPEAKER_01 5:05

the ultimate um work of atonement. So here again you've got these two things. You've got one goat who is taken and sacrificed, killed, sacrificed at the altar and the blood applied to make atonement. But then you've got this other one, and the you know, it's made a scapegoat. It takes the blame for what others have done wrong. This is the original scapegoat, and the priest would put his hands on that goat and pronounce, uh, confess the sins of Israel onto and it's as if they're placed onto this other goat, and then that goat is taken far, far away into the wilderness, and then of course the wilderness in those categories, the holy, the clean, and the unclean. The wilderness is out in the unclean, that's outside the camp, that's the place of God forsaken us, and that so that goat is taken almost like symbolically, carrying away the sins of Israel out into the wilderness where it's completely abandoned. And then the person who took it out mustn't sort of by contact transfer the sins back. So they have to take off all his clothes and have a complete shower, scrub down, and his clothes have to be washed and everything, as if to say the sins have been taken away and that's the end of them, we'll never have them back again. So that's what's going on with the goats.

SPEAKER_02 6:20

Yeah, but it's showing us how incredibly uh seriously the Lord God Almighty takes sin.

SPEAKER_01 6:26

Amazing. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:27

Um because for all of that preparation to be done and accomplished, and all the detail as well. And I mean it would make me shake to think that an animal was killed on my behalf, rightly so. And it must have made them shake and tremble, and they thought, all this is being done on our behalf? It's a terrific thing. And then the priest would he put on a minimal set of the priestly clothes and then make offerings for himself. Well, we'll come on to that perhaps in just a moment, do you think? But Jesus the Messiah, Joseph, because you're from the Jewish background. How does Jesus the Messiah relate to the scapegoat?

SPEAKER_00 7:05

Well, the scapegoat is so unique, isn't it? And again, um, I gave a formula uh in an earlier study when we were thinking about this whole idea of substitution, and Paul just talked about the laying on of hands and so on. Again, these goats, don't forget, they had to be as sacrifices without spot and blemish, perfect in every way, a symbol of sinless perfection. These substitutes were identified upon by the laying on of hands, so that the sin of the nation was being transferred onto the scapegoat. So it was literally a scapegoat carrying upon itself the sin of the nation. So there was that substitute, there was the identification, and of course, normally within the sacrificial system, then there's the death, and through the death there's the exchange of life. This is unique because the animal doesn't actually die, or does it? Because the fact is it's removed out into the desert. Now, one might say, a skeptic, well, you know, goats can survive in the desert. Um, and and perhaps that's so. But symbolically, we see very clearly here a picture of Jesus who was taken outside the city gate. And Deuteronomy, when you do a study on that one, you know, cursed is he who is hung on a tree. And Jesus is hung on a tree, but all the sin of the world is laid upon him. And you think about the sky going dark, you know, in a sense, the face of God, the father, has turned away from the Son. He is utterly forsaken. I mean, that cry of Jesus isn't just a reference to a messianic prophecy. He cries out, My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? As there's this almost rending in the heart of God as the Father and Son. The Son has become full of the sin of the world. And God cannot look upon sin or be, as we can see, contaminated with sin. So now Jesus is utterly forsaken on the cross, and he is taking that upon himself on our behalf. And ultimately, at the very end, there's this great and final cry, it is finished, and he gives up his spirit. And so very much we are again called to identify with the substitute, the scapegoat, Jesus. And as we trust in him, through his death, for us, there is the exchange of life. He died so that we might live. He died so that we know, we have that assurance that our sin, when we we read Leviticus and we cry out, God, I am so unholy. I've shook for days thinking about having to do these studies. I'm so unworthy to speak about these things. But because of the work of Christ on the cross, through his death, there's the exchange of life. The scapegoat Jesus has made possible all my sin to be carried away and for God to look upon me as he looks upon his own son.

SPEAKER_02 9:32

Amazing picture. It is, it is, it's a shaking picture, as you say. And of course, it's very encouraging for those of us who are not yet uh have not yet to make our peace with Jesus the Messiah, to think he's done it all. He's done it all on our behalf. Paul Blackham, can I just move on to where I wanted to be a moment ago about the priestly clothes? A priest puts on these clothes and then makes offerings for himself. How does that contrast with Jesus?

SPEAKER_01 9:56

Well, that's one of the amazing things because these priests are, as Joseph's been saying, they're just sinful men ultimately, and they go through this process, a week-long ordination, to sort of give them the sense, them and the people who watch, the feeling, no, that you know, it it takes time to even be holy to have anything to do with the Lord God. But of course, they're not really sinless, they're not really perfect priests. I mean, they have to make offerings for their own sins. That's it on this day of atonement. A whole section of it is the priests atoning for themselves, let alone for the people. And so the contrast I always think, with when they put on these special priestly clothes, if we back in Exodus, there's a great verse, Exodus 28, verse 2, make sacred garments for your brother Aaron to give him dignity and honour. Because he doesn't have the dignity and honour. He has to wear the

Sin’s Weight And Sacred Preparation

SPEAKER_01 10:50

clothes to put on to make him look as if he's got the dignity and honour of the true priest of God most high. The great thing with Jesus, of course, is he is the sinlessly perfect one, full of the glory and honour of the living God and no sin, total holiness. He doesn't need to wear clothes that like um are a uniform, or it's not like he's an actor. In a sense, these priests are acting the role of Jesus, and so they were clothes that say, think of me as if I was perfect. Jesus doesn't have to, he is perfect. So that when he makes the offering, and when he as the priest makes the sacrifice, he has no sins of his own to deal with. It's all just for us.

SPEAKER_02 11:37

Wonderful. And then that Levitical high priest, I mean, he was the only one, of course, as we know, who is allowed to go into the most holy place and only on that day of atonement once a year. Um, can you just say something about that? I mean, are we to think in terms of the ascension of Jesus at this point?

SPEAKER_00 11:54

Yeah, and the contrast between the Levitical priest and Jesus, the great high priest, is quite profound because this Levitical priest could only go into the Holy of Holies, not even heaven itself, but the Holy of Holies, symbolically heaven, for just a few minutes once a year, and with that with great fear and trepidation. In fact, there are Jewish traditions that say that the high priest, they added bells to the bottoms of his robes and a rope around his waist in case when he went in and they could hear if there was a thud, God didn't accept the offering and he was killed in the presence of the Holy Lord God, they would be able to drag his body out because you couldn't go in and get it. Now that is probably mere conjecture, but it does stress the awesome place that this high priest went to, and yet the even more awesome position that Christ has on our behalf. Because in Hebrews 10, and we see very clearly a picture of Jesus, the great high priest, ascending into heaven. It says, when he got there, he sat down at the right hand of God the Father. Now, I don't know about you, but when I'm done in a hard day's work, especially when I used to work construction, I got home and I sat down, because the work was finished for the day. And I think it's symbolically powerful that Jesus, he has the great high priest, offered himself as the once and for all time sacrifice, because again, Hebrews says the blood of bulls and goats could never take away sin. That's why they had to be offered continually. But Jesus made this once and for all-time sacrifice. He he died, he rose again, and in the and I want to say this this is an exciting thing, especially for a Jewish mind. There is a man in heaven. There is a man in heaven, his name is Jesus. He is a physical resurrected person who is the Son of God, and he sits down at the right hand of the Father, and even his presence sitting there is making a mediation for us on our behalf, because his presence is a continual reminder of the price that was paid, and he represents us to the Father, and again back to us through the work of the Spirit, God back to us. We are holy, and we have a hope. This man in heaven will return one day and he will resurrect us all into this new creation. That's a great thing. And he will reign.

Jesus As The True Scapegoat

SPEAKER_00 13:56

It's a wonderful confidence. Praise God.

SPEAKER_02 13:58

Oh, yes. Back in Leviticus 16, here, Paul. Just give me a few seconds on this. I mean, the people only had to wait a few minutes, of course, in that case. For the uh high priest to come out of the most holy place. We are still waiting for Jesus. Why is he taking so long?

SPEAKER_01 14:12

And that's right, the great high priest he's gone in and he's been there for well, 2,000 years old. Two thousand years having a good sit. Sitting down. And we're thinking, when's he gonna when's the priest coming back out and then then to redeem the whole creation? Why doesn't he come out straight away or maybe after a week or two? Um I'm really in one set I'm in one sense, although I long for him to come back. A few seconds. A few seconds. It's the two in 2 Peter 3, Peter is addressing that question. Why is he stay spending so long? Uh we don't forget this one thing, dear friends. With the Lord, a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He's patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. So the great high priest is in there waiting, and he's just waiting long enough for as many people, if possible, everybody, to come and take advantage of the work that he's done.

SPEAKER_02 15:08

Yeah. Which means you. He's waiting for you. Hey, you know, there's only two ways of doing it. I can think of a friend of mine called Diane Baird, who is in Northern Ireland. I'm sure many of the people sharing in this program know of her. She used to work with us at all Solz Langham Place. She once said to a world religious leader, the big difference between you and me is a four-letter word. She said, actually, she said, with you, and she spoke with respect. With you, it's due. You must go through this ritual, you must do that sacrifice, you must go through that particular piece of uh of of uh moral accomplishment. She said, with us, it's D-O-N-E done, which is exactly what Joseph Steinberg was saying a moment ago. Jesus said, It is finished at the cross. And when he'd done it, there's nothing else for us to do. All we can do is to thank him and to say, thank you for waiting for me. I'm coming now, I'm coming to you. God bless you, and thank you for sharing with us in this program.