Reading: Leviticus 1-4, Psalm 30
Atonement.
noun: atonement; plural noun: atonements
- reparation for a wrong or injury.”she wanted to make atonement for her husband’s behavior”
The word atonement has a fascinating history. It appears to descend both from the middle English verb onen (to make one, unify, unite) and the Latin adunamentum (a unity of separates. A spork is an adunamentum of a fork and a spoon.) It appears in English right around the time William Tyndale translated large portions of the Bible into English, and while it seems someone beat him to the punch in coining the word, he certainly gave it a leap in popularity by using it to translate the Hebrew כִּפֻּר (kippur).
This Hebrew word, kippur, is all over the book of Leviticus. It has appeared before, in a couple places in Exodus, and will show up again scattered around the Scriptures, but in Leviticus it shows up in every single chapter. It is so prominent it almost feels like the reader is being beaten over the head with it. And yet, when we sit down and actually read Leviticus, it is easy to let it slide right by. There are so many descriptions of how to slaughter, burn, and eat various animals, grains, and drinks, that it is easy to forgot the why behind it all.
Leviticus begins where Exodus ends. Moses is outside the tent of the tabernacle, which God has occupied. The first sentence in the book is God speaking to Moses from inside the tent, giving him instructions about how the people are to bring offerings which will allow them to be accepted. Here we see the theme of extreme amounts of detail from the construction of the tabernacle continued. Everything is outlined exactly: what kind of animal, bread, or drink to bring, what to do with it, where to kill it, what to do with the blood, the organs, the meat, the bones. What to eat, what not to, who can eat what, and where, and when. I hope you enjoy this kind of thing, because it’s not going to get any less detailed for a while.
All these details were important for the people of Israel. They took extreme care to follow them, for the same reason they took extreme care to construct the tabernacle in the way God outlined. They had, finally, come to understand that there was another world inside that tent. A world filled with the glory of God. A new creation. But like going to another planet, one cannot just walk in and expect to survive. It is a wonder, but it is a dangerous wonder. Even Moses, who has been spending a great deal of time with God, cannot just waltz in to this place.
But God wants the people to be able to come in. So he works out a system of purification. As we have already seen, God is not going to renege on his words from Genesis 3: death is a consequence of the human declaration of independence, and death must occur if humans are to enter God’s space. There is a curse, and that curse will not be lifted just because. But God has already demonstrated in the story of the sacrifice of Isaac that it will not need to be a human death- God will accept an animal substitute, and that will allow humans to (temporarily) come into God’s space. So here we begin to see all the kinds of substitutes God will accept.
We already know about animals, but here God makes it specific: unblemished animals, and of a particular kind. The substitute death is to be a costly one, not the animal you didn’t really want anyway. As will come up just a little later, God will also make allowance for those who cannot afford an animal. God really is going out of his way here to make the theme of substitution obvious: he will even accept a substitute for the substitute. Want to meet with God but don’t want to die? Bring a bull. Can’t afford a bull? Bring birds. Can’t afford birds? Bring bread.
Back to Atonement. When the people bring these offerings correctly, atonement is made for them- they are brought together as one with God, and their sin is forgiven. But they can’t do this themselves, the priest must make atonement for them. How did the priest get this role of being the atonement broker? Remember Exodus 29- by dying, though again God allows for a substitute death. The work of atonement is carried out by a priest who has died, who then accepts the responsibility for the people, which he will bear on his shoulders and on his heart, and which he will make atonement for once a year. But that’s getting ahead of ourselves.
Leviticus begins with the broad set up for this system of transferred guilt, substitute death, atonement, and forgiveness. What follows will be the application of all this to the impurities of the people, their leaders, their priests, their homes and possessions- everything about the people of Israel becomes subject to this system of atonement so that God can be among them without them all dying. So as you read Leviticus, remember that this book of death, blood, and fire is really a book of atonement, a way forward into the new creation that is wondrous and dangerous.