Sacrifice And Offering

VIEW:22 DATA:01-04-2020

SACRIFICE AND OFFERING
1. Terminology of sacrifice.—(a) General. Since every sacrifice was an offering, but all offerings were not sacrifices, this preliminary study of the usage of these two important terms in our EV [Note: English Version.] may start from the more comprehensive ‘offering.’ It is true that in the majority of the occurrences of ‘offering,’ both in AV [Note: Authorized Version.] and in RV [Note: Revised Version.] , it is simply a synonym of ‘sacrifice’ (cf. German Opfer). This is the case more particularly in the extensive nomenclature of the various sacrifices, as ‘burnt offering,’ which also appears in AV [Note: Authorized Version.] as ‘burnt sacrifice,’ ‘meal (AV [Note: Authorized Version.] meat) offering,’ etc. (In AV [Note: Authorized Version.] and RV [Note: Revised Version.] the names of the sacrifices are printed separately, in Amer. RV [Note: Revised Version.] they are more correctly joined by a hyphen, burnt-offering, etc.) As will presently appear (§ 2), the compound expression in such cases represents but a single word in the original, which is the technical term for the particular sacrifice.
In the remaining occurrences, however, ‘offering,’ or its synonym ‘oblation,’ is used in a more extended application to denote a gift offered to God, as opposed to a secular gift, in the form of a present, bribe, or the like, to a fellow-creature. Such ‘holy gifts’ (Exo_28:38) or offerings may be divided into three classes, namely, (1) altar-offerings, comprising all such offerings as were brought into contact with the altar (cf. Mat_23:19), mostly for the purpose of being consumed thereon; (2) the stated sacred dues, such as tithes, first-fruits, etc.; and (3) special votive offerings, e.g. those specified in Num_7:1-89. In this comprehensive sense of the term, ‘offering,’ or—as almost uniformly in RV [Note: Revised Version.] —‘oblation,’ corresponds to the Heb. qorbân, a word peculiar to Ezekiel and the priestly legislation. It is the corban of Mar_7:11, ‘that is to say, Given to God’ (RV [Note: Revised Version.] ; AV [Note: Authorized Version.] ‘a gift’), and means ‘something brought near,’ i.e. to the altar, or at least presented at the sanctuary, in other words, a present to God. The term, as has been said, appears late in the history of OT sacrifice (Eze_20:28; Eze_40:43 and the various strata of P [Note: Priestly Narrative.] passim), the nearest corresponding term in the older literature being minchâh, for which see § 2.
The classification of OT offerings above suggested serves, further, to bring into relief the relation of ‘sacrifice’ to ‘offering.’ The former may be defined as an offering which is consumed, in whole or in part, upon the altar, or, more briefly, as an altar-offering. It is in this more restricted sense of altar-offering that ‘sacrifice’ and ‘offering’ are employed synonymously in our English nomenclature of sacrifice.
But there is still another use of these terms in which they are not synonymous but contrasted terms. In the sacrificial system of OT, altar-offerings—‘sacrifices,’ in the sense above defined—are of two kinds, animal offerings and cereal offerings, using the latter term a fortiori for all non-bloody altar-offerings, including not merely cereal oblations in the strict sense (flour, cakes, etc.), but also offerings of wine, oil, and the indispensable salt. Now the characteristic and significant Heb. designation of an animal, or, as it is often termed, a bloody, offering is zebach, lit. ‘slaughter,’ from the verb zâbach, originally to slaughter generally, then specially to immolate the sacrificial victim, to sacrifice—hence also the word for ‘altar,’ mizbçach, lit. the place of slaughter (for sacrifice). The complement of zebach in this sense of animal sacrifice is minchâh, in the later specialized sense of cereal offering (see, further, for both terms, § 2), so that ‘sacrifice and offering’ came to denote the whole category of altar offerings (Psa_40:6, 1Sa_2:29, Amo_5:25—also Isa_19:21 ‘sacrifice and oblation’). In this sense, also, they are to be understood in the title of this article. The results now reached may be thus summed up: ‘sacrifice’ is used as a convenient term for both kinds of OT altar-offerings, but in the EV [Note: English Version.] , and in strict usage, it corresponds to the Heb. zebach, which is always used of animal sacrifice, while ‘offering’ is used in three different senses—for all sacred gifts (qorbân), for such gifts only as ‘came up’ upon the altar, and, finally, in the special sense of cereal offering.
2. Terminology of sacrifice.—(b) Special. To the foregoing study of the more general terms may now be added a brief review of the more specific renderings of the names of the principal altar-offerings, reserving for later sections the examination of their characteristic features. Following the order of the manual of sacrifice, Lev_1:1-17; Lev_2:1-16; Lev_3:1-17; Lev_4:1-35; Lev_5:1-19, we have (1) the burnt offering,—so RV [Note: Revised Version.] uniformly, AV [Note: Authorized Version.] also ‘burnt sacrifice’—Heb. ‘ôlâh, lit. ‘that which goes up’ (on the altar). The name is supposed to point to the feature by which the ‘ôlâh was distinguished from all other sacrifices, viz., the burning of the whole victim as a holocaust upon the altar. This characteristic is more explicitly brought out by the rare designation (2) kâlîl, the ‘whole burnt offering’ of Deu_33:10 RV [Note: Revised Version.] (AV [Note: Authorized Version.] ‘whole burnt sacrifice’) and Psa_51:19. ‘Whole offering’ would be a more exact equivalent of (1) and (2).
(3) Meal offering (RV [Note: Revised Version.] ) and meat offering (AV [Note: Authorized Version.] ) are the equivalents of minchâh in its restricted sense of cereal or vegetable offering, as already explained. The Heb. word ‘does not express the neutral idea of a gift, but denotes a present made to secure or retain goodwill’ (Driver, art. ‘Offering.’ in Hastings’ DB [Note: Dictionary of the Bible.] iii. 587), such as Jacob’s ‘present’ to Esau (Gen_32:13; Gen_32:18), and the ‘presents’ which subjects were expected to offer to their sovereigns (1Sa_10:27). From the latter usage there is but a step to the further sense of an ‘offering’ to the Divine sovereign. In the older literature, minchâh, as a present or offering to J″ [Note: Jahweh.] , includes both animal and cereal offerings, as in the case of the ‘offering’ brought by Abel and Cain respectively (Gen_4:3 ff.) In the later Priests’ Code, however, minchâh is restricted to the cereal offering. For this the ‘meal offering’ of RV [Note: Revised Version.] is better than the older rendering, ‘meat’ being now obsolete in the sense intended, but is still not sufficiently comprehensive; hence cereal offering or cereal oblation is the rendering now generally preferred. With the cereal offering may be taken (4) the drink offering, first met with in Gen_35:14.
(5) Peace offering (RVm [Note: Revised Version margin.] thank offering).—The meaning of the special name of this sacrifice (shelem Amo_5:22, elsewhere always plural shĕlâmîm) is still uncertain,—a fact reflected in the alternatives of RV [Note: Revised Version.] . Most scholars, following the LXX [Note: Septuagint.] , connect the word with shâlôm, ‘peace,’ as reflecting the harmonious relations of worshipper and worshipped brought about by the sacrifice. Others, with greater probability, would derive the name from another meaning of the same root—‘to recompense, repay, pay one’s vows’ (see Pro_7:14). On this view, recompense offering is perhaps as good a rendering as any, and leaves (6) thank offering (2Ch_29:31, tôdhâh, lit. ‘thanksgiving,’ hence the expression ‘a sacrifice of thanksgiving,’ Amo_4:5, Psa_50:14; Psa_50:23 RV [Note: Revised Version.] ) for an important variety of the recompense offering (cf. Lev_7:13 RV [Note: Revised Version.] ‘the sacrifice of his peace offerings for thanksgiving’). Other two varieties, named together Lev_7:16, Num_15:3 etc., are (7) the votive offering (EV [Note: English Version.] ‘vow’), defined in the latter passage as ‘a sacrifice to accomplish a vow,’ and (8) the freewill offering (RV [Note: Revised Version.] ), which explains itself.
The probable meaning of the difficult terms rendered (9) sin offering, and (10) trespass (AV [Note: Authorized Version.] ) or guilt (RV [Note: Revised Version.] ) offering will be more profitably discussed when the precise nature and object of these offerings are under consideration (§ 14 f.) All the various offerings (1) to (10) are explicitly or implicitly included in a favourite term of the Priestly legislation, namely (11) ’ishsheh, fire offering, in EV [Note: English Version.] ‘the offering (or sacrifice) made by fire.’ The fire offering is also mentioned in Deu_18:1 and 1Sa_2:28 (a Deuteronomic passage).
Two other significant terms may be taken together, namely, the heave offering and the wave offering. The former is the rendering, in this connexion, of (12) tĕrûmâh, which etymologically signifies not something ‘heaved up’ (so Exo_29:27), but rather ‘what is lifted off a larger mass, or separated from it for sacred purposes.’ The Heb. word is used in a variety of applications—gifts of agricultural produce, of the spoils of war, etc., and in these cases is rendered ‘offering’ or ‘oblation’ (see Driver, DB [Note: Dictionary of the Bible.] iii. 588, and Com. on Deut. 142, who considers ‘that “contribution” is perhaps the English word which … best suggests the ideas expressed by the Heb. tĕrûmâh’). In connexion with sacrifice, however, it denotes certain portions ‘taken or lifted off’ from the rest and assigned to the priests as their due, in particular the ‘heave thigh’ (Lev_7:34 RV [Note: Revised Version.] ), or ‘the thigh of the heave offering’ (Exo_29:27 f.). ‘Heave offering’ accordingly in the sacrificial terminology is the equivalent of ‘priest’s portion’ (cf. Lev_6:17, where, however, a different word is used).
(13) With the tĕrûmâh is closely associated the tĕnûphâh or wave offering. The Heb. word denotes a movement to and fro, swinging, ‘waving,’ the priest lifting his share of the victim and moving it to and fro in the direction of the altar, thus symbolizing the presentation of the part of J″ [Note: Jahweh.] , and J″ [Note: Jahweh.] ’s return of it to the priest. It is applied specially to the breast of the sacrificial victim, hence termed ‘the breast of the wave offering’ (Exo_29:26 f.), or more tersely ‘the wave breast’ (Lev_7:34; Lev_10:14 f.). Further, like tĕrûmâh, tĕnûphâh is also used in the more general sense of ‘offering’ (Exo_35:22; cf. Num_8:11; Num_8:13 of the Levites, where the change from ‘offering’ (AV [Note: Authorized Version.] ) to ‘wave offering’ (RV [Note: Revised Version.] ) is not an improvement).
(14) The last entry in this vocabulary of OT sacrifice is reserved for the obscure term ’azkârâh, memorial offering, applied especially to the handful of the cereal offering burnt by the priest upon the altar (Lev_2:2; Lev_2:9; Lev_2:16 etc., EV [Note: English Version.] ‘memorial’). According to the usual, but uncertain, derivation of the term (zâkar ‘remember’), the ’azkârâh is understood as an offering designed to bring the offerer to J″ [Note: Jahweh.] ’s remembrance.
3. Sacrifice and offering in the pre-exilic period.—The history of OT sacrifice, like the history of the religion of Israel of which it is the most characteristic expression, falls into two main divisions, the first embracing the period from Moses to the end of the monarchy (b.c. 586), the second the period from the Babylonian exile to the destruction of the Temple in a.d. 70. For the latter period we have the advantage of the more or less systematic presentation of the subject in the various strata of the complex legislation of P [Note: Priestly Narrative.] (esp. Lev_1:1-17; Lev_2:1-16; Lev_3:1-17; Lev_4:1-35; Lev_5:1-19; Lev_6:1-30; Lev_7:1-38); for the former we must have recourse to the numerous references to sacrifice in the non-Priestly sources of the Pentateuch, in the early narratives of the historical books, and in the writings of the pre-exilic prophets.
Now, according to J [Note: Jahwist.] , sacrifice as an institution is as old as the human race itself (Gen_4:2 ff.). In this significant narrative, sacrifice appears as the spontaneous expression of man’s need of God, who ‘made of one every nation of men … that they should seek God, if haply they might feel after him and find him’ (Act_17:26 f. RV [Note: Revised Version.] ). Our study of the terminology of sacrifice has shown that the dominant conception of sacrifice in the OT from first to last is that of a gift, present, or offering. The object of the gift, reduced to its simplest terms, may be said to be threefold—to secure and retain the favour of J″ [Note: Jahweh.] , to remove His displeasure incurred, and to express gratitude for benefits received. In this, Hebrew sacrifice differed from sacrifice elsewhere, even in the lowest religions, only in respect of the deity to whom it was offered.
The sacrificial worship of the earlier differs from that of the later period mainly in the greater freedom as regards the occasion and in particular the place of sacrifice, in the greater simplicity of the ritual, and in the joyousness of the cult as compared with the more sombre atmosphere of the post-exilic worship, due to a deepened sense of sin and the accompanying conviction of the need of expiation.
As regards, first of all, the place of sacrifice, every village appears to have had its sanctuary or ‘high place’ with its altar and other appurtenances of the cult, on which the recent excavations have thrown so much new and unexpected light (see High Place). Not that sacrifice could be offered at any spot the worshipper might choose; it must be one hallowed by the tradition of a theophany: ‘in every place where I record my name I will come unto thee and I will bless thee’ (Exo_20:24 RV [Note: Revised Version.] ). With the abolition of the local sanctuaries by Josiah in b.c. 622–21, the Temple at Jerusalem became, and henceforth remained, the only legitimate place of sacrifice, as required by the legislation of Deuteronomy (Deu_12:2 ff.).
The occasions of sacrifice were manifold, and in the days of the local sanctuaries, which practically means the whole of the period under consideration, these occasions were naturally taken advantage of to an extent impossible when sacrifice was confined to the Temple of Jerusalem. Only a few of such occasions, whether stated or special, can be noted here. Of the regular or stated occasions may be named the daily sacrifices of the Temple—a burnt offering in the morning followed by a cereal offering in the afternoon (2Ki_16:15, cf. 1Ki_18:29; 1Ki_18:36, which, however, may refer to one or more of the large sanctuaries of the Northern Kingdom. e.g. Bethel or Samaria), the ‘yearly sacrifice’ of the various clans (1Sa_20:6), those at the recurring festivals, such as the new moon and the three agricultural feasts (Exo_23:14 ff; Exo_34:22 ff.), at which the oldest legislation laid down that ‘none shall appear before me empty’ (Exo_23:15; Exo_34:20), that is, without an offering in token of gratitude and homage. Still more numerous were the special occasions of sacrifice—the installation of a king (1Sa_11:15, the arrival of an honoured guest, family events such as the weaning of a child, a circumcision, a marriage, the dedication of a house (Deu_20:5): no compact or agreement was completed until sealed by a sacrifice (Gen_31:54 etc.); at the opening of a campaign the warriors were ‘consecrated’ by a sacrifice (1Sa_13:9 ff., Isa_13:3 RV [Note: Revised Version.] ). One of the most fruitful occasions of sacrifice was undoubtedly the discharging of a vow, of which those of Jacob (Gen_28:20-22), Jephthah (see 5), Hannah (1Sa_1:11), and Absalom (2Sa_15:7) may be cited as typical specimens, just as in Syria to-day, among fellahin and bedouin alike, similar vows are made to the welys of the local shrines by or on behalf of sick persons, childless women, or to avert or remove plague or other threatened calamity.
4. The varieties and material of sacrifice in this period.—Three varieties of sacrifice are met with in the older Hebrew literature, viz. the burnt offering, the ‘peace’ offering, and the cereal or ‘meal’ offering. The two former, appearing sometimes as ‘burnt offerings and sacrifices’ (Exo_18:12, Jer_7:22 etc.), sometimes as ‘burnt offerings and peace offerings’ (Exo_24:5, 1Sa_13:9 etc.), exhaust the category of animal sacrifices, the special ‘sin’ and ‘guilt’ offerings being first definitely named by Ezekiel (see §§ 13–15). The typical animal offering in the pre-exilic period is that now termed ‘sacrifice’ (zebach) simply, now ‘peace offering’ (Amo_5:22) to differentiate it more clearly from the burnt offering, now still more explicitly ‘sacrifice of peace offerings’ (perhaps rather ‘of recompense,’ shĕlâmîm, § 2). Almost all the special offerings and most of the stated ones were of this type. Its distinguishing feature was the sacrificial meal, which followed the sacrifice proper. After the blood had been returned to the Giver of life (we have no details as to the manipulation of the blood in the earliest period, but see 1Sa_14:32-34), and the fat burned upon the altar (1Sa_2:15; cf. Isa_1:11), the flesh of the victim was eaten at the sanctuary by the sacrificer and his family (1Sa_1:3-7) or, in the case of a communal sacrifice, by the representatives of the community (1Sa_9:22-25). The last passage shows that a special ‘guest-chamber’ was provided at the ‘high place’ for this purpose.
The underlying idea of this, by far the commonest, form of sacrifice was that of sharing a common meal with the deity. The worshippers were the ‘guests’ (Zep_1:7) of God at His sanctuary, and as such secure of His favour. To this day among the Arabs ‘the act of eating together is regarded as something particularly solemn and sacred,’ and, as is well known, creates a solidarity of interest between guest and host, and imposes upon the latter the duty of protecting his guest so long as, in Arab [Note: Arabic.] phrase, ‘his salt is in his belly’ (see Jaussen, Coutumes des Arabes [1908], 86–88). This idea of table communion, as it is termed, is accordingly one which may be reckoned a common possession of the Semitic stock. Even to St. Paul the eating of meat that had been sacrificed to heathen deities appeared as an act of ‘communion (AV [Note: Authorized Version.] ‘fellowship’) with demons’ (1Co_10:20 Amer. RV [Note: Revised Version.] ). References to this solemn—one might almost say sacramental—eating of the sacrifice are too frequent to require citation, but we may recall the favourite expression of Deuteronomy, ‘ye shall eat (and drink) before the Lord your God’ (Deu_12:7 etc.), often followed by the equally characteristic ‘ye shall rejoice before the Lord your God.’ Here we meet with the dominant note of Hebrew worship in this period, the note of joyousness above referred to—an element which not infrequently led to the excesses deplored by the prophets.
Much less frequent in the older documents is the mention of the burnt offering, more precisely the ‘whole’ offering (see above, § 2). The fact that the whole was consumed upon the altar enhanced its value as a ‘holy gift,’ and accordingly we find it offered when the occasion was one of special solemnity (Gen_8:20, 1Ki_3:4 etc.), or was otherwise extraordinary, as e.g. 1Sa_6:14. In most cases the burnt offering appears in conjunction with the ordinary ‘sacrifice’ above described (Exo_18:12, 1Sa_6:17, 2Sa_6:17, 2Ki_16:13; 2Ki_16:15; cf. Isa_1:11, Jer_7:22; Jer_17:26).
Apart from the special offering of the first-fruits, the cereal or meal offering (AV [Note: Authorized Version.] ‘meat offering’ § 2) is rarely mentioned as an independent offering in this period, but is frequently named along with the two more important offerings discussed above, as Jdg_13:23, Amo_5:22, Jer_14:12 (with the burnt offering), 1Sa_2:29; 1Sa_3:14, Isa_19:21 (EV [Note: English Version.] ‘oblation’), and often. ‘When the Hebrew ate flesh, he ate bread with it and drank wine, and when he offered flesh on the table of his God, it was natural that he should add to it the same concomitants that were necessary to make up a comfortable and generous meal’ (RS [Note: S Religion of the Semites.] 2 222). The various forms which the meal offering might assume are attested for a later period by Lev_2:1-16, for which see § 11. One form occurring there is undoubtedly ancient, viz. parched ears of corn (Lev_2:14; cf. Food, § 2).
Another very ancient form of offering, although not an altar-offering in the strict sense (yet strangely reckoned among the fire offerings, Lev_24:9), is that named the presence bread (EV [Note: English Version.] ‘shewbread’), which perpetuates the primitive idea of an offering as a meal for the deity (1Sa_21:4-6, 1Ki_7:48). The mention in a later passage of ‘the flagons thereof and the bowls thereof to pour out withal’ (Exo_25:29, see, further, Shewbread) shows that, as for an ordinary meal, the ‘holy bread’ was accompanied by a provision of wine, in other words by a drink offering. This species of offering occurs as an independent offering only in Gen_35:14. The skins of wine mentioned in 1Sa_1:24; 1Sa_10:3 doubtless served in part for a drink or ‘wine offering’ (Hos_9:4), in part, like the accompanying flour and loaves, for the sacrificial meal. More explicit reference to the wine of the drink offering as an accompaniment of animal sacrifice is found in Deu_32:38 (cf. the early reference, Jdg_9:13, to wine ‘which cheereth God’). For the ritual of the later drink offering, see § 11. It is significant of the predominant part played by the drink offering in early Babylonian ritual, that the word for libation (niqu) has there become the usual term for sacrifice (KAT [Note: Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament.] 3 595).
A brief reference must suffice for oil in early ritual (Gen_28:18, Jdg_9:9, Mic_6:7—for the later ritual, see § 11). A water offering appears only in the isolated cases 1Sa_7:6, 2Sa_23:16, but emerges as an interesting survival in the rites of the Feast of Tabernacles (wh. see). Honey, although offered among the first-fruits (2Ch_31:5), was excluded, along with milk, from the altar (Lev_2:11), on the ground that both were liable to fermentation (see also Leaven).
5. Material and ritual of sacrifice in this period.—From the details just given it is evident that ‘among the Hebrew offerings drawn from the vegetable kingdom, meal, wine, and oil take the chief place, and these were also the chief vegetable constituents of man’s daily food’ (RS [Note: S Religion of the Semites.] 2 219). The same remark holds good of the animal sacrifices, which were drawn chiefly from ‘the herd,’ i.e. neat cattle, and from the ‘flock,’ i.e. sheep and goats. Excluded from the altar, on the other hand, were not only all unclean animals, but also game and fish, which, not being reared by man, were probably regarded as God’s special property, and therefore inadmissible as a present from man. This idea that only what was a man’s ‘very own’ constituted an appropriate sacrifice is reflected in David’s words to Araunah, 2Sa_24:24 (offerings ‘which cost me nothing’ RV [Note: Revised Version.] ). Males of the various species,—a heifer is mentioned in connexion with ordinary sacrifice only 1Sa_16:2 (Gen_15:9, Deu_21:3 ff., 1Sa_6:14 do not belong to this category),—and of these, yearlings, as in the later legislation, were doubtless the commonest victims, although we read of ‘a bullock of three years old’ (1Sa_1:24, see RVm [Note: Revised Version margin.] ; Jdg_6:25 is corrupt, ‘seven years old’).
The question of human sacrifice cannot be passed over, even in this brief sketch of a vast subject. The recent excavations at Gezer and elsewhere (see High Place, § 3) have revealed the surprising extent to which this practice prevailed among the Canaanites (cf. 2Ki_3:27), and well-attested instances are recorded even among the Hebrews (Jdg_11:30-40, 1Ki_16:34 RV [Note: Revised Version.] , for which see House. § 3), apart altogether from the child sacrifices to Molech. Indeed, the familiar story of Abraham’s frustrated sacrifice of Isaac is now regarded as a polemic against this inhuman custom, which certainly had no sanction in the religion of OT.
As regards the ritual of sacrifice in this period, we have little information, 1Sa_2:13-16 being the only passage that touches definitely on this subject. This much is certain, that much greater latitude prevailed while the local sanctuaries existed than was afterwards the case; and also, that the priest played a much less conspicuous part in the rite than he does in the developed system of the Priests’ Code. The chief function of the priest in the earliest times was to give ‘direction’ (tôrâh) by means of the oracle, and to decide in matters pertaining to the sphere of ‘clean and unclean.’ The layman—as father of the family or head of the clan, still more the anointed king—offered his sacrifice without the intervention of the priest. The latter, however, as the custodian of the sanctuary, was entitled to his due (see 1Sam l.c., Deu_18:3). At the more frequented sanctuaries—Jerusalem, Bethel, Beersheba, etc.—a more or less elaborate ritual was gradually evolved, for which the priest, as its depositary, became indispensable.
But even from the first the deity had to be approached with due precaution. The worshippers ‘sanctified’ themselves by ablutions (1Sa_16:5), and by washing (Exo_19:10) or changing their garments (Gen_35:2); for only those who were ceremonially ‘clean’ could approach the altar of J″ [Note: Jahweh.] . The sacrificer then entered the high place and immolated the sacrificial victim, originally, it would appear, upon the altar itself (Gen_22:9, 1Sa_14:33 f.), so that the blood ran over it; later, near to the altar, care being taken that the blood was caught and poured out at its base. The victim was next cut up and the fat of the viscera removed. In the case of an ordinary sacrifice (zebach), to judge from 1Sa_2:16, the flesh was boiled for the sacrificial meal, and not until the latter was ready was the fat, J″ [Note: Jahweh.] ’s special portion, burned upon the altar. By this simultaneous consumption of the sacrifice the table-fellowship of J″ [Note: Jahweh.] and His guests was more strikingly realized, the latter ‘eating and drinking before the Lord,’ as the ‘sweet smoke’ (qĕtôreth) ascended from the altar, an ‘odour of soothing (EV [Note: English Version.] ‘sweet savour’) unto the Lord.’
While the normal attitude of the worshippers on such occasions was one of rejoicings, as became those who, by thus renewing their covenant relation to J″ [Note: Jahweh.] in the way appointed, felt themselves secure of His favour and protection, a more serious note, implying a sense of alienation and the need of propitiation, is not infrequently found even in pre-exilic sacrifice, as will appear in a later section (§ 13).
6. The developed sacrificial system of the post-exilic period—Its general features.—In an earlier section it was shown how intimately connected with the everyday life of the family were the free, joyous sacrifices at the local sanctuaries. The abolition of the latter by Josiah, in accordance with the demands of Deuteronomy (for the justification of this measure, see High Place, § 6), marks an epoch in the history of OT sacrifice. Hitherto every slaughter of a domestic animal for the entertainment of a guest, or to celebrate a family ‘event,’ was a form of sacrifice (for a remarkable list and description of such ‘immolations’ as practised by the Arabs of Moab at the present day, see Jaussen, Coutumes des Arabes au pays de Moab [1908], 337–363). Henceforward this was no longer so. The restriction of legitimate sacrifice to the one distant sanctuary at Jerusalem meant in practice the divorce from common life of the principal rite of religion. The Temple, from being only one, although certainly the most important, of the local sanctuaries of Judah, became the one national sanctuary; the cultus assumed an official character, while its dignity was enhanced by the presence of a numerous priesthood and a more elaborate ritual. Sacrifice, in short, lost its former spontaneity and became a statutory obligation. The Jewish nation had taken the first step towards becoming the Jewish Church.
A still more potent factor, making for change, soon appeared in the shape of the crushing calamity of the Exile. Then, at last, the words of the prophets came home to men’s hearts and minds, and it was recognized that the nation had received the due reward of its deeds. A deepened sense of sin and a heightened conception of the Divine holiness were two of the most precious fruits of the discipline of the Exile. The confident assurance of J″ [Note: Jahweh.] ’s protection and good-will, which marked the relations of worshipper and worshipped in the days of Israel’s prosperity, had passed away. In its place arose a conviction of the need of expiation and propitiation—a conviction reflected in the whole sacrificial system, as gradually systematized and elaborated, on the basis of the usage of the Temple, by successive generations of Priestly writers from Ezekiel onwards. In its fully developed form, as we find it in the middle books of the Pentateuch, we see how the cultus as a whole has become the affair of the community: the old sacral units, the family and the clan, have disappeared.
Great—one is tempted to say, the main—stress is now laid on the technique of sacrifice, on the proper observance of the prescribed ritual: the slightest want of conformity thereto invalidates the sacrifice; the old latitude and freedom are gone for ever. The necessary corollary is the enhanced status and importance of the priest as the indispensable intermediary between the worshipper and the Deity. Beyond immolating the victims, the laity are no longer competent to perform the sacrificial rites. The relative importance of the two older animal sacrifices, the ’ôlâh and the zebach, is now reversed. The typical sacrifice is no longer the latter with its accompanying meal, but the ‘continual burnt offering,’ an act of worship performed every morning and evening in the Temple in the name of the community, whose presence is unnecessary for its due performance. Still more characteristic of the later period, however, is the emergence of special propitiatory sacrifices (piacula)—the allied sin offering and guilt offering. The older varieties of sacrifice, although still retaining their propitiatory efficacy, are no longer sufficient to express and adequately to satisfy the new consciousness of man’s sinfulness, or, more accurately expressed, of God’s exacting holiness.
7. The five kinds of altar-offerings in P [Note: Priestly Narrative.] .—The numerous altar-offerings mentioned in the various strata of the Priestly legislation are divided by Josephus into two classes: (i) those offered ‘for private persons,’ and (ii) those offered ‘for the people in general,’—a classification corresponding to the Roman sacra privata and sacra publica (Ant. III. ix. 1). The public sacrifices were either stated or occasional, the former and more important group comprising the daily burnt offering (see § 10) and the additional sacrifices at the stated festivals—Sabbath, New Moon, New Year, the three great feasts, and the Day of Atonement.
Since it is impossible within present limits to attempt to enumerate, much less to discuss, the multifarious varieties and occasions of public and private sacrifices, it will be more convenient to follow, as before, the order of the five distinct kinds as given in the systematic manual, Lev_1:1-17; Lev_2:1-16; Lev_3:1-17; Lev_4:1-35; Lev_5:1-19; Lev_6:1-30; Lev_7:1-38. These are (1) the burnt offering, (2) the cereal or meal (AV [Note: Authorized Version.] ‘meat’) offering, (3) the peace offering and the two propitiatory sacrifices, (4) the sin offering, and (5) the guilt (AV [Note: Authorized Version.] ‘trespass’) offering. Arranged according to the material of the offering, these fell into two groups represented by the terms’ sacrifice’ and ‘offering’ (§ 1); in other words, into animal and vegetable or cereal offerings (including the drink offering). The four animal or bloody offerings may be classified according to the destination of the flesh of the victim, thus (cf. the relative §§ below)—
(i) The flesh entirely consumed upon the altar—the burnt or whole offering.
(ii) The flesh not consumed upon the altar—the peace offerings and the two propitiatory offerings.
The second group may again he subdivided thus—
(a) The flesh apart from the priest’s dues, assigned to the offerer for a sacrificial meal—the peace offering.
(b) The flesh assigned to the priests to be eaten within the sanctuary—the guilt offerings and the less important of the sin offerings.
(c) The flesh burned without the sanctuary—the more important sin offerings.
8. The material of sacrifice in P [Note: Priestly Narrative.] .—‘Holy’ and ‘most holy.’—The material of all these remains the same as in the pre-exilic period (§ 5), with the addition of pigeons and turtle-doves to meet the needs of the poor, but the victim for each special kind of sacrifice, and its qualifications, are now definitely prescribed. As regards neat and small cattle, the victims must be males for the most part, entire and without blemish (see Lev_22:1-33 for list of imperfections—an exception, however, was made for the freewill offering, Lev_22:23). For the peace offering both sexes were equally admissible (Lev_3:1), and a female victim is specially prescribed for the less important sin offerings (Lev_4:28; Lev_4:32). The animals were eligible for sacrifice from the eighth day onwards (Lev_22:27), but the typical sacrifice was the yearling. For the material of the cereal offering see below.
Here may be noted an interesting contrast between such offerings as were regarded as merely ‘holy’ and those reckoned ‘most holy.’ The limits of the former category are somewhat vague, but it certainly included firstlings and first-fruits, the tithe and the portions of the peace offerings falling to the priests, whereas the shew-bread (Lev_24:9), the sacred incense (Exo_30:36), the meal offering (Lev_2:3), and the sin and guilt offerings (Lev_6:25; Lev_6:29, Lev_7:1; Lev_7:6) are all classed as ‘most holy.’ One practical effect of the distinction was that the ‘most holy things’ could be eaten only by the priests, and by them only within the Temple precincts (Lev_6:16; Lev_6:26, Num_18:10; cf. Eze_42:13; Eze_46:20). As charged with a special potency of holiness, which was highly contagious, the ‘most holy things’—there were many other entries in the category, such as the altar and the high priest’s dress—rendered all who came in contact with them ‘holy,’ in modern phrase ‘taboo’ (Lev_6:18; Lev_6:27). The ‘holy things,’ on the other hand, might he eaten by the priests and their households, if ceremonially clean, in any ‘clean place,’ i.e. practically in Jerusalem (Lev_10:14, Lev_22:3; Lev_22:10-16, Num_18:11 ff.).
9. The Ritual of post-exilic sacrifice.—This is now, like all else, matter of careful regulation. The ritual, as a whole, doubtless continued and developed that of the pre-exilic Temple, where the priest had long taken the place of the lay offerer in the most significant parts of the rite. After the offerer had duly ‘sanctified’ himself as explained in § 5, and had his sacrifice examined and passed by the Temple officials, the procedure comprised the following ‘actions’:—
(1) The formal presentation of the victim to the priest officiating at the altar.
(2) The sěmîkhâh or laying on of hands; the offerer leaned his right hand—in the later praxis, both hands—upon the head of the victim, in token of its being withdrawn from the sphere of the ‘common’ and transferred to the sphere of ‘holy things’ (cf. for the two spheres, 1Sa_21:4), and of his personal assignation of it to the Deity. There is no suggestion in this act of the victim being thereby made the substitute in a penal sense of its owner and donor (see the Comm., and, for recent discussions, the reff. in DB [Note: Dictionary of the Bible.] Ext. Vol. 720b).
(3) The immolation of the victim, on the north side of the altar (Lev_1:11; Lev_6:25), by severing the arteries of the neck. In private sacrifices this was always done by the person presenting them.
(4) The manipulation of the blood by the priest. This, the central action of the whole rite, varied considerably for the different sacrifices. After being caught by the priest in a large basin, the blood was in most cases tossed against the sides of the altar (‘sprinkle’ of EV [Note: English Version.] , Lev_1:5; Lev_3:2 etc., is misleading, being the proper rendering of a different term occurring Lev_4:6, Lev_16:14, and elsewhere). Generally it may be said that the more pronounced the propitiatory character of the sacrifice, the nearer the blood was brought to the presence of the deity (see § 14), the climax being reached in the blood-rite of the Day of Atonement (Lev_16:14, see Atonement [Day of]).
(5) The skinning and dismemberment of the animal, including the removal of the internal fat, as specified Lev_3:3-4 and Lev_4:8 f. The hide fell to the officiating priest, except in the case of the sin offering, when it was burned with the flesh (Exo_29:14).
(6) The arrangement of all the pieces upon the altar in the case of the burnt offering, of the specified portions of ‘the inwards’ in the case of the others; and finally—
(7) The burning—lit. the turning into ‘sweet smoke’—of these upon the altar of burnt offering, the fire on which was kept continually burning (Lev_6:13).
Of these various elements of the ritual, those requiring contact with the altar as a ‘most holy thing,’ viz. (4), (6), and (7), represent the priest’s, the rest the layman’s, share in the rite of sacrifice.
10. The burnt offering (Lev_1:1-17; Lev_6:8-13, Exo_29:15-18).—The first place in the manual of sacrifice, Lev_1:1-17; Lev_2:1-16; Lev_3:1-17; Lev_4:1-35; Lev_5:1-19; Lev_6:1-30; Lev_7:1-38, is occupied by the sacrifice which alone was entirely consumed upon the altar, hence the older and more correct designation ‘whole offering’ (§ 2)—a feature which constituted it the typical honorific sacrifice, the fullest expression of homage to J″ [Note: Jahweh.] on the part alike of the community and of the individual. The victim from the flock and the herd was always a male—young bull, ram, or he-goat. The turtle-dove and the young pigeon of the poor had their special ritual (Lev_1:14-17). The most important of the stated sacrifices in the period under review was the ‘continual burnt offering’ (Exo_29:38-42, Num_28:3-8), so called because it was presented every morning and evening along with a cereal oblation by the particular ‘course’ of priests on duty in the Temple. The victim was a yearling lamb, which was offered on behalf of the whole community of Israel throughout the world. An interesting survival of the primitive anthropomorphic conception of sacrifice, as affording a complete meal to the deity, is seen in the provision that every burnt offering (as also every peace offering) must be accompanied by both a meal offering and a drink offering (see next §).
11. The meal (AV [Note: Authorized Version.] meat) offering (Lev_2:1-16; Lev_6:14-23, Num_15:1-16 etc.).—As pointed out in an early section, the term minchâh, which originally was applicable both to an animal and to a cereal offering, is in the later legislation limited to the latter species. As such it appears in a large variety of forms, and may be either an independent offering, as contemplated in Lev_2:1-16, or, as in most cases, an accompaniment of the burnt and peace offerings (Num_15:1-16). One of the oldest forms of the minchâh was, undoubtedly, the ‘meal offering of first-fruits,’ as described Lev_2:14-16; another antique form survived in the unique offering of barley meal in the jealousy offering (Num_5:15). As an ordinary altar-offering the minchâh consisted of ‘fine flour,’ and was presented either cooked or uncooked, as prescribed in detail in Lev_2:1-7. In the latter case the flour was placed in a vessel and mixed with oil, the equivalent of our butter in matters culinary. The dough was then covered with frankincense, when it was ready for presentation at the altar. The priest took off all the frankincense, then removed a handful of the dough, which he put into another vessel, added salt, the unfailing accompaniment of every species of altar-offering (2:13, Mar_9:44), and the frankincense, and proceeded to burn the whole upon the altar. The portion burned was termed the ’azkârâh (§ 2), or ‘memorial’ (so EV [Note: English Version.] from Vulg. [Note: Vulgate.] memoriale). The remainder of the offering fell to the priests, by whom it was eaten as ‘a thing most holy’ (§ 8). The priests’ own meal offerings, on the other hand, were wholly burned (Lev_6:23).
In Num_15:1-16 and elsewhere, minute instructions are given as to the precise amounts of fine flour, oil, and wine which should accompany the burnt and peace offerings (cf. Eze_46:5-14 and the tabular comparison of the quantities in the two passages in Gray, ‘Numbers’ [ICC [Note: CC International Critical Commentary.] ], 170). These were regulated by the importance of the animal sacrificed, the drink or wine offering (Hos_9:4), for example, being uniformly 1/2 hin for a bullock, 1/3 hin for a ram, and 1/4 hin for a lamb,—the hin may be taken approximately as 12 pints.
No instructions have been preserved as to how the wine was to be offered, but from later evidence it appears that, like the blood, it was ‘poured out at the foot of the altar’ (Sir_50:15; cf. Jos. [Note: Josephus.] Ant. III. ix. 4). For the importance of incense in the later ritual, see Incense.
12. The peace or thank offering (Lev_3:1-16; Lev_7:11-21; Lev_7:28-34; Lev_17:1-9; Lev_22:21-33 etc.). The latter rendering, which is that of RVm [Note: Revised Version margin.] . is nearer what we consider to be the meaning of the original term, ‘sacrifice of recompense’ (§ 2). Its distinguishing feature continued to be the sacrificial meal which followed the actual sacrifice. Three varieties are named—(a) the thanksgiving offering (7:13, 15 tôdhâh, also rendered ‘thank offering’ in the narrower sense, 2Ch_29:31), in recognition of some special mercy; (b) the votive offering (EV [Note: English Version.] ‘vow,’ Lev_7:16), in discharge of a vow; and (c) the freewill offering, a spontaneous and unprescribed recognition of God’s goodness. The last was clearly of less importance than the others, since for it alone imperfect victims were admitted to the altar (Lev_22:23). As a fourth variety may be reckoned (d) the priests’ installation offering (Exo_29:19-26).
The modus operandi was essentially the same as for the burnt offering,—female victims, however, being admitted equally with males. Special instructions are given as to the removal of the fat adhering to the inwards (see the coloured illustrations in SBOT [Note: BOT Sacred Books of Old Testament.] , ‘Levit.,’ in loc.), along with the ‘caul of the liver,’ i.e. the caudate lobe (G. F. Moore; see EBi [Note: Encyclopædia Biblica.] iv. col. 4206, and the ref. in Oxf. Heb. Lex. 1124b), and the two kidneys. The parts falling to the priests, the breast and the right hind leg,—these varied at different times, cf. Deu_18:3 with Exo_29:26, Lev_7:31 f.—were symbolically presented to and returned by J″ [Note: Jahweh.] , by being ‘waved’ towards the altar (see § 2 for this ceremony, and for the expressions ‘heave thigh’ and ‘wave breast’). The fat was then salted and burned, while the remainder of the flesh furnished the characteristic meal. Both sexes, if ceremonially clean, might partake of this meal, but only on the day of the sacrifice or the day following (Lev_7:16-18; Lev_19:5-8). The flesh of the special thanksgiving offering (tôdhâh), however, had to be eaten on the day it was offered (Lev_7:15, Lev_22:29 f.).
13. The special propitiatory sacrifices
The sin offering and the guilt offering.—One of the characteristic features of the later period, as has already been pointed out, is the stress laid on the propitiatory aspect of sacrifice. It is not, of course, to be supposed that this element was absent in the earlier period. Such passages as 1Sa_3:14; 1Sa_26:19, 2Sa_24:25, Mic_6:6-7 and others prove the contrary, even were it not the fact that the idea of propitiating the unseen powers is one lying at the root of all sacrifice (see above, § 3). But, as shown by the passages now cited, expiatioo and propitiation were sought through the medium of the ordinary sacrifices. The special propitiatory sacrifices with which we have now to deal probably made their appearance in the dark days which preceded the fall of the Jewish monarchy, although, so far as our literary evidence goes, Ezekiel is the first to differentiate them by name, as the chattâ’th (sin) and the ’âshâm (guilt), from the older types of offering (Eze_40:39; Eze_42:13 etc.).
The study of these newer sacrifices is complicated, in the first place, by the divergent regulations found in the different sections of the completed Pentateuch, which seem to reflect the practice of different periods, or perhaps the views of different schools; and, in the second place, by the consequent difficulty of detecting a clear line of demarcation between the two allied offerings (see § 15). From the point of view of ritual, the chief points of difference are these: (1) In the guilt offering the manipulation of the blood agrees with that prescribed for the older sacrifices; in the sin offering, on the other hand, the blood ritual is more complicated and varies in intensity according to the theocratic and social position of the offerer. This feature alone is sufficient to distinguish the sin offering as par excellence the sacrifice of expiation and atonement. (2) For the guilt offering the victim is uniformly a ram (‘the ram of atonement,’ Num_5:8); for the sin offering the victim varies according to the same principle as the blood ritual, the higher the position of the offerer in the theocratic community the more valuable the victim. On the other hand, both agree as compared with the older sacrifices: (1) in the disposal of the flesh of the sacrifice in so far as it was neither entirely burned on the altar as in the whole offering, nor assigned to the offerer for a sacred meal as in the peace offering, but was otherwise disposed of (see next §§); and (2) in the absence of the cereal and wine offerings which were the regular accompaniments of the other animal sacrifices.
14. The sin offering (Lev_4:1 to Lev_5:13; Lev_6:24-30, Exo_29:11-14, Num_15:22-29 etc.).—Leaving aside the question of the relation of these sections to each other as to origin and date—all-important as this is for the evolution of the sin offering—we find from a comparison of Lev_4:1-35; Lev_5:7-13, the most systematic as it is probably the latest exposition of the subject, with other sections of the code where this special sacrifice is required, that the latter was the prescribed medium of expiation for two main classes of offences. These are (1) sins committed in ignorance or by inadvertence (Lev_4:2; Lev_4:13; Lev_4:22, Num_15:24-29) as opposed to sins committed ‘with an high hand’ (Num_15:30 RV [Note: Revised Version.] ), i.e. in conscious and wilful defiance of the Divine law, for which no sacrifice could atone; (2) cases of defilement or uncleanness, contracted in various ways and having no connexion with ‘sin’ in the modern sense of a breach of the moral law, such as the defilement of childbirth and of leprosy, the uncleanness of the altar and the like.
At this point it will repay us to examine the origin of the term chattâ’th, omitted from § 2, as likely to afford a clue to the true significance of the sacrifice. Derived from the verb signifying ‘to sin’ in the sense of ‘to miss (the mark or the way),’ chattâ’th denotes sin then a sacrifice for sin. It may be questioned, however, whether this transference of meaning was as direct as is usually implied. The intensive stems of the root-verb are repeatedly used in the ‘privative’ sense best expressed by ‘to unsin’ (Germ. entsündigen) by some rite of purification, as Lev_8:15, Eze_43:20-23, of ‘unsinning.’ i.e. purifying or purging the altar; Num_19:19, of ‘unsinning’ a person defiled by contact with a corpse; Num_8:21 ‘the Levites unsinned themselves (RV [Note: Revised Version.] purified themselves from sin) and washed their clothes,’ where the ‘sin’ of RV [Note: Revised Version.] refers only to ceremonial uncleanness. From this use of the verb, chattâ’th itself acquired the secondary sense of ‘purification,’ e.g. Num_8:7 (AV [Note: Authorized Version.] rightly ‘water of purifying’—RV [Note: Revised Version.] ‘expiation’) and Num_19:9-17, where the red heifer and her ashes are described as a chattâ’th, that is, as the means of removing the uncleanness caused by the dead. It follows from the above that ‘purification offering’ better expresses to the modern mind the purposes of the chattâ’th than does ‘sin offering.’ with its misleading associations.
These considerations lead us directly to the heart of the sacrificial doctrine, if the term may be allowed, of Ezekiel and the Priests’ Code. Sacrifice is the Divinely appointed means by which the ideal holiness of the theocratic community is to be maintained. God’s all-devouring holiness requires that the people shall keep themselves free not only from moral imperfection, but also from every ceremonial defilement that would interrupt the relations between them and God. In the sphere of morals only ‘unwitting faults’ are contemplated, for ‘these are the only faults of which the redeemed and restored people will be guilty’ (A. B. Davidson), and, in so far as the ritual of the sin offering provides for their expiation, these sins of inadvertence are conceived as defiling the sinner who, because of his uncleanness, becomes a source of danger to the community. From this point of view the gradation in the victims prescribed first becomes intelligible; for the higher the theocratic rank of the sinner, the greater, according to the antique view of the contagion both of holiness and of uncleanness, was his power of contamination. It is to be noted, finally, that the order is first the removal of the defilement by means of the sacrifice, and then the Divine forgiveness of his sin as a moral offence (see Lev_4:20; Lev_4:26; Lev_4:31; Lev_4:35).
Returning to Lev_4:1 to Lev_5:13, we find that, apart from the gradation of the prescribed victims already referred to, the distinguishing feature in the ritual of the sin offering is the more intense application of the blood. In this respect two grades of sin offering are distinguished, a higher and a lower. In the higher grade, which comprises the offering of the high priest and that of the ‘whole congregation,’ the blood is carried by the officiating priest into the Holy Place of the Tent of Meeting—In practice the Temple. There some of it is sprinkled with the finger seven times before the veil, and some applied to the horns of the altar of incense, while the rest is poured out at the base of the altar of burnt offering. The victim in both cases is a young bull, the flesh of which is so sacrosanct that it has to be burned without the camp.
In the lower grade, part of the blood was smeared upon the horns of the altar of burnt offering, while the rest was poured out, as before, at its base. It is interesting to note, as bearing on the evolution of the ritual, that in a presumably older stratum of P [Note: Priestly Narrative.] (Exo_29:11-14), the blood ritual, even for the high priest’s offering, does not exceed that of the lower grade of Lev_4:1-35. The flesh of the latter, which was also ‘most holy,’ was eaten by the priests within the sanctuary (Exo_6:24-30). To meet the requirements of the poor man, provision was made for the admission of ‘two turtle-doves or two young pigeons,’ and in cases of extreme poverty of ‘the tenth part of an ephah of fine flour’ (about 7 pints), offered without oil and without incense (Exo_5:11-13).
If the conclusion reached above be accepted, that the chattâ’th is essentially a sacrifice of purification, it is evident that the victim cannot be regarded here, any more than in the other sacrifices, as the substitute for the offerer, presumed to have incurred the penalty of death (see, further, for the doctrine of the pœna vicaria, § 16).
15. The guilt or trespass offering (Lev_5:14 to Lev_6:7; Lev_7:1-7, Num_5:5-8).—
The Heb. word ’âshâm signifies generally a wrong done to another and the guilt thereby incurred, and specially the property of another wilfully withheld (Num_5:7-8). In the earlier period it came to denote also the gift (1Sa_6:3 f.) or money payment (2Ki_12:16 f.) by which, in addition to restitution, it was sought to make amends for the wrong; in the later period, finally, ’âshâm is the sacrifice which accompanied the act of restitution.
The references in the Pentateuch to the guilt (RV [Note: Revised Version.] ) or trespass (AV [Note: Authorized Version.] , RVm [Note: Revised Version margin.] ) offering are not entirely consistent in their representation of its nature and purpose. The guilt offering of the leper, for example (Lev_14:12 ff.), can scarcely be distinguished from the sin offering (cf. Lev_5:17-19). Taking the most explicit of the passages, however, Lev_6:1-7, we see that the guilt offering deals with the misappropriation of the property of another. In Lev_5:14-16 this misappropriation takes the form of unwittingly withholding part of the sacred dues, ‘the holy things of the Lord.’ In both cases the offender has to restore the property or due withheld, together with a fine amounting to one-fifth of its value as compensation for the loss sustained, and to offer a sacrifice as expiation of his breach of faith (Lev_5:15, EV [Note: English Version.] ‘trespass’). Provision is also made for a public confession (Num_5:7). The victim in these typical cases is invariably a ram, and the ritual is that of the ordinary sacrifices, except that the flesh can be eaten, like that of the lower grade of sin offerings, only by the priests ‘in a holy place.’
For the various occasions on which one or more of the five varieties of sacrifice above enumerated had to be offered, see, among others, the following articles:—Atonement [Day of], Clean and Unclean, Covenant, Feasts, Nazirite, Tithe, Vow, etc.
16. The significance of sacrifice in OT.—The origin and significance of sacrifice is a problem on which students of religion are still greatly divided. So far as the OT student is concerned, the question of origins does not necessarily arise, for the institution of sacrifice had already a long life behind it when the Hebrew tribes first entered upon the stage of history. One fact, at least, seems to be well established. The ancestors of the Hebrews, like the Arabs of the present day, had no ‘offerings made by fire,’ but were content to pour the blood over the sacred stone without burning any part of the flesh. (For the view that the Hebrews of the historic period still retained a recollection of this older custom, see Kittel, Studien zur heb. Archdologie [1908], 96–108.) For the rest the wisest word recently spoken on this subject is that of the late Professor Stade (Bibl. Theol. d. AT [Note: Altes Testament.] , 156): ‘The sacrificial worship of ancient Israel is a very complicated phenomenon, which has grown up out of different conceptions and customs, and is by no means to be derived from a single fundamental idea (aus einem Grundgedanken).’ Let us proceed to illustrate this word of wisdom.
(a) In the whole period covered by the OT literature, sacrifice, as the terminology proves (see § 1), was thought of as a gift or present to God. The motives which prompted the gifts are nowhere stated in so many words, but may be clearly inferred. In the earliest period, at least, the gifts are offered, now as to an earthly ruler in token of homage, now as an expression of gratitude for benefits received; again, particularly in the very numerous cases of vows, with a view to obtain a coveted boon, for among the Hebrews as among the Greeks it was believed that ‘gifts persuade the gods, gifts the revered kings.’ We are not surprised, therefore, to find in the oldest Hebrew law-codes the command that none shall appear before J″ [Note: Jahweh.] ‘empty,’ that is, without a gift (Exo_23:15; Exo_34:20). From first to last, the OT witnesses to this ‘conviction that the gift of piety really produces a gratifying, propitious, and in the end conciliatory effect on God’ (Schultz, ‘Significance of Sacrifice in OT,’ AJTh [Note: JTh American Journal of Theology.] iv. 284).
The form which these ‘gifts of piety’ assumed was chiefly that of food. The Hebrew offered to God of the things with which his own table was furnished, and these only of the best. This naïve conception of sacrifice as ‘the food (EV [Note: English Version.] ‘bread’) of God’ is still found as an interesting survival in the later literature (Eze_44:7, Lev_3:11; Lev_21:6 etc.). Cf. ‘my food’ (Num_28:2), ‘the table of the Lord’ (Mal_1:7; Mal_1:12), and the institution of the shew-bread. In the historical period, as we have seen, this food of God was always ‘etherealized’ by being converted into ‘sweet smoke’ upon the altar; it thus became, in the recurring phrase, ‘a soothing odour (EV [Note: English Version.] ‘a sweet savour’) unto the Lord.’ Cf. 1Sa_26:19 ‘let him accept (lit. smell) an offering’ (as a propitiation).
(b) But this antique conception of sacrifice as the food of the deity by no means exhausts its significance to the Hebrew mind. The typical sacrifice in the pre-exilic period was the peace offering, of which the characteristic feature was the common meal which followed the actual sacrifice. The OT is silent regarding the significance to the Hebrew worshipper of this part of the sacrificial worship. Robertson Smith, as every student knows, would have us see in this ‘act of communion in which the god and his worshippers united by partaking of the flesh and blood of a sacred victim’ (RS [Note: S Religion of the Semites.] 2 226 f., and passim), the unconscious survival of the sacramental eating of their god by the members of the totem clan of pre-historic days. This is not the place to enumerate the difficulties of this theory when applied to Semitic sacrifice, the absence of convincing proof of the existence of totemism in the Semitic field being not the least of these.
It is more natural, as suggested above (§ 4), to recognize in the Hebrew sacrificial feast a transference to the sphere of religion of the Semitic idea of the friendship and fellowship which are formed and cemented by partaking of a common meal. By thus sharing, as the guests of God, the common meal of which the worshipped and the worshippers partook within the sanctuary, the latter renewed the bond which united them to their covenant God; they ‘ate and drank before the Lord’ in full assurance of the continuance of all the blessings which the covenant relation implied.
(e) In the later period of Jewish history, this conception of sacrifice as a table-communion with the deity receded in favour of another to which less prominence was given in the early period, and in which, as has been pointed out (§ 14), sacrifice was regarded as the most important of the Divinely appointed means by which the ideal relation of a holy God to a holy people was to be maintained unimpaired. For inadvertent omissions and transgressions, and for all cases of serious ceremonial defilements, which interrupted this ideal relation, sacrifice in all its forms—not the special propitiatory offerings merely—is said to ‘make atonement.’
The Heb. is kipper, of which the original signification is still uncertain. But whether this but ‘to cover’ or ‘to wipe off,’ it gives little help in deciding the special meaning of the word in the terminology of sacrifice. There it is used in neither of the senses given above, but always in close connexion with the verbs signifying ‘to purify’ (tihar) and to ‘unsin’ (chittç’)—terms belonging specially to the terminology of purification (see § 14). Applied to material objects, such as the altar, kipper is little more than a synonym of tihar and chittç’; applied to persons, it is the summary expression of the rites by which the offender against the holiness of God is made fit to receive the Divine forgiveness and to be re-admitted to the fellowship and worship of the theocratic community. The agent is the priest, who performs the propitiatory rites on behalf of the offender. The words in italics, clumsy though they are, fairly express the meaning of this much discussed term of the Heb. ritual (see, further. Driver’s exhaustive study under ‘Propitiation’ in Hastings’ DB [Note: Dictionary of the Bible.] iv. esp. p. 131, on the difficulty of finding a satisfactory English rendering). See, further, the small print in § 14.
Now, although it is true, as G. F. Moore reminds us (EBi [Note: Encyclopædia Biblica.] iv. 4220), that ‘the whole public cultus is a means of propitiating God and obtaining remission for sin and uncleanness’ (Eze_45:15; Eze_45:17), it is equally true that the propitiatory efficacy of sacrifice is represented by the Priestly writers as especially bound up with the blood of the sacrificial victim. When we ask the question, in virtue of what property does the blood make atonement?, we find the answer incidentally in the oft-quoted passage Lev_17:11. We say incidentally, because v. 11 really contains the answer to an entirely different question—Why is blood taboo as an article of food? Now the verse runs in RV [Note: Revised Version.] : ‘For the life of the flesh is in the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that maketh atonement by reason of the life’ (that is in it). Strictly speaking, therefore, it is not the blood but the life that is in it that is the medium of propitiation. Beyond this we cannot go in our search for the explanation of the ‘how’ of atonement on OT ground.
Along other and extra-Biblical lines students have diligently sought for the ultimate basis of this efficacy of blood. It is doubtless to be connected with ‘the almost universal belief that blood is a fluid in which inheres a mysterious potency, no less dangerous when misused than efficacious when properly employed’ (G. F. Moore, EBi [Note: Encyclopædia Biblica.] iv. 4218; cf. Trumbull, The Blood Covenant, passim; and Farnell, The Evolution of Religion, 94 f.). Just because of its ‘mysterious potency,’ and its association with ‘the great primeval mysteries of life and death’ (Farnell), blood was felt to be too sacred, and indeed too dangerous (see 1Sa_14:33 f.), to be used otherwise than as the proper due of the Author of all life. It was at once the most persuasive of gifts at His altar, and the most potent cathartic by which the sinner was purged of uncleanness and sin.
The traditional view that the blood of the sacrifice atoned for the sins of the offerer, because the victim suffered the death which the sinner had incurred, is now rarely maintained. This theory of a pœna vicaria is untenable for these among other reasons: (1) The sins for which the OT sacrifices made atonement were not such as involved the penalty of death (§ 14). (2) Had the guilt of the offerer been transferred to the victim by ‘the laying on of hands’—for the meaning of this rite, see § 9—the flesh of the sacrifice would have been in the highest degree unclean, and could not have been eaten by either priests or people. (3) The idea that the Divine forgiveness was procured by the blood of the victim as its owner’s substitute is excluded by the admission, for the propitiatory sacrifice par excellence, of a bloodless offering in the shape of an oblation of flour (§ 14, end). Nevertheless, although the doctrine that the death of the victim was a vicarious punishment for the sin of the offerer is not to be found in the legislation itself, the thought was one that could scarcely fail to suggest itself to the popular mind—a conclusion to which it was doubtless assisted by the representation of the vicarious sufferings of the Servant in Is 53.
Summing up the conclusions of this section on the significance of sacrifice in OT, we find it represented in all periods as a gift, mainly of homage to the Divine Sovereign, in the earlier period also as a rite of table communion with the covenant God of Israel, and finally in the later period as pre-eminently the appointed means of purification and expiation as the preliminary to forgiveness, in other words of atonement.
Of the ultima ratio of sacrifice no explicit statement is found in OT. T
Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible
Edited by James Hastings, D.D. Published in 1909

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