The Day of Atonement
What is the Day of Atonement (Yom Kippur), and what do we do on that day? Here is what Scripture tells us.
Leviticus is a good place to start,
“For any person who is not afflicted in soul on that same day shall be cut off from his people. “And any person who does any work on that same day, that person I will destroy from among his people. “You shall do no manner of work; it shall be a statute forever throughout your generations in all your dwellings. “It shall be to you a sabbath of solemn rest, and you shall afflict your souls; on the ninth day of the month at evening, from evening to evening, you shall celebrate your sabbath.” Leviticus 23:26-32
This day is commanded to be the 10th day of the 7th month according to YHWH’s calendar. He commanded us to start our year in the spring (Exodus 12:2), so the 7th month falls around September of the Gregorian calendar. The Jewish name for this month is Tishrei (תִּשְׁרֵי). A biblical day starts in the evening and ends in the evening. This is why the Day of Atonement starts on the evening of the 9th day of Tishrei. The evening of the 9th is also the start of the 10th. The day is 24 hours and so ends the following evening. This is why God states that the Day of Atonement starts at the evening of the 9th and runs evening to evening.
God commands us to come together as a separate group of people. We are to afflict ourselves and treat it as a Sabbath rest day where no work is allowed. There is a severe warning that anyone who does not afflict themselves with be cut off from God’s people, and anyone who does not take a Sabbath rest will be destroyed. When God says something, He means it.
This day is about God giving us a way to pay for our sins through sacrifices by the High Priest. You might say, ‘but isn’t the Passover about our atonement for sins? And that is in the spring not the fall.’ The Passover Lamb who is Christ, was sacrificed and His sins (carried in the flesh that He was born into) were atoned for. When we receive the Holy Spirit (the blood of God’s Body, also called Living Water just as blood is living water), we become part of that Body. By becoming part of that Body, we are also part of that sacrifice and our sins are also atoned for.
However, this is not the only sacrifice for atonement. There will be two bodies at the end of the age. One body is the Body of Christ whose sins are atoned for. The other body is the body of Adam whose sins are not atoned for. These are the remaining unrepentant who refused to put their trust in God and submit that all His ways are right and true. Their sins remain.
“Therefore I said to you that you will die in your sins; for if you do not believe that I am He, you will die in your sins.” John 8:24
None of the charges are dropped for the unrepentant, and therefore they are given the sentence of final death which is also called the ‘second death’ because it happens after the resurrection of all the dead.
“But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death.” Revelation 21:8
This final judgment is explained in the proceedings of the Day of Atonement. While each individual is exercising affliction as commanded on this day, the High Priest was commanded to do a special ceremony which is a shadow of the final judgement. Two goats were taken (Leviticus 16:7-10, Leviticus 16:15-22), one was considered YHWH’s and the other was not. YHWH’s was sacrificed and accepted by God. It’s blood was taken into the most Holy Place on this special day. The other goat was left outside and the sins of the entire people was given to it. It was then led away from God and His Temple and left outside to wander in the wilderness.
Many people teach that this wild goat was the saved but they have it backwards. In order to be with God you must also be a sacrifice just as Christ was. Without sacrifice there is no forgiveness of sins.
“In fact, the law requires that nearly everything be cleansed with blood, and without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness.” Hebrews 9:22
In that quote, Paul had just mentioned the Day of Atonement in Hebrews 9:7, as he was explaining how the Temple and sacrifices were shadows of the real things to come. He understood that the sacrificial goat was a symbol of the saved. The other goat is one who can never enter the House of God because it did not shed its blood for God. We as God’s people are also sacrifices and must prove our faith by resisting sin to the point of shedding blood (not real blood but suffering to the point that is considered equivalent).
“You have not yet resisted to bloodshed, striving against sin.” Hebrews 12:4
We all come from Adam, but the people of God break away from that body just as a branch is broken off from one tree and grafted onto another. We are grafted on to the Body of God and receive the nourishing sap of the Tree of Life. The difference between the two bodies at the end of the age will become very clear. One Body is saved and enters the house of God, the other is rejected and turned away from God forever.
“I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End, the First and the Last. Blessed are those who do His commandments, that they may have the right to the Tree of Life, and may enter through the gates into the city. But outside are dogs and sorcerers and sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters, and whoever loves and practices a lie.” Revelation 22:13-15
The Day of Atonement in the Hebrew text is actually the Day of Atonements, as atonement is made for all. It is made for God’s people, and it is also made for the unrepentant. This time of God’s Court is in the fall, when the atonement for the unrepentant has finally come and they are thrown into what is called ‘the lake of fire’.
So today, during the Day of Atonement(s), while the High Priest and Temple priests are enacting the annual rehearsal of judgement, the people are humbling themselves as children of God in heavy repentance and submission that all God’s ways are right. The affliction is traditionally fasting, wearing sack cloth, and sitting in dust and ashes. The fasting can also include abstaining from water, as Nineveh did after receiving the warning from YHWH’s prophet.
“So the people of Nineveh believed God, and proclaimed a fast, and put on sackcloth, from the greatest of them even to the least of them. For word came unto the king of Nineveh, and he arose from his throne, and he laid his robe from him, and covered him with sackcloth, and sat in ashes. And he caused it to be proclaimed and published through Nineveh by the decree of the king and his nobles, saying, Let neither man nor beast, herd nor flock, taste any thing: let them not feed, nor drink water: But let man and beast be covered with sackcloth, and cry mightily unto God: yea, let them turn every one from his evil way, and from the violence that is in their hands.” Jonah 3:5-8
This humbling in repentance was what God was waiting for, and because they did this, God spared them. It is a great example of how to admit our criminality and apologize to God and re-establish ourselves in faithful obedience. This would be the perfect attitude and action for the Day of Atonement.
As each individual today has varying issues of health and abilities, we each must decide what our fast will look like. Fasting must include a fast from sin, and in addition one can choose to be abstaining from one or all of a myriad of things like food, water, internet, a bed, chairs, tv, video games, etc. You need to look at your life and ask yourself, ‘what am I willing or physically able to give up for 24 hours to show God that He is the highest priority in my life and vital for my very survival with the day of judgement coming.
The Judge is watching! Now is the time to demonstrate repentance and follow it up with right actions in the face of pressure from the pagan world. All those pagans and God-haters and Law-haters, those unrepentant people, will have no recourse because the Judge has seen everything and gave them every chance to choose to be a sacrifice of faithful obedience.
To read more about the Day of Atonement(s) or Yom Kippur(im) you can read,
Leviticus 23:26-32 (quoted in full, above)
Leviticus 16 (the entire chapter is the procedures done annually on the Day of Atonement)
Numbers 29:7-11 (summary)
Book of Jonah (4 chapters)
Job 42:6 (Therefore I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes.)
Joel 2:12-13 (‘Now, therefore,’ says YHWH ‘Turn to Me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning. So rend your heart, and not your garments; return to YHWH your God,
for He is gracious and merciful, Slow to anger, and of great kindness; and He relents from doing harm.)
Ezra 9 (entire chapter)
Ezra 10 (continuation of repentance with weeping and then instituting change back to lawfulness)
Nehemiah 1, Nehemiah 9, Nehemiah 10 (entire chapters)
Esther 4:3 (And in every province where the king's command and decree arrived, there was great mourning among the Jews, with fasting, weeping, and wailing; and many lay in sackcloth and ashes.)
Psalm 35:13 (But as for me, when they were sick, my clothing was sackcloth; I humbled myself with fasting…)
Daniel 9:1-23 (excellent example of atonement prayer and supplications, with fasting, sackcloth, and ashes.)
Daniel 10:1-12 (fasting with some food but no wine)
Isaiah 58 (whole chapter, God tells us that a fast is not complete without fasting from sin)
Isaiah 59:1-15 (admission of sins)
Hebrews 9, Hebrews 10 (whole chapters, this may be difficult to understand if you aren’t familiar with the Levitical sacrifices)
Matthew 6:16-18 (Moreover, when you fast, do not be like the hypocrites, with a sad countenance. For they disfigure their faces that they may appear to men to be fasting. Assuredly, I say to you, they have their reward. But you, when you fast, anoint your head and wash your face, so that you do not appear to men to be fasting, but to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly.)
Acts 27:9 (mentions a fast day which is thought to refer to the Day of Atonement so most translations translated it as such)
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