p. 203 | The Day of Atonement

Publishing Committee · Rochester, N. Y. · Aug 1, 1854

The Day of Atonement

The following description of the ceremonies of this great day is from the Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge.

The DAY OF ATONEMENT, was the tenth of Tizri which nearly answers to our September. The Hebrews call it kippur or chippur, pardon or expiation, because the faults of the year were then expiated. The principal ceremonies were the following: The high-priest, after he had washed, not only his hands, and his feet, as usual at common sacrifices, but his whole body, dressed himself in plain linen like the other priests, neither his purple robe, nor the ephod, nor the pectoral, because he was to expiate his own sins, together with those of the people. He first offered a bullock and a ram for his own sins, and those of the priests, putting his hands on the heads of the victims, and confessing his own sins, and the sins of his house. Afterwards, he received from the princes of the people two goats for a sin-offering, and a ram for a burnt offering, to be offered in the name of the whole nation. The lot determined which of the two goats should be sacrificed, and which set at liberty. After this, the high priest put some of the sacred fire of the altar of burnt-offerings into a censer, threw incense upon it, and entered with it, thus smoking, into the sanctuary. After having perfumed the sanctuary with this incense, he came out, took some of the blood of the young bullock he had sacrificed, and carried that also into the sanctuary, and dipping his fingers in it, sprinkled it seven times between the ark and the veil, which separated the holy from the sanctuary, or most holy. Then he came out a second time, and beside the altar of burnt offerings killed the goat which the lot had determined to be the sacrifice. The blood of this goat he carried into the most holy place, and sprinkled it seven times between the ark and the veil, which separated the holy from the sanctuary: from thence he returned into the court of the tabernacle, and sprinkled both sides of it with the blood of the goat. During this time none of the priests, or people, were admitted into the tabernacle, or into the court. This being done, the high-priest came to the altar of burnt-offerings, wetted the four horns of it with the blood of the goat, and young bullock, and sprinkled it seven times with the same blood. The sanctuary, the court, and the altar, being thus purified, he directed the goat which was set at liberty by the lot, to be brought to him, which being done, he put his hand on the goat's head, confessed his own sins, and the sins of the people, and then delivered it to a person to carry it to some desert place, and let it loose, or throw it down a precipice. (See Scape Goat.) This being done, the high-priest washed himself all over in the tabernacle, putting on other clothes, (some think his pontificial dress, his robe of purple, the ephod, and the pectoral,) sacrificed two rams for burnt-offering, one for himself, and the other for the people. The day was a great solemnity of the Hebrews; a day of rest, and of strict fasting.