Leviticus 16 - Day of Atonement—When Aaron goes into
the sanctuary he needs to bring a young bullock for a sin offering and a ram
for a holocaust. From the community he
shall receive two male goats to the entrance and cast lots to determine which one will be for the Lord and which one will
be for “Azazal” - a name for Satan the note suggests—it translates the word as
“escaping goat” hence “scapegoat”. The
one for the Lord shall be offered up as a sin offering (hattat). The other shall be “set alive before the
Lord” and then sent into the desert.
The bullock
Aaron brings for himself shall be offered up to atone for himself and his
family. Incense from
the altar of sacrifice shall be brought inside the veil, placed on the fire so
that a cloud of incense covers the propitiatory. The blood of the bullock shall be sprinkled
on the propitiatory.
Then he
offers the people’s sin offering and does the same with its blood—he makes
atonement for the sanctuary, the meeting tent, for himself and for the community,
for the altar—mixing the blood of both sacrifices. When he comes out he shall
place his hands on the head of the other goat and confess the sins of the
community. Then the goat is escorted out of the
community, out into the desert. He
leaves his vestments in the sanctuary, bathes and puts them on again and then
offers up the holocaust and burn the fat of the sin offering on the altar.
There
shall be a fast on this day as well every year in perpetuity.
Early Christian
Writers
Justin Martyr (100-165
AD) – First Apology
The Demons Still
Mislead Men
56 – Not only did “the evil
spirits” rely on their pre-incarnation stories of Jupiter and his sons, even
AFTER Christ’s appearance and AFTER they learned of the prophesies regarding
Him and AFTER they should have believed, the still continued to set their eyes
on lesser men like Simon Magus and Menander.
We
pray that the “sacred senate” and you leaders help people to avoid those evil
doctrines and destroy the statue set up to honor them.
And Cause Persecution
57 – The devils can’t
persuade us that there will be no eventual punishment of evil – just as they
couldn’t keep Him hidden after He came.
The
only thing “they who live irrationally, and were brought up licentiously in
wicked customs, and are prejudiced in their own opinions, should kill and hate
us.” But not only do we NOT hate them, we pity and try to lead them to
repentance.
We
do not fear death; all die. If they don’t believe that we exists after death,
they help us by setting us free.
And Raise Up Heretics
58 – These same devils have
tried to get us to list to Marcion of Pontus, “who is even now teaching men to
deny that God is the maker of all things in heaven and on earth, and that the
Christ predicted by the prophets is His Son, and preaches another god besides
the Creator of all, and likewise another son. And this man many have believed,
as if he alone knew the truth, and laugh at us, though they have no proof of
what they say, but are carried away irrationally as lambs by a wolf, and become
the prey of atheistical doctrines, and of devils. For they who are called
devils attempt nothing else than to seduce men from God who made them, and from
Christ His first-begotten; and those who are unable to raise themselves above
the earth they have riveted, and do now rivet to things earthly and to the
works of their own hands; but those who devote themselves to the contemplation
of things divine, they secretly beat back; and if they have not a wise
sober-mindedness, and a pure and passionless life, they drive them into
godlessness.”
Marcion was not trying to lure men TO THE WORLD but away from all
things physical. And that is not what we are about as Christians anyway. Our
savior came in human flesh to redeem the lives we live.
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