The Pulpit Commentary — Leviticus — Section 284

Ver. 81.-" .A sahbath of rest." " Ye shall afflict your souls." The true penitence is the true peace. The ",sabbath " represents the joyful acceptance of the creature, and his entrance into the Divine satisfaction. The Lord rested, and he invites man to rest with him. Sin is the only obstacle to that reconciliation and fellowship which blends man's sabbath witl:i. God's sabbath. "Once a year" the Jews celebrated this restoration, to us a statute of daily life-every day a sabbath.-R. The cli= of sacrificial v,orship, the Day of Atonement, Ch. xvi.; cf. John i. 29; 1 Cor. v. 7 ; Heb. ix. x. The sacrifices already considered all bring out with more or less emphasis the idea of atonement. But to render this cardinal idea of our religion still more emphatic, it was ordained that the tenth day of the seventh month in each year should be a day of special humiliation on the part of the people, and special ritual on the part of the priests. The directions about it were apparently given imme- diately after the presumption and death of Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron. They must have ventured, we think, into the very "holiest of all," with their censers of unholy fire. The stages in atonement may be set forth in the following way :- L THERE IS THE VOLUNTARY HUMILIATION OF THE filGH PRIEST. The Day of Atonement was the high priest's day; he undertook the atoning work, and no man was to venture near the tabernacle (ver. 17) while he was engaged in it. 'l'he first thing required of him was humiliation, He had to lay aside his glorious garments in which he usually ministered, and to assume plain white linen ones; he had to bring a sin offering for himself and household ; he had thus to humble himself under the mighty hand of God, before he could be exalted by admission to the Divine presence. Now, it nquires the high priest with his sin offering to typify with any adequacy Jesus Christ. For he is both our High Priest and our Sin Offering. He humbles himself to die as a Sacrifice upon the cross; he is a voluntary Sacrifice-he offers himself (Heb. vii. 27). The humiliation of our High Priest can only be judged by our conception of the glory of Divinity which he temporarily resigned, added to the depth of ignominy into which in his crucifixion he came. All this wae necessary that a way of reconciliation might be opened up for sinners. lL THE HIGH PRIEST WAS REQUIRED NEXT TO PERFUME THE AUDIENCE CHAMBER WITH INCENSE, He proceeded with a censer of coals from off the altar, and a handful of incense, and was careful to fill the holy of holies with the fragrant cloud. Here again does it require the incense, in addition to the priest, to typify the relations of Jesus to our atonement. The work of atonement begins in his intercession. Think how he prayed during his life on earth-how earnest his prayer in Gethsemane was when he sweat as it were great drops of blood; think, further, how his intercession ie continued in the heavenly places. Prayer is the beginning, middle, and end of the redemptive work. Without this incense, even the blood of the unblemished lamb would lose much of its effect. lt seems evident from this that we must put away those hard and business-like illustratione of atonement, as a hard ba.rgain driven on the one side and paid literally and in f1tll on the other. We must allow a sufficient sphere in our conceptions for the 11Jt. XVL 1-34.) THE BOOK OF LEVl'l'ICUS. 249