Leviticus — Chapter 16

The chapter of the Day of Atonement opens with the death of Aaron's two sons as its occasion (Lev. 16:1), which God used to ordain the supreme rite of annual expiation. Lapide sets out the entire order: the High Priest on the tenth day of the seventh month enters the Holy of Holies once a year — bearing incense to veil his sight of the divine presence — offers his own bull for sin, sacrifices one of the two goats chosen by lot, sprinkles the blood seven times before the propitiatory, and sends the scapegoat laden with the sins of Israel into the desert. This was the most solemn act of the entire Levitical religion.

The propitiatory (kapporeth) above the ark is the throne of God's mercy. The High Priest entering the Holy of Holies alone once a year is the figure of Christ entering heaven with His own blood (Heb. 9:7, 12). Lapide notes the darkness of the Holy of Holies: no window, no lamp — a darkness that expressed the transcendence and mystery of the divine presence, hidden even from the High Priest by the cloud of incense. \"For I will appear in a cloud upon the oracle\" (Lev. 16:2) signifies the incomprehensibility of God.

The High Priest clothed himself in plain linen garments — not his pontifical vestments — to enter the Holy of Holies on the Day of Atonement (Lev. 16:4). Lapide: this is the supreme figure of the kenosis of Christ, who laid aside the glory of divinity (Phil. 2:7) and appeared in the simple linen of our humanity to make atonement for sins. The resumption of pontifical vestments after the expiation (v. 24) figures the glorification of Christ in the Resurrection.

The bull offered by the High Priest for his own sins and those of his household (Lev. 16:6) allegorically signifies Christ offering Himself for His own, that is, for our sins which He took upon Himself. Lapide follows Radulphus: Christ prayed for Himself and His household, that is, for the Apostles and all believers (John 17:9). The High Priest's humility in laying aside his pontifical vestments and wearing simple linen figures the kenosis of the Incarnation.

The two goats and the casting of lots is one of the richest typological passages in Leviticus. Lapide surveys the Fathers: according to Theodoret, Isychius, and Cyril (lib. 9 contra Julianum), the slain goat signifies Christ suffering and dying on the cross; the scapegoat signifies Christ's divinity which could not suffer and remained free, or (as Procopius) His soul which escaped death and rose on the third day. A second interpretation (Cyril) sees the scapegoat as mankind, freed from death by Christ's sacrifice. Origen and Bede see the slain goat as Christ condemned and the scapegoat as Barabbas released.

The sprinkling of blood seven times before the propitiatory (Lev. 16:14-16) expiated the Holy of Holies, the Holy Place, and the altar of incense from the uncleannesses of the Israelites. Lapide teaches this signifies that the entire economy of worship — the Church, her ministers, and her sacred rites — required the cleansing blood of Christ to remain holy before God. The sevenfold sprinkling is the perfect and complete expiation, seven being the symbol of fullness.

The High Priest confesses over the head of the living scapegoat all the iniquities of the children of Israel and all their transgressions and sins, imprecating them upon the goat's head and sending it into the wilderness (Lev. 16:21). Lapide: this is the clearest figure of Christ bearing the sins of the world — \"the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all\" (Isa. 53:6). The wilderness into which the goat goes is the grave and the realm of death, from which it does not return.

And the goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities unto a land not inhabited: and he shall let go the goat in the wilderness (Lev. 16:22). Lapide: the wilderness into which the scapegoat disappears figures the abyss of hell, into which Christ cast the power of Satan and of sin by His death. He never returns — just as sin, once truly forgiven, is cast into the sea of divine mercy (Mic. 7:19) and remembered no more. Tropologically, this figures the complete and definitive expulsion of sin from the soul in a good confession and absolution.

The command to afflict one's soul on the Day of Atonement (Lev. 16:29-31) is the foundation of the Jewish fast, and the figure of Christian penance. Lapide notes this feast corresponds to Good Friday and the entire Lenten fast: on that day the High Priest — wearing only white linen, not pontifical vestments — performed the expiation, just as the Church on Good Friday is stripped of solemnity, and the celebrant wears only the simplest vestments. The Day of Atonement is thus the supreme figure of the Passion of Christ.

The Day of Atonement is commanded to be celebrated \"once a year\" (Lev. 16:34). Lapide: this once-a-year expiation figures the perfect, once-for-all sacrifice of Christ on the Cross (Heb. 9:12), which redeems for all time. The Mass does not add to or repeat this sacrifice but is its perpetual memorial and application. As the High Priest alone entered the Holy of Holies, so Christ alone entered heaven by His own blood, interceding perpetually for us.