JESUS, "THE WILLING SCAPEGOAT"

click on arrow and then click on enlarge

Jesus, keep me near the cross,

There a precious fountain—

Free to all, a healing stream—

Flows from Calv’ry’s mountain.

Refrain:

In the cross, in the cross,

Be my glory ever;

Till my raptured soul shall find

Rest beyond the river.

Near the cross, a trembling soul,

Love and Mercy found me;

There the bright and morning star

Sheds its beams around me.

Near the cross! O Lamb of God,

Bring its scenes before me;

Help me walk from day to day,

With its shadows o’er me.

Near the cross I’ll watch and wait

Hoping, trusting ever,

Till I reach the golden strand,

Just beyond the river.

It was our infirmities that he bore, our sufferings that he endured. He was pierced for our offenses, crushed for our sins. Upon him was the chastisement that makes us whole, by his stripes we were healed. The Lord laid upon him the guilt of us all. 

Isaiah 52 

Today around the world Christians gather to solemnly celebrate the feast of "Jesus, the Willing Scapegoat." We all know what a "scapegoat" is, but many of us may not know where the idea came from. On the Jewish Day of Atonement, the high priest confessed the sins of the people while imposing his hands upon a goat. This "scapegoat" was then expelled into the desert with the people's sins pinned to it. The symbolism of expelling the guilt-laden goat from the community is obvious: the "scapegoat" carried the community's sins away. Isaiah's long, sobbing, and repetitive look at the bruised and bleeding face of God's sinless servant is used each Good Friday. The inclusion of this moving text focuses us on Jesus as the perfect fulfillment of this prophecy. The sinless Jesus becomes our willing "scape goat," bearing our sufferings, infirmities, offenses, guilt, and sins. Though innocent, he willingly bore our guilt.

 

Jews are not the only people who had the idea of pinning one’s sins to a scapegoat. I am told the American Indians had a tradition called the "Eater of Impurities." On a high holy day, the wise man of the tribe would sit down with each member of the tribe individually and suggest something like, "Bring into your mind some thought, some feeling that you have that you wish no one else to know; some idea or fantasy, something you feel aberrant or abhorrent; that you feel that you must suppress or hide away." Often that person would be so frightened that he would hardly be able to allow that thought to arise in his mind for fear that it might somehow leak out his ears and be heard, that someone might overhear the fearful content of his mind. The wise man encouraged the individual to see how frightened he was of exposing himself, of being vulnerable, of approaching wholeness. After some time, the wise man would say "Now, give me that thought.” The thought or image would be brought out and shared between them and the darkness in which it was held would be dispelled in the light of trust and compassion.

 

Now that sounds like "confession" to me! Even though we receive reconciliation with God through Christ, the church has been entrusted with the ministry and message of reconciliation. “Whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven them…” Like the Old Testament priest who was the intermediary between the sins of the people and the scapegoat, like the Indian wise man who was a catalyst for letting go of some awful secret, the priest in the Sacrament of Reconciliation receives the sins of the people and announces God’s forgiveness. He helps the sinner pin his sins to the cross from where forgiveness comes back to us all.

 

Behold, our willing scapegoat, the Lamb of God! He was pierced for our offenses, crushed for our sins. By his stripes we are healed. The Lord laid upon him the guilt of us all.

A SHORT RELIGIOUS HISTORY OF THE "SCAPEGOAT"

The idea of the scapegoat is a biblical one. The term scapegoat is a translation of the Hebrew word Azazel. The Azazel was part of the ancient Jewish feast of Yom Kippur's  ritual of animal sacrifice.

It was literally a goat that carried the sins of the nation into the wilderness. Though not technically a sacrifice, the scapegoat would visually and ritually cleanse the nation from the guilt of their sins. In the book of Leviticus, chapter 16, we read about what God wanted to happen on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement. This chapter in Leviticus tells us both the purpose for the Day of Atonement and the important details of what people were expected to do.

“For on this day [Yom Kippur] shall atonement be made for you to cleanse you. You shall be clean before the Lord from all your sins.” (Leviticus 16:30)

The purpose of the holiday was twofold—first, to “be clean.” The idea of cleansing and purification is a fairly standard one in most every tradition. Most of the world religions have standards for purity and make provision when the adherents of that religion fall short. The holiday of Yom Kippur and its corresponding ritual of sacrifices function as the mechanism to purify and cleanse.

The second purpose of Yom Kippur is just as important, but easily missed: to be “before the Lord.” Here is where we find the Bible making a significant break from other religious traditions. Rather than having a God that simply needs to be appeased, the God of the Bible requires cleansing for the purpose of relationship, because He wants to be with us. Much like a parent welcoming home a child after a summer’s day at the park—a child who is probably hot, sweaty and dirty—God wants us to be clean because He wants to enjoy our company. Our impurity is not something God permits in His presence. And so, He says to us much the same thing a parent would say to that child—go wash up before you come to the table to eat because I want a person who is clean at my table.

So, if being clean and being with the Lord are the dual purposes of the holiday, how was it supposed to work? If you’re only familiar with fasting on Yom Kippur, the fuller answer may surprise you. Leviticus chapter 16 lays out in vivid detail a system of sacrifice. Though it may be unfamiliar and maybe even shocking to modern readers, physical sacrifices were indispensable to the celebration of Yom Kippur.

The ritual began with the High Priest (Aaron in the Leviticus passage) preparing himself by bathing and changing into a special set of holiday vestments that included a turban and sash! He then selected three animals as sacrifices—two young goats and one bull. The goats each had a purpose—one as a sacrificial offering and the other as a scapegoat. Aaron cast lots (not unlike a roll of a die) to select one goat as the offering and the other as scapegoat . This random selection ensured that the high priest would not be able to sway the decision; God Himself would make the decision. The goat selected as an offering was killed along with the young bull. Their blood together was brought into the center, most holy place of the Temple. That sacrifice atoned for (cleansed, purified) the High Priest, the people and the sanctuary. The stage was set for the next goat, the scapegoat.

What followed next was very dramatic . The High Priest placed both hands upon the head of the goat and confessed aloud the sins of the nation, transferring them to the goat. This casting of the sins was more than symbolic; it was ritual. As the previous goat was killed as a representative of the nation before God, this goat would carry away the sins as a representative of the nation. In our world today, this kind of confession is rare. Today, we would think of the scapegoat as needing some kind of written contract releasing the nation from its guilt and contractually placing that guilt onto the goat. In the biblical world, a person’s word, their confession, was as valid as any written contract.

The goat was then brought deep into the wilderness by a trusted man and released in a barren place. Ancient Jewish tradition records that the goat would be led to a rocky place, or a place of jagged rocks to ensure the death of the goat in the wilderness. Evidently the rabbis wanted to make sure the sins wouldn’t make their way back into the camp looking for something to eat! This is the tradition of the Azazel, the scapegoat.