The Day of Atonement
Stephen Terry
Commentary for the November 9, 2013
Sabbath School Lesson
“The law is only a shadow of the good
things that are coming—not the realities themselves. For this reason it can
never, by the same sacrifices repeated endlessly year after year, make perfect
those who draw near to worship. Otherwise, would they not have stopped being
offered? For the worshipers would have been cleansed once for all, and would no
longer have felt guilty for their sins. But those sacrifices are an annual
reminder of sins. It is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take
away sins.” Hebrews 10:1-4, NIV
Our lesson
quarterly focuses throughout the quarter on the sanctuary as a model for a purification
ritual going on in heaven based on a single verse in the Epistle to the
Hebrews.[i]
The logical conclusion of such an approach would be that the sanctuary service
of the wilderness wanderings was not efficacious for anything. It was merely a
symbol. This seems to be the conclusion the author of Hebrews came to also from
the passage cited above. But this begs the question, if this is only a symbol
of something unseen, why was it necessary to carry on this practice for almost
one and a half millennia? Why did perhaps millions of animals have to die if
this was only a symbolic gesture and accomplished no real cleansing from sin?
Also, if
this had value to present to the world what was going on in heaven, then why
did it no longer have value once Christ was crucified? According to Hebrews,
Christ is actively involved in what Seventh-day Adventists refer to as the “Antitypical
Day of Atonement.” In other words, He functions as a High Priest in heaven in a
literal sanctuary, offering sacrifice for sin. Instead of the blood of animals,
His blood is offered.[ii]
But if the sacrifices of the sanctuary service had value for understanding what
was taking place in heaven, why do they not have value for that now?
Some believe
that the offering of animal sacrifices came to an end when Christ died on the
cross and the curtain of the temple between the Holy Place (pronaos) and the Most Holy Place (naos) was torn in two, thereby
eliminating the veil that stood between God and His people. But if the sacrificial
system came to an end when the curtain was torn, did the early Christians
believe this? Perhaps not, for we find even Paul sponsoring the cost of the
animal sacrifice for the purification of someone at the time of his arrest in
Jerusalem.[iii]
This was most certainly after the curtain in the temple was torn as Luke, Mark
and Matthew’s gospels tell us.[iv]
Yet, strangely, Paul does not question the idea of continuing with the
sacrificial system. The fact that the apostles in Jerusalem suggested that he
do this would seem to indicate that they, also, felt that the sacrificial
system was not done away with. Could it be that something other than Christ’s
death caused the end of the sacrificial system? Was the justification for its
end only developed after that other event? What event could have had such a
dramatic impact?
If we look
for a major event that happened after the death of Christ that may have
profoundly affected the early church, we might find such an event in the
destruction of the Temple in 70 AD. It is perhaps interesting that the Gospel
of John, which conservative biblical scholars feel was written prior to the destruction
of the Temple[v]
makes no mention of the curtain being torn. However, the Synoptic Gospels all
make mention of the torn curtain. Because of internal references in these
gospels, many date them to after the destruction of the Temple.[vi]
So why would gospels written after the Temple’s destruction have this passage
and the one possibly written prior not have it? Perhaps it was related more to
practice than to faith. With the destruction of the temple, change in practice was
needed, and a theological justification for that change became necessary.
If we look
at the Jewish community, the synagogue system of worship came into its own
during the intertestamental period. Perhaps its importance grew as a result of
the desecration of the Temple by Antiochus Epiphanes.[vii]
In any event, the synagogue system continued parallel to the Temple worship
system even during the time of Jesus.[viii]
Once the Temple was destroyed, the Jews may have naturally transitioned fully
to the synagogues, seeing the time of Antiochus as a precedent for doing so. However,
the early Christians may have found it necessary to create a different
perspective to justify the transition away from the sacrificial system.
In an
increasing number of instances, the Christians found themselves being opposed
by the Jews and excluded from the synagogues.[ix]
Therefore, they began developing a network of house churches where they could
meet and fellowship together. At times those houses were close to the synagogues.[x]
No longer attending the synagogues, they also were no longer restrained in
their theological development by the rabbis of those synagogues. They could be
free to develop a distinct theology not dependent on the Temple and its
sacrificial system. Orthodox Jews, even today, in spite of the synagogues they
now worship in believe that the Temple will be rebuilt and the sacrificial
system one day re-established.[xi]
Since Gentiles (non-Jews) would never be admitted to the Temple[xii]
and Christians freely welcomed Gentiles into their fellowship, they also would likely
not be allowed to join in its restoration. Perhaps finding themselves barred
from participation in the sacrificial system, even before the Temple was
destroyed by Rome, Christians had already begun to look for answers, and that
search found expression in the Synoptic Gospels. Through the symbolism of a
torn curtain in the Temple, they may have found a powerful metaphor for the end
of the sacrificial system. Perhaps Paul’s arrest at the Temple served to hurry
them along that theological pathway.
Maybe the
Epistle to the Hebrews was written as a response to the Jews, who had excluded
Christians from the sacrificial system and the synagogues, in effect, telling
them that they no longer needed such a system anyway. In fact, their system was
better with Christ ministering in a heavenly temple that no Roman army could ever
destroy. Then one day, instead of rebuilding the Temple here on earth, each
believer would go to the temple in heaven to be with Christ. However,
Christians may have paid a high price for this theological posturing.
In
maintaining that the sacrificial system was ineffectual, Christianity, in some
ways, divorced itself from the precedential history of the Old Testament. Who
has not heard those Christians who assert with an air of superiority that they
are “New Testament” Christians? Uncomfortable with the blood and violence of
the Old Testament, they may have disavowed its validity not just in terms of
the sacrifices of the sanctuary but as an ongoing spiritual guide as well. They
perhaps feel comfortable reciting Psalm 23 from time to time, but the rest is just
too messy to deal with so they cast it all aside. However, Christ never turned
His back on the Old Testament. Instead, He relied on the Old Testament to provide
textual foundation for His own ministry. In effect He claimed His ministry was
biblically based in a time when the only Bible was the Old Testament.[xiii]
Seventh-day
Adventists have attempted to follow Christ’s lead in this. They seek to define
the New Testament through the lens of the Old. Often seeing the Old Testament as
being “typically” symbolic of “antitypical” and at times apocalyptic
applications, Adventists make herculean efforts to try to knit the disparate
components into a coherent systematic theological whole. While this approach is
commendable, one cannot help but ask when things get too literal, is it
practical to seek a perfect understanding of a God which by definition is
beyond understanding?
For
instance, suppose Hebrews was simply written as an apologetic to a xenophobic Jewry,
telling them that their theology wasn’t need anyway and therefore there is no
real temple in heaven beyond the image conjured up by its writer. Does that
change our relationship to Christ? Perhaps it changes nothing. Maybe it is like
those who believe that when they die Jesus takes them immediately to heaven as
opposed to those who believe they sleep in the graves until Jesus comes for
them at the Parousia. Since there will be no sense of passage of time in the
grave, possibly both will awake at the Second Coming and believe they were each
right, and in the joy of being received into eternal fellowship with Christ,
which belief was literally right no longer really matters.
Could it be
that we are placing too much of an emphasis on a literal understanding of
something that may only be a symbolic construct to illustrate a theological
position? Historically, when the church has developed understandings that were
too literal, they have been used for persecution, judgment and even pursuing
capital punishment when it had the power to do so. Even Christ may not have
been received as He should have been because those responsible for orthodoxy
had things figured out too closely for their own good and that of the church.
Perhaps we should pray not to go to that extreme.
