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Blood, Life, and Atonement: Reassessing Hebrews’ Christological Appropriation of Yom Kippur*

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Blood, Life, and Atonement: Reassessing Hebrews’ Christological Appropriation of Yom Kippur* BLOOD, LIFE, AND ATONEMENT: REASSESSING HEBREWS’ CHRISTOLOGICAL APPROPRIATION OF YOM KIPPUR* David M. Moffitt I. Introduction The recent work of several Hebrew Bible scholars on the ways that blood sacrifice functioned has highlighted the importance of the ritual manip- ulation of blood over the act of slaughtering the victim as the primary means for atonement prescribed by the Mosaic Law (e.g., Eberhart ; Janowski ; Milgrom , esp. –; Willi-Plein ). Some scholars have tried to apply this understanding of purification to the book of Hebrews (most notably Eberhart ), and indeed, no other New Tes- tament text contains such a detailed and consistent application of cultic, sacrificial language to Jesus. I contend in this article that Hebrews’ appeal to Yom Kippur needs to be understood in terms of the author’s emphasis on the post-crucifixion life of Jesus. To put the issue more bluntly, I argue that Jesus’ death on the cross is not the place or the primary means of atonement for the author of Hebrews.1 Rather, when the writer claims in : that Jesus can only serve * Versions of this essay have been presented at various conferences and colloquia. I am grateful for all the critical feedback I have received. 1 Jesus’ death on the cross is almost universally assumed to be the place where atonement occurs in Hebrews. See, e.g., Harold Attridge who explains that in Heb – the writer interprets Jesus’ death ‘as a sacrifice that effectively atones for sins,’ adding that ‘[t]he complex exposition [of Heb –] will indicate how it is that Christ’s death accomplishes [atonement]’ (Attridge , ). Paul Ellingworth comments, ‘The significance of the cross is essentially Christ’s once-for-all self-offering in obedience to the will of God; yet that significance can clearly not stand apart from the crucifixion itself’ (Ellingworth , ). William L. Lane also states, ‘In the sacrifice of his body on the cross, Jesus freely and fully made the will of God his own. Consequently, his sacrifice embodied the totality of obedience . Because Jesus embraced the will ofGod in solidarity with the human family, the writer of Hebrews deduced, the new people of God have been consecrated to the service of God’ (Lane a, cxxxiv). He later adds, ‘The perfection of the new priest is exhibited and is fully accomplished in the offering of himself once for all as the sufficient sacrifice for the transgressions of the people. His david m. moffitt as a high priest in heaven, he intends to say that the great redemptive moment of the Christ event occurred not when Jesus was crucified, but after he was resurrected and ascended into heaven. There he presented himself alive and incorruptible before God. Just as Yom Kippur does not focus on the slaughter of the victim, but the presentation of its blood— that is, its life—before God, so also the author of Hebrews thinks in terms of the presentation of Jesus’ indestructible life before God as the central act that effects atonement. The thesis just presented is likely to trigger a number of critical ques- tions. I cannot address all the possible objections in this brief essay. I focus instead on three of the main problems a thesis like this encoun- ters in contemporary Hebrews’ commentary. These are as follows: ) the assumption that the cross/death of Jesus is the center of atonement in Hebrews, ) the general opinion that the author of Hebrews does not consider Jesus’ resurrection to be a discrete event that contributes to the Christology and soteriology developed in the epistle, and ) that Yom Kippur has two key moments—the slaughter of the victims in the court of the sanctuary and the presentation of their blood in the inner sanctum—that the author correlates with the Christological and soteri- ological agenda of his epistle. I turn, then, to a brief discussion of these points. II. The Two Great Moments of Yom Kippur and Jesus’ Blood in Hebrews The importance of Yom Kippur as a source for the soteriological and Christological reflection of the author of Hebrews goes almost without saying. Jesus’ priestly service and blood offering are both depicted in terms of and contrasted with those of the high priest who enters the holy of holies once a year on the Day of Atonement.2 It has become commonplace in Hebrews scholarship to assume that the author maps own sinlessness . required of him no sin offering and assured the unconditional efficacy of his atoning death’ (Lane a, ). Barnabas Lindars writes, ‘The argument for the permanent efficacy of Christ’s sacrificial death is a major contribution [of Hebrews] to the theology of the New Testament. Hebrews alone tackles the subject [of Jesus’ death as a sacrifice] comprehensively and systematically, so as to show not only how it canbe claimed that the death of Christ was a sacrifice for sins in general, but also how its effect is continually operative’ (Lindars , ). 2 See e.g., :, –. Hebrews draws on other sacrificial imagery in addition to Yom Kippur (e.g., :), but the blood offering on Yom Kippur is the dominant motif..
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