Leviticus 16:11 MEANING



Leviticus 16:11
(11) And Aaron shall bring the bullock.--Having formally dedicated the bullock for his own sin offering (see Leviticus 16:6), and after the two goats which constituted the people's sin offering had been presented and their lots decided (Leviticus 16:7-10), Aaron comes back to his own sin offering a second time. He again laid both his hands on the victim and repeated the confession for himself, for his house, and for the whole priesthood, as given in Leviticus 16:6.

And shall make an atonement for himself.--His own sins had first to be expiated before he could offer the atoning sacrifices for the people. (Comp. Hebrews 5:3; Hebrews 9:7.)

And shall kill the bullock.--Being a sacrifice offered up for himself the high priest, like any layman, had to slaughter the victim, and could not delegate this work to anyone else. (See Leviticus 1:5.) He received the blood in the sprinkling bowl, which he handed over to a priest to stir the blood lest it should coagulate while he performed the fumigation.

Verse 11. - After having offered the bullock for his own sin offering, and presented the two goats, which constituted the sin offering of the people, and offered one of them, Aaron kills the bullock for the sin offering. A considerable interval had to elapse before he could make use of the bullock's blood for purposes of propitiation, and during this interval, occupied by his entrance into the holy of holies with the incense, the blood was held by an attendant, probably by one of his sons, and prevented from coagulating by being kept in motion.

16:1-14 Without entering into particulars of the sacrifices on the great day of atonement, we may notice that it was to be a statute for ever, till that dispensation be at an end. As long as we are continually sinning, we continually need the atonement. The law of afflicting our souls for sin, is a statue which will continue in force till we arrive where all tears, even those of repentance, will be wiped from our eyes. The apostle observes it as a proof that the sacrifices could not take away sin, and cleanse the conscience from it, that in them there was a remembrance made of sin every year, upon the day of atonement, Heb 10:1,3. The repeating the sacrifices, showed there was in them but a feeble effort toward making atonement; this could be done only by offering up the body of Christ once for all; and that sacrifice needed not to be repeated.And Aaron shall bring the bullock of the sin offering which is for himself,.... In the same manner, and is to be understood in the same sense as in Leviticus 16:6,

and shall make atonement for himself and for his house: by a confession of words, as the Targum of Jonathan adds, and which Jarchi calls the second confession; for the same was made, and in the same words as before; see Gill on Leviticus 16:6,

and shall kill the bullock of the sin offering which is for himself; which was a type of Christ; the creature itself was, being strong for labour, and patient in bearing the yoke; Christ had a laborious service to perform, the work of man's redemption, and he was strong for it, able to go through it, and did not only readily take upon him the yoke of the law, and became obedient to every command of his divine Father, but even to death itself, the death of the cross; the kind of sacrifice was a sin offering, and such Christ in soul and body was made for his people; in order to which, as this sacrifice, he was put to death, the use of which was, to atone for all the sins of his mystical self, his body, the church; for all his family, his children, the priests of the Lord.

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