logically it is our own blood that should be shed to pay off our sin. why is it necessary to hack innocent animals then? ----------- Akgo01, That is a good point you make, we all deserve to die because we all sin. And this is where the term scapegoat derives. As early as the sixteenth century before our Common Era, it was revealed for the first time that someone would serve as a scapegoat for the entire race of mankind. In the code of laws that was given to the nation of Israel through Moses at Mount Sinai in 1513 B.C.E., Jehovah God made provision for the Israelites to hold a solemn Day of Atonement on the tenth day of the seventh lunar month (Tishri) each year. In connection with the atonement for sins that was made through the blood of a bull and a goat, which was taken into the Most Holy of the tabernacle and sprinkled before the golden ark of God’s covenant, there was a goat that was made a scapegoat. How this goat was determined upon and what was done with it is described for us in chapter sixteen of the third book of Moses, in the following way: And [Aaron] shall take of the congregation of the children of Israel two kids of the goats for a sin offering, and one ram for a burnt offering. And Aaron shall offer his bullock of the sin offering, which is for himself, and make an atonement for himself, and for his house. And he shall take the two goats, and present them before the LORD at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation. And Aaron shall cast lots upon the two goats; one lot for the LORD, and the other lot for the scapegoat. And Aaron shall bring the goat upon which the LORD’S lot fell, and offer him for a sin offering. But the goat, on which the lot fell to be the scapegoat, shall be presented alive before the LORD, to make an atonement with him, and to let him go for a scapegoat into the wilderness. And when he hath made an end of reconciling the holy place, and the tabernacle of the congregation, and the altar, he shall bring the live goat: And Aaron shall lay both his hands upon the head of the live goat, and confess over him all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their transgressions in all their sins, putting them upon the head of the goat, and shall send him away by the hand of a fit man into the wilderness: 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.—Leviticus 16:5-10, 20-22, Authorized Version. Now this goat, which was a feature of the annual Atonement Day of ancient Israel, had a typical significance. It typified something good to come for mankind. In Hebrews 10:1 it is written: “The Law has a shadow of the good things to come.” And, speaking about the sacrificial victims of the Atonement Day, Hebrews 13:11-14 says: “The bodies of those animals whose blood is taken into the holy place by the high priest for sin are burned up outside the camp. Hence Jesus also, that he might sanctify the people with his own blood, suffered outside the gate. Let us, then, go forth to him outside the camp, bearing the reproach he bore, for we do not have here a city that continues.” According to Isaiah’s prophecy, chapter fifty-three, Jehovah’s “Servant” is the sin-bearer who was typified by the scapegoat of the Atonement Day that continued being observed at Jehovah’s temple until the destruction of the city of Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 C.E. That the Messianic “Servant” was to serve as the antitypical “scapegoat,” the prophet Isaiah proceeds to show, saying: “Truly our sicknesses were what he himself carried; and as for our pains, he bore them. But we ourselves accounted him as plagued, stricken by God and afflicted. But he was being pierced for our transgression; he was being crushed for our errors. The chastisement meant for our peace was upon him, and because of his wounds there has been a healing for us.”—Isaiah 53:4, 5. So the 'innocent animals' being substituted for guilty men served as a "tutor leading to Christ" Galatians 3:24, someone who was truly innocent.
