The article on "The Day of Atonement" in help and food for March, 1909, is interesting. While the view suggested is not new, its presentation invites a re-consideration of the great Levitical type.

The article tells us " there are various and distinct actions on the part of the priest " noted in Leviticus 1 6, and that "it required them all to set forth the one truth of Atonement and what was necessary to make it." Four things are then distinguished :(1) the killing of the bullock by the priest; (2) the priest's entrance into the holiest with sweet incense; (3) the priest's entrance with blood; and (4) the priest's confession of the people's sins on the scapegoat.

One might suppose that the first three things simply present three aspects of the one sacrificial work. But in the article they are placed in contrast. "The priest kills the bullock . . . Though the blood is not presented, death has taken place . . . But notice again, before we can have the work of Christ to present to God, we must have His person, and so we find Aaron fills his hands full of sweet incense." Again:"In the incense we have typified the excellencies and perfections of the person of Christ . . . The cloud of incense covers the mercy seat. God surrounds Himself with the perfections of Christ's person . . . He looks at the priest as it were through that cloud, although no blood is taken in as yet . . . Jesus needed no blood to give Him title to be there . . . The next thing we notice is, the priest comes and takes of the blood of the bullock and carries it in before God. Having got the Person, he can now present the Work." If I read Leviticus 16 aright, the incense and the bullock's blood were carried into the holiest at the same time, and not on two separate journeys. Therefore, even assuming that the incense represents the person, and the blood the work, the person and the work were presented together.

As a matter of fact, however, does not each of these three things-the slain bullock, the burning incense, and the blood-represent both the person and the work? Does not the bullock assuredly typify Christ's person ? and the shedding of its blood for guilt of others picture His sacrifice? The strong but docile yearling, led to the slaughter, figures Christ, a passive victim, taken in judgment. The slaying of. the animal by the high-priest represents Christ in priestly activity, Offerer as well as offering, Himself putting sin away by the sacrifice of Himself. The bullock's death under God's command portrays sacrifice under divine judgment. The innocent creature suffering vicariously for a sinful people, sets forth substitution-the Just smitten for the unjust. All these aspects of Christ's person and work are typified in the bullock and his death.

Now the blood, afterwards to be presented, is simply that which here is shed in taking the bullock's life. Whatever may subsequently be done with it, the blood itself is but a symbol, representing the bullock slain, witnessing that its life has been offered in sacrifice.

Blood, as such, is virtueless. "Without shedding of blood there is no remission; " but uncommanded blood-shedding is an abomination. Scripture nowhere presents a doctrine of " propitiation by blood" merely. There was, indeed, a flesh-purifying propitiation by blood of bulls and goats; there now is a conscience-purging propitiation by the blood of Christ; but in each case the virtue lies in the sacrifice, which the blood but symbolizes.

Apply this principle to Leviticus 16. Instantly we realize that the bullock's blood is but the symbolical representation, brought within the sanctuary, of the sacrifice offered outside. If the priest enters by virtue of the blood, he enters by virtue of the sacrifice. If he enters to present the blood, it is the sacrifice itself which he presents-symbolically.

Is not this precisely what we find in Leviticus 16:3? "Thus shall Aaron come into the sanctuary:with a young bullock for a sin-offering, and a ram for a burnt-offering." How shall he enter? Not with blood, not with incense, but with a bullock and a ram, a sin-offering and a burnt-offering! Thus the type interprets itself. Aaron must approach with a sin-offering. How does he do this ? By entering with the sin-offering's symbolical representation-its shed blood. In carrying the blood, symbolically he carries the sacrifice; in sprinkling the blood, symbolically he applies the sacrifice.

But he was to enter with a burnt-offering also. The ram is not taken in literally, any more than is the bullock; nor can it be, for the entire ram is offered by fire on the brazen altar outside, just as the fat of the bullock is consumed there, and the rest of its carcase burned beyond the camp. In the ram's case as in the bullock's, therefore, the Lord's command, to bring the sacrifice into the sanctuary, Aaron can obey only by filling his hands with its symbolical representation.

Again the type interprets itself. The priest is to enter with two things, the sin-offering and the burnt-offering. He enters, and the two things he carries are the sweet incense and the bullock's blood. If the blood certainly represents the sin-offering, from which it has been drawn, the incense, the only other thing taken in, unmistakably represents the burnt-offering.

Incidentally, these conclusions warn us that in its order of procedure the type departs widely from the chronology of actual events in the work of Christ. For example, in the Levitical ritual the priest enters the sanctuary with the symbolical representations of the sin-offering and burnt-offering before the ram is really slain, and before the burning of the bullock's body, figuring the visitation of divine wrath upon Christ, has taken place outside the camp. Moreover, it is notorious that in all these typical sacrifices the infliction of the governmental penalty of death precedes the action of fire upon the victim, whereas at the cross death came afterward, when fell the infinite horror poured out for us in making Christ a curse had spent itself upon our adorable Lord.

Do these differences in type and anti-type suggest that the typical order is barren of significance and may be neglected ? Do they not rather urge us diligently to seek a fulness of meaning more broad and deep than lies in any mere detail of procedure in the great work of Christ? Leaving these and other features for another time, if God will, let us pause to gather some of the sweetness of the things before us.

The typical high priest was to "come into the sanctuary with … a sin-offering and … a burnt-offering." And so "within the veil . . . the Forerunner is for us entered, Jesus, made an high priest for ever after the order of Melchisedek" (Heb. 6:19, 20). " We have such an High Priest, who set Himself down on the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens, a Minister of the holy places and of the tabernacle which the Lord pitched-not man " (Heb. 8:i, 2). Moreover, "every priest is ordained to offer gifts and sacrifices; wherefore it is needful that this One should have somewhat also to offer " (Heb. 8:3). Now "into the first tabernacle the priests enter at all times, . . . but into the second the high priest only, once a year, not without blood, which he offers for himself and for the errors of the people . . . But Christ, being come high priest of the good things to come, by the better and more perfect tabernacle not made with hand, that is, not of this creation, nor by blood of goats and calves, but by His own blood, has entered in, once for all, into the holies, having found an eternal redemption" (Heb. 9; 6, 7, 11, 12). "Almost all things, by the law, are purged with blood It was therefore necessary that the figurative representations of the things in the heavens should be purified by these, but the heavenly things themselves with sacrifices better than these. For the Christ is not entered into holy places made with hand, figures of the true, but into heaven itself, now to appear before the face of God for us; nor yet that He should offer Himself often, as the high priest enters the holy places every year, with blood not his own, since then He had been obliged often to suffer, from the foundation of the world; but now, once, in the consummation of the ages, He has been manifested for the putting away of sin by the sacrifice of Himself; and since it is the portion of men once to die, and after this judgment, so Christ also was once offered to bear the sins of the many; and unto them that look for Him He shall appear the second time, apart from sin, unto salvation " (Heb. 9:22-28).

This, the perfect, the God-breathed interpretation of what is before us, illuminates the type by measureless contrasts as well as by eloquent likenesses. No mysterious going into the sanctuary and out again, in the disembodied state, can be depicted in such language, but rather the triumphal, public and official passage through the heavens of our risen Lord, "once;" having first, in resurrection, been saluted of God a Priest, eternal, unchangeable, after the order of Melchizedek.

Aaron passed in momentarily, and passed out again. Our High Priest entered heaven itself, "once for all," at His ascension; forty days after His resurrection; and in heaven He abides, and shall until His glorious second advent to bring complete salvation to His expectant saints. In the one brief moment of approach, Aaron stood before the mercy-seat. Our great Priest entering, seated Himself on the right hand of the Greatness in the heavens, taking eternal possession as the rightful priestly minister of the holy places and the tabernacle.

Indeed, this reenthronement of God's Son, His sacrificial work accomplished, is the grand theme of the epistle to the Hebrews. Creator, Preserver, Heir of all, as we learn from the epistle's introduction, He, having bent down from the seat of Omnipotence to the depths of the curse to purge and redeem creation, forever resumed His place as God upon the throne of God. "Who, . . . having by Himself purged our sins, set Himself down on the right hand of the Greatness on high " (Heb. i:3).

Returning to our main point, we have seen that in the blood and incense carried into the holy places the sacrifices themselves were symbolically presented. Hence if Christ entered the holies once for all, "by," or "in virtue of," His own blood (Heb. 9:12), it was really by, or in virtue of, His sacrifice. This we fully understand since He entered not for Himself, but "to appear before the face of God for us."

Is this not abundantly confirmed by the interpreting epistle ? In one place we have the divine argument that since it is the function of every high priest to offer sacrifice, it was needful for our Melchizedek-Priest also to have such to offer (Heb. 8:3). It follows therefore that what our Priest presented to God was not blood, but sacrifice. It was necessary, we read again, that figurative things should be purified by "blood" of goats and calves, but the heavenly things themselves with-" better blood " ? No, but with " better sacrifices " (Heb. 9:23).
Is this not overwhelmingly conclusive ? Can we doubt that the typical making of atonement for the sanctuary, in which the priest sprinkled symbolical blood of slain goats and bullocks, was by Christ fulfilled, not by any literal or mystical presentation of His blood (which, though His, would still be only a symbol), but by the presentation unto God of His entire sacrificial work, in all its infinite efficacy and glorious entirety ?

In the type no one can question the touching suitability of the victim's blood to symbolize the sacrifice. "The life of the flesh is in the blood" (Lev. 17:11), and in shed blood we see life relinquished, life poured out-a sacrifice. So in Scripture the "blood of Christ" ever is the touching symbolism of the life and soul of Christ poured out to make atonement, an emblem of His complete sacrifice, in the fulness of its value. Nor can we fail to see in Heb. 9 the anti-typical presentation of the sin-offering within the sanctuary in the entering in of Christ, "by His own blood," to purify the heavenly things by His "better sacrifice." Do we also find in Hebrews the presentation of the burnt-offering ?

While the sin-offering could put away an Israelite's particular sins, sins of ignorance, the "errors of the people" (Heb. 9:7), the burnt-offering alone availed for the "acceptance" of a sinner's person (Lev. 1:3, where '' of his own voluntary will" should read, "for his acceptance"). Indeed, the burnt-offering combined in one the sin-, trespass-, peace-and meal-offerings, expressing the perfect execution in sacrifice of the whole will of God. How suited, therefore, is the sweet incense of the type to symbolize this fragrant holocaust, the perpetual going up to God of "sweet-smelling savor," an "odor of rest," in place of sin's dishonoring stench!

By itself, no doubt, the incense figures the preciousness of Christ's person. But in the type we have person and work, or the person in His work, Christ sacrificially offered without spot to God; for the priest presents not incense merely, but incense laid upon burning coals from the altar of burnt-offering-a fire which only draws forth the utmost strength of sweetness, filling the whole house with a cloud of fragrance.

The article we review itself interprets the incense as "the excellences and perfections of the person of Christ, brought out in all their sweetness and preciousness by the action of fire-judgment." But is this the Person, in contrast with His work ? Christ under the action of fire-judgment ? What is this but Christ sacrificed-the work itself ? It is, indeed, the Sacrifice, in the fulness of its efficacy to atone for sin, sweet with infinite preciousness of the person and character of God's Son, redolent of the perfumes of His ardent love, His devotion to God's will, His touching consecration unto death and woe unfathomable-God's perpetual glory, His delight, and His eternal rest!

But does Hebrews interpret for us the priestly entrance into the holiest with this fragrant offering? It does. "He saith, sacrifice and offering Thou wouldst not, but a body hast Thou prepared Me. . . . Then said I, Lo, I come (in the volume of the book it is written of Me) to do Thy will, O God. . By the which will we have been sanctified by the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. And every priest standeth ministering daily, and offering often the same sacrifices. . . . But this One, having offered one sacrifice for sins, set Himself down in perpetuity at the right hand of God, from henceforth waiting till His enemies be made His footstool. For by one offering He has perfected, in perpetuity, the sanctified" (Heb. 10:5, 7, 10-13).
We reach the climax in one transcendent contrast between the Antitype and its infirm figure. Aaron, commanded to enter in with sin-offering and burnt-offering, could approach only with symbolical representations. But Christ, entering heaven for us, literally carried in His mighty sacrifice-sin-offering and burnt-offering in one!

In His Person all types converge. He Himself is priest and sacrifice, sin-offering, burnt-offering, bullock, goat, and ram. The God of resurrection, therefore, when He raised Christ from the grave, brought up from death and judgment Priest and Victim, Offerer and Offering; and Christ, when He appeared before God's face for us, presented both in His own person-Himself our priest, Himself our sacrifice. Yea, rather, seating Himself beside the Eternal, He began to minister gifts to men on the basis of the sacrifice-Himself, seated there!

This is not propitiation by blood, but propitiation by sacrifice-propitiation by the Person who is the sacrifice. And is it not the explicit doctrine of Scripture ? " Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son, a propitiation for our sins " (i John 4:10). The Person is the propitiation. And are we not again expressly taught to gaze with faith-lit eyes upon the Propitiation for our sins, living, exalted, enthroned in the highest ? "My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any one sin, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and He Himself (αυτoς) is a propitiation for our sins:and not for our sins only, but also for the whole cosmos" (i John 2:1, 2, Greek)

What a doctrine to hang one's soul upon! The holy Sacrifice for our sins, lifted by our mighty Priest up to God's throne for God's acceptance, there, in all its infinite preciousness and power, everlastingly to abide, eternally efficacious! Gloriously, thus, we see the sin-offering presented in the holiest. What of the burnt-offering ?

Recall the lambs of the morning and evening sacrifice, yielding perpetual sweetness day and night, "day by day continually" (Ex. 29:38-46); then lift the eyes to heaven's "continual burnt-offering":" Lo, in the midst of the throne, . . . and in the midst of the elders, a Lamb as it had been slain " (Rev. 5:6)-filling God's halls with fragrance, God's heart with sweet delight, and the wondering soul of saint and angel with paeans of worshipful rapture! F. Allaben

(To be continued.)