Leviticus 16 (selected verses)

Two goats. Aaron casts lots. One is for the Lord for a purification offering, and the other is for atonement. One will live, and one will die. But it won’t be much of a life – being all alone, far out in the barren wilderness. The scapegoat.

I wonder what percent of the general public would correctly state the origins of the scapegoat as being in the Bible, much less stating Old Testament or Leviticus. I suspect this would be a relatively small percentage.

We heard selected verses from Leviticus 16 read today, in which the Lord speaks to Moses and gives him instructions for Aaron about how to come into unity with God after all of Israel’s sins. And those instructions include getting a ram and two goats; the ram, which is to be slaughtered for a purification offering, doesn’t figure into our selected verses. But the goats sure do!

So, here they are… two male goats. Each of them relatively innocent, right? I mean, they’re just goats! They haven’t done anything. And yet, one of them will die, and the other will live, for whatever its life is worth, alone in a barren wilderness. And lots will be cast to decide their fate.

We live in a very different time, and it’s easy for us to get offended about animal abuse or the like. But recall that in the ancient world, the sacrifice of animals was quite common, as was the casting of lots.

So, what can these animals, these two male goats, tell us? What message is God trying to get across through them, specifically through the scapegoat?

First, let’s look at what will happen once the lot falls on the goat who will be the scapegoat. He will be presented, alive, to God. This is certainly a different fate than that which befell his colleague, the goat used for purification. The scapegoat, after being presented alive to God, then feels Aaron’s hands upon its head, confessing and symbolically laying upon its head all of the sins of the Israelites. Then, someone else takes the goat and leads it far, far into a barren, desolate wilderness before letting it go. The goat certainly wouldn’t know or understand this, but the action symbolically removes the people’s sin from them, removes it as far away as the East is from the West.

Lest we think that the goat itself, or Aaron, or Moses, was the one doing the atoning, we must recall who initiated the whole thing: God. In our human story, we are the ones walking away from God; we are the ones who choose our own paths over God’s paths, our ways over God’s ways. It is always God who comes toward us, offering reconciliation and unity. This entire thing is God’s idea, God’s plan for making everything whole again, God’s plan for atonement, or at-one-ment.

From the first moment that sin entered the creation story until this very moment, God has always been the pursuer – always seeking us – always wanting wholeness and peace for us.

But we like to think of ourselves as clever, and as reasonably good. We like to feel that sense of accomplishment when we have done something really well. We like to think of ourselves as just a little smarter than average. We don’t like to admit that we have made a mistake, have hurt someone, or just flat-out can’t do something. We like to do everything ourselves, and it’s super hard to ask for help. We just don’t like to admit defeat. And when something goes wrong, we say – or we want to say, “It’s not my fault!”

If we can blame someone else, we often do. That scapegoating serves to deflect attention from us and put it on the other, making us feel superior.

Scapegoating started almost immediately after sin was introduced into creation. Remember what Adam said, “The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit from the tree, and I ate.” Adam skillfully deflects blame from himself and blames not only the woman but God himself!

Adam tries to “save face,” to deflect blame. The fact is that he ate the fruit. But he feels the need to shore up his esteem by bringing someone else down.

If we’re being honest with ourselves, we can relate. Scapegoating – “it’s not my fault!” – is a way to explain failure or misdeeds while maintaining one’s own positive self-image.

Many of us – perhaps not all of us – have struggled or still struggle with perfectionism – the idea that we must not make a mistake, that we must automatically be able to do things perfectly.

We will often go to great lengths in order to avoid having anyone know that we have made a mistake, or that we don’t know how to do something.

Perfectionists are natural scapegoaters – it fits right in with our need to not be found out – our need for no one to ever know that we don’t know something – our need to never falter or make a mistake. Then, when we do make a mistake, we look for someone or something to blame: the scapegoat.

Ah yes, the scapegoat. What message from God does the little fellow have for us?

The scapegoat – sent into the wilderness bearing everyone’s sins – says to us that God is removing our sin from us, as far as the East is from the West. God sees our sins no more.

The people of Israel performed this rite of atonement once per year.

But Jesus has performed it once for all. Our sins were laid on him as he died on the cross, descended to Hell, and rose again. The atonement, the at-one-ment, has been done once for all. We are put in right relationship with God through Christ’s death and resurrection, once for all.

The challenge now is to live into that reality. The challenge now is to own our own mistakes, ask forgiveness, and grow from them, rather than finding a scapegoat, someone to blame.

The challenge now is to be more ready to share God’s reconciling love in Christ than we are to find differences between ourselves and others.

Are you up for the challenge?
May we say, “Yes, and I ask God to help me.”
Amen.