Meditate

16. The Day of Atonement

The Day of Atonement

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The Lord spoke to Moses after the death of the two sons of Aaron, when they drew near before the Lord and died.²The Lord said to Moses:

Tell your brother Aaron not to come just at any time into the sanctuary inside the curtain before the mercy seat that is upon the ark, or he will die; for I appear in the cloud upon the mercy seat.³Thus shall Aaron come into the holy place: with a young bull for a sin offering and a ram for a burnt offering.⁴He shall put on the holy linen tunic, and shall have the linen undergarments next to his body, fasten the linen sash, and wear the linen turban; these are the holy vestments. He shall bathe his body in water, and then put them on.⁵He shall take from the congregation of the people of Israel two male goats for a sin offering, and one ram for a burnt offering.

⁶ Aaron shall offer the bull as a sin offering for himself, and shall make atonement for himself and for his house.⁷He shall take the two goats and set them before the Lord at the entrance of the tent of meeting;⁸and Aaron shall cast lots on the two goats, one lot for the Lord and the other lot for Azazel.⁹Aaron shall present the goat on which the lot fell for the Lord, and offer it as a sin offering;¹⁰but the goat on which the lot fell for Azazel shall be presented alive before the Lord to make atonement over it, that it may be sent away into the wilderness to Azazel.

¹¹ Aaron shall present the bull as a sin offering for himself, and shall make atonement for himself and for his house; he shall slaughter the bull as a sin offering for himself.¹²He shall take a censer full of coals of fire from the altar before the Lord, and two handfuls of crushed sweet incense, and he shall bring it inside the curtain¹³and put the incense on the fire before the Lord, that the cloud of the incense may cover the mercy seat that is upon the covenant, or he will die.¹⁴He shall take some of the blood of the bull, and sprinkle it with his finger on the front of the mercy seat, and before the mercy seat he shall sprinkle the blood with his finger seven times.

¹⁵ He shall slaughter the goat of the sin offering that is for the people and bring its blood inside the curtain, and do with its blood as he did with the blood of the bull, sprinkling it upon the mercy seat and before the mercy seat.¹⁶Thus he shall make atonement for the sanctuary, because of the uncleannesses of the people of Israel, and because of their transgressions, all their sins; and so he shall do for the tent of meeting, which remains with them in the midst of their uncleannesses.¹⁷No one shall be in the tent of meeting from the time he enters to make atonement in the sanctuary until he comes out and has made atonement for himself and for his house and for all the assembly of Israel.¹⁸Then he shall go out to the altar that is before the Lord and make atonement on its behalf, and shall take some of the blood of the bull and of the blood of the goat, and put it on each of the horns of the altar.¹⁹He shall sprinkle some of the blood on it with his finger seven times, and cleanse it and hallow it from the uncleannesses of the people of Israel.

²⁰ When he has finished atoning for the holy place and the tent of meeting and the altar, he shall present the live goat.²¹Then Aaron shall lay both his hands on the head of the live goat, and confess over it all the iniquities of the people of Israel, and all their transgressions, all their sins, putting them on the head of the goat, and sending it away into the wilderness by means of someone designated for the task.²²The goat shall bear on itself all their iniquities to a barren region; and the goat shall be set free in the wilderness.

²³ Then Aaron shall enter the tent of meeting, and shall take off the linen vestments that he put on when he went into the holy place, and shall leave them there.²⁴He shall bathe his body in water in a holy place, and put on his vestments; then he shall come out and offer his burnt offering and the burnt offering of the people, making atonement for himself and for the people.²⁵The fat of the sin offering he shall turn into smoke on the altar.²⁶The one who sets the goat free for Azazel shall wash his clothes and bathe his body in water, and afterward may come into the camp.²⁷The bull of the sin offering and the goat of the sin offering, whose blood was brought in to make atonement in the holy place, shall be taken outside the camp; their skin and their flesh and their dung shall be consumed in fire.²⁸The one who burns them shall wash his clothes and bathe his body in water, and afterward may come into the camp.

²⁹ This shall be a statute to you forever: In the seventh month, on the tenth day of the month, you shall deny yourselves, and shall do no work, neither the citizen nor the alien who resides among you.³⁰For on this day atonement shall be made for you, to cleanse you; from all your sins you shall be clean before the Lord.³¹It is a sabbath of complete rest to you, and you shall deny yourselves; it is a statute forever.³²The priest who is anointed and consecrated as priest in his father’s place shall make atonement, wearing the linen vestments, the holy vestments.³³He shall make atonement for the sanctuary, and he shall make atonement for the tent of meeting and for the altar, and he shall make atonement for the priests and for all the people of the assembly.³⁴This shall be an everlasting statute for you, to make atonement for the people of Israel once in the year for all their sins. And Moses did as the Lord had commanded him.

7. Sexual Immorality and Marriage

Directions concerning Marriage

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Now concerning the matters about which you wrote: “It is well for a man not to touch a woman.”²But because of cases of sexual immorality, each man should have his own wife and each woman her own husband.³The husband should give to his wife her conjugal rights, and likewise the wife to her husband.⁴For the wife does not have authority over her own body, but the husband does; likewise the husband does not have authority over his own body, but the wife does.⁵Do not deprive one another except perhaps by agreement for a set time, to devote yourselves to prayer, and then come together again, so that Satan may not tempt you because of your lack of self-control.⁶This I say by way of concession, not of command.⁷I wish that all were as I myself am. But each has a particular gift from God, one having one kind and another a different kind.

106. Psalm 106

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They were jealous of Moses in the camp,

and of Aaron, the holy one of the Lord.

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The earth opened and swallowed up Dathan,

and covered the faction of Abiram.

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Fire also broke out in their company;

the flame burned up the wicked.

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They made a calf at Horeb

and worshiped a cast image.

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They exchanged the glory of God

for the image of an ox that eats grass.

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They forgot God, their Savior,

who had done great things in Egypt,

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wondrous works in the land of Ham,

and awesome deeds by the Red Sea.

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Therefore he said he would destroy them—

had not Moses, his chosen one,

stood in the breach before him,

to turn away his wrath from destroying them.

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Then they despised the pleasant land,

having no faith in his promise.

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They grumbled in their tents,

and did not obey the voice of the Lord.

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Therefore he raised his hand and swore to them

that he would make them fall in the wilderness,

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and would disperse their descendants among the nations,

scattering them over the lands.

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Then they attached themselves to the Baal of Peor,

and ate sacrifices offered to the dead;

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they provoked the Lord to anger with their deeds,

and a plague broke out among them.

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Then Phinehas stood up and interceded,

and the plague was stopped.

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And that has been reckoned to him as righteousness

from generation to generation forever.

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They angered the Lord at the waters of Meribah,

and it went ill with Moses on their account;

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for they made his spirit bitter,

and he spoke words that were rash.