Echoes of the Most Holy

The Levitical Day of Atonement was a day of penitence, confession, and judgment for Israelites of loyal character and a day of covenant renewal for the nation of Israel. On this day, sin was removed from the tabernacle through the application of sacrificial blood to its altars and compartments, as well as by the dismissal of the goat for Azazel, which carried all the community's sin to a barren land. As it became ingrained in the veil of Jewish consciousness, the Day of Atonement underwent a process of abstraction over many centuries leading up to Second Temple times, when the Most Holy Place lay devoid of the ark of the covenant and its mercy seat. Continuing to reverberate in the Jewish imaginaire, the Day of Atonement was received by the authors of the New Testament, including John of Patmos, to whom its sacrificial typology provided irresistible motifs which they used to proclaim the Christ event. By utilizing a coherent intertextual approach, this book explores how John wove the Day of Atonement into the colorful literary tapestry of Revelation.