Page:Keil and Delitzsch,Biblical commentary the old testament the pentateuch, trad James Martin, volume 1, 1885.djvu/794

 that wrath; that is to say, from the punishment which his sin had deserved, as we may clearly see from Gen 32:20, and still more clearly from Exo 32:30. In the former case Jacob's object is to reconcile (כּפּר) the face of his brother Esau by means of a present, that is to say, to modify the wrath of his brother, which he has drawn upon himself by taking away the blessing of the first-born. In the latter, Moses endeavours by means of his intercession to expiate the sin of the people, over whom the wrath of God is about to burn to destroy them (Exo 32:9-10); in other words, to protect the people from the destruction which threatens them in consequence of the wrath of God (see also Num 17:11-12; Num 25:11-13). The power to make expiation, i.e., to cover an unholy man from before the holy God, or to cover the sinner from the wrath of God, is attributed to the blood of the sacrificial animal, only so far as the soul lives in the blood, and the soul of the animal when sacrificed takes the place of the human soul. This substitution is no doubt incongruous, since the animal and man differ essentially the one from the other; inasmuch as the animal follows an involuntary instinct, and its soul being constrained by the necessities of its nature is not accountable, and it is only in this respect that it can be regarded as sinless; whilst man, on the contrary, is endowed with freedom of will, and his soul, by virtue of the indwelling of his spirit, is not only capable of accountability, but can contract both sin and guilt. When God, therefore, said, “I have given it to you upon the altar to make atonement for your souls” (Lev 17:11), and thus attributed to the blood of the sacrificial animals a significance which it could not naturally possess; this was done in anticipation of the true and perfect sacrifice which Christ, the Son of man and God, would offer in the fulness of time through the holy and eternal Spirit, for the reconciliation of the whole world (Heb 9:14). This secret of the unfathomable love of the triune God was hidden from the Israelites in the law, but it formed the real background for the divine sanction of the animal sacrifices, whereby they acquired a typical signification, so that they set forth in shadow that reconciliation, which God from all eternity had determined to effect by giving up His only-begotten Son to death, as a sacrifice for the sin of the whole world. But however firmly the truth is established that the blood of