How can the sacrifice of one animal atone for many? [closed]

Question

It is often thought that the fundamental principle of atonement is "life for life."

In Lev. 6:2, if an individual sinned, he would bring a "trespass offering to YHVH" (Lev. 6:6), and the kohen would make atonement for him before YHVH (Lev. 6:7).

The individual sinned. He brought an offering. The offering was slaughtered and offered upon the altar. The life of the animal was a substitute for the life of the sinner. The sinner had to bring the offering to the kohen for his own sin; he could not bring an offering for another's sin.

In contemplating atonement, I thought about the life of the animal being a substitute or atonement for the life of the man offering it. Yet, it is written (Lev. 16:33 KJV),

"And he shall make an atonement for the holy sanctuary, and he shall make an atonement for the tabernacle of the congregation, and for the altar, and he shall make an atonement for the priests, and for all the people of the congregation."

In that verse, maybe one or two animals were offered, yet it says that atonement was made for "...all the people of the congregation." If the principle of life for life applied, there would need to be hundreds of thousands of animals slaughtered on Yom Kippur. Yet, we only see one or two.

How is it that this paucity of animals can atone for an entire nation of people?

Answer 1

The question is a good one, but some of the underlying suppositions need to be challenged in order to answer it.

The Sacrifice of an Animal Cannot Atone For One Man

In Leviticus 6, the animal's life is not enough to atone for the man's life. In some of the in-between verses which the question does not directly reference (4 and 5), the man must make retribution for what he has done to the humans he has sinned against:

If he has sinned and has realized his guilt and will restore what he took by robbery or what he got by oppression or the deposit that was committed to him or the lost thing that he found or anything about which he has sworn falsely, he shall restore it in full and shall add a fifth to it, and give it to him to whom it belongs on the day he realizes his guilt. (ESV)

Not only does he need to bring an animal sacrifice; he must also more than restore the damages he caused. This indicates that the animal sacrifice itself is not enough.

But further, if the man were to sin thus again, the life of the former animal already taken does not atone for this his new crime; he must sacrifice again. This indicates that the life of the animal is at best a partial atonement for only one sin.

The Sacrifice of an Animal Cannot Atone for One Sin

However, if the sacrifice of the animal atoned even partly for one sin, then why do we find in the prophets that God is so angry with the people that he tells them to stop sacrificing entirely—says that their sacrifices and incense and festivals are abominable to him?

"What makes you think I want all your sacrifices?" says the Lord.
"I am sick of your burnt offerings of rams
and the fat of fattened cattle.
I get no pleasure from the blood
of bulls and lambs and goats." (Isaiah 1:11, NLT)

It is not a good sign for the atoning power of the life of an animal if that sacrifice itself can become abominable to him by the weight of sin. Note that this is not a complaint that the people have continued sinning but not brought sacrifice—it is a complaint that they have continued sinning and have brought sacrifice! And as it is, he sees them as entirely unclean.

The Sacrifice of Many Animals Cannot Atone For Many People

Indeed, read any of the prophets; the wrath of God was hot against Israel, even when she brought him many sacrifices. Only two animals were sacrificed on Yom Kippur?—but how many of those days occurred during the lifetime of a man? Those animals also did not atone for the nation, or they would not have to be offered year after year. Moreover, rather than seeing this as a small number of animals atoning for a large number of people, remember that Yom Kippur did not cancel out the sacrifices required by Leviticus 6—another words, on this particular day, a small number of animals were sacrificed; but that did not save the lives of the thousands upon thousands of other animals who still had to be sacrificed day after day.

So how can the sacrifice of one animal atone for many? It cannot.

The Sacrifice of Animals Can Symbolize Atonement

But wait—the law of Moshe still talks about atonement. So what's going on here? David says that God does not desire sacrifice, but a broken spirit—and yet, he does command sacrifice for atonement in the law.

Animals atoned by type—by teaching a sacrificial principle. They atoned by way of shadow; signposts to some other atonement. They taught both by their native symbolism, and by their inadequacy. This is the only way we can harmonize the law and the prophets on this topic.

What is Symbolized?

Yes, "life for life" is the principle of God's immutable justice:

Show no pity: life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot. (Deuteronomy 19:21, NIV)

But that is a principle of match crime and punishment. But if the crime merits the death of a man, who does the death of a beast atone? That is hardly a match. However, by this principle, no mere man's life could atone for the whole people either, for that would be a mismatch of justice; for no man's life is worth more than another's—thus the matching principle: there is no respect of the lofty above the lowly in such a principle!

Atonement could only be found in someone whose life is supremely valuable, so that he could ransom the people of God—certainly not in animals, whether a small number or a great number.

Answer 2

There are some flawed assumptions in the question.

1. As Kazark said in his answer, an animal sacrifice, by itself, does not atone for a sin where you wronged another person. Per Lev. 6 (among other places), you must also make restitution. You probably also need to regret what you did (certainly true by the time of Maimonides in the 13th century; I think the roots are older).

2. Animal sacrifices are not limited to capital sins, so "life for life" can't always apply. Sin-offerings are owed for all sorts of things for which your life was never forfeit, even giving birth. The sin-offering is a fine, not a proxy.

So, the sacrifice of an animal, in combination with restitution and regret, confers atonement. Ok, one might ask, so what about the Yom Kippur sacrifices? Is this yet another step, or what? The answer, according to the rabbis of the talmud, is that the Yom Kippur sacrifice and atonement isn't connected to the sacrifice/atonement for other sins; Yom Kippur is to cover a specific set of transgressions done out of ignorance (Babylonian Talmud, Shevuot 2a, first mishna). Rashi says something similar on Lev 16:16.

You can't very well bring a sacrifice and atone for something you didn't know you did, so the Yom Kippur sacrifice covers that.

Also, we flawed human beings don't have a great track record; we get atonement and manage to go out and mess things up again, requiring further atonement. An act of atonement is for a particular transgression, not a one-time thing; if it were the latter, much of the book of Leviticus wouldn't need to be there. We have Yom Kippur once a year, not once a lifetime. Atonement is for something you already did; when you transgress again you have to atone again.

How can an offering atone for the sin of somebody other than the one who brought it? The communal offerings were paid for by the community, through the tithes paid to the priests, and thus everybody had a share in them. This is similar to the Pesach offering, where the text specifies "one lamb to a household" (Ex 12:3) and it covers everybody in the household. (I realize that the Pesach offering is not a sin-offering; I'm illustrating the "one covers many" principle.)

Finally, how can one animal make atonement for an entire community? I have no answer that is more satisfying than: because the text tells us it does, and according to the text this system is a divine commandment.