By Water & Blood

Questions on Exodus 61: Why the priests lay hands on the victims

Why did the priests, laying their hands on the sacrificial victims, then sacrifice them in this way?

Not on all the victims, but on those offered for themselves, and especially on those for sin. On the others the offerers themselves laid on their hands. This was a symbol that the victim filled the place of the one offering, receiving the slaughter on his behalf.

One should also note that for the high priest a calf was offered; again for the whole people a calf; for the ruler a he-goat; and for each man a she-goat. For the male is fitting for the ruler, and the female for the one ruled—since from the beginning God also subjected the woman to Adam. The calf sacrificed for sin was burned outside the camp. For this reason also the Master Christ, as the divine Apostle says, “suffered outside the gate,” and set the truth upon the type.

To the altar was offered the omentum. For this is what he means by “the fat upon the belly, and the two kidneys and the fat upon them, and the lobe of the liver,” which the other translators called “the surplus.” These are riddles of the passions in us: the fat covering the belly signifies the disease of gluttony; the kidneys, the pleasures below the belly; and the lobe of the liver, the spirited part—for to it is joined the vessel that receives the bile. He commands that these be consecrated, and as it were that their wicked activities be declared dead. Of the ram of consecration he prescribed that the right shoulder be offered, commanding that practical virtue, which is right and excellent, be offered to God. The bread and the cake and the drink-offering of wine show the fruits that grow from the earth, of which it is holy to offer the firstfruits to God.