The Inva­lid­i­ty of the Cru­ci­fix­ion of Jesus as an Atone­ment of Sin

Dr. JosephG

A Study of the Hebrew Tanakh (Old Testament)

Here is a par­tial list of rea­sons for why the death of Jesus on the cross could­n’t pos­si­bly have served as a valid sac­ri­fice — any one of these would ren­der a sac­ri­fice as unac­cept­able for the pur­pose of expi­a­tion of sins.

GIVEN that, at the time of Jesus’ death, the Sec­ond Tem­ple was still stand­ing in Jerusalem and the Hebrew Bible was the Scrip­ture in force, here are some of the rea­sons why the death of Jesus on the cross can­not be a valid sac­ri­fi­cial offering :

FIRST, the Hebrew Bible requires that the sac­ri­fi­cial rit­u­al be admin­is­tered by a Priest (see Leviti­cus Chap­ters 1 – 7) — accord­ing to the accounts in the New Tes­ta­ment, Jesus was cru­ci­fied by Roman sol­diers (Mt 27:35 ; Mk 15:24 ; Lk 23:33 ; Jn 19:18, 23).

SECOND, the Hebrew Bible requires that the blood of the (sin) sac­ri­fice had to be sprin­kled by the Priest on the veil of the sanc­tu­ary and on the altar in the Tem­ple (e.g., Lev 4:5 – 6) — there is no evi­dence in the New Tes­ta­ment that this was done.

THIRD, the Hebrew Bible requires that the (sin) sac­ri­fice be with­out any phys­i­cal defects or blem­ish­es (e.g., Lev 4:3) — accord­ing to the accounts in the New Tes­ta­ment, Jesus was beat­en, whipped, and dragged on the ground before being cru­ci­fied (Mt 26:67, 27:26, 30 – 31 ; Mk 14:65, 15:15 – 20 ; Lk 22:63 ; Jn 18:22, 19:1, 3). More­over, as a Jew by birth, Jesus was cir­cum­cised on the eighth day after being born, a rit­u­al that leaves a scar (“sign of the covenant”). Accord­ing to the NT, cir­cum­ci­sion is tan­ta­mount to muti­la­tion (Phil 3:2, Gal 5:12).

FOURTH, the Hebrew Bible requires that the Passover (sin) sac­ri­fice, a male-goat, be offered on an indi­vid­ual (per house­hold) basis (Num 28:22), not as a com­mu­nal offer­ing — accord­ing to the New Tes­ta­ment, Jesus’ death (termed a sin sac­ri­fice”) expi­at­ed the sins of mankind (Ro 6:10 ; He 9:12, 10:10, 10:18).

FIFTH, the Hebrew Bible directs that the Paschal Lamb was not to be offered for the removal of sins — it was a commemorative/​festive offer­ing (see also under Fourth” above and Sixth” below). A more appro­pri­ate time for a sin offer­ing would have been on Yom Kip­pur (the Day of Atone­ment ; Num 29:11 [indi­vid­ual sin-offer­ing — male goat]; Lev 16:15 [com­mu­nal sin-offer­ing — male goat]).

SIXTH, the Hebrew Bible requires that the sac­ri­ficed Paschal Lamb had to be roast­ed and eat­en, and it’s blood used to place mark­ings on the side-posts and lin­tel of the doors (Exod 12:7 – 8) ? there is no record in the New Tes­ta­ment that this was, in fact, done (lest it be sug­gest­ed that Chris­tian­i­ty pro­motes cannibalism).

SEVENTH, the Hebrew Bible states that the sac­ri­fi­cial sin offer­ing could only atone for unin­ten­tion­al sins, with few notable excep­tions as stat­ed in Lev 5:1 – 6, 20 – 26 [Lev 6:1 – 7 in Chris­t­ian Bibles] (e.g., Num 15:27 – 31).

EIGHTH, the Hebrew Bible teach­es that sac­ri­fices can atone only for sins com­mit­ted pri­or to the offer­ing of the sac­ri­fice ; no sac­ri­fice could ever atone for sins com­mit­ted after the sac­ri­fice was offered and, thus, no sac­ri­fice could ever atone for peo­ple born after the sac­ri­fice was offered (e.g., Leviti­cus 1 – 7). So, even if it were true that Jesus was some kind of super-sac­ri­fice that atoned for all sins of all mankind, then his death could only atone for the sins com­mit­ted before his death, not for any sins com­mit­ted after his death by peo­ple who were born after he died.

NINTH, the Hebrew Bible strict­ly for­bids (human) vic­ar­i­ous atone­ment (e.g., Exod 32:31 – 33 ; Num 35:33 ; Deut 24:16 ; II Kgs 14:6 ; Jer 31:29 [30 in Chris­t­ian Bibles]; Ezek 18:4,20 ; Ps 49:7).

TENTH, the Hebrew Bible strict­ly pro­hibits human sac­ri­fices (e.g., Lev 18:21, 24 – 25 ; Deut 18:10 ; Jer 7:31, 19:5 ; Ezek 23:37, 39).

It is sim­ply aston­ish­ing that so many peo­ple believe what their preach­ers feed” them, as well as how the New Tes­ta­ment writ­ings con­tra­dict the teach­ings of the Hebrew Bible. The Invalidity of the Crucifixion of Jesus as an Atonement of Sin 1

This arti­cle was repro­duced from an inter­net forum post­ing by Dr. JosephG, a retired physi­cist and prac­tis­ing Jew resid­ing in Amer­i­ca, who explains why Jesus’ death on the cross could not have been a valid sac­ri­fice from the Jew­ish point of view. Dr. JosephG is not asso­ci­at­ed with bis​mikaal​lahu​ma​.org
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