Priestly ordinances held that only the High-priest could enter into the Holy of Holies on, and then only on the Day of Atonement. He offered incense, prayers (a spiritual sacrifice) and real sacrifices in the form of a physically perfect lamb. This ritual was performed for the high-priest as well as the people (Cf. Leviticus 16). Not of interest here, but never the less interest our study of the Blessed Virgin Mary; it seems that the high-priest can only marry a virgin. I’m of the opinion that beyond the sacrificial ritual, the high-priest’s main spiritual duty was to be, as it were, ‘the voice of God’ or to give people the knowledge of God through dreams and prophecy. At other times, scholars use the Hebrew term Urim and Thummim to describe another aspect of being, as it were, an intermediary between God and man. Urim literally means “light”, or “to give light”, and Thummim means “completeness”, “perfection”, or “innocence”. The sense is that the high-priest’s duty was to receive the Divine light knowledge of judgment that of the incorrupt and the corrupt; I take it to be a form of ‘Divine truth detection’ (my words). At the time of Christ this seems to have evolved into a fetish like oracle function divining the guilt or innocence; with which the Sanhedrin and the high-priest would eventually condemn itself finding guilt in a perfect priest.
Taking the seat of Moses, Christ now becomes the High Priest of that Kingdom of God, “The Lord hath sworn, and he will not repent: Thou art a priest for ever according to the order of Melchisedech.” (Psalm 109:4) And that priesthood is institutionalized in the Kingdom, “For from the rising of the sun even to the going down, my name is great among the Gentiles, and in every place there is sacrifice, and there is offered to my name a clean oblation: for my name is great among the Gentiles, saith the Lord of hosts” (Malachi 1:11). The priesthood in this Messianic Kingdom is a continuation of the priesthood in the Old Testament with continued sacrificial offerings; “Thus saith the Lord: if my covenant, with the day can be made void, and my covenant with the night, that there should not be day and night in their season" (Jeremiah 33:20) The importance of “God’s Kingdom” is that it is a direct connection with the Divine by which we are “ruled” by our faith and love of God. Taking that seat Christ becomes the perfect high-priest sacrificing the perfect sacrifice offering it up in the Kingdom of God, i.e. his Temple, the Church, with His own blood entering Heaven. (Cf. Hebrews 9)
One of the most important observances for the observing Jew then and now is the Pasch or Passover. It too was a commemoration or a remembrance of the blood that caused death to pass over the first born. Another commemoration was commanded by God and an elaborate sacrificial Law. (See Exodus 12, 13, etc.) This is a reference to the law of sacrifices, the Old Law, the Law of Moses. In Hebrews 10, Paul tells us that the blood of the goat or oxen cleansing, but not perfectly remitting sin. Obviously had the Jews possessed a perfect sacrifice there would have been no need for Christ’s redemptive sacrifice. However the Jew did understand that there is both a real and a spiritual power in the Sacrifice of the Meat and Blood. Moses’ sacrifice can’t remove sin because it is not a perfect sacrifice; rather ritualistic or symbolic, that is a sacrifice that leaves no sense of a “conscience of sin.” This would have been an offering did not please the pharisaic Jew. Christ offered himself (a Real Sacrifice) doing the will of God, fulfilling the prophecy of the sacrificial lamb. This sacrifice produces eternal life similar to the manna from God, but more still. Not a sacrifice simply feeds the belly or the intellect by one that removes totally the stain of sin. This sacrifice is so perfect it can never be repeated nor can it ever ceases, this is one in the same sacrifice of the Passion Christ, done for remittance of our sins and eternal life. It’s done in loving obedience of that continual perfect sacrifice, “do this,” He says, “in commemoration of me.” The Sacrament of Communion is a continuation of Moses’ sacrifice with a perfect lamb; The Real Sacrifice, the Real Presence of Christ. (Cf. St. John Chrysostom,Homily 17 on Hebrews)
The Jewish Sacred tradition of Passover celebrates the first born of every family who ceremoniously eats the flesh of the sacrificial lamb; a commemoration when death passed over the firstborn of Israel. Don’t you watch movies? Good grieve Charlie Brown, everybody our age has seen Charlton Heston’s, ‘The Ten Commandments’ – you should’ve seen it a dozen times since its’ release in 1956. What Got Yul Brynner, aka Rameses, so mad that he went chasing after Moses in a rage? Rameses’ son was killed by the curse he himself uttered. Moses saw it coming and the ‘BLOOD’ of the sacrificial lamb was ordered to be placed over the door header so the curse would ‘PASS OVER’. And I get this part of the story right without the use of a BOOK – who’d a thunk it! Since then, (no, not since 1956 -, since Moses) part of the commemoration of Passover was to sacrifice the lamb in a special feasts and customs. At the home, there was the custom of ‘Pesachim’ which included a search the house for leaven bread. The household was cleared of common bread (leavened) which represented a blotted, vainglorious and arrogant sinful nature. It was hung over a lamp to burn out the leaven (corruption). You might recall Paul’s words “Purge out the old leaven, that you may be a new paste, as you are unleavened.” (1Cor 5: Judaism was steeped with metaphoric visions of leavened and unleavened bread that was culturally ingrained in the Jewish psyche, as it was Christ’s and the Twelve.
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