The Two Goats: LORD's Goat and Azazel -- What the Day of Atonement Teaches About Sin's Complete Removal¶
A Plain-English Summary¶
On the Day of Atonement, two goats stood before the high priest. They looked the same -- both young, both healthy, both presented together as a single sin offering. But their fates were entirely different. One was killed, its blood carried into the holiest place on earth. The other was led alive into the wilderness, never to return. This study asks what these two goats represent: What does the LORD's goat point to? What does the scapegoat point to? And how does this two-goat pattern play out across the rest of Scripture?
The answer that emerges from the biblical text is more precise than many expect. The two goats address two different dimensions of the sin problem -- and the Bible is careful to keep them distinct while insisting that both are necessary.
Two Goats, One Offering, Two Problems¶
The starting point is a detail easily overlooked in English: the Hebrew text of Leviticus 16:5 calls both goats a single sin offering. Not two offerings, but one. Two animals serve a single purpose because the sin problem has two sides that cannot be addressed by the same action.
Leviticus 16:5 "And he shall take of the congregation of the children of Israel two kids of the goats for a sin offering, and one ram for a burnt offering."
The first problem is propitiation -- the need for shed blood to satisfy divine justice and cleanse the sanctuary that had been defiled by the people's sins throughout the year. The LORD's goat handles this. The second problem is elimination -- the need for sin to be permanently removed from the community. The scapegoat handles this. Neither goat alone completes the atonement. Both are required.
The LORD's Goat: Christ's Sacrifice¶
The LORD's goat was killed, and its blood was taken inside the veil to be sprinkled on the mercy seat. This blood-ministry cleansed the sanctuary of the accumulated contamination of the people's sins.
Leviticus 16:15 "Then shall he kill the goat of the sin offering, that is for the people, and bring his blood within the vail, and do with that blood as he did with the blood of the bullock, and sprinkle it upon the mercy seat, and before the mercy seat."
The New Testament identifies this as a direct type of Christ's sacrifice. The connection is not loose or symbolic -- it runs through specific vocabulary that bridges the Old and New Testaments.
The mercy seat in Hebrew is called the kapporeth. When the Old Testament was translated into Greek, the translators used the word hilasterion for the mercy seat. Paul uses this same word in Romans 3:25:
Romans 3:25 "Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God."
The English word "propitiation" obscures what the Greek makes plain: Paul is calling Christ the mercy seat. In the earthly tabernacle, the LORD's goat blood was sprinkled ON the mercy seat. In the reality to which the tabernacle pointed, Christ is both the sacrifice and the mercy seat -- everything that required separate elements in the type converges in one Person.
Hebrews makes this even more explicit:
Hebrews 9:12 "Neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us."
Christ entered the heavenly sanctuary with His own blood, accomplishing what the yearly repetition of the LORD's goat could only foreshadow. Even the detail that the LORD's goat carcass was burned "outside the camp" (Leviticus 16:27) finds its counterpart in Christ's crucifixion outside Jerusalem:
Hebrews 13:11-12 "For the bodies of those beasts, whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high priest for sin, are burned without the camp. Wherefore Jesus also, that he might sanctify the people with his own blood, suffered without the gate."
The Scapegoat: After Atonement, Not Part of It¶
Here is where the ceremony introduces a critical sequence that carries enormous theological weight. Between the LORD's goat blood-ministry and the scapegoat ceremony, the text inserts an emphatic statement of completion:
Leviticus 16:20 "And when he hath made an end of reconciling the holy place, and the tabernacle of the congregation, and the altar, he shall bring the live goat."
The Hebrew verb translated "made an end" is an intensive form that means absolute completion. The blood-atonement is finished. Only then -- after propitiation is complete -- does the live goat enter the ceremony. This is not a minor procedural detail; it establishes a principle that holds throughout the Bible: blood-atonement must be complete before sin-removal begins.
What happens next is the most dramatic moment in the ceremony. Aaron places both hands on the live goat's head and confesses over it every category of sin -- iniquities, transgressions, and sins -- transferring them onto the goat. Then a specially appointed man leads the goat away into the wilderness.
Leviticus 16:21-22 "And Aaron shall lay both his hands upon the head of the live goat, and confess over him all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their transgressions in all their sins, putting them upon the head of the goat, and shall send him away by the hand of a fit man into the wilderness: And the goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities unto a land not inhabited: and he shall let go the goat in the wilderness."
The goat goes alive. It is not killed. It is not sacrificed. It carries sin to a "land not inhabited" -- a place of absolute desolation, fundamentally cut off from the community. The sins are gone.
Who Is Azazel?¶
The KJV translation "scapegoat" masks a significant feature of the Hebrew text. The word is Azazel, and the Hebrew grammar treats it as a proper noun -- a name. The lot-casting verse makes this unmistakable:
Leviticus 16:8 "And Aaron shall cast lots upon the two goats; one lot for the LORD, and the other lot for the scapegoat."
In Hebrew, the construction is "one lot for YHWH and one lot for Azazel." The identical grammatical structure -- the same preposition attached to a proper noun -- is used for both. The lots assign one goat to a Person (the LORD) and one goat to another personal entity (Azazel). If Azazel were merely a description meaning "goat that goes away," the parallel would break down: one lot for a Person, one lot for a concept. The grammar maintains the parallel: one lot for the LORD, one lot for Azazel.
This does not mean the goat was offered to a demonic power. The Bible explicitly forbids offering sacrifices to demons (Leviticus 17:7), and the scapegoat is not a sacrifice. No blood is shed. No altar is used. The goat is not presented as a gift but sent away as sin-laden refuse. Sending accumulated sin to the entity responsible for its origination is an act of divine judgment, not worship.
Christ Bears Sin as Priest, Not as Scapegoat¶
Since Christ bore the sins of humanity, does that make Him the scapegoat? The biblical text provides a clear answer by distinguishing between different kinds of sin-bearing.
Long before the Day of Atonement, the Bible established that the high priest bears sin as part of his priestly office:
Exodus 28:38 "And it shall be upon Aaron's forehead, that Aaron may bear the iniquity of the holy things, which the children of Israel shall hallow in all their holy gifts; and it shall be always upon his forehead, that they may be accepted before the LORD."
Leviticus 10:17 "Wherefore have ye not eaten the sin offering in the holy place, seeing it is most holy, and God hath given it you to bear the iniquity of the congregation, to make atonement for them before the LORD?"
The priest bears sin "before the LORD" -- God-ward, for the purpose of acceptance and atonement. The scapegoat bears sin in the opposite direction -- away from God's presence, into the wilderness, toward desolation. The priest bears sin God-ward; the scapegoat carries sin wilderness-ward.
When the New Testament describes Christ bearing sin, the direction is consistently God-ward, matching the priestly pattern:
Hebrews 9:24 "For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the true; but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us."
Hebrews 9:28 "So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many; and unto them that look for him shall he appear the second time without sin unto salvation."
Christ bears sin "in the presence of God for us" -- the same direction as the priest of Exodus 28:38 and Leviticus 10:17. Furthermore, Isaiah 53, the great Old Testament prophecy of Christ's atoning work, pairs sin-bearing with intercession -- and intercession is an exclusively priestly function. Christ fills two Day of Atonement roles: the LORD's goat (His death provides the blood) and the High Priest (He bears sin and intercedes before God). The scapegoat role remains unfilled by Christ.
The Scapegoat Points to Satan's Binding¶
If Christ is both the LORD's goat and the High Priest, the scapegoat ceremony points to a different fulfillment. The specific structural markers of the scapegoat ritual correspond to what Revelation describes as happening to Satan at the beginning of the millennium:
Revelation 20:1-3 "And I saw an angel come down from heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. And he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years, And cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand years should be fulfilled."
The correspondences between the scapegoat ceremony and Revelation 20 are specific and structural:
The scapegoat goes alive -- it is not killed. Satan is cast into the abyss alive -- his destruction comes later (Revelation 20:10), not at this point.
The scapegoat goes after blood-atonement is complete. Satan's binding occurs after Christ's atoning work is finished and after the second coming.
A specially designated agent escorts the scapegoat. The "fit man" of Leviticus 16:21 -- a unique figure whose title appears nowhere else in Scripture -- has a single task: lead the goat to the wilderness. In Revelation 20:1, a nameless angel descends with a key and chain to bind Satan. Both agents are defined entirely by their function.
The destination is a place of desolation and confinement. The scapegoat goes to a "land not inhabited" -- a place cut off from all human life. Satan goes to the abyss, a place of confinement that even demons fear. Scripture consistently associates desolate, uninhabited places with the domain of evil:
Matthew 12:43 "When the unclean spirit is gone out of a man, he walketh through dry places, seeking rest, and findeth none."
Luke 8:31 "And they besought him that he would not command them to go out into the deep."
The wilderness of the scapegoat and the abyss of Revelation represent the same theological reality. Both are places of desolation, cut off from habitation, serving as the destination for sin-bearing entities under divine judgment.
The Two-Creature Pattern Recurs in Scripture¶
The one-killed, one-released pattern is not unique to the Day of Atonement. It appears in the cleansing of a leper, where two birds serve the same structure:
Leviticus 14:6-7 "As for the living bird, he shall take it, and the cedar wood, and the scarlet, and the hyssop, and shall dip them and the living bird in the blood of the bird that was killed over the running water: And he shall sprinkle upon him that is to be cleansed from the leprosy seven times, and shall pronounce him clean, and shall let the living bird loose into the open field."
One bird is killed and its blood used for cleansing. The other is released alive. The same verb -- "send away" -- governs both the living bird's release and the scapegoat's dismissal, confirming that dealing with sin requires two actions: bloodshed for purification and release for removal.
The Barabbas narrative provides a historical echo of this pattern in inverted form. Two figures stand before Pilate; the crowd chooses: Jesus is killed, Barabbas is released.
John 18:38-40 "Pilate saith unto him, What is truth? And when he had said this, he went out again unto the Jews, and saith unto them, I find in him no fault at all. But ye have a custom, that I should release unto you one at the passover: will ye therefore that I release unto you the King of the Jews? Then cried they all again, saying, Not this man, but Barabbas. Now Barabbas was a robber."
The innocent Jesus takes the LORD's goat role -- killed as the sacrifice -- while the guilty Barabbas walks free. The substitutionary principle is enacted in history.
The Sequence Holds from Cross to Millennium¶
The order established in Leviticus 16:20 -- blood-atonement completed before sin-removal begins -- is maintained across the entire biblical timeline of redemption.
At the cross, Christ dies as the LORD's goat, providing the blood of atonement. In the heavenly sanctuary, He enters with His own blood and continues His intercessory ministry as High Priest. At the second coming, Satan is bound and cast into the abyss -- the scapegoat ceremony fulfilled at the cosmic level. The sequence never reverses. Propitiation always precedes elimination.
1 John 3:5,8 "And ye know that he was manifested to take away our sins; and in him is no sin... For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil."
Both dimensions appear in this single passage: taking away sin (the blood-atonement function) and destroying the works of the devil (the eschatological defeat of the Azazel figure).
What the Bible Does NOT Say¶
The Bible does not teach that the scapegoat was a sacrifice offered to a demonic power. The scapegoat is not killed, no blood is shed, and no altar is involved. The verb used is "send away," not "offer" or "sacrifice." Sending sin to its originator under divine command is an act of judgment, not an act of worship.
The Bible does not teach that Christ is the scapegoat. While Christ bears sin, the New Testament consistently places His sin-bearing within the priestly tradition -- bearing sin God-ward, in the presence of God, paired with intercession. The scapegoat's function is to carry sin in the opposite direction: away from God's presence, into desolation. Christ's bearing matches the priest's direction, not the scapegoat's.
The Bible does not teach that the scapegoat ceremony was part of the blood-atonement. The emphatic completion statement in Leviticus 16:20 draws a clear line: blood-atonement is finished before the live goat is even brought forward. The scapegoat operates in the aftermath of completed atonement, not as part of it.
The Bible does not teach that the specific mechanism by which sin's accumulated guilt is placed upon Satan is fully explained. The structural correspondence between the scapegoat ceremony and Revelation 20:1-3 is clear, but the precise nature of how guilt is eschatologically returned to its originator remains less fully revealed. The typological framework is established; every detail of its fulfillment is not spelled out.
The Bible does not teach that the scapegoat's exile is the final end of evil. The scapegoat goes to the wilderness alive -- its story ends with exile, not destruction. Satan's story likewise does not end with the abyss; after the millennium, he is released briefly and then destroyed permanently in the lake of fire (Revelation 20:10). The scapegoat typology covers the binding and confinement phase but not the ultimate destruction that follows.
Conclusion¶
The two goats of Leviticus 16 present a complete picture of how God deals with sin. The LORD's goat -- killed, its blood applied to the mercy seat -- points to Christ's sacrificial death and His entrance into the heavenly sanctuary with His own blood. Christ is both the sacrifice and the mercy seat, both the offering and the place where atonement is accomplished.
The scapegoat -- alive, bearing confessed sins, led to the wilderness after blood-atonement is complete -- points to the eschatological removal of sin when Satan is bound and cast into the abyss at the second coming. The scapegoat is not a sacrifice, not an offering, and not a picture of Christ. It is sin-laden refuse returned to its source under divine judgment.
Christ fills two roles in the Day of Atonement: the LORD's goat through His death and the High Priest through His sin-bearing and intercession. The scapegoat role is filled not by Christ but by Satan, whose binding in Revelation 20 matches the scapegoat ceremony at every structural point: alive, after atonement, led by a designated agent, to a place of desolation.
The two goats together -- inseparable halves of a single sin offering -- teach that dealing with sin requires both propitiation and elimination, both shed blood and permanent removal. The cross provides the first. The millennium provides the second. And the order never reverses: the blood must be applied before the sin can be sent away.
Isaiah 53:6 "All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way; and the LORD hath laid on him the iniquity of us all."
Based on the full technical study available in the Conclusion tab.