By Roy McDaniel, TGC.
From the beginning, Christian theology has argued that the sacrifices and offerings prescribed in Leviticus were types of Christ. And much of that theology, especially from the Reformed tradition, has argued that these sacrifices and offerings typified a penal-substitutionary death.
As one who gladly and gratefully stands in the Reformed tradition, I affirm a penal-substitutionary reading of Levitical sacrifice—and of Christ’s work, in which the promise and pattern of Levitical sacrifice find fulfillment. But I also affirm the need to revise, or at least refine, the standard argument for a penal-substitutionary reading. Our reading of Levitical sacrifice needs close attention to the book’s narrative context.
Standard Argument
Consider the standard argument. When the offerer appeared before God at the tabernacle and, standing beside the altar, placed a hand on the head of his offering, it represented the imputation of sin. The slaughter of the offering that shortly followed was the essential or definitive act of sacrifice. And when the priest subsequently placed the sacrificial blood on the altar, the blood represented a substitutionary death that made the offerer acceptable. Thus, atonement was made.
This argument’s virtues are considerable—the close attention to the text, high regard for canonical context, and deep concern for the church and its mission. But since at least Faustus Socinus in the late 16th century, the exegetical pillars of the standard Reformed reading have been challenged, and that challenge has been somewhat successful. In particular, the Reformed reading of the hand-laying (or hand-leaning) rite is uncertain; it was likely intended to signify some notion of identification between offerer and offering, not a true imputation of sin.