ATONEMENT, or EXPIATION, DAY OF. A Jewish fast day, occurring on the tenth day of the seventh month (Tishri), and observed as a day of humiliation and supplication. The laws in connection with it are found in Lev. xvi., and in some scattered passages (Ex. xxx. 10; Num. xxix. 7-11), all connected with the Priestly Code. (See PENTATEUCH.) It was a day de voted to worship, on which all manlier of work was forbidden; abstention from food, from drink, and pleasure commanded; and so long as the Temple stood, during the post-exilic period, a long sacrificial service was gone through. The centre of the service was the high-priest, who had, according to the Ta] mudical tradition, to spend the seven preced ing days in separation from all persons and in careful study of the duty imposed upon him. On the Day of Atonement, dressed in white linen garments (not in the gorgeous dress of his office), lie entered the holy of holies and con fessed his sins. He then chose two goats, and by lot determined which one was to be sacri ficed. This one was killed, and its blood sprinkled in front of the veil in the holy of holies. The second one, after the high-priest had rested his hands on its head and had con fessed the sins of the whole people, was given in charge of trusty men, who led it outside of the city limits, and then one of them released it in the wilderness (Lev. xvi. 10-21). While the biblical ritual for the day contains some evidently ancient features, and while the sanc tity of the tenth day of the 'sacred' seventh month probably reverts to an early epoch, the institution of the distinctively Jewish Day of Atonement is an outcome of religious conditions as they existed during the Babylonian exile. The earliest trace of the biblical ceremonial is to he found in Ezek. xlv., though his prescrip tions for the day are much simpler than those found in Leviticus. With the destruction of the Temple and the abolition of sacrifice, the Day of Atonement was changed in one im portant particular—from being a purely na tional fast, it has now also an individual side.
At present the day is kept by fasting from sunset of the ninth to sunset of the tenth day of Tishri, and by services in the evening and all day. An important part of the service is the recital of the service of the Temple, as handed down by tradition.
Just as the popular sense of guilt experienced during the Babylonian exile furnished the con ditions favorable for the institution of a great atonement day, so the second destruction of Jerusalem directly contributed not only toward enhancing the importance of the day, but toward giving to it a sombre character relieved only by the consolatory hope of securing, by a strict obedience to elaborate ceremonial regulations, forgiveness of individual sin and the assuage ment of divine anger manifested by the loss of national independence. An entire treatise of the Talmud, known as Iona (i.e. The Day par excellence), is devoted to setting forth the cere monies and ritual for the fast, and to this day, despite general laxity prevailing in wide circles, Jews of the most advanced views still observe the day as the most sacred of the year.
BIBLiocR.tPUy. On the biblical observances and questions connected with its origin consult: W. Nowack, Hebrdi.sehc Arehdologie, Vol. IL ( Freiburg, 1894 ) ; I. Ben zi ng,er, Hebrdischc Arch tiologie (ib. 1894) ; J. J. Wellhansen, Prolego• mena zur Geschichte Israels (Berlin, 1899) ; for the later observances: J. Lightfoot, The Temple Srrviec, Vol. IL of his Collected Works (London, 1864) ; A. Edersheim, The Temple, its Ministry and Services (ib. 1894) ; L. Dembitz, Jewish Scrrices in Synagogue and Bow (Philadelphia, 189S).