N19-6: Why Would God Create A Sacrifice (Like the Red Heifer Offering) That Causes Impurity?

One important key that unlocks a deeper understanding of the Red Heifer ritual is to notice what the Torah calls this sacrifice.

Recall the five different sacrifices we’ve studied so far.

They are the…

OLAH (Burnt Offering)
MINCHAH (Grain Offering)
HATA-AT (Purification Offering)
ASHAM (Reparation Offering)
ZEVAH (Peace Offering)

Now which one of these five general classifications do you think the Red Heifer ritual falls under?

Let me give you a big hint.

For the Red Heifer sacrifice, the meat of this sacrifice was NOT to be eaten and the animal had to be burned outside the camp!

So those two facts should tell you immediately that the general classification of the Red Heifer should fall under the HATA-AT category.

Recall that most English Bibles will translate the HATA-AT as a “sin offering“.

But as I’ve said many times before, that is a gross mistranslation.

Because the function of the HATA-AT, rather than being an offering that “pays” for sin is an offering that PURIFIES one from the toxic effects of sin.

The whole purpose of the HATA-AT sacrifice was to decontaminate the person who had become defiled.

However, what made the HATA-AT unique is that whoever officiated over this sacrifice became impure.

And of course, as I wrote about in my post a couple of days ago, this is exactly what we see with the Red Heifer sacrifice.

The VERY SAME ASHES OF THE RED HEIFER that made the unclean clean also make the clean unclean.

Don’t you find that both strange and fascinating?

Why would God create a sacrifice that causes impurity?

Well, here’s what happens.

The HATA-AT sacrifice acts like a spiritual absorbent of sorts that sucks out of the defiled person all of the impurities he has acquired because of the dead body he has touched.

Now think about it for a second.

Let’s say you have a sponge that was used to absorb and suck up all those impurities that a poisoned person had.

That sponge, being now filled with such an enormous amount of impurity, would be quite a poisonous and dangerous object, don’t you think?

That is precisely why anybody else who was involved in the decontamination Red Heifer ritual becomes contaminated or impure himself.

And that’s also why the “sponge” (being used as an analogy for the “red heifer” in this example) has to be destroyed in an UNCLEAN place far away from the camp of Israel.

Obviously, such an impure object cannot be offered up on the Holy Altar.

Again, keep in mind that the HATA-AT is NOT a sacrifice that is offered up to God.

It is KADOSH or set apart for destruction.

However, there is a key difference between the normal HATA-AT sacrifice and the Red Heifer sacrifice.

Note that none of the blood of the Red Heifer is to be splashed on the Brazen Altar.

The blood remains INSIDE the female cow as it is roasted to a crisp outside the camp.