Commentaria in Leviticum
Now, first, all these are males by fortitude, without blemish by holiness. Second, Christ was immolated at the door of the tabernacle, that is, near and outside the city. Third, Christ, who is at once the offerer and the victim (for He offered Himself), Christ, I say, as offerer laid His hands on the head of the victim, because He laid the sins of the human race upon His own head, says Origen. Fourth, Christ in offering Himself to the Father poured out His blood round about the altar, that is, of the cross, that we might know that all the nations of the earth were to be partakers of the cross and blood of Christ; the skin of the victim was stripped off when Christ was despoiled of all His garments; the limbs were cut in pieces when Christ’s body, torn with scourges and nails, was so stretched on the cross that the bones were moved out of their places, according to Psalm 21: “They have dug my hands and feet, and numbered all my bones.” The fire in which Christ was immolated and mystically burnt was His fiery charity; the wood, our miseries, which stirred up His love. Of the rest, namely the sheep and the birds, I shall speak below in their places.
Of the herd—of oxen. So the Hebrew has it; or of calves, for these alone of the larger animals were immolated.
A male—because the holocaust was the most noble sacrifice, offered directly to God for His honour and praise alone; hence it befitted that the most noble victim be employed in it, and such is the male. It was otherwise in the peace sacrifice, which was offered for someone’s welfare: in it, as being less noble, a female could be offered. So Abulensis.
He shall offer without blemish—an ox, or a calf. He calls a victim without blemish one that has no blemishes, not of colour (for a spotted ox, that is, one with a black or variegated coat, was reckoned without blemish and could be immolated), but of deformity and defect: for this blemish Leviticus explains [chapter 22:20–22]: “That it may be acceptable, there shall be no blemish in it. If it be blind, if it be broken, if it have a scar, or pimples, or scab, or itch”; and of such a blemish is understood Canticle 4:7, where of the spouse it is said: “Thou art all fair, and there is no spot in thee.” Hence for “without blemish” the Hebrew has tamim, that is, perfect, as Aquila renders it, and entire, as Symmachus. The priests were wont to examine these blemishes, as I said above from Philo. The Gentiles, however, gilded the horns of the victim. Hence Ovid:
And the victim, its horns clothed in gold, makes vows,
And I will set before the altars a bullock with gilded brow;
where Servius says: “If a smaller victim were to be immolated, it was crowned with the foliage of him to whom the rites were made, and, girt with a woollen fillet and a white band, it stood before the altars bound by no tie.”
He shall offer at the door of the tabernacle of the testimony.—I said on Exodus 26 that there were three parts of the tabernacle or temple: the first, innermost, namely the Holy of Holies; the second joined to it, namely the Holy; these properly were the structure of the tabernacle itself; the third, outermost, namely a court surrounding the tabernacle on every side; and these were as it were three tabernacles: the first of the pontiff, the second of the priests, the third of the laity: for in this court, as in their own temple, the laity assembled, and in it they ate the peace victims. Moreover the court was twofold: the front part was the court of the priests, in which was the altar of holocausts; the rear part, divided from the former by a fence, was the court of the laity. The laity, therefore, offering a victim for a holocaust, brought it to the door of the tabernacle, that is, to the entrance of the court of the priests; for there the priests received it, and led it to the altar of holocausts, where they immolated it; for the laity could not enter this altar or the court of the priests.
To make the Lord favourable to him.—The proper end of the holocaust was to worship and honour God, not to appease Him; yet the latter followed from the former, even if the offerer thought nothing of appeasement. The Hebrew lirtsono, which more recent writers render “according to his own will,” as if to say, “He shall offer what pleases him,” you should better render “to his favour before the Lord,” as if to say, “He shall offer to win the Lord’s favour for himself.” For Hebrew nouns and affixes are often taken passively, according to Canon 95; so here “his favour” is called, not that which favours, but that by which one is favoured, which our version renders, to make the Lord favourable to him; and the Septuagint, “it shall be acceptable to him for propitiation for him.” Hence it follows:
Verse 4. And he shall put his hand upon the head of the victim.—First, by this rite the offerer signifies that he transfers the victim from his own hand and power into the right of God. By a like ceremony the ancient Romans renounced their slaves and manumitted them; for holding the head they said, “I will this man to be free,” and let him go from their hand. Hence this ceremony was also used in the offering and consecration of the Levites, Numbers 8:10. Second, that by this ceremony the offerer may signify that he imprecates his sins, and as it were lays them on the victim to be immolated, and offers it for himself; for by the hands are signified actions and sins, which are done by the hands, says Theodoret and Eusebius, book 1 of the Demonstratio Evangelica, chapter 10. “The imposition of hands,” says Eusebius, “was a symbol of oblation, and a testimony of guilt transferred to the victim.” For although the holocaust was offered primarily for the honour of God, it was offered secondarily for sins, to appease God, as I said. So the Egyptian Gentiles imprecated on the head of the victim whatever evil might be about to befall the sacrificers or Egypt, that it might all be turned upon this head; and presently they cut off the head of the victim and cast it into the river, as Giraldus relates, Syntagma 47. Third, that by this rite the offerer may signify that he offers himself wholly with the victim in holocaust to God, and wishes to spend himself wholly in the service of God. For these reasons our priests also in the sacrifice of the Mass lay their hands upon the host, as Durandus has noted in the Rationale of the Divine Offices, Suarez and others.
For this same reason Numa ordained among the Romans that “he who adores must turn himself round in a circle,” that by this gesture he might signify that in human affairs nothing is stable, and that therefore it is fitting, in whatever way God twists and turns our life, that we take it in good part, says Plutarch in his Numa.
And it shall be acceptable.—The Hebrew is nirtsah lo, that is, it shall please, or shall be accepted by him, namely by God. Second, it may be rendered, it shall be accepted for him, namely for the offerer. That God showed this by an outward sign Josephus teaches, book 3 of the Antiquities, chapter 9: “For of the two onyxes,” he says, “that were set on the shoulders of the high priest, the right one shone, whenever a sacrifice was favourably accepted, with such a brilliance that it was seen even from afar.” In like manner the same author asserts that the stones of the rational shone.
And from chapter 4 Calvin infers that by these ancient sacrifices the Israelites were reconciled in a sacramental manner, and freed from guilt and liability in God’s judgment, as we are today washed and freed by baptism. This opinion follows from another principle of Calvin, in which he teaches that the Sacraments of the new law do not confer grace ex opere operato, but that the faith which the Sacraments excite confers grace, and that the Sacraments are only seals of grace conferred through faith; since, therefore, both old and new Sacraments and sacrifices justify only through faith, which they excite in like manner, hence, according to Calvin, the manner of justifying in both is alike.
But this is a manifest error, and is clearly refuted, first, by Scripture, Psalm 50:18: “If thou hadst desired sacrifice, I would indeed have given it; with burnt offerings thou wilt not be delighted”; Psalm 39:7: “Sacrifice and oblation thou wouldst not”; Galatians 4:9: “How turn you again to the weak and needy elements?” as it is expressly refuted by Paul, Hebrews 10:4 and following. Second, this error is opposed to the Council of Florence, treatise On the Sacraments, and is condemned by the Council of Trent, session 7, canon 2; and rightly, for this heresy so extenuates the grace and Sacraments of the new law that it makes Jews equal to Christians, and the old law equal to the new, and, according to it, it would be as desirable to be a Jew as a Christian, so that Hunnius and others have rightly written a book against Calvin with this title: Calvin Judaizing. Third, therefore, St. Clement refutes him, book 6 of the Constitutions, chapter 22; Irenaeus, book 4, chapter 32; Jerome, on chapter 5 of Matthew, and on Isaias; and others.