The second subpoint about sacrifice is this. In early Christian thought we find the strange, otherwise unprecedented, early Christian combination of imagery from both Passover and the Day of Atonement. This is to be explained in terms of the exile. Unlike the slavery in Egypt, Israel’s extended Babylonian exile was the result of idolatry and sin; accordingly, the victorious rescue (the new exodus) of the new Passover is accomplished through the great act of, yes, “atonement.” But the point here is that through Jesus, as the resurrection and ascension insist, what is effected is not just the
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