Central to Christian theology is the idea that Jesus Christ sacrificed himself on the cross to redeem humankind of its sins. "Look," exclaims John the Baptist upon seeing Jesus in John 1:29, "the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world." And as Paul matter-of-factly states in 1 Corinthians 5:7, "Christ, our Passover Lamb, has been sacrificed." Christianity has long preached the message of God's wonderful mercy and grace that drove him to come to Earth and offer himself as a sacrifice to save us, but as many have pointed out, a look at the Old Testament reveals quite a different attitude from God, not so full of mercy and grace. Why would a god who had set up a complicated system of laws for his 'chosen people' and drowned, burned, and slaughtered thousands of dissidents suddenly change to a loving approach based only on faith?

The god of the Old Testament is distinctly separate from the god taught by Jesus in the New Testament, and there can hardly be better evidence of this then the issue of Christ's alleged sacrifice. The Hebrew god Yahweh gave specific instructions for acceptable kinds of sacrifices and also laid out prohibitions that are overlooked in the case of Jesus' sacrifice. As it will be shown, nothing about the death of a man on a cross to take away the sin of the world is permissible according to the teachings in the Old Testament, which is where the whole idea of sin sacrifice originates from. The sacrifice of Christ is a Christian invention because it has no basis in Hebrew scripture, making it a sacrifice in vain.

I. Passover and Sin Offerings

The Torah prescribed several types of sacrifices to ancient Israelites, including voluntary burnt offerings, mandatory burnt offerings, peace offerings, guilt offerings, commemorative offerings, new moon offerings and sin offerings. Not all sacrifices were atonement offerings, nor did all of them involve animals, as in some cases it was acceptable to use grain, wine and incense. As already indicated, Jesus is referred to as a Passover offering throughout the New Testament, but a few inconsistencies haunt this notion.

The Passover sacrifice was developed to remember and appreciate God's deliverance of Israel from Egyptian captivity (Exodus 12:1-14). Thus the Passover lamb was not sacrificed as a sin offering, but as a commemorative offering. Additionally, one lamb would only be sufficient for one household or family (Exodus 12:3-4), not for the entire community or for all humanity. Like all animal sacrifices, the Passover lamb also had to be ceremonially sacrificed in the Jewish temple (Deuteronomy 12:11), and have some of its blood sprinkled on the altar (Leviticus 4:32-34). Finally, according to Mark 14:12-18 and Luke 22:7-15, Jesus was not crucified until after the Passover celebration. This is in stark contrast to John 18:28 and 19:14-16, which clearly place Christ's crucifixion a day before Passover, when the lamb would usually be sacrificed. Needless to say, by all these standards and instructions, Jesus' crucifixion would not have been an acceptable sacrifice for Passover.

What about a sin offering? Contrary to what may be assumed from the name, sin offerings were more about atoning for unintentional wrongdoing then for repenting of real premeditated sin (Lev. 4:27). Animals sacrificed as a sin offering had to have their blood sprinkled in front of the veil to the holy of holies in the temple (or in front of the mercy seat on Yom Kippur). Afterwards, the flesh of the animal would be consumed by the priest and his family. Note that the whole community does not partake of a sin offering, but only the priests, in contrast to the Last Supper ritual instituted by the New Testament. Interestingly, lambs offered as sin sacrifices had to be female as well (Lev. 4:32). Once again, Jesus' death could only be a sin offering in a very loose and metaphorical sense.

Blood is treated as a sacrament in the Old Testament, and while the New Testament has Jesus offering up his blood as "real drink" to give eternal life to his followers (John 6:54-55), the laws of God for Israel were explicitly against consumption of blood. The sincerity of Yahweh in condemning this is seen in Leviticus 17:10, where he says, "Any Israelite or any alien living among them who eats any blood - I will set my face against that person who eats blood and will cut him off from his people." Some believers will obviously protest that Jesus was only symbolically saying that the wine was his blood, and although this is likely true, symbolic sin is no less of an offense to God, even according to Jesus himself in Matthew 5:27-29. What kind of god would set up such a confusing symbolic ritual that appears to contradict his own previous teachings? And what kind of god chooses to sacrifice himself in a way that violates nearly all of his own commands for acceptable sacrifices?

Hebrews 9:22 argues that "without the shedding of blood there is no forgiveness," but blood is far from the only permissible kind of sin sacrifice. Flour (Lev. 5:11), money (Exodus 30:15-16), jewelry (Numbers 31:50), and prayer (Hosea 14:1-4) are also acceptable sin offerings, according to scripture. Just where are the New Testament authors pulling their understanding of Hebrew law from? So far we've seen two very convoluted ideas of sacrifice applied to Jesus, metaphorical language that is quite at odds with Yahweh's instructions, and now a dead wrong declarative statement about the necessity of blood in forgiveness.

II. Human Sacrifice

How does Hebrew scripture feel about human sacrifice, for that matter? Bulls, goats, lambs, doves, and other animals are frequently named as permissible sacrifices, but you won't find humans among those lists. Leviticus 4 explains that a sacrifice must be unblemished (have no physical defects), die of blood loss, and have its blood sprinkled on the altar, all of this to be conducted in the temple by a Levitical priest. Would Jesus have been unblemished, after being scourged and nailed to a cross? He certainly was not sacrificed in the temple, nor by any priest, and his blood was not sprinkled upon the altar. None of this is ultimately relevant though, because as we find in the Old Testament, Yahweh was not fond of human sacrifice:

It deserves to be mentioned that even though these passages very specifically denounce human sacrifice, the story of Abraham and Isaac (Genesis 22:1-18), as well as the story of Jephthah and his daughter (Judges 11:29-40), seem like clear contradictions. The Hebrew god is not well known for following his own laws, but there are moral lessons to be gained from both Abraham and Isaac (trust in God to provide), and from Jephthah and his daughter (be careful of the oaths you make), which may suggest a less literal application in their case. Regardless, Yahweh does reject human sacrifice in multiple instances, going so far as to call it "detestable".

So yet again, what kind of a god would suddenly decide to come to Earth as a man and sacrifice himself, after expressly condemning human sacrifice? Christians may contend that it's a different case with Jesus, because he was not just a man. Whether he was fully god and fully man, part god and part man, or just a god that took on human form, the problem of Yahweh misrepresenting his own teachings still applies. Why forbid certain things only to later incorporate symbolism that superficially appreciates them?

Moses actually offered to take the sins of the people on himself in Exodus 32:31-34, asking God to "blot me out of the book you have written". In rejecting Moses' solution, God explains that, "Whoever has sinned against me I will blot out of my book... when the time comes for me to punish, I will punish them for their sin." To put it another way, Yahweh punishes each individual according to what they deserve, and no single person can take on the sins of another. Ezekiel 18:20-22 and verse 30 provide further support to show that sons inheriting the father's sins and one man taking on sins that are not his are not part of Yahweh's 'justice'. Christ's death would be unacceptable to the Hebrew god because it is both human sacrifice and displacing the responsibility for sin.

III. Corrupted in Confusion

Mainstream Christian theology believes that Jesus was/is God incarnate. On the cross, God supposedly sacrificed himself to himself in order to remove the obligations of the law that he himself had instituted for his people. If you were God, why overturn your own laws, which had previously been described as perfect and eternal (Psalm 119:151-152, Psalm 111:1,7-8)? Not only that, but why have such laws in the first place, if you were going to later abolish them and enact a new means of salvation that would be more merciful, gracious, and loving, by your own admission? Why wait the minimum of 4,000 years that even biblical literalists believe to have passed from creation and the original covenant until the birth and sacrifice of Jesus? How meaningful is an omnipotent god's sacrifice to begin with? And of what significance is death and resurrection for an immortal being?

There is something horribly inefficient and illogical in this type of 'divine' plan for salvation. To sacrifice means that you give up something of value and worth, with no expectation of getting it back. If Jesus knew he would be rising from the grave and regaining his life, then his death - as a principle of simple understanding - was not a sacrifice. The value and worth of God's death can also be criticized as meaningless for an immortal being, especially if the doctrine of the trinity is applied, and God was all along existing as the father and holy spirit during the son's two days in the grave. Add to these problems the numerous inconsistencies of Christ's sacrifice with Yahweh's law and the entire edifice can do nothing but collapse. In nearly every imaginable sense, the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, if historical, was a sacrifice in vain.