Leviticus 16

Leviticus 16:2

Richard Challoner: Enter not: No one but the high priest, and he but once a year, could enter into the sanctuary; to signify that no one could enter into the sanctuary of heaven, till Christ our high priest opened it by his passion. Heb. 10. 8.

Leviticus 16:8

Tertullian: May I offer, moreover, an interpretation of the two goats which were presented on “the great day of atonement”? Do they not also prefigure the two natures of Christ? They were of like size and very similar in appearance, owing to the Lord’s identity of aspect. He is not to come in any other form. He had to be recognized by those by whom he was also wounded and pierced. One of these goats was bound with scarlet and driven by the people out of the camp into the wilderness, amid cursing, and spitting, and pulling and piercing, being thus marked with all the signs of the Lord’s own passion. The other, by being offered up for sins and given to the priests of the temple for meat, afforded proofs of his second appearance, when (after all sins have been expiated) the priests of the spiritual temple, that is, the church, are to enjoy the flesh, as it were, of the Lord’s own grace. The rest will deport from salvation without tasting it. — AGAINST MARCION 3.7.7

Theodoret of Cyrus: I will however mention the sacrifice in which two goats were offered, the one being slain and the other let go. In these two goats there is an anticipative image of the two natures of the Savior; in the one let go, of the impassible Godhead, in the one slain, of the passible manhood. — DIALOGUE 3

Leviticus 16:29

Caesarius of Arles: “On the days of your solemn feasts you shall mortify yourselves.” Why did he say this? Because fasts and vigils and holy mortifications afflict bodies that are humbled, but they purify hearts that have been defiled. They may take strength away from limbs, but they add a bright sheen to conscience. Sins of pleasure are redeemed by bodily weariness while the physical delights of dissipation are punished by the distresses of a hard cross. Thus by present mortification the sentence of future death is suspended. — SERMON 197.1