Chatat is the Levitical purification offering. Leviticus 4 is the chapter on it. When an Israelite sinned unintentionally, the priest offered a chatat, and the worshiper was restored. But here is what the chatat is not: it is not punishment-transfer. The animal was not punished for the offerer's sin. Jacob Milgrom's Anchor Bible commentary on Leviticus makes the case with the kind of rigor that has ended the debate in serious scholarship: the blood of the chatat purifies the sanctuary, not the sinner. It removes defilement so the meeting place can continue to function.

This is why the Septuagint's choice to translate chatat with hamartia matters so much. When Sha'ul writes in 2 Corinthians 5:21 that Yeshua was made hamartia, the Levitical frame is right there in the vocabulary. Yeshua as the new chatat — the new purification offering, the new means of cleansing the meeting place so the relationship can continue. Not a scapegoat absorbing a penalty. A means of purification opening the door. The animal in Leviticus 4 was not guilty. The worshiper was. The animal's life was given to cover the breach. That is the pattern Sha'ul carries into his theology of the cross.