A ceremony is given in the Mishnah in Ta’anit 4.8 and it was done after the Azazel goat was slain and the news had reached Jerusalem. The Mishnah says, “Rabban Simeon Ben Gamaliel (when “Rabban” is used, it means that person was the Nasi of the Sanhedrin) said: There were no happier days for Israel than the 15th of Av (not a “hag” or festival) and the Day of Atonement, for on them the daughters of Jerusalem used to go forth in white raiments; and these were borrowed, that none should be abashed which had them not; (hence) all the raiments required immersion. And the daughters of Jerusalem went forth to dance in the vineyards. And what did they say? Young man, lift up thine eyes and see what thou would choose for thyself: set not thine eyes on beauty, but set thine eyes on family; for favor is deceitful and beauty is vain, but a woman that fears the Lord she shall be praised; moreover it saith, give her of the fruit of her hands and let her works praise her in the gates. Likewise is saith, go forth ye daughters of Zion, and behold King Solomon with the crown wherewith his mother hath crowned him in the day of his espousal’s and in the day of the gladness of his heart. In the day of his espousal’s-this is the giving of the Law; and in the day of his gladness of his heart-this is the building of the Temple. May it be built speedily, in our days! Amen.”
This ceremony was not done until Azazel was dead. This relates to Judges 21.16-21 where it says, “Then the elders of the congregation said, ‘How shall we do for wives for them that remain, seeing the women are destroyed out of Benjamin?’ And they said, ‘There must be an inheritance for them that be escaped of Benjamin, that a tribe be not destroyed out of Israel. Howbeit we may not give them wives of our daughters; for the children of Israel have sworn, saying “Cursed be he that gives a wife to Benjamin.” Then they said, ‘Behold, there is a feast (a “Hag”, and this can only be Yom Kippur, based on Ta’anit 4.8) of the Lord in Shiloh yearly in a place which is on the north side of Bethel, on the east side of the highway that goes up from Bethel to Shechem, and on the south of Lebonah.’ Therefore they commanded the children of Benjamin, saying, ‘Go and lie in wait in the vineyards; and see, and, behold, if the daughters of Shiloh come out to dance in dances, then come ye out of the vineyards, and catch you every man his wife of the daughters of Shiloh, and go into the land of Benjamin.'” So, we know that these dances happened on the 15th of Av and Yom Kippur, and since the 15th of Av is not a “festival” or “hag” (v 19), we can conclude that this was Yom Kippur.
Let’s go back to the article on “Azazel” in the Jewish Encyclopedia, where it says, “Evidently the figure of Azazel was an object of general fear and awe rather than, as he has been conjectured, a foreign product or the invention of a late lawgiver. Nay, more; as a demon of the desert, it seems to have been closely interwoven with the mountainous region of Jerusalem and of ancient pre-Israelitish origin.” Now, it may be true that other nations around had similar customs, but we don’t believe that the Jewish people got these customs from them. It came from the Lord (1 Chr 28.11-19).
The article on Azazel continues, “Leader of the rebellious angels. This is confirmed by the Book of Enoch (written around 200-50 B.C.), which brings Azazel into connection with the biblical story of the fall of the angels, located, obviously in accordance with ancient folk-lore, on Mount Hermon as a sort of a gathering place of demons from of old (Enoch 13). Azazel is represented in the Book of Enoch as the leader of the rebellious giants in the time preceding the Flood; he taught men the art of warfare, of making swords, knives, shields, coats of mail, and women the art of deception by ornamenting the body, dyeing the hair, and painting the face and the eyebrows, and also revealed to the people the secrets of witchcraft and corrupted their manners, leading them into the wilderness and impurity; until at last he was, at the Lord’s command, bound hand and foot by the Archangel Raphael and chained to the rough and jagged rocks of Cha’Duduel (=Beit Chadudo), whence he is to abide in outer darkness until the great Day of Judgment, when he will be cast into the fire to be consumed forever (Enoch 8.1, 9.6, 10.4-6, 54.5, 88.1).”
So, we will notice in the Mishnah it mentions Chadudo as the place where Azazel is taken, and we find the same reference in Enoch. Now, back to the article, “The story of Azazel as the seducer of men and women was familiar also to the Rabbis, as may be learned from Tanna R. Ishmael: ‘The Azazel goat was to atone for the wicked deeds of Uzza and Azazel, the leaders of the rebellious hosts in the time of Enoch’ (Yoma 67b).; and still better from the Midrash Abkir, end, Yalk, Gen 44, where Azazel is represented as the seducer of women, teaching them the art of beautifying the body with dye and paint (compare Chronicles of Jerahmeel, trans. by Gaster, 25.13). According to Pirke R. Eliezer (Tosefta, Meg 31a), the goat is offered to Azazel as a bribe that he who is identical with Samael or Satan should not by his accusations prevent the atonement of the sins on that day. The fact that Azazel occupied a place in Mandaean, Sabean and Arabian mythology, Azazel (a demon identical with Satan) renders it probable that Azazel was a degraded Babylonian deity.”
Again, we don’t believe Israel got their concepts of this from the Babylonians. Origen identified “Azazel with Satan; Pirke R. Eliezer with Samael and the Zohar Achare Mot, following Nahmanides with the spirit of Esau or heathenism; still, while some of the chief demons in the Kaballah, he never attained in the doctrinal system of Judaism a position similar to that of Satan.”
In Part 17, we are going to begin with references about Azazel in the Book of Enoch and then we will go to the article on “Revelation” and “Apocalypse” in the Jewish Encyclopedia to pick up additional information on Azazel. Hopefully you re beginning to see that Azazel was never presented as a messianic figure, and is certainly not a picture of Yeshua. He is, on the other hand, a clear picture of the Satan and the False Messiah, and we will continue to present evidence to show that this interpretation of Azazel is the correct one.
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