In her commentary on Hebrews, Catholic scholar Mary Healy discussed how Christ fulfilled the Old Covenant sacrifices and how his atoning work (and/or the Lord’s Supper) can be seen as the antitypes of these Old Testament types:
How Jesus Fulfills the Sacrifices of the Old Covenant
The law of Moses provided detailed instructions for five main types of sacrifice in ancient Israel: the burnt offering, grain offering, peace offering, purification offering, and reparation offering (Lev 1-7). Although the New Testament does not mention each of these explicitly, in the light of the New Testament each can be recognized as prefiguring Christ in a unique way; each brings out a distinct aspect of his paschal mystery.
The first three types are freewill sacrifices, offering voluntarily to express one’s love and devotion to the Lord. In the burnt offering, or holocaust (lev 1), the animal was entirely burnt on the altar, going up to the Lord in the form of smoke (the Hebrew word for “holocaust,” olah, is from the verb “ascend”). It was a powerful symbol of offering oneself totally to God, holding nothing back. On a national level, Israel offered the tamid, or daily burnt offering, of a lamb every morning and evening. Jesus’ death on the cross was a “holocaust” in that he was entirely consumed by his self-offering; he gave himself so completely that he had nothing left to give. As the Gospel of John puts it, “he loved them to the end” (13:1)—that is, to an unlimited extent. And he ascended back to God having been “made perfect” (Heb 2:10; 5:9), transformed in his human nature, by the fire of the Holy Spirit.
The grain offering (Lev 2; 6:7-16) consisted of raw flour, cooked cakes, or roast grain, part of which would be burned on the altar and the rest eaten by the priests. It may have been intended as a form of burnt offering that the poor could afford. Grain, along with wine and oil, was also offered with the daily tamid. Jesus’ passion was a “grain offering” in that through it he becomes the bread of life for us (John 6:35; see John 12:24). By partaking of this bread in the Eucharist (see Heb 13:10), we share in his own divine life.
The peace offering, or communion sacrifice (3; 7:11-36), the only sacrifice in which some of the meat was eaten by the worshiper and his household, was a festive sacrifice offered to fulfill a vow, celebrate a special occasion, or thank God or a particular favor such as saving one from death. In the latter case it was called the “thanksgiving sacrifice” (see Ps 107:21-22; 116:17). The sacred banquet in the vicinity of the temple, accompanied by songs of praise, was an expression of joyous communion with the Lord and with one another (see Deut 12:7). The annual Passover sacrifice was Israel’s great national peace offering. The New Testament reveals that Jesus’ passion, and the sacred banquet by which it would be signified and made present for all time, are the fulfillment of Passover and the peace offering that establishes the ultimate communion between God and man (see Luke 22:17-19). Thus the Christian name for the celebration of the Lord’s Supper is “Eucharist” (eucharistia), meaning “thanksgiving.”
The last two types were expiatory sacrifices, offered to atone for wrong-doing. The purification offering, or sin offering (Lev 4:1-5; 5:13; 6:17-23), was for the purpose of cleansing the sanctuary from contamination due to sins. The victim’s blood was sprinkled before the veil of the Holy of Holies and smeared on the altar of incense, after which the animal was burned outside the camp. The annual Yom Kippur sacrifices were Israel’s great national purification offering. Hebrews 13:11-12 suggests that Jesus’ passion was a purification offering, since he “suffered outside the gate to sanctify the people with his own blood” (NJB). His blood purifies the living temple, the Church, of all sin for all time (see 1:3; 10:10).
The reparation offering, or guilty offering (Lev 5:14-26; 7:1-10), was the sacrifice of a ram in atonement for acts of sacrilege or offenses against one’s neighbor such as theft or perjury. Besides bringing the ram, toe worshiper confessed his guilt and made restitution plus one fifth. Isaiah foretells that the Suffering Servant of the Lord, in accord with God’s will, would give himself as a “reparation offering” (Isa 53:10)—a prophecy fulfilled by Christ, whose sacrifice was the all-sufficient restitution to God of the human love, trust, and obedience that had been withheld due to sin. (Mary Healy, Hebrew [Catholic Commentary on Sacred Scripture; Grand Rapids, Mich.: Baker Academic, 2016], 152-53)
While Latter-day Saints would have no issue with the focus on the Eucharist ("Sacrament"), such would not necessarily entail, as Healy and other faithful Catholics hold to, the Eucharist itself being a propitiatory sacrifice and, related to that, Transubstantiation. For a listing of articles addressing these important issues, see:
