What Distinguishes the Chatat and Asham/2

What Distinguishes the Chatat and Asham?

Exegetical Approaches

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Function of the Offering

While the Chatat is first and foremost a purification offering, the Asham is a reparation offering.

Sources:R. David Zvi HoffmannVayikra 5:17About R. David Zvi Hoffmann, modern scholars,

Meaning of חטאת – According to these sources, the root "חטא" means to purify, as proven by the many verses where it is clearly mentioned in the context of purification (sometimes being parallel to the root "טהר") including Vayikra 14:48-52, Bemidbar 8:7, Bemidbar 19:19 and Yechezkel 43:23-26.¹

Chatat: common denominator – R. D"Z Hoffmann asserts that the common denominator between all cases in which one must bring a Chatat is that they involve contraction of impurity, be it spiritual or physical. Thus, both those who have created spiritual impurity by unintentionally transgressing a prohibition² and those who have contracted physical impurity (a birthing mother, one who has  tzara'at, one who has an emission, and a nazirite who has come in contact with a corpse) are obligated to bring a Chatat.³

What does the Chatat purify? R. Hoffmann explains that sin defiles not just the person, but also the Mikdash,⁴ and as such, the Chatat comes to purify the Mikdash itself from impurity.  As evidence that the Mikdash itself can be polluted not just via physical impurity but by sin as well, he points to Vayikra 16:16, "וְכִפֶּר עַל הַקֹּדֶשׁ מִטֻּמְאֹת בְּנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל וּמִפִּשְׁעֵיהֶם לְכׇל חַטֹּאתָם" and Vayikra 20:3, "כִּי מִזַּרְעוֹ נָתַן לַמֹּלֶךְ לְמַעַן טַמֵּא אֶת מִקְדָּשִׁי". 

Where the blood is sprinkled? In support of the assumption that the Chatat is meant to purify the Mikdash itself,⁵ R. Hoffmann notes that the blood of such offerings is sprinkled not on the person but in the Mikdash. He further suggests that the gravity of the sin determines the depths to which the Mikdash is polluted, and hence, where exactly the blood is sprinkled:

• Unintentional sins of an individual are the least defiling and affect only the courtyard. As such, the blood of these Chatatot is sprinkled on the outer altar.
• Inadvertent sins of the high priest (Vayikra 4:1-12) and community (Vayikra 4:13-21) affect even the Outer Sanctum and thus, the blood of their Chatatot is sprinkled on the Incense Altar.
• Brazen sins penetrate to even the Inner Sanctum, and this is purified through the blood of the Yom HaKippurim offerings, sprinkled in the Holy of Holies.

Meaning of Asham – R. Hoffmann asserts that

Asham: common denominator

Animals brought?

"בְּעֶרְכְּךָ"

Severity of Sin

While both the Chatat and Asham serve an atoning role, they do so for different types of sins.

Asham More Severe

The more severe offenses necessitate an Asham offering rather than a Chatat.

Asham Less Severe

Less severe sins are expiated with an Asham rather than a Chatat.

¹ See also Shemot 29:36, Vayikra 8:15, and Yechezkel 45:18. 

² Though the verses appear to speak of unintentional transgression of any prohibition, R. Hoffmann, like Chazal, limits the cases for which one needs to bring an offering to only those which one would have been obligated with כרת had one transgressed them intentionally.

³ The red heifer whose ashes come to purify one who ha come into contact with a dead body is also referred to as a Chatat.

⁴ He suggests that this impurity takes the form of the distancing of the Shekhinah, while purification via sprinkling of blood allows the Shekhinah to return.

⁵ R. Hoffmann asserts that the sacrifice serves to purify both the sinner's soul and the Mikdash.  Prof. Milgrom, though, goes a step further to suggest that the Chtat comes to purify only the Mikdash. To explain the process of sin's defilement, he uses Oscar Wilde's "The Picture of Dorian Gray" as an analogy.  In the work, the corrupt and hedonistic Dorian Gary remains handsome and unblemished, while his portrait progressively reveals his corruption.  So, too, Milgrom suggests that according to Sefer Vayikra, sinful actions might not always be revealed in the figure of the sinner, but every sin will progressively contaminate the Mikdash.