Acharei Mot

Azazel: A Place

Yoma 9 (first century CE) 67b:6-7

§ The Sages taught: The word Azazel indicates that the cliff the goat is pushed from should be rough and hard. I might have thought that it may be located in a settled area. Therefore, the verse states: “In the wilderness.” And from where does one derive that the goat is pushed from a cliff? The verse states “gezeira,” indicating an area that is sharp, like a cliff. It was taught in another baraita: Azazel is a reference to the hardest mountain, and so it says: “And the mighty [eilei] of the land he took away” (Ezekiel 17:13). Azazel is interpreted as azaz-el, with the term el connoting something rough and hard. The school of Rabbi Yishmael taught: Azazel is so called because it atones for the actions of Uzza and Azael. These are the names of “sons of God” who sinned with “daughters of men” (Genesis 6:2) and thereby caused the world to sin during the generation of the Flood.

Rashi (1040-1105CE) on Leviticus 16:8:2

(8) עזאזל AZAZEL — (The word is taken to be a compound of עזז "to be strong" and אל "mighty"). It was a precipitous and flinty rock — a towering peak, for it is said (v. 22) "[and the goat shall bear upon it their iniquities into] an גזר) "ארץ גזרה means to cut) — into a craggy land (Yoma 67b).

Ibn Ezra (1090-1165CE) on Leviticus 16:8:1

(8) lots These objects are known to us through the tradition which we have received from our ancestors. Sa‘adya Gaon said that ‘Azazel is the name of a mountain, so called because it is mighty [Hebrew: ‘az]. A divine name [Hebrew: ’el , powerful] appears as a suffix, in the sense of “the great mountains” [Psalms 36:7] and “Yequti’el” [literally, “hope in the Mighty One”] [I Chronicles 4:18]. The Gaon Halevy held that the word ‘Azazel does not contain such a suffix, because its ’alef appears between two zayin’s . Some say that this mountain is near Mount Sinai, and that God commanded us to lead the goat up the mountain and to slaughter it there. Afterward, during the time of the Second Temple, the goat used to be led to a different mountain.

Azazel: Name of the Goat

The translators of the Greek Septuagint understood the Hebrew term as meaning "the sent away" (apparently reading either עז אזל goat which leaves or the mighty sent or עזלזל v.s.), and read:

⁸and Aaron shall cast lots upon the two goats, one lot for the Lord and the other lot for the scapegoat (Greek apodiopompaio dat.).⁹And Aaron shall present the goat on which the lot fell for the Lord, and offer it as a sin offering; ¹⁰but the goat on which the lot of the sent away one fell shall be presented alive before the Lord to make atonement over it, that it may be sent away (Greek eis ten apopompen acc.) into the wilderness.

Following the Septuagint, the Latin Vulgate, Martin Luther and the King James Version also give readings such as Young's Literal Translation: "And Aaron hath given lots over the two goats, one lot for Jehovah, and one lot for a goat of departure'".

Azazel: A Demon..?

Rabbi Abraham Ibn Ezra (1089-1164)

And if you could understand the secret of the word Azazel you will know its secret and its secret and the secret of its name as it has friends in the Bible, and I will reveal to you a bit of the secret with a hint: When you turn 33 you will know it.

Nahmanides (1194-1270)

If you count 33 verses from the verse in Leviticus where Azazel is first mentioned (16:8), you reach a verse that reads “And they shall no more offer their sacrifices unto devils, after whom they have gone a whoring. This shall be a statute for ever unto them throughout their generations.” (17:7) And this is the secret of the issue, that they worshipped other gods, they the messengers sacrificed to them.

Rabbi Ishmael (2nd century CE)

“And he said to Aaron: Take for yourself a bull-calf for a sin-offering” (Lev. 9:2): We are hereby taught that Moses said to Aaron: Aaron, my brother, even though the Holy One, blessed be He, has consented to forgive your sins [i.e., the ones relating to the episode of the golden calf], you must [nonetheless] “place something in Satan’s mouth.” Send your gift before you before entering the sanctuary, lest He condemn you upon your entering.

The school of Rabbi Ishmael taught [tanna d’vei rabbi ishmael]: Azazel is so called because it atones for the actions of Uzzah and Azael. [Cf. Rashi: “These are the names of “sons of God” who sinned with “daughters of men” (Genesis 6:2) and thereby caused the world to sin during the generation of the Flood”] (BT Yoma 67b).

Rabbi Eliezer in Pirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer, Chapter 46 (8th/9th century CE)

On the day the Torah was given, Samael said before the Holy One, blessed be He, “Master of the World! You have given me jurisdiction over all the nations of the world, but over Israel do you not give me jurisdiction?” He replied, “Here, you have jurisdiction over them on the Day of Atonement if you find sin amongst them, and if not, you have no jurisdiction.” Therefore they [Israel] would bribe him on the Day of Atonement, in order that Israel’s offering should not be canceled, as it says, “(and he shall place lots upon the two goats,) one marked for the Lord and the other marked for ‘Aza’zel” (Lev. 16:8). The lot for the Holy One, blessed be He, was for a burnt offering and the lot for ‘Aza’zel for a goat-sin offering, and all the sins of Israel were upon it, as it says, “Thus the goat shall carry on it all their iniquities to a cut-off land; [and the goat shall be set free in the wilderness]” (Lev. 16:22).

I Enoch 8:1-3 And Azazel taught men to make swords, and daggers, and shields and breastplates. And he showed them the things after these, and the art of making them: bracelets, and ornaments, and the art of making up the eyes and of beautifying the eyelids, and the most precious and choice stones, and all kinds of colored dyes. And the world was changed. And there was great impiety and much fornication, and they went astray, and all their ways became corrupt.

1 Enoch 10:4-7

And further the Lord said to Raphael: “Bind Azazel by his hands and his feet, and throw him into the darkness. And split open the desert which is in Dudael, and throw him there. And throw on him jagged and sharp stones, and cover him with darkness; and let him stay there for ever, and cover his face, that he may not see light, and that on the great day of judgment he may be hurled into the fire. And restore the earth which the angels have ruined, and announce the restoration of the earth, for I shall restore the earth …

Modern Applications

"Lekh l'azazel"

Excerpted from Word of the Day / Azazel: What the Hell Does It Mean? by Elon Gilad

The first reference to the use of the phrase Lekh le'azazel is in the book Khavat Yair by Rabbi Yair Chayim Bacharach (1701-1638). Bacharach writes of a mother who hit her son and said “Go to Azazel in the desert!” The phrase gained popularity among the users of Hebrew. It appears twice in the novel Ayit Tzavua (1858) by Abraham Mapu, the first Hebrew novelist.

The phrase reached the apex of its popularity in the early 20th century. One day in 1927, the poet Haim Nahman Bialik and his friend the publisher Yehoshua Hana Ravnitzky were walking on a Tel Aviv street talking in Yiddish with one another. Aharon Nachmani, a young and zealous member of the Battalion for the Defense of the Language, a group dedicated to policing the exclusive use of Hebrew among Palestine Jews, approached Bialik and shouted “Bialik, speak Hebrew!” to which the annoyed Bialik responded, “Lekh le'azazel!”

Scapegoat (n.)

1530, "goat sent into the wilderness on the Day of Atonement as a symbolic bearer of the sins of the people," coined by Tyndale from scape, a shortening of escape (see scape (v.)) + goat; the whole word translating Latin caper emissarius, itself a translation in Vulgate of Hebrew 'azazel (Leviticus xvi.8, 10, 26), which was read as 'ez ozel "goat that departs," but which others hold to be the proper name of a devil or demon in Jewish mythology (sometimes identified with Canaanite deity Aziz).