Summary: According to Andrew Remington Rillera’s 2024 book, Lamb of the Free, neither animal sacrifices in the OT nor Jesus’ death in the NT is substitutionary atonement. In the OT, most animal sacrifices are non-atoning, e.g., the regular burnt offerings (to attract God), the well-being sacrifices (shared meals with God), and the Passover (to commemorate Exodus) (Rillera 2024:27). Kipper is atoning but only in the sense of cleansing the sanctuary of ritual impurities. Based on 1 Peter 2:21-24 as an allusion to Isaiah 53 (the Suffering Servant passage) and Rev. 14:5, Jesus’ crucifixion is not a substitutionary sacrifice but a call upon us to follow His example, pick up His cross, and share in His righteous sufferings and resurrection (Rillera 2024:243-4, 251). This is a progressive interpretation for instead of giving us a free lunch as claimed by Paul (Romans 7:4; 10:10), Jesus expects us to “join with Him in that sort of self-giving service of others” before we can share in His eternal life (Rillera 2024:251).
Rillera’s (2024) problems are as follows. Concerning the OT, he ignores the 5 great prophets’ opposition to animal sacrifice (Isaiah 1:11; Jeremiah 7:22-23; Hosea 6:6; Amos 5:21-22; Micah 6:6-8), and the possibility that those atrocious animal sacrificial rituals are interpolations inserted by “the lying pen of the scribes” (Jer. 8:8 NIV). Concerning Jesus’ crucifixion, Rillera’s stance is self-contradictory. On the one hand, he asserts that Jesus’ death is NOT a sacrifice (Rillera 2024:243). On the other hand, he calls Jesus “the ultimate Passover Lamb” (Rillera 2024:196, 285), thereby endorsing Paul, the anti-vegan apostate's, distortion of Jesus' martyrdom for animal liberation (Akers 2020) into a new form of blood voodoo, succeeding the animal sacrificial cult in the OT.
To be continued.
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