He shall wash his flesh with water in the holy place— Not only the high-priest, but the person who bore the goat into the wilderness (Leviticus 16:26.) was to wash, after touching an animal which they judged so polluted; and which, as being a substitute for a sinful people, none could touch without contracting some pollution. And hence the words καθαρμα, περικαθαρμα, which properly signify a piacular deprecatory sacrifice, were applied to denote the vilest and most contemptible objects: in which sense St. Paul, speaking of the ill usage which he and his brethren met with in the world, says, we are περικαθαρματα; as despicable in the eyes of the heathen world, as those condemned persons who were offered up by way of public expiation, 1 Corinthians 4:13. Porphyry observes the same custom of washing among the heathens, who, in their deprecatory sacrifices, permitted no man, who had meddled with them, to come into the city, or to go into his own house, who had not first washed his clothes and his body in some river or spring water.
And put on his garments— The solemn and deprecatory offering being finished, the high-priest was to put off the linen garments, Leviticus 16:23. (which, as we have observed on Leviticus 16:4 were emblematic of the occasion) and to leave them in the tabernacle; never more to be worn, according to Maimonides and others; after which he was to put on the garments peculiar to his office; and in these to offer the burnt-offering for himself and the people; hereby signifying his own, as well as their, total consecration to God: and thus the atonement was completed.