Scapegoat

Ben Macintyre in his The genius Britain betrayed - Times 14 July is mistaken about his goats and I'm not even religious let alone Jewish. It took me two seconds to check so why didn't he rather than to start the article with an erroneous metaphor leading me to ignore the rest? In fact two very similar-appearing male goats were brought into the courtyard of the Temple in Jerusalem on Yom Kippur as part of the Holy Service of that day. The high priest cast lots for the two goats. One goat was offered as a burnt offering. The second goat was the scapegoat. The high priest placed his hands on the head of the goat and confessed the sins of the people of Israel. The scapegoat was led away and let go in the wilderness according to Leviticus 16:22, although the Talmud adds that it was pushed over a distant cliff. In modern Hebrew Azazel is used derogatorily, as in lekh la-Azazel ("go to Azazel"), as in "go to hell". (Azazel is the word translated as "scapegoat" in the King James Version of the Bible.) So where was he again with rehabilitating the innocent?