The Lottery
“Scapegoats in The Lottery by Shirley Jackson and Throughout Human History” First and foremost, where did the term scapegoat originate? The term can be traced back to the Bible. In the Bible, the goat upon whose head Aaron symbolically laid the sins of the people on the Day of Atonement, after which it was led away into the wilderness. “When Aaron has finished making atonement for the Most Holly Place, the Tent of Meeting and the altar, he shall bring forward the live goat. He is to lay both hands on the head of the live goat and confess over it all the wickedness and rebellion of the Israelites-all their sins- and put them on the goat’s head. He shall send the goat away into the desert in the care of a man appointed for the task. The goat will carry on itself all their sins to a solitary place; and the man shall release it in the desert.”(Leviticus 16:20-22) Now that the origin has been discussed the definition can be given. A scapegoat is any person or thing bearing blame for the misdeeds of others. Many societies throughout human history have used scapegoats for ritualistic sacrifices. The Aztecs held sacrifices in their culture. The Aztecs did not use their own people for their human sacrifices. Instead, they used prisoners of war for the sacrifices. These people were sacrificed to appease the Aztec gods. The god most of these sacrifices were centered around was Huitzilopochtili. He was the Aztec god of war and god of the sun. Now and again they would sacrifice someone from their own community.