NOTES for Lev 4:1-35
The next most important kind of sacrifice is the sin offering. As we see, in the very rite of offering this sacrifice there are many indications that its essence differs sharply from other offerings. No one eats the meat of the animal "for sin"; after it is slaughtered before the tabernacle, its blood is brought into the sanctuary, before the veil, in order to show God symbolically that blood has been shed; its inner parts are burned on the altar, and the meat is destroyed outside the camp (cf. Heb 13:11).
This is not "God's sacred meal with human beings," but a symbolic punishment of the animal for human sins; let us recall the rite of laying hands on the head of the victim. This ritual binds together the spiritually inseparable concepts of sin, as falling away from God, from the Source of life, and death, destruction, as the consequence of that falling away.