At the very beginning of the fifth aliyah of Tzav, VaYikra 8:14, the Torah describes an interesting two-part procedure in which the mizbe'ach is inaugurated: first, part of the korban bull's blood is "placed on the corners/horns of the Altar" -- this step "purifies" (although the Hebrew word seems to indicate that the Altar is "de-sinned") the Altar; second, the remainder of the korban's blood is "poured onto the bases" to "sanctify" it "so that atonement could be provided upon it."
If I haven't made it clear already, I am most definitely a fan of the interlinear Schottenstein translation, which is fairly faithful, accurate, and consistent to the text and allows me to translate, in real-time (and when my intellectual faculties can handle it) Hebrew to English. But I do wonder if its translation of li'capare - "so that atonement could be provided upon it," is the most accurate.
Backing up for a second, the first part certainly seems accurate - that spreading blood upon the altar's "horns" (somehow) purifies it. I can't disagree with the Rashi commentary that this step takes formerly secular precious metals and turns it into a holy object. (I do wonder, however, if anything remotely resembling this step is available to us today, if we still need to do it, especially for objects outside of the holy mishkan, or if we can just, with the right intention, purify any object and use it to accomplish our divine mission.)
It is the second step - I truly wonder what this is all about. Turning back to a potentially loose translation, li'capare doesn't exactly mean "so that atonement could be provided" -- it literally means "to atone" upon it. In other words, this second step doesn't seem to indicate a somehow "transition" of the Altar from one purpose to another - it seems to literally "atone upon it" - as in, the process is self-atoning, or atoning on behalf of the altar, or atoning for something else when poured upon the altar - not that the Altar is now ready to be atoned upon by other offerings.
This more literal translation fits in nicely with the remainder of the narrative - Moshe brings forth a bull, Aharon and his sons lean upon its head (the prototypical action of atonement - a potential transferring of "sin" from the wrongdoer to the animal to be offered), at which point it is shechted and offered according to the precise commandments of H'. Therefore, while part of it may certainly be used to "holify" the Altar, it would almost make sure sense that the second step of this process actually achieves some form of atonement -- for whom and for what reason we are not told -- as opposed to merely setting up the Altar for future teshuvah.
Since Moshe himself performs these actions -- in what I believe is his first and only Temple rite -- is it for his own atonement? Is there any chance that this is the first and only actual act of teshuvah we see regarding Moshe in the entire Torah? And since we know that linearity, while preferred, is certainly by no means required by the Torah, could this be his teshuvah for all of his actions, including hitting the rock with the stick in the future? If this really is his one and only opportunity to perform these holy acts, perhaps Moshe wanted to utilize the experience for all it was worth, using his time there to both purify/sanctify the Altar and atone "upon" the Altar for his own actions.
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