According to Hugh Nibley, it was the custom for one fleeing for his life in the desert to seek protection in the tent of the great sheik by crying out, "Ana dakhiluka--I am thy suppliant." The lord had to take you into his tent, and then he would place his robe over your shoulder, the kaf, and declare you under his protection. . . . This puts him under the Lord's protection from all enemies. They embrace in a close hug, as the Arab chiefs always do. The Lord makes a place for him and invites him to sit down beside him. They are at one
Yom Kippur means embrace. Kippur means atonement, and it also means embrace, the literal act of hugging. It means enfolding or hugging a person. And I should have told you that when the priest goes to the door to be received by the Lord [on the Day of Atonement], they embrace each other. There are interesting old Jewish pictures of the Lord's hand coming through the door of the tent and Moses taking the hand (see illustration). . . . In early Christian representations the hand of God reaching through the veil is grasped by the initiate or human spirit who is being caught up into the presence of the Lord. Philo of Alexandria, who for all his philosophizing had a thorough knowledge of Jewish customs, compares all the hangings in the tabernacle with the main veil. "But in a sense the curtains are also veils, not only because they cover the roof and the walls but because they are woven of the same kinds of material." They represent the cosmos . . .
In the Law of Atonement (at-one-ment), how do you become one? Well, the ultimate becoming one is a fusion in an embrace. That's how you signify it, whether it's the marriage vow that "they two shall become one flesh," or something like that. This embrace is a very important thing, and it figures here.
The two parts of the Yom Kippur are the yeshivah and the teshuvah. Teshuvah is to return home; it is when you return and are let in. Yeshivah is when you sit down. Yashab means to sit down beside your Lord. In one you return home, and in the other you enter the tent and sit down beside your Lord. That's what you do. These are very nicely set forth in the Book of Mormon in Alma 5 and 2 Nephi. This is what happens. This is the imagery of the Atonement. This is what 2 Nephi 1:15 tells us: "But behold, the Lord hath redeemed my soul from hell; I have beheld his glory, and I am encircled about eternally with the arms of his love."
And 2 Nephi 4:33 says: "O lord, wilt thou encircle me around in the robe of thy righteousness! [see the chief puts his robe around his servant, and this is at the time when he is running away from his enemies]. O Lord, wilt thou make a way for mine escape before mine enemies!" That's exactly what he does. When the lord puts his protecting robe around your shoulder, that protects you from your enemies.
"Behold, he sendeth an invitation to all men, for the arms of his mercy are extended toward them, and he saith: Repent, and I will receive you" (Alma 5:33). This is the hepet, the ritual embrace that consummates the final escape from death in the Egyptian funerary texts--and the release, where Horus is received into the arms of his father Osiris, which takes place at the veil in the last scene of the Book of the Dead, where he passes through.
The prophets repeatedly invite Israel to return to God who is waiting with open arms to receive them if they will only repent (Jeremiah 3:14; Leviticus 16:30). [Hugh W. Nibley, Teachings of the Book of Mormon, Semester 2, pp. 270-273] [See the commentary on 2 Nephi 1:15; 2 Nephi 4:33]