Another religious practice that existed for 1000 years before it appeared in Yahwistic worship:

“Archaeology has uncovered texts from many ancient Near Eastern societies that use ‘Scapegoat’ rituals that predate Leviticus 16.

The oldest recorded is the Eblaite Goat Ritual from 2400 BCE. A cuneiform tablet describes how a goat is to have a ribbon put round it, have the sins of the people symbolically put on it, then it is to be sent out from the people to a remote place, carrying away the impurity of the people in the sight of the gods.

The ‘scapegoats’ in these other religions are highly reminiscent of the biblical description of the scapegoat, The ‘scapgoat’ practice was one of many shared religious practices in the region.

Additional examples for this shared cultural region include the purification by blood and the burning of sacrifices on altars, which have been found in neighboring cultures stretching from Turkey down to the Sinai Peninsula. “

See also: Ida Zatelli, “The Origin of the Biblical Scapegoat Ritual: The Evidence of Two Eblaite Texts,” VT 48 (1998): 254–263.

https://www.thetorah.com/article/the-scapegoat-ritual-and-its-ancient-near-eastern-parallels