BSN: Feasts of Israel

Feasts of Moses

• The very first words Moses spoke to Pharaoh on behalf of the Lord were, “Let My people go that they may celebrate a feast to Me in the wilderness” (Ex 5:1)
• Israel’s feasts were enumerated and described in the Law of Moses (Ex, Lev, Num, Dt).
• The purpose behind all of them was to foster national cohesion. In America, we call such events “holidays” (Memorial Day, the Fourth of July, Labor Day, etc.). Of course, the purpose of the nation Israel was to bear witness to the one true God who had created heaven and earth. Today, in the eternal age, all nations should be bearing this witness (Matt 28:18-20).
• For multiple reasons, these feasts are hard to keep straight -especially because of the next point.
• The feasts all point in one way or another to Christ – Col 2:16-17. Therefore, we today do not have to concern ourselves with keeping these feasts as the ancient Israelites did; rather, we just need to appreciate what they have to teach us about Christ.
• See Leviticus 23 and 25 for a list of most of them. See also Numbers 28-29. What follows here is a complete list.
• The Sabbath
  • The Sabbath Day (Weekly) – The 7th day – Ex 20:8-11; 31:12-17; 34:21; Lev 23:3; Dt 5:12-15
  • The Sabbath Year (The 7th year) – Ex 23:10-11; Lev 25:1-7
  • The Year of Jubilee (The 50th year) – Lev 25:8-55; 27:17-24; Num 36:4 – Debts are cleared, slaves are freed, and all land reverts to the tribe to which it was originally granted by inheritance when Israel conquered Canaan and its land was apportioned among the twelve tribes.
    • “The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath” – Mt 12:8; Lk 6:5
• The Three Main Feasts – The three annual feasts at which all Jewish males were required to appear at the tabernacle (later at the temple in Jerusalem) with gifts are followed with an asterisk (*) below. – Ex 23:14-19; 34:23; Dt 16:16-17; 2 Chr 8:12-13
• Passover and Unleavened Bread (Spring) These two feast are held in conjunction. The Passover meal is eaten the evening before the first day of Unleavened Bread. Another way of saying this is that Passover and Unleavened Bread are two feasts celebrated as one; that is, Passover is the first day of Unleavened Bread, which lasts a week.
  • Passover* (Hebrew: Pesach; Greek: Pascha) – Ex 12:1-14; 34:25; Lev 23:4-5; Num 9:1-14; 28:16; Dt 16:1-7; Lk 2:41 – The Hebrew word for Passover (pesach, 6453) comes from the Hebrew words for “pass” (6452a) and “over” (5921). In other words, we can understand the word “Passover” to literally mean God “passes over” as He passed over the Israel’s firstborns when He sent the plague on the Egyptians firstborns, as in “you shall say, ‘It is a Passover sacrifice to the LORD who passed over the houses of the sons of Israel in Egypt when He smote the Egyptians, but spared our homes.'” (Ex 12:27).
    • Christ our Passover – 1 Cor 5:7
  • Unleavened Bread* – Ex 12:15-20; 13:3-10; 23:15; 34:18; Lev 23:6-8; Num 28:17-25; Dt 16:3-4, 8; Lk 22:1
    • Christ our Bread – 1 Cor 5:6-8; Jn 6
• The Feast of Fruit Fruits (Spring) – Lev 23:9-14
  • Christ our First Fruits – 1 Cor 15:20, 23
• Weeks*, Harvest*, Pentecost* (Spring) Hebrew: Shavuot – Ex 23:16; 34:22; Lev 23:15-21; Num 28:26-31; Dt 16:9-12; Acts 2:1; 20:16; 1 Cor 16:8
  • Peter preached the first post-resurrection sermon in Act 2 on the day of Pentecost. The Holy Spirit was poured out on the assembled believers.
• The Feast of Trumpets (Fall) Later known as Rosh Hashanah, New Year’s Day – Lev 23:23-25; Num 29:1-6
• The Day of Atonement (Fall) – The Jewish name for this day is Yom Kippur. “Yom” means “day” and “Kippur” means “atonement” and/or “cleansing.” It occurs on the tenth day of the seventh month, which is five days before the Feast of Booths. See Lev 16 (especially verses 29-34); Lev 23:26-32: Num 29:7-11
  • Christ our Propitiation – Rom 3:25; Heb 2:17; 1 Jn 2:2; 4:10
• Booths*, Ingathering*, Tabernacles*, Tents* (Fall) Hebrew: Succoth or Sukkot – Ex 23:16; 34:22; Lev 23:33-36, 39-43; Num 29:12-34; Dt 16:13-15; 2 Chr 8:13; Zech 14:16-19 – a “booth” was a temporary shelter, and “ingathering” referred to the full harvest at the end of the year. The people would “camp out” in temporary shelters (typically made out of tree branches) in the fields they were working to harvest. This feast was foreshadowed in the book of Genesis by Jacob’s use of booths in Succoth (a Hebrew word meaning “booths”) immediately after reconciling with Esau upon his return to Canaan (Gen 33:17). The Mosaic purpose was to commemorate the 40 years of Israel’s wandering in the desert, during which they lived in temporary shelters (booths or sukkot), remembering God’s miraculous protection after leaving Egypt.
  • The New Testament Church fulfilled the Feast of Booths – The New Testament churches were a “feast of booths” with spiritual Israelites meeting in temporary quarters in anticipation of permanence upon entrance into the promised land (foreshadowing the coming of the kingdom of God at the end of the church age in the late 1st century. See any or all of these essays:
    • The One True Church (3 min)
    • The Apostles Have the Keys (4 min)
    • The Apostolic Age (3 min)
    • The Greatest Generation of Them All (3 min)
    • Spiritual Israel v Physical Israel (3 min)
• Holy Convocation – Lev 23:36; Num 29:35-38

Feasts Established after Moses’ Time

Moses lived in the 16-15th centuries BC.

• Purim – (the feast instituted to celebrate the victory of the Jews through Mordecai and Esther in the 6th century BC) – Esther 9:20-32 (and related BSN notes).
• Hanukkah (the feast of dedication or festival of lights, instituted in the Maccabean period which was between the testaments in the 2nd century BC) – Jn 10:22