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Articles, Bible studies, and sermons that contain Leviticus 23:36:
Israel's Long WarLeviticus 23:33-36
Excerpted from: Jesus in the Feasts (Part Six): The Eighth DayLet us go back to Leviticus 23. We were here a few times today already. I was not kidding when I said I would take David's notes and basically give the same thing.
I am just going to preface this whole paragraph or so with, as David said this morning, actually, James said it too, Martin, you may have said it too - except for the offerings to be given on this holy day in Numbers 29:35-38, this is the totality of scriptural instruction about the Eighth Day. It is very rare in the Bible for any kind of instruction to be given about this day in particular. There is also a passing reference to it in Nehemiah 8:18. We will not go there. It just basically says that they kept this day. And in the New Testament, before you understand the symbolism and everything of this, using the time markers in John 7, chapters 8 through 10, about halfway through chapter 10 may have occurred on the Eighth Day in the last Feast of Tabernacles of Jesus' life. So that gives us some things to talk about, what happens in John 8, 9, and the first half of chapter 10 before the Feast of Dedication is spoken about there.
But that is it. That is basically all we have to go on about the Eighth Day unless you begin to start putting things together, and I think God has revealed some of these things to us in the last few years so that we can understand more about this particular holy day. It is not readily apparent what the Eighth Day is all about just from a straight through reading of the text. Because the way it is in the texts, most people just say that it is just a continuation of the Feast of Tabernacles. That is how it is presented in Leviticus 23. There is the first day you have a holy convocation. You keep the feast on the Eighth Day, you have a holy convocation, a sacred assembly, a Sabbath rest.
That is what it seems, but what we have been finding is that that particular understanding is, to me, a severe oversimplification of what this day is all about.
Now, last year on this same day, David Grabbe gave a sermonette. He called it The Sacred Assemblies, and we published it this past August as a two-part CGG Weekly, and he used some of it in his offertory sermonette today. He found something in Scripture and did a bit of corresponding word study that was to me at the time completely new. I had never heard it explained before. And it revolves around what is said in verse 36 about the Eighth Day. Let us just jump in the middle.
It is the phrase sacred assembly that was the big aha! phrase for us. Because the sacred assembly, we thought, was just the same thing as a holy convocation, but when you dig into it, you find out that it is other. There is more there. So only the Eighth Day of the Feast of Tabernacles and the Last Day of Unleavened Bread are sacred assemblies. And like I said, it is different from a holy convocation. It is a holy convocation. It is a Sabbath rest. It is a holy day, but it is also designated specifically as a sacred assembly.
Now the word study deals with the Hebrew word underlying sacred assembly and as he mentioned this morning, it is atzeret. It is Strong's number 6116. I found that actually to be interesting because that is a numerical palindrome, makes it easy to remember: 61-16. A palindrome is something like a word or a phrase or even numbers that are the same backwards and forwards. So atzeret is 6116.
And as David said today, a sacred assembly, an atzeret, is a holy convocation with a special purpose. It makes the Last Day of Unleavened Bread and the Eighth Day of the Feast different, special. Both of these obviously end week-long feasts. A sacred assembly occurs at the end of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, a week-long festival, and also on the Eighth Day after the seven days of the Feast of Tabernacles.
Now atzeret's root is atsar. It is Strong's number 6113. And as he mentioned this morning, it contains the ideas of closing, stopping, restraining, and retaining. And understanding … . . .
Leviticus 23:36
Excerpted from: Jesus in the Feasts (Part Six): The Eighth DayNow, last year on this same day, David Grabbe gave a sermonette. He called it The Sacred Assemblies, and we published it this past August as a two-part CGG Weekly, and he used some of it in his offertory sermonette today. He found something in Scripture and did a bit of corresponding word study that was to me at the time completely new. I had never heard it explained before. And it revolves around what is said in verse 36 about the Eighth Day. Let us just jump in the middle.
It is the phrase sacred assembly that was the big aha! phrase for us. Because the sacred assembly, we thought, was just the same thing as a holy convocation, but when you dig into it, you find out that it is other. There is more there. So only the Eighth Day of the Feast of Tabernacles and the Last Day of Unleavened Bread are sacred assemblies. And like I said, it is different from a holy convocation. It is a holy convocation. It is a Sabbath rest. It is a holy day, but it is also designated specifically as a sacred assembly.
Now the word study deals with the Hebrew word underlying sacred assembly and as he mentioned this morning, it is atzeret. It is Strong's number 6116. I found that actually to be interesting because that is a numerical palindrome, makes it easy to remember: 61-16. A palindrome is something like a word or a phrase or even numbers that are the same backwards and forwards. So atzeret is 6116.
And as David said today, a sacred assembly, an atzeret, is a holy convocation with a special purpose. It makes the Last Day of Unleavened Bread and the Eighth Day of the Feast of Tabernacles different, special. Both of these obviously end week-long feasts. A sacred assembly occurs at the end of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, a week-long festival, and also on the Eighth Day after the seven days of the Feast of Tabernacles.
Now atzeret's root is atsar. It is Strong's number 6113. And as he mentioned this morning, it contains the ideas of closing, stopping, restraining, and retaining. And understanding these ideas in the root helps to explain the purpose of the sacred assembly. Closing is understandable. We just went through that as these holy days end their feasts. Stopping or ceasing and restraining comes when we think of it as a Sabbath rest. On a Sabbath rest, we stop, we cease, we do not do our daily work. We rest and we restrain ourselves from our normal everyday activities. We do not do on these days what we normally do on a normal day. Finally, we are to retain what the feasts teach. We are to take in, listen to, think about, and retain the things that we are taught during these feasts. We are to meditate on them and consider what they mean to us, what we should put into long-term memory, if you will, and begin to put into action in our lives.
So what does this mean in terms of pointing us to Christ on this day? As I mentioned, simply that He is our everything. In Him He encapsulates all the lessons, all the examples, all the reasons, all the hope, all the good things that have been revealed to us through God's festivals. I mean, if you did not have the words on the paper that we have in our Bibles, if there was some other way that God could reveal Himself to us, it would be showing us Jesus Christ Himself. Because He is the Word of God. We know everything about Jesus that God wanted to reveal for what is printed in the Book. And then later on when we are called and converted, given God's Holy Spirit, Jesus himself begins to reveal through our experiences with Him other things about Jesus Christ - all based on the Word.
What I am getting at here is, He is the source of the Word. And He, in Himself is everything that we could learn from this Book. So He is everything that is good, right, and true. Remember what He says about himself in John 14. I am the way, the truth, and the life. He is basically saying, I am everything that you need. I am the way to go. I am the truth you are supposed to follow. And as we … . . .
Leviticus 23:33-36
Excerpted from: The Feasts of Tabernacles and Unleavened BreadSo, we saw that the first two feasts were a one-day feast followed by a seven-day feast, and here we see that same pattern, but in reverse, like a mirror. The last feasts of the year are a seven-day feast, followed by a one-day feast. That is not an accident. As we will see, what we observe later in the year relates to what we observe at the beginning.
Knowing what we do of God, both as the Creator and as the One who inspired these things, we should know that this is not happenstance. In everything God does, there is a purpose and precision, and His written word is no exception. His feasts and holy days are no exception. And this arrangement of one day plus seven days, and then seven days plus one, is also no exception. This pattern invites us to explore these feasts together, which will help us to get just a little more into the mind of their Author.
But first, we need to understand another pattern within God's word. This seems to be one of God's favorites, because He uses it in many places. It is called the chiasm. A chiasm is a where related ideas are repeated, but in reverse order. That's what we've seen already, with the 1+7 and then 7+1. It repeats, but in reverse order.
The word chiasm comes from the Greek word chi, which is the letter X. In a chiasm, the first idea or element relates to the last idea or element. It does not mean they are identical, only that there is some relationship between them. When we understand the relationship through comparing and contrasting, we understand both better. Next in the chiasm, the second element in the chiasm relates to the second-to-last element. So, the top and bottom of the chiasm march toward each other, and they meet in the middle of the X.
And for our topic today, the eight feast days are also arranged in a chiasm. Passover relates to the 8th Day. The First Day of Unleavened Bread - and, really, most of Unleavened Bread - relates to Tabernacles. The Last Day of Unleavened Bread relates to Atonement. And Pentecost and Trumpets are linked as well. We have tended to look at them just as a sequence, but when we identify the commonalities between the pairs, it helps us to better understand what God is teaching us with these times that He has set apart.
As we read, the reason that we stay in temporary dwellings is because God made the Israelites stay in booths when He delivered them from slavery in Egypt. Now, maybe it seems unusual that the instructions for this feast mention the exodus, which we associate with the Unleavened Bread. We have tended to think of Tabernacles in terms of looking ahead. But by God's command, Israel had to look back to and remember the exodus journey, and this applies to us as well.
So, this is a commonality with Tabernacles, because the place the Israelites camped for the First Day of Unleavened Bread is what this feast is named after. The Jews call this Feast Sukkot, which is the Hebrew word for tabernacle, tent, or booth. And the name of the place the Israelites camped is Succoth, which is the same word, except that it is plural. So, the Israelites stayed in booths in Succoth. This is curious because they stayed in booths in the place that had already been named booths. It was already named Succoth when they got there and made their camp. The backstory to this is found in Genesis 33:17:
So, the place the Israelites camped for the First Day of Unleavened Bread was named after the dwellings Jacob made for his livestock. Therefore the name of the place is called Succoth.
Another commonality with these feasts is that they are both kept for seven days. That may sound obvious, and it is, but it is worth reviewing God's commands so we don't forget. Back in verse 6, it says, …seven days you must eat unleavened bread. You don't have to turn to these, but I will read to you the same command in other places:
There is similar slippage that can happen with the Feast of Tabernacles, where sometimes plans are made to arrive at the Feast late or … . . .
Leviticus 23:36-37
Excerpted from: Prosperity's ConsequencesSo sacrifices were added to the Feast of Tabernacles. For the first time God temporarily imposed in Leviticus 23:36-37 special burnt offerings on each of the seven days of the Feast of Tabernacles. When He initially revealed the Festival of Ingathering, or Tabernacles, God did not command any burnt offerings. You find that in Exodus 23:16 and also Exodus 34:22. It was only when the nation sinned again and again that first year after the Exodus, that God imposed the sacrifices of the law to remind them of their sins and to teach them that the coming Messiah would shed His blood for them. But the Israelites focused on the details of the animal sacrifices and completely overlooked their true purpose after a time.
It was not until well into the 40th year after the Exodus that God commanded Moses additional sacrifices for the Feast of Tabernacles for a special purpose. You can read the account of that in Numbers 29:12-34.
Upon entering the Promised Land, the Israelites were to offer as burnt offerings: 13 young bulls on the first day of the Feast, 12 on the next day, 11 on the third day, then 10 and 9 and 8, and finally 7 on the seventh and last day of the Feast. That makes 70 young bulls.
Why 70? There must be a significance to that. To offer a young bull was not an ordinary sacrifice. Leviticus 4:13-21 tells us that when Israel as a nation sinned and sought forgiveness, a young bull was offered. Ordinary Israelites could offer lambs or goats or doves. But the sacrifice of a bullock was required of the nation or its leaders as a whole. And these sacrifices during the Feast of Tabernacles represented nations or their leaders or forerunners.
Genesis 10 gives us an answer to the number 70. The sons of Noah were three. Their sons and grandsons, and later descendants listed in Genesis 10 as forerunners of the tribes (or nations) were 67 of them. That adds up to a total of 70 nations at about the time of the Tower of Babel.
The Jewish Talmud, which I only trust basically for historical information, states, "To what do these 70 bullocks that were offered during the seven days of the festival correspond? They correspond to 70 nations." A footnote to this quotation reads, "Seventy is a traditional number of Gentile nations and the 70 bullocks are offered to make atonement for them," during the Feast of Tabernacles, which is interesting because the Feast of Tabernacles is a time when the Gentiles will have their opportunity en masse, as well as the Israelites to live God's way of life.
Leviticus 23:35-36
Excerpted from: John 7:37 Examined (Part 1)Now what is the eighth day called in the Old Testament? It is translated as either "sabbath rest," "holy convocation," or "sacred assembly." No other names are given to it. The Hebrew words that are translated into those terms is Shemini Atzeret. Shemini Atzeret means "sacred assembly." It means "holy convocation." Incidentally, that is a term that is used frequently in the Bible.
A woman rabbi, Nina Beth Cardin, authored a book called, "The Tapestry of Jewish Times." In this book she goes through all the festivals that the Jews observe and attempts to bring out meaning so that non-Jews will be able to understand it. She calls the eighth day, "a holy day in search of a cause." They do not know what it is. She calls it, "a holy day in search of a cause." In other words, it is a search for meaning and purpose. Why is it here? The Jews are at a loss because all other feast days and holy days have instructions associated with them in the Old Testament. They have events that occurred at the time it seemed significant to those particular days. You are familiar with those things.
Now Cardin goes on in her writing of The Tapestry of Jewish Times, and on page 88 she says this: "The Torah tells us that immediately after Succoth—immediately after the Feast of Booths, on the eighth day you shall hold a solemn assembly—a Shemini Atzeret—and you shall do no customary work." Then she adds, "This is all we know about this holy day." That is a true statement because that is all God tells us in the Old Testament. The explanations for the eighth day are in the New Testament, and it is only here that we can see its meaning and purpose. Nothing about it is directly named in the Old Testament. Now there is meaning of it in the Old Testament, but you cannot connect the dots in the Old Testament without New Testament information.
Leviticus 23:33-39
Excerpted from: An Abundance of Living WaterSo here we have it this day that we're keeping now. The Last Great Day is the eighth day of the Feast of Tabernacles. It is part of the Feast of Tabernacles, yet distinctive and different because he mentions that we keep the Feast of Tabernacles in verse 34 for seven days. And then, the eighth day is "tacked on" it seems at the end. It is the last great hurrah of God's feasts for the year.
Leviticus 23:36-39
Excerpted from: Knowing God: Formality and Customs (Part 2)Did you see that phrase "unto the LORD" [for] seven days, followed by the Last Great Day? "Unto the LORD" means "in His direction," or "because of Him," or "in recognition of Him," or "in accordance with His will."
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