| YEAR 1885-86. | Days in Each Season. | Sundays in Each Season. | |
| a— | Advent Sunday, November 29th; Advent-tide. | 26 | 4 |
| 1st | Ember Week, after December 13th; Ember Days, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. | ||
| b— | Christmas, December 25th; Christmas-tide. | 12 | 2 |
| c— | Epiphany, January 6th; Epiphany-tide. | 46 | 6 |
| Septuagesima Sunday, February 21st. | 7 | 1 | |
| Paschal season, from Feb. 21st to May 2d, 70 days. | |||
| Sexagesima Sunday, February 28th. | 7 | 1 | |
| Quinquagesima Sunday, March 7th. | 3 | 1 | |
| Shrove-tide, (confession time) Shrove Tues., Mar. 9th. | |||
| d— | Ash Wednesday, March 10th, Lent begins; Lenten-tide. | 46 | 6 |
| First Sunday in Lent (Quadragesima) March 14th. | |||
| 2d | Ember Week after first Sunday in Lent; Ember Days, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. | ||
| Holy Week, the week before Easter; Special Days, Palm Sunday, Spy Wednesday, Maundy Thursday, and Good Friday, April 18th, 21st, 22d and 23d. | |||
| e— | Easter Sunday, April 25th; Easter-tide. | 39 | 6 |
| Low Sunday, May 2d, Paschal Season ends. | |||
| Rogation Sunday, May 30th; Rogation Days, the Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday after Rogation Sunday. | |||
| f— | Ascension Day (Holy Thursday), June 3d; Ascension-tide. | 10 | 1 |
| Expectation Sunday, first Sunday after Ascension, June 6th. | |||
| g— | Whitsun Day, (Pentecost) June 13th; Whitsun-tide. | 7 | 1 |
| 3d | Ember Week, after Whitsun Day; Ember Days, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. | ||
| h— | Trinity Sunday, June 20th; Trinity-tide. | 161 | 23 |
| 4th | Ember Week, after September 14th; Ember Days, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. | ||
| All Saints’ Day, November 1st. | |||
| All Souls’ Day, November 2d. | |||
| [Appendix K.] | 364 | 52 | |
CHAPTER VIII.
HEBREW CALENDAR.
To the Bible student a knowledge of the Hebrew calendar is indispensable, if he would know how the date of events recorded in the Bible are made to correspond with our present English calendar. From the exodus (1491 B. C.) downward, the Hebrew month was lunar, and commenced invariably with the new moon.
Dr. Smith, author of Bible Dictionary, says that the terms for month and moon have the same close connection in the Hebrew language as in our own, only the Hebrew Codesh (that is new moon) is, perhaps, more distinctive than the corresponding term in our language; for it expresses not simply the idea of a lunation, but the recurrence of a period commencing definitely with the new moon. Though the identification of the Jewish month with our own cannot be effected with precision on account of the variations that must necessarily exist between the lunar and the solar month, each of the former ranging over portions of two of the latter, still it can be shown how they may be made to coincide very nearly by a systematic method of intercalation.
Now from new moon to new moon again, is about 29½ days; therefore, the Hebrew year consisted of 354 days, for 29½ × 12 = 354; so that the epact, (which is the excess of the solar year beyond the lunar) is eleven days. Hence, had they no method of intercalation, the commencement of their year would go back eleven days every year, and consequently make a revolution of the seasons every thirty-three years, for 365 ÷ 11 = 33 nearly.
To illustrate, let us suppose that the new moon of Nisan, which is the first month in the Sacred year, should on any given year fall on the 10th of April, then the following year it would fall on the 30th of March, which is eleven days earlier; the second year it would fall on the 19th of March or twenty-two days earlier; the third year the new moon would fall on the 8th of March or thirty-three days earlier, but that would not be the new moon of Nisan, which cannot happen earlier than the 11th, so the following moon which happens thirty days later on the 7th of April is the new moon of Nisan. Hence it may be seen that by intercalating a full month every three years, or which comes nearer to accuracy seven times in nineteen years, restores the coincidence of the solar and the lunar year, and consequently the moons to the same day of the month on which they fell nineteen years before.