Thus none of these three great feasts omitted the element of thanksgiving for the fruits of the season, the first barley sheaves being brought with grateful thanks before the Lord during the Passover; the first-fruits of the wheat harvest giving a special thanksgiving character to the Feast of Pentecost; and the latest fruits, the olive and the grape, reminding them of God’s crowning blessing upon the labors of the year at the Feast of Tabernacles. What a beautiful training into the service of thanksgiving for the fruits of the earth!
This last of the festivals was pre-eminently one of joyful festivity, and of loud and high praises to the Lord, their Great Benefactor. The Jews have a saying—that “whoever has not seen the rejoicing of the last great day of the Feast of Tabernacles has never seen a day of joy in his life.”
The principal passages of Moses that treat of it are Ex. 23: 16, and 34: 22, and Lev. 23: 34–43, and Num. 29: 12–40, and Deut. 16: 13–15.
The celebration of this feast in the age of Nehemiah (8: 14–18) the reader should not fail to notice. At this time the law was read daily in the hearing of the people. The law of Moses provided for this public reading on each seventh, i. e. the Sabbatic year, during the Feast of Tabernacles (Deut. 31: 10–13).
The striking allusion (Jn. 7: 37) to the scenes on the last great day of the feast will be readily recalled. A custom unknown to the law of Moses had then come into practice—that of going in vast procession to the fountain of Siloam for water, and bearing it with joyful acclaim to the temple to pour it out there before the Lord. While this procession was passing, Jesus lifted up his voice and cried—“If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink.” May we suppose that possibly the words of Isaiah were before him:—“Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters”—to these waters of life which I give for the life of the world!
Upon these three great festivals all the males of Israel were required to appear before the Lord at the one place of his choice—the tabernacle or the temple—ultimately in Jerusalem “whither the tribes go up.” The women of Israel manifestly went when they chose and could. According to Oriental usage they traveled in groups—little caravans—several adjacent families, or as the case might be by households, the patriarch with his children and children’s children together, moving on with many a song of social cheer and grateful praise till at length they lifted up their eyes to the hills of the goodly city. The so-called “songs of degrees” (Ps. 120–134)—more strictly songs of the stages or upgoings—are specimens of this free and outflowing worship of the traveling companies, bound upward to Jerusalem. The allusion in Luke 2: 41–45, is pleasant to think of.
We must not overlook the fact that the Lord relieved their minds of all fear lest their defenseless homes might be assailed and robbed and perhaps their wives and little ones murdered by foreign enemies while all their able-bodied men were away from their homes in Jerusalem. “Neither shall any man desire thy land when thou shalt go up to appear before the Lord thy God thrice in the year” (Ex. 34: 24). None but a God of universal providence and omnipotent resources could safely make such a promise. In their own Jehovah they might safely trust.
Of sacred seasons, the most peculiar and striking yet remains to be noticed, viz. the great day of atonement. This was one day only; was not a feast day but a fast—a day “in which ye shall afflict your souls,” i. e. subject yourselves to the discomforts and pains of entire abstinence from food for the whole day, “from even to even.” Whoever would not afflict his soul on this day must be “cut off from his people.” All labor was forbidden under the same penalty. The passages Lev. 23: 26–32 and Num. 29: 7–11 give these general features of the institution. Only in Lev. 16 do we find a full description. In this chapter it appears that the original appointment of this day stands connected with the saddeath of Nadab and Abihu, the two eldest sons of Aaron for their rash unauthorized offering of strange fire before the Lord (Lev. 10: 1–8). That awful scene of death suggested the great necessity of ceremonial purity in the priesthood and of the utmost care and self-control when they came before God. There would be sins in the priesthood and sins among the people of which they might not be aware: hence the propriety of one comprehensive, all-embracing service for atonement.
The points to be specially noted in this service are—That the High Priest washed himself clean; put on white linen garments, symbolic of purity, and then made a special offering for his own sins and for the sin of all the people. The latter had this striking peculiarity—that two goats were taken for a sin-offering, upon whom lots were cast to select one for the Lord and one for Azazel [Eng. “scape-goat”]. Another still more important peculiarity was that on this day only (never on any other) the High Priest went alone into the most holy place, bearing both the blood of the sin-offering and incense. First he bore into the most holy place the blood of a bullock as a sin-offering for himself, and sprinkled it with his finger upon the mercy-seat and in front of the mercy-seat seven times. He also bore a censer full of coals from the great altar and upon it burned incense, the smoke of which enshrouded the mercy-seat. Then the goat upon which the lot fell for the Lord was slain, and the High Priest bore his blood also into the most holy place and sprinkled it there to make atonement for the whole people. No other man save the High Priest might go in at any time on pain of death.