THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES.
Suggestion:—The objects used are a green branch of a tree and a glass of clear water.
DEAR YOUNG FRIENDS: Last Sunday I told you about the Feast of the Passover, how it came to be instituted, and what it signified. To-day I want to talk to you about the Feast of Tabernacles. The Feast of the Passover occurred in the spring, nearly corresponding to our Easter; and at such times when the Israelites from every quarter of the land came up to Jerusalem, as was the custom at the three annual feasts, some provision had to be made for their entertainment.
At the Feast of the Passover all the Jews living in Jerusalem had to throw open their homes, and entertain under the cover of their own roofs, all who came to them. They could not decline to receive the thousands of worshipers who came up to the Feast, but were required to afford them a place of shelter in their homes. Therefore it was that before the Feast of the Passover Jesus sent two of His disciples, and told them to go into the city, and they would find a man bearing a pitcher of water; they should follow him and ask him to direct them to a room in his house, where Jesus might eat the Passover with His disciples. (Matt. xxvi: 17; Mark xiv: 13.)
Building Booths at Feast of Tabernacles.
At the Feast of Tabernacles, which occurred in the fall of the year, after the harvest and the fruit of the vines and the trees had all been gathered in, it was very different. At this Feast, when the Israelites came up to Jerusalem, not only those who came from a distance, but even those who lived regularly in the city, were required to tent or live in booths made by simply placing some poles in the ground, with other poles reaching across the top, so as to form a roof or covering. This roof was not shingled, but was formed by laying branches of trees upon the sticks which had been laid across from one pole to the other. (Neh. viii: 14, 15.)
You now see why to-day I have chosen this branch of a tree to show you in connection with this sermon. I have chosen this to impress upon your mind the character of the arbors used at the Feast of Tabernacles; the tops or roofs of which were formed or made of olive, and willow and pine, myrtle and palm branches. These booths or arbors were to remind the Children of Israel of the journey of their forefathers through the desert, when for forty long years they did not live within the walls or under the roof of any house, but dwelt only in booths.
I am sure that you and I would like to have looked in upon Jerusalem at the time when one of these Harvest Home festivals was being celebrated. We would like to have seen the booths on the tops of the houses and along the side of the hills, outside of the walls of the city, and sloping down through the valleys and crowding far out into the country upon the Mount of Olives and beyond. We would like to have seen the bright faces of the happy throngs of people as they moved in procession through the streets, waving their palm branches; and to have listened to the music of the trumpeters of the Temple, as they sounded their trumpets twice every hour throughout the entire day. I am sure we would have been delighted to look down upon the festive crowd at night, when, instead of waving palm branches as they did during the day, they carried bright flaming torches, amid the clashing of cymbals and the blast of trumpets.
