Leviticus 23

Chapter 23 - Feasts
A favorite subject of mine: Older Testament feasts, and their fulfillment in the Newer Testament, especially in the Passion of Jesus, the Messiah.

First, what's a feast? The word means an appointed time to gather as God's people for sacred purposes.

SABBATH (verse 3) - every 7th day is a feast!

PASSOVER/UNLEAVENED BREAD (4-8) - 1st month, 14th day = Passover. The next day is the first day of Unleavened Bread, which lasts 7 days. Gathering for worship and no work on the 1st and 7th days.

Passover was from sundown Thursday of Passion week (Maundy Thursday) to sundown Friday. Jesus, our Passover Lamb. The shepherd was struck, and the sheep scattered, during the night of Passover in Gethsemane. He died during Passover. The next day, a Sabbath and a high day (John 19:31) - the 1st day of the feast Unleavened Bread) began at sundown, as Jesus was taken down from the cross and buried. This feast was given for a reason: "And you shall tell your son in that day, saying, ‘This is done because of what the Lord did for me when I came up from Egypt’" (Exodus 13:8). At the moment of the Messiah's death and burial, every faithful Jew was bringing to mind what God had done to save them from bondage. A custom had also arisen to plant some grain at the onset of this feast, and remember that it is God who brings life/bread/nourishment from the ground. WHO had just been put in the ground?

FIRSTFRUITS (9-14)
Besides bringing the first ripe grain from the field, the worshipper also brought a male lamb, grain, oil and wine.

Dating of this feast from Scripture is dicey, but the New Geneva Study Bible, and other sources I've heard, put it on the day after the first day of Unleavened Bread. We also know it was the day after the Sabbath: Sunday (11). This means it took place on the very day that Jesus rose from the dead, as the firstfruits of those who will rise from the dead (1 Corinthians 15:20-22).

PENTECOST (15-22)
50 days after firstfruits was the feast of weeks, named after counting 7 Sabbaths and a day - 50 days total. The Greek for 50 is "pente," thus Pentecost. Did you know God commanded Israel to celebrate Pentecost for 2000 years before Acts 2? This was a harvest festival. Worshipers brought baked grain, 7 lambs, 1 bull and 2 rams as a burnt offering, a goat for a sin offering, and 2 male lambs for the peace offering.

There is a concluding call to generosity (22). Don't keep all your harvest for yourself - give some to the poor and needy. When the NT church is formed in Acts 2, Luke refers to this in verses 44-45, showing that the church fulfilled the spirit of Pentecost in their generosity, as well.

TRUMPETS (23-25)
7th month, 1st day (half-year point) was trumpets, when God's people gathered and didn't work, and heard trumpets blown as a memorial to God. Somehow, the half-year has turned around today, so that this day (Rosh Hashanah) is the Jewish new year, usually in October.

Further Newer Testament parallels get speculative, but here is my take:
This feast will be fulfilled when Jesus returns to the sounding of trumpets (1 Thessalonians 4:16), and a new era/year begins.

DAY OF ATONEMENT (26-32)
7th month, 10th day. A day of humility and repenting. The one day of the year when the high priest enters the holy of holies.

I believe this corresponds to an event in heaven after the second coming when the righteousness of Christ's saints will be declared. Every mouth having been stopped, the books opened, the book of Life will spare those repentant (29), who are written in that book.

In one sense of course we are already saved. But Scripture also speaks of our justification taking place at an event like this in the future (note "will be justified" in Matt 12:37; Rom 2:13; 3:20).

TABERNACLES (33-43)
7th month, 15th day. Another 7-day feast, with the 1st and 8th days being high. Tree fruit and branches were waved before the Lord in thanksgiving. Tents (booths) were made to remember the desert wandering. The themes are rest (tents of dwelling) and victory (palm branches).

Revelation portrays this for us, with the saints holding palm branches (7:9) and God declaring He would "live" (same word as taberacle, or tent, or booth) with His people (21:3). This is a picture of heaven: every one under his vine and fig tree, enjoying the blessing God has given, without hindrance of sin and sorrow.