None of the pages on this web site will be updated from now on
Transfer to the new wildolive - click on the banner below
|
None of the pages on this web site will be updated from now on Transfer to the new wildolive - click on the banner below
|
|
|
The Jewish holidays appear to shift around relative to our calendar. Thus Tabernacles, for instance, may fall in September or October. This is because the Jewish calendar is Lunar while the western calendar is Solar.
Every four years the western calendar has to add a day ( 29th February ) to keep the calendar in step with the Earth's progress around the Sun.
|
The Jewish calendar is a lunar calendar, with twelve lunar months of 29 or thirty days, which is about ten days short of a solar year, so seven years in every nineteen have an extra month. This ensures that the seasonal feasts keep to their correct season. (Seasons = moedim) Rosh Chodesh is the New Moon, which is the start of each month. Biblically, Rosh Chodesh was determined by witnesses observing the first thin crescent of the moon. In days before modern communication the new moon could not be notified to all dispersed communities so Rosh Chodesh is celebrated on two consecutive days outside Israel. |
In Genesis Ch1 v14 GOD said, "Let there be lights in the expanse of the sky ..... to serve to mark the seasons and days of years." See also Rosh Chodesh to understand the importance of observation of the New Moon, as opposed to calculation. The same is true of the start of the year - The Month of the Aviv - The biblical year begins when the first new moon after the barley in the land of Israel reaches the state in its development that the Bible calls Aviv. Only by checking the state of the barley crop can we fulfill the Biblical commandment to "Keep the Month of the Aviv" (Deut 16:1). This obviously determines when the other feasts should be celebrated, for example, the Feast of Unleavened Bread; ( "at the time of the month of the Aviv, because in the month of the Aviv you went out of Egypt." - Exodus 34:18) (The 19 year cycle is an un-Biblical substitute for this observational method)
In Leviticus 23, Moses instructed the people that Nisan ( or Aviv or Abib ) was to be the first month. This is the religious calendar, as opposed to the civil calendar which starts at Rosh Hashanna.
The seven seasonal feasts start with Passover (Pessach) (14th Nisan), which celebrated the creation of God's nation of Israel, and followed through to Tabernacles (Sukot) which celebrates Ingathering ( both as a harvest celebration and looking to God's ingathering of the righteous).
Rosh Hashanna ( New Year ) ( described with Yom Kippur) is now celebrated on the day of the feast of Trumpets. Thus the Jews start the year with a call to self examination and repentance before God.
| Jewish calendar month | Corresponding western calendar months in 2000 |
| Nisan | April May |
| Iyar | May June |
| Sivan | June July |
| Tamuz | July August |
| Av | August |
| Elul | September |
| Tishri | September October |
| Heshvan | October November |
| Kislev | November December |
| Tevet | December January |
| Shevat | January February |
| Adar | February March |
Feasts in the year 2005-2007 CE (western)
(5766 and 5767 Jewish)
Incidentally, the Jewish calendar is calculated from
Creation and therefore needs no BC or AD. Jewish reference to the
Western, Gregorian, calendar are CE or BCE; CE standing for Common Era
and Before Common Era.
