feast of tabernacles Summary and Overview

FEAST OF TAB'ERNACLES one of the three greatest Jewish feasts. The law for it is laid down in Lev 23:34-43, Num 29:12-40. It was designed to commemorate the long tent-life of the Israelites during the Wandering. The feast began on the fifteenth day of the seventh month, and lasted eight days - seven for the feast and one day for a "solemn assembly," a sabbath of rest. In Num 29:12-39 the proper sacrifices for each day are given. During the whole time, the people dwelt in booths. Like the other feasts, the place for keeping this one was Jerusalem. The city must have presented a very animated and picturesque appearance. The booths were erected on the tops of houses, in the courts of the temple, and in the streets and on the neighboring hills. There was also much innocent mirth; indeed, it was distinguished for this. It was commanded to rejoice before the Lord. On the first and last days there was a holy convocation. Deut 31:10-13 enjoins the reading of the Law to the whole people every seventh or sabbatical year at the feast of tabernacles. This regulation, as interpreted by later Jewish practice, is obeyed by reading, on the first day of the feast, certain portions of Deuteronomy. In Ex 23:16 this feast is called "the feast of ingathering," because it came at the end of the harvest, 15th to 22d Tisri - September-October. References to the observance of the feast are found in the O.T. in Neh 8:13-18; Hos 12:9; Zech 14:16-19, and in the N.T. in John 7:2, John 7:37-38. In the latter passage our Lord is by some supposed to refer to a daily custom at the feast, adopted in later times. The Israelites, dressed in holiday clothes, repaired to the temple at the time of morning sacrifice. A priest then took a golden ewer, holding about two pints and a half, went to the pool of Siloam, filled his ewer, and returned to the temple by the Water-gate. His approach was the signal for a blast of trumpets. Before the people he ascended the steps of the altar, and poured the water into that one of the two silver basins which was on the eastern side. Into the other wine was poured. There were small openings in the bottoms of each, and so the two streams flowed, mingled together, through pipes, into the Kidron. But on the eighth day this ceremony was omitted. Hence our Lord on that day offers himself to the people as the Source of living waters. Again, in John 8:12, some see an allusion to another post-biblical ceremony in this preeminently popular feast; viz. to the torch-feast - i.e., the lighting of the great golden candelabras in the court of the women on the evening of the first day of the feast. Before them the men performed a torchlight dance with music and singing.

(See FEASTS.) Hasukoth, "feast of in-gathering"; haciyp (Exodus 23:16); Greek skenofgia (John 7:2). Third of the three great feasts; from Tisri 15 to 22 (Leviticus 23:34-43); commemorating Israel's passage through the desert. Thanksgiving for harvest (Deuteronomy 16:13-15). The rites and sacrifices are specified, Numbers 29:12-38. The law was read thereat publicly on the sabbatical year (Deuteronomy 31:10-13). Kept with joy on the return from Babylon (Nehemiah 8); compare the contemporary Psalm 118:14-15; Psalm 118:19-20; Psalm 118:22-27, in undesigned coincidence, alluding to the feast, the joy, the building of the walls, and setting up of the gates; Zechariah 4:7-10; Zechariah 3:9; Zechariah 14:16-17. The earlier celebration under Zerubbabel was less formal and full according to the law (Ezra 3:4); therefore it is unnoticed in the statement (Nehemiah 8:17) that since Joshua's days until then (when the later celebration under Nehemiah, which was fuller and more exact, took place) it had not been so kept. The people in the wilderness dwelt in tents, not "booths" (sukot). The primary design was a harvest feast kept in autumn bowers, possibly first in Goshen. The booth, like the tent, was a temporary dwelling, and so suited fairly to represent camp life in the desert. So Hosea (Hosea 12:9) uses "tabernacles" or "tents" for "booths," when speaking of the feast; the booth was probably used at times in the desert, when at certain places they made a more permanent stay during the forty years. It commemorated, with thanksgiving for the harvest which was the seal of their settlement in a permanent inheritance, their transition from nomadic to agricultural life. Its popularity induced Jeroboam to inaugurate his Bethel calf worship with an imitation feast of tabernacles on the 15th day of the eighth month, "which he devised of his own heart" (1 Kings 12:32-33), possibly because the northern harvest was a little later, and he wished to break off Israel from the association with Judah by having a different month from the seventh, which was the legal month. In Jerusalem the booths were built on the roofs, in house courts, in the temple court, and in the street of the water gate and of the Ephraim gate. They were made of boughs of olive, palm, pine, myrtle, and of her trees of thick foliage. From the first day of the feast to the seventh the Israelites carried in their hands "the fruit (margin) of goodly trees, branches of palm, thick trees, and willows" (Leviticus 23:40). In one hand each carried a bundle of branches (called luwlab or "palm" in rabbiical Hebrew) and in the other a citron (hadar, "goodly trees".) The feast of tabernacles, like Passover, began at full moon on the 15th day of the month; the first day was a day of holy convocation; the seven days of the feast were followed by an eighth day, forming no part of it (Leviticus 23:34-36; Numbers 29:35), a day of holy convocation, "a solemn assembly" ('atsereth), or, as the Hebrew denotes, "a closing festival" (2 Chronicles 7:9). On each of the seven days the offering consisted of two rams, 14 lambs a year old, with 13 bulls on the first day, 12 on the second, and so on until on the seventh there were only seven, the whole amounting to 70 bulls; but on the 'atsereth only one bull, one ram, and seven lambs. The booths or, according to Jewish tradition, huts of boards on the sides covered with boughs on the top, were occupied only the seven days, not on the 'atsereth. The feast of tabernacles is referred to in John 7:2-37; John 8:12. Jesus alludes to the custom of drawing water from Siloam in a golden goblet and pouring it into one of the two silver basins adjoining the western side of the altar, and wine into the other, while the words of Isaiah 12:3 were repeated, in commemoration of the water drawn from the rock in the desert; the choir sang the great hallel, and waved palms at different parts of Psalm 118, namely, Psalm 118:1-25; Psalm 118:29. Virtually Jesus said, I am the living Rock of the living water. Coming next day at daybreak to the temple court as they were extinguishing the artificial lights, two colossal golden candlesticks in the center of the temple court, recalling the pillar of fire in the wilderness, Jesus said, cf6 "I am the Light of the world" (John 8:1-2; John 8:12). As the sun by natural light was eclipsing the artificial lights, so Jesus implies, I, the Sun of righteousness, am superseding your typical light. "The last great day of the feast" is the atsereth, though the drawing of water was on previous days not omitted. Joy was the prominent feature, from whence the proverb, "he who has never seen the rejoicing at the pouring out of the water of Siloam has never seen joy in his life" (Succah 5:1). The feast was called Hosanna, "save we beseech Thee." Isaiah 11 refers to the future restoration of Israel; the feast of tabernacles connected with chapter 12 doubtless will have its antitype in their restored possession of and rest in Canaan, after their long dispersion; just as the other two great feasts, Passover and Pentecost, have their antitype respectively in Christ's sacrifice for us, and in His writing His new law on our hearts at Pentecost. Jewish tradition makes Gog and Magog about to be defeated on the feast of tabernacles, or that the seven months' cleansing shall end at that feast (Ezekiel 39:12). Rest after wanderings, lasting habitations after the life of wanderers, is the prominent thought of joy in the feast, alike in its former and in its future celebration.