Warm hellos to you dear brethren, co-workers, and spiritual family on the coast of the Gulf of Mexico and scattered children of God, from our offices here in Spanish Fort.

Over the years, the question often arises, worded generally something like this. “How’d We Come to That?” or “Why Do We Observe these Days on this Specific Date?”

Last Friday evening we commenced to examine the determining the timing of the “Feast of Weeks” or Pentecost. This subject has involved a fair amount of controversy over the decades. We concluded that the wave sheaf was to be offered “on the day after the Sabbath” (Lev. 23:11) or on the first day of the week.

Some more history to review. The children of Israel were instructed to bring a sheaf of the first grain harvest to the priest before they completed the rest of the harvest they had sown. In the Middle East, this grain would be the barley harvest that began to ripen during the month of Abib. The word translated “sheaf” is the Hebrew word omer. It refers to what a harvester would have in his hand after cutting a “swath of grain”. Bible references show that it measured approximately 2 quarts.

The priest was instructed to take the omer brought to him and wave it in the air to be accepted “on their behalf” on the day after the Sabbath. The word here is shabbath in Hebrew, and is the same word used for the seventh day weekly Sabbath in the first part of Leviticus 23. Logic would imply that this Sabbath, after which the sheaf of grain was waived, is a weekly Sabbath associated with the Feast of Unleavened Bread. Thus the Wave sheaf day was not on a fixed date of the month as some believe.

A challenge arises when the fourteenth of Nisan (Abib) falls on a weekly Sabbath. In this case the First Day of Unleavened Bread would be observed on Sunday (Nisan 15). Under the Old Covenant, sacrifices were offered every Sabbath. Jews circumcised their sons on the eighth day even if that eighth day was a Sabbath. There is no reason to suppose that the Passover sacrifice would not have been offered on the fourteenth of Nisan even when that date fell on a weekly Sabbath.

If the Passover fell on the weekly Sabbath, then the people would have already removed the leavening from their homes, (since removing the leavening would constitute work). This actual possibility indicates the season for counting Pentecost correctly begins with the fourteenth of Nisan, the day of the paschal sacrifice. Neither the Pharisees nor the Sadducees acknowledged this principle. The Sadducees objected to the fact that the Pharisees believed that the Wave sheaf offering could occur on a day other than Sunday (the morrow after the Sabbath). The Pharisees objected to the fact that, on occasion, the Sadducees would offer the Wave sheaf outside of the Days of Unleavened Bread.

Beginning the season on Passover day best harmonizes the scriptures. This approach assures that the Wave sheaf is always offered on Sunday and that it is always offered within the Days of Unleavened Bread. This understanding requires that if the first Holy Day of Unleavened bread is a Sunday, it will also be the day of the Wave sheaf offering.

There has unfortunately been controversy over the decades in interpreting the instructions in Leviticus 23:15-16, “And you shall count for yourselves from the day after the Sabbath . . . ‘Count fifty days to the day after the seventh Sabbath.” The count was to be “from” a specific date “to” another specific date, with a set period of time in between. An analysis of the Hebrew expression “from the morrow” (AV) will provide a better understanding of how the count was to proceed. According to Strong’s this word mochorath is used 32 times in the King James Version of the Old Testament. 29 times it is translated “morrow” and 28 of them contain the preposition mi in front of the word.

The overwhelming evidence is in favor of beginning the count on the morrow after the weekly Sabbath. But when it (the Hebrew ‘mi’ or ‘min’) is translated as ‘from’ (instead of on) and is used in conjunction with the element of time, it is always used inclusively, and never exclusively.’ This being true — that is, in the Hebrew, when in relation to time, it (mi) should never be translated into the English ‘from,’ but ‘beginning on.’ Therefore the count begins on the day after the Sabbath not two days after it…

Let us continue to be about diligently studying the Bible, drawing close to God through prayer, and not just assuming we know everything, or remember it all when it comes to God’s Word.  I’ve found that sometimes decades can go by where we simply don’t go back and review what God’s Word instructs us. Some of these things we discuss from time to time are technical, but hopefully helpful as to why we as God’s children do what we do.

Arms up friends! Our prayers and thoughts are with you daily. Please do pray for us as well.