It has been my wish in this book, to take the reader back nineteen centuries; to show him Jerusalem as it was, when our Lord passed through its streets, and the Sanctuary, when He taught in its porches and courts; to portray, not only the appearance and structure of the Temple, but to describe its ordinances and worshippers, the ministry of its priesthood, and the ritual of its services. In so doing, I have hoped, not only to illustrate a subject, in itself most interesting to the Bible-student, but also, and chiefly, to sketch, in one important aspect, the religious life of the period in which our blessed Lord lived upon earth, the circumstances under which He taught, and the religious rites by which He was surrounded; and whose meaning, in their truest sense, He came to fulfil.
The Temple and its services form, so to speak, part of the life and work of Jesus Christ; part also of His teaching, and of that of His apostles. What connects itself so closely with Him must be of deepest interest. We want to be able, as it were, to enter Jerusalem in His train, along with those who on that Palm-Sunday cried, ‘Hosanna to the Son of David’; to see its streets and buildings; to know exactly how the Temple looked, and to find our way through its gates, among its porches, courts, and chambers; to be present in spirit at its services; to witness the Morning and the Evening Sacrifice; to mingle with the crowd of worshippers at the great Festivals, and to stand by the side of those who offered sacrifice or free-will offering, or who awaited the solemn purification which would restore them to the fellowship of the Sanctuary. We want to see these rites, as it were, before us—to hear the Temple-music, to know the very Psalms that were chanted, the prayers that were offered, the duties of the priesthood, the sacrificial worship in which they engaged, and the very attitude of the worshippers—in short, all those details which in their combination enable us vividly to realise the scenes, as if we ourselves were present in them. For, amidst them all, we ever see that one great outstanding Personality, Whose presence filled that house with glory.
The New Testament transports us into almost every one of the scenes described in this book. It also makes frequent reference to them for illustration. We see the father of John ministering in his course in the burning of incense; the Virgin-Mother at her purification, presenting her First-born; the child Jesus among the Rabbis; the Master teaching in the porches of the Temple, sitting in the Treasury, attending the various festivals, giving His sanction to the purifications by directing the healed leper to the priest, and, above all, as at the Feast of Tabernacles, applying to himself the significant rites of the Sanctuary. And, as we follow on, we witness the birth of the Church on the day of Pentecost; we mark the frequent illustrations of spiritual realities by Temple-scenes, in the writings of the apostles, but more especially in the Book of Revelation, whose imagery is so often taken from them; and we still look for the accomplishment of the one yet unfulfilled type—the Feast of Tabernacles, as the grand harvest-festival of the Church.
I have thus placed the permanent Christian interest in the foreground, because it occupied that place in my own mind. At the same time, from the nature of the subject, I hope the volume may fulfil yet another and kindred purpose. Although it does not profess to be a Handbook of Biblical Antiquities, nor a treatise on the types of the Old Testament, both these subjects had to be constantly referred to. But to realise the gorgeous Temple ritual, in all its details, possesses more than a merely historical interest. We are indeed fascinated by it; we live over again, if not the period of Israel’s temporal glory, yet that of deepest interest to us; and we can vividly represent to ourselves what the Temple had been before its services had for ever passed away. But beyond this, stretching far back through the period of prophets and kings, and reaching up to the original revelation of Jehovah amid the awful grandeur of Sinai, our holiest recollections, and the very springs of our religious life rise among these ordinances and types, which we here see fully developed and carried out, and that under the very light of His Presence, to Whom they all had pointed. I say not, whether or how far later Jewish practice may have misapprehended the original import or the meaning of the Divine ordinances. That was beyond my present task. But an accurate acquaintance with the sacrificial services at the time of Christ must not only tend to correct mistakes, but throw a fresh and vivid light upon all, and influence our views of what the Levitical ordinances were intended to be and to teach.
To have thus stated my object in this book, is also to have
indicated its difficulties. Yet abundant materials for such a work, though
scattered far and wide, are within our reach. Not to speak of contemporary
writings, as those of Josephus and Philo, and references in the New Testament
itself, we have in the Mishnah a body of authoritative traditions,
reaching up, not only to Temple-times, but even to the days of Jesus Christ.
While thus deriving my materials at first hand, I have also thankfully made use of any and every help within my reach. Foremost I place here the writings of Maimonides, not only because he is of greatest authority among the Jews, but because his vast and accurate knowledge of these subjects, and the clearness and subtlety of his intellect, entitle him to that position. Next to him come the numerous writers on Biblical Antiquities, in Latin and German; works on Typology—scientific and popular; treatises on the Life and Times of our Lord; histories of the Jewish Nation, or of Judaism; commentaries on such passages in the Old and New Testament as bore on these subjects; and numerous treatises on cognate points. In my study of ancient Jerusalem, I had the benefit of the labours of recent explorers, from Robinson and Barclay to the volumes published under the auspices of the Palestine Exploration Fund.
To the Cyclopaedias of Winer, Herzog, Ersch and Gruber, Dr. Smith, and Kitto (the third edition), I have been greatly indebted. The last-named of these works has the special merit of a series of articles on Jewish subjects (as I may designate them), written in quite an original manner, and with most competent knowledge. Although, as will appear from the text, I have been obliged frequently to differ from their writer, yet these articles must, from the fulness and ability of their treatment, be of very great use to the student. Lightfoot’s Horae Hebraicae et Talmudicae are known to every scholar. Not so, perhaps, his small learned treatise De ministerio templi. The title and many of the subjects are similar to those treated in the present volume. But the learned reader will at once perceive that the plan and execution are quite different, though the work has been of great service to me. Perhaps I ought not here to omit such names as Relandus, Buxtorf, Otho, Schottgen, Meuschen, Goodwin, Hottinger, Wagenseil, and Lundius; and, among modern writers, Bahr, Keil, Kurtz, de Wette, Saalschutz, Zunz, Jost, Geiger, Herzfeld, and Fratz, of whose works I have, I may say, constantly availed myself. Many others have been consulted, some of which are quoted in the foot-notes, while others are not expressly referred to, as not adding anything material to our knowledge.
In general, I should explain, that I have acted on the principle of giving the minimum of references possible. It would have been easy to have multiplied them almost indefinitely. But I wished to avoid cumbering my pages with an array of authorities, which too often give a mere appearance of learning; and, while they are not needed by scholars, may tend to interfere with the more general and popular use of such a work. For a similar reason, I have throughout avoided the use of Hebrew and even Greek letter-press. To print an expression in Hebrew letters could not be necessary for students, while the general reader, whom it too often bewilders by a show of knowledge, must in such case necessarily pass it over, unnoticed and unknown.
While this book embodies the studies of many years, I have
during its actual composition deemed no labour nor pains irksome in comparing
the results of my own investigations with those of all, within reach, who were
entitled to such consideration. Thus much for the matter of the book. As to its
form, some subjects may be touched in it which do not equally interest all
readers;
A. E.
‘And when He was come near, He beheld the city, and wept over it.’
In every age, the memory of Jerusalem has stirred the
deepest feelings. Jews, Christians, and Mohammedans turn to it with reverent
affection. It almost seems as if in some sense each could call it his ‘happy
home,’ the ‘name ever dear’ to him. For our holiest thoughts of the past, and
our happiest hopes for the future, connect themselves with ‘the city of our
God.’ We know from many passages of the Old Testament, but especially from the
Book of Psalms, with what ardent longing the exiles from Palestine looked
towards it; and during the long centuries of dispersion and cruel persecution,
up to this day, the same aspirations have breathed in almost every service of
the synagogue, and in none more earnestly than in that of the paschal night,
which to us is for ever associated with the death of our Saviour. It is this one
grand presence there of ‘the Desire of all nations,’ which has for ever cast a
hallowed light round Jerusalem and the Temple, and given fulfillment to the
prophecy—’Many people shall go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the
mountain of Jehovah, to the house of the God of Jacob; and He will teach us of
His ways, and we will walk in His paths: for out of Zion shall go forth the law,
and the word of Jehovah from Jerusalem.’ (
But our memories of Jerusalem stretch far back beyond these
scenes. In the distance of a remote antiquity we read of Melchisedek, the
typical priest-king of Salem, who went out to meet Abraham, the ancestor of the
Hebrew race, and blessed him. A little later, and this same Abraham was coming
up from Hebron on his mournful journey, to offer up his only son. A few miles
south of the city, the road by which he travelled climbs the top of a high
promontory, that juts into the deep Kedron valley. From this spot, through the
cleft of the mountains which the Kedron has made for its course, one object rose
up straight before him. It was Moriah, the mount on which the sacrifice
of Isaac was to be offered. Here Solomon afterwards built the Temple. For over
Mount Moriah David had seen the hand of the destroying angel stayed, probably
just above where afterwards from the large altar of burnt-offering the smoke of
countless sacrifices rose day by day. On the opposite hill of Zion, separated
only by a ravine from Moriah, stood the city and the palace of David, and close
by the site of the Temple the tower of David. After that period an ever-shifting
historical panorama passes before our view, unchanged only in this, that, amidst
all the varying events, Jerusalem remains the one centre of interest and
attractions, till we come to that Presence which has made it, even in its
desolateness, ‘Hephzibah,’ ‘sought out,’ ‘a city not forsaken.’ (
The Rabbis have a curious conceit about the origin of the
name Jerusalem, which is commonly taken to mean, ‘the foundation,’ ‘the abode,’
or ‘the inheritance of peace.’ They make it a compound of Jireh and
Shalem, and say that Abraham called it ‘Jehovah-Jireh,’ while Shem had named
it Shalem, but that God combined the two into Jireh-Shalem, Jerushalaim,
or Jerusalem. There was certainly something peculiar in the choice of Palestine
to be the country of the chosen people, as well as of Jerusalem to be its
capital. The political importance of the land must be judged from its situation
rather than its size. Lying midway between the east and the west, and placed
between the great military monarchies, first of Egypt and Assyria, and then of
Rome and the East, it naturally became the battle-field of the nations and the
highway of the world. As for Jerusalem, its situation was entirely unique.
Pitched on a height of about 2, 610 feet above the level of the sea, its climate
was more healthy, equable, and temperate than that of any other part of the
country. From the top of Mount Olivet an unrivalled view of the most interesting
localities in the land might be obtained. To the east the eye would wander over
the intervening plains to Jericho, mark the tortuous windings of Jordan, and the
sullen grey of the Dead Sea, finally resting on Pisgah and the mountains of Moab
and Ammon. To the south, you might see beyond ‘the king’s gardens,’ as far as
the grey tops of ‘the hill country of Judea.’ Westwards, the view would be
arrested by the mountains of Bether, (
‘Beautiful for situation, the joy of the whole earth, is
Mount Zion, on the sides of the north, the city of the Great King. . . . Walk about
Zion, and go round about her: tell the towers thereof. Mark ye well her
bulwarks, consider her palaces.’ If this could be said of Jerusalem even in the
humbler days of her native monarchy, (
From whatever side the pilgrim might approach the city, the first impression must have been solemn and deep. But a special surprise awaited those who came, whether from Jericho or from Galilee, by the well-known road that led over the Mount of Olives. From the south, beyond royal Bethlehem—from the west, descending over the heights of Beth-horon—or from the north, journeying along the mountains of Ephraim, they would have seen the city first vaguely looming in the grey distance, till, gradually approaching, they had become familiar with its outlines. It was far otherwise from the east. A turn in the road, and the city, hitherto entirely hid from view, would burst upon them suddenly, closely, and to most marked advantage. It was by this road Jesus made His triumphal entry from Bethany on the week of His Passion. Up from ‘the house of dates’ the broad, rough road would round the shoulder of Olivet. Thither the wondering crowd from Bethany followed Him, and there the praising multitude from the city met Him. They had come up that same Olivet, so familiar to them all. For did it not seem almost to form part of the city itself, shutting it off like a screen from the desert land that descended beyond to Jordan and the Dead Sea?
From the Temple Mount to the western base of Olivet, it was
not more than 100 or 200 yards straight across, though, of course, the distance
to the summit was much greater, say about half a mile. By the nearest pathway it
was only 918 yards from the city gate to the principal summit.
Olivet was always fresh and green, even in earliest spring
or during parched summer—the coolest, the pleasantest, the most sheltered walk
about Jerusalem. For across this road the Temple and its mountain flung their
broad shadows, and luxuriant foliage spread a leafy canopy overhead. They were
not gardens, in the ordinary Western sense, through which one passed, far less
orchards; but something peculiar to those climes, where Nature everywhere strews
with lavish hand her flowers, and makes her gardens—where the garden bursts
into the orchard, and the orchard stretches into the field, till, high up, olive
and fig mingle with the darker cypress and pine. The stony road up Olivet wound
along terraces covered with olives, whose silver and dark green leaves rustled
in the breeze. Here gigantic gnarled fig-trees twisted themselves out of rocky
soil; there clusters of palms raised their knotty stems high up into waving
plumed tufts, or spread, bush-like, from the ground, the rich-coloured fruit
bursting in clusters from the pod. Then there were groves of myrtle, pines,
tall, stately cypresses, and on the summit itself two gigantic cedars. To these
shady retreats the inhabitants would often come from Jerusalem to take pleasure
or to meditate, and there one of their most celebrated Rabbis was at one time
wont in preference to teach.
Coming from Bethany the city would be for some time
completely hidden from view by the intervening ridge of Olivet. But a sudden
turn of the road, where ‘the descent of the Mount of Olives’ begins, all at once
a first glimpse of Jerusalem is caught, and that quite close at hand. True, the
configuration of Olivet on the right would still hide the Temple and most part
of the city; but across Ophel, the busy suburb of the priests, the eye might
range to Mount Zion, and rapidly climb its height to where Herod’s palace
covered the site once occupied by that of David. A few intervening steps of
descent, where the view of the city has again been lost, and the pilgrim would
hurry on to that ledge of rock. What a panorama over which to roam with hungry
eagerness! At one glance he would see before him the whole city—its valleys and
hills, its walls and towers, its palaces and streets, and its magnificent
Temple—almost like a vision from another world. There could be no difficulty in
making out the general features of the scene. Altogether the city was only
thirty-three stadia, or about four English miles, in circumference. Within this
compass dwelt a population of 600,000 (according to Tacitus), but, according to
the Jewish historian, amounting at the time of the Passover to between two and
three millions, or about equal to that of London.
The first feature to attract attention would be the city
walls, at the time of Christ only two in number.
The first, or old wall, began at the north-western angle of Zion, at the tower of Hippicus, and ran along the northern brow of Zion, where it crossed the cleft, and joined the western colonnade of the Temple at the ‘Council-house.’ It also enclosed Zion along the west and the south, and was continued eastward around Ophel, till it merged in the south-eastern angle of the Temple. Thus the first wall would defend Zion, Ophel, and, along with the Temple walls, , Moriah also. The second wall, which commenced at a gate in the first wall, called ‘Gennath,’ ran first north, and then east, so as to enclose Acra, and terminated at the Tower of Antonia. Thus the whole of the old city and the Temple was sufficiently protected.
The Tower of Antonia was placed at the north-western angle
of the Temple, midway between the castle of the same name and the Temple. With
the former it communicated by a double set of cloisters, with the latter by a
subterranean passage into the Temple itself, and also by cloisters and stairs
descending into the northern and the western porches of the Court of the
Gentiles. Some of the most glorious traditions in Jewish history were connected
with this castle, for there had been the ancient ‘armoury of David,’ the palace
of Hezekiah and of Nehemiah, and the fortress of the Maccabees. But in the days
of Christ Antonia was occupied by a hated Roman garrison, which kept watch over
Israel, even in its sanctuary. In fact, the Tower of Antonia overlooked and
commanded the Temple, so that a detachment of soldiers could at any time rush
down to quell a riot, as on the occasion when the Jews had almost killed Paul
(
If the pilgrim scanned the city more closely, he would observe that it was built on four hills. Of these, the western, or ancient Zion, was the highest, rising about 200 feet above Moriah, though still 100 feet lower than the Mount of Olives. To the north and the east, opposite Zion, and divided from it by the deep Tyropoeon Valley, were the crescent-shaped Acra and Moriah, the latter with Ophel as its southern outrunner. Up and down the slopes of Acra the Lower City crept. Finally, the fourth hill, Bezetha (from bezaion, marshy ground), the New Town, rose north of the Temple Mount and of Acra, and was separated from them by an artificial valley. The streets, which, as in all Eastern cities, were narrow, were paved with white marble. A somewhat elevated footway ran along for the use of those who had newly been purified in the Temple, while the rest walked in the roadway below. The streets derived their names mostly from the gates to which they led, or from the various bazaars. Thus there were ‘Water-street,’ ‘Fish-street,’ ‘East-street,’ etc. The ‘Timber Bazaar’ and that of the ‘Tailors’ were in the New City; the Grand Upper Market on Mount Zion. Then there were the ‘Wool’ and the ‘Braziers’ Bazaar’; ‘Baker-street,’ ‘Butcher-street,’ ‘Strangers’-street,’ and many others similarly named. Nor would it have been difficult to identify the most prominent buildings in the city. At the north-western angle of Mount Zion, the ancient Salem and Jebus, on the site of the castle of David, was the grand palace of Herod, generally occupied by the Roman procurators during their temporary sojourn in Jerusalem. It stood high up, just within shelter of the great towers which Herod had reared—a marvel of splendour, of whose extent, strength, height, rooms, towers, roofs, porticoes, courts, and adjacent gardens Josephus speaks in such terms of admiration.
At the opposite, or north-eastern corner of Mount Zion, was
the palace of the High-priest. Being built on the slope of the hill, there was
under the principal apartments a lower story, with a porch in front, so that we
can understand how on that eventful night Peter was ‘beneath in the
palace.’ (
Here Peter probably addressed the three thousand converts
on the day of Pentecost when the multitude had hurried thither from the Temple
on hearing ‘the mighty rushing sound.’ The Xystus was surrounded by a covered
colonnade. Behind it was the palace of Agrippa, the ancient palace of David and
of the Maccabees, and again, in the rear of it, that of Bernice. On Acra stood
afterwards the palaces of certain foreign princes, such as those of Queen
Helena, King Monobasus, and other proselytes. In this quarter, or even beyond it
to the north-west, one would naturally look for the Theatre and the
Amphitheatre, which, being so essentially un-Jewish, must have been located as
far as possible from the Temple. The space around the Temple was no doubt kept
clear of buildings. On the south-eastern corner behind it was the great Sheep
Market, and to the south of it the Hippodrome. Originally, the king’s house by
the horse-gate, built by Solomon, and the royal stables, had occupied the
southern area of the Temple Mount, where Herod afterwards built the ‘Royal
Porch.’ For the Temple of Solomon was 300 feet shorter, from north to south,
than that of Herod. Transversely, between Xystus and the Fish Gate, lay the
quarter of Maktesh, (
Such must have been a first view of Jerusalem, as ‘beheld’
from the Mount of Olives, on which we are supposed to have taken our stand. If
Jewish tradition on the subject may be trusted, a gate opened upon this Mount of
Olives through the eastern wall of the Temple.
It is called ‘the Shushan Gate,’ from the sculptured
representation over it of the city to which so many Jewish memories attached.
From this gate an arched roadway, by which the priests brought out the ‘red
heifer,’ and on the Day of Atonement the scapegoat, is said to have conducted to
the Mount of Olives. Near the spot where the red heifer was burned were
extensive lavatories, and booths for the sale of articles needed for various
purifications. Up a crest, on one of the most commanding elevations, was the
Lunar Station, whence, by fire signals, the advent of each new moon was
telegraphed from hill to hill into far countries. If Jewish tradition may
further be trusted, there was also an unused gate in the Temple towards the
north—Tedit or Tere—and two gates towards the south. We know for
certain of only a subterranean passage which led from the fortress Antonia on
the ‘north-western angle’ of the Temple into the Temple Court, and of the
cloisters with stairs descending into the porches, by one of which the chief
captain Lysias rushed to the rescue of Paul, when nearly killed by the
infuriated multitude. Dismissing all doubtful questions, we are sure that at any
rate five gates opened into the outer Temple enclosure or Court of the
Gentiles—one from the south, and four—and these the principal—from the west.
That southern gate was double, and must have chiefly served the convenience of
the priests. Coming from Ophel, they would pass through its gigantic archway and
vestibule (40 feet each way), and then by a double tunnel nearly 200 feet long,
whence they emerged at a flight of steps leading straight up from the Court of
the Gentiles into that of the priests, close to the spot where they would
officiate.
But to join the great crowd of worshippers we have to enter the city itself. Turning our back on Mount Zion, we now face eastwards to Mount Moriah. Though we look towards the four principal entrances to the Temple, yet what we see within those walls on the highest of the terraces is not the front but the back of the sanctuary. It is curious how tradition is here in the most palpable error in turning to the east in worship. The Holy Place itself faced east-wards, and was approached from the east; but most assuredly the ministering priests and the worshippers looked not towards the east, but towards the west.
The Temple plateau had been artificially levelled at
immense labour and cost, and enlarged by gigantic substructures. The latter
served also partly for the purpose of purification, as otherwise there might
have been some dead body beneath, which, however great the distance from the
surface, would, unless air had intervened, have, according to tradition, defiled
the whole place above. As enlarged by Herod the Great, the Temple area occupied
an elongated square of from 925 to 950 feet and upwards.
Roughly calculating it at about 1,000 feet, this would give an extent more than one-half greater than the length of St. Peter’s at Rome, which measures 613 feet, and nearly double our own St. Paul’s, whose extreme length is 520 1/2 feet. And then we must bear in mind that the Temple plateau was not merely about 1,000 feet in length, but a square of nearly 1,000 feet! It was not, however, in the centre of this square, but towards the north-west, that the Temple itself and its special courts were placed. Nor, as already hinted, were they all on a level, but rose terrace upon terrace, till the sacred edifice itself was reached, its porch protruding, ‘shoulder-like,’ on either side—perhaps rising into two flanking towers—and covering the Holy and Most Holy Places. Thus must the ‘golden fane’ have been clearly visible from all parts; the smoke of its sacrifices slowly curling up against the blue Eastern sky, and the music of its services wafted across the busy city, while the sunlight glittered on its gilt roofs, or shone from its pavement of tesselated marble, or threw great shadows on Olivet behind.
Assuredly, when the Rabbis thought of their city in her glory, they might well say: ‘The world is like unto an eye. The ocean surrounding the world is the white of the eye; its black is the world itself; the pupil is Jerusalem; but the image within the pupil is the sanctuary.’ In their sorrow and loneliness they have written many fabled things of Jerusalem, of which some may here find a place, to show with what halo of reverence they surrounded the loving memories of the past. Jerusalem, they say, belonged to no tribe in particular—it was all Israel’s. And this is in great measure literally true; for even afterwards, when ancient Jebus became the capital of the land, the boundary line between Judah and Benjamin ran right through the middle of the city and of the Temple; so that, according to Jewish tradition, the porch and the sanctuary itself were in Benjamin, and the Temple courts and altar in Judah. In Jerusalem no house might be hired. The houses belonged as it were to all; for they must all be thrown open, in free-hearted hospitality, to the pilgrim-brethren that came up to the feast. Never had any one failed to find in Jerusalem the means of celebrating the paschal festivities, nor yet had any lacked a bed on which to rest. Never did serpent or scorpion hurt within her precincts; never did fire desolate her streets, nor ruin occur. No ban ever rested on the Holy City. It was Levitically more sacred than other cities, since there alone the paschal lamb, the thank-offerings, and the second tithes might be eaten. Hence they carefully guarded against all possibility of pollution. No dead body might remain in the city overnight; no sepulchres were there, except those of the house of David and of the prophetess Huldah. No even domestic fowls might be kept, nor vegetable gardens be planted, lest the smell of decaying vegetation should defile the air; nor yet furnaces be built, for fear of smoke. Never had adverse acident interrupted the services of the sanctuary, nor profaned the offerings. Never had rain extinguished the fire on the altar, nor contrary wind driven back the smoke of the sacrifices; nor yet, however great the crowd of worshipperes, had any failed for room to bow down and worship the God of Israel!
Thus far the Rabbis. All the more impressive is their own admission and their lament—so significant as viewed in the light of the Gospel: ‘For three years and a half abode the Shechinah’ (or visible Divine presence) ‘on the Mount of Olives,’—waiting whether Israel would repent—’and calling upon them, “Seek ye the Lord while He may be found, call upon Him while He is near.” And when all was in vain, then the Shechinah returned to its own place!’
The Shechinah has withdrawn to its own place! Both
the city and the Temple have been laid ‘even with the ground,’ because Jerusalem
knew not the time of her visitation (
‘There shall not
be left here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down.’—
Of the four principal entrances into the Temple—all of
them from the west—the most northerly descended, perhaps by flights of steps,
into the Lower City; while two others led into the suburb, or Parbar, as
it is called. But by far the most magnificent avenue was that at the
south-western angle of the Temple. Probably this was ‘the ascent . . . into the
house of the Lord,’ which so astounded the Queen of Sheba (
It would, indeed, be difficult to exaggerate the splendour of this approach. A colossal bridge on arches spanned the intervening Valley of the Tyropoeon, connecting the ancient City of David with what is called the ‘Royal Porch of the Temple.’ From its ruins we can reconstruct this bridge. Each arch spanned 41 1/2 feet, and the spring-stones measured 24 feet in length by 6 in thickness. It is almost impossible to realise these proportions, except by a comparison with other buildings. A single stone 24 feet long! Yet these were by no means the largest in the masonry of the Temple. Both at the south-eastern and the south-western angles stones have been found measuring from 20 to 40 feet in length, and weighing above 100 tons.
The view from this ‘Royal Bridge’ must have been splendid. It was over it that they led the Saviour, in sight of all Jerusalem, to and from the palace of the high-priest, that of Herod, the meeting-place of the Sanhedrim, and the judgment-seat of Pilate. Here the city would have lain spread before us like a map. Beyond it the eye would wander over straggling suburbs, orchards, and many gardens—fairest among them the royal gardens to the south, the ‘garden of roses,’ so celebrated by the Rabbis—till the horizon was bounded by the hazy outline of mountains in the distance. Over the parapet of the bridge we might have looked into the Tyropoeon Valley below, a depth of not less than 225 feet. The roadway which spanned this cleft for a distance of 354 feet, from Mount Moriah to Mount Zion opposite, was 50 feet broad, that is, about 5 feet wider than the central avenue of the Royal Temple-Porch into which it led. These ‘porches,’ as they are called in the New Testament, or cloisters, were among the finest architectural features of the Temple. They ran all round the inside of its wall, and bounded the outer enclosure of the Court of the Gentiles. They consisted of double rows of Corinthian pillars, all monoliths, wholly cut out of one block of marble, each pillar being 37 1/2 feet high. A flat roof, richly ornamented, rested against the wall, in which also the outer row of pillars was inserted. Possibly there may have been towers where one colonnade joined the other. But the ‘Royal Porch,’ by which we are supposed to have entered the Temple, was the most splendid, consisting not as the others, of a double, but of a treble colonnade, formed of 162 pillars, ranged in four rows of 40 pillars each, the two odd pillars serving as a kind of screen, where the ‘Porch’ opened upon the bridge. Indeed, we may regard the Royal Porch as consisting of a central nave 45 feet wide, with gigantic pillars 100 feet high, and of two aisles 30 feet wide, with pillars 50 feet high. By very competent authorities this Royal Porch, as its name indicates, is regarded as occupying the site of the ancient palace of Solomon, to which he ‘brought up’ the daughter of Pharaoh. Here also had been the ‘stables of Solomon.’ When Herod the Great rebuilt the Temple, he incorporated with it this site of the ancient royal palace. What the splendour and height (Professor Porter has calculated it at 440 feet) of this one porch in the Temple must have been is best expressed in the words of Captain Wilson (Recovery of Jerusalem, p. 9): ‘It is almost impossible to realise the effect which would be produced by a building longer and higher than York Cathedral, standing on a solid mass of masonry almost equal in height to the tallest of our church spires.’ And this was only one of the porches which formed the southern enclosure of the first and outermost court of the Temple—that of the Gentiles. The view from the top of this colonnade into Kedron was to the stupendous depth of 450 feet. Here some have placed that pinnacle of the Temple to which the tempter brought our Saviour.
These halls or porches around the Court of the Gentiles
must have been most convenient places for friendly or religious intercourse—for
meetings or discussions. Here Jesus, when still a child, was found by His
parents disputing with the doctors; here He afterwards so often taught the
people; and here the first assemblies of the Christians must have taken place
when, ‘continuing daily with one accord in the Temple, . . . praising God, and
having favour with all the people, . . . the Lord added to the church daily such as
should be saved.’ Especially do we revert to Solomon’s Porch, that ran along the
eastern wall of the Temple, and faced its great entrance. It was the only
remnant left of the Temple built by the wise King of Israel. In this porch
‘Jesus walked’ on that ‘Feast of the Dedication,’ (
It was the rule when entering the Temple to pass in by the
right, and when leaving it to go out by the left hand. The great Court of the
Gentiles,
According to Jewish tradition, it formed a square of 750
feet. Its name is derived from the fact that it was open to all—Jews or
Gentiles—provided they observed the prescribed rules of decorum and reverence.
In this court tradition places eating and sleeping apartments for the Levites,
and a synagogue. But, despite pharisaic punctilliousness, the noise, especially
on the eve of the Passover, must have been most disturbing. For there the oxen,
sheep, and doves selected as fit for sacrifices were sold as in a market; and
here were those tables of the money-changers which the Lord overthrew when He
drove from His Father’s house them that bought and sold (
These eight side gates, as we may call them, were all two-leaved, wide, high, with superstructures and chambers supported by two pillars, and covered with gold and silver plating. But far more magnificent than any of them was the ninth or eastern gate, which formed the principal entrance into the Temple. The ascent to it was from the terrace by twelve easy steps. The gate itself was made of dazzling Corinthian brass, most richly ornamented; and so massive were its double doors that it needed the united strength of twenty men to open and close them. This was the ‘Beautiful Gate’; and on its steps had they been wont these many years to lay the lame man, just as privileged beggars now lie at the entrance to Continental cathedrals. No wonder that all Jerusalem knew him; and when on that sunny afternoon Peter and John joined the worshippers in the Court of the Women, not alone, but in company with the well-known cripple, who, after his healing, was ‘walking and leaping and praising God,’ universal ‘wonder and amazement’ must have been aroused. Then, when the lame man, still ‘holding by’ the apostles, again descended these steps, we can readily understand how all the people would crowd around in Solomon’s Porch, close by, till the sermon of Peter—so fruitful in its spiritual results—was interrupted by the Temple police, and the sudden imprisonment of the apostles.
The Court of the Women obtained its name, not from its
appropriation to the exclusive use of women, but because they were not allowed
to proceed farther, except for sacrificial purposes. Indeed, this was probably
the common place for worship, the females occupying, according to Jewish
tradition, only a raised gallery along three sides of the court. This court
covered a space upwards of 200 feet square. All around ran a simple colonnade,
and within it, against the wall, the thirteen chests, or ‘trumpets,’ for
charitable contributions were placed. These thirteen chests were narrow at the
mouth and wide at the bottom, shaped like trumpets, whence their name. Their
specific objects were carefully marked on them. Nine were for the receipt of
what was legally due by worshippers; the other four for strictly voluntary
gifts. Trumpets I and II were appropriated to the half-shekel Temple-tribute of
the current and of the past year. Into Trumpet III those women who had to bring
turtledoves for a burnt- and a sin-offering dropped their equivalent in money,
which was daily taken out and a corresponding number of turtledoves offered.
This not only saved the labour of so many separate sacrifices, but spared the
modesty of those who might not wish to have the occasion or the circumstances of
their offering to be publicly known. Into this trumpet Mary the mother of Jesus
must have dropped the value of her offering (
It is probably in ironical allusion to the form and name of
these treasure-chests that the Lord, making use of the word ‘trumpet,’ describes
the conduct of those who, in their almsgiving, sought glory from men as
’sounding a trumpet’ before them (
In each of the four corners of the Court of the Women were chambers, or rather unroofed courts, each said to have been 60 feet long. In that at the right hand (on the north-east), the priests who were unfit for other than menial services on account of bodily blemishes, picked the worm-eaten wood from that destined for the altar. In the court at the farther angle (north-west) the purified lepers washed before presenting themselves to the priests at the Gate of Nicanor. At the left (south-east) the Nazarites polled their hair, and cooked their peace-offerings; while in a fourth court (at the south-west) the oil and wine were kept for the drink-offerings. The musical instruments used by the Levites were deposited in two rooms under the Court of the Israelites, to which the access was from the Court of the Women.
Of course the western colonnade of this court was open.
Thence fifteen easy steps led through the so-called Gate of Nicanor into the
Court of Israel. On these steps the Levites were wont on the Feast of
Tabernacles to sing the fifteen ‘Psalms of Degrees,’ or ascent (
Perhaps it will be most convenient for practical purposes to regard the two Courts of Israel and of the Priests as in reality forming only one, divided into two parts by a low balustrade 1 1/2 feet high. Thus viewed, this large double court, inclusive of the Sanctuary itself, would measure 280 1/2 feet in length by 202 1/2 feet in breadth. Of this a narrow strip, 16 1/2 feet long, formed the Court of Israel. Two steps led up from it to the Court of the Priests. Here you mounted again by three low semicircular steps to a kind of pulpit or platform, where, as well as on the ‘fifteen steps,’ the Levites sang and played during the ordinary service. The priests, on the other hand, occupied, while pronouncing the blessing, the steps at the other end of the court which led up to the Temple porch. A similar arrangement existed in the great court as in that of the Women. Right and left of the Nicanor Gate were receptacles for the priestly vestments (one for each of the four kinds, and for the twenty-four courses of priests: 4 x 24 = 96).
Next came the chamber of the high-priest’s meat-offering
(
The account which Jewish tradition gives of these gates and
chambers around the Court of the Priests is somewhat conflicting, perhaps
because the same chambers and gates may have borne different names. It may,
however, be thus summarised. Entering the Great Court by the Nicanor Gate, there
was at the right hand the Chamber of Phinehas with its 96 receptacles for
priests’ vestments, and at the left the place where the high-priest’s daily
meat-offering was prepared, and where every morning before daybreak all the
ministering priests met, after their inspection of the Temple and before being
told off to duty. Along the southern side of the court were the Water-gate,
through which at the Feast of Tabernacles the pitcher with water was brought
from the Pool of Siloam, with a chamber above it, called Abtinas, where the
priests kept guard at night; then the Gate of the Firstlings, through which the
firstlings fit to be offered were brought; and the Wood-gate, through which the
altar-wood was carried. Alongside these gates were Gazith, the hall of
square polished stones, where the Sanhedrim sat; the chamber Golah, for
the water apparatus which emptied and filled the laver; and the wood-chamber.
Above and beyond it were the apartments of the high-priest and the
council-chamber of the ‘honourable councillors,’ or priestly council for affairs
strictly connected with the Temple. On the northern side of the Priests’ Court
were the gate Nitzutz (Spark Gate), with a guard-chamber above for the priests,
the Gate of Sacrifices, and the Gate of the Beth-Moked. Alongside these gates
were the chamber for salting the sacrifices; that for salting the skins (named
Parvah from its builder), with bathrooms for the high-priest above it;
and finally the Beth-Moked with its apartments. The two largest of these
buildings—the council-chamber of the Sanhedrim at the south-eastern,
This, because none other than a prince of the house of
David might sit down within the sacred enclosure of the Priests’ Court. Probably
there was a similar arrangement for the high-priest’s apartments and the
priests’ council-chamber, as well as for the guard-chambers of the priests, so
that at each of the four corners of the court the apartments would abut upon
‘the terrace.’
All along the colonnades, both around the Court of the Gentiles and that of the Women, there were seats and benches for the accommodation of the worshippers.
The most prominent object in the Court of the Priests was
the immense altar of unhewn stones,
All around it a ‘circuit’ ran for the use of the
ministering priests, who, as a rule, always passed round by the right, and
retired by the left.
As this ‘circuit’ was raised 9 feet from the ground, and 1
1/2 feet high, while the ‘horns’ measured 1 1/2 feet in height, the priests
would have only to reach 3 feet to the top of the altar, and 4 1/2 feet to that
of each ‘horn.’ An inclined plane, 48 feet long by 24 wide, into which about the
middle two smaller ‘descents’ merged, led up to the ‘circuit’ from the south.
Close by was the great heap of salt, from which every sacrifice must be salted
with salt.
On the altar, which at the top was only 36 feet wide, three fires burned, one (east) for the offerings, the second (south) for the incense, the third (north) to supply the means for kindling the other two. The four ‘horns’ of the altar were straight, square, hollow prominences, that at the south-west with two openings, into whose silver funnels the drink-offerings, and, at the Feast of Tabernacles, the water from the Pool of Siloam, were poured. A red line all round the middle of the altar marked that above it the blood of sacrifices intended to be eaten, below it that of sacrifices wholly consumed, was to be sprinkled. The system of drainage into chambers below and canals, all of which could be flushed at will, was perfect; the blood and refuse being swept down into Kedron and towards the royal gardens. Finally, north of the altar were all requisites for the sacrifices—six rows, with four rings each, of ingenious mechanism, for fastening the sacrifices; eight marble tables for the flesh, fat, and cleaned ‘inwards’; eight low columns, each with three hooks, for hanging up the pieces; a marble table for laying them out, and one of silver for the gold and silver vessels of the service.
Between the altar and porch of the Temple, but placed towards the south, was the immense laver of brass, supported by twelve colossal lions, which was drained every evening, and filled every morning by machinery, and where twelve priests could wash at the same time. Indeed, the water supply to the Sanctuary is among the most wonderful of its arrangements. That of the Temple is designated by Captain Wilson as the ‘low-level supply,’ in contradistinction to the ‘high-level aqueduct,’ which collected the water in a rock-hewn tunnel four miles long, on the road to Hebron, and then wound along so as to deliver water to the upper portion of the city. The ‘low-level’ aqueduct, which supplied the Temple, derived its waters from three sources—from the hills about Hebron, from Etham, and from the three pools of Solomon. Its total length was over forty miles. The amount of water it conveyed may be gathered from the fact that the surplusage of the waters of Etham is calculated, when drained into the lower pool of Gihon, to have presented when full, ‘an area of nearly four acres of water.’ And, as if this had not been sufficient, ‘the ground is perfectly honeycombed with a series of remarkable rock-hewn cisterns, in which the water brought by an aqueduct form Solomon’s Pools, near Bethlehem, was stored. The cisterns appear to have been connected by a system of channels cut out of the rock; so that when one was full the surplus water ran into the next, and so on, till the final overflow was carried off by a channel into the Kedron. One of the cisterns—that known as the Great Sea—would contain two million gallons; and the total number of gallons which could be stored probably exceeded ten millions.’ There seems little doubt that the drainage of Jerusalem was ‘as well managed as the water supply; the mouth of the main drain being in the valley of the Kedron, where the sewerage was probably used as manure for the gardens.’
The mind becomes bewildered at numbers, the accuracy of which we should hesitate to receive if they were not confirmed by modern investigations. We feel almost the same in speaking of the proportions of the Holy House itself. It was built on immense foundations of solid blocks of white marble covered with gold, each block measuring, according to Josephus, 67 1/2 by 9 feet. Mounting by a flight of twelve steps to the ‘Porch,’ we notice that it projected 30 feet on each side beyond the Temple itself. Including these projections, the buildings of the Temple were 150 feet long, and as many broad. Without them the breadth was only 90, and the length 120 feet. Of these 60 feet in length, from east to west, and 30 feet in breadth, belonged to the Holy Place; while the Most Holy was 30 feet long, and as many broad. There were, therefore, on either side of the Sanctuary, as well as behind it, 30 feet to spare, which were occupied by side buildings three stories high, each containing five rooms, while that at the back had eight. These side-buildings, however, were lower than the Sanctuary itself, over which also super-structures had been reared. A gabled cedar roof, with golden spikes on it, and surrounded by an elegant balustrade, surmounted the whole.
The entrance to the ‘Porch,’ which was curiously roofed,
was covered by a splendid veil. Right and left were depositories for the
sacrificial knives. Within the ‘Porch’ a number of ‘dedicated’ gifts were kept,
such as the golden candelabra of the proselyte queen of Adiabene, two golden
crowns presented by the Maccabees, etc. Here were also two tables—one of
marble, on which they deposited the new shewbread; the other of gold, on which
they laid the old as it was removed from the Holy Place. Two-leaved doors,
Above it hung that symbol of Israel (
Such was the Temple as restored by Herod—a work which occupied forty-six years to its completion. Yet, though the Rabbis never weary praising its splendour, not with one word do any of those who were contemporary indicate that its restoration was carried out by Herod the Great. So memorable an event in their history is passed over with the most absolute silence. What a complete answer does this afford to the objection sometimes raised from the silence of Josephus about the person and mission of Jesus!
With what reverence the Rabbis guarded their Temple will be
described in the sequel. The readers of the New Testament know how readily any
supposed infringement of its sanctity led to summary popular vengeance. To the
disciples of Jesus it seemed difficult to realise that such utter ruin as their
Master foretold could so soon come over that beautiful and glorious house. It
was the evening of the day in which He had predicted the utter desolation of
Jerusalem. All that day He had taught in the Temple, and what He had said, not
only there, but when, on beholding the city, He wept over it, seems to have
filled their minds alike with awe and with doubt. And now He, with His
disciples, had ‘departed from the Temple.’ Once more they lingered in sweet
retirement ‘on the Mount of Olives’ (
Then it was and there that the disciples, looking down upon the Temple, pointed out to the Master: ‘What manner of stones and what buildings are here.’ The view from that site must have rendered belief in the Master’s prediction even more difficult and more sad. A few years more, and it was all literally fulfilled! It may be, as Jewish tradition has it, that ever since the Babylonish captivity the ‘Ark of the Covenant’ lies buried and concealed underneath the wood-court at the north-eastern angle of the Court of the Women. And it may be that some at least of the spoils which Titus carried with him from Jerusalem—the seven-branched candlestick, the table of shewbread, the priests’ trumpets, and the identical golden mitre which Aaron had worn on his forehead—are hidden somewhere in the vaults beneath the site of the Temple, after having successively gone to Rome, to Carthage, to Byzantium, to Ravenna, and thence to Jerusalem. But of ‘those great buildings’ that once stood there, there is ‘not left one stone upon another’ that has not been ‘thrown down.’
‘For the bodies of
those beasts, whose blood is brought into the sanctuary by the high-priest for
sin, are burned without the camp. Wherefore Jesus also, that He might sanctify
the people with His own blood, suffered without the gate.’—
To the devout and earnest Jew the second Temple must, ‘in
comparison of’ ‘the house in her first glory,’ have indeed appeared ‘as nothing’
(
But, unless faith had recognised in Jesus of Nazareth ‘the
Desire of all nations,’ who should ‘fill this house with glory’ (
Nor could the will of God be now ascertained through the Urim and Thummim, nor even the high-priest be anointed with the holy oil, its very composition being unknown. Yet all the more jealously did the Rabbis draw lines of fictitious sanctity, and guard them against all infringement.
In general, as the camp in the wilderness had really
consisted of three parts—the camp of Israel, that of the Levites, and that of
God—so they reckoned three corresponding divisions of the Holy City. From the
gates to the Temple Mount was regarded as the camp of Israel; thence to the gate
of Nicanor represented the camp of Levi; while the rest of the sanctuary was
‘the camp of God.’ It is in allusion to this that the writer of the Epistle to
the Hebrews compares Christ’s suffering ‘without the gate’ of Jerusalem to the
burning of the sin-offerings ‘without the camp.’ According to another Rabbinical
arrangement different degrees of sanctity attached to different localities. The
first, or lowest degree, belonged to the land of Israel, whence alone the first
sheaf at the Passover, the firstfruits, and the two wave-loaves at Pentecost
might be brought; the next degree to walled cities in Palestine, where no leper
nor dead body (
From these views of the sanctity of the place, it will
readily be understood how sufficient outward reverence should have been expected
of all who entered upon the Temple Mount. The Rabbis here also lay down certain
rules, of which some are such as a sense of propriety would naturally suggest,
while others strangely remind us of the words of our Saviour. Thus no one was to
come to it except for strictly religious purposes, and neither to make the
Temple Mount a place of thoroughfare, nor use it to shorten the road. Ordinarily
the worshippers were to enter by the right and to withdraw by the left, avoiding
both the direction and the gate by which they had come. But mourners and those
under ecclesiastical discipline were to do the reverse, so as to meet the stream
of worshippers, who might address to them either words of sympathy (‘He who
dwelleth in this house grant thee comfort!’), or else of admonition (‘He who
dwelleth in this house put it into thy mind to give heed to those who would
restore thee again!’). As already stated, it was expressly prohibited to sit
down in the Court of the Priests, an exception being only made in favour of
princes of the house of David, probably to vindicate their consistency, as such
instances were recorded in the past history of Israel. Alike the ministering
priests and the worshippers were to walk backwards when leaving the immediate
neighbourhood where the holy service was performed, and at the gate of Nicanor
each one was to stand with his head bent. It need scarcely be said that
reverence in gesture and deportment was enjoined while on the Temple Mount. But
even when at a distance from Jerusalem and the Temple, its direction was to be
noted, so as to avoid in every-day life anything that might seem incongruous
with the reverence due to the place of which God had said, ‘Mine eyes and mine
heart shall be there perpetually’ (
Other Rabbinical ordinances, however, are not so easily
explained, unless on the ground of the avoidance of every occupation and
undertaking other than worship. Thus ‘no man might go on the Temple Mount with
his staff,’ as if on business or pleasure; nor yet ‘with shoes on his
feet’—sandals only being allowed; nor ‘with the dust upon his feet’; nor ‘with
his scrip,’ nor ‘with money tied to him in his purse.’ Whatever he might wish to
contribute either to the Temple, or for offerings, or for the poor must be
carried by each ‘in his hand,’ possibly to indicate that the money about him was
exclusively for an immediate sacred purpose. It was probably for similar reasons
that Jesus transferred these very ordinances to the disciples when engaged in
the service of the real Temple. The direction, ‘Provide neither gold, nor
silver, nor brass in your purses, nor scrip for your journey, neither two coats,
neither shoes, nor yet staves,’ must mean, Go out in the same spirit and manner
as you would to the Temple services, and fear not—’for the workman is worthy of
his meat’ (
But, guard it as they might, it was impossible wholly to
preserve the sanctuary from profanation. For wilful, conscious, high-handed
profanity, whether in reference to the Temple or to God, the law does not appear
to have provided any atonement or offering. To this the Epistle to the Hebrews
alludes in the well-known passage, so often misunderstood, ‘For if we sin
wilfully after that we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remaineth
no more sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and
fiery indignation, which shall devour the adversaries’ (
To these two Divine punishments corresponded other two by
the hand of man—the ‘forty stripes save one,’ and the so-called ‘rebels’
beating.’ The distinction between them is easily explained. The former were only
inflicted after a regular judicial investigation and sentence, and for the
breach of some negative precept or prohibition; while the latter was, so to
speak, in the hands of the people, who might administer it on the spot, and
without trial, if any one were caught in supposed open defiance of some positive
precept, whether of the Law of Moses or of the traditions of the elders. The
reader of the New Testament will remember such popular outbursts, when the men
of Nazareth would have cast Jesus over the brow of the hill on which their city
was built (
That strict discipline both in regard to priests and
worshippers would, however, be necessary, may be inferred even from the immense
number of worshippers which thronged Jerusalem and the Temple. According to a
late computation, the Temple could have held ‘within its colossal girdle’ ‘two
amphitheatres of the size of the Coliseum.’ As the latter is reckoned to have
been capable, inclusive of its arena and passages, of accommodating 109,000
persons, the calculation that the Temple might contain at one time about 210,000
persons seems by no means exaggerated.
Indeed, the Temple treasury had always been an object of
cupidity to foreigners. It was successively plundered by Syrians and Romans,
though at the last siege the flames deprived Titus and his soldiers of this
booty. Even so liberal and enlightened a statesman as Cicero inveighed, perhaps
on the ground of exaggerated reports, against the enormous influx of gold from
all lands to Jerusalem. From Biblical history we know how liberal were the
voluntary contributions at the time of Moses, of David, and again of Joash (
Besides these votive offerings, and the sale of the
surplusage of incense, flour, etc., the people were wont on the Sabbaths and
feast-days to bring voluntary contributions ‘in their hand’ to the Temple.
another and very large source of revenue was from the profit made by the
meat-offerings, which were prepared by the Levites, and sold every day to the
offerers. But by far the largest sum was derived from the half-shekel of Temple
tribute, which was incumbent on every male Israelite of age, including
proselytes and even manumitted slaves. As the shekel of the sanctuary was double
the ordinary, the half-shekel due to the Temple treasury amount to about 1s. 4d.
(two denarii or a didrachma). Hence, when Christ was challenged at
Capernaum (
The total sum derived annually from the Temple tribute has
been computed at about 76,000 pounds. As the bankers were allowed to charge a
silver meah, or about one-fourth of a denar (2d.) on every half-shekel,
their profits must have amounted to nearly 9, 500 pounds, or, deducting a small
sum for exceptional cases, in which the meah was not to be charged, say
about 9,000 pounds—a very large sum, considering the value of money in a
country where a labourer received a denar (8d.) for a day’s work (
It had only been a century before, during the reign of
Salome- Alexandra (about 78 B.C.), that the Pharisaical party, being then in
power, had carried an enactment by which the Temple tribute was to be enforced
at law. It need scarcely be said that for this there was not the slightest
Scriptural warrant. Indeed, the Old Testament nowhere provided legal means for
enforcing any payment for religious purposes. The law stated what was due, but
left its observance to the piety of the people, so that alike the provision for
the Temple and for the priesthood must have varied with the religious state of
the nation (
The Temple revenues were in the first place devoted to the purchase of all public sacrifices, that is, those offered in the name of the whole congregation of Israel, such as the morning and evening sacrifices, the festive sacrifices, etc. This payment had been one of the points in controversy between the Pharisees and the Sadducees. So great importance was attached to it, that all Israel should appear represented in the purchase of the public sacrifices, that when the three chests were emptied they took expressly from one ‘for the land of Israel,’ from another ‘for the neighbouring lands’ (that is, for the Jews there resident), and from the third ‘for distant lands.’ Besides, the Temple treasury defrayed all else necessary for the services of the sanctuary; all Temple repairs, and the salaries of a large staff of regular officials, such as those who prepared the shewbread and the incense; who saw to the correctness of the copies of the law used in the synagogues; who examined into the Levitical fitness of sacrifices; who instructed the priests in their various duties; who made the curtains, etc.,—not omitting, according to their own testimony, the fees of the Rabbis. And after all this lavish expenditure there was not only enough to pay for the repairs of the city-walls, the roads, and public buildings, etc., about Jerusalem, but sufficient to accumulate immense wealth in the treasury!
To the wealth and splendour of the Temple corresponded the
character of its services. The most important of these, next to the sacrificial
rites, was the hymnody of the sanctuary. We can conceive what it must have been
in the days of David and of Solomon. But even in New Testament times it was such
that St. John could find no more adequate imagery to portray heavenly realities
and the final triumph of the Church than that taken from the service of praise
in the Temple. Thus, when first ‘the twenty-four elders,’ representing the
chiefs of the twenty-four courses of the priesthood, and afterwards the 144,000,
representing redeemed Israel in its fulness (12 x 12,000), sing ‘the new
song’—the former in heaven, the latter on Mount Zion—they appear, just as in
the Temple services, as ‘harpers, harping with their harps’ (
Properly speaking, the real service of praise in the Temple
was only with the voice. This is often laid down as a principle by the Rabbis.
What instrumental music there was, served only to accompany and sustain the
song. Accordingly, none other than Levites might act as choristers, while other
distinguished Israelites were allowed to take part in the instrumental music.
The blasts of the trumpets, blown by priests only, formed—at least in the
second Temple—no part of the instrumental music of the service, but were
intended for quite different purposes. Even the posture of the performers showed
this, for while the Levites stood at their desks facing towards the sanctuary,
or westwards, the priests, with their silver trumpets, stood exactly in the
opposite direction, on the west side of the rise of the altar, by the ‘table of
the fat,’ and looking eastwards or down the courts. On ordinary days the priests
blew seven times, each time three blasts—a short sound, an alarm, and again a
sharp short sound (Thekiah, Theruah, and Thekiah
According to tradition, they were intended symbolically to proclaim the kingdom of God, Divine Providence, and the final judgment. The first three blasts were blown when the great gates of the Temple—especially that of Nicanor—were opened. Then, when the drink-offering was poured out, the Levites sung the psalm of the day in three sections. After each section there was a pause, when the priests blew three blasts, and the people worshipped. This was the practice at the evening, as at the morning sacrifice. On the eve of the Sabbath a threefold blast of the priests’ trumpets summoned the people, far as the sound was carried over the city, to prepare for the holy day, while another threefold blast announced its actual commencement. On Sabbaths, when, besides the ordinary, an additional sacrifice was brought, and the ‘Song of Moses’ sung—not the whole every Sabbath, but divided in six parts, one for every Sabbath, —the priests sounded their trumpets additional three times in the pauses of the Sabbath psalm.
The music of the Temple owed its origin to David, who was
not only a poet and a musical composer, but who also invented musical
instruments (
That music was chiefly sustained by the harp (Kinnor) and
the lute (Nevel). Of the latter (which was probably used for solos) not less
than two or more than six were to be in the Temple orchestra; of the former, or
harp, as many as possible, but never less than nine. There were, of course,
several varieties both of the Nevel and the Kinnor. The chief difference between
these two kinds of stringed instruments lay in this, that in the Nevel (lute or
guitar) the strings were drawn over the sounding-board, while in the Kinnor they
stood out free, as in our harps. Of wind-instruments we know that, besides their
silver trumpets, the priests also blew the Shophar or horn, notably at the new
moon, on the Feast of the New Year (
The flute (or reed pipe) was played in the Temple on twelve
special festivities.
These were: the day of killing the first, and that of
killing the second Passover, the first day of unleavened bread, Pentecost, and
the eight days of the Feast of Tabernacles. Quite in accordance with the social
character of these feasts, the flute was also used by the festive pilgrim-bands
on their journey to Jerusalem, to accompany ‘the Psalms of Degrees,’ or rather
of ‘Ascent’ (
As already stated, the service of praise was mainly
sustained by the human voice. A good voice was the one qualification needful for
a Levite. In the second Temple female singers seem at one time to have been
employed (
But how solemn must have been the scene when, at the
dedication of Solomon’s Temple during the service of praise, ‘the house was
filled with a cloud, even the house of Jehovah; so that the priests could not
stand to minister by reason of the cloud: for the glory of Jehovah had filled
the house of God’! (
‘And every priest
standeth daily ministering and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices, which
can never take away sins.’—
Among the most interesting glimpses of early life in the
church is that afforded by a small piece of rapidly-drawn scenery which presents
to our view ‘a great company of the priests,’ ‘obedient to the faith’ (
The number of priests to be found at all times in Jerusalem must have been very great, and Ophel a densely inhabited quarter. According to Jewish tradition, half of each of the twenty-four ‘courses,’ into which the priesthood were divided, were permanently resident in Jerusalem; the rest scattered over the land. It is added, that about one half of the latter had settled in Jericho, and were in the habit of supplying the needful support to their brethren while officiating in Jerusalem. Of course such statements must not be taken literally, though no doubt they are substantially correct. When a ‘course’ was on duty, all its members were bound to appear in the Temple. Those who stayed away, with such ‘representatives of the people’ (or ‘stationary men’) as, like them, had been prevented from ‘going up’ to Jerusalem in their turn, had to meet in the synagogues of their district to pray and to fast each day of their week of service, except on the sixth, the seventh, and the first—that is, neither on the Sabbath, nor on the days preceding and succeeding it, as the ‘joy’ attaching to the Sabbath rendered a fast immediately before or after it inappropriate.
It need scarcely be said, that everything connected with
the priesthood was intended to be symbolical and typical—the office itself, its
functions, even its dress and outward support. The fundamental design of Israel
itself was to be unto Jehovah ‘a kingdom of priests and an holy nation’ (
For this purpose God chose the tribe of Levi, and
out of it again the family of Aaron, on whom He bestowed the ‘priest’s
office as a gift’ (
But there was yet another idea to be expressed by the priesthood. The object of reconciliation was holiness. Israel was to be ‘a holy nation’—reconciled through the ‘sprinkling of blood’; brought near to, and kept in fellowship with God by that means. The priesthood, as the representative offerers of that blood and mediators of the people, were also to show forth the ‘holiness’ of Israel. Every one knows how this was symbolised by the gold-plate which the high-priest wore on his forehead, and which bore the words: ‘Holiness unto Jehovah.’ But though the high-priest in this, as in every other respect, was the fullest embodiment of the functions and object of the priesthood, the same truth was also otherwise shown forth. The bodily qualifications required in the priesthood, the kind of defilements which would temporarily or wholly interrupt their functions, their mode of ordination, and even every portion, material, and colour of their distinctive dress were all intended to express in a symbolical manner this characteristic of holiness. In all these respects there was a difference between Israel and the tribe of Levi; between the tribe of Levi and the family of Aaron; and, finally, between an ordinary priest and the high-priest, who most fully typified our Great High-priest, in whom all these symbols have found their reality.
This much it seemed necessary to state for the general
understanding of the matter. Full details belong to the exposition of the
meaning and object of the Levitical priesthood, as instituted by God, while our
present task rather is to trace its further development to what it was at the
time when Jesus was in the Temple. The first peculiarity of post-Mosaic times
which we here meet, is the arrangement of the priesthood into ‘twenty-four
courses,’ which undoubtedly dates from the times of David. But Jewish tradition
would make it even much older. For, according to the Talmud, it should be traced
up to Moses, who is variously supposed to have arranged the sons of Aaron into
either or else sixteen courses (four, or else eight, of Eleazar; and the other
four, or else eight, of Ithamar), to which, on the one supposition, Samuel and
David each added other eight ‘courses,’ or, on the other, Samuel and David, in
conjunction, the eight needed to make up the twenty-four mentioned in
The institution of David and of Solomon continued till the
Babylonish captivity. Thence, however, only four out of the twenty-four
‘courses’ returned: those of Jedaiah, Immer, Pashur, and Harim (
It had been their duty to look after the sacred vestments
and vessels; the store-houses and their contents; and the preparation of the
shewbread, of the meat-offerings, of the spices, etc. They were also generally
to assist the priests in their work, to see to the cleaning of the sanctuary,
and to take charge of the treasuries (
Of course these services, as also those of the singers and
musicians, and of the porters and guards, were retained in the Temple of Herod.
But for the employment of Levites as ‘officers and judges’ there was no further
room, not only because such judicial functions as still remained to the Jews
were in the hands of the Sanhedrim and its subordinate authorities, but also
because in general the ranks of the Levites were so thinned. In point of fact,
while no less than 4, 289 priests had returned from Babylon, the number of
Levites was under 400 (
Though the Nethinim, like the Levites and priests, were
freed from all taxation (
The duties of priests and Levites in the Temple may be
gathered from Scripture, and will be further explained in the course of our
inquiries. Generally, it may here be stated that on the Levites devolved the
Temple-police, the guard of the gates, and the duty of keeping everything about
the sanctuary clean and bright. But as at night the priests kept watch about the
innermost places of the Temple, so they also opened and closed all the inner
gates, while the Levites discharged this duty in reference to the outer gates,
which led upon the Temple Mount (or Court of the Gentiles), and to the
‘Beautiful Gate,’ which formed the principal entrance into the Court of the
Women. The laws of Levitical cleanness, as explained by the Rabbis, were most
rigidly enforced upon worshippers and priests. If a leper, or any other who was
‘defiled,’ had ventured into the sanctuary itself, or any priest officiated in a
state of ‘uncleanness,’ he would, if discovered, be dragged out and killed,
without form of process, by ‘the rebels’ beating.’ Minor punishments were
awarded to those guilty of smaller offences of the same kind. The Sabbath-rest
was strictly enforced, so far as consistent with the necessary duties of the
Temple service. But the latter superseded the Sabbath law (
Each ‘course’ of priests and of Levites (as has already been stated) came on duty for a week, from one Sabbath to another. The service of the week was subdivided among the various families which constituted a ‘course’; so that if it consisted of five ‘houses of fathers,’ three served each one day, and two each two days; if of six families, five served each one day, and one two days; if of eight families, six served each one day, and the other two in conjunction on one day; or, lastly, if of nine families, five served each one day, and the other four took it two in conjunction for two days. These divisions and arrangements were made by ‘the chiefs’ or ‘heads of the houses of their fathers.’ On Sabbaths the whole ‘course’ was on duty; on feast-days any priest might come up and join in the ministrations of the sanctuary; and at the Feast of Tabernacles all the twenty-four courses were bound to be present and officiate. While actually engaged on service in the Temple, the priests were not allowed to drink wine, either by day or by night. The other ‘families’ or ‘houses’ also of the ‘course’ who were in attendance at Jerusalem, though not on actual duty, were, during their week of ministry, prohibited the use of wine, except at night, because they might have to be called in to assist their brethren of the officiating ‘family,’ which they could not do if they had partaken of strong drink. The law even made (a somewhat curious) provision to secure that the priests should come up to Jerusalem properly trimmed, washed, and attired, so as to secure the decorum of the service.
It would be difficult to conceive arrangements more
thoroughly or consistently opposed to what are commonly called ‘priestly
pretensions,’ than those of the Old Testament. The fundamental principle, laid
down at the outset, that all Israel were ‘a kingdom of priests’ (
Nor must we forget the powerful controlling influence which Rabbinism exercised. Its tendency, which must never be lost sight of in the study of the state of Palestine at the time of our Lord, was steadily against all privileges other than those gained by traditionary learning and theological ingenuity. The Pharisee, or, rather, the man learned in the traditional law, was everything both before God and before man; ‘but this people, who knoweth not the law,’ were ‘cursed,’ plebeians, country people, unworthy of any regard or attention. Rabbinism applied these principles even in reference to the priesthood. It divided all priests into ‘learned’ and ‘unlettered,’ and excluded the latter from some of the privileges of their own order. Thus there were certain priestly dues which the people might at will give to any priest they chose. But from some of them the ‘unlettered’ priests were debarred, on the ostensible ground that in their ignorance they might have partaken of them in a state of Levitical uncleanness, and so committed mortal sin.
In general, the priests had to undergo a course of instruction, and were examined before being allowed to officiate. Similarly, they were subject to the ordinary tribunals, composed of men learned in the law, without regard to their descent from one or another tribe. The ordained ‘rulers’ of the synagogues, the teachers of the people, the leaders of their devotions, and all other officials were not necessarily ‘priests,’ but simply chosen for their learning and fitness. Any one whom the ‘elders’ or ‘rulers’ deemed qualified for it might, at their request, address to the people on the Sabbath a ‘word of exhortation.’ Even the high-priest himself was answerable to the Sanhedrim. It is distinctly stated, that ‘if he committed an offence which by the law deserved whipping, the Great Sanhedrim whipt him, and then had him restored again to his office.’ Every year a kind of ecclesiastical council was appointed to instruct him in his duties for the Day of Atonement, ‘in case he were not learned,’ or, at any rate, to see to it that he knew and remembered them. Nay, the principle was broadly laid down—that ‘a scholar, though he were a bastard, was of far higher value than an unlearned high-priest.’ If, besides all this, it is remembered how the political influence of the high-priest had decayed in the days of Herod, and how frequently the occupants of that office changed, through the caprice of the rulers or through bribery, the state of public feeling will be readily understood.
At the same time, it must be admitted, that generally speaking the high-priest would, of necessity, wield very considerable influence, and that, ordinarily, those who held the sacred office were not only ‘lettered,’ but members of the Sanhedrim. According to Jewish tradition, the high-priest ought, in every respect, to excel all other priests, and if he were poor, the rest were to contribute, so as to secure him an independent fortune. Certain marks of outward respect were also shown him. When he entered the Temple he was accompanied by three persons—one walking at each side, the third behind him. He might, without being appointed to it, officiate in any part of the Temple services; he had certain exceptional rights; and he possessed a house in the Temple, where he lived by day, retiring only at night to his own home, which must be within Jerusalem, and to which he was escorted by the people after the solemnities of the Day of Atonement, which devolved almost exclusively upon him.
Originally the office of high-priest was regarded as being
held for life and hereditary;
Without here entering into the complicated question of the succession to the high-priesthood, the following may be quoted from the Talmud (Talmud Jer. Ioma, I.), without, of course, guaranteeing its absolute accuracy: ‘In the first Temple, the high-priests served, the son succeeding the father, and they were eighteen in number. But in the second Temple they got the high-priesthood for money; and there are who say they destroyed each other by witchcraft, so that some reckon 80 high-priests during that period, others 81, others 82, 83, 84, and even 85.’ The Rabbis enumerate 18 high-priests during the first Temple; Lightfoot counts 53 from the return from Babylon to Matthias, when the last war of the Jews began; while Relandius reckons 57. But there is both difficulty and confusion amid the constant changes at the last.
There was not any fixed age for entering on the office of
high-priest, any more than on that of an ordinary priest. The Talmudists put it
down at twenty years. But the unhappy descendant of the Maccabees, Aristobulus,
was only sixteen years of age when his beauty, as he officiated as high-priest
in the Temple, roused the jealousy of Herod, and procured his death. The
entrance of the Levites is fixed, in the sacred text, at thirty during the
wilderness period, and after that, when the work would require less bodily
strength, but a larger number of ministers, at twenty-five years of age.
No special disqualifications for the Levitical office
existed, though the Rabbis insist that a good voice was absolutely necessary. It
was otherwise with the priest’s office. The first inquiry instituted by the
Sanhedrim, who for the purpose sat daily in ‘the Hall of Polished Stones,’ was
into the genealogy of a candidate. Certain genealogies were deemed
authoritative. Thus, ‘if his father’s name were inscribed in the archives of
Jeshana at Zipporim, no further inquiry was made.’ If he failed to satisfy the
court about his perfect legitimacy, the candidate was dressed and veiled in
black, and permanently removed. If he passed that ordeal, inquiry was next made
as to any physical defects, of which Maimonides enumerates a hundred and forty
that permanently, and twenty-two which temporarily disqualified for the exercise
of the priestly office. Persons so disqualified were, however, admitted to
menial offices, such as in the wood-chamber, and entitled to Temple support.
Those who had stood the twofold test were dressed in white raiment, and their
names properly inscribed. To this pointed allusion is made in
Thus received, and afterwards instructed in his duties, the formal admission alike of the priest and of the high-priest was not, as of old, by anointing, but simply by investiture. For even the composition of the sacred oil was no longer known in the second Temple. They were called ‘high-priests by investiture,’ and regarded as of inferior rank to those ‘by anointing.’ As for the common priests, the Rabbis held that they were not anointed even in the first Temple, the rite which was applied to the sons of Aaron being valid also for their descendants. It was otherwise in the case of the high-priest. His investiture was continued during seven days. In olden days, when he was anointed, the sacred oil was not only ‘poured over him,’ but also applied to his forehead, over the eyes, as tradition has it, after the form of the Greek letter X. The coincidence is certainly curious. This sacred oil was besides only used for anointing such kings as were of the family of David, not other Jewish monarchs, and if their succession had been called in question. Otherwise the royal dignity went, as a matter of course, by inheritance from father to son.
The high-priests ‘by investiture’ had not any more the real
Urim and Thummim (their meaning even being unknown), though a breast-plate, with
twelve stones, was made and worn, in order to complete the eight sacred
vestments. This was just double the number of those worn by an ordinary priest,
viz. the linen breeches, the coat, the girdle, and the bonnet. To these the
high-priest added other four distinctive articles of dress, called ‘golden
vestments,’ because, unlike the robes of the ordinary priests, gold, the
symbol of splendour, appeard in them. They were the Meil, or robe of the
ephod, wholly of ‘woven work,’ of dark blue colour, descending to the knees, and
adorned at the hem by alternate blossoms of the pomegranate in blue, purple, and
scarlet, and golden bells, the latter, according to tradition, seventy-two in
number; the Ephod with the breast-plate, the former of the four colours
of the sanctuary (white, blue, purple, and scarlet), and inwrought with threads
of gold; the Mitre; and, lastly, the Ziz, or golden frontlet. If
either a priest or the high-priest officiated without wearing the full number of
his vestments, his service would be invalid, as also if anything, however
trifling (such, for instance, as a plaster), had intervened between the body and
the dress of the priest. The material of which the four vestments of the
ordinary priest were made was ‘linen,’ or, more accurately, ‘byssus,’ the white
shining cotton-stuff of Egypt. These two qualities of the byssus are specially
marked as characteristic (
We add some further particulars, chiefly in illustration of
allusions in the New Testament. The priest’s ‘coat’ was woven of one piece, like
the seamless robe of the Saviour (
Of the four distinctive articles in the high-priest’s
dress, the breast-plate, alike from its square form and the twelve jewels on it,
bearing the names of the tribes, suggest ‘the city four-square,’ whose
‘foundations’ are twelve precious stones (
It only requires to be added that the priests’ garments, when soiled, were not washed, but used as wicks for the lamps in the Temple; those of the high-priest were ‘hid away.’ The high-priest wore ‘a fresh suit of linen vestments’ each time on the Day of Atonement.
The priesthood ministering in the Temple were arranged into
‘ordinary’ priests and various officials. Of the latter there were, besides the
high-priest,
These fourteen officers, ranking in the order mentioned,
formed the standing ‘council of the Temple,’ which regulated everything
connected with the affairs and services of the sanctuary. Its members were also
called ‘the elders of the priests,’ or ‘the counsellors.’ This judicatory, which
ordinarily did not busy itself with criminal questions, apparently took a
leading part in the condemnation of Jesus. But, on the other hand, it is well to
remember that they were not all of one mind, since Joseph of Arimathea belonged
to their number—the title by which he is designated in
It is difficult to specify the exact duties of each of
these classes of officials. The ‘Sagan’ (or ‘Segen,’ or ‘Segan’) would officiate
for the high-priest, when from any cause he was incapacitated; he would act
generally as his assistance, and take the oversight of all the priests, whence
he is called in Scripture ‘second priest’ (
Next in rank to these officials were the ‘heads of each course’ on duty for a week, and then the ‘heads of families’ of every course. After them followed fifteen overseers, viz. ‘the overseer concerning the times,’ who summoned priests and people to their respective duties; the overseer for shutting the doors (under the direction, of course, of the Ammarcalin); the overseer of the guards, or captain of the Temple; the overseer of the singers and of those who blew the trumpets; the overseer of the cymbals; the overseer of the lots, which were drawn every morning; the overseer of the birds, who had to provide the turtledoves and pigeons for those who brought such offerings; the overseer of the seals, who dispensed the four counterfoils for the various meat-offerings suited for different sacrifices; the overseer of the drink-offerings, for a similar purpose to the above; the overseer of the sick, or the Temple physician; the overseer of the water, who had charge of the water-supply and the drainage; the overseer for making the shewbread; for preparing the incense; for making the veils; and for providing the priestly garments. All these officers had, of course, subordinates, whom they chose and employed, either for the day or permanently; and it was their duty to see to all the arrangements connected with their respective departments. Thus, not to speak of instructors, examiners of sacrifices, and a great variety of artificers, there must have been sufficient employment in the Temple for a very large number of persons.
We must not close without enumerating the twenty-four
sources whence, according to the Talmud, the priests derived their support. Of
these ten were only available while in the Temple itself, four in Jerusalem, and
the remaining ten throughout the Holy Land. Those which might only be used in
the Temple itself were the priest’s part of the sin-offering; that of the
trespass-offering for a known, and for a doubtful trespass; public
peace-offerings; the leper’s log of oil; the two Pentecostal loaves; the
shewbread; what was left of meat-offerings, and the omer at the Passover. The
four which might be used only in Jerusalem were the firstlings of beasts, the
Biccurim,
Of the ten which might be used throughout the land, five
could be given at will to any priest, viz. the tithe of the tithe, the
heave-offering of the dough (
Thus elaborate in every particular was the system which regulated the admission, the services, and the privileges of the officiating priesthood. Yet it has all vanished, not leaving behind it in the synagogue even a single trace of its complicated and perfect arrangements. These ‘old things are passed away,’ because they were only ‘a shadow of good things to come.’ But ‘the substance is of Christ,’ and ‘He abideth an High-Priest for ever.’
‘There are priests
that offer gifts according to the law: who serve unto the example and shadow of
heavenly things.’—
It is a curious fact, but sadly significant, that modern
Judaism should declare neither sacrifices nor a Levitical priesthood to belong
to the essence of the Old Testament; that, in fact, they had been foreign
elements imported into it—tolerated, indeed, by Moses, but against which the
prophets earnestly protested and incessantly laboured. The only arguments by
which this strange statement is supported are, that the Book of Deuteronomy
contains merely a brief summary, not a detailed repetition, of sacrificial
ordinances, and that such passages as
The sacrifices of the Old Testament were symbolical and typical. An outward observance without any real inward meaning is only a ceremony. But a rite which has a present spiritual meaning is a symbol; and if, besides, it also points to a future reality, conveying at the same time, by anticipation, the blessing that is yet to appear, it is a type. Thus the Old Testament sacrifices were not only symbols, nor yet merely predictions by fact (as prophecy is a prediction by word), but they already conveyed to the believing Israelite the blessing that was to flow from the future reality to which they pointed. Hence the service of the letter and the work-righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees ran directly contrary to this hope of faith and spiritual view of sacrifices, which placed all on the level of sinners to be saved by the substitution of another, to whom they pointed. Afterwards, when the destruction of the Temple rendered its services impossible, another and most cogent reason was added for trying to substitute other things, such as prayers, fasts, etc., in room of the sacrifices. Therefore, although none of the older Rabbis has ventured on such an assertion as that of modern Judaism, the tendency must have been increasingly in that direction. In fact, it had become a necessity—since to declare sacrifices of the essence of Judaism would have been to pronounce modern Judaism an impossibility. But thereby also the synagogue has given sentence against itself, and by disowning sacrifices has placed itself outside the pale of the Old Testament.
Every unprejudiced reader of the Bible must feel that sacrifices constitute the centre of the Old Testament. Indeed, were this the place, we might argue from their universality that, along with the acknowledgment of a Divine power, the dim remembrance of a happy past, and the hope of a happier future, sacrifices belonged to the primeval traditions which mankind inherited from Paradise. To sacrifice seems as ‘natural’ to man as to pray; the one indicates what he feels about himself, the other what he feels about God. The one means a felt need of propitiation; the other a felt sense of dependence.
The fundamental idea of sacrifice in the Old Testament is
that of substitution, which again seems to imply everything else—atonement and
redemption, vicarious punishment and forgiveness. The firstfruits go for the
whole products; the firstlings for the flock; the redemption-money for that
which cannot be offered; and the life of the sacrifice, which is in its blood
(
At the very threshold of the Mosaic dispensation stands the
sacrifice of the Paschal Lamb connected with the redemption of Israel, and which
in many respects must be regarded as typical, or rather anticipatory, of all the
others. But there was one sacrifice which, even under the Old Testament,
required no renewal. It was when God had entered into covenant relationship with
Israel, and Israel became the ‘people of God.’ Then Moses sprinkled ‘the blood
of the covenant’ on the altar and on the people (
The readiest, but perhaps the most superficial, arrangement
of sacrifices is into bloody and unbloody. The latter, or ‘Minchah,’ included,
besides the meat- and drink-offering, the first sheaf at the Passover, the two
loaves at Pentecost, and the shewbread. The meat-offering was only brought alone
in two instance—the priest’s offering (
The general requisites of all sacrifices were—that they
should be brought of such things, in such place and manner, and through such
mediatorial agency, as God had appointed. Thus the choice and the appointment of
the mode of approaching Him, were to be all of God. Then it was a first
principle that every sacrifice must be of such things as had belonged to the
offerer. None other could represent him or take his place before God. Hence the
Pharisees were right when, in opposition to the Sadducees, they carried it that
all public sacrifices (which were offered for the nation as a whole) should be
purchased, not from voluntary contributions, but from the regular Temple
revenues. Next, all animal sacrifices were to be free of blemishes (of which the
Rabbis enumerate seventy-three), and all unbloody offerings to be without
admixture of leaven or of honey; the latter probably because, from its tendency
to fermentation or corruption, it resembled leaven. For a similar reason salt,
as the symbol of incorruption, was to be added to all sacrifices.
Hence we read in
In Scripture three kinds of four-footed beasts—oxen,
sheep, and goats; and two of birds—turtle-doves and young pigeons—are
appointed for sacrifices.
The latter, except in certain purifications, are only
allowed as substitutes for other sacrifices in case of poverty. Hence also no
direction is given either as to their age or sex, though the Rabbis hold that
the turtle-doves (which were the common birds of passage) should be fully grown,
and the domestic pigeons young birds. But, as in the various sacrifices of oxen,
sheep, and goats there were differences of age and sex, the Jews enumerate
twelve sacrifices, to which as many terms in Scripture correspond. The Paschal
lamb and that for the trespass-offerings required to be males, as well as all
burnt- and all public sacrifices. The latter ‘made void the Sabbath and
defilement,’ i.e. they superseded the law of Sabbath rest (
The Rabbis, who are very fond of subtle distinctions, also speak of public sacrifices that resembled the private, and of private sacrifices that resembled the public, in that they also ‘made void the Sabbath and defilement.’ Altogether they enumerate eleven public sacrifices, viz. the daily sacrifices; the additional for the Sabbath; for the New Moon; the Passover sacrifices; the lamb when the sheaf was waved; the Pentecostal sacrifices; those brought with the two first loaves; New Year’s; Atonement Day sacrifices; those on the first day of, and those on the octave of ‘Tabernacles.’ Private sacrifices they classify as those on account of sins by word or deed; those on account of what concerned the body (such as various defilements); those on account of property (firstlings, tithes); those on account of festive seasons; and those on account of vows or promises. Yet another division of sacrifices was into those due, or prescribed, and those voluntary. For the latter nothing could be used that had previously been vowed, since it would already belong unto God.
But of far greater importance is the arrangement of
sacrifices into the most holy and the less holy, which is founded on Scripture
(
The skins of the most holy sacrifices, except such as were wholly burnt, belonged to the priests; those of the less holy to the offerers. In the latter case they also partook of their flesh, the only exception being the firstlings, which were eaten by the priests alone. The Rabbis attach ten comparative degrees of sanctity to sacrifices; and it is interesting to mark that of these the first belonged to the blood of the sin-offering; the second to the burnt-offering; the third to the sin-offering itself; and the fourth to the trespass-offering. Lastly, all sacrifices had to be brought before actual sunset, although the unconsumed flesh might smoulder on the altar till next dawn.
The Rabbis mention the following five acts as belonging to the offerer of a sacrifice: the laying on of hands, slaying, skinning, cutting up, and washing the inwards. These other five were strictly priestly functions: catching up the blood, sprinkling it, lighting the altar fire, laying on the wood, bringing up the pieces, and all else done at the altar itself.
The whole service must have been exceedingly solemn. Having
first been duly purified, a man brought his sacrifice himself ‘before the
Lord’—anciently, to ‘the door of the Tabernacle’ (
But this was only the commencement of the service. Women
might bring their sacrifices into the Great Court; but they might not perform
the second rite—that of laying on of hands. This meant transmission and
delegation, and implied representation; so that it really pointed to the
substitution of the sacrifice for the sacrificer. Hence it was always
accompanied by confession of sin and prayer. It was thus done. The sacrifice was
so turned that the person confessing looked towards the west, while he laid his
hands between the horns of the sacrifice,
It is not quite a settled point whether one or both hands
were laid on; but all are agreed that it was to be done ‘with one’s whole
force’—as it were, to lay one’s whole weight upon the substitute.
If a person under vow had died, his heir-at-law took his
place. The only public sacrifices in which hands were laid on were those for
sins of public ignorance (
Closely connected with this was ‘the lifting and waving’ of
certain sacrifices. The priest put his hands under those of the offerer, and
moved the sacrifice upwards and downwards, right and left; according to
Abarbanel also ‘forwards and backwards.’ The lamb of the leper’s
trespass-offering was waved before it was slain (
Under ordinary circumstances all public sacrifices, and
also always that of the leper, were slain by the priests.
The Talmud declares the offering of birds, so as to secure
the blood,
For the death of the sacrifice was only a means towards an
end, that end being the shedding and sprinkling of the blood, by which the
atonement was really made. The Rabbis mention a variety of rules observed by the
priest who caught up the blood—all designed to make the best provision for its
proper sprinkling.
Thus the priest was to catch up the blood in a silver
vessel pointed at the bottom, so that it could not be put down, and to keep it
constantly stirred, to preserve the fluidity of the blood. In the sacrifice of
the red heifer, however, the priest caught the blood directly in his left hand,
and sprinkled it with his right towards the Holy Place: while in that of the
leper one of the two priests received the blood in the vessel; the other in his
hand, from which he anointed the purified leper (
According to the difference of sacrifices, the blood was
differently applied, and in different places. In all burnt-, trespass-, and
peace-offerings the blood was thrown directly out of the vessel or vessels in
which it had been caught, the priest going first to one corner of the altar and
then to the other, and throwing it in the form of the Greek Letter gamma, so
that each time two sides of the altar were covered. Any blood left after these
two ‘gifts,’ as they were called (which stood for four), was poured out at the
base of the altar, whence it flowed into the Kedron. In all sin-offerings the
blood was not thrown, but sprinkled, the priest dipping the forefinger of his
right hand into the blood, and then sprinkling it from his finger by a motion of
the thumb. According to the importance of the sin-offering, the blood was so
applied either to the four horns of the altar of burnt-offering, or else it was
brought into the Holy Place itself, and sprinkled first seven times towards the
veil of the Most Holy Place (
On the shedding of blood, which was of the greatest
importance—since, according to the Talmud, ‘whenever the blood touches the
altar the offerer is atoned for’—followed the ‘flaying’ of the sacrifice and
the ‘cutting up into his pieces.’ All this had to be done in an orderly manner,
and according to certain rules, the apostle adopting the sacrificial term when
he speaks of ‘rightly dividing the word of truth’ (
The common idea that the burning either of part or the
whole of the sacrifice pointed to its destruction, and symbolised the wrath of
God and the punishment due to sin, does not seem to accord with the statements
of Scripture. The term used is not that commonly employed for burning, but means
‘causing to smoke,’ and the rite symbolises partly the entire surrender of the
sacrifice, but chiefly its acceptance on the part of God. Thus the sacrifice
consumed by a fire which had originally come down from God Himself—not by
strange fire—would ascend ‘for a sweet savour unto the Lord’ (
As already stated, those parts of the sin-, trespass-,
The flesh of these offerings had also to be eaten on the day of the sacrifice, or in the night following; while in other offerings the permission extended to a second day. The Rabbis, however, restrict the eating of the Paschal lamb to midnight. Whatever was left beyond the lawful time had to be burned.
It is deeply interesting to know that the New Testament
view of sacrifices is entirely in accordance with that of the ancient Synagogue.
At the threshold we here meet the principle: ‘There is no atonement except by
blood.’ In accordance with this we quote the following from Jewish interpreters.
Rashi says (on
There is yet one other phase on which the Synagogue lays stress. It is best expressed in the following quotation, to which many similar might be added: ‘Properly speaking, the blood of the sinner should have been shed, and his body burned, as those of the sacrifices. But the Holy One—blessed be He!—accepted our sacrifice from us as redemption and atonement. Behold the full grace which Jehovah—blessed be He!—has shown to man! In His compassion and in the fulness of His grace He accepted the soul of the animal instead of his soul, that through it there might be an atonement.’ Hence also the principle, so important as an answer to the question, Whether the Israelites of old had understood the meaning of sacrifices? ‘He that brought a sacrifice required to come to the knowledge that that sacrifice was his redemption.’
In view of all this, the deep-felt want so often expressed by the Synagogue is most touching. In the liturgy for the Day of Atonement we read: ‘While the altar and the sanctuary were still in their places, we were atoned for by the goats, designated by lot. But now for our guilt, if Jehovah be pleased to destroy us, He takes from our hand neither burnt-offering nor sacrifice.’ We add only one more out of many similar passages in the Jewish prayer-book: ‘We have spoken violence and rebellion; we have walked in a way that is not right . . . Behold, our transgressions have increased upon us; they press upon us like a burden; they have gone over our heads; we have forsaken Thy commandments, which are excellent. And wherewith shall we appear before Thee, the mighty God, to atone for our transgressions, and to put away our trespasses, and to remove sin, and to magnify Thy grace? Sacrifices and offerings are no more; sin- and trespass-offerings have ceased; the blood of sacrifices is no longer sprinkled; destroyed is Thy holy house, and fallen the gates of Thy sanctuary; Thy holy city lies desolate; Thou hast slain, sent from Thy presence; they have gone, driven forth from before Thy face, the priests who brought Thy sacrifices!’ Accordingly, also, the petition frequently recurs: ‘Raise up for us a right Intercessor (that it may be true), I have found a ransom (an atonement, or covering).’ And on the Day of Atonement, as in substance frequently on other occasions, they pray: ‘Bring us back in jubilee to Zion, Thy city, and in joy as of old to Jerusalem, the house of Thy holiness! Then shall we bring before Thy face the sacrifices that are due.’
Who shall make answer to this deep lament of exiled Judah?
Where shall a ransom be found to take the place of their sacrifices? In their
despair some appeal to the merits of the fathers or of the pious; others to
their own or to Israel’s sufferings, or to death, which is regarded as the last
expiation. But the most melancholy exhibition, perhaps, is that of an attempted
sacrifice by each pious Israelite on the eve of the Day of Atonement. Taking for
males a white cock,
Next, the head of the house swings the sacrifice round his head, saying, ‘This is my substitute; this is in exchange for me; this is my atonement. This cock goes into death, but may I enter into a long and happy life, and into peace!’ Then he repeats this prayer three times, and lays his hands on the sacrifice, which is now slain.
This offering up of an animal not sanctioned by the law, in a place, in a manner, and by hands not authorised by God, is it not a terrible phantom of Israel’s dark and dreary night? and does it not seem strangely to remind us of that other terrible night, when the threefold crowing of a cock awakened Peter to the fact of his denial of ‘the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world’?
And still the cry of the Synagogue comes to us through
these many centuries of past unbelief and ignorance: ‘Let one innocent come and
make atonement for the guilty!’ To which no other response can ever be made than
that of the apostle: ‘Such an High-Priest became us, who is holy, harmless,
undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens’! (
‘And every priest
standeth daily ministering and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices, which
can never take away sins: but this Man, after He had offered one sacrifice for
sins for ever, sat down on the right hand of God.’—
The question whether or not sacrifices were to cease after
the coming of the Messiah is differently answered in the Jewish synagogue, some
arguing that only thank- and peace-offerings would then be brought, while the
majority expect a revival of the regular sacrificial worship.
But on one point the authorities of the old synagogue, previous to their controversy with Christianity, are agreed. As the Old Testament and Jewish tradition taught that the object of a sacrifice was its substitution for the offender, so Scripture and the Jewish fathers also teach that the substitute to whom all these types pointed was none other than the Messiah.
It has been well remarked, that the difficulties of modern
interpreters of the Messianic prophecies arise chiefly from their not perceiving
the unity of the Old Testament in its progressive unfolding of the plan of
salvation. Moses must not be read independently of the Psalms, nor yet the
Psalms independently of the Prophets. Theirs are not so many unconnected
writings of different authorship and age, only held together by the boards of
one volume. They form integral parts of one whole, the object of which is to
point to the goal of all revelation in the appearing of the Christ. Accordingly,
we recognize in the prophetic word, not a change nor a difference, but three
well-marked progressive stages, leading up to the sufferings and the glory of
Messiah. In the Proto-Evangel, as
One element only was still wanting—that this Son of David,
this Sufferer and Conqueror, should be shown to be our Substitute, to
whom also the sacrificial types had pointed. This is added in the writings of
the prophets, especially in those of Isaiah, culminating, as it were, in
As already stated, such early works as the Targum
Jonathan and the Jerusalem Targum frankly adopt the Messianic
interpretation of these prophecies. The later Rabbis also admit that this had
been the common view of the Jewish fathers; but, on account of ‘the sages of the
Nazarenes, who apply it to that man whom they hanged in Jerusalem towards the
close of the second Temple, and who, according to their opinion, was the Son of
the Most Blessed, and had taken human nature in the womb of the Virgin,’ they
reject that interpretation, and refer the prediction of suffering either to some
individual, or mostly to Israel as a nation. But so difficult is it to weaken
the language in which the Messiah’s vicarious sufferings are described—not less
than twelve times in
Thus, if by the universal consent of all who are unprejudiced sacrifices point to substitution, substitution in its turn points to the Person and Work of the Messiah.
It has already been explained that all sacrifices were either such as were offered on the ground of communion with God—the burnt- and the peace-offering; or else such as were intended to restore that communion when it had been dimmed or disturbed—the sin- and the trespass-offering. Each of these four kinds of sacrifices will now have to be separately considered.
I. The burnt-offering—Olah, or also
Chalil (
Thus day by day it formed the regular morning and evening service in the Temple, while on sabbaths, new moons, and festivals additional burnt-offerings followed the ordinary worship. There the covenant-people brought the covenant-sacrifice, and the multitude of offerings indicated, as it were, the fulness, richness, and joyousness of their self-surrender. Accordingly, although we can understand how this sacrifice might be said to ‘make atonement’ for an individual in the sense of assuring him of his acceptance, we cannot agree with the Rabbis that it was intended to atone for evil thoughts and purposes, and for breaches of positive commands, or of such negative as involved also a positive command.
The burnt-offering was always to be a male animal, as the
more noble, and as indicating strength and energy. The blood was thrown on the
angles of the altar below the red line that ran round it. Then ‘the sinew of the
thigh’ (
The skins belonged to the ministering priests, who derived
a considerable revenue from this source. The burnt-offering was the only
sacrifice which non-Israelites were allowed to bring.
The Emperor Augustus had a daily burnt-offering brought for him of two lambs and a bullock; and ever afterwards this sacrifice was regarded as indicating that the Jewish nation recognised the Roman emperor as their ruler. Hence at the commencement of the Jewish war Eleazar carried its rejection, and this became, as it were, the open mark of the rebellion.
II. The sin-offering.—This is the most important of
all sacrifices. It made atonement for the person of the offender, whereas
the trespass-offering only atoned for one special offence. Hence sin-offerings
were brought on festive occasions for the whole people, but never
trespass-offerings (comp.
However, in reference both to sin- and to
trespass-offerings, the Rabbinical principle must be kept in view—that they
only atoned in case of real repentance. Indeed, their first effect would be ‘a
remembrance of sins’ before God (
The ‘varying’ sacrifices were those for lepers (
In both cases, however, the ‘inwards,’ as enumerated in
It only remains to explain in detail two peculiarities
connected with the sin-offering. First, it differed according to the
theocratic position of him who brought the sacrifice. For the high-priest on the
Day of Atonement (
The lowest grade of sin-offering was that of turtle-doves
or young pigeons offered at certain purifications (
Secondly, the blood of the sin-offering was
sprinkled, not thrown. In the case of a private Israelite, it was sprinkled,
that is, either jerked or dropped successively on each of the four horns
On the other hand, when offering bullocks and goats, whose
carcases were to be burned without the camp, the officiating priest stood in the
Holy Place, between the golden altar and the candlestick, and sprinkled of the
blood seven times
The most solemn of all sacrifices were those of the Day of Atonement, when the high-priest, arrayed in his linen garments, stood before the Lord Himself within the Most Holy Place to make an atonement. Every spot of blood from a sin-offering on a garment conveyed defilement, as being loaded with sin, and all vessels used for such sacrifices had either to be broken or scoured.
Quite another phase of symbolic meaning was intended to be
conveyed by the sacrificial meal which the priests were to make of the flesh of
such sin-offerings as were not wholly burnt without the camp. Unquestionably
Philo was right in suggesting, that one of the main objects of this meal was to
carry to the offerer assurance of his acceptance, ‘since God would never have
allowed His servants to partake of it, had there not been a complete removal and
forgetting of the sin’ atoned for. This view entirely accords with the statement
in
III. The trespass-offering was provided for certain
transgressions committed through ignorance, or else, according to Jewish
tradition, where a man afterwards voluntarily confessed himself guilty. The
Rabbis arrange this class into those for a doubtful and for a certain
trespass. The former were offered by the more scrupulous, when, uncertain
whether they might not have committed an offence which, if done high-handed,
would have implied being ‘cut off,’ or, if in ignorance, necessitated a
sin-offering. Accordingly, the extreme party, or Chassidim, were wont to bring
such a sacrifice every day! On the other hand, the offering for certain
trespasses covered five distinct cases,
It forms no exception to this principle, that a
trespass-offering was also prescribed in the case of a healed leper (
But that this last was, at the same time, considered the
lightest kind of trespass appears even from this—that, while ordinarily the
flesh of the trespass-offering, after burning the inwards on the altar of (
IV. The most joyous of all sacrifices was the
peace-offering, or, as from its derivation it might also be rendered, the
offering of completion.
This was, indeed, a season of happy fellowship with the
Covenant God, in which He condescended to become Israel’s Guest at the
sacrificial meal, even as He was always their Host. Thus it symbolised the
spiritual truth expressed in
Peace-offerings were brought either of male or of female
animals (chiefly of the former), but not of pigeons, the sacrifice being, of
course, always accompanied by a meat- and a drink offering (
The Rabbinical suggestion, that there was a distinct rite
of ‘heaving’ besides that of ‘waving,’ seems only to rest on a misunderstanding
of such passages as
The following were to be ‘waved’ before the Lord: the
breast of the peace-offering (
We close with a few particulars about meat-offerings.
These were either brought in conjunction with burnt- and peace-offerings (but
never with sin- or with trespass-offerings) or else by themselves. The latter
were either public or private meat-offerings. The three public
meat-offerings were: the twelve loaves of shewbread, renewed every Sabbath, and
afterwards eaten by the priests; the omer, or sheaf of the harvest, on the
second day of the Passover; and the two wave-loaves at Pentecost. Four of the
private meat-offerings were enjoined by the law, viz: (1) the daily
meat-offering of the high-priest, according to the Jewish interpretation of
In all baken meat-offerings, an ‘omer’ was always made into
ten cakes—the symbolical number of completeness—except in that of the
high-priest’s daily meat-offering, of which twelve cakes were baken, as
representative of Israel. Finally, as the Rabbis express it, every meat-offering
prepared in a vessel had ‘three pourings of oil’—first into the vessel, then to
mingle with the flour, and lastly, after it was ready—the frankincense being
then put upon it. The ‘wafers’ were ‘anointed’ with oil, after the form of the
Hebrew letter caph, or the Greek letter kappa, as they explain, ‘to run down in
two parts.’ The subjoined Rabbinical table may be of use: Meat-Offerings— Requiring the addition of oil and frankincense: Of fine flour unbaken;
baken in a pan; baken in a frying-pan; baken in the oven; the ‘wafers’; the
high-priest’s daily and the priest’s consecration offering; the flour from the
’sheaf’ offered on the second day of the Passover. Requiring oil without frankincense: all meat-offerings, accompanying a burnt- or a peace-offering. Requiring frankincense without oil: The shew bread. Requiring neither oil nor frankincense: The two loaves at Pentecost; the jealousy-offering;
and that in substitution for a sin-offering.
When presenting a meat-offering, the priest first brought
it in the golden or silver dish in which it had been prepared, and then
transferred it to a holy vessel, putting oil and frankincense upon it. Taking
his stand at the south-eastern corner of the altar, he next took the ‘handful’
that was actually to be burnt, put it in another vessel, laid some of the
frankincense on it, carried it to the top of the altar, salted it, and then
placed it on the fire. The rest of the meat-offering belonged to the priests.
So complicated a service, and one which enjoined such frequent sacrifices, must always have kept a large number of priests busy in the courts of the Temple. This was especially the case on the great festivals; and if the magnificent Temple could hold its 210,000 worshippers—if the liturgy, music, and ritual were equally gorgeous—we cannot wonder that it required, multitudes of white-robed priests properly to discharge its ministry. Tradition has it, that on the Day of Atonement no less than five hundred priests were wont to assist in the services. On other feast-days even more must have been engaged, as it was a Rabbinical principle, ‘that a man should bring all his offerings, that were either due from him or voluntarily dedicated, at the solemn festival that cometh next.’ In other words, if a man incurred a sacrifice, or voluntarily promised one, he was to bring it when next he came to Jerusalem. But even this provision showed ‘the weakness and unprofitableness thereof,’ since in all ordinary cases a long time must have elapsed before the stain of guilt could be consciously removed by an atoning sacrifice, or a vow performed. Blessed be God, the reality in Christ Jesus in this, as in all other things, far out-distances the type! For we have always ‘liberty to enter into the Holiest by the blood of Jesus’; and ‘if the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh, how much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the Eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God!’
‘Blessed is he
that watcheth, and keepeth his garments.’—
There is a marked peculiarity and also a special charm about the allusions of the ‘beloved disciple’ to the ‘Temple and its services.’ The other New Testament writers refer to them in their narratives, or else explain their types, in such language as any well-informed worshipper at Jerusalem might have employed. But John writes not like an ordinary Israelite. He has eyes and ears for details which others would have left unnoticed. As, according to a Jewish tradition, the high-priest read the Divine answer of the Urim and Thummim by a heavenly light cast upon special letters in the names of the tribes grave upon his breast-plate, so to John the presence and the words of Jesus seem to render luminous the well-remembered services of the Temple. This, as we shall have frequent occasion to show, appears in his Gospel, but much more in the Book of Revelation. Indeed, the Apocalypse, as a whole, may be likened to the Temple services in its mingling of prophetic symbols with worship and praise. But it is specially remarkable, that the Temple-references with which the Book of Revelation abounds are generally to minutiae, which a writer who had not been as familiar with such details, as only personal contact and engagement with them could have rendered him, would scarcely have even noticed, certainly not employed as part of his imagery. They come in naturally, spontaneously, and so unexpectedly, that the reader is occasionally in danger of overlooking them altogether; and in language such as a professional man would employ, which would come to him from the previous exercise of his calling. Indeed, some of the most striking of these references could not have been understood at all without the professional treatises of the Rabbis on the Temple and its services. Only the studied minuteness of Rabbinical descriptions, derived from the tradition of eye-witnesses, does not leave the same impression as the unstudied illustrations of St. John.
These naturally suggest the twofold inference that the Book
of Revelation and the Fourth Gospel must have been written before the Temple
services had actually ceased, and by one who had not merely been intimately
acquainted with, but probably at one time an actor in them.
The argument may be illustrated by an analogous case. Quite
lately, they who have dug under the ruins of the Temple have discovered one of
those tablets in the Court of the Temple which warned Gentiles, on pain of
death, not to advance farther into the sanctuary. The tablet answers exactly to
the description of Josephus, and its inscription is almost literally as he gives
it. This tablet seems like a witness suddenly appearing, after eighteen
centuries, to bear testimony to the narrative of Josephus as that of a
contemporary writer. Much the same instantaneous conviction, only greatly
stronger, is carried to our minds, when, in the midst of some dry account of
what went on in the Temple, we suddenly come upon the very words which St. John
had employed to describe heavenly realities. Perhaps one of the most striking
instances of this kind is afforded by the words quoted at the head of this
chapter—’Blessed is he that watcheth, and keepeth his garments.’ They literally
describe, as we learn from the Rabbis, the punishment awarded to the
Temple-guards if found asleep at their posts; and the Rabbinical account of it
is curiously confirmed by the somewhat naive confession of one of their
number,
For the service of the officiating ministers was not only
by day, but also ‘at night in the Temple.’ From Scripture we know that the
ordinary services of the sanctuary consisted of the morning and evening
sacrifices. To these the Rabbis add another evening service, probably to account
for their own transference of the evening service to a much later hour than that
of the sacrifice.
There is, however, some difficulty about the exact time
when each of the sacrifices was offered. According to general agreement, the
morning sacrifice was brought at the ‘third hour,’ corresponding to our
nine o’clock. But the preparations for it must have commenced more than two
hours earlier. Few, if any, worshippers could have witnessed the actual slaying
of the lamb, which took place immediately on opening the great Temple-gate.
Possibly they may have gathered chiefly to join in the prayer ‘at the time of
incense’ (
Such admonitions as ‘to show forth thy faithfulness every
night upon an instrument of ten strings and on the psaltery’ (
We can conceive the laborious work of the day over, and the
rest and solemnity of ‘night in the Temple’ begun. The last notes of the Temple
music have died out, and the worshippers slowly retired, some after lingering
for private prayer, or else tarrying in one of the marble porches. Already the
short Eastern day is fading out in the west. Far over the mountains of Gibeon
the sun is sinking in that ocean across which the better light is so soon to
shine. The new company of priests and Levites who are to conduct the services of
the morrow are coming up from Ophel under the leadership of their heads of
houses, their elders. Those who have officiated during the day are preparing to
leave by another gate. They have put off their priestly dress, depositing it in
the appointed chambers, and resumed that of ordinary laymen, and their sandals.
For such, although not shoes, might be worn in the Temple, the priests being
barefoot only during their actual ministry. Nor did they otherwise wear any
distinctive dress, not even the high-priest himself, nor yet those who performed
in the Temple other than strictly sacrificial services.
As for the Levites, they had no clerical dress at all, but
only wore the white linen (
We know that on Sabbaths at least, when one company gave
place to another, or, rather, as the outgoing course left the Temple precincts,
they parted from each other with a farewell, reminding us of St. Paul’s to the
Corinthians (
As the ‘family’ whose daily ‘ministration was accomplished’
left the Temple, the massive gates were closed by priests or Levites, some
requiring the united strength of twenty men. Then the Temple keys were hung up
in a hollow square, under a marble slab in the ‘fire-room’ (Beth-ha-Moked),
which may also be designated as the chief guard-room of the priests. Now, as the
stars were shining out on the deep blue Eastern sky, the priests would gather
for converse or the evening meal.
Pieces of the sacrifices and the ‘prepared’ first-fruits
(the Therumoth) supplied the needful refreshments.
Though the work of the day was over, certain arrangements
had yet to be made. For the Levites in charge of collecting the tithes and other
business details were wont to purchase in large quantities what each who brought
any sacrifice needed for meat- and drink-offerings, and to sell it to the
offerers. This was a great accommodation to the worshipper, and a source of
daily profit to the Temple. On payment of a price, fixed by tariff every month,
the offerer received his proper counterfoil,
But already the night-watches had been set in the Temple.
By day and night it was the duty of the Levites to keep guard at the gates, to
prevent, so far as possible, the unclean from entering. To them the duties of
the Temple police were also entrusted, under the command of an official known to
us in the New Testament as the ‘captain of the Temple’ (
Each guard consisted of ten men; so that in all two hundred
and forty Levites and thirty priests were on duty every night. The Temple guards
were relieved by day, but not during the night, which the Romans divided into
four, but the Jews, properly, into three watches, the fourth being really the
morning watch.
Hence, when the Lord saith, ‘Blessed are those servants
whom the lord when he cometh shall find watching,’ He expressly refers to the
second and third watches as those of deepest sleep (
During the night the ‘captain of the Temple’ made his
rounds. On his approach the guards had to rise and salute him in a particular
manner. Any guard found asleep when on duty was beaten, or his garments were set
on fire—a punishment, as we know, actually awarded. Hence the admonition to us
who, as it were, are here on Temple guard, ‘Blessed is he that watcheth, and
keepeth his garments’ (
But then the preparations for the service of the morning
required each to be early astir. The priest whose duty it was to superintend the
arrangements might any moment knock at the door and demand entrance. He came
suddenly and unexpectedly, no one knew when. The Rabbis use almost the very
words in which Scripture describes the unexpected coming of the Master (
Those who were prepared now followed the superintending
priest through a wicket into the court. Here they divided into two companies,
each carrying a torch, except on the Sabbaths, when the Temple itself was lit
up. One company passed eastwards, the other westwards, till, having made their
circuit of inspection, they met at the chamber where the high-priest’s daily
meat-offering was prepared (
This arrangement had been rendered necessary by certain painful scenes to which the eagerness of the priests for service had led. Altogether the lot was cast four times, though at different periods of the service. It was done in this manner. The priests stood in a circle around the president, who for a moment removed the head-gear of one of their number, to show that he would begin counting at him. Then all held up one, two, or more fingers—since it was not lawful in Israel to count persons—when the president named some number, say seventy, and began counting the fingers till he reached the number named, which marked that the lot had fallen on that priest. The first lot was for cleansing the altar and preparing it; the second, for those who were to offer the sacrifice, and for those who were to cleanse the candlestick and the altar of incense in the Holy Place. The third lot was the most important. It determined who was to offer the incense. If possible, none was to take part in it who had at any previous time officiated in the same capacity. The fourth lot, which followed close on the third, fixed those who were to burn the pieces of the sacrifice on the altar, and to perform the concluding portions of the service. The morning lot held good also for the same offices at the evening sacrifice, save that the lot was cast anew for the burning of the incense.
When the priests were gathered for ‘the first lot’ in the
‘Hall of Polished Stones,’ as yet only the earliest glow of morning light
streaked the Eastern sky. Much had to be done before the lamb itself could be
slain. It was a law that, as no sacrifice might be brought after that of the
evening, nor after the sun had set, so, on the other hand, the morning sacrifice
was only to be slain after the morning light had lit up ‘the whole sky as far as
Hebron,’ yet before the sun had actually risen upon the horizon. The only
exception was on the great festivals, when the altar was cleansed much earlier,
Perhaps it was on this ground that, on the morning of the
Passover, they who led Jesus from Caiaphas thronged so ‘early’ ‘the
judgment-hall of Pilate.’ Thus, while some of them would be preparing in the
Temple to offer the morning sacrifice, others were at the same moment
unwittingly fulfilling the meaning of that very type, when He on whom was ‘laid
the iniquity of us all’ was ‘brought as a lamb to the slaughter’ (
‘And it came to
pass, that while he executed the priest’s office before God in the order of his
course, according to the custom of the priest’s office, his lot was to burn
incense when he went into the temple of the Lord. And the whole multitude of the
people were praying without at the time of incense.’—
Before proceeding to describe the ‘morning sacrifice,’ it
is necessary to advert to a point of considerable interest and importance. There
can be no doubt that, at the time of Christ, public prayer occupied a very
prominent place in the ordinary daily services of the Temple. Yet the original
institution in the law of Moses contains no mention of it; and such later
instances as the prayer of Hannah, or that of Solomon at the dedication of the
Temple, afford neither indication nor precedent as regards the ordinary public
services. The confession of the high-priest over the scape-goat (
It was otherwise after the return from Babylon. With the
institution and spread of synagogues—designed for the twofold purpose, that in
every place Moses should be read every Sabbath day, and to provide a place
‘where prayer was wont to be made’—the practice of public worship soon became
general. In
On the other hand, they also tell us that prayer may be contracted within the narrowest limits, and that a mere summary of the prescribed formulas is sufficient; while some of their number go the length of strenuously contending for free prayer. In fact, free prayer, liturgical formulas, and special prayers taught by celebrated Rabbis, were alike in use. Free prayer would find its place in such private devotions as are described in the parable of the Publican and the Pharisee. It also mingled with the prescribed liturgical formulas. It may be questioned whether, even in reference to the latter, the words were always rigidly adhered to, perhaps even accurately remembered. Hence the Talmud lays it down (in the treatise Berachoth), that in such cases it sufficed to say the substance of the prescribed prayers.
That liturgical formulas were used not only in the Temple,
but in the daily private devotions, cannot be doubted. The first trace of them
appears so early as in the arrangement of the Psalter, each of its first four
books closing with a ‘eulogy,’ or benediction (
The prayer spoken by the Lord far transcended any that
Jewish Rabbis ever conceived, even where its wording most nearly approaches
theirs.
It is characteristic that two of its petitions find no real
counterpart in the prayers of the Rabbis. These are: ‘Forgive us our
trespasses,’ and ‘Lead us not into temptation.’ In the Temple the people never
responded to the prayers by an Amen, but always with this benediction,
‘Blessed be the name of the glory of His kingdom for ever!’
This formula was traced up to the patriarch Jacob, on his death-bed. In regard to ‘the kingdom,’ whatever the Rabbis understood by it, the feeling was so strong, that it was said: ‘Any prayer which makes not mention of the kingdom, is not a prayer at all.’
The attitude to be observed during prayer is very accurately defined by the Rabbis. The worshipper was to stand, turning towards the Holy Place; he was to compose his body and his clothes, to draw his feet close together, to cast down his eyes, at least at the beginning of his prayer, to cross his hands over his breast, and to ‘stand as a servant before his master, with all reverence and fear.’ Even the priests, while pronouncing the priestly blessing, were to look to the ground. In regard to the special manner of bowing before the Lord, a distinction was made between bending the knees, bending the head, and falling prostrate on the ground. The latter was not deemed ‘fit for every man, but only for such as knew themselves righteous men, like Joshua.
In general the Rabbis distinguish two elements in prayer,
on the ground of the two terms used by Solomon (
It is this burning of incense which in the Gospel is
alluded to in connection with the birth of John the Baptist (
The lot for burning the incense was, as we have seen, the
third by which the order of the ministry for the day was determined. The
first lot, which in reality had been cast before the actual break of day,
was that to designate the various priests who were to cleanse the altar and to
prepare its fires. The first of the priests on whom this lot had fallen
immediately went out. His brethren reminded him where the silver chafing-dish
was deposited, and not to touch any sacred vessel till he had washed his hands
and feet. He took no light with him; the fire of the altar was sufficient for
his office. Hands and feet were washed by laying the right hand on the right
foot, and the left hand on the left.
The sound of the machinery, as it filled the laver with
water, admonished the others to be in readiness. This machinery had been made by
Ben Catin, who also altered the laver so that twelve priests could at the
same time perform their ablutions. Otherwise the laver resembled that in the
Temple of Solomon. It was of brass. All the vessels in the Sanctuary were of
metal, the only exception being the altar of burnt-offering, which was solid,
and wholly of stones taken from virgin soil, that had not been defiled by any
tool of iron. The stones were fastened together by mortar, pitch, and molten
lead. The measurement of the altar is differently given by Josephus and the
Rabbis. It seems to have consisted of three sections, each narrower than the
former: the base being thirty-two cubits wide, the middle twenty-eight, and the
top, where the fire was laid (of course, not including the horns of the altar
nor the space where the priests moved), only twenty-four cubits. With the
exception of some parts of the altar, in which the cubit was calculated at five
hand-breadths, the sacred cubit of the Temple was always reckoned at six
hand-breadths. Lastly, as readers of the New Testament know, whatever touched
the altar, or, indeed, any sacred vessel, was regarded as ‘sanctified’ (
But to return. While the assistant priests were waiting, the first priest had taken the silver chafing-dish, and scraped the fire on the altar, removing the burnt coals, and depositing them at a little distance north of the altar. As he descended, the other priests quickly washed hands and feet, and took shovels and prongs, with which they moved aside what of the sacrifices had been left unburned from the previous evening, then cleaned out the ashes, laying part on the great heap in the middle of the altar, and the rest in a place whence it was afterwards carried out of the Temple. The next duty was to lay on the altar fresh wood, which, however, might be neither from the olive nor the vine. For the fire destined to feed the altar of incense the wood of the fig-tree was exclusively used, so as to secure good and sufficient charcoal. The hitherto unconsumed pieces of the sacrifice were now again laid upon the fire.
These preliminaries finished, the priests gathered once
more for the second lot. The priest on whom it fell was designated, along
with the twelve who stood nearest to him, for offering the sacrifice and
cleansing the candlestick and the altar of incense. Immediately after casting
this second lot, the president directed one to ascend some ‘pinnacle,’ and see
whether it was time to kill the daily sacrifice. If the priest reported, ‘The
morning shineth already,’ he was again asked, ‘Is the sky lit up as far as
Hebron?’ If so, the president ordered the lamb to be brought from the chamber by
the Beth-Moked, where it had been kept in readiness for four days. Others
fetched the gold and silver vessels of service, of which the Rabbis enumerate
ninety-three. The sacrificial lamb was now watered out of a golden bowl, and
anew examined by torch-light, though its Levitical fitness had been already
ascertained the evening before. Then the sacrificing priest, surrounded by his
assistants, fastened the lamb to the second of the rings on the north side of
the altar—in the morning in the western, in the evening in the eastern corner.
The sacrifice was held together by its feet, the fore and hind feet of each side being tied together; its head was laid towards the south and fastened through a ring, and its face turned to the west, while the sacrificing priest stood on the east side. The elders who carried the keys now gave the order for opening the Temple gates. As the last great gate slowly moved on its hinges, the priests, on a signal given, blew three blasts on their silver trumpets, summoning the Levites and the ‘representatives’ of the people (the so-called ‘stationary men’) to their duties, and announcing to the city that the morning sacrifice was about to be offered. Immediately upon this the great gates which led into the Holy Place itself were opened to admit the priests who were to cleanse the candlestick and the altar of incense.
The opening of these gates was the signal for actually slaying the sacrificial lamb. The sacrifice was offered in the following manner. One priest drew forward the windpipe and gullet of the sacrifice, and quickly thrust upwards the knife, while another caught the blood in a golden bowel. Standing at the east side of the altar, he sprinkled it, first at the north-east, and then at the south-west corner, below the red line which ran round the middle of the altar, in each case in such manner as to cover two sides of the altar, or, as it is described, in the form of the Greek letter (gamma). The rest of the blood was poured out at the base of the altar. Ordinarily, the whole of this service would of course be performed by priests. But it was valid even if the sacrifice had been killed by a layman, or with an ordinary knife. Not so if the blood were caught up in any but a consecrated vessel, or sprinkled by other than the hands of a priest who at the time was Levitically fit for the service.
We proceed to describe the service of those whose duty it
was to cleanse the altar of incense and to dress the golden candlestick in the
Holy Place. A few particulars as to each of these will not be out of place. The
triumphal Arch of Titus in Rome bears a representation of the golden mortars in
which the incense was bruised, and of the golden candlestick, but not the altar
of incense. Still, we can form a sufficiently accurate idea of its appearance.
It was square, one cubit long and broad, and two cubits high, that is, half a
cubit higher than the table of shewbread, but one cubit lower than the
candlestick, and it had ‘horns’ at each of its four corners. It was probably
hollow, and its top covered with a golden plate, and like an Eastern roof,
surrounded by what resembled a balustrade, to prevent the coals and incense from
falling off. Below this balustrade was a massive crown of gold. The incense
burned upon this altar was prepared of the four ingredients mentioned in
Now, while one set of priests were busy in the Court of the Priests offering the sacrifice, the two on whom it devolved to trim the lamps of the candlestick and to prepare the altar of incense had gone into the Holy Place. As nearly as possible while the lamb was being slain without, the first of these priests took with his hands the burnt coals and ashes from the golden altar, and put them into a golden vessel—called ‘teni’—and withdrew, leaving it in the sanctuary. Similarly, as the blood of the lamb was being sprinkled on the altar of burnt-offering, the second priest ascended the three steps, hewn in stone, which led up to the candlestick. He trimmed and refilled the lamps that were still burning, removed the wick and old oil from those which had become extinguished, supplied fresh, and re-lit them from one of the other lamps. But the large central lamp, towards which all the others bent, and which was called the western, because it inclined westward towards the Most Holy Place, might only be re-lit by fire from the altar itself. Only five, however, of the lamps were then trimmed; the other two were reserved to a later period of the service.
Meantime in the Court of the Priests the sacrifice had been
hung on one of the hooks, flayed, cut up according to rules, cleaned, and handed
to the six priests who were successively to carry up the pieces to the rise of
the altar, where they were salted and deposited. For ‘every sacrifice must be
salted with salt’—nay, everything that was laid on the altar, except the
drink-offering. At the same time, three other priests carried up to the rise of
the altar the daily meat-offering, that of the high-priest, and the
drink-offering. The skins of the sacrifices were salted, and on the eve of each
Sabbath distributed among the ‘course’ of priests that had been on ministry.
And now the most solemn part of the service was about to begin. For the third time the priests assembled in the ‘Hall of Polished Stones,’ to draw the third and the fourth lots. But before doing so the president called on them to join in the prescribed prayers. Tradition has preserved these to us. Subjecting them to the severest criticism, so as to eliminate all later details, the words used by the priests before the third and fourth lots were as follows:
‘With great love hast Thou loved us, O Lord our God, and
with much overflowing pity hast Thou pitied us. Our Father and our King, for the
sake of our fathers who trusted in Thee, and Thou taughtest them the statutes of
life, have mercy upon us, and enlighten our eyes
After this prayer the ten commandments were (at one time)
wont to be repeated, a practice discontinued, however, lest the Sadducees should
declare them to be the only essential part of the law. Then all assembled said
the so-called ‘Shema’
After this the lot was cast for burning the incense. No one might take part in it who had ministered in that office before, unless in the very rare case that all present had previously so officiated. Hence, while the other three lots held good for the evening service, that for the incense required to be repeated. He on whom this lot fell chose from among his friends his two assistants. Finally, the third was succeeded by the fourth lot, which designated those who were to lay on the altar the sacrifice and the meat-offerings, and to pour out the drink-offering.
The incensing priest and his assistance now approached
first the altar of burnt-offering. One filled with incense a golden censer held
in a silver vessel, while another placed in a golden bowl burning coals from the
altar. As they passed from the court into the Holy Place, they struck a large
instrument (called the ‘Magrephah’), at sound of which the priests hastened from
all parts to worship, and the Levites to occupy their places in the service of
song; while the chief of the ‘stationary men’ ranged at the Gate of Nicanor such
of the people as were to be purified that day. Slowly the incensing priest and
his assistants ascended the steps to the Holy Place, preceded by the two priests
who had formerly dressed the altar and the candlestick, and who now removed the
vessels they had left behind, and, worshipping, withdrew. Next, one of the
assistants reverently spread the coals on the golden altar; the other arranged
the incense; and then the chief officiating priest was left alone within the
Holy Place, to await the signal of the president before burning the incense. It
was probably while thus expectant that the angel Gabriel appeared to Zacharias.
As the president gave the word of command, which marked that ‘the time of
incense had come,’ ‘the whole multitude of the people without’ withdrew from the
inner court, and fell down before the Lord, spreading their hands
It is this most solemn period, when throughout the vast
Temple buildings deep silence rested on the worshipping multitude, while within
the sanctuary itself the priest laid the incense on the golden altar, and the
cloud of ‘odours’ (
The prayers offered by priests and people at this part of
the service are recorded by tradition as follows:
‘Be graciously pleased, Jehovah our God, with Thy people Israel, and with their prayer. Restore the service to the oracle of Thy house; and the burnt-offerings of Israel and their prayer accept graciously and in love; and let the service of Thy people Israel be ever well-pleasing unto Thee.
‘We praise Thee, who art Jehovah our God, and the God of our fathers, the God of all flesh, our Creator, and the Creator from the beginning! Blessing and praise be to Thy great and holy name, that Thou hast preserved us in life and kept us. So preserve us and keep us, and gather the scattered ones into Thy holy courts, to keep Thy statutes, and to do Thy good pleasure, and to serve Thee with our whole heart, as this day we confess unto Thee. Blessed be the Lord, unto whom belongeth praise.
‘Appoint peace, goodness, and blessing; grace, mercy, and compassion for us, and for all Israel Thy people. Bless us, O our Father, all of us as one, with the light of Thy countenance. For in the light of Thy countenance hast Thou, Jehovah, our God, given us the law of life, and loving mercy, and righteousness, and blessing, and compassion, and life, and peace. And may it please Thee to bless Thy people Israel at all times, and at every hour with Thy peace. [May we and all Thy people Israel be remembered and written before Thee in the book of life, with blessing and peace and support.] Blessed be Thou, Jehovah, who blessest Thy people Israel with peace.’
These prayers ended, he who had formerly trimmed the
candlestick once more entered the Holy Place, to kindle the two lamps that had
been left unlit; and then, in company with the incensing priest, took his stand
on the top of the steps which led down to the Court of the Priests.
The other three who had also ministered within the Holy Place gathered beside him, still carrying the vessels of their ministry; while the rest of the priests grouped themselves on the steps beneath. Meanwhile he on whom the fourth lot had fallen had ascended to the altar. They whose duty it was handed to him, one by one, the pieces of the sacrifice. Upon each he pressed his hands, and next flung them confusedly upon the fire, that so the flesh of the sacrifice might be scattered as well as its blood sprinkled. After that he ranged them in order, to imitate as nearly as possible the natural shape of the animal. This part of the service was not unfrequently performed by the high-priest himself.
The priests, who were ranged on the steps to the Holy
Place, now lifted their hands above their heads, spreading and joining their
fingers in a peculiar mystical manner.
One of their number, probably the incensing priest,
repeated in audible voice, followed by the others, the blessing in
Of course all this was not the case in the Temple. But if
it had been the duty of Zacharias, as incensing priest for the day, to lead in
the priestly blessing, we can all the better understand the wonder of the people
as ‘he beckoned unto them, and remained speechless’ (
After the priestly blessing the meat-offering was brought,
and, as prescribed in the law, oil added to it. Having been salted, it was laid
on the fire. Next the high-priest’s daily meat-offering was presented,
consisting of twelve cakes broken in halves—twelve half-cakes being presented
in the morning, and the other twelve in the evening. Finally, the appropriate
drink-offering was poured out upon the foundation of the altar (perhaps there
may be an allusion to this in
Upon this the Temple music began. It was the duty of the
priests, who stood on the right and the left of the marble table on which the
fat of the sacrifices was laid, at the proper time to blow the blasts on their
silver trumpets. There might not be less than two nor more than 120 in this
service; the former in accordance with the original institution (
The Psalm of the day was always sung in three sections. At the close of each the priests drew three blasts from their silver trumpets, and the people bowed down and worshipped. This closed the morning service. It was immediately followed by the sacrifices and offerings which private Israelites might have to bring, and which would occasionally continue till near the time for the evening service. The latter resembled in all respects that of the morning, except that the lot was only cast for the incense; that the incense was burned, not, as in the morning, before, but after the pieces of the sacrifice had been laid on the fire of the altar, and that the priestly blessing was generally admitted.
The following was the order of the Psalms in the daily
service of the Temple (Tamid, sect. vii, and Maimonides in Tamid).
On the first day of the week they sang
‘The Sabbath was
made for man, and not man for the Sabbath: therefore the Son of man is Lord also
of the Sabbath.’—
It is a beautifully significant practice of the modern
Jews, that, before fulfilling any special observance directed in their Law, they
always first bless God for the giving of it. One might almost compare the idea
underlying this, and much else of a similar character in the present religious
life of Israel, to the good fruits which the soil of Palestine bore even during
the Sabbatical years, when it lay untilled. For it is intended to express that
the Law is felt not a burden, but a gift of God in which to rejoice. And this
holds specially true of the Sabbath in its Divine institution, of which it was
distinctly said, ‘I gave them My Sabbaths, to be a sign between Me and them,
that they might know that I, Jehovah, sanctify them’ (
The term Sabbath, ‘resting,’ points to the origin and
meaning of the weekly festival. The Rabbis hold that it was not intended for the
Gentiles, and most of them trace the obligation of its observance only to the
legislation on Mount Sinai. Nor is another Rabbinical saying, that ‘circumcision
and the Sabbath preceded the law,’ inconsistent with this. For even if the duty
of Sabbath-observance had only commenced with the promulgation of the law on
Mount Sinai, yet the Sabbath-law itself rested on the original ‘hallowing’ of
the seventh day, when God rested from all His works (
It is necessary to bear all this in remembrance when
thinking of what the perverted ingenuity of the Rabbis made the Sabbath at the
time of Christ, and probably even more in the generations following. For there
is evidence that the Sabbath-law has become stricter than it had been, since,
for instance, the practice of taking an ox or an ass out of a pit, to which our
Saviour alludes (
The school of Shammai, the sect of the Essenes, and strange
to say, the Samaritans, were the most stringent in their Sabbath-observance. The
school of Shammai held that the duty of Sabbath-rest extended not only to men
and to beasts, but even to inanimate objects, so that no process might be
commenced on the Friday which would go on of itself during the Sabbath, such as
laying out flax to dry, or putting wool into dye. The school of Hillel excluded
inanimate things from the Sabbath-rest, and also allowed work to be given on a
Friday to Gentiles, irrespective of the question whether they could complete it
before the Sabbath began. Both schools allowed the preparation of the
Passover-meal on the Sabbath, and also priests, while on their ministry in the
Temple, to keep up the fire in the ‘Beth Moked.’ But this punctilious
enforcement of the Sabbath-rest became occasionally dangerous to the nation. For
at one time the Jews would not even defend themselves on the Sabbath against
hostile attacks of armies, till the Maccabees laid down the principle, which
ever afterwards continued in force (Jos. Anti. xii. 6, 2; xiv. 4, 2.),
that defensive, though not offensive, warfare was lawful on the holy day. Even
as thus modified, the principle involved peril, and during the last siege of
Jerusalem it was not uniformly carried out (compare Jewish Wars, ii. 19,
2, but, on the other hand, Antiq, xiv. 4, 2.). Nor was it, so far as we
can judge from analogy (
The only directions given in Scripture for the celebration
of the Sabbath in the sanctuary are those which enjoin ‘a holy convocation,’ or
a sacred assembly (
If the sun were not visible, sunset was to be reckoned from
when the fowls went to roost. But long before that the preparations for the
Sabbath had commenced. Accordingly, Friday is called by the Rabbis ‘the eve of
the Sabbath,’ and in the Gospels ‘the preparation’
No fresh business was then undertaken; no journey of any
distance commenced; but everything purchased and made ready against the feast,
the victuals being placed in a heated oven, and surrounded by dry substances to
keep them warm. Early on Friday afternoon, the new ‘course’ of priests, of
Levites, and of the ‘stationary men,’ who were to be the representatives of all
Israel, arrived in Jerusalem, and having prepared themselves for the festive
season, went up to the Temple. The approach of the Sabbath, and then its actual
commencement, were announced by threefold blasts from the priests’ trumpets. The
first three blasts were drawn when ‘one-third of the evening sacrifice service
was over’; or, as we gather from the decree by which the Emperor Augustus set
the Jews free from attendance in courts of law (Jos. Ant. xvi. 6, 2.),
about the ninth hour, that is, about three p.m. on Friday. This, as we remember,
was the hour when Jesus gave up the ghost (
Then the outgoing ‘course’ handed over to the incoming the keys of the sanctuary, the holy vessels, and all else of which they had had charge. Next the heads of the ‘houses’ or families of the incoming ‘course’ determined by lot which of the families were to serve on each special day of their week of ministry, and also who were to discharge the various priestly functions on the Sabbath.
The first of these functions, immediately on the
commencement of the Sabbath, was the renewal of the ‘shewbread.’ It had been
prepared by the incoming course before the Sabbath itself, and—we might almost
say, invariably—in one of the chambers of the Temple, though, in theory, it was
held lawful to prepare it also at Bethphage. For, although it was a principle
that ‘there is no Sabbath in the sanctuary,’ yet no work was allowed which might
have been done on any other day. Even circumcision, which, like the Temple
services, according to the Rabbis, superseded the Sabbath, was deferred by some
to the close of the festive day. Hence, also, if Friday, on the afternoon of
which the shewbread was ordinarily prepared, fell on a feast day that required
Sabbatical rest, the shewbread was prepared on the Thursday afternoon.
But this subject is too important to be thus briefly
treated. Our term ‘shewbread’ is a translation of that used by Luther (Schaubrod),
which, in turn, may have been taken from the Vulgate (panes praepositionis).
The Scriptural name is ‘Bread of the Face’ (
As described by the Rabbis, and represented on the
triumphal Arch of Titus at Rome, the table of shewbread was two cubits long (two
cubits = three feet), one cubit broad, and one and a half high.
It was made of pure gold, the feet being turned out and
shaped to represent those of animals, and the legs connected, about the middle,
by a golden plate, which was surrounded by a ‘crown,’ or wreath, while another
wreath ran round the top of the table. Thus far its form was the same as that
made at the first for the tabernacle (
Considerable doubt exists as to the precise meaning of the
terms used in Scripture to describe the golden vessels connected with the ‘table
of shewbread’ (
The ‘shewbread’ was made of the finest wheaten flour, that
had been passed through eleven sieves. There were twelve of these cakes,
according to the number of the tribes of Israel, ranged in two piles, each of
six cakes. Each cake was made of two omers of wheat (the omer = about five
pints). Between the two rows, not upon them (as according to the Rabbis) (Menach.
xi. 5), two bowls with pure incense were placed, and, according to Egyptian
tradition (LXX
The preparation of the shewbread seems to have been
hereditarily preserved as a secret family tradition in ‘the house of Garmu,’ a
family of the Kohathites (
The mode of changing the shewbread may be given in the
words of the Mishnah (Men. xi. 7): ‘Four priests enter (the Holy Place),
two carrying, each, one of the piles (of six shewbread), the other two the two
dishes (of incense). Four priests had preceded them—two to take off the two
(old) piles of shewbread, and two the two (old) dishes of incense. Those who
brought in (the bread and incense) stood at the north side (of the table),
facing southwards; they who took away at the south side, facing north: these
lifted off, and those replaced; the hands of these being right over against the
hands of those (so as to lift off and put on exactly at the same moment), as it
is written: “Thou shalt set upon the table bread of the Presence before Me
alway.”’ The shewbread which had been taken off was then deposited on the golden
table in the porch of the sanctuary, the incense burnt on that heap on the altar
of burnt-offering from which the coals were taken for the altar of incense,
after which the shewbread was distributed among the outgoing and the incoming
course of priests.
The incoming priests stood at the north side, the outgoing at the south side, and each course gave to the high-priest half of their portion. The shewbread was eaten during the Sabbath, and in the Temple itself, but only by such priests as were in a state of Levitical purity.
The importance of the service which has just been described depended, of course, on its meaning. Ancient symbolism, both Jewish and Christian, regarded ‘the bread of the Presence’ as an emblem of the Messiah. This view is substantially, though not literally, correct. Jehovah, who dwelt in the Most Holy Place between the Cherubim, was the God manifest and worshipped in the Holy Place. There the mediatorial ministry, in the name of, and representing Israel, ‘laid before’ Him the bread of the Presence, kindled the seven-lamped candlestick, and burnt incense on the golden altar. The ‘bread’ ‘laid before Him’ in the northern or most sacred part of the Holy Place was that of His Presence, and meant that the Covenant-people owned ‘His Presence’ as their bread and their life; the candlestick, that He was their Light-giver and Light; while between the table of shewbread and the candlestick burned the incense on the golden altar, to show that life and light are joined together, and come to us in fellowship with God and prayer. For a similar reason, pure incense was placed between the shewbread—for, the life which is in His Presence is one of praise; while the incense was burned before the shewbread was eaten by the priests, to indicate God’s acceptance and ratification of Israel’s dependence upon Him, as also to betoken praise to God while living upon His Presence. That this ‘Presence’ meant the special manifestation of God, as afterwards fully vouchsafed in Christ, ‘the Angel of His Presence,’ it is scarcely necessary to explain at length in this place.
But although the service of the incoming ‘course’ of
priests had begun with the renewal of the ‘shewbread,’ that of the outgoing had
not yet completely ceased. In point of fact, the outgoing ‘course’ of priests
offered the morning sacrifice on the Sabbath, and the incoming the evening
sacrifice, both spending the Sabbath in the sanctuary. The inspection of the
Temple before the Sabbath morning service differed from that on ordinary days,
inasmuch as the Temple itself was lit up, to obviate the necessity of the
priests carrying torches on the holy day. The altar of burnt-offering was
cleansed before the usual hour; but the morning service commenced later, so as
to give an opportunity of attending to as many as possible. All appeared in
their festive garments, and each carried in his hand some contribution for
religious purposes. It was no doubt from this that the practice was derived of
‘laying by in store upon the first day of the week,’ which St. Paul recommended
to the Corinthians (
Though not strictly connected with the Temple services, it
may be desirable briefly to refer to the observance of the Sabbatical year, as
it was strictly enforced at the time of Christ. It was otherwise with the year
of Jubilee. Strangely, there are traces of the latter during the period before
the return from Babylon (
As Divinely enjoined, the soil was to be left uncultivated
at the end of every period of six years, beginning, as the Jews argue, after the
Passover for the barley, after Pentecost for the wheat, and after the Feast of
Tabernacles for all fruit-trees. The Sabbatical year itself commenced, as most
of them hold, on New Year’s Day, which fell on the new moon of the tenth month,
or Tishri.
Whatever grew of itself during the year was to belong to
the poor (
It will be gathered that in this view the Divine law had
not intended the absolute remission of debts, but only their ‘release’ during
the Sabbatical year.
Jewish tradition, indeed, holds the opposite; but, by its ordinances, it rendered the law itself void. For, as explained by the Rabbis, the release from debt did not include debts for things purchased in a shop, nor judicial fines, nor yet money lent on a pledge. But, as the great Rabbi Hillel found that even these exceptions were not sufficient to insure the loan of money in view of the Sabbatical year, he devised a formula called ‘Prosbul’ (probably ‘addition,’ from a Greek word to the same effect), by which the rights of a creditor were fully secured. The ‘Prosbul’ ran thus: ‘I, A.B., hand to you, the judges of C.D. (a declaration), to the effect that I may claim any debt due to me at whatever time I please.’
This ‘Prosbul,’ signed by the judges or by witnesses,
enabled a creditor to claim money lent even in the Sabbatical year; and though
professedly applying only to debts on real property, was so worded as to cover
every case (Mish. Shev., sec x). But even this was not all, and the
following legal fiction was suggested as highly meritorious to all concerned.
The debtor was to offer payment, and the creditor to reply, ‘I remit’; upon
which the debtor was to insist that ‘nevertheless’ the creditor was to accept
the repayment. In general, money owing to Jewish proselytes was to be repaid to
them, but not to their heirs, even though they also had turned Jews, as by
becoming a proselyte a man had separated himself from his kin, who therefore
were no longer, strictly speaking, his natural heirs. Still, to make payment in
such a case was deemed specially meritorious. The Rabbinical evasions of the
law, which forbade the use of that which had grown spontaneously on the soil,
are not so numerous nor so irrational. It was ruled that part of such products
might be laid by in the house, provided sufficient of the same kind were left in
the field for cattle and beasts to feed upon. Again, as much land might be
tilled as was necessary to make payment of tributes or taxes. The omer (or
‘wave-sheaf’) at the Passover, and the two wave-loaves at Pentecost, were also
to be made from the barley and wheat grown that year in the field. Lastly,
Rabbinical ordinance fixed the following portions as being ‘the law’ which was
to be publicly read in the Temple by the king or the high-priest at the Feast of
Tabernacles in the Sabbatical year, viz.,
The account just given proves that there was scarcely any
Divine ordinance, which the Rabbis, by their traditions, rendered more fully
void, and converted into ‘a yoke which neither our fathers nor we were able to
bear,’ than the Sabbath law. On the other hand, the Gospels bring before us
Christ more frequently on the Sabbath than on any other festive occasion. It
seemed to be His special day for working the work of His Father. On the Sabbath
He preached in the synagogues; He taught in the Temple; He healed the sick; He
came to the joyous meal with which the Jews were wont to close the day (
‘Then sought they
for Jesus, and spake among themselves, as they stood in the temple, What think
ye, that He will not come to the feast?’—
The symbolical character which is to be traced in all the
institutions of the Old Testament, appears also in the arrangement of its
festive calendar. Whatever classification of the festivals may be proposed, one
general characteristic pervades the whole. Unquestionably, the number seven
marks in Scripture the sacred measurement of time. The Sabbath is the seventh of
days; seven weeks after the commencement of the ecclesiastical year is the Feast
of Pentecost; the seventh month is more sacred than the rest, its ‘firstborn’ or
‘New Moon’ being not only devoted to the Lord like those of the other months,
but specially celebrated as the ‘Feast of Trumpets,’ while three other festivals
occur within its course—the Day of Atonement, the Feast of Tabernacles, and its
Octave. Similarly, each seventh year is Sabbatical, and after seven times seven
years comes that of Jubilee. Nor is this all. Seven days in the year may
be designated as the most festive, since in them alone ‘no servile work’ was to
be done,
Besides this general division of time by the sacred number
seven, certain general ideas probably underlay the festive cycles. Thus we may
mark two, or else three, such cycles; the one commencing with the Paschal
sacrifice and ending on the Day of Pentecost, to perpetuate the memory of
Israel’s calling and wilderness life; the other, which occurs in the seventh
month (of rest), marking Israel’s possession of the land and grateful homage to
Jehovah. From these two cycles the Day of Atonement may have to be
distinguished, as intermediate between, applying to both, and yet possessing a
character of its own, as Scripture calls it, ‘a Sabbath of Sabbatism,’
In Hebrew two terms are employed—the one, Moed, or
appointed meeting, applied to all festive seasons, including Sabbaths and New
Moons; the other, Chag, from a root which means ‘to dance,’ or ‘to be
joyous,’ applying exclusively to the three festivals of Easter, Pentecost, and
Tabernacles, in which all males were to appear before the Lord in His sanctuary.
If we might venture to render the general term Moadim by ‘trystings’ of
Jehovah with His people, the other would be intended to express the joyousness
which was to be a leading characteristic of the ‘pilgrim-feasts.’ Indeed, the
Rabbis expressly mention these three as marking the great festivals: Reiyah,
Chagigah, and Simchah; that is, presence, or appearance
at Jerusalem; the appointed festive offerings of the worshippers, which
are not to be confounded with the public sacrifices offered on these occasions
in the name of the whole congregation; and joyousness, with which they
connect the freewill offerings that each brought, as the Lord had blessed him,
and which afterwards were shared with the poor, the desolate, and the Levite, in
the joyous meal that followed the public services of the Temple. To these
general characteristics of the three great feasts we ought, perhaps, to add in
regard to all festive seasons, that each was to be a ‘holy convocation,’ or
gathering for sacred purposes; the injunction of ‘rest’ from ‘servile,’ or else
from all work; and, lastly, certain special sacrifices which were to be brought
in the name of the whole congregation. Besides the Mosaic festivals, the Jews
celebrated at the time of Christ two other feasts—that of Esther, or Purim,
and that of the Dedication of the Temple, on its restoration by Judas the
Maccabee. Certain minor observances, and the public fasts in memory of the great
national calamities, will be noticed in the sequel. Private fasts would, of
course, depend on individuals, but the strict Pharisees were wont to fast every
Monday and Thursday
The duty of appearing three times a year in the Temple
applied to all male Israelites—bondsmen, the deaf, dumb, and lame, those whom
sickness, infirmity, or age rendered incapable of going on foot up the mountain
of the house, and, of course, all in a state of Levitical uncleanness, being
excepted. In general, the duty of appearing before the Lord at the services of
His house was deemed paramount. Here an important Rabbinical principle came in,
which, although not expressed in Scripture, seems clearly founded upon it, that
‘a sacrifice could not be offered for any one unless he himself were present,’
to present and to lay his hand upon it (
Their duty was twofold: to represent all Israel in the
services of the sanctuary, and to act as a sort of guide to those who had
business in the Temple. Thus, at a certain part of the service, the head of the
course brought up those who had come to make an atonement on being cleansed from
any impurity, and ranged them along the ‘Gate of Nicanor,’ in readiness for the
ministry of the officiating priests. The ‘men of the station’ were dispensed
from attendance in the Temple on all occasions when the ‘Hallel’ was
chanted,
Hitherto we have not adverted to the difficulties which
those who intended to appear in Jerusalem at the feasts would experience from
the want of any fixed calendar. As the year of the Hebrews was lunar, not
solar, it consisted of only 354 days 8 hours 48’ 38”. This, distributed among
twelve months, would in the course of years have completely disordered the
months, so that the first month, or Nisan (corresponding to the end of
March or the beginning of April), in the middle of which the first ripe barley
was to be presented to the Lord, might have fallen in the middle of winter.
Accordingly, the Sanhedrim appointed a Committee of three, of which the chief of
the Sanhedrim was always president, and which, if not unanimous, might be
increased to seven, when a majority of voices would suffice, to determine which
year was to be made a leap-year by the insertion of a thirteenth month. Their
resolution
A Sabbatical year could not be a leap-year, but that preceding it was always such. Sometimes two, but never three, leap-years succeeded each other. Commonly, every third year required the addition of a month. The mean duration of the Jewish month being 29 days 12 hours 44’ 3 1/3”, it required, during a period of nineteen years, the insertion of seven months to bring the lunar era in accordance with the Julian.
And this brings up yet another difficulty. The Jews calculated the month according to the phases of the moon, each month consisting of either twenty-nine or thirty days, and beginning with the appearance of the new moon. But this opened a fresh field of uncertainty. It is quite true that every one might observe for himself the appearance of a new moon. But this would again partly depend on the state of the weather. Besides, it left an authoritative declaration of the commencement of a month unsupplied. And yet not only was the first of every month to be observed as ‘New Moon’s Day,’ but the feasts took place on the 10th, 15th, or other day of the month, which could not be accurately determined without a certain knowledge of its beginning. To supply this want the Sanhedrim sat in the ‘Hall of Polished Stones’ to receive the testimony of credible witnesses that they had seen the new moon. To encourage as many as possible to come forward on so important a testimony, these witnesses were handsomely entertained at the public expense. If the new moon had appeared at the commencement of the 30th day—which would correspond to our evening of the 29th, as the Jews reckoned the day from evening to evening—the Sanhedrim declared the previous month to have been one of twenty-nine days, or ‘imperfect.’ Immediately thereon men were sent to a signal-station on the Mount of Olives, where beacon-fires were lit and torches waved, till a kindling flame on a hill in the distance indicated that the signal had been perceived. Thus the tidings, that this was the new moon, would be carried from hill to hill, far beyond the boundaries of Palestine, to those of the dispersion, ‘beyond the river.’ Again, if credible witnesses had not appeared to testify to the appearance of the new moon on the evening of the 29th, the next evening, or that of the 30th, according to our reckoning, was taken as the commencement of the new month, in which case the previous month was declared to have been one of thirty days, or ‘full.’ It was ruled that a year should neither have less than four nor more than eight such full months of thirty days.
But these early fire-signals opened the way for serious
inconvenience. The enemies of the Jews lit beacons to deceive those at a
distance, and it became necessary to send special messengers to announce the new
moon. These were, however, despatched only seven times in the year, just in time
for the various feasts—in Nisan, for the Passover on the 15th, and in
the month following, Iyar, for the ‘Second Passover,’ kept by those who
had been debarred from the first (
The present Hebrew names of the months are variously
supposed to be derived from the Chaldee, or from the Persian language. They
certainly do not appear before the return from Babylon. Before that, the months
were named only after their numbers, or else from the natural phenomena
characteristic of the seasons, as Abib, ‘sprouting,’ ‘green ears,’ for
the first (
The earliest era adopted by the Jews was that which was reckoned to commence with the deliverance from Egypt. During the reigns of the Jewish kings, time was computed from the year of their accession to the throne. After their return from exile, the Jews dated their years according to the Seleucidic era, which began 312 BC, or 3, 450 from the creation of the world. For a short time after the war of independence, it became customary to reckon dates from the year of the liberation of Palestine. However, for a very long period after the destruction of Jerusalem (probably, till the twelfth century AD), the Seleucidic era remained in common use, when it finally gave place to the present mode of reckoning among the Jews, which dates from the creation of the world. To commute the Jewish year into that of our common era we have to add to the latter 3, 761, always bearing in mind, however, that the common or civil Jewish year commences in the month of Tishri, i.e. in autumn.
The week was divided into seven days, of which, however,
only the seventh—the Sabbath—had a name assigned to it, the rest being merely
noted by numerals. The day was computed from sunset to sunset, or rather to the
appearance of the first three stars with which a new day commenced. Before the
Babylonish captivity, it was divided into morning, mid-day, evening, and night;
but during the residence in Babylon, the Hebrews adopted the division of the day
into twelve hours, whose duration varied with the length of the day. The longest
day consisted of fourteen hours and twelve minutes; the shortest, of nine hours
forty-eight minutes; the difference between the two being thus more than four
hours. On an average, the first hour of the day corresponded nearly to our 6
a.m.; the third hour (when, according to
For the convenience of the reader, we subjoin a calendar, showing the occurrence of the various festive days—
1—Nisan. Spring Equinox, end of March or beginning of April.
Day 1. New Moon.
Day 14. The preparation for the Passover and the Paschal Sacrifice.
Day 15. First Day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread.
Day 16. Waving of the first ripe Omer.
Day 21. Close of the Passover.
2—Iyar
Day 1. New Moon.
Day 15. ‘Second,’ or ‘little’ Passover.
Day 18. Lag-le-Omer, or the 33rd day in Omer, i.e. from the presentation of the first ripe sheaf offered on the 2nd day of the Passover, or the 15th of Nisan.
3—Sivan
Day 1. New Moon.
Day 6. Feast of Pentecost, or of Weeks—7 weeks, or 50 days after the beginning of the Passover, when the two loaves of first ripe wheat were ‘waved,’ commemorative also of the giving of the Law on Mount Sinai.
4—Thamus
Day 1. New Moon.
Day 17. Fast; taking of Jerusalem on the 9th by Nebuchadnezzar (and on the 17th by Titus). If the 17th occur on a Sabbath, the Fast is kept on the day following.
5—Ab
Day 1. New Moon.
Day 9. Fast—(threefold) destruction of the Temple.
6—Elul
Day 1. New Moon.
7—Tishri. Beginning of Civil Year
Day 1 & 2. New Year’s Feast.
Day 3. Fast for the murder of Gedaliah.
Day 10. Day of Atonement; Great Fast.
Day 15. Feast of Tabernacles.
Day 21. Close of the above.
Day 22. Octave of the Feast of Tabernacles. (In the Synagogues, on the 23rd, Feast on the annual completion of the Reading of the Law.)
8—Marcheshvan or Cheshvan
Day 1. New Moon.
9—Kislev
Day 1. New Moon.
Day 25. Feast of the Dedication of the Temple, or of Candles, lasting eight days, in remembrance of the Restoration of the Temple after the victory gained by Judas Maccabeus (BC 148) over the Syrians.
10—Tebeth
Day 1. New Moon.
Day 10. Fast on account of the Siege of Jerusalem.
11—Shebat
Day 1. New Moon.
12—Adar
Day 1. New Moon.
Day 13. Fast of Esther. If it fall on a Sabbath, kept on the Thursday preceding.
Day 14. Purim, or Feast of Haman.
Day 15. Purim Proper.
‘Purge out
therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For
even Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us.’—
The cycle of Temple-festivals appropriately opens with ‘the
Passover’ and ‘Feast of Unleavened Bread.’ For, properly speaking, these two are
quite distinct (
There are peculiarities about the Passover which mark it as
the most important, and, indeed, take it out of the rank of the other festivals.
It was the first of the three feasts on which all males in Israel were bound to
appear before the Lord in the place which He would choose (the two others being
the Feast of Weeks and that of Tabernacles [
Thus nature, history, and grace combined to
give a special meaning to the festivals, but chiefly to the Passover. It was the
feast of spring; the spring-time of nature, when, after the death of winter, the
scattered seeds were born into a new harvest, and the first ripe sheaf could be
presented to the Lord; the spring-time of Israel’s history, too, when each year
the people celebrated anew their national birthday; and the spring-time of
grace, their grand national deliverance pointing forward to the birth of the
true Israel, and the Passover sacrifice to that ‘Lamb of God which taketh away
the sin of the world.’ Accordingly, the month of the Passover, Abib, or, as it
was called in later times, Nisan,
Here we mark again the significance of seven as the sacred or covenant number. On the other hand, the Feast of Tabernacles, which closed the festive cycle, took place on the 15th of the seventh month of the sacred, which was also the first in the civil, year. Nor is it less significant that both the Passover and the Feast of Tabernacles fell upon the 15th day of the month; that is, at full moon, or when the month had, so to speak, attained its full strength.
The name of the Passover, in Hebrew Pesach, and in
Aramean and Greek Pascha, is derived from a root which means to ‘step
over,’ or to ‘overleap,’ and thus points back to the historical origin of the
festival (
In the original institution the blood of the sacrifice was
to be sprinkled with hyssop on the lintel and the two doorposts of the house,
probably as being the most prominent place of entrance. Then the whole animal,
without breaking a bone of it, was to be roasted, and eaten by each family—or,
if the number of its members were too small, by two neighbouring families—along
with unleavened bread and bitter herbs, to symbolise the bitterness of their
bondage and the haste of their deliverance, and also to point forward to the
manner in which the true Israel were in all time to have fellowship in the
Paschal Lamb (
The Mishnah (Pes. ix. 5) contains the
following, as the distinctions between the ‘Egyptian’ and the ‘Permanent’
Passover: ‘The Egyptian Passover was selected on the 10th, and the blood was to
be sprinkled with a sprig of hyssop on the lintel and the two door-posts, and it
was to be eaten in haste in the first night; but the Permanent Passover is
observed all the seven days’; i.e. the use of unleavened cakes was, on its first
observance, enjoined only for that one night, though, from Israel’s haste, it
must, for several days, have been the only available bread; while afterwards its
exclusive use was ordered during the whole week. Similarly, also, the journey of
the children of Israel commenced on the 15th of Nisan, while in after-times that
day as observed as a festival like a Sabbath (
Scripture records that the Passover was kept the second
year after the Exodus (
But the inference that the Passover was only celebrated on
the occasions actually mentioned in Scripture seems the less warranted, that in
later times it was so punctiliously and universally observed. We can form a
sufficiently accurate idea of all the circumstances attending it at the time of
our Lord. On the 14th of Nisan every Israelite who was physically able, not in a
state of Levitical uncleanness, nor further distant from the city than fifteen
miles, was to appear in Jerusalem. Though women were not legally obliged to go
up, we know from Scripture (
Of course, many of these pilgrims must have camped outside
the city walls.
Those who lodged within the walls were gratuitously
accommodated, and in return left to their hosts the skins of the Passover lambs
and the vessels which they had used in their sacred services. In such festive
‘company’ the parents of Jesus went to, and returned from this feast ‘every
year,’ taking their ‘holy child’ with them, after He had attained the age of
twelve—strictly in accordance with Rabbinical law (Yoma, 82a)—when He
remained behind, ‘sitting in the midst of the doctors, both hearing them and
asking them questions’ (
But the preparations for the Passover had begun long before
the 14th of Nisan. Already a month previously (on the 15th of Adar), bridges and
roads had been repaired for the use of the pilgrims. That was also the time for
administering the testing draught to women suspected of adultery, for burning
the red heifer, and for boring the ears of those who wished to remain in
servitude—in short, for making all kinds of preliminary arrangements before the
festive season began. One of these is specially interesting as recalling the
words of the Saviour. In general, cemeteries were outside the cities; but any
dead body found in the field was (according to an ordinance which tradition
traces up to Joshua) to be buried on the spot where it had been discovered. Now,
as the festive pilgrims might have contracted ‘uncleanness’ by unwitting contact
with such graves, it was ordered that all ‘sepulchres’ should be ‘whitened’ a
month before the Passover. It was, therefore, evidently in reference to what He
actually saw going on around Him at the time He spoke, that Jesus compared the
Pharisees ‘unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but
are within full of dead men’s bones, and of all uncleanness’ (
The modern synagogue designates the Sabbath before the
Passover as ‘the Great Sabbath,’ and prescribes particular prayers and special
instruction with a view to the coming festival. For, according to Jewish
tradition, at the original institution of the Passover (
We have already explained that according to the Rabbis (Chag.
ii, 1; vi. 2), three things were implied in the festive command to ‘appear
before the Lord’—’Presence,’ the ‘Chagigah,’ and ‘Joyousness.’ As specially
applied to the Passover, the first of these terms meant, that every one was to
come up to Jerusalem and to offer a burnt-offering, if possible on the first, or
else on one of the other six days of the feast. This burnt-offering was to be
taken only from ‘Cholin’ (or profane substance), that is, from such as did not
otherwise belong to the Lord, either as tithes, firstlings, or things devoted,
etc. The Chagigah, which was strictly a peace-offering, might be twofold. This
first Chagigah was offered on the 14th of Nisan, the day of the Paschal
sacrifice, and formed afterwards part of the Paschal Supper. The second Chagigah
was offered on the 15th of Nisan, or the first day of the feast of unleavened
bread. It is this second Chagigah which the Jews were afraid they might be
unable to eat, if they contracted defilement in the judgment-hall of Pilate
(
The special preparations for the Passover commenced on the
evening of the 13th of Nisan, with which, according to Jewish reckoning, the
14th began, the day being always computed from evening to evening.
Then the head of the house was to search with a lighted
candle all places where leaven was usually kept, and to put what of it he found
in the house in a safe place, whence no portion could be carried away by any
accident. Before doing this, he prayed: ‘Blessed art Thou, Jehovah, our God,
King of the Universe, who hast sanctified us by Thy commandments, and commanded
us to remove the leaven.’ And after it he said: ‘All the leaven that is in my
possession, that which I have seen and that which I have not seen, be it null,
be it accounted as the dust of the earth.’ The search itself was to be
accomplished in perfect silence and with a lighted candle. To this search the
apostle may have referred in the admonition to ‘purge out the old leaven’ (
Early on the forenoon of the 14th of Nisan the feast of the Passover may be said to have begun. In Galilee, no work was done all that day; in Judea it was continued till mid-day; the rule, however, being that no new work was to be commenced, though that which was in hand might be carried on. The only exception to this was in the case of tailors, barbers, and those engaged in the laundry. Even earlier than mid-day of the 14th it was no longer lawful to eat leaven. The strictest opinion fixes ten o’clock as the latest hour when leaven might be eaten, the more lax eleven. From that hour to twelve o’clock it was required to abstain from leaven, while at twelve it was to be solemnly destroyed, either by burning, immersing it in water, or scattering it to the winds. To secure strict obedience and uniformity, the exact time for abstaining from and for destroying the leaven was thus made known: ‘They laid two desecrated cakes of a thank-offering on a bench in the porch (of the Temple). So long as they lay there, all the people might eat (leavened); when one of them was removed, they abstained from eating, but they did not burn (the leaven); when both were removed, all the people burnt (the leaven)’ (Pes. i. 5).
The next care was to select a proper Paschal lamb which, of
course, must be free from all blemish, and neither less than eight days, nor
more than exactly one year, old. Each Paschal lamb was to serve for a ‘company,’
which was to consist of not less than ten, nor of more than twenty persons. The
company at the ‘Lord’s Passover Supper’ consisted of Himself and His disciples.
Two of them, Peter and John, the Master had sent early forward to ‘prepare the
Passover,’ that is, to see to all that was needful for the due observance of the
Paschal Supper, especially the purchase and sacrifice of the Paschal lamb.
Probably they may have purchased it in the Holy City, though not, as in the
majority of cases, within the Temple-court itself, where a brisk and very
profitable traffic in all such offerings was carried on by the priests. For
against this the Lord Jesus had inveighed only a few days before, when He ‘cast
out all them that sold and bought in the Temple, and overthrew the tables of the
money-changers’ (
While the Saviour still tarried with the other disciples
outside the city, Peter and John were completing their preparations. They
followed the motley crowd, all leading their sacrificial lambs up the
Temple-mount. Here they were grouped into three divisions. Already the evening
sacrifice had been offered. Ordinarily it was slain at 2:30 p.m., and offered at
about 3:30. But on the eve of the Passover, as we have seen, it was killed an
hour earlier; and if the 14th of Nisan fell on a Friday—or rather from Thursday
at eve to Friday at eve—two `63 hours earlier, so as to avoid any needless
breach of the Sabbath. On the occasion to which we refer the evening sacrifice
had been slain at 1:30, and offered at 2:30. But before the incense was burned
or the lamps were trimmed, the Paschal sacrifice had to be offered.
It was done on this wise:—The First of the three festive
divisions, with their Paschal lambs, was admitted within the Court of the
Priests. Each division must consist of not less than thirty persons (3 x 10, the
symbolical number of the Divine and of completeness). Immediately the massive
gates were closed behind them. The priests drew a threefold blast from their
silver trumpets when the Passover was slain. Altogether the scene was most
impressive. All along the Court up to the altar of burnt-offering priests stood
in two rows, the one holding golden, the other silver bowls. In these the blood
of the Paschal lambs, which each Israelite slew for himself (as representative
of his company at the Paschal Supper), was caught up by a priest, who handed it
to his colleague, receiving back an empty bowl, and so the bowls with the blood
were passed up to the priest at the altar, who jerked it in one jet at the base
of the altar. While this was going on, a most solemn ‘hymn’ of praise was
raised, the Levites leading in song, and the offerers either repeating after
them or merely responding. Every first line of a Psalm was repeated by the
people, while to each of the others they responded by a ‘Hallelujah,’ or ‘Praise
ye the Lord.’ This service of song consisted of the so-called ‘Hallel,’ which
comprised
The Levites began: ‘Hallelu Jah’ (Praise ye the Lord).
The people repeated: ‘Hallelu Jah.’
The Levites: ‘Praise (Hallelu), O ye servants of Jehovah.’
The people responded: ‘Hallelu Jah.’
The Levites: ‘Praise (Hallelu) the name of Jehovah.’
The people responded: ‘Hallelu Jah.’
Similarly, when
The Levites: ‘When Israel went out of Egypt.’
The people repeated: ‘When Israel went out of Egypt.
The Levites: ‘The house of Jacob from a people of strange language.’
The people responded: ‘Hallelu Jah.’
And in the same manner, repeating each first line and
responding at the rest, till they came to
‘Save now, I beseech Thee, Jehovah.’
‘O Jehovah, I beseech Thee, send now prosperity’; and
‘Blessed be He that cometh in the name of Jehovah.’
May it not be that to this solemn and impressive ‘hymn’
corresponds the Alleluia song of the redeemed Church in heaven, as described in
The singing of the ‘Hallel’ at the Passover dates from very
remote antiquity. The Talmud dwells on its peculiar suitableness for the
purpose, since it not only recorded the goodness of God towards Israel, but
especially their deliverance from Egypt, and therefore appropriately opened (
If the ‘Hallel’ had been finished before the service of one
division was completed, it was repeated a second and, if needful, even a third
time. The Mishnah remarks, that as the Great Court was crowded by the
first two divisions, it rarely happened that they got further than
When all had been finished in the Temple, the priests washed the Great Court, in which so much sacrificial blood had been shed. But this was not done if the Passover had been slain on the Sabbath. In that case, also, the three divisions waited—the first in the Court of the Gentiles, the second on the Chel, and the third in the Great Court—so as not needlessly to carry their burdens on the Sabbath.
But, as a general rule, the religious services of the
Passover, like all positive religious injunctions, ‘made void the Sabbath.’ In
other respects the Passover, or rather the 15th of Nisan, was to be observed
like a Sabbath, no manner of work being allowed. There was, however, one most
important exception to this rule. It was permitted to prepare the necessary
articles of food on the 15th of Nisan. This explains how the words of Jesus to
Judas during the Paschal (not the Lord’s) Supper could be misunderstood by the
disciples as implying that Judas, ‘who had the bag,’ was to ‘buy those things’
that they had ‘need of against the feast’ (
It was probably as the sun was beginning to decline in the horizon that Jesus and the other ten disciples descended once more over the Mount of Olives into the Holy City. Before them lay Jerusalem in her festive attire. All around pilgrims were hastening towards it. White tents dotted the sward, gay with the bright flowers of early spring, or peered out from the gardens and the darker foliage of the olive plantations. From the gorgeous Temple buildings, dazzling in their snow-white marble and gold, on which the slanting rays of the sun were reflected, rose the smoke of the altar of burnt-offering. These courts were now crowded with eager worshippers, offering for the last time, in the real sense, their Paschal lambs. The streets must have been thronged with strangers, and the flat roofs covered with eager gazers, who either feasted their eyes with a first sight of the Sacred City for which they had so often longed, or else once more rejoiced in view of the well-remembered localities. It was the last day-view which the Lord had of the Holy City—till His resurrection! Only once more in the approaching night of His betrayal was He to look upon it in the pale light of the full moon. He was going forward to ‘accomplish His death’ in Jerusalem; to fulfil type and prophecy, and to offer Himself up as the true Passover Lamb—’the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.’ They who followed Him were busy with many thoughts. They knew that terrible events awaited them, and they had only a few days before been told that these glorious Temple-buildings, to which, with a national pride not unnatural, they had directed the attention of their Master, were to become desolate, not one stone being left upon the other. Among them, revolving his dark plans, and goaded on by the great Enemy, moved the betrayer. And now they were within the city. Its Temple, its royal bridge, its splendid palaces, its busy marts, its streets filled with festive pilgrims, were well known to them, as they made their way to the house where the guest-chamber had been prepared for them. Meanwhile the crowd came down from the Temple-mount, each bearing on his shoulders the sacrificial lamb, to make ready for the Paschal Supper.
‘And as they were
eating, Jesus took bread, and blessed, and brake, and gave to the disciples, and
said, Take, eat; this is My Body. And He took the cup, and gave thanks, and gave
to them, saying, Drink ye all of it; for this is My blood of the New Testament,
which is shed for many for the remission of sins.’—
Jewish tradition has this curious conceit: that the most
important events in Israel’s history were connected with the Paschal season.
Thus it is said to have been on the present Paschal night that, after his
sacrifice, the ‘horror of great darkness’ fell upon Abraham when God revealed to
him the future of his race (
If we could only believe that the prayers and ceremonies which it embodies were the same as those at the time of our Lord, we should have it in our power to picture in minutest detail all that took place when He instituted his own Supper. We should see the Master as He presided among the festive company of His disciples, know what prayers He uttered, and at what special parts of the service, and be able to reproduce the arrangement of the Paschal table around which they sat.
At present and for many centuries back the Paschal Supper has been thus laid out: three large unleavened cakes, wrapped in the folds of a napkin, are placed on a salver, and on them the seven articles necessary for the ‘Passover Supper’ are ranged in this manner:
| A roasted Egg | Roasted Shankbone of a Lamb | |
| (Instead of the 14th day Chagigah) | (Instead of the Paschal Lamb) | |
| Charoseth | Bitter | Lettuce |
| (To represent the mortar of Egypt) | Herbs | |
| Salt Water | Chervil and Parsley | |
But, unfortunately, the analogy does not hold good. As the
present Passover liturgy contains comparatively very few relics from New
Testament times, so also the present arrangement of the Paschal table evidently
dates from a time when sacrifices had ceased. On the other hand, however, by far
the greater number of the usages observed in our own days are precisely the same
as eighteen hundred years ago. A feeling, not of gratified curiosity, but of
holy awe, comes over us, as thus we are able to pass back through those many
centuries into the upper chamber where the Lord Jesus partook of that Passover
which, with the loving desire of a Saviour’s heart, He had desired to eat with
His disciples. The leading incidents of the feast are all vividly before us—the
handling of ‘the sop dipped in the dish,’ ‘the breaking of bread,’ ‘the giving
thanks,’ ‘the distributing of the cup,’ and ‘the concluding hymn.’ Even the
exact posture at the Supper is known to us. But the words associated with those
sacred memories come with a strange sound when we find in Rabbinical writings
the ‘Passover lamb’
Before proceeding further we may state that, according to
Jewish ordinance, the Paschal lamb was roasted on a spit made of pomegranate
wood, the spit passing right through from mouth to vent. Special care was to be
taken that in roasting the lamb did not touch the oven, otherwise the part
touched had to be cut away. This can scarcely be regarded as an instance of
Rabbinical punctiliousness. It was intended to carry out the idea that the lamb
was to be undefiled by any contact with foreign matter, which might otherwise
have adhered to it. For everything here was significant, and the slightest
deviation would mar the harmony of the whole. If it had been said, that not a
bone of the Paschal lamb was to be broken, that it was not to be ‘sodden at all
with water, but roast with fire—his head with his legs, and with the purtenance
thereof,’ and that none of it was to ‘remain until the morning,’ all that had
not been eaten being burnt with fire (
Such views and feelings, which, no doubt, all truly
spiritual Israelites shared, gave its meaning to the Paschal feast at which
Jesus sat down with His disciples, and which He transformed into the Lord’s
Supper by linking it to His Person and Work. Every sacrifice, indeed, had
prefigured His Work; but none other could so suitably commemorate His death, nor
yet the great deliverance connected with it, and the great union and fellowship
flowing from it. For other reasons also it was specially suited to be typical of
Christ. It was a sacrifice, and yet quite out of the order of all Levitical
sacrifices. For it had been instituted and observed before Levitical sacrifices
existed; before the Law was given; nay, before the Covenant was ratified by
blood (
As the guests
On the contrary, they were arrayed in their best festive
garments, joyous and at rest, as became the children of a king. To express this
idea the Rabbis also insisted that the Paschal Supper—or at least part of
it—must be eaten in that recumbent position with which we are familiar from the
New Testament. ‘For,’ say they, ‘they use this leaning posture, as free men do,
in memorial of their freedom.’ And, again, ‘Because it is the manner of slaves
to eat standing, therefore now they eat sitting and leaning, in order to show
that they have been delivered from bondage into freedom.’ And, finally: ‘No, not
the poorest in Israel may eat till he has sat down, leaning.’ But, though it was
deemed desirable to ‘sit leaning’ during the whole Paschal Supper, it was only
absolutely enjoined while partaking of the bread and the wine. This recumbent
posture so far resembled that still common in the East, that the body rested on
the feet. Hence, also, the penitent woman at the feast given by Simon is said to
have ‘stood at His feet, behind,’ ‘weeping’ (
The use of wine in the Paschal Supper,
According to the Jerusalem Talmud, it was intended to
express Israel’s joy on the Paschal night, and even the poorest must have ‘at
least four cups, though he were to receive the money for it from the poor’s box’
(Pes. x. 1). If he cannot otherwise obtain it, the Talmud adds, ‘he must
sell or pawn his coat, or hire himself out for these four cups of wine.’ The
same authority variously accounts for the number four as either
corresponding to the four words used about Israel’s redemption (bringing out,
delivering, redeeming, taking), or to the fourfold mention of the cup in
connection with the chief butler’s dream (
As detailed in the earliest Jewish record of
ordinances—the Mishnah—the service of the Paschal Supper was
exceedingly simple. Indeed, the impression left on the mind is, that, while all
the observances were fixed, the prayers, with some exceptions preserved to us,
were free. Rabbi Gamaliel, the teacher of St. Paul, said (Pes. x. 15):
‘Whoever does not explain three things in the Passover has not fulfilled the
duty incumbent on him. These three things are: the Passover lamb, the unleavened
bread, and the bitter herbs. The Passover lamb means that God passed over
the blood-sprinkled place on the houses of our fathers in Egypt; the
unleavened bread means that our fathers were delivered out of Egypt (in
haste); and the bitter herbs mean that the Egyptians made bitter the
lives of our fathers in Egypt.’ A few additional particulars are necessary to
enable the reader to understand all the arrangements of the Paschal Supper. From
the time of the evening-sacrifice nothing was to be eaten till the Paschal
Supper, so that all might come to it with relish (Pes, x. 1). It is a
moot point, whether at the time of our Lord two, or, as at present, three, large
cakes of unleavened bread were used in the service. The Mishnah mentions
(Pes. ii. 6) these five kinds as falling within the designation of
‘bitter herbs,’ viz. lettuce, endive, succory (garden endive?), what is called
‘Charchavina’ (urtica, beets?), and horehound (bitter coriander?). The
‘bitter herbs’ seem to have been twice partaken of during the service, once
dipped in salt water or vinegar, and a second time with Charoseth, a compound of
dates, raisins, etc., and vinegar, though the Mishnah expressly declares
(Pes. x. 3) that Charoseth was not obligatory. Red wine alone was to be
used at the Paschal Supper, and always mixed with water.
Each of the four cups must contain at least the fourth of a quarter of an hin (the hin = one gallon two pints). Lastly, it was a principle that, after the Paschal meal, they had no Aphikomen (after-dish), an expression which may perhaps best be rendered by ‘dessert.’
The Paschal Supper itself commenced by the head of ‘the
company’ taking the first cup of wine in his hand, and ‘giving thanks’ over it
in these words: ‘Blessed art Thou, Jehovah our God, who has created the fruit of
the vine! Blessed art Thou, Jehovah our God King of the Universe, who hast
chosen us from among all people, and exalted us from among all languages, and
sanctified us with Thy commandments! And Thou hast given us, O Jehovah our God,
in love, the solemn days for joy, and the festivals and appointed seasons for
gladness; and this the day of the feast of unleavened bread, the season of our
freedom, a holy convocation, the memorial of our departure from Egypt. For us
hast Thou chosen; and us hast Thou sanctified from among all nations, and Thy
holy festivals with joy and with gladness hast Thou caused us to inherit.
Blessed art Thou, O Jehovah, who sanctifiest Israel and the appointed seasons!
Blessed art Thou, Jehovah, King of the Universe, who hast preserved us alive and
sustained us and brought us to this season!’
The first cup of wine was then drunk, and each washed his
hands.
It was evidently at this time that the Saviour in His
self-humiliation proceeded also to wash the disciples’ feet (
These preliminaries ended, the Paschal table was brought forward. The president of the feast first took some of the herbs, dipped them in salt water, ate of them, and gave to the others. Immediately after it, all the dishes were removed from the table (as it was thought so strange a proceeding would tend to excite the more curiosity), and then the second cup was filled. A very interesting ceremony now took place, It had been enjoined in the law that at each Paschal Supper the father was to show his son the import of this festival. By way of carrying out this duty, the son (or else the youngest) was directed at this particular part of the service to make inquiry; and, if the child were too young or incapable, the father would do it for him.
The son asks: ‘Why is this night distinguished from all
other nights? For on all other nights we eat leavened or unleavened bread, but
on this night only unleavened bread? On all other nights we eat any kind of
herbs, but on this night only bitter herbs? On all other nights we eat meat
roasted, stewed, or boiled, but on this night only roasted? On all other nights
we dip (the herbs) only once, but on this night twice?’ Thus far according to
the earliest and most trustworthy tradition. It is added (Mishnah, Pes.
x. 4): ‘Then the father instructs his child according to the capacity of his
knowledge, beginning with our disgrace and ending with our glory, and expounding
to him from, “A Syrian, ready to perish, was my father, ” till he has explained
all through, to the end of the whole section’ (
This done, the Paschal dishes were brought back on the
table. The president now took up in succession the dish with the Passover lamb,
that with the bitter herbs, and that with the unleavened bread, and briefly
explained the import of each; for, according to Rabbi Gamaliel: ‘From generation
to generation every man is bound to look upon himself not otherwise than if he
had himself come forth out of Egypt. For so it is written (
Rabbinical authorities distinctly state that this
thanksgiving was to follow not to precede, the breaking of the bread, because it
was the bread of poverty, ‘and the poor have not whole cakes, but broken
pieces.’ The distinction is important, as proving that since the Lord in
instituting His Supper, according to the uniform testimony of the three Gospels
and of St. Paul (
Pieces of the broken cake with ‘bitter herbs’ between them,
and ‘dipped’ in the Charoseth, were next handed to each in the company. This, in
all probability, was ‘the sop’ which, in answer to John’s inquiry about the
betrayer, the Lord ‘gave’ to Judas (
The Paschal Supper itself consisted of the unleavened bread with bitter herbs, of the so-called Chagigah, or festive offering (when brought), and, lastly, of the Paschal lamb itself. After that nothing more was to be eaten, so that the flesh of the Paschal Sacrifice might be the last meat partaken of. But since the cessation of the Paschal Sacrifice the Jews conclude the Supper with a piece of unleavened cake, which they call the Aphikomen, or after-dish. Then, having again washed hands, the third cup is filled, and grace after meat said. Now, it is very remarkable that our Lord seems so far to have anticipated the present Jewish practice that He brake the bread ‘when He had given thanks,’ instead of adhering to the old injunction of not eating anything after the Passover lamb. And yet in so doing He only carried out the spirit of the Paschal feast. For, as we have already explained, it was commemorative and typical. It commemorated an event which pointed to and merged in another event—even the offering of the better Lamb, and the better freedom connected with that sacrifice. Hence, after the night of His betrayal, the Paschal lamb could have no further meaning, and it was right that the commemorative Aphikomen should take its place. The symbolical cord, if the figure may be allowed, had stretched to its goal—the offering up of the Lamb of God; and though again continued from that point onwards till His second coming, yet it was, in a sense, as from a new beginning.
Immediately afterwards the third cup was drunk, a special
blessing having been spoken over it. There cannot be any reasonable doubt that
this was the cup which our Lord connected with His own Supper. It is called in
Jewish writings, just as by St. Paul (
The service concluded with the fourth cup, over which the
second portion of the ‘Hallel’ was sung, consisting of
‘The breath of all that lives shall praise Thy name,
Jehovah our God. And the spirit of all flesh shall continually glorify and exalt
Thy memorial, O our King! For from everlasting to everlasting Thou art God, and
besides Thee we have no King, Redeemer, or Saviour,’ etc.
In this manner was the Paschal Supper celebrated by the
Jews at the time when our Lord for the last time sat down to it with His
disciples. So important is it to have a clear understanding of all that passed
on that occasion, that, at the risk of some repetition, we shall now attempt to
piece together the notices in the various Gospels, adding to them again those
explanations which have just been given in detail. At the outset we may dismiss,
as unworthy of serious discussion, the theory, either that our Lord had observed
the Paschal Supper at another than the regular time for it, or that St. John
meant to intimate that He had partaken of it on the 13th instead of the 14th of
Nisan. To such violent hypotheses, which are wholly uncalled for, there is this
one conclusive answer, that, except on the evening of the 14th of Nisan, no
Paschal lamb could have been offered in the Temple, and therefore no Paschal
Supper celebrated in Jerusalem. But abiding by the simple text of Scripture, we
have the following narrative of events:—Early on the forenoon of the 14th of
Nisan, the Lord Jesus having sent Peter and John before Him ‘to prepare the
Passover,’ ‘in the evening He cometh with the twelve’ (
‘And after the sop Satan entered into him,’ and he ‘went
out immediately.’ It was an unusual time to leave the Paschal table, for with
‘the sop dipped’ into the ‘Charoseth’ the Paschal Supper itself had only just
begun. But then ‘some of them thought’—perhaps without fully considering it in
their excitement—that Judas, who ‘had the bag,’ and on whom, therefore, the
care of such things devolved, had only gone to see after ‘those things that they
had need of against the feast,’ or to ‘give something to the poor’—applying
some of the common stock of money in helping to provide ‘peace-offerings’ for
the poor. This would have been quite in accordance with the spirit of the
ordinance, while neither supposition necessarily involved a breach of the law,
since it was permitted to prepare all needful provision for the feast, and of
course also for the Sabbath, which in this instance followed it. For, as we have
seen, the festive observance of the 15th of Nisan differed in this from the
ordinary Sabbath-law, although there is evidence that even the latter was at
that time by no means so strict as later Jewish tradition has made it. And then
it was, after the regular Paschal meal, that the Lord instituted His own Supper,
for the first time using the Aphikomen ‘when He had given thanks’ (after
meat), to symbolise His body, and the third cup, or ‘cup of blessing which we
bless’ (
Then it was that the Lord’s great heaviness and loneliness
came upon Him; when all around seemed to give way, as if crushed under the
terrible burden about to be lifted; when His disciples could not watch with Him
even one hour; when in the agony of His soul ‘His sweat was as it were great
drops of blood, falling down to the ground’; and when He ‘prayed, saying: O my
Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from Me: nevertheless not as I
will, but as Thou wilt.’ But ‘the cup which the Father’ had given Him, He drank
to the bitter dregs; and ‘when He had offered up prayers and supplications with
strong crying and tears unto Him that was able to save Him from death, and was
heard in that He feared; though He were a Son, yet learned He obedience by the
things which He suffered; and being made perfect, He became the author of
eternal salvation unto all them that obey Him’ (
Thus the ‘Lamb without blemish and without spot, who verily
was foreordained before the foundation of the world’ (
‘And when the day
of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place.’—
The ‘Feast of Unleavened Bread,’ which commenced in the
Paschal night itself and lasted for seven days, derived its name from the
Mazzoth, or unleavened cakes, which were the only bread allowed during that
week. This is called in Scripture ‘the bread of affliction’ (
The Passover, therefore, was not so much the remembrance of
Israel’s bondage as of Israel’s deliverance from that bondage, and the bread
which had originally been that of affliction, because that of haste, now became,
as it were, the bread of a new state of existence. None of Egypt’s leaven was to
pervade it; nay, all the old leaven, which served as the symbol of corruption
and of death, was to be wholly banished from their homes. They were to be ‘a new
lump,’ as they were ‘unleavened’ (
The same truth is fully symbolised in the sacrifices of
this feast, and especially in the presentation of the first ripe sheaf on the
second day of the Passover. The first day of ‘unleavened bread,’ or the 15th of
Nisan, was a ‘holy convocation,’ when neither servile nor needless work was to
be done, that only being allowed which was necessary for the joyous observance
of the festival. After the regular morning sacrifice the public offerings were
brought. These consisted, on each of the seven days of the festive week, of two
young bullocks, one ram, and seven lambs for a burnt-offering, with their
appropriate meat-offerings; and of ‘one goat for a sin-offering, to make an
atonement for you’ (
Both the Chagigah and the ‘offerings of joyousness’ were
‘peace-offerings.’ They required imposition of hands, sprinkling of blood,
burning of the inside fat and kidneys on the altar, and the proper setting aside
of what went to the priest, viz. the breast as a wave- and the right shoulder as
a heave-offering (
‘It was early’ on the 15th day of Nisan when the Lord was
delivered into the hands of the Gentiles. In the previous night He and His
disciples had partaken of the Paschal Supper. The betrayer alone was too busy
with his plans to finish the meal. He had, so to speak, separated from the
fellowship of Israel before he excommunicated himself from that of Christ. While
the Paschal services in the ‘guest-chamber’ were prolonged by the teaching and
the intercession of the Master, and when the concluding rites of that night
merged in the institution of the Lord’s Supper, Judas was completing, with the
chief priests and elders, the betrayal of Jesus, and received the ‘reward of
iniquity’ (
Some of their number hastily gathered the Temple guard
under its captains. A detachment of Roman soldiers under an officer
A number of trusty fanatics from the populace accompanied
‘the band.’ They were all armed with clubs and swords, ‘as against a murderer’;
and though the dazzling light of a full moon shone on the scene, they carried
torches and lamps, in case He or His followers should hide in the recesses of
the garden or escape observation. But far other than they had expected awaited
them in ‘the garden.’ He whom they had come to take prisoner by violent means
first overcame, and then willingly surrendered to them, only stipulating for the
freedom of His followers. They led Him back into the city, to the Palace of the
High Priest, on the slope of Mount Zion, almost opposite to the Temple. What
passed there need not be further described, except to say, that, in their
treatment of Jesus, the Sanhedrim violated not only the law of God, but grossly
outraged every ordinance of their own traditions.
Possibly the consciousness of this, almost as much as
political motives, may have influenced them in handing over the matter to
Pilate. The mere fact that they possessed not the power of capital punishment
would scarcely have restrained them from killing Jesus, as they afterwards
stoned Stephen, and would have murdered Paul but for the intervention of the
Roman garrison from Fort Antonia. On the other hand, if it was, at the same
time, their object to secure a public condemnation and execution, and to awaken
the susceptibilities of the civil power against the movement which Christ had
initiated, it was necessary to carry the case to Pilate. And so in that grey
morning light of the first day of unleavened bread the saddest and strangest
scene in Jewish history was enacted. The chief priests and elders, and the most
fanatical of the people were gathered in Fort Antonia. From where they stood
outside the Praetorium they would, in all probability, have a full view of the
Temple buildings, just below the rocky fort; they could see the morning
sacrifice offered, and the column of sacrificial smoke and of incense rise from
the great altar towards heaven. At any rate, even if they had not seen the
multitude that thronged the sacred buildings, they could hear the Levites’ song
and the blasts of the priests’ trumpets. and now the ordinary morning service
was over, and the festive sacrifices were offered. It only remained to bring the
private burnt-offerings, and to sacrifice the Chagigah,
And so the strangest contradiction was enacted. They who had not hesitated to break every law of God’s and of their own making, would not enter the Praetorium, lest they should be defiled and prevented from the Chagigah! Surely, the logic of inconsistency could go no further in punctiliously observing the letter and violating the spirit of the law.
That same afternoon of the first Passover day, ‘when the
sixth hour was come, there was darkness over the whole land until the ninth
hour. And at the ninth hour Jesus cried with a loud voice, saying, Eloi, Eloi,
lama sabachthani? which is, being interpreted, My God, my God, why hast Thou
forsake Me? . . . And Jesus cried with a loud voice, and gave up the ghost. And the
veil of the Temple was rent in twain, from the top to the bottom.’ This, just
about the time when the evening sacrifice had been offered, so that the
incensing priest standing in the Holy Place must have witnessed the awful sight.
A little later on in the evening of that same day, just as
it was growing dark, a noisy throng followed delegates from the Sanhedrim
outside the city and across the brook Kedron. It was a very different
procession, and for a very different purpose, from the small band of mourners
which, just about the same time, carried the body of the dead Saviour from the
cross to the rock-hewn tomb wherein no man had yet been laid. While the one
turned into ‘the garden’ (
The expression, ‘the morrow after the Sabbath’ (
When the time for cutting the sheaf had arrived, that is,
on the evening of the 15th of Nisan (even though it were a Sabbath
But in order clearly to bring out all that was distinctive
in the ceremony, they first asked of the bystanders three times each of these
questions: ‘Has the sun gone down?’ ‘With this sickle?’ ‘Into this basket?’ ‘On
this Sabbath (or first Passover-day)?’—and, lastly, ‘Shall I reap?’ Having each
time been answered in the affirmative, they cut down barley to the amount of one
ephah, or ten omers, or three seahs, which is equal to about three pecks and
three pints of our English measure. The ears were brought into the Court of the
Temple, and thrashed out with canes or stalks, so as not to injure the corn;
then ‘parched’ on a pan perforated with holes, so that each grain might be
touched by the fire, and finally exposed to the wind. The corn thus prepared was
ground in a barley-mill, which left the hulls whole. According to some, the
flour was always successfully passed through thirteen sieves, each closer than
the other. The statement of a rival authority, however, seems more
rational—that it was only done till the flour was sufficiently fine (Men.
vi. 6, 7), which was ascertained by one of the ‘Gizbarim’ (treasurers) plunging
his hands into it, the sifting process being continued so long as any of the
flour adhered to the hands (Men. viii. 2). Though one ephah, or ten
omers, of barley was cut down, only one omer of flour, or about 5 1 pints of our
measure, was offered in the Temple on the second Paschal, or 16th day of Nisan.
The rest of the flour might be redeemed, and used for any purpose. The omer of
flour was mixed with a ‘log,’ or very nearly three-fourths of a pint of oil, and
a handful
The remainder belonged to the priest. This was what is popularly, though not very correctly, called ‘the presentation of the first or wave-sheaf’ on the second day of the Passover-feast, of the 16th of Nisan.
Thus far the two first days. The last day of the Passover,
as the first, was a ‘holy convocation,’ and observed like a Sabbath. The
intervening days were ‘minor festivals,’ or Moed Katon. The Mishnah
(Tract. Moed Katon) lays down precise rules as to the kind of work
allowed on such days. As a general principle, all that was necessary either for
the public interest or to prevent private loss was allowed; but no new work of
any kind for private or public purposes might be begun. Thus you might irrigate
dry soil, or repair works for irrigation, but not make new ones, nor dig canals,
etc. It only remains to add, that any one prevented by Levitical defilement,
disability, or distance from keeping the regular Passover, might observe what
was called ‘the second,’ or ‘the little Passover,’ exactly a month later (
The ‘Feast of Unleavened Bread’ may be said not to have
quite passed till fifty-days after its commencement, when it merged in that of
Pentecost, or ‘of Weeks.’ According to unanimous Jewish tradition, which was
universally received at the time of Christ, the day of Pentecost was the
anniversary of the giving of the Law on Mount Sinai, which the Feast of Weeks
was intended to commemorate. Thus, as the dedication of the harvest, commencing
with the presentation of the first omer on the Passover, was completed in the
thank-offering of the two wave-loaves at Pentecost, so the memorial of Israel’s
deliverance appropriately terminated in that of the giving of the Law—just as,
making the highest application of it, the Passover sacrifice of the Lord Jesus
may be said to have been completed in the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the
day of Pentecost (
Accordingly the days before Pentecost were always reckoned as the first, second, third, etc., since the presentation of the omer. Thus Maimonides beautifully observes: ‘Just as one who is expecting the most faithful of his friends is wont to count the days and hours to his arrival, so we also count from the omer of the day of our Exodus from Egypt to that of the giving of the law, which was the object of our Exodus, as it is said: “I bare you on eagle’s wings, and brought you unto Myself.” And because this great manifestation did not last more than one day, therefore we annually commemorate it only one day.’
Full seven weeks after the Paschal day, counting from the
presentation of the omer on the 16th of Nisan, or exactly on the fiftieth day
(
The festive sacrifices for the day of Pentecost were,
according to
As the stars shone out in the deep blue sky with the
brilliancy peculiar to an Eastern clime, the blasts of the priests’ trumpets,
announcing the commencement of the feast, sounded from the Temple mount through
the delicious stillness of the summer night. Already in the first watch the
great altar was cleansed, and immediately after midnight the Temple gates were
thrown open. For before the morning sacrifice all burnt- and peace-offerings
which the people proposed to bring at the feast had to be examined by the
officiating priesthood. Great as their number was, it must have been a busy
time, till the announcement that the morning glow extended to Hebron put an end
to all such preparations, by giving the signal for the regular morning
sacrifice. After that the festive offerings prescribed in
Then came the peculiar offering of the day—that of the two
wave-loaves, with their accompanying sacrifices. These consisted of seven lambs
of the first year, without blemish, one young bullock, and two rams for a
burnt-offering, with their appropriate meat-offerings; and then ‘one kid of the
goats for a sin-offering, and two lambs of the first year for a sacrifice of
peace-offerings’ (
As the omer for the 16th of Nisan was of barley, being the
first ripe corn in the land, so the ‘two wave-loaves’ were prepared from wheat
grown in the best district of the country—under conditions similar to those
already noticed about the Passover-sheaf. Similarly, three seahs, or
about three pecks and three pints of wheat, were cut down, brought to the
Temple, thrashed like other meat-offerings, ground, and passed through twelve
sieves.
From the flour thus obtained two omers (or double the
quantity of that at the Passover) were used for ‘the two loaves’; the rest might
be redeemed and used for any purpose. Care was taken that the flour for each
loaf should be taken separately from one and a half seah, that it should be
separately kneaded with lukewarm water (like all thank-offerings), and
separately baked—the latter in the Temple itself. The loaves were made the
evening preceding the festival; or, if that fell on the Sabbath, two evenings
before. In shape they were long and flat, and turned up, either at the edges or
at the corners. According to the Mishnah, each loaf was four handbreadths
wide, seven long, and four fingers high, and as it contained one omer of flour
(5 1 pints, or rather less than four pounds’ weight), the dough would weigh
about five pounds and three-quarters, yielding, say, five pounds and a quarter
of bread, or ten and a half for the two ‘wave-loaves.’
Contrary to the common rule of the Sanctuary, these loaves
were leavened, which, as the Mishnah, informs us (Men. v. 1), was
the case in all thank-offerings. The common explanation—that the wave-loaves
were leavened because they represented the ordinary food of the people—only
partially accounts for this. No doubt these wave-loaves expressed the Old
Testament acknowledgment of the truth which our Lord embodied in the prayer,
‘Give us this day our daily bread.’ But this is not all. Let it be remembered
that these two loaves, with the two lambs that formed part of the same
wave-offering, were the only public peace- and thank-offerings of Israel; that
they were accompanied by burnt- and sin-offerings; and that, unlike ordinary
peace-offerings, they were considered as ‘most holy.’ Hence they were leavened,
because Israel’s public thank-offerings, even the most holy, are leavened by
imperfectness and sin, and they need a sin-offering. This idea of a public
thank-offering was further borne out by all the services of the day. First, the
two lambs were ‘waved’ while yet alive; that is, before being made ready for
use. Then, after their sacrifice, the breast and shoulder, or principal parts of
each, were laid beside the two loaves, and ‘waved’ (generally towards the east)
forwards and back wards, and up and down.
After burning the fat, the flesh belonged, not to the offerers, but to the priests. As in the case of the most holy sacrifices, the sacrificial meal was to take place within the Temple itself, nor was any part of it to be kept beyond midnight. One of the wave-loaves and of the lambs went to the high-priest; the other belonged to all the officiating priesthood. Lastly, after the ceremony of the wave-loaves, the people brought their own freewill-offerings, each as the Lord had prospered him—the afternoon and evening being spent in the festive meal, to which the stranger, the poor, and the Levite were bidden as the Lord’s welcome guests. On account of the number of such sacrifices, the Feast of Weeks was generally protracted for the greater part of a week; and this the more readily that the offering of firstfruits also began at this time. Lastly, as the bringing of the omer at the Passover marked the period when new corn might be used in the land, so the presentation of the wave-loaves that when new flour might be brought for meat-offerings in the Sanctuary.
If Jewish tradition connected the ‘Feast of Firstfruits’ with the ‘Mount that might be touched,’ and the ‘voice of words which they that heard entreated that the word should not be spoken to them any more,’ we have in this respect also ‘come unto Mount Zion,’ and to the better things of the New Covenant. To us the Day of Pentecost is, indeed, the ‘feast of firstfruits,’ and that of the giving of the better law, ‘written not in tables of stone, but on the fleshy tables of the heart,’ ‘with the Spirit of the living God.’ For, as the worshippers were in the Temple, probably just as they were offering the wave-lambs and the wave-bread, the multitude heard that ‘sound from heaven, as of a mighty rushing wind,’ which drew them to the house where the apostles were gathered, there to hear ‘every man in his own language’ ‘the wonderful works of God.’ And on that Pentecost day, from the harvest of firstfruits, not less than three thousand souls added to the Church were presented as a wave-offering to the Lord. The cloven tongues of fire and the apostolic gifts of that day of firstfruits have, indeed, long since disappeared. But the mighty rushing sound of the Presence and Power of the Holy Ghost has gone forth into all the world.
‘In the last day,
that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst,
let him come unto Me, and drink.’—
The most joyous of all festive seasons in Israel was that
of the ‘Feast of Tabernacles.’ It fell on a time of year when the hearts of the
people would naturally be full of thankfulness, gladness, and expectancy. All
the crops had been long stored; and now all fruits were also gathered, the
vintage past, and the land only awaited the softening and refreshment of the
‘latter rain,’ to prepare it for a new crop. It was appropriate that, when the
commencement of the harvest had been consecrated by offering the first ripe
sheaf of barley, and the full ingathering of the corn by the two wave-loaves,
there should now be a harvest feast of thankfulness and of gladness unto the
Lord. But that was not all. As they looked around on the goodly land, the fruits
of which had just enriched them, they must have remembered that by miraculous
interposition the Lord their God had brought them to this land and given it
them, and that He ever claimed it as peculiarly His own. For the land was
strictly connected with the history of the people; and both the land and the
history were linked with the mission of Israel. If the beginning of the harvest
had pointed back to the birth of Israel in their Exodus from Egypt, and forward
to the true Passover-sacrifice in the future; if the corn-harvest was connected
with the giving of the law on Mount Sinai in the past, and the outpouring of the
Holy Spirit on the Day of Pentecost; the harvest-thanksgiving of the Feast of
Tabernacles reminded Israel, on the one hand, of their dwelling in booths in the
wilderness, while, on the other hand, it pointed to the final harvest when
Israel’s mission should be completed, and all nations gathered unto the Lord.
Thus the first of the three great annual feasts spoke, in the presentation of
the first sheaf, of the founding of the Church; the second of its harvesting,
when the Church in its present state should be presented as two leavened
wave-loaves; while the third pointed forward to the full harvest in the end,
when ‘in this mountain shall the Lord of Hosts make unto all people a feast of
fat things . . . And He will destroy in this mountain the face of the covering cast
over all people, and the veil that is spread over all nations. He will swallow
up death in victory; and the Lord God will wipe away tears from off all faces;
and the rebuke of His people (Israel) shall He take away from all the earth’
(
That these are not ideal comparisons, but the very design
of the Feast of Tabernacles, appears not only from the language of the prophets
and the peculiar services of the feast, but also from its position in the
Calendar, and even from the names by which it is designated in Scripture. Thus
in its reference to the harvest it is called ‘the feast of ingathering’ (
The Feast of Tabernacles was the third of the great annual
festivals, at which every male in Israel was to appear before the Lord in the
place which He should choose. It fell on the 15th of the seventh month, or
Tishri (corresponding to September or the beginning of October), as the Passover
had fallen on the 15th of the first month. The significance of these numbers in
themselves and relatively will not escape attention, the more so that this feast
closed the original festive calendar; for Purim and ‘the feast of the dedication
of the Temple,’ which both occurred later in the season, were of post-Mosaic
origin. The Feast of Tabernacles, or, rather (as it should be called), of
‘booths,’ lasted for seven days—from the 15th to the 21st Tishri—and was
followed by an Octave on the 22nd Tishri. But this eighth day, though closely
connected with the Feast of Tabernacles, formed no part of that feast, as
clearly shown by the difference in the sacrifices and the ritual, and by the
circumstance that the people no longer lived in ‘booths.’ The first day of the
feast, and also its Octave, or Azereth (clausura, conclusio), were to be
days of ‘holy convocation’ (
There is yet another important point to be noticed. The
‘Feast of Tabernacles’ followed closely on the Day of Atonement. Both took place
in the seventh month; the one on the 10th, the other on the 15th of Tishri. What
the seventh day, or Sabbath, was in reference to the week, the seventh month
seems to have been in reference to the year. It closed not only the sacred
cycle, but also the agricultural or working year. It also marked the change of
seasons, the approach of rain and of the winter equinox, and determined alike
the commencement and the close of a sabbatical year (
Three things specially marked the Feast of Tabernacles: its
joyous festivities, the dwelling in ‘booths,’ and the peculiar sacrifices and
rites of the week. The first of these was simply characteristic of a ‘feast of
ingathering’: ‘Because the Lord thy God shall bless thee in all thine increase,
and in all the works of thine hands, therefore thou shalt surely rejoice—thou,
and thy son, and thy daughter, and thy manservant, and thy maidservant, and the
Levite, the stranger, and the fatherless, and the widow, that are within thy
gates.’ Nor were any in Israel to ‘appear before the Lord empty: every man shall
give as he is able, according to the blessing of the Lord thy God which He hath
given thee’ (
As usual, we are met at the outset by a controversy between
the Pharisees and the Sadducees. The law had it (
It has already been noticed that, according to the view universally prevalent at the time of Christ, the direction on the first day of the feast to ‘take the fruit of goodly trees, branches of palm trees, and the boughs of thick trees, and willows of the brook,’ was applied to what the worshippers were to carry in their hands. The Rabbis ruled, that ‘the fruit of the goodly trees’ meant the aethrog, or citron, and ‘the boughs of thick trees’ the myrtle, provided it had ‘not more berries than leaves.’ The aethrogs must be without blemish or deficiency of any kind; the palm branches at least three handbreadths high, and fit to be shaken; and each branch fresh, entire, unpolluted, and not taken from any idolatrous grove. Every worshipper carried the aethrog in his left hand, and in his right the lulav, or palm, with myrtle and willow branch on either side of it, tied together on the outside with its own kind, though in the inside it might be fastened even with gold thread. There can be no doubt that the lulav was intended to remind Israel of the different stages of their wilderness journey, as represented by the different vegetation—the palm branches recalling the valleys and plains, the ‘boughs of thick trees,’ the bushes on the mountain heights, and the willows those brooks from which God had given His people drink; while the aethrog was to remind them of the fruits of the good land which the Lord had given them. The lulav was used in the Temple on each of the seven festive days, even children, if they were able to shake it, being bound to carry one. If the first day of the feast fell on a Sabbath, the people brought their lulavs on the previous day into the synagogue on the Temple Mount, and fetched them in the morning, so as not needlessly to break the Sabbath rest.
The third characteristic of the Feast of Tabernacles
was its offerings. These were altogether peculiar. The sin-offering for each of
the seven days was ‘one kid of the goats.’ The burnt-offerings consisted of
bullocks, rams, and lambs, with their appropriate meat- and drink-offerings.
But, whereas the number of the rams and lambs remained the same on each day of
the festival, that of the bullocks decreased every day by one—from thirteen on
the first to seven bullocks on the last day, ‘that great day of the feast.’ As
no special injunctions are given about the drink-offering, we infer that it was,
as usually (
On the day before the Feast of Tabernacles—the 14th Tishri—the festive pilgrims had all arrived in Jerusalem. The ‘booths’ on the roofs, in the courtyards, in streets and squares, as well as roads and gardens, within a Sabbath day’s journey, must have given the city and neighbourhood an unusually picturesque appearance. The preparation of all that was needed for the festival—purification, the care of the offerings that each would bring, and friendly communications between those who were to be invited to the sacrificial meal—no doubt sufficiently occupied their time. When the early autumn evening set in, the blasts of the priests’ trumpets on the Temple Mount announced to Israel the advent of the feast.
As at the Passover and at Pentecost, the altar of burnt-offering was cleansed during the first night-watch, and the gates of the Temple were thrown open immediately after midnight. The time till the beginning of the ordinary morning sacrifice was occupied in examining the various sacrifices and offerings that were to be brought during the day. While the morning sacrifice was being prepared, a priest, accompanied by a joyous procession with music, went down to the Pool of Siloam, whence he drew water into a golden pitcher, capable of holding three log (rather more than two pints). But on the Sabbaths they fetched the water from a golden vessel in the Temple itself, into which it had been carried from Siloam on the preceding day. At the same time that the procession started for Siloam, another went to a place in the Kedron valley, close by, called Motza, whence they brought willow branches, which, amidst the blasts of the priests’ trumpets, they stuck on either side of the altar of burnt-offering, bending them over towards it, so as to form a kind of leafy canopy. Then the ordinary sacrifice proceeded, the priest who had gone to Siloam so timing it, that he returned just as his brethren carried up the pieces of the sacrifice to lay them on the altar. As he entered by the ‘Water-gate,’ which obtained its name from this ceremony, he was received by a threefold blast from the priests’ trumpets. The priest then went up the rise of the altar and turned to the left, where there were two silver basins with narrow holes—the eastern a little wider for the wine, and the western somewhat narrower for the water. Into these the wine of the drink-offering was poured, and at the same time the water from Siloam, the people shouting to the priest, ‘Raise thy hand,’ to show that he really poured the water into the basin which led to the base of the altar. For, sharing the objections of the Sadducees, Alexander Jannaeus, the Maccabean king-priest (about 95 BC), had shown his contempt for the Pharisees by pouring the water at this feast upon the ground, on which the people pelted him with their aethrogs, and would have murdered him, if his foreign body-guard had not interfered, on which occasion no less than six thousand Jews were killed in the Temple.
As soon as the wine and the water were being poured out,
the Temple music began, and the ‘Hallel’ (
Thus the Talmud says distinctly: ‘Why is the name of it called, The drawing out of water? Because of the pouring out of the Holy Spirit, according to what is said: “With joy shall ye draw water out of the wells of salvation.”’ Hence, also, the feast and the peculiar joyousness of it are alike designated as those of ‘the drawing out of water’; for, according to the same Rabbinical authorities, the Holy Spirit dwells in many only through joy.
A similar symbolism was expressed by another ceremony which
took place at the close, not of the daily, but of the festive sacrifices. On
every one of the seven days the priests formed in procession, and made the
circuit of the altar, singing: ‘O then, now work salvation, Jehovah! O Jehovah,
give prosperity’! (
We can now in some measure realise the event recorded in
But matters were not to end with the wrangling of priests
and Pharisees. The proof which Nicodemus had invited them to seek from the
teaching and the miracles of Christ was about to be displayed both before the
people and their rulers in the healing of the blind man. Here also it was in
allusion to the ceremonial of the Feast of Tabernacles that Jesus, when He saw
the ‘man blind from his birth,’ said (
At the close of the first day of the feast the worshippers descended to the Court of the Women, where great preparations had been made. Four golden candelabras were there, each with four golden bowls, and against them rested four ladders; and four youths of priestly descent held, each a pitcher of oil, capable of holding one hundred and twenty log, from which they filled each bowl. The old, worn breeches and girdles of the priests served for wicks to these lamps. There was not a court in Jerusalem that was not lit up by the light of ‘the house of water-pouring.’ The ‘Chassidim’ and ‘the men of Deed’ danced before the people with flaming torches in their hands, and sang before them hymns and songs of praise; and the Levites, with harps, and lutes, and cymbals, and trumpets, and instruments of music without number, stood upon the fifteen steps which led down from the Court of Israel to that of the Women, according to the number of the fifteen Songs of Degrees in the Book of Psalms. They stood with their instruments of music, and sang hymns. Two priests, with trumpets in their hands, were at the upper gate (that of Nicanor), which led from the Court of Israel to that of the Women. At cock-crowing they drew a threefold blast. As they reached the tenth step, they drew another threefold blast; as they entered the court itself, they drew yet another threefold blast; and so they blew as they advanced, till they reached the gate which opens upon the east (the Beautiful Gate). As they came to the eastern gate, they turned round towards the west (to face the Holy Place), and said: ‘Our fathers who were in this place, they turned their back upon the Sanctuary of Jehovah, and their faces toward the east, and they worshipped towards the rising sun; but as for us, our eyes are towards the Lord.’
A fragment of one of the hymns sung that night has been preserved. It was sung by the ‘Chassidim’ and ‘men of Deed,’ and by those who did penance in their old age for the sins of their youth:
The Chassidim and Men of Deed.
‘Oh joy, that our youth, devoted, sage,
Doth bring no shame upon our old age!’
The Penitents.
‘Oh joy, we can in our old age
Repair the sins of youth not sage!’
Both in unison.
‘Yes, happy he on whom no early guilt doth rest,
And he who, having sinned, is now with pardon blest.
It seems clear that this illumination of the Temple was
regarded as forming part of, and having the same symbolical meaning as, ‘the
pouring out of water.’ The light shining out of the Temple into the darkness
around, and lighting up every court in Jerusalem, must have been intended as a
symbol not only of the Shechinah which once filled the Temple, but of that
‘great light’ which ‘the people that walked in darkness’ were to see, and which
was to shine ‘upon them that dwell in the land of the shadow of death’ (
Only the first of the seven days of this feast was ‘a holy
convocation’; the other six were ‘minor festivals.’ On each day, besides the
ordinary morning and evening sacrifices, the festive offerings prescribed in
On the afternoon of the seventh day of the feast the people
began to remove from the ‘booths.’ For at the Octave, on the 22nd of Tishri,
they lived no longer in booths, nor did they use the lulav. But it was
observed as ‘a holy convocation’; and the festive sacrifices prescribed in
It will have been observed that the two most important
ceremonies of the Feast of Tabernacles—the pouring out of water and the
illumination of the Temple—were of post-Mosaic origin. According to Jewish
tradition, the pillar of cloud by day and of fire by night had first appeared to
Israel on the 15th of Tishri, the first day of the feast. On that day also Moses
was said to have come down from the Mount, and accounted to the people that the
Tabernacle of God was to be reared among them. We know that the dedication of
Solomon’s Temple and the descent of the Shechinah took place at this feast (
Whether or not our suggestions be adopted as to the typical meaning of the two great ceremonies of the ‘pouring out of the water’ and the Temple illumination, the fact remains, that the Feast of Tabernacles is the one only type in the Old Testament which has not yet been fulfilled.
‘Let no man
therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holy day, or of
the new moon, or of the Sabbath: which are a shadow of things to come; but the
body is of Christ.’—
Scarcely any other festive season could have left so
continuous an impress on the religious life of Israel as the ‘New Moons.’
Recurring at the beginning of every month, and marking it, the solemn
proclamation of the day, by—’It is sanctified,’ was intended to give a hallowed
character to each month, while the blowing of the priests’ trumpets and the
special sacrifices brought, would summon, as it were, the Lord’s host to offer
their tribute unto their exalted King, and thus bring themselves into
‘remembrance’ before Him. Besides, it was also a popular feast, when families,
like that of David, might celebrate their special annual sacrifice (
We have already shown of what importance the right determination of the new moon was in fixing the various festivals of the year, and with what care and anxiety its appearance was ascertained from witnesses who had actually seen it; also how the tidings were afterwards communicated to those at a distance. For the new moon was reckoned by actual personal observation, not by astronomical calculation, with which, however, as we know, many of the Rabbis must have been familiar, since we read of astronomical pictures, by which they were wont to test the veracity of witnesses. So important was it deemed to have faithful witnesses, that they were even allowed, in order to reach Jerusalem in time, to travel on the Sabbath, and, if necessary, to make use of horse or mule (Mish. Rosh ha Sh. i. 9; iii. 2). While strict rules determined who were not to be admitted as witnesses, every encouragement was given to trustworthy persons, and the Sanhedrim provided for them a banquet in a large building specially destined for that purpose, and known as the Beth Yaazek.
In the law of God only these two things are enjoined in the
observance of the ‘New Moon’—the ‘blowing of trumpets’ (
Besides the ‘blowing of trumpets,’ certain festive
sacrifices were ordered to be offered on the New Moon (
When we pass from these simple Scriptural directions to what tradition records of the actual observance of ‘New Moons’ in the Temple, our difficulties increase. For this and New Year’s Day are just such feasts, in connection with which superstition would most readily grow up, from the notions which the Rabbis had, that at changes of seasons Divine judgments were initiated, modified, or finally fixed.
Modern critics have not been sufficiently careful in
distinguishing what had been done in the Temple from what was introduced into
the synagogue, gradually and at much later periods. Thus, prayers which date
long after the destruction of Jerusalem have been represented as offered in the
Temple, and the custom of chanting the ‘Hallel’ (
If any special prayers were said in the Temple on New
Moons’ Days, tradition has not preserved them, the only formula dating from that
period being that used on first seeing the moon—’Blessed be He who reneweth the
months.’ To this the synagogue, towards the close of the third century, added
the following: ‘Blessed be He by whose word the heavens were created, and by the
breath of whose mouth all the hosts thereof were formed! He appointed them a law
and time, that they should not overstep their course. They rejoice and are glad
to perform the will of their Creator, Author of truth; their operations are
truth! He spoke to the moon, Be thou renewed, and be the beautiful diadem (i.e.
the hope) of man (i.e. Israel), who shall one day be quickened again like the
moon (i.e. at the coming of Messiah), and praise their Creator for His glorious
kingdom. Blessed be He who reneweth the moons.’ At a yet much later period, a
very superstitious prayer was next inserted, its repetition being accompanied by
leaping towards the moon! New Moon’s Day, though apparently observed in the time
of Amos as a day of rest (
Quite distinct from the other new moons, and more sacred
than they, was that of the seventh month, or Tishri, partly on
account of the symbolical meaning of the seventh or sabbatical month, in which
the great feasts of the Day of Atonement and of Tabernacles occurred, and
partly, perhaps, because it also marked the commencement of the civil year,
always supposing that, as Josephus and most Jewish writers maintain, the
distinction between the sacred and civil year dates from the time of Moses.
In Scripture this feast is designated as the ‘memorial
blowing’ (
The Mishnah, which devotes a special tractate to
this feast, remarks that a year may be arranged according to four different
periods; the first, beginning with the 1st of Nisan, being for ‘kings’ (to
compute taxation) and for computing the feasts; the second, on the 1st of Elul
(the sixth month), for tithing flocks and herds, any animal born after that not
being reckoned within the previous year; the third, on the 1st of Tishri (the
seventh month), for the Civil, the Sabbatical, and the Jubilee year, also for
trees and herbs; and lastly, that on the 1st of Shebat (the eleventh month), for
all fruits of trees. Similarly, continues the Mishnah, there are four
seasons when judgment is pronounced upon the world: at the Passover, in regard
to the harvest; at Pentecost, in regard to the fruits of trees; on the Feast of
Tabernacles, in regard to the dispensation of rain; while on ‘New Year’s Day all
the children of men pass before Him like lambs (when they are counted for the
tithing), as it is written (
To this we may add, as a comment of the Talmud, that on New
Year’s Day three books were opened—that of life, for those whose works
had been good; another of death, for those who had been thoroughly evil; and a
third, intermediate, for those whose case was to be decided on the Day of
Atonement (ten days after New Year), the delay being granted for repentance, or
otherwise, after which their names would be finally entered, either in the book
of life, or in that of death. By these terms, however, eternal life or death are
not necessarily meant; rather earthly well-being, and, perhaps, temporal life,
or the opposite. It is not necessary to explain at length on what Scriptural
passages this curious view about the three books is supposed to rest.
But so deep and earnest are the feelings of the Rabbis on
this matter, that by universal consent the ten days intervening between New Year
and the Day of Atonement are regarded as ‘days of repentance.’ Indeed, from a
misunderstanding of a passage in the Mishnah (Sheb. i. 4, 5), a
similar superstition attaches to every new moon, the day preceding it being kept
by rigid Jews as one of fasting and repentance, and called the ‘Lesser Day of
Atonement.’ In accordance with this, the Rabbis hold that the blowing of the
trumpets is intended, first, to bring Israel, or rather the merits of the
patriarchs and God’s covenant with them, in remembrance before the Lord;
secondly, to be a means of confounding Satan, who appears on that day specially
to accuse Israel; and, lastly, as a call to repentance—as it were, a blast to
wake men from their sleep of sin (Maimonides, Moreh Nev. iii. 43).
During the whole of New Year’s Day, trumpets and horns were
blown in Jerusalem from morning to evening. In the Temple it was done, even on a
Sabbath, but not outside its walls. Since the destruction of Jerusalem this
restriction has been removed, and the horn is blown in every synagogue, even
though the feast fall upon a Sabbath. It has already been hinted that the
instruments used were not the ordinary priests’ trumpets, but horns. The
Mishnah holds that any kind of horns may be blown except those of oxen or
calves, in order not to remind God of the sin of the golden calf! The Mishnah,
however, specially mentions the straight horn of the antelope and the bent horn
of the ram; the latter with special allusion to the sacrifice in substitution of
Isaac, it being a tradition that New Year’s Day was that in which Abraham,
despite Satan’s wiles to prevent or retard him, had offered up his son Isaac on
Mount Moriah. The mouthpiece of the horns for New Year’s Day were fitted with
gold—those used on fast days with silver. Another distinction was this—on New
Year’s Day those who blew the horn were placed between others who blew the
trumpets, and the sound of the horn was prolonged beyond that of the trumpets;
but on fast days those who sounded the trumpets stood in the middle, and their
blast was prolonged beyond that of the horn. For the proper observance of these
solemn seasons, it was deemed necessary not only to hear but to listen to the
sound of the horns, since, as the Mishnah adds, everything depends on the
intent of the heart, not on the mere outward deed, just as it was not Moses
lifting up his hands that gave Israel the victory, nor yet the lifting up of the
brazen serpent which healed, but the upturning of the heart of Israel to ‘their
Father who is in heaven’—or faith (Rosh ha Sh. iii. 8). We quote the
remark, not only as one of the comparatively few passages in the Mishnah
which turn on the essence of religion, but as giving an insight into the most
ancient views of the Rabbis on these types, and as reminding us of the memorable
teaching of our Lord to one of those very Rabbis (
The Mishnah (Rosh ha Sh. iv. 5, etc.)
mentions various ‘Berachoth’ or ‘benedictions’ as having been repeated on New
Year’s Day. These, with many others of later date, still form part of the
liturgy in the synagogue for that day. But there is internal evidence that the
prayers, at any rate in their present form, could not have been used, at least,
in the Temple.
Besides, the Rabbis themselves differ as to their exact amount and contents, and finally satisfy themselves by indicating that the titles of these benedictions are rather intended as headings, to show their contents, and what special direction their prayers had taken. One set of them bore on ‘the kingdom’ of God, and is accordingly called Malchiyoth; another, the Sichronoth, referred to the various kinds of ‘remembrance’ on the part of God; while a third, called Shopharoth, consisted of benedictions, connected with the ‘blowing of the horn.’ It is said that any one who simply repeated ten passages from Scripture—according to another authority, three—bearing on ‘the kingdom of God,’ ‘the remembrance of God,’ and ‘the blowing of horns,’ had fulfilled his duty in regard to these ‘benedictions.’
From Scripture we know with what solemnity the first day of
the seventh month as observed at the time of Ezra, and how deeply moved the
people were by the public reading and explanation of the law, which to so many
of them came like a strange sound, all the more solemn, that after so long a
period they heard it again on that soil which, as it were, bore witness to its
truth (
Yet there seems some allusion to the blowing of the horn in
the writings of St. Paul. We have already stated that, according to Maimonides (Moreh
Nev. iii. c. 43), one of its main purposes was to rouse men to repentance.
In fact, the commentator of Maimonides makes use of the following words to
denote the meaning of the blowing of trumpets: ‘Rouse ye, rouse ye from your
slumber; awake, awake from your sleep, you who mind vanity, for slumber most
heavy has fallen upon you. Take it to heart, before Whom you are to give an
account in the judgment.’ May not some such formula also have been anciently
used in the synagogue; and may not the remembrance of it have been present to
the mind of the apostle, when he wrote (
‘But into the
second (tabernacle) went the high-priest alone once every year, not without
blood, which he offered for himself, and for the errors of the people . . . But
Christ being come an high-priest of good things to come . . . by His own blood He
entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for
us.’—
It may sound strange, and yet it is true, that the clearest
testimony to ‘the weakness and unprofitableness’ ‘of the commandment’ is that
given by ‘the commandment’ itself. The Levitical arrangements for the removal of
sin bear on their forefront, as it were, this inscription: ‘The law made nothing
perfect’—having neither a perfect mediatorship in the priesthood, nor a perfect
‘atonement’ in the sacrifices, nor yet a perfect forgiveness as the result of
both. ‘For the law having a shadow of good things to come, and not the very
image of the things, can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by
year continually make the comers thereunto perfect’ (
As might have been expected, this ‘weakness and
unprofitableness of the commandment’ became most apparent in the services of the
day in which the Old Testament provision for pardon and acceptance attained, so
to speak, its climax. On the Day of Atonement, not ordinary priests, but
the high-priest alone officiated, and that not in his ordinary dress, nor
yet in that of the ordinary priesthood, but in one peculiar to the day, and
peculiarly expressive of purity. The worshippers also appeared in circumstances
different from those on any other occasion, since they were to fast and to
‘afflict their souls’; the day itself was to be ‘a Sabbath of Sabbatism’
(rendered ‘Sabbath of rest’ in Authorised Version), while its central services
consisted of a series of grand expiatory sacrifices, unique in their character,
purpose, and results, as described in these words: ‘He shall make an atonement
for the holy sanctuary, and he shall make an atonement for the tabernacle of the
congregation, and for the altar, and he shall make an atonement for the priests,
and for all the people of the congregation’ (
The names ‘Day of Atonement,’ or in the Talmud, which
devotes to it a special tractate, simply ‘the day’ (perhaps also in
It took place on the tenth day of the seventh month (Tishri),
that is, symbolically, when the sacred or Sabbath of months had just attained
its completeness. Nor must we overlook the position of that day relatively to
the other festivals. The seventh or sabbatical month closed the festive cycle,
the Feast of Tabernacles on the 15th of that month being the last in the year.
But, as already stated, before that grand festival of harvesting and
thanksgiving Israel must, as a nation, be reconciled unto God, for only a people
at peace with God might rejoice before Him in the blessing with which He had
crowned the year. And the import of the Day of Atonement, as preceding the Feast
of Tabernacles, becomes only more striking, when we remember how that feast of
harvesting prefigured the final ingathering of all nations. In connection with
this point it may also be well to remember that the Jubilee Year was always
proclaimed on the Day of Atonement (
In briefly reviewing the Divine ordinances about this day
(
From
Seven days before the Day of Atonement the high-priest left
his own house in Jerusalem, and took up his abode in his chambers in the Temple.
A substitute was appointed for him, in case he should die or become Levitically
unfit for his duties. Rabbinical punctiliousness went so far as to have him
twice sprinkled with the ashes of the red heifer—on the 3rd and the 7th day of
his week of separation—in case he had unwittingly to himself, been defiled by a
dead body (
During the whole of that week, also, he had to practise the
various priestly rites, such as sprinkling the blood, burning the incense,
lighting the lamp, offering the daily sacrifice, etc. For, as already stated,
every part of that day’s services devolved on the high-priest, and he must not
commit any mistake. Some of the elders of the Sanhedrim were appointed to see to
it, that the high-priest fully understood, and knew the meaning of the service,
otherwise they were to instruct him in it. On the eve of the Day of Atonement
the various sacrifices were brought before him, that there might be nothing
strange about the services of the morrow. Finally, they bound him by a solemn
oath not to change anything in the rites of the day. This was chiefly for fear
of the Sadducean notion, that the incense should be lighted before the
high-priest actually entered into the Most Holy Place; while the Pharisees held
that this was to be done only within the Most Holy Place itself.
The evening meal of the high-priest before the great day was to be scanty. All night long he was to be hearing and expounding the Holy Scriptures, or otherwise kept employed, so that he might not fall asleep (for special Levitical reasons). At midnight the lot was cast for removing the ashes and preparing the altar; and to distinguish the Day of Atonement from all others, four, instead of the usual three, fires were arranged on the great altar of burnt-offering.
The services of the day began with the first streak of
morning light. Already the people had been admitted into the sanctuary. So
jealous were they of any innovation or alteration, that only a linen cloth
excluded the high-priest from public view, when, each time before changing his
garments, he bathed—not in the ordinary place of the priests, but in one
specially set apart for his use. Altogether he changed his raiments and washed
his whole body five times on that day,
When the first dawn of morning was announced in the usual
manner, the high-priest put off his ordinary (layman’s) dress, bathed, put on
his golden vestments, washed his hands and feet, and proceeded to perform all
the principal parts of the ordinary morning service. Tradition has it, that
immediately after that, he offered certain parts of the burnt-sacrifices for the
day, viz. the bullock and the seven lambs, reserving his own ram and that of the
people, as well as the sin-offering of a kid of the goats (
The morning service finished, the high-priest washed his
hands and feet, put off his golden vestments, bathed, put on his ‘linen
garments,’ again washed his hands and feet, and proceeded to the peculiar part
of the day’s services. The bullock for his sin-offering stood between the
Temple-porch and the altar. It was placed towards the south, but the
high-priest, who stood facing the east (that is, the worshippers), turned the
head of the sacrifice towards the west (that is, to face the sanctuary). He then
laid both his hands upon the head of the bullock, and confessed as
follows:—’Ah, JEHOVAH! I have committed iniquity; I have transgressed; I have
sinned—I and my house. Oh, then, JEHOVAH, I entreat Thee, cover over (atone
for, let there be atonement for) the iniquities, the transgressions, and the
sins which I have committed, transgressed, and sinned before Thee, I and my
house—even as it is written in the law of Moses, Thy servant: “For, on that day
will He cover over (atone) for you to make you clean; from all your
transgressions before JEHOVAH ye shall be cleansed.”’ It will be noticed that in
this solemn confession the name JEHOVAH occurred three times. Other three times
was it pronounced in the confession which the high-priest made over the same
bullock for the priesthood; a seventh time was it uttered when he cast the lot
as to which of the two goats was to be ‘for JEHOVAH’; and once again he spoke it
three times in the confession over the so-called ‘scape-goat’ which bore the
sins of the people. All these ten times the high-priest pronounced the
very name of JEHOVAH, and, as he spoke it, those who stood near cast themselves
with their faces on the ground, while the multitude responded: ‘Blessed be the
Name; the glory of His kingdom is for ever and ever’ (in support of this
benediction, reference is made to
The first part of the expiatory service—that for the
priesthood—had taken place close to the Holy Place, between the porch and the
altar. The next was performed close to the worshipping people. In the eastern
part of the Court of Priests, that is, close to the worshippers, and on the
north side of it, stood an urn, called Calpi, in which were two lots of
the same shape, size, and material—in the second Temple they were of gold; the
one bearing the inscription ‘la-JEHOVAH,’ for Jehovah, the other ‘la-Azazel,’
for Azazel, leaving the expression (
The lot having designated each of the two goats, the
high-priest tied a tongue-shaped piece of scarlet cloth to the horn of the goat
for Azazel—the so-called ‘scape-goat’—and another round the throat of the goat
for Jehovah, which was to be slain. The goat that was to be sent forth was now
turned round towards the people, and stood facing them, waiting, as it were,
till their sins should be laid on him, and he would carry them forth into ‘a
land not inhabited.’ Assuredly a more marked type of Christ could not be
conceived, as He was brought forth by Pilate and stood before the people, just
as He was about to be led forth, bearing the iniquity of the people. And, as if
to add to the significance of the rite, tradition has it that when the sacrifice
was fully accepted the scarlet mark which the scape-goat had borne became white,
to symbolise the gracious promise in
With this presentation of the scape-goat before the people commenced the third and most solemn part of the expiatory services of the day. The high-priest now once more returned towards the sanctuary, and a second time laid his two hands on the bullock, which still stood between the porch and the altar, to confess over him, not only as before, his own and his household’s sins, but also those of the priesthood. The formula used was precisely the same as before, with the addition of the words, ‘the seed of Aaron, Thy holy people,’ both in the confession and in the petition for atonement. Then the high-priest killed the bullock, caught up his blood in a vessel, and gave it to an attendant to keep it stirring, lest it should coagulate. Advancing to the altar of burnt-offering, he next filled the censer with burning coals, and then ranged a handful of frankincense in the dish destined to hold it. Ordinarily, everything brought in actual ministry unto God must be carried in the right hand—hence the incense in the right and the censer in the left. But on this occasion, as the censer for the Day of Atonement was larger and heavier than usual, the high-priest was allowed to reverse the common order. Every eye was strained towards the sanctuary as, slowly bearing the censer and the incense, the figure of the white-robed high-priest was seen to disappear within the Holy Place. After that nothing further could be seen of his movements.
The curtain of the Most Holy Place was folded back, and the
high-priest stood alone and separated from all the people in the awful gloom of
the Holiest of All, only lit up by the red glow of the coals in the priest’s
censer. In the first Temple the ark of God had stood there with the ‘mercy-seat’
over-shadowing it; above it, the visible presence of Jehovah in the cloud of the
Shechinah, and on either side the outspread wings of the cherubim; and
the high-priest had placed the censer between the staves of the ark. But in the
Temple of Herod there was neither Shechinah nor ark—all was empty; and
the high-priest rested his censer on a large stone, called the
‘foundation-stone.’ He now most carefully emptied the incense into his hand, and
threw it on the coals of the censer, as far from himself as possible, and so
waited till the smoke had filled the Most Holy Place. Then, retreating
backwards, he prayed outside the veil as follows:
While the incense was offering in the Most Holy Place the people withdrew from proximity to it, and worshipped in silence. At last the people saw the high-priest emerging from the sanctuary, and they knew that the service had been accepted. Rapidly he took from the attendant, who had kept it stirring, the blood of the bullock. Once more he entered into the Most Holy Place, and sprinkled with his finger once upwards, towards where the mercy-seat had been, and seven times downwards, counting as he did so : ‘Once’ (upwards), ‘once and once’ (downwards), ‘once and twice’ and so on to ‘once and seven times,’ always repeating the word ‘once,’ which referred to the upwards sprinkling, so as to prevent any mistake. Coming out from the Most Holy Place, the high-priest now deposited the bowl with the blood before the veil. Then he killed the goat set apart for Jehovah, and, entering the Most Holy Place a third time, sprinkled as before, once upwards and seven times downwards, and again deposited the bowl with the blood of the goat on a second golden stand before the veil. Taking up the bowl with the bullock’s blood, he next sprinkled once upwards and seven times downwards towards the veil, outside the Most Holy Place, and then did the same with the blood of the goat. Finally, pouring the blood of the bullock into the bowl which contained that of the goat, and again the mixture of the two into that which had held the blood of the bullock, so as thoroughly to commingle the two, he sprinkled each of the horns of the altar of incense, and then, making a clear place on the altar, seven times the top of the altar of incense. Thus he had sprinkled forty-three times with the expiatory blood, taking care that his own dress should never be spotted with the sin-laden blood. What was left of the blood the high-priest poured out on the west side of the base of the altar of burnt-offering.
By these expiatory sprinklings the high-priest had cleansed
the sanctuary in all its parts from the defilement of the priesthood and the
worshippers. The Most Holy Place, the veil, the Holy Place, the altar of
incense, and the altar of burnt-offering were now clean alike, so far as the
priesthood and as the people were concerned; and in their relationship to the
sanctuary both priests and worshippers were atoned for. So far as the law could
give it, there was now again free access for all; or, to put it otherwise, the
continuance of typical sacrificial communion with God was once more restored and
secured. Had it not been for these services, it would have become impossible for
priests and people to offer sacrifices, and so to obtain the forgiveness of
sins, or to have fellowship with God. But the consciences were not yet
free from a sense of personal guilt and sin. That remained to be done through
the ‘scape-goat.’ All this seems clearly implied in the distinctions made in
Most solemn as the services had hitherto been, the worshippers would chiefly think with awe of the high-priest going into the immediate presence of God, coming out thence alive, and securing for them by the blood the continuance of the Old Testament privileges of sacrifices and of access unto God through them. What now took place concerned them, if possible, even more nearly. Their own personal guilt and sins were now to be removed from them, and that in a symbolical rite, at one and the same time the most mysterious and the most significant of all. All this while the ‘scape-goat,’ with the ‘scarlet-tongue,’ telling of the guilt it was to bear, had stood looking eastwards, confronting the people, and waiting for the terrible load which it was to carry away ‘unto a land not inhabited.’ Laying both his hands on the head of this goat, the high-priest now confessed and pleaded: ‘Ah, JEHOVAH! they have committed iniquity; they have transgressed; they have sinned—Thy people, the house of Israel. Oh, then, JEHOVAH! cover over (atone for), I entreat Thee, upon their iniquities, their transgressions, and their sins, which they have wickedly committed, transgressed, and sinned before Thee—Thy people, the house of Israel. As it is written in the law of Moses, Thy servant, saying: “For on that day shall it be covered over (atoned) for you, to make you clean from all your sins before JEHOVAH ye shall be cleansed.”’ And while the prostrate multitude worshipped at the name of Jehovah, the high-priest turned his face towards them as he uttered the last words, ‘Ye shall be cleansed!’ as if to declare to them the absolution and remission of their sins.
Then a strange scene would be witnessed. The priests led
the sin-burdened goat out through ‘Solomon’s Porch,’ and, as tradition has it,
through the eastern gate, which opened upon the Mount of Olives.
Here an arched bridge spanned the intervening valley, and
over it they brought the goat to the Mount of Olives, where one, specially
appointed for the purpose, took him in charge. Tradition enjoins that he should
be a stranger, a non-Israelite, as if to make still more striking the type of
Him who was delivered over by Israel unto the Gentiles! Scripture tells us no
more of the destiny of the goat that bore upon him all the iniquities of the
children of Israel, than that they ‘shall send him away by the hand of a fit man
into the wilderness,’ and that ‘he shall let go the goat in the wilderness’ (
What then was the meaning of a rite on which such momentous
issue depended? Everything about it seems strange and mysterious—the lot that
designated it, and that ‘to Azazel’; the fact, that though the highest of all
sin-offerings, it was neither sacrificed nor its blood sprinkled in the Temple;
and the circumstance that it really was only part of a sacrifice—the two
goats together forming one sacrifice, one of them being killed, and the other
‘let go,’ there being no other analogous case of the kind except at the
purification of a leper, when one bird was killed and the other dipped in its
blood, and let go free. Thus these two sacrifices—one in the removal of what
symbolically represented indwelling sin, the other contracted guilt—agreed in
requiring two animals, of whom one was killed, the other ‘let go.’ This is not
the place to discuss the various views entertained of the import of the
scape-goat. But it is destructive of one and all of the received
interpretations, that the sins of the people were confessed not on the goat
which was killed, but on that which was ‘let go in the wilderness,’ and that it
was this goat—not the other—which ‘bore upon him all the iniquities’ of the
people. So far as the conscience was concerned, this goat was the real and the
only sin-offering ‘for all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all
their transgressions in all their sins,’ for upon it the high-priest laid the
sins of the people, after he had by the blood of the bullock and of the other
goat ‘made an end of reconciling the Holy Place, and the tabernacle of the
congregation, and the altar’ (
Thus viewed, not only the text of
‘And for this cause He is the mediatory of a new covenant,
in order that, death having taken place for the propitiation of the
transgressions under the first covenant, they which have been called may receive
the promise of the eternal inheritance’ (
This is not the place for following the argument further.
Once understood, many passages will recur which manifest how the Old Testament
removal of sin was shown in the law itself to have been complete indeed, so far
as the individual was concerned, but not really and in reference to God, till He
came to Whom as the reality these types pointed, and Who ‘now once at the end of
the world hath been manifested to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself’ (
After this it is comparatively of secondary importance to
discuss, so far as we can in these pages, the question of the meaning of the
term ‘la-Azazel’ (
While the scape-goat was being led into the wilderness, the
high-priest proceeded to cut up the bullock and the goat with whose blood he had
previously ‘made atonement,’ put the ‘inwards’ in a vessel which he committed to
an attendant, and sent the carcasses to be burnt ‘outside the city,’ in the
place where the Temple ashes were usually deposited. Then, according to
tradition, the high-priest, still wearing the linen garments,
A series of prayers accompanied this reading of the Scriptures. The most interesting of these supplications may be thus summed up:—Confession of sin with prayer for forgiveness, closing with the words, ‘Praise be to Thee, O Lord, Who in Thy mercy forgivest the sins of Thy people Israel‘; prayer for the permanence of the Temple, and that the Divine Majesty might shine in it, closing with—’Praise be to Thee, O Lord, Who inhabitest Zion‘; prayer for the establishment and safety of Israel, and the continuance of a king among them, closing—’Thanks be to Thee, O Lord, Who hast chosen Israel‘; prayer for the priesthood, that all their doings, but especially their sacred services, might be acceptable unto God, and He be gracious unto them, closing with—’Thanks be to Thee, O Lord, Who hast sanctified the priesthood‘; and, finally (in the language of Maimonides), prayers, entreaties, hymns, and petitions of the high-priest’s own, closing with the words: ‘Give help, O Lord, to Thy people Israel, for Thy people needeth help; thanks be unto Thee, O Lord, Who hearest prayer.’
These prayers ended, the high-priest washed his hands and
feet, put off his ‘linen,’ and put on his ‘golden vestments,’ and once more
washed hands and feet before proceeding to the next ministry. He now appeared
again before the people as the Lord’s anointed in the golden garments of the
bride-chamber. Before he offered the festive burnt-offerings of the day, he
sacrificed ‘one kid of the goats for a sin-offering’ (
On his return he washed once more hands and feet, put off his linen garments, which were never to be used again, put on his golden vestments, washed hands and feet, burnt the evening incense on the golden altar, lit the lamps on the candlestick for the night, washed his hands and feet, put on his ordinary layman’s dress, and was escorted by the people in procession to his own house in Jerusalem. The evening closed with a feast.
If this ending of the Day of Atonement seems incongruous,
the Mishnah records (Taan. iv. 8) something yet more strange in
connection with the day itself. It is said that on the afternoon of the 15th of
Ab, when the collection of wood for the sanctuary was completed, and on that of
the Day of Atonement, the maidens of Jerusalem went in white garments, specially
lent them for the purpose, so that rich and poor might be on an equality, into
the vineyards close to the city, where they danced and sung. The following
fragment of one of their songs has been preserved:
We will not here undertake the melancholy task of
describing what the modern synagogue has made the Day of Atonement, nor how it
observes the occasion—chiefly in view of their gloomy thoughts, that on that
day man’s fate for the year, if not his life or death, is finally fixed. But
even the Mishnah already contains similar perverted notions of how the
day should be kept, and what may be expected from its right observance (Mish.
Yoma, viii). Rigorous rest and rigorous fasting are enjoined from sundown of
one day to the appearance of the first stars on the next. Neither food nor drink
of any kind may be tasted; a man may not even wash, nor anoint himself, nor put
on his sandals.
The sole exception made is in favour of the sick and of
children, who are only bound to the full fast—girls at the age of twelve years
and one day, and boys at that of thirteen years and one day, though it is
recommended to train them earlier to it.
In return for all this ‘affliction’ Israel may expect that
death along with the Day of Atonement will finally blot out all sins!
That is all—the Day of Atonement and our own death! Such are Israel’s highest
hopes of expiation! It is unspeakably saddening to follow this subject further
through the minutiae of rabbinical ingenuity—how much exactly the Day of
Atonement will do for a man; what proportion of his sins it will remit, and what
merely suspend; how much is left over for after-chastisements, and how much for
final extinction at death. The law knows nothing of such miserable petty
misrepresentations of the free pardon of God. In the expiatory sacrifices of the
Day of Atonement every kind
Yet annually anew, and each time confessedly only
provisionally, not really and finally, till the gracious promise (
‘And it was at
Jerusalem the feast of the dedication, and it was winter. And Jesus walked in
the Temple in Solomon’s Porch.’—
Besides the festivals mentioned in the Law of Moses, other festive seasons were also observed at the time of our Lord, to perpetuate the memory either of great national deliverances or of great national calamities. The former were popular feasts, the latter public fasts. Though most, if not all of them, are alluded to in the Canonical Scriptures, it is extremely difficult to form a clear idea of how they were kept in the Temple. Many of the practices connected with them, as described in Jewish writings, or customary at present, are of much later date than Temple times, or else apply rather to the festive observances in the various synagogues of the land than to those in the central sanctuary. And the reason of this is evident. Though those who were at leisure might like to go to Jerusalem for every feast, yet the vast majority of the people would, except on the great festivals, naturally gather in the synagogues of their towns and villages. Moreover, these feasts and fasts were rather national than typical—they commemorated a past event instead of pointing forward to a great and world-important fact yet to be realised. Lastly, being of later, and indeed, of human, not Divine institution, the authorities at Jerusalem did not venture to prescribe for them special rites and sacrifices, which, as we have seen, constituted the essence of Temple worship.
Arranging these various feasts and fasts in the order of their institution and importance, we have:—
1. The Feast of Purim, that is ‘of lots,’ or the
Feast of Esther, also called in
Even this shows that Purim was never more than a
popular festival. As such it was kept with great merriment and rejoicing, when
friends and relations were wont to send presents to each other. There seems
little doubt that this was the ‘feast of the Jews,’ to which the Saviour ‘went
up to Jerusalem’ (
So far as we can gather, the religious observances of Purim commenced with a fast—’the Fast of Esther’—on the 13th of Adar. But if Purim fell on a Sabbath or a Friday, the fast was relegated to the previous Thursday, as it was not lawful to fast either on a Sabbath or the day preceding it. But even so, there were afterwards disputes between the Jews in Palestine and the much larger and more influential community that still resided in Babylon as to this fast, which seem to throw doubt on its very early observance. On the evening of the 13th of Adar, or rather on the beginning of the 14th, the Book of Esther, or the Megillah (‘the roll,’ as it is called par excellence), was publicly read, as also on the forenoon of the 14th day, except in ancient walled cities, where it was read on the 15th. In Jerusalem, therefore, it would be read on the evening of the 13th, and on the 15th—always provided the day fell not on a Sabbath, on which the Megillah was not allowed to be read. In the later Jewish calendar arrangements care was taken that the first day of Purim should fall on the first, the third, the fifth, or the sixth day of the week. Country people, who went into their market towns every week on the Monday and Thursday, were not required to come up again specially for Purim, and in such synagogues the Megillah, or at least the principal portions of it, was read on the previous Thursday. It was also allowed to read the Book of Esther in any language other than the Hebrew, if spoken by the Jews resident in the district, and any person, except he were deaf, an idiot or a minor, might perform this service. The prayers for the occasion now used in the synagogue, as also the practice of springing rattles and other noisy demonstrations of anger, contempt, and scorn, with which the name of Haman, where it occurs in the Megillah, is always greeted by young and old, are, of course, of much later date. Indeed, so far from prescribing any fixed form of prayer, the Mishnah (Megill. iv. 1) expressly leaves it an open question, to be determined according to the usage of a place, whether or not to accompany the reading of the Megillah with prayer. According to the testimony of Josephus (Antiq. xi. 6, 13), in his time ‘all the Jews that are in the habitable earth’ kept ‘these days festivals,’ and sent ‘portions to one another.’ In our own days, though the synagogue has prescribed for them special prayers and portions of Scripture, they are chiefly marked by boisterous and uproarious merrymaking, even beyond the limits of propriety.
2. The Feast of the Dedication of the Temple, Chanuchah
(‘the dedication’), called in
All this becomes the more interesting, when we remember, on
the one hand, the typical meaning of the Feast of Tabernacles, and on the other
that the date of the Feast of the Dedication—the 25th of Chislev—seems to have
been adopted by the ancient Church as that of the birth of our blessed
Lord—Christmas—the Dedication of the true Temple, which was the body of Jesus
(
From the hesitating language of Josephus (Antiq.
xii. 7, 7), we infer that even in his time the real origin of the practice of
illuminating the Temple was unknown. Tradition, indeed, has it that when in the
restored Temple the sacred candlestick
This, then, was pure oil, but the supply was barely
sufficient for one day—when, lo, by a miracle, the oil increased, and the
flagon remained filled for eight days, in memory of which it was ordered to
illuminate for the same space of time the Temple and private houses. A learned
Jewish writer, Dr. Herzfeld, suggests, that to commemorate the descent of fire
from heaven upon the altar in the Temple of Solomon (
The forms of prayer at present in use by the Jews are of
comparatively late date, and indeed the Karaites, who in many respects represent
the more ancient traditions of Israel, do not observe the festival at all. But
there cannot be a doubt that our blessed Lord Himself attended this festival at
Jerusalem (
3. The Feast of Wood-offering took place on the 15th
Ab (August), being the last of the nine occasions on which offerings of
wood were brought for the use of the Temple. For the other eight occasions the
Talmud names certain families as specially possessing this privilege, which they
had probably originally received ‘by lot’ at the time of Nehemiah (
The wood was first deposited in an outer chamber, where that which was worm-eaten or otherwise unfit for the altar was picked out by priests who were disqualified from other ministry. The rest was handed over to the priests who were Levitically qualified for their service, and by them stored in ‘the wood chamber.’ The 15th of Ab was observed as a popular and joyous festival. On this occasion (as on the Day of Atonement) the maidens went dressed in white, to dance and sing in the vineyards around Jerusalem, when an opportunity was offered to young men to select their companions for life. We may venture on a suggestion to account for this curious practice. According to the Talmud, the 15th of Ab was the day on which the prohibition was removed which prevented heiresses from marrying out of their own tribes. If there is any historical foundation for this, it would be very significant, that when all Israel, without any distinction of tribes or families, appeared to make their offerings at Jerusalem, they should be at liberty similarly to select their partners in life without the usual restrictions.
4. Fasts—These may be arranged into public
and private, the latter on occasions of personal calamity or felt need.
The former alone can here claim our attention. Properly speaking, there was only
one Divinely-ordained public fast, that of the Day of Atonement. But it was
quite in accordance with the will of God, and the spirit of the Old Testament
dispensation, that when great national calamities had overtaken Israel, or great
national wants arose, or great national sins were to be confessed, a day of
public fasting and humiliation should be proclaimed (see for example,
Besides these four, the Day of Atonement, and the Fast of
Esther, the Jewish calendar at present contains other twenty-two fast-days. But
that is not all. It was customary to fast twice a week (
In Jerusalem they gathered at the eastern gate, and seven
times
In other towns, they only blew horns. After prayer, the
people retired to the cemeteries to mourn and weep. In order to be a proper
fast, it must be continued from one sundown till after the next, when the stars
appeared, and for about twenty-six hours the most rigid abstinence from all food
and drink was enjoined. Most solemn as some of these ordinances sound, the
reader of the New Testament knows how sadly all degenerated into mere formalism
( Of the three sects or
schools the Pharisees were here the strictest, being in this also at the
opposite pole from the Sadducees. The fasts of the Essenes were indeed even more
stringent, and almost constant, but they were intended not to procure merit,
but to set the soul free from the bondage of the body, which was regarded as the
seat of all sin. Besides the above-mentioned fast, and one of all the firstborn
on the eve of every Passover, such of the ‘men of the station’ as went not up to
Jerusalem with their company fasted on the Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and
Thursday, in their respective synagogues, and prayed for a blessing on their
brethren and on the people. They connected their fasts and prayers with the
section in Further particulars would
lead us from a description of the Temple-services to those of the synagogue. But
it is interesting to note how closely the Roman Church has adopted the practices
of the synagogue. In imitation of the four Jewish fasts mentioned in
‘And Jesus saith
unto him, See thou tell no man; but go thy way, show thyself to the priest, and
offer the gift that Moses commanded, for a testimony unto them.’—
Festive seasons were not the only occasions which brought worshippers to Jerusalem. Every trespass and sin, every special vow and offering, and every defilement called them to the Temple. All the rites then enjoined are full of deep meaning. Selecting from them those on which the practice of the Jews at the time of Christ casts a special light, our attention is first called to a service, distinguished from the rest by its unique character.
1. The purification from the defilement of death by the
ashes of the red heifer (
On bringing her offering, she would enter the Temple
through ‘the gate of the first-born,’ and stand in waiting at the Gate of
Nicanor, from the time that the incense was kindled on the golden altar. Behind
her, in the Court of the Women, was the crowd of worshippers, while she herself,
at the top of the Levites’ steps, which led up to the great court, would witness
all that passed in the sanctuary. At last one of the officiating priests would
come to her at the gate of Nicanor, and take from her hand the ‘poor’s offering’
(so it is literally called in the Talmud), which she had brought. The morning
sacrifice was needed; and but few would linger behind while the offering for her
purification was actually made. She who brought it mingled prayer and
thanksgiving with the service. And now the priest once more approached her, and,
sprinkling her with the sacrificial blood, declared her cleansed. Her
‘first-born’ was next redeemed at the hand of the priest, with five shekels of
silver;
And when, with grateful heart, and solemnised in spirit, she descended those fifteen steps where the Levites were wont to sing the ‘Hallel,’ a sudden light of heavenly joy filled the heart of one who had long been in waiting ‘for the consolation of Israel.’ If the Holy Spirit had revealed it to just and devout Simeon, that he ‘should not see death before he had seen the Lord’s Christ,’ who should vanquish death, it was the same Spirit, who had led him up into the Temple ‘when the parents brought in the child Jesus, to do for Him after the custom of the law.’ Then the aged believer took the Divine Babe from His mother’s into his own arms. He felt that the faithful Lord had truly fulfilled His word. Content now to depart in peace, he blessed God from the fulness of a grateful heart, for his eyes had seen His salvation—’a light to lighten the Gentiles,’ and the ‘glory of His people Israel.’ But Joseph and Mary listened, wondering, to the words which fell from Simeon’s lips.
Such was the service of purification connected with the
origin of life. Yet it was not nearly so solemn or important as that for the
removal of defilement from contact with death. A stain attached indeed to the
spring of life; but death, which cast its icy shadow from the gates of Paradise
to those of Hades, pointed to the second death, under whose ban every one lay,
and which, if unremoved, would exercise eternal sway. Hence defilement by the
dead was symbolically treated as the greatest of all. It lasted seven days; it
required a special kind of purification; and it extended not only to those who
had touched the dead, but even to the house or tent where the body had lain, and
all open vessels therein. More than that, to enter such a house; to come into
contact with the smallest bone, or with a grave;
Nay, he who was thus defiled in turn rendered everything
unclean which he touched (
In general, Jewish writers distinguish six degrees,
which they respectively term, according to their intensity, the ‘fathers of
fathers,’ the ‘fathers,’ and the ‘first,’ ‘second,’ ‘third,’ and ‘fourth
children of defilement.’ They enumerate in all twenty-nine ‘fathers of
defilement,’ arising from various causes, and of these no less than eleven arise
from some contact with a dead body. Hence also the law made here exceptional
provision for purification. ‘A red heifer without spot,’ that is, without any
white or black hair on its hide, without ‘blemish, and on which never yoke
came,’ was to be sacrificed as a sin-offering (
From all these provisions it is evident that as death carried with it the greatest defilement, so the sin-offering for its purification was in itself and in its consequences the most marked. And its application must have been so frequently necessary in every family and circle of acquaintances that the great truths connected with it were constantly kept in view of the people. In general, it may here be stated, that the laws in regard to defilement were primarily intended as symbols of spiritual truths, and not for social, nor yet sanitary purposes, though such results would also flow from them. Sin had rendered fellowship with God impossible; sin was death, and had wrought death, and the dead body as well as the spiritually dead soul were the evidence of its sway.
It has been well pointed out (by Sommers, in his Bibl.
Abh. vol. i. p. 201, etc.), that all classes of Levitical defilement can
ultimately be traced back to death, with its two great outward symptoms, the
corruption which appears in the skin on the surface of the body, and to which
leprosy may be regarded as akin, and the fluxes from the dead body, which have
their counterpart in the morbid fluxes of the living body. As the direct
manifestation of sin which separates man from God, defilement by the dead
required a sin-offering, and the ashes of the red heifer are expressly so
designated in the words: ‘It is a sin-offering’ (
But it differs from all other sin-offerings. The sacrifice
was to be of pure red colour; one ‘upon which never came yoke’;
These particulars symbolically point to life in its freshness, fulness, and fruitfulness—that is, the fullest life and the spring of life. But what distinguished it even more from all others was, that it was a sacrifice offered once for all (at least so long as its ashes lasted); that its blood was sprinkled, not on the altar, but outside the camp towards the sanctuary; and that it was wholly burnt, along with cedarwood, as the symbol of imperishable existence, hyssop, as that of purification from corruption, and ‘scarlet,’ which from its colour was the emblem of life. Thus the sacrifice of highest life, brought as a sin-offering, and, so far as possible, once for all, was in its turn accompanied by the symbols of imperishable existence, freedom from corruption, and fulness of life, so as yet more to intensify its significance. But even this is not all. The gathered ashes with running water were sprinkled on the third and seventh days on that which was to be purified. Assuredly, if death meant ‘the wages of sin,’ this purification pointed, in all its details, to ‘the gift of God,’ which is ‘eternal life,’ through the sacrifice of Him in whom is the fulness of life.
And here there is a remarkable analogy between three sacrifices, which, indeed, form a separate group. The scape-goat, which was to remove the personal guilt of the Israelites—not their theocratic alienation from the sanctuary; the red heifer, which was to take away the defilement of death, as that which stood between God and man; and the ‘living bird,’ dipped in ‘the water and the blood,’ and then ‘let loose in the field’ at the purification from leprosy, which symbolised the living death of personal sinfulness, were all, either wholly offered, or in their essentials completed outside the sanctuary. In other words, the Old Testament dispensation had confessedly within its sanctuary no real provision for the spiritual wants to which they symbolically pointed; their removal lay outside its sanctuary and beyond its symbols. Spiritual death, as the consequence of the fall, personal sinfulness, and personal guilt lay beyond the reach of the Temple-provision, and pointed directly to Him who was to come. Every death, every case of leprosy, every Day of Atonement, was a call for His advent, as the eye, enlightened by faith, would follow the goat into the wilderness, or watch the living bird as, bearing the mingled blood and water, he winged his flight into liberty, or read in the ashes sprung from the burning of the red heifer the emblem of purification from spiritual death. Hence, also, the manifest internal connection between these rites. In the sacrifices of the Day of Atonement and of the purified leper, the offering was twofold, one being slain, the other sent away alive, while the purification from leprosy and from death had also many traits in common.
Lastly, all these sacrifices equally defiled those who took
part in their offering,
Thus, also, we understand why the red heifer as, so to
speak, the most intense of sin-offerings, was wholly burnt outside the
camp, and other sin-offerings only partially so (
This is not the place more fully to vindicate the views
here propounded. Without some deeper symbolical meaning attaching to them, the
peculiarities of the sin-offering of the red heifer would indeed be well-nigh
unintelligible. This must be substantially the purport of a Jewish tradition to
the effect that King Solomon, who knew the meaning of all God’s ordinances, was
unable to understand that of the red heifer. A ‘Haggadah’ maintains that the
wisest of men had in
Even more particular are the Rabbis to secure that the sacrifice be properly offered (Parah, iii. iv.). Seven days before, the priest destined for the service was separated and kept in the Temple—in ‘the House of Stoves’—where he was daily sprinkled with the ashes—as the Rabbis fable—of all the red heifers ever offered. When bringing the sacrifice, he was to wear his white priestly raiments. According to their tradition, there was an arched roadway leading from the east gate of the Temple out upon the Mount of Olives—double arched, that is, arched also over the supporting pillars, for fear of any possible pollution through the ground upwards. Over this the procession passed. On the Mount of Olives the elders of Israel were already in waiting. First, the priest immersed his whole body, then he approached the pile of cedar-, pine-, and fig-wood which was heaped like a pyramid, but having an opening in the middle, looking towards the west. Into this the red heifer was thrust, and bound, with its head towards the south and its face looking to the west, the priest standing east of the sacrifice, his face, of course, also turned westwards. Slaying the sacrifice with his right hand, he caught up the blood in his left. Seven times he dipped his finger in it, sprinkling it towards the Most Holy Place, which he was supposed to have in full view over the Porch of Solomon or through the eastern gate. Then, immediately descending, he kindled the fire. As soon as the flames burst forth, the priest, standing outside the pit in which the pile was built up, took cedarwood, hyssop, and ‘scarlet’ wool, asking three times as he held up each: ‘Is this cedarwood? Is this hyssop? Is this scarlet?’ so as to call to the memory of every one the Divine ordinance. Then tying them together with the scarlet wool, he threw the bundle upon the burning heifer. The burnt remains were beaten into ashes by sticks or stone mallets and passed through coarse sieves; then divided into three parts—one of which was kept in the Temple-terrace (the Chel), the other on the Mount of Olives, and the third distributed among the priesthood throughout the land.
The next care was to find one to whom no suspicion of
possible defilement could attach, who might administer purification to such as
needed it. For this purpose a priest was not required; but any one—even a
child—was fit for the service. In point of fact, according to Jewish tradition,
children were exclusively employed in this ministry. If we are to believe the
Mishnah (Parah, iii. 2-5), there were at Jerusalem certain dwellings
built upon rocks, that were hollowed beneath, so as to render impossible
pollution from unknown graves beneath. Here the children destined for this
ministry were to be born, and here they were reared and kept till fit for their
service. Peculiar precautions were adopted in leading them out to their work.
The child was to ride on a bullock, and to mount and descend it by boards. He
was first to proceed to the Pool of Siloam,
Dismounting, he would approach the ‘Beautiful Gate,’ where
the vessel with the ashes of the red heifer was kept. Next a goat would be
brought out, and a rope, with a stick attached to it, tied between its horns.
The stick was put into the vessel with the ashes, the goat driven backwards, and
of the ashes thereby spilt the child would take for use in the sacred service so
much as to be visible upon the water. It is only fair to add, that one of the
Mishnic sages, deprecating a statement which might be turned into ridicule by
the Sadducees, declares that any clean person might take with his hand from the
vessel so much of the ashes as was required for the service. The purification
was made by sprinkling with hyssop. According to the Rabbis (Parah, xi.
9), three separate stalks, each with a blossom on it, were tied together, and
the tip of these blossoms dipped into the water of separation, the hyssop itself
being grasped while sprinkling the unclean. The same authorities make the most
incredible assertion that altogether, from the time of Moses to the final
destruction of the Temple, only seven, or else nine, such red heifers had been
offered: the first by Moses, the second by Ezra, and the other five, or else
seven, between the time of Ezra and that of the taking of Jerusalem by the
Romans. We only add that the cost of this sacrifice, which was always great,
since a pure red heifer was very rare,
Those who lived in the country would, for purification from defilement by the dead, come up to Jerusalem seven days before the great festivals, and, as part of the ashes were distributed among the priesthood, there could never be any difficulty in purifying houses or vessels.
2. After what has already been explained, it is not
necessary to enter into details about the purification of the leper, for
which this, indeed, is not the place. Leprosy was not merely the emblem of sin,
but of death, to which, so to speak, it stood related, as does our actual
sinfulness to our state of sin and death before God. Even a Rabbinical saying
ranks lepers with those who may be regarded as dead.
They were excluded from ‘the camp of Israel,’ by which, in
later times, the Talmudists understood all cities walled since the days of
Joshua, who was supposed to have sanctified them. Lepers were not allowed to go
beyond their proper bounds, on pain of forty stripes. For every place which a
leper entered was supposed to be defiled. They were, however, admitted to the
synagogues, where a place was railed off for them, ten handbreadths high and
four cubits wide, on condition of their entering the house of worship before the
rest of the congregation, and leaving it after them (Negaim, xiii. 12).
It was but natural that they should consort together. This is borne out by such
passages as
The Mishnic tractate, Negaim, enters into most wearisome details on the subject of leprosy, as affecting persons or things. It closes by describing the ceremonial at its purification. The actual judgment as to the existence of leprosy always belonged to the priest, though he might consult any one who had knowledge of the matter. Care was to be taken that no part of the examination fell on the Sabbath, nor was any on whom the taint appeared to be disturbed either during his marriage week, or on feast days. Great precautions were taken to render the examination thorough. It was not to be proceeded with early in the morning, nor ‘between the evenings,’ nor inside the house, nor on a cloudy day, nor yet during the glare of midday, but from 9 a.m. to 12 o’clock noon, and from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m.; according to Rabbi Jehudah, only at 10 or 11 o’clock a.m., and at 2 and 3 o’clock p.m. The examining priest must neither be blind of an eye, nor impaired in sight, nor might he pronounce as to the leprosy of his own kindred. For further caution, judgment was not to be pronounced at the same time about two suspicious spots, whether on the same or on different persons.
A very curious mistake by writers on typology here requires
passing notice. It is commonly supposed
If this interpretation were correct, the priest would have
had to declare what was simply untrue! And, mark, it is not a question
about cleansing one who had been a leper, but about declaring such an one
clean, that is, not a leper at all, while yet the malady covered his whole body
from head to foot! Nor does even the doctrinal analogy, for the sake of which
this strange view must have been adopted, hold good. For to confess oneself, or
even to present oneself as wholly covered by the leprosy of sin, is not yet to
be cleansed—that requires purification by the blood of Christ. Moreover, the
Old Testament type speaks of being clean, not of cleansing; of being
non-leprous, not of being purified from leprosy! The correct interpretation of
But where, in the Divine mercy, one really leprous had been
restored, the law (
This will appear from an attentive study of the ceremonial
of purification, as described in the Mishnah (Negaim, xiii.). The
priest having pronounced the former leper clean, a quarter of a log (the log
rather less than a pint) of ‘living water’ was poured into an earthenware dish.
Then two ‘clean birds’ were taken—the Rabbis say two sparrows
Next, cedar-wood, hyssop, and scarlet wool were taken and
tied together (as at the burning of the red heifer), and dipped, along with the
living bird, which was seized by the tips of his wings and of his tail, into the
blood-stained water, when the person to be purified was sprinkled seven times on
the back of his hand, or, according to others, on his forehead. Upon this the
living bird was set free, neither towards the sea, nor towards the city, nor
towards the wilderness, but towards the fields. Finally, the leper had all the
hair on his body shorn with a razor, after which he washed his clothes, and
bathed, when he was clean, though still interdicted his house
The first stage of purification had now been completed, and
the seven days’ seclusion served as preparation for the second stage. The former
might take place anywhere, but the latter required the attendance of the
purified leper in the sanctuary. It began on the seventh day itself, when the
purified leper had again all his hair shorn, as at the first, washed his
clothes, and bathed. The Mishnah remarks (Negaim, xiv. 4) that
three classes required this legal tonsure of all hair—lepers, Nazarites, and
the Levites at their consecration—a parallel this between the purified lepers
and the Levites, which appears even more clearly in their being anointed on the
head with oil (
Though not of any special importance, we may add that, according to the Mishnah, as in the analogous case of the two goats for the Day of Atonement, the two birds for the leper were to be of precisely the same colour, size, and value, and, if possible, bought on the same day—to mark that the two formed integral parts of one and the same service; the cedar-wood was to be one cubit long and ‘the quarter of a bedpost’ thick; the hyssop of the common kind, that is, not such as had any other bye-name, as Grecian, Roman, ornamental, or wild; while the scarlet wool was to be a shekel’s weight. The rest of the ceremonial we give in the words of the Mishnah itself (Negaim, xiv. 7, etc.):—’On the eighth day the leper brings three sacrifices—a sin-, a trespass-, and a burnt-offering, and the poor brings a sin- and a burnt-offering of a bird. He stands before the trespass-offering, lays his hands upon it, and kills it. Two priests catch up the blood—one in a vessel, the other in his hand. He who catches it up in the vessel goes and throws it on the side of the altar, and he who catches it in his hand goes and stands before the leper. And the leper, who had previously bathed in the court of the lepers, goes and stands in the gate of Nicanor. Rabbi Jehudah says:—He needs not to bathe. He thrusts in his head (viz. into the great court which he may not yet enter), and the priest puts of the blood upon the tip of his ear; he thrusts in his hand, and he puts it upon the thumb of his hand; he thrusts in his foot, and he puts it upon the great toe of his foot. Rabbi Jehudah says:—He thrusts in the three at the same time. If he have lost his thumb, great toe, or right ear, he cannot ever be cleansed. Rabbi Eliezer says:—The priest puts in on the spot where it had been. Rabbi Simeon says:—If it be applied on the corresponding left side of the leper’s body, it sufficeth. The priest now takes from the log of oil and pours it into the palm of his colleague—though if he poured it into his own it were valid. He dips his finger and sprinkles seven times towards the Holy of Holies, dipping each time he sprinkles. He goes before the leper; and on the spot where he had put the blood he puts the oil, as it is written, “upon the blood of the trespass-offering.” And the remnant of the oil that is in the priest’s hand, he pours on the head of him that is to be cleansed, for an atonement; if he so puts it, he is atoned for, but if not, he is not atoned for. So Rabbi Akiba. Rabbi Jochanan, the son of Nuri, saith:—This is only the remnant of the ordinance—whether it is done or not, the atonement is made; but they impute it to him (the priest?) as if he had not made atonement.’
3. It still remains to describe the peculiar ceremonial
connected with the purification of a wife from the suspicion of adultery.
Strictly speaking, there was no real offering connected with this. The
rites (
According to the Mishnah, which devotes to this
subject a special tractate (Sotah), a wife could not be brought to this
solemn trial unless her husband have previously warned her, in presence of two
witnesses, against intercourse with one whom he suspected, and also two
witnesses had reported that she had contravened his injunction. The Rabbis,
moreover, insist that the command must have been express, that it only applied
to intercourse out of reach of public view, and that the husband’s charge to his
wife before witnesses should be preceded by private and loving admonition.
But if, after all this, she had left such warning unheeded,
her husband had first to bring her before the Sanhedrim of his own place, who
would dispatch two of their scholars with the couple to Jerusalem, where they
were to appear before the Great Sanhedrim. The first endeavour of that tribunal
was to bring the accused by any means to make confession. If she did so, she
only lost what her husband had settled upon her, but retaind her own portion.
If she persisted in her innocence, she was brought through
the eastern gate of the Temple, and placed at the gate of Nicanor, where the
priest tore off her dress to her bosom, and dishevelled her hair. If she wore a
white dress, she was covered with black; if she had ornaments, they were taken
from her, and a rope put round her neck. Thus she stood, exposed to the gaze of
all, except her own parents. all this to symbolise the Scriptural warning (
The waving of the woman’s offering was done in the usual
manner, but opinions differ whether she had to drink ‘the bitter water’ before
or after part of her offering had been burned on the altar. If before the
writing was washed into the water she refused to take the test, her offering was
scattered among the ashes; similarly, if she confessed herself guilty. But if
she insisted on her innocence after the writing was washed, she was forced to
drink the water. The Divine judgment was supposed to overtake the guilty sooner
or later, as some thought, according to their other works. The wave-offering
belonged to the priest, except where the suspected woman was the wife of a
priest, in which case the offering was burned. If a husband were deaf or insane,
or in prison, the magistrates of the place would act in his stead in insisting
on a woman clearing herself of just suspicion. An adulteress was prohibited from
living with her seducer. It is beside our purpose further to enter into the
various legal determinations of the Mishnah. But it is stated that, with
the decline of morals in Palestine, the trial by the ‘water of jealousy’
gradually ceased (in accordance with what we read in
‘But now is Christ
risen from the dead, the firstfruits of them that sleep.’ . . . ‘These were
purchased from among men—the firstfruits unto God and to the Lamb.’—
‘If a man vow a vow unto Jehovah, or swear an oath to bind
his soul with a bond, he shall not profane his word; he shall do according to
all that hath proceeded out of his mouth’ (
It lies on the surface, that all vows were limited by
higher obligations. A man could not have vowed anything that was not fairly his
own; hence, according to the Mishnah, neither what of his fortune he owed
to others, nor his widow’s portion, nor yet what already of right belonged unto
the Lord (
Such ‘beasts’ ‘whereof men bring an offering,’ went to the
altar; all others, as well as any other thing dedicated, were to be valued by
the priest, and might be redeemed on payment of the price, together with
one-fifth additional, or else were sold for behoof of the Temple treasury (
In the latter times of the Temple such vows, made either thoughtlessly, or from Pharisaical motives, became painfully frequent, and called forth protests on the part of those who viewed them in a more reverent and earnest spirit. Thus it is said, that the high-priest, Simeon the Just—to whom tradition ascribes so much that is good and noble—declared that he had uniformly refused, except in one instance, to partake of the trespass-offering of Nazarites, since such vows were so often made rashly, and the sacrifice was afterwards offered reluctantly, not with pious intent. A fair youth, with beautiful hair, had presented himself for such a vow, with whom the high-priest had expostulated: ‘My son, what could have induced thee to destroy such splendid hair?’ To which the youth replied: ‘I fed my father’s flock, and as I was about to draw water for it from a brook, I saw my wraith, and the evil spirit seized and would have destroyed me (probably by vanity). Then I exclaimed: Miserable fool, why boastest thou in a possession which does not belong to thee, who art so soon to be the portion of maggots and worms? By the Temple! I cut off my hair, to devote it to God.’ ‘Upon this,’ said Simeon, ‘I rose and kissed him on the forehead, saying, Oh that many in Israel were like thee! Thou hast truly, and in the spirit of the Law, made this vow according to the will of God.’
That great abuses crept in appears even from the large
numbers who took them. Thus the Talmud records that, in the days of King Jannai
no fewer than 300 Nazarites presented themselves before Simeon, the son of
Shetach. Moreover, a sort of traffic in good works, like that in the Romish
Church before the Reformation, was carried on. It was considered meritorious to
‘be at charges’ for poor Nazarites, and to defray the expenses of their
sacrifices. King Agrippa, on arriving at Jerusalem, seems to have done this to
conciliate popular favour (Jos. Antiq. xix. 6. 1). A far holier motive
than this influenced St. Paul (
1. The law concerning the Nazarite vow (
We have, therefore, in the Nazarite, the three ideas of
separation, holiness, and the crown of the royal priesthood, all closely
connected. With this agree the threefold obligations incumbent on a Nazarite. He
was to be not only a priest, but one in a higher and more intense sense, since
he became such by personal consecration instead of by mere bodily descent. If
the priest was to abstain from wine during his actual ministration in the
sanctuary, the Nazarite must during the whole period of his vow refrain from all
that belongs to the fruit of the vine, ‘from the kernels even to the husk’ (
According to the Mishnah (tractate Nazir),
all epithets of, or allusions to, the Nazarite vow, carried its obligation. Thus
if one said, ‘I will be it! or, I will be a beautiful one!’—with reference to
the long hair—or made any similar allusion, he had legally taken upon him the
vow. If taken for an indefinite period, or without express declaration of the
time, the vow lasted for thirty days, which was the shortest possible time for a
Nazarite. There were, however, ‘perpetual Nazarites,’ the Mishnah
distinguishing between an ordinary ‘perpetual Nazarite’ and a ‘Samson-Nazarite.’
Both were ‘for life,’ but the former was allowed occasionally to shorten his
hair, after which he brought the three sacrifices. He could also be defiled by
the dead, in which case he had to undergo the prescribed purification. But as
Samson had not been allowed under any circumstances to poll his hair, and as he
evidently had come into contact with death without afterwards undergoing any
ceremonial (
To prevent even the accidental removal of hair, the Rabbis
forbade the use of a comb (Naz. vi. 3). According to the Law, defilement
from death annulled the previous time of the vow, and necessitated certain
offerings. To this the Mishnah adds, that if anyhow the hair were cut, it
annulled the previous time of a vow up to thirty days (the period of an
indefinite vow), while it is curiously determined that the use of anything
coming from the vine did not interrupt the vow. Another Rabbinical
contravention of the spirit of the law was to allow Nazarites the use of all
intoxicating liquors other than what came from the vine (such as palm-wine,
etc.). Lastly, the Mishnah determines that a master could not annul the
Nazarite vow of his slave; and that, if he prevented him from observing it, the
slave was bound to renew it on attaining his liberty. The offerings of a
Nazarite on the completion of his vow are explicitly described in
The breast, the fore-leg, the boiled shoulder, and the
waved cake and wafer, belonged to the priests—the remaining bread and meat were
eaten by the Nazarite. Lastly, the expression, ‘besides that that his hand shall
get,’ after mention of the other offerings (
Scripture mentions three Nazarites for life: Samson,
Samuel, and John the Baptist, to which Christian tradition adds the name of
James the Just, ‘the brother of the Lord,’ who presided over the Church at
Jerusalem when Paul joined in the Nazarite-offering (Eusebius, Eccl. Hist.
ii. 23. 3). In this respect it is noteworthy that, among those who urged upon
Paul to ‘be at charges’ with the four Christian Nazarites, James himself is not
specially mentioned (
2. Properly speaking, the offering of the firstfruits
belonged to the class of religious and charitable contributions, and falls
within our present scope only in so far as certain of them had to be presented
in the Temple at Jerusalem. Two of these firstfruit offerings were public
and national; viz. the first omer, on the second day of the
Passover, and the wave-loaves at Pentecost. The other two kinds of
‘firstfruits’—or Reshith, ‘the first, the beginning’—were offered on
the part of each family and of every individual who had possession in Israel,
according to the Divine directions in
The distinction is convenient, but not strictly correct, since the Terumoth also included vegetables and garden produce (Ter. ii. 5; iii. 1; x. 5). Still less accurate is the statement of modern writers that the Greek term Protogennemata corresponds to Biccurim, and Aparchai to Terumoth, an assertion not even supported by the use of those words in the version of the Septuagint, which is so deeply tinged with traditionalism.
Adopting, however, the distinction of the terms, for
convenience sake, we find that the Biccurim (primitiva) were only
to be brought while there was a national Sanctuary (
The Biccurim were only presented in the Temple, and
belonged to the priesthood there officiating at the time, while the Terumoth
might be given to any priest in any part of the land. The Mishnah holds
that, as according to
If the distance of the offerer from Jerusalem was too great, the figs and grapes might be brought in a dried state.
The amount of the Biccurim was not fixed in the
Divine Law, any more than of the wheat which was to be left in the corners of
the fields in order to be gleaned by the poor.
But according to the Rabbis in both these cases
one-sixtieth was to be considered as the minimum. From
In the class Terumoth we may also include the
Reshith or ‘first of the fleece’ (
Of course, neither tithes, nor Biccurim, nor
Terumoth, were to be given of what already belonged to the Lord, nor of what
was not fairly the property of a person. Thus if only the trees, but not the
land in which they grew, belonged to a man, he would not give firstfruits. If
proselytes, stewards, women, or slaves brought firstfruits, the regular service
was not gone through, since such could not have truthfully said either one or
other of these verses (
Biccurim, Terumoth, and what was to be left in the ‘corners’ of the fields for the poor were always set apart before the tithing was made. If the offering of ‘firstfruits’ had been neglected, one-fifth was to be added when they were brought. Thus the prescribed religious contributions of every Jewish layman at the time of the second Temple were as follows: Biccurim and Terumoth, say two percent; from the ‘first of the fleece,’ at least five shekels’ weight; from the ‘first of the dough,’ say four per cent; ‘corners of the fields’ for the poor, say two per cent; the first, or Levitical tithe, ten per cent; the second, or festival tithe, to be used at the feasts in Jerusalem, and in the third and sixth years to be the ‘poor’s tithe,’ ten per cent; the firstling of all animals, either in kind or money-value; five shekels for every first-born son, provided he were the first child of his mother, and free of blemish; and the half-shekel of the Temple-tribute. Together, these amounted to certainly more than the fourth of the return which an agricultural population would have. And it is remarkable, that the Law seems to regard Israel as intended to be only an agricultural people—no contribution being provided for from trade or merchandise. Besides these prescribed, there were, of course, all manner of voluntary offerings, pious works, and, above all, the various sacrifices which each, according to his circumstances or piety, would bring in the Temple at Jerusalem.
Having thus explained the nature of the various religious contributions, it only remains to describe the mode in which the Biccurim or ‘firstfruits,’ were ordinarily set apart, and the ceremonial with which they were brought to Jerusalem, and offered in the Temple. Strictly speaking, the presentation of the firstfruits was an act of family religion. As in the first omer at the Passover, and by the Pentecostal loaves, Israel as a nation owned their God and King, so each family, and every individual separately acknowledged, by the yearly presentation of the firstfruits, a living relationship between them and God, in virtue of which they gratefully received at His hands all they had or enjoyed, and solemnly dedicated both it and themselves to the Lord. They owned Him as the Giver and real Lord of all, and themselves as the recipients of His bounty, the dependents on His blessing, and the stewards of His property. Their daily bread they would seek and receive only at His hand, use it with thanksgiving, and employ it in His service; and this, their dependence upon God, was their joyous freedom, in which Israel declared itself the redeemed people of the Lord.
As a family feast the presentation of the firstfruits would enter more than any other rite into family religion and family life. Not a child in Israel—at least of those who inhabited the Holy Land—could have been ignorant of all connected with this service, and that even though it had never been taken to the beautiful ‘city of the Great King,’ nor gazed with marvel and awe at the Temple of Jehovah. For scarcely had a brief Eastern spring merged into early summer, when with the first appearance of ripening fruit, whether on the ground or on trees, each household would prepare for this service. The head of the family—if we may follow the sketch in the harvest-picture of the household of the Shunammite—accompanied by his child, would go into his field and mark off certain portions from among the most promising of the crop. For only the best might be presented to the Lord, and it was set apart before it was yet ripe, the solemn dedication being, however, afterwards renewed, when it was actually cut. Thus, each time any one would go into the field, he would be reminded of the ownership of Jehovah, till the reapers cut down the golden harvest. So, also, the head of the house would go into his vineyards, his groves of broad-leaved fig-trees, of splendid pomegranates, rich olives and stately palms, and, stopping short at each best tree, carefully select what seemed the most promising fruit, tie a rush round the stem, and say: ‘Lo, these are the firstfruits.’ Thus he renewed his covenant-relationship to God each year as ‘the winter was past, the rain over and gone, the flowers appeared on the earth, the time of the singing of birds was come, and the voice of the turtle was heard in the land, the fig-tree put forth his green figs, and the vines with the tender grapes gave a good smell.’ And as these fruits gradually ripened, the ceremonies connected first with setting them apart, and then with actually offering them, must have continued in every Israelitish household during the greater portion of the year, from early spring till winter, when the latest presentation might be made in the Temple on the 25th Kislev (corresponding to our December).
Of course every family could not always have sent its
representatives to Jerusalem. But this difficulty was provided for. It will be
remembered that as the priests and the Levites, so all Israel, were divided into
twenty-four courses, who were represented in the Sanctuary by the so-called
’standing men,’ or ‘men of the station.’ This implied a corresponding division
of the land into twenty-four districts or circuits. In the capital of each
district assembled those who were to go up with the firstfruits to the Temple.
Though all Israel were brethren, and especially at such times would have been
welcomed with the warmest hospitality each home could offer, yet none might at
that season avail himself of it. For they must camp at night in the open air,
and not spend it in any house, lest some accidental defilement from the dead, or
otherwise, might render them unfit for service, or their oblation unclean. The
journey was always to be made slowly, for the pilgrimage was to be a joy and a
privilege, not a toil or weariness. In the morning, as the golden sunlight
tipped the mountains of Moab, the stationary man of the district, who was the
leader, summoned the ranks of the procession in the words of
And so they passed through the length and breadth of the
land, everywhere wakening the echoes of praise. As they entered the city, they
sang
As they reached the Temple Mount, each one, whatever his
rank or condition, took one of the baskets on his shoulder, and they ascended,
singing that appropriate hymn (
Turning from this to what may be called its higher
application, under the Christian dispensation, we find that the word rendered
‘firstfruits’ occurs just seven times in the New Testament. These seven passages
are:
‘Glory to God on account of all things.’—St. Chrysostom.
Did The Lord Institute His ‘Supper’ On The Paschal Night?
The question, whether or not the Savior instituted His Supper during the meal of the Paschal night, although not strictly belonging to the subject treated in this volume, is too important, and too nearly connected with it, to be cursorily passed over. The balance of learned opinion, especially in England, has of late inclined against this view. The point has been so often and so learnedly discussed that I do not presume proposing to myself more than the task of explaining my reasons for the belief that the Lord instituted His ‘Supper’ on the very night of the Paschal Feast, and that consequently His crucifixion took place on the first day of Unleavened Bread, the 15th of Nisan.
From the writers on the other side, it may here be convenient to select Dr. Farrar, as alike the latest and one of the ablest expositors of the contrary position. His arguments are stated in a special Excursus appended to his Life of Christ. At the outset it is admitted on both sides, ‘that our Lord was crucified on Friday and rose on Sunday;’ and, further, that our Lord could not have held a sort of anticipatory Paschal Supper in advance of all the other Jews, a Paschal Supper being only possible on the evening of the 14th Nisan, with which, according to Jewish reckoning, the 15th Nisan began. Hence it follows that the Last Supper which Christ celebrated with His disciples must have either been the Paschal Feast, or an ordinary supper, at which He afterwards instituted His own special ordinance. Now, the conclusions at which Dr. Farrar arrives are thus summed up by him’ ‘That Jesus ate His last supper with the disciples on the evening of Thursday, Nisan 13, i.e. at the time when, according to Jewish reckoning, the 14th of Nisan began; that this supper was not, and was not intended to be, the actual Paschal meal, which neither was nor could be legally eaten till the following evening; but by a perfectly natural identification, and one which would have been regarded as unimportant, the Last Supper, which was a quasi-Passover, a new and Christian Passover, and one in which, as in its antitype, memories of joy and sorrow were strangely blended, got to be identified, even in the memory of the Synoptists, with the Jewish Passover, and that St. john silently but deliberately corrected this
erroneous impression, which, even in his time, had come to be generally prevalent.’ Before entering into the discussion, I must confess myself unable to agree with the a priori reasoning by which Dr. Farrar accounts for the supposed mistake of the Synoptists. Passing over the expression, that ‘the Last Supper was a quasi-Passover,’ which does not convey to me a sufficiently definite meaning, I should rather have expected that, in order to realize the obvious ‘antitype,’ the tendency of the Synoptists would have been to place the death of Christ on the evening of the 14th Nisan, when the Paschal lamb was actually slain, rather than on the 15th Nisan, twenty-four hours after that sacrifice had taken place. In other words, the typical predilections of the Synoptists would, I imagine, have led them to identify the death of Christ with the slaying of the lamb; and it seems, a priori, difficult to believe that, if Christ really died at that time, and His last supper was on the previous evening — that of the 13th Nisan, — they
should have fallen into the mistake of identifying that supper, not with His death, but with the Paschal meal. I repeat: a priori, if error there was, I should have rather expected it in the opposite direction. Indeed, the main dogmatic strength of the argument on the other side lies in the consideration that the anti-type (Christ) should have died at the same time as the type (the Paschal lamb). Dr. Farrar himself feels the force of this, and one of his strongest arguments against the view that the Last Supper took place at the Paschal meal is: ‘The sense of inherent and symbolical fitness in the dispensation which ordained that Christ should be slain on the day and at the hour appointed for the sacrifice of the Paschal lamb.’ Of all persons, would not the Synoptists have been alive: to this consideration? And, if so, is it likely that they would have fallen into the mistake with which they are charged? Would not all their tendencies have lain in the opposite direction?
But to pass to the argument itself. For the sake of clearness it will here be convenient to treat the question under three aspects: — How does the supposition that the Last Supper did not take place on the Paschal night agree with the general bearing of the whole history? What, fairly speaking, is the inference from the Synoptical Gospels? Lastly, does the account of St. John, in this matter, contradict those of the Synoptists, or is it harmonious indeed with theirs, but incomplete?
How Does The Supposition That The Last Supper Did Not Take Place On The Paschal Night Agree With The General Bearing Of The Whole History?
1. The language of the first three Evangelists, taken in its natural sense, seems dearly irreconcilable with this view. Even Dr. Farrar admits: ‘If we construe the language for the Evangelists in its plain, straightforward, simple sense, and without reference to any preconceived theories, or supposed necessities for harmonizing the different narratives, we should be led to conclude from the Synoptists that the Last Supper was the ordinary Paschal meal.’ On this point further remarks will be made in the sequel.
2. The account of the meal as given, not only by the Synoptists but also by St. John, so far as he describes it, seems to me utterly inconsistent with the idea of an ordinary supper. It is not merely one trait or another which here influences us, but the general impression produced by the whole. The preparations for the meal; the allusions to it; in short, so to speak, the whole raise mise, en scene is not that of a common supper. Only the necessities of a preconceived theory would lead one to such a conclusion. On the other hand, all is just what might have been expected, if the Evangelists had meant to describe the Paschal meal.
3. Though I do not regard such considerations as decisive,
there are, to my mind, difficulties in the way of adopting the view that Jesus
died while the Paschal lamb was being slain, far greater than those which can
attach to the other theory. On the supposition of Dr. Farrar, the crucifixion
took place on the 14th Nisan, ‘between the evenings’ of which the Paschal lamb
was slain. Being a Friday, the ordinary evening service would have commenced at
1:30 P.M., and the evening sacrifice offered, say, at 1:30, after which the
services connected with the Paschal lamb would immediately begin. Now it seems
to me almost inconceivable, that under such circumstances, and on so busy an
afternoon, there should have been, at the time when they must have been most
engaged, around the cross that multitude of reviling Jews, ‘likewise also the
chief priests, mocking Him, with the scribes,’ which all the four Evangelists
record. (
What, Fairly Speaking, Is The Inference From The Synoptical Gospels?
1.To this, I should say, there can be only one reply: — The
Synoptical Gospels, undoubtedly, place the Last Supper in the Paschal night. A
bare quotation of their statements will establish this: ‘Ye know that after two
days is the Passover’; (
2. Assuming, then, the testimony of the Synoptical Gospels to be unequivocally in our favor, it appears to me extremely improbable that, in such a matter, they should have been mistaken, or that such an ‘erroneous impression’ could — and this even ‘in the time of St. John’ have ‘come to be generally prevalent.’ On the contrary, I have shown that if mistake there was, it would most likely have been rather in the opposite: direction.
3. We have now to consider what Dr. Farrar calls ‘the
incidental notices preserved in the Synoptists,’ which seem to militate against
their general statement. Selecting those which are of greatest force, we have: —
(a) The fact’ that the disciples (
(b) As for the meeting of the Sanhedrim, and the violent arrest of Christ on such a night of peculiar solemnity, the fanatical hatred of the chief priests, and the supposed necessities of the case, would sufficiently account for them. On any supposition we have to admit the operation of these causes, since the Sanhedrim confessedly violated, in the trial of Jesus, every principle and form of their own criminal jurisprudence.
Lastly, We Have To Inquire: Does The Account Of St. John Contradict Those Of The Synoptists, Or Is It Harmonious, Indeed, With Them, But Incomplete?
1. Probably few would commit themselves to the statement,
that the account of St. John necessarily contradicts those of the Synoptists.
But the following are the principal reasons urged by Dr. Farrar for the
inference that, according to St. John, the Last Supper took place the evening
before the Paschal night: — (a) Judas goes, as is supposed, to buy the things
that they have need of against the feast. This has already been explained. (b)
The Pharisees ‘went not into the judgment-hall, lest they should be defiled, but
that they might eat the Passover.’ And in answer to the common explanation that
‘the Passover’ here means the 15th day, Chaigigah, he adds, in a footnote, that
‘there was nothing specifically Paschal’ about this Chaigigah. Dr. Farrar should
have paused before committing himself to such a statement. One of the most
learned Jewish writers, Dr. Saalschutz, is not of his opinion. He writes as
follows’: The whole feast and all its festive meals were designated as the
Passover. See
‘a high day,’ or ‘a great day;’ on which Dr. Farrar
comments: ‘Evidently because it was at once; a Sabbath, and the first day of the
Paschal Feast.’ Why not the second day of the feast, when the first omer was
presented in the Temple? To these may be added the following among the other
arguments advanced by Dr. Farrar: — (d) The various engagements recorded in the
Gospels on the day of Christ’s crucifixion are incompatible with a festive day
of rest, such as the 15th Nisan. The reference to ‘Simon the Cyrenian coming out
of the country’ seems to me scarcely to deserve special notice. But then Joseph
of Arimathaea bought on that day the ‘line linen’ (
On the other hand, I have now to add two arguments taken
from the masterly disquisition of the whole question by Wieseler, to show that
St. John, like the Synoptists, places the date of the crucifixion on the 15th
Nisan, and hence that of the Last Supper on the evening of the 14th
(a) Not only the Synoptists, but St. John (
2. Hitherto I have chiefly endeavored to show that the account of St. John is harmonious with that of the Synoptists in reference to the time of the Last Supper. But, on the other hand, I am free to confess that, if it had stood alone, I should not have been able to draw the same clear inference from it as from the narratives of the first three Gospels. My difficulty here arises, not from what St. John says, but from what he does not say. His words, indeed, are quite consistent with those of the Synoptists, but, taken alone, they would not have been sufficient to convey, at least to my mind, the same clear impression. And here I have to observe that St. John’s account must in this respect seem equally incomplete, whichever theory of the time of the Last Supper be adopted. If the Gospel of St. John stood alone, it would, I think, be equally difficult for Dr. Farrar to prove from it his, as for me to establish my view. He might reason from certain expressions, and so might I; but there are no such clear, unmistakable statements as those in which the Synoptists describe the Passover night as that of the Last Supper. And yet we should have expected most fullness and distinctness from St. John! Is not the inference suggested that the account in the Gospel of St. John, in the form in which we at present possess it, may be incomplete? I do not here venture to construct a hypothesis, far less to offer a matured explanation, but rather to make a suggestion of what possibly may have been, and to put it as a question to scholars. But once admit the idea, and there are, if not many, yet weighty reasons, to confirm it.
It would account for all the difficulties felt by those who have adopted the same view as Dr. Farrar, and explain, not, indeed, the supposed difference — for such I deny — but the incompleteness of St. John’s narrative, as compared with those of the Synoptists.
It explains what otherwise seems almost unaccountable. I agree with Dr. Farrar that St. John’s ‘accounts of the Last Supper are incomparably more full than those of the other Evangelists,’ and that he ‘was more immediately and completely identified with every act ill those last trying scenes than any one of the apostles.’ And yet, strange to say, on this important point St. John’s information is not only more scanty than that of the Synoptists, but so indefinite that, of alone, no certain inference could be drawn from it. The circumstance is all the more inexplicable if, as on Dr. Farrar’s theory, ‘the error’ of the Synoptists was at the time ‘generally prevalent,’ and St. John silently but deliberately,’ had set himself to correct it.
Strangest of all, the Gospel of St. John is the only one
which does not contain any account of the institution of the Lord’s Supper, and
yet, if anywhere; we would have expected to find it here. 4. The account in
Of such a possible hiatus there seems, on closer
examination, some internal confirmation, of which I shall here only adduce this
one instance — that chapter 14: concludes by, ‘Arise, let us go hence;’ which,
however, is followed by other three chapters of precious teaching and
intercessory prayer, when the narrative is abruptly resumed, by a strange
repetition, as compared with
Genesis
1:9 1:9 1:11 1:12 1:14 1:20 2:3 3:15 12:3 15 28:20 32:32 40:9-15 44:26
Exodus
12 12:3 12:6 12:8-10 12:15 12:16 12:22 12:25 12:33 12:39 13:4 13:5 13:8 13:8 15 15 16:36 19:1-3 19:5 19:5 19:6 19:6 19:7 19:8 19:10-16 19:16 19:19 20:18 22:29 23:10 23:11 23:14 23:14-16 23:14-17 23:15 23:15 23:16 23:16 23:16 23:19 23:19 24 24 25:2 25:2 25:23 25:29 25:30 25:31 25:35 29:6 29:27 30:12 30:12 30:12 30:13 30:13 30:34 32:26 32:32 34:18-20 34:18-23 34:22 34:22 34:22 34:26 34:30 35:5 35:13 36:3 36:6 39:36 40:6
Leviticus
1:3 1:3 1:9 1:9 2 2:1 2:2 2:3 2:4-7 2:9 2:10 3:1-5 3:2 3:3-5 3:4 3:5 3:8 4:3 4:3 4:4 4:6 4:8 4:11 4:12 4:13 4:14 4:15 4:17 4:20 4:22 4:23 4:25 4:28 4:31 5:1 5:6 5:11 5:11 5:11-13 5:12 5:15 6:2 6:12-16 6:17 6:17 6:20 6:20 6:20 6:21 7:1 7:3 7:11 7:11 7:12 7:12 7:12 7:14 7:16 7:29-34 7:30 7:30 7:32 7:32 7:32 7:34 8:9 8:25-29 8:26 9:3 9:15 10:12 10:15 10:17 12 12:6 12:8 13:12 13:12 13:12 13:12 13:13 13:13 13:13 13:13 14 14:1-9 14:4 14:10 14:10-20 14:12 14:12 14:12 14:13 14:21 14:24 14:29 15:14 15:29 16 16 16 16 16:2 16:3 16:3 16:3 16:4 16:5 16:8 16:8 16:10 16:10 16:13 16:20 16:20 16:21 16:21 16:21 16:21 16:22 16:24 16:26 16:26 16:26 16:31 16:33 16:33 17:11 17:11 19:20 19:23-25 21 21:11 21:12 22:12 22:23 22:29 22:30 23 23:3 23:4-22 23:5 23:5 23:6 23:7 23:10 23:11 23:11 23:11 23:15 23:15 23:15 23:16 23:16 23:17 23:19 23:19 23:20 23:21 23:24 23:24 23:24 23:25 23:26-32 23:27-32 23:32 23:32 23:32 23:32 23:34 23:35 23:36 23:39 23:39 23:39 23:39 23:40 23:42 23:43 23:43 24:7 24:8 25:5 25:6 25:8 25:9 25:9 25:11 25:23 27:2-8 27:9 27:10 27:11-27 27:16
Numbers
4:3 4:7 4:7 5:9 5:11-31 5:15 5:15 5:19 5:19-22 5:21 5:25 6 6:2 6:3 6:4 6:7 6:7 6:7 6:8 6:10 6:10-12 6:12 6:13-21 6:14 6:14 6:15 6:19 6:20 6:20 6:21 6:24-26 8:24 8:25 9:1-5 9:3 9:5 9:9-11 9:9-11 9:9-12 9:17 10:1-10 10:2 10:10 15:1-10 15:1-12 15:18-21 15:19 15:20 15:20 15:21 15:24 15:37-41 18:7 18:8 18:11 18:12 18:13 19 19:7 19:8 19:9 19:11 19:11-16 19:12 19:12 19:13 19:17 19:18 19:21 19:22 25:7 25:8 28 28:1-12 28:4 28:4 28:8 28:9 28:9 28:9 28:10 28:10 28:10 28:11 28:11-15 28:11-15 28:15 28:16 28:17 28:18 28:19-24 28:26 28:26 28:26-30 28:26-31 28:27 29 29:1 29:5 29:7-11 29:7-11 29:7-11 29:7-11 29:8-11 29:11 29:12-38 29:16 29:36-38 30:2 30:3-8 30:26-28 31:19 31:41 39:1
Deuteronomy
1:1-6 5:15 6:4-8 6:4-9 8:8 8:8 11:13-21 11:13-22 14:22 15:1-6 15:14 15:23 16:1 16:2 16:2 16:3 16:3 16:10 16:13 16:13-17 16:16 16:16 16:16 16:16 16:16 16:17 16:17 16:17 17:14 18:3 18:3 18:4 18:11 21:3 23:18 23:22-24 25:2 25:3 26:2 26:2-11 26:3 26:3 26:5-11 26:10 26:12-19 26:15 26:15 27 27:7 27:7 27:7 28 28:58 28:59 31:10 31:10 31:10 31:10-13 31:11 32 32 32:1-6 32:3 32:7-12 32:13-18 32:16 32:19-28 32:29-39 32:40-52 33:10
Joshua
Judges
1 Samuel
1:3-7 1:11 6:7 7:6 20:5 20:6 20:24 20:29
2 Samuel
1 Kings
1:33 1:38 6:1 6:38 8 8 8:2 8:2 8:28 8:30-52 8:63 9:3 10:5 21:3 21:27
2 Kings
4:23 11:9 11:12 22 23:21 25:18
1 Chronicles
6:15 9:32 9:33 16:36 18:17 23:4 23:5 23:24-27 23:28 23:28-32 23:30 24 24:10 25:6 26:6
2 Chronicles
5:3 5:12 5:12 5:13 5:14 7 7:1 7:8 7:9 8:13 8:13 8:13 13:10 13:11 20:3 23:8 24 24:6-11 29:23 30:15 30:15 30:21 30:24 35:8 35:9 36:21
Ezra
1:8 2 2:36-39 2:40-42 2:43-58 2:58 2:65 3:2 3:4 3:10 3:11 4:3 6:19 6:19 6:22 7:24 8:15 8:18 8:19 8:20 8:20
Nehemiah
2:1 7:43-45 7:60 7:67 8:1-12 8:15 8:18 10:1-27 10:31 10:32-34 10:34 10:35 11:17 12:27 12:40 13:31
Esther
Psalms
2 11:6 16:5 16:5 16:6 22 23:5 24 27:4 29 29 30 32:1 32:2 33:2 33:15 35 40:6 40:7 41 48 48:2 48:12 48:13 49 50:5 50:16 51:4 51:7 51:17 51:19 54:6 56:12 68:26 69:25 69:28 72 72 75:8 78:38 79:1 79:6 80:8 81 81 81:3 81:3 81:6 82 82:5 84:9 85:1 89 89 92 92 92 92 92 92:2 92:3 93 94 94:8 94:16 102 102 104:27 105 106 110 113 113 113 113 113 113 114 115 115 116 116 116:13 116:17 116:18 117 118 118 118 118 118:1 118:25 118:25 118:25 118:26 118:29 120 120 120 120 121 122 122:2 122:2 122:3 127:2 130 134 141:2 144:9 145:16 150 150
Proverbs
Ecclesiastes
Song of Solomon
Isaiah
1:3 1:11 1:13 1:15 1:18 1:18 1:18 2:3 5:8 8:8 9 9:2 12:3 12:3 14:2 25:6-8 30:29 37:30 52:11 52:12 52:13-53:1 53 53:6 53:7 58:1 58:13 58:13 60 61:1-3 62:4 63:9 65:7 66:23
Jeremiah
2:21 25:15 26:18-23 31:6 31:34 33:11 41:1 51:7 52:24
Lamentations
Ezekiel
1:1 7:12 9:2 9:4-6 19:10 20:12 40 44:18 44:25 46:1
Daniel
Hosea
Joel
Amos
Jonah
Micah
Zephaniah
Haggai
Zechariah
3:3 3:4 7 8 8:19 8:19 9:16 14:16-21 14:20
Malachi
Matthew
6:2 6:13 6:16 8:4 9:14 9:23 10:9 10:10 10:29 12:4 12:5 12:5 14:25 15:5 17:24 20:2 20:3 21:8 21:9 21:12 21:12 21:13 23:14 23:19 23:19 23:27 24:1 24:2 24:3 24:31 26:17 26:17 26:17 26:18 26:18 26:19 26:19 26:21 26:26 26:26-28 26:30 26:30 26:36 26:59 26:68 27:39 27:41 27:45 27:51 28:1
Mark
2:18 2:27 2:27 2:28 7:3 7:3 7:11 7:11-13 9:49 12:41 13:35 14:1 14:12 14:12-16 14:12-17 14:17 14:18 14:22 14:26 14:32 14:66 15:25 15:29 15:31 15:34 15:42 15:43 15:46 16:2
Luke
1:5 1:8-10 1:9 1:10 1:22 2:22 2:22 2:24 2:24 2:41 2:41-49 2:42 4:29 5:33 6:1 6:4 7:12 7:38 10:35 11:1 12:38 14:1 14:5 17:12 18:12 18:12 18:12 19:41 19:44 21:1 22:1 22:7-13 22:7-15 22:11 22:12 22:17 22:17 22:19 22:20 22:39 23:35 23:44 23:56 24:1 24:13
John
2:13-18 2:14 2:15 2:19 3:14 3:15 4:35 5:1 6:4 7 7:37 7:37 7:37 7:38 8 8:12 8:12 8:20 8:59 9:5 10:22 10:22 10:22 10:23 10:23 10:31 11:55 11:56 12:12 12:13 13 13:4 13:5 13:5 13:10 13:10 13:12-20 13:22 13:23 13:23 13:25 13:25 13:29 13:31 13:31 14:31 16 17 18:1 18:1 18:1 18:2 18:3 18:12 18:15 18:16 18:28 18:28 18:28 18:28 18:28 18:39 18:39 19:14 19:14 19:14 19:14 19:23 19:27 19:31 19:31 19:31 20:1 20:2 20:15 20:39-39 21:20
Acts
1:18 2 2 2:1 2:1 2:15 3:1 4:1 4:6 6:7 7 7:57 7:58 10:9 12:12 18:18 18:18 20:16 21:20-25 21:23 21:31 21:31 23:5 27:9
Romans
3:25 8:13 8:21 8:22 8:23 11:16 11:16 11:16 12:1 16:5 16:5
1 Corinthians
5:7 5:7 5:7 5:7 5:8 10:16 10:16 10:16 10:17 11:23-29 11:24 11:27 11:28 13:1 15:20 15:20 15:20-23 15:23 15:52 16:1 16:2 16:8 16:15 16:15 16:22
2 Corinthians
Ephesians
Colossians
1 Thessalonians
2 Timothy
Hebrews
4:9 5:4 5:7-9 7:19 7:26 7:27 7:27 8:4 8:5 9 9:2 9:7 9:7 9:9 9:11 9:11 9:12 9:12 9:13 9:13 9:14 9:15 9:26 9:26 10 10:1 10:1 10:1-24 10:3 10:4 10:4 10:11 10:11 10:12 10:26 10:26 10:27 13:11 13:12
James
1 Peter
1 John
Revelation
1:13 3:5 3:20 4:8 4:11 5:8 5:8 5:8 5:9 5:12 5:13 6:9 6:10 7:2 7:3 7:9 7:10 7:10-12 8:1 8:2 8:3 8:4 9:4 10:7 11 11:15 13:8 14:1-5 14:2 14:3 14:4 14:4 14:4 15:2 15:3 15:4 15:6 15:6 16:15 16:15 19:1 19:3 19:4 19:6 19:6 19:7 19:8 21:4 21:16 21:19 21:20
1 Maccabees
2 Maccabees
The cover art for this book is a derivative work of http://www.flickr.com/photos/29096601@N00/2160554010 and available for use under the Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike 3.0 license.