FEAST OF TABERNACLES

KEY VERSE: They kept also the feast of tabernacles, as it is written. (Ezra 3:4)

  My mind wonders continually as I read Holy Scripture. What do these ancient stories have to do with Jesus? They do, or they would not be in the Word. Never forget that God and Jesus are One and the same. When there is interface with God in the Old Testament, human beings are communing with Jesus. People think of Jesus as the Son of God, but forget that his flesh was God’s Flesh! For the key verse, what is the significance for Christians? There are several questions from the key verse:

1)      Who are “they?”

2)      What is the feast?

3)      What is a tabernacle?

4)      What is the significance of the tabernacle?

5)      How is the feast “kept?”

6)      Where is it written?

  Standing alone with no context, the key verse has little meaning. In other words, like the eunuch who sought knowledge from Philip in the New Testament, this ancient verse needs explanation. Let’s tackle the last question first; where is it written?

And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, The fifteenth day of this seventh month shall be the feast of tabernacles for seven days unto the Lord. On the first day shall be an holy convocation: ye shall do no servile work therein. (Lev 23:33-34)

  Where is it written? By Moses as part of the Law from Leviticus 23. The feast of tabernacles is Sukkot in Hebrew and is from the Jewish month of Tishrei 15-21, ending on Roshana Rabbah – the final day of divine judgment. That period is from October 2-9 in 2020 on the Gregorian, or Christian, calendar.  Tishrei means “beginning.” It is, however, not the beginning of the lunar calendar, but the civil calendar. Judah used the civil (ecclesiastical) calendar and Israel the (lunar) calendar. Keep that in mind as the commentary continues.
  On Roshana Rabbah (the Great Supplication) the Torah (The Law) is removed from the Ark of the Covenant, and is annunciated by sounding of sofars.
  The Feast is a pilgrimage festival. For the Jews returning from the diaspora, their pilgrimage was a return to “Paradise” – to the land of milk and honey! During the week, in homage to God, there is a seven-day sabbatical with different degrees of work allowed and meals are eaten in “sukkah” (huts).
  During the pilgrimage of the Exodus, the Hebrews lived in tents, also referred to as “tabernacles.” In the center of the tabernacles was one Holy Tabernacle. God was in the grand central tabernacle, and encircling God’s Tent were the tabernacles of all the families. In the Book of Ezra, all the families of the diaspora were making their return pilgrimage. Their Sukkat was a re-enactment of the feast of Tabernacles so often celebrated on the Hebrew pilgrimage to Paradise. As Tabernacle worship was a new beginning, so was the ingathering of those Jews from the diaspora. It was a return to Paradise!
  The Feast of Tabernacles commenced by doing no work, and during it, as little as possible. It was therefore a feast not of works, but of rest. In other words, God was to do the works and serve them the bounty from His hand. The week ended with taking the Law from the Presence of God, and each year, having a new beginning, not according to the times, but according to the Ecclesiastes (the civil teachings of Moses and the writers of wisdom.) Thus, the civil or ecclesiastical calendar was more appropriate, and hence, Tishrei was the beginning of the new civil year. The Feast represented a new beginning of not doing the works in gratitude for God’s deliverance from sin, or from the harlot Babylon, as it was called in the Book of Revelation.
  “They” (from the key verse) are God’s people who were allowed to and chose to return from Babylon. None were forced to return, but they were among the number of whom God had grace upon. Those who sought God, and were elected to do so (Ezra 1) were among the number. The prize was, of course, a return to Paradise. Upon their arrival, they found that “Paradise” was not what it once was, but only its foundation was there. The assignment of the Jews was to rebuild a worldly “paradise” on the foundation where it always existed. Thus, the City of God was rebuilt on the foundation of peace – Jerusalem. The original Paradise was “Shalom” or “Salem.”
  The returning Jews were building a House for God, but New Jerusalem will be a House built for righteous men, each with their own room (John 14:2-3). The Jews who followed God were those who are the ”they” in the key verse. They were God’s peculiar and chosen people to re-build for Him a House. Christians are also the peculiar people, who are to build a House for God. It is not to be of wood and stone, but the invisible Church where Christians are the lively stones making up the pillars of the invisible Church.
  “They” (the Jews) were to keep the Feast on behalf of all mankind. Among the returning “Jews” were all sorts of pure, mixed, and servant races. They all built the Tabernacle, and they were all called by God.
  The “feast” in the key verse are things that God supplied, or the celebration of the “Great Supplication” (Roshana Rabbah). God supplied the ingredients for the Feast with minimum work of the people. God served them, and they rested from serving God as they took a sabbatical from the building of the tabernacle of wood and stone.
  People think of “tabernacles” as tents because in the wilderness of Sin, the Hebrews lived in tents. In fact, God said, in the time of Noah, “God shall enlarge Japheth, and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant” (Gen 9:27). If a person studies Ezra 1, the rebuilding of the Temple was by Gentiles (Japhethites) who would also live in the permanent “Tent” of the Jews (Shemites), and built  with servants (Canaanites). The rebuilding of the Temple signified that everyone can be God’s chosen and peculiar people!
  Tabernacles were not new things. Tabernacles are merely different types of coverings for people. Solomon’s Temple, just as the Second Temple, was intended to be a permanent House for God, and someday it will be rebuilt! In the wilderness, tabernacles were tents, or canopies, so that each family could stand in their canopy and see God in a cloud in the central Canopy.
  Tabernacle worship was an emulation of original worship! Back in the Garden, the other “trees” were the individual "tents," overall the canopy of the Garden, with God in the midst (Gen 2:9). Blind Bartmaeus, as Jesus restored his sight, “saw men; as trees walking” (Mark 8:24). I was amazed because my vision of the Garden was as trees looking at the Tree of Life in the midst of the Garden!  Of course, the Tree of Life is the manifestation of God as Jesus. Always remember; seeing Jesus is seeing God, for He is the Invisible God made manifest to mankind!
  Tabernacles are of two types: (1) The main tabernacle is where God resides, and (2) the lesser tabernacles are where human beings are blessed by and honor God who blissed them. As such, the human soul is the Tabernacle of God which Christians call “the temple of the Holy Spirit” and is Jesus’s house, tabernacle, or tent. (All in quotes as each are a representative of the soul.) When natural man’s “old decaying trees” are weary of perishing, they look toward the Tree of Life for supplication, and are born again when they see Jesus as a tree (called “pole” in John 3:14). Of course, the dead serpent on the pole represents the dead Serpent all red from the blood of Jesus which killed him. It was the false “Jesus” (Judas) that the serpent represented. Judas, who Satan entered, was the new Serpent, and like the animal that was the first “Beast.”
  The “tabernacle” is wherever God Is and where people look toward Him for His Plan for us and for a future (Jer 29:11). That answers questions #3 and #4. When those Jews returned from “sin,” there was a new beginning, and it was celebrated just as the Hebrews of the Exodus did with their expected end. The Feast of the Tabernacles is deserving of celebration by all God’s people, but there are less obvious ways that it can be celebrated.
  Question #5 is, “How is the feast kept?” It’s honoring the Law, but removing it from the Face of God. When the Glory of God was on the Ark of the Covenant, the priests withdrew the Torah (the Law) from God’s Presence. It was a modification in the terms of the Covenant. The original Abrahamic Covenant seemed to be strict obedience to the Law. God asked not for obedience with circumcision of the foreskin, but ALL the “skin,” represented as “circumcision of the heart.” The Feast represented a new beginning which Christians call “born again.” If a young man’s bar mitzvah falls during that year, the Feast of Tabernacles is when he is circumcised. Hence, Sukkot is honoring the advent of the new person, and for Christians, honoring the second birth, as the Jews were honoring the Second Temple.
  What has the Feast of Tabernacles to do with Christianity?

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. He that believeth on me, as the scripture hath said, out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. (But this spake he of the Spirit, which they that believe on him should receive: for the Holy Ghost was not yet given; because that Jesus was not yet glorified.) (John 7:37-39)

  In the year that Jesus said that, it was on Roshana Rabbah. The Jews were celebrating the “new beginning” when the Law was removed from the presence of God. Roshana Rabbah celebrates the coming of Jesus who came to fulfill the Law, and not to do away with it (Mat 5:17). Jesus spoke of the Spirit entering into the souls on those who trust him. He supplied (The Great Supplication or Feast of the Tabernacles) with his Holy Spirit.
  Note the last words of that passage; Jesus was speaking of the Spirit. Why? Because Jesus had not yet been glorified, or arisen to the Presence of his Father. If you’ll remember from his death, Jesus “gave up the Ghost” (Mark 15:37). His “Ghost” had business to do while Jesus slept; the Ghost of Jesus delivered all the sins of mankind into Hell. Once that was completed, Jesus’s Ghost and Flesh were reunited and then he ascended and was glorified (Acts 1). Immediately, Jesus’s Ghost returned, and living waters filled the Jews (Acts 2). The Church was built during Jewish Pentecost, but Jesus revealed the Plan on the last day of the Feast of Tabernacles.
  The Second Temple was not built during Sukkot, but was celebrated when the foundation was laid. Likewise, during the Feast of Tabernacles, Jesus revealed his plan to build the true Temple; that he would live in the hearts of mankind. Their souls would be his Temple, and his death was laying the foundation that he promised on Roshana Rabbah.
  What did the building for God a Second House have to do with Christianity? Rebirth! Just as God regenerated another Temple where the old once stood, His Plan was to build other “temples” in the hearts of men. Removing the Law from the Ark of God was the Jewish thought on a new beginning. It was a preview that circumcision of the foreskin was not efficacious, but circumcision of the heart truly was. Baptism is the bar mitzvahs and bat mitzvahs for Christians as representative of the living waters which cleanses. Perhaps Christians’ baptisms during the Feast of Weeks would be meaningful, as it is for the bar mitzvahs for the Jews.
  Now, study the picture of Tabernacle worship below. Replace the outlying tents with trees, all together with a huge canopy. Then substitute for the large tent in the center, the Tree of Life with its canopy in continuity with the surrounding tree canopy. It should be clear, that tabernacle, or tent, worship is much as the worship in the Garden, only with not as many living souls as there were trees in the beginning!

(Picture from truthnet.com)

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