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By: Dr. Don Meecha, Ph.D., Th.

The Feast of Shavout (Pentecost) is the fifth of God’s Appointed Times, and the Bible describes it as a Harvest Festival. This Feast is celebrated on the 50th days after the waving of the First Fruits (Leviticus 23:15-22), the day Y’shua was raised from the dead.

On the Jewish Religious Calendar this year, Shavout is celebrated on the 6th day of Sivan, correlating to the Western calendar as Wednesday, May 23, 2007. On this day, Jewish people around the world will remember it as the day God gave the Torah to Moses abnd to the people of Israel at Mount Sinai. Oddly enough, the Bible does not state God gave the Torah on this day, but there is some excellent internal historical evidence and the fact that the Spirit was given on Shavout between 30-32 C.E. makes a direct correlation between the Law on Stone and the Law on the Heart.

However, it is more the connection between Shavout and Passover that is most uncanny. This association is a dependence based on timing. The Sadducees, I believer, were correct in their estimation that Ha Bikkurim is always the day after the the Sabbath after the Passover, which then changes the date of Shavout yearly. However, it will always be the First Day of the Week, a Sunday. This then is a good introduction to what I call the “dependence of one feast upon the other.” The Feasts build themselves one upon the other revealing God’s plan of salvation through Messiah Y’shua. The Feasts of Passover, Unleavened Bread, First Fruits and Pentecost are all linked together through congruent events and timing. The period between the waving of Ha Bikkurim (the day Y’shua rose from the dead) and the Feast of Shavout (Israel received the Torah), is called the Counting of the Omer. An omer was a unit of measure used in the ancient world for trade and commerce and also in the various Temple systems for sacrifices.

The period of time during the counting of the seven Sabbaths between Ha Bikkurim and Shavout (the Omer), is exactly the time needed to raise the spring crops to maturity and full harvest. Oddly enough, there is an interesting comparison between this timing and the actual physical journey made by the Children of Israel to get to the mountain of the Torah.

Israel left Egypt on the 14th of Nissan on the Feast of Pesach and under the Blood of the Lamb. Then, on the 15th of Nissan, Israel was in the midst of the next Feast, Unleavened Bread. This was the day after they left Egypt, and during this Feast, Israel and those who sojourned with her, were to clean out all Chametz (Leaven) from their midst. Then, for a period of seven days, they weer to have no yeast found among their dwellings. The removal of yeast from the dwelling place can be clearly see as the beginning of a new life outside of Egypt without the bondage of slavery to Pharaoh and/or as seen with spiritual eyes, freedom from sin, or slavery to Satan. With leaven seen as a symbol of sin in the Bible (Corinthians 5:6), life outside of Egypt was to be a new and fresh start in God. However, they needed preparation for a transformation.

Israel left Egypt and moved outward toward a new life. The Feast of Ha Bikkurim passed (remember: they were not yet in the Land as the future counting of the Omer ended) and Israel found themselves in the third month of their journey. The Bible states that God gave the Torah to Israel in the third month of their journey and Jewish tradition tells us God gave the Torah to Israel on the exact day of Shavout. Neither archeology nor history can give us the accurate date, but there is internal evidence in the Bible that leaves us some clues as to the veracity of this claim. In Exodus 19:1-3 we find described for us the following:

“In the third month after the sons of Israel had gone out of the land of Egypt, on that very day they came into the wilderness of Sinai. When they set out from Rephidim, they came to the wilderness of Sinai, and camped in front of the mountain. And Moses went up to God and the Lord called to him from the mountain…”

This occasion ultimately created the Nation of Israel by establishing it as a Theocracy, a nation with God as its Head. It was the day God accepted Israel as His People. He culminated this event with the giving of the Covenant and ratifying it in blood, as the author of Hebrews 9:18-19 points out:

”...The first Covenant was not inaugurated without blood. For when every commandment had been spoken by Moses to all the people according to the Law, he took the blood of calves and the goats, with water and scarlet wool and hyssop and sprinkled both the book itself and all the people.”

Once Israel entered the Land, Shavout was then the Festival of the First Harvest. As stated above, in earlier times, the harvest of the barley and grains brought into the Temple after the Counting of the Omer, according to the Bible, this is the day after the Sabbath after the Passover (the 1st days of the week, Sunday), on Ha Bikkurim, when there was to be a wave offering consisting of sheaved of grain from the field. Remember, the High Priest, on behalf of the people of Israel, waved two of these sheaved before the Lord for the people to be accepted. We must not forget that the Counting of Omer began on the Feast of First Fruits, the day Y’shua was raised from the dead. On the first day after the Sabbath after Passover, the Priest made a Wave Offering to the Lord for “the people (of Israel) to be accepted…” (Leviticus 23:11). Ha Bikkurim finds ultimate culmination in Shavout.

After Y’shua’s death, burial and resurrection, the time of the giving of the promise came and the Ruach HaKodesh was poured out on that Shavout, when the Talmudim (Disciples) spoke that Good News to all in the streets. We read, “and about 3,000 were added” in the First Harvet and all those who believed had the Law, the Torah, which was once written on stone, now written on their hearts with the indelible ink of Y’shua’s Blood.