I Shall Not Be Silent

Biblical Calendar ~ How Does God Tell Time 

“The Biblical Calendar”

A study compilation

By

Carol Drasher

When it comes to accepting or denying a biblical truth, it must be the Bible, The Word of God, which determines the Accuracy or error of any doctrine.

If the Bible seems contradictory, then we must dig deeper to uncover the mysteries in which our Father God has put before us to learn, through his Holy Spirit.

“It is harder to “UNLEARN ERROR” Than it is to learn the “REAL TRUTH.”

                                                                                             ~ unknown

Introduction to Calendars

Introduction:

A calendar is a system of organizing units of time for the purpose of reckoning time over extended periods.

There are six principal calendars in current use. These are:

·        Gregorian

·        Hebrew 

·        Islamic

·        Indian

·        Chinese

·        Julian

The principal astronomical cycles are:

·        the day (based on the rotation of the Earth on its axis)

·        the year (based on the revolution of the Earth around the Sun)

·        the month (based on the revolution of the Moon around the Earth). The complexity of calendars arises because the year does not comprise an integral number of days or an integral number of lunar months.

The civil calendar (Gregorian) in use around the world is a solar calendar based on the progression through the seasons as the Earth revolves around the Sun.

A lunar calendar bases each month on a full cycle of the Moon's phases (called a lunation or synodic month). Lunar calendars usually start each month with a New Moon or the first visible crescent moon after conjunction.

The solar year does not contain an integral number of days or an integral number of lunar months. To compensate for this effect, many calendars (called lunisolar calendars) typically adjust the length of their years and months. Without such an adjustment the seasons will steadily drift through the months.

Intercalation:

Historical records from around the world show continued efforts to build reliable lunisolar calendars. One of the methods used most often was to insert (intercalate) an extra month every few years. It might be done randomly, but usually it is not. Pick a year that starts with a New Moon and let the months run in sequence, how many lunar months pass before another year comes that starts on a New Moon? The answer is 235 lunar months - or 19 years. In other words the Full Moon appears on the same day in that year as it did 19 years earlier.

This 19 year period defines the Metonic Cycle. This cycle is useful for calendar makers. The same pattern of lunar phase and date in the year repeats every 19 years. A calendar maker needs to follow only one pattern - change the number of months for a prechosen pattern of years and repeat that pattern every 19 years. This number was so important to ancient calendar makers that the Greeks inscribed this number in golden letters on a temple in Athens - hence the term The Golden Number, G.

Today's almanacs, including The Astronomical Almanac, provide The Golden Number. As it turns out, however, the Metonic Cycle is not quite exactly 19 years. It is off by about 2 hours per cycle.

Principal Solar Calendars:

The Julian Calendar was introduced by Julius Caesar in 45 BCE and introduced a simple leap year rule: insert an extra day every four years. The Julian Calendar eventually standardized on 21 March as the date of the vernal equinox. Although this leap year rule is a simple one, it does not produce a precise match to the solar year. Over the centuries the date of the astronomical vernal equinox slowly drifted away from the date of 21 March. The ecclesiastical rules to compute the date of Easter defined 21 March as the date of the vernal equinox. The Gregorian Calendar resulted from a perceived need to reform the calculation method for the dates of Easter (see footnotes.)  Nonetheless, the Julian Calendar and variations of it are still in use by some groups to set the dates for liturgical events.

The Gregorian Calendar has become the internationally accepted civil calendar. The leap year rule for the Gregorian calendar differs slightly from one for the Julian Calendar. The Gregorian leap year rule is: Every year that is exactly divisible by four is a leap year, except for years that are exactly divisible by 100; the centurial years that are exactly divisible by 400 are still leap years. For example, the year 1900 is not a leap year; the year 2000 is a leap year. The Gregorian dates for Easter are computed from a set of ecclesiastical rules and tables.

Principal Lunar Calendars:

The Islamic Calendar is a purely lunar calendar in which months correspond to the lunar phase cycle. Thus the twelve months of the Islamic Calendar systematically shift with respect to the months of the international civil calendar. The cycle of twelve months regresses through the seasons over a period of about 33 years. For religious purposes, Muslims begin each month with the first visibility of the lunar crescent after conjunction. For civil purposes a tabulated calendar that approximates the lunar phase cycle is often used.

The astronomical date and time of each New Moon can be computed exactly; however, the time an observer first sees that young Moon cannot be computed exactly. The time the Moon first becomes visible after the conjunction depends on many factors. The various effects are the geometry of the Sun, Moon, and natural horizon; the width and surface brightness of the crescent; the absorption of the Moon's light and the scattering of the Sun's light in the Earth's atmosphere; and the physiology of human vision. These things all change very rapidly. Information on Crescent Moon Visibility and the Islamic Calendar includes information on the difficulties associated with visual sightings of the crescent Moon. Her Majesty's Nautical Almanac Office computes the time of New Moon and provides information sheets that give the date of earliest visibility of the new crescent Moon for each lunar month for a selection of cities in the UK and around the world.

Lunisolar Calendars:

The Hebrew Calendar is a lunisolar calendar based on calculation rather than observation. Its current form dates from about 359 CE. This calendar is the official calendar for the State of Israel, although variations on this calendar exist. The dates for Passover for this calendar are computed from a set of defined rules.  Note (In ancient biblical times the calendar was based on observation with the naked eye by two witnesses that would then report it to the Sandhedrin).

The National Calendar of India is a formalized lunisolar calendar in which leap years coincide with those of the Gregorian calendar. The Gregorian calendar is used for administrative purposes. The Indian religious calendars require calculations of the motions of the Sun and Moon. Tabulations of the religious holidays are prepared by the India Meteorological Department and published annually in The Indian Astronomical Ephemeris. Many local variations exist.

The Chinese Calendar is a lunisolar calendar based on calculations of the positions of the Sun and Moon. Since this calendar uses the true positions of the Sun and Moon, its accuracy depends on the accuracy of the astronomical theories and calculations.

Special purpose calendars:

There are also many special purpose calendars. Some are based on abstract, perpetually repeating cycles of no astronomical significance. Some calendars are regulated by observations (not computed or tabulated times) of celestial events.

Some calendars are codified in written laws; others are transmitted by oral tradition. Many of these calendars provide dates for religious events and depend upon, for example, the occurrence of a specific religious, cultural, or agricultural event. They may or may not tie this to a date on the international civil calendar. They may or may not tie this to other astronomical events such as the astronomical vernal equinox. Those calendars are outside the scope of this study.

The following definitions are taken from Strong’s Concordance to help give the meaning from the original text of the King James Bible.

Old testament scriptures:

Moon / Moons

  [H3394]  yareach, yaw-ray-akh; from the same as [3391];

                       The moon: __ moon.

           [H3391]  yerach, yeh-rakh; uncertain significance; A lunation, i.e.

                       Month, Moon.

          [H2320]  Chodesh, kho-dash;  from [2318],  The new moon; by implication,

                      A Month; ___month (- ly), New Moon.

         

 [H2318]  Chadash, khaw-dash; a prime root;  To be new; cause to rebuild:

              __renew, repair.

[H3842]   Libnah,  lib-naw; the same as [3835], prop. (the) white, i.e. the moon:

             __moon.

[H3835]   Laban, law-ban; a prime root; to be (or become) white.

New Testament scriptures

[G4582]   Selene, sel-ay-nay; from selas, (brilliancy; probably akin to the

               alternate of [138 ] through the idea of attractivness); the moon: __moon.

[G3561]   noumenia, noo-may-nee-ah; femine of a comparative of [3501] and

             [3376], (as noun by implied by [2250]); The festival of new moon.

[G3501]   Neos, neh-os;  include the comparative neoteros, neh-o-ter-os; a prime

             word; “new”, i.e. (of persons) youthful or (of things) fresh; figuratively

              regenerate: New, Young.

[G3376]   men, mane; a prime word; a month: __Month.

Month / monthly / months

Old testament scriptures:

[H2320]   Chodesh, kho-desh;  from [2318], The new moon; by implication,

              A Month; ___month (_ ly), New moon.

[H2318]   Chadash, khaw-dash; a prime root;  To be new; cause to rebuild:

              __renew, repair.

[H3391]   yerach, yeh-rakh; from an unusual root of uncertain significance;

              A lunation, i.e. Month: __month, moon.

[H3393]   yerach, (chaldee), yeh-rakh; corresp. To [3391], A month:__month.

Noah Webster 1828 dictionary

Lunation = A revolution of the moon

Naval  Observatory

A Lunation is a lunar month, during which time the moon completely circles the earth in its orbit. This cycle of phases completes in an average of 29.5 days.

Phases of the moon:

·         New moon

·         Waxing crescent

·         First quarter

·         Waxing Gibbous

·         Full Moon

·         Wanning Gibbous

·         Last quarter

·        Wanning crescent

Daniel 7: 25

“And he shall speak great words against the most high, and shall wear out the saints of the most high, and think to change times and laws: and they shall be given unto his hand until a time and times and the dividing of time.

This is something that has to be understood right from the start of this part of the Biblical study of the calendar in scripture:

The Sabbath was established during creation week in the first chapter of Genesis. God himself established this covenant with us right from the start.”

This is a perpetual covenant throughout our generations and not negotiable.

Genesis 2: 1-4

“Thus the heavens and the earth were finished and all the host of them.

And on the seventh day God ended his work which he had made; and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had made.

And God blessed the seventh day, and sanctified it: because that in it he had rested from all his work which God created and made.

These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens.”

Genesis 1: 14 - 18

And God said, Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven to divide the day from the night;

And let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days and years:

And let them be for lights in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth: and it was so.

And God made two great lights; The greater light to rule the day, and the lesser light to rule the night. He made the stars also.

And God set them in the firmament of the heaven to give light upon the earth. And to rule over the day and the night, and to divide the light from the darkness: and God saw that it was good.

Strong’s Concordance:

Signs

 [H226]  Owth, oth, prob. [225](in the sense of appearing); a signal

          (lit. or fig.), as a flag, beacon, monument, omen, prodigy, evidence, etc.

          _mark, miracle, (en_), sign, token.

[H225]   uwth, ooth; a primary root; prop. To come, i.e. (impl.) to assent:

         _consent.

Seasons

[H4150] mow’ed, mo-ade or fem. Mo-ed, mo-ade or fem.

           Mow’adah (2 chron. 8:13), mo-aw-daw’; from [3259] prop. An

           Appointment, i.e. a fixed time or season; esp. a festival;

           Conventionally a year; by implication, an assembly (as convened for a

           Definite purpose); technically the congregation; by extension, the

           Place of meeting; also a signal (as appointed beforehand): appointed

           (sign, time), (place of, solemn), Assembly, congregation, (set, solemn),

           Feast, (appointed, due) season, solemn (-ity), Synagogue, (set) time

           (appointed).

Yahuah re-establishes his Calendar with Moses When leaving Egypt

Listed below are Biblical scriptures concerning the Biblical calendar. These scriptures explain appointed Feasts, Festivals, and the seventh day Sabbath, which are beautifully woven in together and were established by God our Father himself, and passed down and given to us by his prophet Moses as instructed.

I pray that the Holy Spirit be upon these words and anyone that reads them, that they may reveal

God, Our Father’s

“TRUTHS”.

Exodus 12: 1-28

And the Lord spake unto Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, saying,

“This Month shall be unto you the beginning of months: it shall be the first month of the year to you.”

Speak ye unto all the congregation of Israel, saying, In the tenth day of this month they shall take to them every man a lamb, according to the  house of their fathers, a lamb for an house.

And if the household be too little for the lamb, let him and his neighbour next unto his house take it according to the number of the souls; every man according to his eating shall make your count for the lamb.

Your lamb shall be without blemish, a male of the first year: ye shall take it out from the sheep, or from the goats:

And ye shall keep it up until the fourteenth day of the same month: and the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening.

And they shall take of the blood, and strike it on the two side posts and on the upper door post of the houses, wherein they shall eat it.

And they shall eat the flesh in that night, roast with fire, and unleavened bread; and with bitter herbs they shall eat it.

Eat not of it raw, nor sodden at all with water, but roast with fire; his head with his legs, and with the purtenance thereof.

And ye shall let nothing of it remain until the morning; and that which remaineth of it until the morning ye shall burn with fire.

And thus shall ye eat it; with your loins girded, your shoes on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and ye shall eat it in haste: it is the Lord's passover.

 For I will pass through the land of Egypt this night, and will smite all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgment: I am the Lord.

And the blood shall be to you for a token upon the houses where ye are: and when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you, when I smite the land of Egypt.

And this day shall be unto you for a memorial; and ye shall keep it a feast to the Lord throughout your generations; ye shall keep it a feast by an ordinance for ever.

Seven days shall ye eat unleavened bread; even the first day ye shall put away leaven out of your houses: for whosoever eateth leavened bread from the first day until the seventh day, that soul shall be cut off from Israel.

And in the first day there shall be an holy convocation, and in the seventh day there shall be an holy convocation to you; no manner of work shall be done in them, save that which every man must eat, that only may be done of you.

And ye shall observe the feast of unleavened bread; for in this selfsame day have I brought your armies out of the land of Egypt: therefore shall ye observe this day in your generations by an ordinance for ever.

In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month at even, ye shall eat unleavened bread, until the one and twentieth day of the month at even.

Seven days shall there be no leaven found in your houses: for whosoever eateth that which is leavened, even that soul shall be cut off from the congregation of Israel, whether he be a stranger, or born in the land.

Ye shall eat nothing leavened; in all your habitations shall ye eat unleavened bread.

Then Moses called for all the elders of Israel, and said unto them, Draw out and take you a lamb according to your families, and kill the Passover.

And ye shall take a bunch of hyssop, and dip it in the blood that is in the bason, and strike the lintel and the two side posts with the blood that is in the bason; and none of you shall go out at the door of his house until the morning.

For the Lord will pass through to smite the Egyptians; and when he seeth the blood upon the lintel, and on the two side posts, the Lord will pass over the door, and will not suffer the destroyer to come in unto your houses to smite you.

And ye shall observe this thing for an ordinance to thee and to thy sons for ever.

And it shall come to pass, when ye be come to the land which the Lord will give you, according as he hath promised, that ye shall keep this service.

And it shall come to pass, when your children shall say unto you, What mean ye by this service?

That ye shall say, It is the sacrifice of the Lord's passover, who passed over the houses of the children of Israel in Egypt, when he smote the Egyptians, and delivered our houses. And the people bowed the head and worshipped.

And the children of Israel went away, and did as the Lord had commanded Moses and Aaron, so did they.

 Exodus 13

And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,

² Sanctify unto me all the firstborn, whatsoever openeth the womb among the children of Israel, both of man and of beast: it is mine.
³ And Moses said unto the people, Remember this day, in which ye came out from Egypt, out of the house of bondage; for by strength of hand the Lord brought you out from this place: there shall no leavened bread be eaten.
⁴ This day came ye out in the month Abib.
⁵ And it shall be when the Lord shall bring thee into the land of the Canaanites, and the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites, which he sware unto thy fathers to give thee, a land flowing with milk and honey, that thou shalt keep this service in this month.
⁶ Seven days thou shalt eat unleavened bread, and in the seventh day shall be a feast to the Lord.
⁷ Unleavened bread shall be eaten seven days; and there shall no leavened bread be seen with thee, neither shall there be leaven seen with thee in all thy quarters.
⁸ And thou shalt shew thy son in that day, saying, This is done because of that which the Lord did unto me when I came forth out of Egypt.
⁹ And it shall be for a sign unto thee upon thine hand, and for a memorial between thine eyes, that the Lord's law may be in thy mouth: for with a strong hand hath the Lord brought thee out of Egypt.
¹⁰ Thou shalt therefore keep this ordinance in his season from year to year.
¹¹ And it shall be when the Lord shall bring thee into the land of the Canaanites, as he sware unto thee and to thy fathers, and shall give it thee,
¹² That thou shalt set apart unto the Lord all that openeth the matrix, and every firstling that cometh of a beast which thou hast; the males shall be the Lord's.
¹³ And every firstling of an ass thou shalt redeem with a lamb; and if thou wilt not redeem it, then thou shalt break his neck: and all the firstborn of man among thy children shalt thou redeem.
¹⁴ And it shall be when thy son asketh thee in time to come, saying, What is this? that thou shalt say unto him, By strength of hand the Lord brought us out from Egypt, from the house of bondage:
¹⁵ And it came to pass, when Pharaoh would hardly let us go, that the Lord slew all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, both the firstborn of man, and the firstborn of beast: therefore I sacrifice to the Lord all that openeth the matrix, being males; but all the firstborn of my children I redeem.
¹⁶ And it shall be for a token upon thine hand, and for frontlets between thine eyes: for by strength of hand the Lord brought us forth out of Egypt.
¹⁷ And it came to pass, when Pharaoh had let the people go, that God led them not through the way of the land of the Philistines, although that was near; for God said, Lest peradventure the people repent when they see war, and they return to Egypt:
¹⁸ But God led the people about, through the way of the wilderness of the Red sea: and the children of Israel went up harnessed out of the land of Egypt.
¹⁹ And Moses took the bones of Joseph with him: for he had straitly sworn the children of Israel, saying, God will surely visit you; and ye shall carry up my bones away hence with you.
²⁰ And they took their journey from Succoth, and encamped in Etham, in the edge of the wilderness.
²¹ And the Lord went before them by day in a pillar of a cloud, to lead them the way; and by night in a pillar of fire, to give them light; to go by day and night:
²² He took not away the pillar of the cloud by day, nor the pillar of fire by night, from before the people.

Exodus 16

And they took their journey from Elim, and all the congregation of the children of Israel came unto the wilderness of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai, on the fifteenth day of the second month after their departing out of the land of Egypt.

² And the whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness:
³ And the children of Israel said unto them, Would to God we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the flesh pots, and when we did eat bread to the full; for ye have brought us forth into this wilderness, to kill this whole assembly with hunger.
⁴ Then said the Lord unto Moses, Behold, I will rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a certain rate every day, that I may prove them, whether they will walk in my law, or no.
⁵ And it shall come to pass, that on the sixth day they shall prepare that which they bring in; and it shall be twice as much as they gather daily.
⁶ And Moses and Aaron said unto all the children of Israel, At even, then ye shall know that the Lord hath brought you out from the land of Egypt:
⁷ And in the morning, then ye shall see the glory of the Lord; for that he heareth your murmurings against the Lord: and what are we, that ye murmur against us?
⁸ And Moses said, This shall be, when the Lord shall give you in the evening flesh to eat, and in the morning bread to the full; for that the Lord heareth your murmurings which ye murmur against him: and what are we? your murmurings are not against us, but against the Lord.
⁹ And Moses spake unto Aaron, Say unto all the congregation of the children of Israel, Come near before the Lord: for he hath heard your murmurings.
¹⁰ And it came to pass, as Aaron spake unto the whole congregation of the children of Israel, that they looked toward the wilderness, and, behold, the glory of the Lord appeared in the cloud.
¹¹ And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,
¹² I have heard the murmurings of the children of Israel: speak unto them, saying, At even ye shall eat flesh, and in the morning ye shall be filled with bread; and ye shall know that I am the Lord your God.
¹³ And it came to pass, that at even the quails came up, and covered the camp: and in the morning the dew lay round about the host.
¹⁴ And when the dew that lay was gone up, behold, upon the face of the wilderness there lay a small round thing, as small as the hoar frost on the ground.
¹⁵ And when the children of Israel saw it, they said one to another, It is manna: for they wist not what it was. And Moses said unto them, This is the bread which the Lord hath given you to eat.
¹⁶ This is the thing which the Lord hath commanded, Gather of it every man according to his eating, an omer for every man, according to the number of your persons; take ye every man for them which are in his tents.
¹⁷ And the children of Israel did so, and gathered, some more, some less.
¹⁸ And when they did mete it with an omer, he that gathered much had nothing over, and he that gathered little had no lack; they gathered every man according to his eating.
¹⁹ And Moses said, Let no man leave of it till the morning.
²⁰ Notwithstanding they hearkened not unto Moses; but some of them left of it until the morning, and it bred worms, and stank: and Moses was wroth with them.
²¹ And they gathered it every morning, every man according to his eating: and when the sun waxed hot, it melted.
²² And it came to pass, that on the sixth day they gathered twice as much bread, two omers for one man: and all the rulers of the congregation came and told Moses.
²³ And he said unto them, This is that which the Lord hath said, To morrow is the rest of the holy sabbath unto the Lord: bake that which ye will bake to day, and seethe that ye will seethe; and that which remaineth over lay up for you to be kept until the morning.
²⁴ And they laid it up till the morning, as Moses bade: and it did not stink, neither was there any worm therein.
²⁵ And Moses said, Eat that to day; for to day is a sabbath unto the Lord: to day ye shall not find it in the field.
²⁶ Six days ye shall gather it; but on the seventh day, which is the sabbath, in it there shall be none.
²⁷ And it came to pass, that there went out some of the people on the seventh day for to gather, and they found none.
²⁸ And the Lord said unto Moses, How long refuse ye to keep my commandments and my laws?
²⁹ See, for that the Lord hath given you the sabbath, therefore he giveth you on the sixth day the bread of two days; abide ye every man in his place, let no man go out of his place on the seventh day.
³⁰ So the people rested on the seventh day.
³¹ And the house of Israel called the name thereof Manna: and it was like coriander seed, white; and the taste of it was like wafers made with honey.
³² And Moses said, This is the thing which the Lord commandeth, Fill an omer of it to be kept for your generations; that they may see the bread wherewith I have fed you in the wilderness, when I brought you forth from the land of Egypt.
³³ And Moses said unto Aaron, Take a pot, and put an omer full of manna therein, and lay it up before the Lord, to be kept for your generations.
³⁴ As the Lord commanded Moses, so Aaron laid it up before the Testimony, to be kept.
³⁵ And the children of Israel did eat manna forty years, until they came to a land inhabited; they did eat manna, until they came unto the borders of the land of Canaan.
³⁶ Now an omer is the tenth part of an ephah.

In Chapter 16 (above) God re-establishes the Sabbath keeping with the children 

of Israel. He gives exact instructions not to mention the manna and the double portion on preparation day before Sabbath. He also tells them what will happen if they do not obey what he has commanded for his Sabbath.

Exodus 31: 13 –18 ¹² And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,
¹³ Speak thou also unto the children of Israel, saying, verily my Sabbaths ye shall keep: for it is a sign between me and you throughout your generations; that ye may know that I am the Lord that doth sanctify you.
¹⁴ Ye shall keep the sabbath therefore; for it is holy unto you: every one that defileth it shall surely be put to death: for whosoever doeth any work therein, that soul shall be cut off from among his people.
¹⁵ Six days may work be done; but in the seventh is the sabbath of rest, holy to the Lord: whosoever doeth any work in the sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death.
¹⁶ Wherefore the children of Israel shall keep the sabbath, to observe the sabbath throughout their generations, for a perpetual covenant.
¹⁷ It is a sign between me and the children of Israel for ever: for in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, and on the seventh day he rested, and was refreshed.
¹⁸ And he gave unto Moses, when he had made an end of communing with him upon mount Sinai, two tables of testimony, tables of stone, written with the finger of God.

Convocation (-s)

(Strongs Concordance)

[H4744]  miqra’, mik-raw; from [7121]; something called out, i.e. a public meeting

             (the act, the persons, or the place); also a rehersal: -assembly, calling,

              reading, convocation

[H7121]   qara’, kaw-raw’; a prime root [rather indentify with 7122 through the

                idea of accosting a person met]; to call out to (i.e. properly address by

                name, but used in a wide variety of applications):  bewray [self], that

                are bidden, call (for, forth, self, upon), cry (unto), (be) famous, guest,

                invite, mention, (give) name, preach, (make) proclaim (-ation),

                pronounce, publish, read, renowned, say.

HOLY

[H6944]   qodesh, ko-desh;  from 6942; a sacred place or thing; rarely abstract.

                 Sanctity; -- consecrated (thing), dedicated (thing), hallowed (thing),

                  Holiness, (x most), holy (x day, portion, thing), saint, sanctuary.

Noah Webster 1828:

Convocation(s):    1. The act of calling or assembling by summons.

                                2. An assembly. In the first day there shall be a holy

                                    convocation. (Exodus 12)

Holy:   1. Properly, whole, entire or perfect, in a moral sense. Hence,

               pure in heart, temper or dispositions; free from sin and sinful affections.

                Applied to the Supreme Being, holy signifies perfectly pure, immaculate

              and complete in moral character; and man is more or less holy, as his

              heart is more or less sanctified, or purified from evil dispositions.

              We call a man holy,when his heart is conformed in some degree to the 

              image of God, and his life is regulated by the divine precepts. Hence,

              holy is used as nearly synonymous with good, pious, godly.  

              Be ye holy; for I am holy. 1 pet.1.

 2. Hallowed; consecrated or set apart to a sacred use, or to the service or

     worship of God; a sense frequent in Scripture; as the holy sabbath;

     holy oil; holy vessels; a holy nation; the holy temple; a holy priesthood.

3. Proceeding from pious principles,or directed to pious purposes; as holy

    zeal.

4. Perfectly just and good; as the holy law of God.

           5. Sacred; as a holy witness.

Leviticus 23

And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,

² Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, concerning the feasts of the Lord, which ye shall proclaim to be holy convocations, even these are my feasts.
³ Six days shall work be done: but the seventh day is the sabbath of rest, an holy convocation; ye shall do no work therein: it is the sabbath of the Lord in all your dwellings.
⁴ These are the feasts of the Lord, even holy convocations, which ye shall proclaim in their seasons.
⁵ In the fourteenth day of the first month at even is the Lord's passover.
⁶ And on the fifteenth day of the same month is the feast of unleavened bread unto the Lord: seven days ye must eat unleavened bread.
⁷ In the first day ye shall have an holy convocation: ye shall do no servile work therein.
⁸ But ye shall offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord seven days: in the seventh day is an holy convocation: ye shall do no servile work therein.
⁹ And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,
¹⁰ Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye be come into the land which I give unto you, and shall reap the harvest thereof, then ye shall bring a sheaf of the firstfruits of your harvest unto the priest:
¹¹ And he shall wave the sheaf before the Lord, to be accepted for you: on the morrow after the sabbath the priest shall wave it.
¹² And ye shall offer that day when ye wave the sheaf an he lamb without blemish of the first year for a burnt offering unto the Lord.
¹³ And the meat offering thereof shall be two tenth deals of fine flour mingled with oil, an offering made by fire unto the Lord for a sweet savour: and the drink offering thereof shall be of wine, the fourth part of an hin.
¹⁴ And ye shall eat neither bread, nor parched corn, nor green ears, until the selfsame day that ye have brought an offering unto your God: it shall be a statute for ever throughout your generations in all your dwellings.
¹⁵ And ye shall count unto you from the morrow after the sabbath, from the day that ye brought the sheaf of the wave offering; seven sabbaths shall be complete:
¹⁶ Even unto the morrow after the seventh sabbath shall ye number fifty days; and ye shall offer a new meat offering unto the Lord.
¹⁷ Ye shall bring out of your habitations two wave loaves of two tenth deals; they shall be of fine flour; they shall be baken with leaven; they are the firstfruits unto the Lord.
¹⁸ And ye shall offer with the bread seven lambs without blemish of the first year, and one young bullock, and two rams: they shall be for a burnt offering unto the Lord, with their meat offering, and their drink offerings, even an offering made by fire, of sweet savour unto the Lord.
¹⁹ Then ye shall sacrifice one kid of the goats for a sin offering, and two lambs of the first year for a sacrifice of peace offerings.
²⁰ And the priest shall wave them with the bread of the firstfruits for a wave offering before the Lord, with the two lambs: they shall be holy to the Lord for the priest.
²¹ And ye shall proclaim on the selfsame day, that it may be an holy convocation unto you: ye shall do no servile work therein: it shall be a statute for ever in all your dwellings throughout your generations.
²² And when ye reap the harvest of your land, thou shalt not make clean riddance of the corners of thy field when thou reapest, neither shalt thou gather any gleaning of thy harvest: thou shalt leave them unto the poor, and to the stranger: I am the Lord your God.
²³ And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,
²⁴ Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, In the seventh month, in the first day of the month, shall ye have a sabbath, a memorial of blowing of trumpets, an holy convocation.
²⁵ Ye shall do no servile work therein: but ye shall offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord.
²⁶ And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,
²⁷ Also on the tenth day of this seventh month there shall be a day of atonement: it shall be an holy convocation unto you; and ye shall afflict your souls, and offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord.
²⁸ And ye shall do no work in that same day: for it is a day of atonement, to make an atonement for you before the Lord your God.
²⁹ For whatsoever soul it be that shall not be afflicted in that same day, he shall be cut off from among his people.
³⁰ And whatsoever soul it be that doeth any work in that same day, the same soul will I destroy from among his people.
³¹ Ye shall do no manner of work: it shall be a statute for ever throughout your generations in all your dwellings.
³² It shall be unto you a sabbath of rest, and ye shall afflict your souls: in the ninth day of the month at even, from even unto even, shall ye celebrate your sabbath.
³³ And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying,
³⁴ 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.
³⁵ On the first day shall be an holy convocation: ye shall do no servile work therein.
³⁶ Seven days ye shall offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord: on the eighth day shall be an holy convocation unto you; and ye shall offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord: it is a solemn assembly; and ye shall do no servile work therein.
³⁷ These are the feasts of the Lord, which ye shall proclaim to be holy convocations, to offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord, a burnt offering, and a meat offering, a sacrifice, and drink offerings, every thing upon his day:
³⁸ Beside the sabbaths of the Lord, and beside your gifts, and beside all your vows, and beside all your freewill offerings, which ye give unto the Lord.
³⁹ Also in the fifteenth day of the seventh month, when ye have gathered in the fruit of the land, ye shall keep a feast unto the Lord seven days: on the first day shall be a sabbath, and on the eighth day shall be a sabbath.
⁴⁰ And ye shall take you on the first day the boughs of goodly trees, branches of palm trees, and the boughs of thick trees, and willows of the brook; and ye shall rejoice before the Lord your God seven days.
⁴¹ And ye shall keep it a feast unto the Lord seven days in the year. It shall be a statute for ever in your generations: ye shall celebrate it in the seventh month.
⁴² Ye shall dwell in booths seven days; all that are Israelites born shall dwell in booths:
⁴³ That your generations may know that I made the children of Israel to dwell in booths, when I brought them out of the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God.
⁴⁴ And Moses declared unto the children of Israel the feasts of the Lord.

Deuteronomy 16: 1-17

Observe the month of Abib, and keep the passover unto the Lord thy God: for in the month of Abib the Lord thy God brought thee forth out of Egypt by night.

² Thou shalt therefore sacrifice the passover unto the Lord thy God, of the flock and the herd, in the place which the Lord shall choose to place his name there.
³ Thou shalt eat no leavened bread with it; seven days shalt thou eat unleavened bread therewith, even the bread of affliction; for thou camest forth out of the land of Egypt in haste: that thou mayest remember the day when thou camest forth out of the land of Egypt all the days of thy life.
⁴ And there shall be no leavened bread seen with thee in all thy coast seven days; neither shall there any thing of the flesh, which thou sacrificedst the first day at even, remain all night until the morning.
⁵ Thou mayest not sacrifice the passover within any of thy gates, which the Lord thy God giveth thee:
⁶ But at the place which the Lord thy God shall choose to place his name in, there thou shalt sacrifice the passover at even, at the going down of the sun, at the season that thou camest forth out of Egypt.
⁷ And thou shalt roast and eat it in the place which the Lord thy God shall choose: and thou shalt turn in the morning, and go unto thy tents.
⁸ Six days thou shalt eat unleavened bread: and on the seventh day shall be a solemn assembly to the Lord thy God: thou shalt do no work therein.
⁹ Seven weeks shalt thou number unto thee: begin to number the seven weeks from such time as thou beginnest to put the sickle to the corn.
¹⁰ And thou shalt keep the feast of weeks unto the Lord thy God with a tribute of a freewill offering of thine hand, which thou shalt give unto the Lord thy God, according as the Lord thy God hath blessed thee:
¹¹ And thou shalt rejoice before the Lord thy God, thou, and thy son, and thy daughter, and thy manservant, and thy maidservant, and the Levite that is within thy gates, and the stranger, and the fatherless, and the widow, that are among you, in the place which the Lord thy God hath chosen to place his name there.
¹² And thou shalt remember that thou wast a bondman in Egypt: and thou shalt observe and do these statutes.
¹³ Thou shalt observe the feast of tabernacles seven days, after that thou hast gathered in thy corn and thy wine:
¹⁴ And thou shalt rejoice in thy feast, 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.
¹⁵ Seven days shalt thou keep a solemn feast unto the Lord thy God in the place which the Lord shall choose: 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.
¹⁶ Three times in a year shall all thy males appear before the Lord thy God in the place which he shall choose; in the feast of unleavened bread, and in the feast of weeks, and in the feast of tabernacles: and they shall not appear before the Lord empty:
¹⁷ Every man shall give as he is able, according to the blessing of the Lord thy God which he hath given thee.

Joshua 5: 10-12
¹⁰ And the children of Israel encamped in Gilgal, and kept the passover on the fourteenth day of the month at even in the plains of Jericho.
¹¹ And they did eat of the old corn of the land on the morrow after the passover, unleavened cakes, and parched corn in the selfsame day.
¹² And the manna ceased on the morrow after they had eaten of the old corn of the land; neither had the children of Israel manna any more; but they did eat of the fruit of the land of Canaan that year.

I Samuel 20: 5,18, 24, 27
And David said unto Jonathan, behold, tomorrow is the New moon, and I should not fail to sit with the king at meat: but let me go, that I may hide myself in the field unto the third day at even.
18Then Jonathan said to David, tomorrow is the New Moon: and thou shalt be missed, because thy seat will be empty.
24So David hid himself in the field: and when the New Moon was come, the king sat him down to eat meat.
27And it came to pass on the morrow, which was the second day of the month, that David’s place was empty: and Saul said unto Jonathan his son, wherefore cometh not the son of Jesse to meat, neither yesterday, nor today?

I Chronicles 23: 24-32

²⁴ These were the sons of Levi after the house of their fathers; even the chief of the fathers, as they were counted by number of names by their polls, that did the work for the service of the house of the Lord, from the age of twenty years and upward.

²⁵ For David said, The Lord God of Israel hath given rest unto his people, that they may dwell in Jerusalem forever:

²⁶ And also unto the Levites; they shall no more carry the tabernacle, nor any vessels of it for the service thereof.

²⁷ For by the last words of David the Levites were numbered from twenty years old and above:

²⁸ Because their office was to wait on the sons of Aaron for the service of the house of the Lord, in the courts, and in the chambers, and in the purifying of all holy things, and the work of the service of the house of God;

²⁹ Both for the shewbread, and for the fine flour for meat offering, and for the unleavened cakes, and for that which is baked in the pan, and for that which is fried, and for all manner of measure and size;

³⁰ And to stand every morning to thank and praise the Lord, and likewise at even:

³¹ And to offer all burnt sacrifices unto the Lord in the sabbaths, in the new moons, and on the set feasts, by number, according to the order commanded unto them, continually before the Lord:

³² And that they should keep the charge of the tabernacle of the congregation, and the charge of the holy place, and the charge of the sons of Aaron their brethren, in the service of the house of the Lord.

II Chronicles 2:4
⁴ Behold, I build an house to the name of the Lord my God, to dedicate it to him, and to burn before him sweet incense, and for the continual shewbread, and for the burnt offerings morning and evening, on the sabbaths, and on the new moons, and on the solemn feasts of the Lord our God. This is an ordinance for ever to Israel.

II Chronicles 8: 12,13

¹² Then Solomon offered burnt offerings unto the Lord on the altar of the Lord, which he had built before the porch,

¹³ Even after a certain rate every day, offering according to the commandment of Moses, on the sabbaths, and on the new moons, and on the solemn feasts, three times in the year, even in the feast of unleavened bread, and in the feast of weeks, and in the feast of tabernacles.

II Chronicles 31: 2,3

² And Hezekiah appointed the courses of the priests and the Levites after their courses, every man according to his service, the priests and Levites for burnt offerings and for peace offerings, to minister, and to give thanks, and to praise in the gates of the tents of the Lord.

³ He appointed also the king's portion of his substance for the burnt offerings, to wit, for the morning and evening burnt offerings, and the burnt offerings for the sabbaths, and for the new moons, and for the set feasts, as it is written in the law of the Lord.

Ezra 3:1-6

And when the seventh month was come, and the children of Israel were in the cities, the people gathered themselves together as one man to Jerusalem.

² Then stood up Jeshua the son of Jozadak, and his brethren the priests, and Zerubbabel the son of Shealtiel, and his brethren, and builded the altar of the God of Israel, to offer burnt offerings thereon, as it is written in the law of Moses the man of God.

³ And they set the altar upon his bases; for fear was upon them because of the people of those countries: and they offered burnt offerings thereon unto the Lord, even burnt offerings morning and evening.

⁴ They kept also the feast of tabernacles, as it is written, and offered the daily burnt offerings by number, according to the custom, as the duty of every day required;

⁵ And afterward offered the continual burnt offering, both of the new moons, and of all the set feasts of the Lord that were consecrated, and of every one that willingly offered a freewill offering unto the Lord.

⁶ From the first day of the seventh month began they to offer burnt offerings unto the Lord. But the foundation of the temple of the Lord was not yet laid.

Psalms 104:19
He appointed the moon for seasons: The sun knoweth his going down.

Isaiah 66: 23
And it shall come to pass, that from one New Moon to another, and from one Sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord.

Ezekiel 45: 18-25

¹⁸ Thus saith the Lord God; In the first month, in the first day of the month, thou shalt take a young bullock without blemish, and cleanse the sanctuary:

¹⁹ And the priest shall take of the blood of the sin offering, and put it upon the posts of the house, and upon the four corners of the settle of the altar, and upon the posts of the gate of the inner court.

²⁰ And so thou shalt do the seventh day of the month for every one that erreth, and for him that is simple: so shall ye reconcile the house.

²¹ In the first month, in the fourteenth day of the month, ye shall have the passover, a feast of seven days; unleavened bread shall be eaten.

²² And upon that day shall the prince prepare for himself and for all the people of the land a bullock for a sin offering.

²³ And seven days of the feast he shall prepare a burnt offering to the Lord, seven bullocks and seven rams without blemish daily the seven days; and a kid of the goats daily for a sin offering.

²⁴ And he shall prepare a meat offering of an ephah for a bullock, and an ephah for a ram, and an hin of oil for an ephah.

²⁵ In the seventh month, in the fifteenth day of the month, shall he do the like in the feast of the seven days, according to the sin offering, according to the burnt offering, and according to the meat offering, and according to the oil.

Ezekiel 46: 1-3

Thus saith the Lord God; The gate of the inner court that looketh toward the east shall be shut the six working days; but on the sabbath it shall be opened, and in the day of the new moon it shall be opened.

² And the prince shall enter by the way of the porch of that gate without, and shall stand by the post of the gate, and the priests shall prepare his burnt offering and his peace offerings, and he shall worship at the threshold of the gate: then he shall go forth; but the gate shall not be shut until the evening.

³ Likewise the people of the land shall worship at the door of this gate before the Lord in the sabbaths and in the new moons.

Matthew 26: 17,18
Now the first day of the feast of unleavened bread the disciples came to Jesus saying unto him, Where wilt thou that we prepare for thee to eat the Passover?
And he said, Go into the city to such a man, and say unto him, the master saith, my time is at hand: I will keep the Passover at thy house with my disciples.
And the disciples did as Jesus had appointed them; and they made ready the Passover.

Mark 14: 12
And on the first day of unleavened bread, when they killed the Passover, his disciples said unto him, where wilt thou we go and prepare that thou mayest eat the passover?

Luke 22: 1, 7,8
Now the feast of unleavened bread drew nigh, which is called the Passover.
7Then came the day of unleavened bread when the Passover must be killed.
8and he sent Peter and John, saying, go and prepare us the Passover, that we may eat.

Acts 18: 20,21
When they desired him (Paul) to tarry longer time with them, he consented not;
But bade them farewell, saying, I must by all means keep this feast that cometh in Jerusalem: but I will return again unto you, if God will. And he sailed from Ephesus.

Antiquity Evidence

According to God’s covenant agreement with the children of Israel, as long as they remained obedient they would also remain a sovereign and free people. If at any time Israel broke His Laws, God would chasten them, and also allowing them to be taken into captivity.

Once in captivity they must succumb to keeping the laws of the ruling nation, along with its calendric system, festivals and holidays. In this way, and because of their unfaithfulness in keeping their covenant agreement, God caused them to forget His ways.

These divine oracles of truth God had entrusted to Israel, He would like to entrust to us today. Again, in His wisdom, they would only be safe within the walls of His covenant agreement. Israel’s story of unfaithfulness is our story, and their captivity is our captivity.

But God has a plan to restore all things to those who desire and diligently seek the restoration of His original divine covenant. Only to those who are willing to enter into His covenant will He open the way to discover His long lost and hidden truths.

Within the pages of antiquity is recorded “the how and why” the seventh-day Sabbath, as well as His appointed Feast days, Statutes and Judgments; all became lost and forgotten in time. It is only through our understanding of how they were lost, that they can truly be found and restored, along with God’s other inseparable divine truths.

“I will also cause all her mirth to cease, her feast days, Her New Moons, Her

Sabbaths-- All her appointed feasts,” says the Lord. Hosea 2:11

Historical and Biblical records identify at least three times in which Israel went into captivity. The first was Israel’s bondage in Egypt, followed by Babylon, and finally at the destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70 by Rome. During those long

years in Egypt, the majority of Israel completely lost the ways of Yahweh, and had to be reinstructed through Moses. During the captivity in Babylon many forgot, but certainly not all, including Daniel, Ezra and Nehemiah. But with the destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70, began the first phase in a lengthy Roman captivity, and under a hard rulership that was bent on destroying the Hebrew Law and calendar of her Feast days and Sabbaths. While it was God’s will that His truths should be hidden for a time, ultimately in the end, and by divine providence, all will be restored

Her priests have violated my law, and have profaned mine holy things: they have put no difference between the holy and profane, neither have they showed difference between the unclean and the clean, and have hid their eyes from my sabbaths, and I am profaned among them. Ezekiel 22:26.

Remember ye the law of Moses my servant, which I commanded unto him in Horeb for all Israel, with the statutes and judgments. Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD: Malachi 4:4-5

And when the debate is, they shall stand in my (judgment) domes, and shall consider and believe my laws; and they shall keep my commandments in all my solemnities, and they shall hallow my Sabbaths. Ezekiel 44:24 Wycliffe Bible 1378.

And all the children of Israel will forget and will not find the path of years,

and will forget the new moons, and seasons, and Sabbaths and they will go wrong as to all the order of the years. For I know and from hence forth

will I declare it unto thee, and it is not my own devising; for the book (lies) written before me, and on the heavenly tablets the division of days is ordained, lest they forget the feasts of the covenant and walk according to the feasts of the Gentiles after their error and after their ignorance. For there will be those who will assuredly make observations of the moon –how (it) disturbs the seasons and comes in from year to year ten days too soon. For this reason the years will come upon them when they disturb (the order), and make an abominable (day) the day of testimony, and an unclean day a feast day, and they will confound the days, the holy with the unclean, and the unclean day with the holy; for they will go wrong as to the months and Sabbaths and feasts and Jubilees.

Book of Jubilees23:34-38

The present Jewish calendar was fixed in the fourth century. Jewish

Theological Seminary of America, Letter by Louis Finkelstein to Dr. L. E.

Froom, Feb. 20, 1939. regarding the present Jewish calendar.

“The Sabbath depending, in Israel’s nomadic period, upon the observation of the phases of the moon, it could not, accordingly be a fixed day.

www.Jewishencyclopedia.com “Sabbath.”

The [early] Hebrews employed lunar seven-day weeks, which ended with special observances on the seventh day, but none the less were tied to the moon's course.

Rest Days, p. 254-255 by Hutton Webster . . . the Jewish festivals being regulated solely by the moon, may fall on any day of the [Roman] week.

Oxford English Dictionary,1971 Edition,

Vol. 2, “Pentecost.” [emphasis mine] The invention of the continuous week was therefore one of the most significant breakthroughs in human beings’ attempts

to break away from being prisoners of nature [and from under God’s law] and create a social world of their own.”

The Seven Day Circle: The History and Meaning of the Week,

Eviator Zerubavel, New York: The Free Press, 1985.p.11.

“Most theologians and some scholars assume that mainstream Jewish society, at

the time of Jesus...was practicing a fixed seven-day week which was the same as

the modern fixed [cycling planetary designations] seven-day week. This is

extremely doubtful.

The change, from a lunar to a fixed week, was brought about by the power and influence of Rome. As long as the Nazarenes held power in Jerusalem, all Roman practices and customs, including that of the consecutive week, were held at bay.”  Shawui Sabbath: Ancient Sabbath Observance.

1^st  Century B.C. 1

In the mid-1st century B.C. Julius Cæsar invited Sosigenes, an Alexandrian astronomer, to advise him about the reform of the calendar, and Sosigenes decided that the only practical step was to abandon the lunar calendar altogether. Months must be arranged on a seasonal basis, and a tropical (solar) year used, as in the Egyptian calendar. “The Julian Calendar,” Encyclopedia Britannica.

These imported [from Babylon] superstitions eventually led Jewish rabbis

to call Saturn Shabbti, 'the star of the Sabbath.' [and] it was not until the

first century of our era, when the planetary week had become an

established institution, that the Jewish Sabbath seems always to have

corresponded to Saturn's Day [Saturday]. Rest Days, p.244 by Hutton

Webster.

1^st  Century (A.D. 70)

How great are the things the enemy did wickedly in the Holy place. They hated your glory in the midst of your solemnities. They placed their signs and banners on the highest places. . . . They burned with fire your sanctuary; they befouled the tabernacle of your name on earth. The kindred of them said together in their hearts; make we all the “feast days” of God to cease from the earth.

Psalms 74:3, 7, 8  Wycliffe Bible, 1378.

2^nd Century (Emperor Hadrian)

This change from the luni-solar to a fixed solar calendar occurred in Rome during the repressive measures which were enacted against ALL Jewish customs...during the reign of Emperor Hadrian. With the fall of the Nazarene headquarters...at Jerusalem, this new Roman calendar quickly spread throughout 'Christendom.' This new calendar not only replaced yearly festival dates such as Passover, but it also revamped the concept of the week and its seventh day.

Iranaeus 2^nd Century A.D.

The [lunar solar] calendar was used by all the original disciples of Christ. This

original Nazarene lunar-solar calendar was supplanted by a Roman "planetary

week" and calendar in 135 C.E. when the 'Bishops of the Circumcision' (i.e.

legitimate Nazarene successors to Christ) were displaced from Jerusalem. This

began a three hundred year controversy concerning the true calendar and the

correct Sabbath. Shawui Calendar: Ancient Shawui Observance.

2^nd  & 3^rd  Century (Clement of Alexandria)

“In the years following Clement of Alexandria's time, an ominous change

started to take place that was to radically change the Christian concept of

the Sabbath.” Records the Encyclopedia Biblica:

 “This intimate connection between the week and the month was soon

dissolved.”  It is certain that the week soon followed a development of its own, and it became the custom -- without paying any regard to the days of the month

(i.e. the luni-solar month) . . . so that the New Moon no longer coincided with the first day of the month. Then, on page 4179 of the same encyclopedia, we read: "The introduction . . .of the custom of celebrating the Sabbath every 7th day, irrespective of the relationship of the day to the moon’s phases, led to a complete separation from the ancient view of the Sabbath. . . Encyclopaedia Biblica,1903 p. 5290.

It should be noted that the oldest dated Christian inscription to employ a

planetary designation [Sunday – Saturday, unbroken cycle of weeks]

belongs to the year 269 A.D. Inscriptiones Christianae urbis Romae, ed.

De Rossi, 1861, i, No. 1.

We shall be taken for Persians [Mithraists], perhaps . . . The reason for this I suppose, is that it is known that we pray towards the east . . .

Likewise, if we devote the day of the Sun to festivity (from a far different reason from Sun worship), we are in a second place from those who devote the day of Saturn, themselves also deviating by way of a Jewish custom of which they are ignorant. Tertullian, Apologia.

4^th Century (Emperor Constantine in A.D. 321-325)

The modern seven-day week came into use during the early imperial period, after the Julian calendar came into effect, apparently stimulated by immigration from the Roman East. For a while it coexisted alongside the old 8-day nundinal cycle, and fasti are known which show both cycles. It was finally given official status by Constantine in 321. Roman Calendar Encyclopedia, Days of the Week.

Even after Constantine’s edict about Sunday, it took another generation or two for the seven-day week to catch on throughout the empire. The 24-hour system took longer, having to wait until the invention of the mechanical clock in the Middle Ages by monks anxious to observe with precision their canonical hours. Before this, people marked the passage of time during the night by using the stars and during the day either by eyeballing the sun or by listening to public

announcements of the time. Calendar, David Ewing Duncan, p. 47, New York, Avon Books, 1998.

A Profession Of Faith From The Church Of Constantinople in the year 325 C.E.(A.D.) Under The Emperor Constantine:

I renounce all customs, rites, legalisms, unleavened breads & sacrifices of

lambs of the Hebrews, and all other feasts of the Hebrews, sacrifices, prayers, aspersions, purifications, sanctifications and propitiations and fasts, and new moons, and Sabbaths, and superstitions, and hymns and chants and observances and Synagogues, and the food and drink of The Hebrews; in one word, I renounce everything Jewish, every law, rite and custom and if afterwards I shall wish to deny and return to Jewish superstition, or shall be found eating with The Jews, or feasting with them, or secretly conversing and condemning the Christian religion instead of openly confuting them and condemning their vain faith, then let the trembling of Gehazi cleave to me, as well as the legal punishments to which I acknowledge myself liable. And may I be anathema in the world to come, and may my soul be set down with Satan and the devils. Source: Parks, James The Conflict Of The Church And The Synagogue Athenaeum, New York, 1974, p. 397-398.

The present Jewish calendar was fixed [continuous weekly cycle] in the

fourth century. Jewish Theological Seminary of America, Letter by Louis

Finkelstein to Dr. L. E. Froom, Feb. 20, 1939. Regarding the present

Jewish calendar.

Most Saturday Sabbatarians have been taught to believe that the Council of Laodicea, Canon 29 stated:

“Christians shall not Judaize and be idle on Saturday, but shall work on

that day; but the Lord’s Day they shall especially honor, and, as being

Christians, shall, if possible, do no work on that day. If however, they are

found Judaizing, they shall be shut out from Christ.”

However, the above quote is in error. According to Karl J. von Hefele, a Catholic bishop, in his History of the Councils of the Church from the Original Documents, states that the word “Saturday”(dies Saturni) does not exist either in the Greek or Latin text. Rather, the word “Saturday”was supplied in the English translation in place of the word Sabbato, meaning Sabbath.

(original of above)

Quod non oportet Christianos Judaizere et otiare in Sabbato, sed operari in

eodem die. Preferentes autem in veneratione Dominicum Diem si vacre voluerint, ut Christiani hoc faciat; quod si reperti fuerint Judaizere Anathema sint a Christo.

Council of Laodicea,Canon 29

“That is not necessary, and the ease of Judaizere Christians on the Sabbath, but to work in the same day. But the person offering them in the veneration of the Lord 's Day vacre if they so desire, he may do this as Christians; let them be anathema from Christ, that if there shall be found Judaizere.”

At the time the Julian calendar was being enforced upon Christians for religious purposes, no one confused the word Sabbato with dies Saturni. Simply everyone at that time knew these were names for two different days on two distinctly different calendar systems. It is only as the facts of history have been forgotten,

that  “Saturday” has been assumed to be the seventh-day Sabbath of Scripture. Therefore this historic quote from the Council of Laodicea, Canon 29, applies to

lunisolar time-keeping only and not to the Gregorian calendar which keeps the rhythm of the pagan unbroken cycles of weeks. Lunisolar time-keeping was betrothed to mankind as an oracle of the government of heaven, and was the

only time-system consistently kept by the Hebrew people during their times of

faithfulness.

These . . . eventually led Jewish rabbis to call Saturn Shabbti, 'the star of

the Sabbath.' It was not until the first century of our era, when the planetary week had become an established institution, that the Jewish Sabbath seems always to have corresponded to Saturn's Day [Saturday]. Rest Days, p.244 by Hutton Webster.

Early historical records clearly confirms that very early Gentile Christians also

kept the same Sabbath as the Nazarenes. This practice was first changed by

[Pope] Sixtus in 126 AD, and later officially changed by a royal Roman decree from the emperor Constantine. Observance of the Sabbath day was made illegal

and observance of a "Sunday" of a fixed [cycling planetary designated] week was

made mandatory for all except farmers. Previous to this time the Roman Saturday was the first day of the Roman week. The veneration of the Sun in the second century AD began to pressure Roman culture to change the first day of their week from Saturn Day to Sunday. Shawui Sabbath: Ancient Sabbath Observance

A Two Phase Process

The departure from God’s true seventh-day Sabbath took place in two phases over a period of approximately 250 years. This process began around the year A.D. 70, and received its final blow when Constantine placed the last nail in the proverbial coffin in A.D. 324.

Phase 1:

This change from the luni-solar to a fixed  solar calendar occurred in Rome during the repressive measures which were enacted against ALL Jewish customs and practices, including the lunar calendar, during the reign of Emperor Titus. With the fall of the Nazarene headquarters...at Jerusalem, this new Roman

calendar quickly spread throughout 'Christendom.' This new calendar not only

replaced yearly festival dates such as Passover, but it also revamped the concept of the week and its seventh day. Iranaeus 2^nd Century A.D.

Phase 2:

The modern seven-day week came into use during the early imperial period, after the Julian calendar came into effect, apparently stimulated by immigration from the Roman East. For a while it [the cycling seven-day week] coexisted alongside the old 8-day nundinal cycle, and fasti are known which show both cycles. It was finally given official status by Constantine in 321. Roman Calendar Encyclopedia, Days of the Week.

Under the reign of Constantius the persecutions of the Jews reached such a

height that . . . the computation of the [lunisolar] calendar [was] forbidden under pain of severe punishment. The Jewish Encyclopedia, “Calendar.”

Sabbath and New Moon (Rosh Hodesh), both periodically recur in the course of the year. The New Moon is still, and the Sabbath originally was, dependent upon the lunar cycle. Universal Jewish Encyclopedia, p. 410.

“He shall insult the Most High, he shall torment/wear out the holy ones of the Most High, and he shall attempt to change the calendar and the ordinance” Daniel 7:25 (Twentieth Century Knox translation.)

 The connection of the Sabbath with lunar phases, however, was (later) discarded by the Israelites. . .The New Schaff-Herzog Religious Encyclopedia, p. 135-136.

Intrinsic Evidence

Confirmation of the fact that the lunar week goes all the way back to Adam and Eve is found in The Popular and Critical Bible Encyclopedia–

It is powerfully urged by the believers in a primitive Sabbath, that we find from time immemorial the knowledge of a week of 7 days among all nations -- Egyptians, Arabians, Indians -- in a word, all the nations of the East, have in all ages made use of this week of 7 days, for which it is difficult to account without admitting that this knowledge was derived from the common ancestors [Adam and Eve] of the human race. Among all early nations the lunar months were the readiest large divisions of time. . . In order to connect the reckoning by weeks with the lunar month, we find that all ancient nations observed some peculiar solemnities to mark the day of the New Moon. Accordingly, in the Mosaic law the same thing was also enjoined (Numbers 10:10; 28:11, etc.), though it is worthy of remark that, while particular observances are here enjoined, the idea of celebrating the New Moon in some way is alluded to as if already familiar

to them. In other parts of the Bible, we find the Sabbaths and New Moons continually spoken of in conjunction; as (Isaiah 1:13, etc.) the division of time by weeks prevailed all over the East, from the earliest periods among the Assyrians, Arabs, & Egyptians. It was found among the tribes in the interior of Africa....The Peruvians counted their months by the moon, their half-months by the increase and decrease of the moon . . . without having any particular names for the week days. The Popular and Critical Bible Encyclopedia 1904. Vol. 3, p. 1497.

Webster goes on to associate the Babylonian "shabattum" with the Hebrew

"Sabbath" as found in the Old Testament: "And it shall come to pass, that

from one new moon to another, and from one Sabbath to another, shall all

flesh come to worship before me, saith Jehovah." This remarkable association of the Sabbath with the day of the new moonhad been previously noticed by such acute critics as Wellhausen and Robertson Smith, who were unable to offer a satisfactory solution of the problem thus presented. When, however, the cuneiform records disclosed the fact that the Babylonian Shabattum fell on the fifteenth day of the month . . .it became clear that in these Biblical passages we have another survival of what must have been the primary meaning of the Hebrew term Shabbath [Sabbath]. As late, then, as the eighth century B.C., popular phraseology retained a lingering trace of the original collocation of the new-moon . . . days as festival occasions characterized by abstinence from secular activities. How long-lived were the old ideasis further illustrated by the

provision in Ezekiel's reforming legislation that the inner eastern gate of the new Temple at Jerusalem should be shut during the six working days, but should be opened on the Sabbath and on the new-moon day for the religious assemblage of the people. That the term Shabbath [Sabbath . . . should have come to be applied to every seventh day of the month seems to be quite in accord with both Babylonian and Hebrew usage, which, as we have seen, led the month itself to be called after the new-moon day. Hutton Webster in his book.

The Hebrew seven-day week, ending with the Sabbath, did not, of course,

originate in Babylonia. The Sabbath day -- both Hebrew and Babylonian --

originated with the creation week and was transmitted down through the

flood to Babylonia where Abraham was born. "The celebration of new- moon and full-moon festivals," remarks Hutton Webster, "which both Babylonians and Hebrews appear to have derived from a common Semitic antiquity, underwent, in fact, a radically unlike evolution among the two kindred peoples." "To dissever the week from the lunar month," continues Webster, "to employ it as a recognized calendrical unit, and to fix upon one day of that week for the exercises of religion were momentous innovations, which, until evidence to the contrary is found, must be attributed to the Hebrew people alone. Rest Days, Hutton Webster, p.254.

New Testament Era

One thing is self-evident -- the Messiah had absolutely no problem with the day of the week the religious leaders of his day (the Pharisees) were observing the Sabbath on! He had plenty to say about the wall of restrictions and the dos and

don'ts surrounding the Pharisees' concept of the Sabbath, and blasted

them for their nit-picking and hypocrisy. But he never once corrected them over the TIMING of the Sabbath. So when were the Pharisees and the main part of the populace keeping the Sabbath? And, later, when were the early Christians keeping the Sabbath?

In the article Shawui Sabbath: Ancient Sabbath Observance we find

written the following: "Most theologians and some scholars assume that

mainstream Jewish society, at the time of Jesus...was practicing a fixed

seven-day week which was the same as the modern fixed seven-day week. This is extremely doubtful. The change, from a lunar to a fixed week, was

brought about by the power and influence of Rome. As long as the Nazarenes held power in Jerusalem, all Roman practices and customs, including that of the consecutive week, were held at bay.

This article goes on to explain:

God...observed a Sabbath, but this Sabbath was neither Saturday nor

Sunday. The Nazarene Sabbath was a lunar Sabbath . . . of the lunar

month. (A lunar month starts on the New Moon). This was standard

practice among the Beni-Aumen Nazarene Order and most of the other

orthodox Jewish sects of the time. . . Lunar Sabbath observance is an

ancient Semitic custom concurrent and ante-dating the time of Yashua.

Shawui Sabbath: Ancient Sabbath Observance.

Further, states the article:

It is a mistake to assume the ancient followers of Yashua...kept the modern week consisting of Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday. They did not. Their week was a lunar week. . . Most scholars agree that the modern concept of the week began in the first century and was made popular by Rome, although there is not unanimous agreement on this point. Shawui Sabbath: Ancient Sabbath Observance.

At the time of the Messiah the observance of the weekly Sabbath was a national law for those in Judah. "All seven sects, including the Nazarenes and Osseaens, observed it. . .The Beni-Aumen [Nazarenes] observed the Sabbath according to the lunar quarters.” Shawui Sabbath: Ancient Sabbath Observance.

The resurrection of Christ is recorded to have taken place on the second

day of the Passover, being that year the first day of the week. Seven

weeks after that (and so again on the first day of the week) was the Feast of Weeks or Pentecost. In commemoration of this, these two Christian festivals are always held on the first day of the week (Sunday), and so in most cases do not coincide with the Jewish festivals. Oxford English Dictionary,1971 Edition, Vol. 2, “Pentecost.”

But what of the gentile Christians? Did this early split-off from the Nazarenes also

observe a lunar Sabbath cycle? Early historical records clearly confirm that at a very early date gentile Christians also kept the same Sabbath calendar as the Nazarenes!

In the article Shawui Calendar: Ancient Shawui Observance, the author expounds on the fact:

The Sabbath observed by Christ and His family, was on neither a Saturday nor a Sunday, and is calculated in a manner all together different than the modern custom of weekday observance . . .The method of calculating weekdays on God’s calendar is at variance with the modern fixed [fixed to the continuous weekly cycle] week system. Shawui Sabbath: Ancient Sabbath Observance.

The Christian Divorcement of the Sabbath in the years following Clement of Alexandria's time, an ominous change started to take place that was to radically change the Christian concept of the Sabbath. "This intimate connection," records the Encyclopedia Biblica, "between the week and the month was soon dissolved. It is certain that the week soon followed a development of its own, and it became the custom -- without paying any regard to the days of the month (i.e. the lunar month) . . . so that the New Moon no longer coincided with the first day of the week.” The MacMillan Company,1899, p. 5290.

Then, on page 4179 of the same encyclopedia, we read:

The introduction...of the custom of celebrating the Sabbath every 7th day,

irrespective of the relationship of the day of the moon’s phases, led to a

complete separation from the ancient view of the Sabbath. The MacMillan Company,1899, p. 4179.

In the article Shawui Calendar: Ancient Shawui Observance, we find confirmation of this radical change in Yahovah God's calendar:

The [lunar] . . . calendar was used by all the original disciples of Christ. . .This original Nazarene lunar-solar calendar was supplanted by a Roman "planetary week" and calendar in 135 C.E. -- when the "Bishops of the Circumcision" (i.e. legitimate Nazarene successors to Yashua) were displaced from Jerusalem. This began a three hundred year controversy concerning the true calendar and correct Sabbath:

This [calendar] controversy arose after the exodus of the bishops of the

circumcision and has continued until our time" Epiphanius, HE4, 6, 4.

"The groundwork for this supplanting of the true calendar", suggests the

ancient historian Iranaeus "began in Rome with a Bishop Sixtus (c.a. 116-

c.a.126)."

According to Iranaeus:

Sixtus was the first to celebrate a Sunday Easter in Rome instead of the

traditional Nisan 15 [full moon] date on the lunar calendar. This change from the luni-solar to a fixed solar calendar occurred in Rome during the repressive measures which were enacted against ALL Jewish customs and practices, including the lunar calendar, during the reign of Emperor Hadrian. With the fall of the Nazarene headquarters...at Jerusalem, this new Roman calendar quickly spread throughout 'Christendom.' This new calendar not only replaced yearly festival dates such as Passover, but it also revamped the concept of the week and its seventh day.

Hutton Webster points out that "the early Christians had at first adopted the Jewish [lunar] seven-day week with its numbered weekdays, but by the close of the third century A.D. this began to give way to the planetary week; and in the fourth and fifth centuries the pagan designations became generally accepted in the western half of Christendom. The use of the planetary names by Christians attests to the growing influence of astrological speculations introduced by converts from paganism" Rest Days: A Study in Early Law and Morality. New York: The MacMillan Company,1916, p. 220).

It should be noted that the oldest dated Christian inscription to employ a planetary designation belongs to the year 269 A.D. Inscriptiones Christianae urbis Romae, ed. De Rossi, 1861, i, No. 1.

In the article, Shawui Sabbath: Ancient Sabbath Observance, the author asks these questions:

But what of Gentile Christians? Did this early break-off of true Nazarene[s]...also observe a Sabbath cycle? Early historical records clearly confirm that very early Gentile Christians also kept the same [lunar] Sabbath Calendar as the...Nazarenes.

This practice was first changed by [Pope] Sixtus in 126 A.D. and later officially changed by a royal Roman decree from the emperor Constantine. Observance of the [lunar] Sabbath day was made illegal and observance of a "Sunday" of a fixed week [continuous weekly cycle] was made mandatory for all except farmers.

Previous to this time the Roman Saturday was the first day of the Roman week. The veneration of the Sun in the second century A.D. began to pressure Roman culture to change the first day of their week from Saturnday to Sunday. (Had the Jews been observing this same Roman calendar at this early date, as some maintain, their seventh-day Sabbath would have been on Friday, which was the traditional seventh-day of this Roman calendar during the first century A.D.)

Shawui Sabbath: Ancient Sabbath Observance.

Hutton Webster adds:

The change from such [lunar] cycles to those unconnected with the lunations would not have involved so abrupt and sudden a departure from the previous system of time reckoning as that from a bipartite division of the lunar month

to a week which ran continuously through the months and the years. (Rest Days).

The Great Easter Controversy

The Catholic Encyclopedia Easter Controversy is a historical record series of controversies about the proper date to celebrate Easter. There are four distinct phases of the dispute.

First phase Catholic Encyclopedia

This was mainly concerned with whether Christians should follow Old Testament

practices, see also, Old Testament Christian View of the Law. Eusebius of Caesarea (Hist. Eccl., V, xxiii) wrote:

A question of no small importance arose at that time [i.e. the time of Pope

Victor I, about A.D. 190]. The dioceses of all Asia[the Eastern Mediterranean], as from an older tradition, held that the fourteenth day of the moon, on which day the Jews were commanded to sacrifice the lamb, should always be observed as the feast of the life-giving pasch [epi tes tou soteriou Pascha heortes], contending that the fast ought to end on that day, whatever day of the week it might happen to be. However it was not the custom of the churches in the rest of the world to end it at this point, as they observed the practice, which from Apostolic tradition has prevailed to the present time, of terminating the fast on no other day than on that of the Resurrection of our Saviour.

Quartodecimanism (“fourteenism”, derived from Latin) refers to the practice of fixing the celebration of Passover for Christians on the fourteenth day of Nisan in the Old Testament’s Hebrew Calendar (for example, in Latin “quarta decima”). This was the original method of fixing the date of the Passover, which is to be a“

perpetual ordinance”.

A letter of St. Irenaeus shows that the diversity of practice regarding

Easter had existed at least from the time of Pope Sixtus I (c. 120). Further,

Irenaeus states that St. Polycarp, who like the other Eastern Christians, kept Easter on the fourteenth day of the moon. . . following therein the

tradition, which he claimed to have derived from St. John the Apostle.

About 195, Pope Victor I excommunicated the Quartodecimans. Though

this was regarded as immoderate — Origen in the "Philosophumena" (VIII,

xviii) seems to regard them as a mere handful of wrong-headed nonconformists — the practice (by the Jews & Christians of keeping Passover by the lunar calendar Nissan 14) was forced underground.

Second phase Catholic Encyclopedia

The second stage in the Easter controversy centers round the Council of Nicaea (A.D. 325). Granted that the great Easter festival was always to be held on a Sunday, and was not to coincide with a particular phase of the moon, which might occur on any day of the week, a new dispute arose as to the determination of the Sunday itself.

The Syrian Christians always held their Easter festival on the Sunday after the Jews kept their Pasch. On the other hand at Alexandria, and seemingly throughout the rest of the Roman Empire, the Christians calculated the time of

Easter for themselves, paying no attention to the Jews. In this way the date of Easter as kept at Alexandria and Antioch did not always agree; for the Jews, upon whom Antioch depended, adopted very arbitrary methods of intercalating embolismic months (see CALENDAR, Bol. II, p. 158) before they celebrated Nisan, the first spring month, on the fourteenth day of which the paschal

lamb was killed. In particular we learn that they had become neglectful (or at least the Christians of Rome and Alexandria declared they were neglectful) of the law that the fourteenth of Nisan must never precede the equinox.

The Alexandrians, on the other hand, accepted it as a first principle that the Sunday to be kept as Easter Day must necessarily occur after the vernal equinox, then identified with 21 March of the Julian Calendar.

The Council of Nicaea, however, did not declare the Alexandrian or Roman calculations as normative. Instead, the council gave the Bishop of Alexandria the privilege of announcing annually the date of Christian Passover to the Roman curia. Although the synod undertook the regulation of the dating of Christian Passover, it contented itself with communicating its decision to the different dioceses, instead of establishing a canon. Its exact words were not preserved, but from scattered notices the council ruled:

Easter must be celebrated by all throughout the world on the same Sunday; that this Sunday must follow the fourteenth day of the paschal moon; that that moon was to be accounted the paschal moon whose fourteenth day followed the spring equinox; that some provision should be made, probably by the Church of Alexandria as best skilled in astronomical calculations, for determining the proper date of Easter and communicating it to the rest of the world.

Third phase Catholic Encyclopedia

The Roman missionaries coming to England in the time of St. Gregory the Great found the British Christians, the representatives of that Christianity which had been introduced into Britain during the period of the Roman occupation, still adhering to an ancient system of Easter computation which Rome itself had laid aside. The British and Irish Christians were not Quartodecimans, for they kept the Easter festival upon a Sunday. They are supposed (e.g. by Krusch) to have observed an eighty-four year cycle and not the five-hundred and thirty-two year cycle of Victorius which was adopted in Gaul, but the most recent investigator of the question (Schwartz, p. 103) declares it to be impossible to determine what system they followed and himself inclines to the opinion that they derived their rule for the determining of Easter direct from Asia Minor.

Fourth phase Catholic Encyclopedia

The World Council of Churches proposed a reform of the method of determining the date of Easter at a summit in Aleppo, Syria, in 1997:

Easter would be defined as the first Sunday following the first astronomical full moon following the astronomical vernal equinox, as determined from the meridian of Jerusalem. The reform would have been implemented starting in 2001, since in that year the Eastern and Western dates of Easter would coincide. This reform has not yet been implemented. Catholic Encyclopedia: Easter Controversy

The Second Roman-Jewish War

Further information: Bar Kokhba Revolt

In 130, Hadrian visited the ruins of Jerusalem left after the First Roman-Jewish War of 66–73. He promised to rebuild the city, but planning it as a pagan metropolis to be called Aelia Capitolina. A new pagan temple on the ruins of the Second Temple was to be dedicated to Jupiter. In addition, Hadrian abolished circumcision (brit milah), which he, as an avid Hellenist, viewed as mutilation. A Roman coin inscribed Aelia Capitolina was issued in 132. Hadrian's policies triggered the massive Jewish uprising (132–135), led by Bar Kokhba and Akiba ben Joseph. Following the outbreak of the revolt, Hadrian called his general Sextus Julius Severus from Britain, and troops were brought from as far as the Danube. Roman losses were very heavy, and it is believed that an entire legion,

the XXII Deiotariana was destroyed. Roman losses were so heavy that Hadrian's report to the Roman Senate omitted the customary salutation "I and the legions are well". Hadrian's army eventually defeated the revolt however. According to Cassius Dio, during the war 580,000 Jews were killed, 50 fortified towns and 985 villages razed. After the end of the war, Hadrian continued the religious persecution of Jews, according to the Babylonian Talmud. He attempted to root out Judaism, which he saw as the cause of continuous rebellions, prohibited the Torah law, the Hebrew calendarand executed Judaic scholars. The sacred scroll was ceremoniously burned on the Temple Mount. At the former Temple sanctuary, he installed two statues, one of Jupiter, another of himself.

In an attempt to erase any memory of Judea, he removed the name from the map and replaced it with Syria Palaestina, after the Philistines, the ancient enemies of the Jews. He re-established Jerusalem as the Roman pagan polis of Aelia Capitolina, and Jews were forbidden from entering it. Hadrian from Wikipedia the free Enclyclopedia

The Council of Nicea and Attempts to Standardize Easter

In 325 A.D., the First Council of Nicaea came to a decision that Christendom as a whole should use a unified calendar system, which was the Roman one. The Catholic Epiphanius wrote in the mid-4th Century:

. . . the emperor...convened a council of 318 bishops...in the city of Nicea...They passed certain ecclesiastical canons at the council besides, and at the same time decreed in regard to the Passover that there must be one unanimous concord

on the celebration of God's holy and supremely excellent day. For it was variously observed by people . . .

A Sunday date was selected (regardless of the day of the calendar), instead of Nisan 14, which is the fourteenth day from the “full” New Moon of the New

Year.

Eusebius' Life of Constantine, Book 3 chapter 18 records Constantine the Great as writing:

. . it appeared an unworthy thing that in the celebration of this most holy

feast we should follow the practice of the Jews, who have impiously defiled their hands with enormous sin, and are, therefore, deservedly afflicted with blindness of soul. ... Let us then have nothing in common with the detestable Jewish crowd; for we have received from our Saviour a different way.

Theodoret's Ecclesiastical History1.9 records The Epistle of the Emperor Constantine, concerning the matters transacted at the Council, addressed to those Bishops who were not present:

It was, in the first place, declared improper to follow the custom of the

Jews in the celebration of this holy festival, because, their hands having

been stained with crime, the minds of these wretched men are necessarily

blinded. ... Let us, then, have nothing in common with the Jews, who are

our adversaries. ... avoiding all contact with that evil way. ... who, after having compassed the death of the Lord, being out of their minds, are guided not by sound reason, but by an unrestrained passion, wherever their innate madness carries them. ... a people so utterly depraved. ... Therefore, this irregularity must be corrected, in order that we may no more have any thing in common with those parricites and the murderers of our Lord. ... no single point in common with the perjury of the Jews.

Philip Schaff's History of the Christian Church, volume 3, section 79, The Time of the Easter Festival states:

The feast of the resurrection was thenceforth required to be celebrated everywhere on a Sunday, and never on the day of the Jewish Passover, but

always after the fourteenth of Nisan, on the Sunday after the first vernal

full moon. The leading motive for this regulation was opposition to Judaism, which had dishonored the Passover by the crucifixion of the Lord . . . At Nicaea, therefore, the Roman and Alexandrian usage with respect to Easter triumphed, and the Judaizing practice of the Quartodecimanians, who always celebrated Easter on the fourteenth of Nisan, became thenceforth a heresy. Yet that practi

ce continued in many parts of the East, and in the time of Epiphanius, about A.D. 400, there were many, Quartodecimanians, who, as he says, were orthodox, indeed, in doctrine, but in ritual were addicted to Jewish fables, and built upon the principle: “Cursed is every one who does not keep his Passover on the fourteenth of Nisan.” They kept the day with the Communion and with fasting till three o’clock.

Yet they were divided into several parties among themselves. A peculiar offshoot of the Quartodecimanians was the rigidly ascetic Audians, who likewise held that the Passover must be kept at the very same time (not after the same manner) with the Jews, on the fourteenth of Nisan, and for their authority appealed to their edition of the Apostolic Constitutions. And even in the orthodox church these measures did not secure entire uniformity. For the council of Nicaea, probably from prudence, passed by the question of the Roman and Alexandrian computation of Easter. At least the Acts contain no reference to it. At all events this difference remained: that Rome, afterward as before, fixed the vernal equinox, the terminus a quo of the Easter full moon, on the 18th

of March, while Alexandria placed it correctly on the 21st. It thus occurred that the Latin’s, the very year after the Nicene council, and again in the years 330, 333, 340, 341, 343, varied from the Alexandrians in the time of keeping Easter.

On this account the council of Sardica, as evident in the recently discovered Paschal Epistles of Athanasius, took the Easter question again in hand, and brought about, by mutual concessions, a compromise for the ensuing fifty years, but without permanent result. In 387 the difference of the Egyptian and the Roman Easter amounted to fully five weeks. Later attempts also to adjust the matter were in vain, until the monk Dionysius Exiguus, the author of our Christian calendar, succeeded in harmonizing the computation of Easter on the basis of the true Alexandrian reckoning; except that the Gallican and British Christians adhered still longer to the old custom, and thus fell into conflict with the Anglo-Saxon [one of the issues addressed at the Synod of Whitby ]. The intr

oduction of the improved Gregorian calendar in the Western church in 1582 again produced discrepancy; the Eastern and Russian church adhered to the Julian calendar, and is consequently now about twelve days behind ... [the

Western Church]. According to the Gregorian calendar, which does not

divide the months with astronomical exactness, it sometimes happens that

the Paschal full moon is put a couple of hours too early, and the Christian

Easter, as was the case in 1825, coincides with the Jewish Passover, against the express order of the council of Nicaea." Wikipedia Enclyclopedia.

The Modern Saturday

An old and still common theory derives the Sabbath institution from the worship

of Saturn after which planet the first day of the astrological week received its

designation. The theory is untenable for more than one reason. In the first place

the Hebrews did not name their weekdays after the planets, but indicated them by ordinal numbers. In the second place Saturn's day began the planetary week,

while the Jewish [Hebrew] Sabbath was regarded as the last day of the seven, a

suitable position for a rest day. And in the third place neither the Hebrews nor

any other Oriental people ever worshipped the planet Saturn as god and observed his day as a festival. Rest Days, p. 243, Hutton Webster

These imported [from Babylon] superstitions eventually led Jewish rabbis to call

Saturn “Shabbti,” 'the star of the Sabbath.' [and] it was not until the first century

of our era, when the planetary week had become an established institution, that

the Jewish Sabbath seems always to have corresponded to Saturn's Day [Saturday]. Rest Days,p. 244, Hutton Webster

“Those who argue that the present Saturday of the Roman planetary week was

always the 7th day of the week [Biblical week of Creation] are either ignorant of

the real facts or otherwise are plain and blunt liars. All authoritative sources plainly show that originally in Rome the week consisted of EIGHT days. And as

long as this was the case the week did not begin with SUNDAY but rather with

SATURDAY. Yes, in ancient Rome SATURDAY was the FIRST and not the SEVENTH day of their consecutive week. Hutton Webster in his book Rest Days: A Study in Early Law and Morality, on p. 264, clearly points out that originally in Rome, SATURDAY - the DAY of SATURN - began the Roman astrological week: ...the worship of SATURN, after which planet the first day of the astrological week [Saturday] received its designation...SATURN'S DAY [SATURDAY] BEGAN THE PLANETARY WEEK, while the Jewish Sabbath was regarded as the LAST DAY [of a lunar week].’”

Conclusion

The above evidence is only a sample of the abundant historical records available, which is made increasingly possible through the communication advancement of the internet.

Daniel 12:4 says,

 “. . . shut up the words, and seal the book until the time of the end; many shall run to and fro, and knowledge shall increase.”

These words are literally being fulfilled. If historical evidence was all that was available in support of the lunisolar calendar and Sabbath, it would still be quite impressive. However, in addition to this wealth of historical evidence, there is also the solid Scriptural and astronomical evidence. Together they form an unbreakable alliance that function as a GPS unit to identify the true calendar

of God the Creator.

Together they prove that the Biblical calendar is grafted from a different vine than that of the modern Roman calendar: one is man made, and the other divine.

May God continue to bless you as you diligently seek him.

FOOTNOTES

1 calculation method for the dates of (Pagan) Easter

Easter is an annual festival observed throughout the Christian world. The date for Easter shifts every year within the Gregorian Calendar. The Gregorian Calendar is the standard international calendar for civil use. In addition, it regulates the ceremonial cycle of the Roman Catholic and Protestant churches. The current Gregorian ecclesiastical rules that determine the date of Easter trace back to 325 CE at the First Council of Nicaea convened by the Roman Emperor Constantine. At that time the Roman world used the Julian Calendar (put in place by Julius Caesar).

The Council decided to keep Easter on a Sunday, the same Sunday throughout the world. To fix incontrovertibly the date for Easter, and to make it determinable indefinitely in advance, the Council constructed special tables to compute the date. These tables were revised in the following few centuries,  resulting eventually in the tables constructed by the 6th century Abbot of Scythia, Dionysis Exiguus. Nonetheless, different means of calculations continued in use throughout the Christian world.

In 1582 Gregory XIII (Pope of the Roman Catholic Church) completed a reconstruction of the Julian calendar and produced new Easter tables. One major difference between the Julian and Gregorian Calendar is the "leap year rule". See our FAQ on Calendars for a description of the difference. Universal adoption of this Gregorian calendar occurred slowly. By the 1700's, though, most of western Europe had adopted the Gregorian Calendar. The Eastern Christian churches still determine the Easter dates using the older Julian Calendar method.

The usual statement, that Easter Day is the first Sunday after the full moon that occurs next after the vernal equinox, is not a precise statement of the actual ecclesiastical rules. The full moon involved is not the astronomical Full Moon but an ecclesiastical moon (determined from tables) that keeps, more or less, in step with the astronomical Moon.

The ecclesiastical rules are:

Easter falls on the first Sunday following the first ecclesiastical full moon that occurs on or after the day of the vernal equinox;

this particular ecclesiastical full moon is the 14th day of a tabular lunation (new moon); and

the vernal equinox is fixed as March 21.

resulting in that Easter can never occur before March 22 or later than April 25. The Gregorian dates for the ecclesiastical full moon come from the Gregorian tables. Therefore, the civil date of Easter depends upon which tables - Gregorian or pre-Gregorian - are used. The western (Roman Catholic and Protestant) Christian churches use the Gregorian tables; many eastern (Orthodox) Christian churches use the older tables based on the Julian Calendar.

In a congress held in 1923, the eastern churches adopted a modified Gregorian Calendar and decided to set the date of Easter according to the astronomical Full Moon for the meridian of Jerusalem. However, a variety of practices remain among the eastern churches.

There are three major differences between the ecclesiastical system and the astronomical system.

The times of the ecclesiastical full moons are not necessarily identical to the times of astronomical Full Moons. The ecclesiastical tables did not account for the full complexity of the lunar motion.

The vernal equinox has a precise astronomical definition determined by the actual apparent motion of the Sun as seen from the Earth. It is the precise time at which the apparent ecliptic longitude of the Sun is zero. (Yes, the Sun's ecliptic longitude, not its declination, is used for the astronomical definition.) This precise time shifts within the civil calendar very slightly from year to year. In the ecclesiastical system the vernal equinox does not shift; it is fixed at March 21 regardless of the actual motion of the Sun.

The date of Easter is a specific calendar date. Easter starts when that date starts for your local time zone. The vernal equinox occurs at a specific date and time all over the Earth at once.

Inevitably, then, the date of Easter occasionally differs from a date that depends on the astronomical Full Moon and vernal equinox. In some cases this difference may occur in some parts of the world and not in others because two dates separated by the International Date Line are always simultaneously in progress on the Earth.

For example, take the year 1962. In 1962, the astronomical Full Moon occurred on March 21, UT=7h 55m - about six hours after astronomical equinox. The ecclesiastical full moon (taken from the tables), however, occurred on March 20, before the fixed ecclesiastical equinox at March 21. In the astronomical case, the Full Moon followed its equinox; in the ecclesiastical case, it preceded its equinox. Following the rules, Easter, therefore, was not until the Sunday that followed the next ecclesiastical full moon (Wednesday, April 18) making Easter Sunday, April 22.

Similarly, in 1954 the first ecclesiastical full moon after March 21 fell on Saturday, April 17. Thus, Easter was Sunday, April 18. The astronomical equinox also occurred on March 21. The next astronomical Full Moon occurred on April 18 at UT=5h. So in some places in the world Easter was on the same Sunday as the astronomical Full Moon.

Source: http://www.usno.navy.mil/USNO/astronomical-applications/astronomical-information-center/calendars

Seventh Day Adventist

concerning the

Biblical Calendar

I am adding this portion of study due to the fact that I myself was raised in a SDA/ Ellen G. White environment, and therefore know the strongholds this teaching has had on my life, mainly my mind, and how I saw and interpreted things concerning the Bible.

There are many things due to the writings of Ellen G. White that tend to hinder the opening of one’s mind to the truths of the Bible itself. This is a stronghold of the devil himself. I completely turned my back and walked away due to the fact that they began to teach more of Ellen G. White than they did from God’s word. This is a big flag waving letting one know that they are not of God or of truth.

Christ himself warns of false teachings in the last days:

Matt. 24:11

And many false prophets shall rise, and shall deceive many.

For there shall arise false Christ’s, and false prophets, and shall show great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.

Matthew 24:24-25

“Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves.”
Matthew 7:15

“For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ. And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light. Therefore it is no great thing if his ministers also be transformed as the ministers of righteousness; whose end shall be according to their works.”
2nd Corinthians 11:13-15

  

We are told to try the Spirits:

Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world. John 4:1

False Teachings ?

Ellen G. White appears to state that there has been a continuous weekly cycle that has continued since the first week of creation. first volume of Spirit of Prophecy, p. 85

Isn't this evidence that the God’s time keeping and weeks are in harmony with Rome's unbroken-cycle-of-successive-weeks?

Those that have grown up hearing, reading or have been taught with the writings of Ellen G. White know it is no secret that she followed an unbroken-cycle-of-successive-weeks, as she also believed and kept the entire Roman Gregorian calendar/clock system for years, months, weeks, days, and hours. She consistently believed and taught that the seventh-day of the Roman weekly cycle was indeed "Saturday," the seventh-day Sabbath of creation.

Ellen White also proclaimed that Christ's death on Passover was on the 14th according to the Jewish calendar, and not the Roman calendar. This statement creates a contradiction in terms of outrageous proportions, regarding which calendar is in harmony with creation.

Without a doubt, the calendar used by the Lord for Passover/crucifixion was the one in harmony with creation, the first Passover when leaving Egypt, appointed Feasts, and festivals. Don’t you think God wants us to faithfully keep the same calendar as he did, that was set into motion at creation to be for signs, and for seasons, and for days and years (Genesis 1:14-18; Ezekiel 46:1).

Sir Isaac Newton discovered this same discrepancy between the Roman calendar and the old Jewish calendar, specifically with regards to the crucifixion date. As a result of his in depth mathematical prowess, the Catholic Church was forced to change the recorded year of the crucifixion to A.D. 33, just so the crucifixion would fall on a Friday, with a Saturday rest in the tomb, and a Sunday resurrection. This is history. It simply cannot be both ways, or Rome would never have changed the recorded year of the crucifixion

In all of her writings and even following the vision recorded in Early Writings, p. 255:

It was represented to me that the remnant followed Jesus into the most holy place and beheld the ark and the mercy seat, and were captivated with their glory. Jesus then raised the cover of the ark, and lo! the tables of stone, with the ten commandments written upon them. They trace down the lively oracles, but start back with trembling when they see the fourth commandment among the ten holy precepts, with a brighter light shining upon it than upon the other nine, and a halo of glory all around it. They find nothing there informing them that the Sabbath has been abolished, or changed to the first day of the week. The commandment reads as when spoken by the voice of God in solemn and awful grandeur upon the mount, while the lightnings flashed and the thunders rolled; it is the same as when written with His own finger on the tables of stone: “Six days shalt thou labor, and do all thy work: but the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God.” They are amazed as they behold the care taken of the ten commandments. They see them placed close by Jehovah, overshadowed and protected by His holiness. They see that they have been trampling upon the fourth commandment of the Decalogue, and have observed a day handed down by the heathen and papists, instead of the day sanctified by Jehovah. They humble themselves before God and mourn over their past transgressions. {EW 255.1}

Ellen White, never produced a "thus saith the Lord" that "Saturday" is the true and holy seventh-day Sabbath. All that was shown her was that the "seventh-day" is the Sabbath. Since there is nothing in either Scripture or her writings that proclaims "Saturday" to be the seventh-day Sabbath of the Creator, in the context of a "thus saith the Lord," the evidence should be acquired by all for a close inspection. The evidence, while shocking, will feed the soul of the humble truth seeker.

It has been determined by some that the quote in question below provides support that the seventh-day Sabbath of Scripture cycles without end. This would place it in harmony with the Roman Gregorian calendar in contrast to weeks that are ruled and beaconed by the moon as stated in Scripture. Let's look at the weight of evidence.

Spirit of Prophecy, Vol.1, p. 85.

1.     I was then carried back to the creation, and was shown that the first week, in which God performed the work of creation in six days and rested on the seventh day, was just like every other week.

2.      The great God, in his days of creation and day of rest, measured off the first cycle as a sample for successive weeks till the close of time.

3.     "These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created." God gives us the productions of his work at the close of each literal day. Each day was accounted of him a generation, because every day he generated or produced some new portion of his work.

4.     On the seventh day of the first week God rested from his work, and then blessed the day of his rest, and set it apart for the use of man.

5.     The weekly cycle of seven literal days, six for labor and the seventh for rest, which has been preserved and brought down through Bible history, originated in the great facts of the first seven days.

To fully understand what this paragraph is saying and what it is not saying, let’s break it down point by point. There are added numbers to assist in discussing each point.

Point by Point Analysis and Evidence:

Point 1 - I was then carried back to the creation, and was shown that the first week, in which God performed the work of creation in six days and rested on the seventh day, was just like every other week.

Point 1 Ellen White is describing what was shown her in vision regarding the first week of creation. The Creator performed everything He made in six literal days, and rested on the seventh day. Then in the last words she clarifies that the week of creation is just like every other week. Her inspired position was that each day of creation was not equal to 1000 or even a million years as some have tried to harmonize the seven literal days of the creation week with the theory of evolution. Rather, she is clarifying that "weeks" according to the Creator and Scripture are made up of two components- six literal work days that are followed by a holy seventh-day Sabbath, making a Biblical week a total of seven literal days. The scenario presented in this first point, perfectly applies to both the Roman continuous-weekly-cycle and the Biblical lunar week.

Point 2 - The great God, in his days of creation and day of rest, measured off the first cycle as a sample for successive weeks till the close of time.

Point 2 defines that it was the Creator, during the first week of creation, who defined the parameters of the weekly cycle. It was to be the prototype for all weeks to come.

This sentence does not actually say that weeks are to cycle one after another in an unbroken fashion forever. While it alludes to Ellen White's personal belief that the weeks of seven days cycle without end, every detail also applies to the Biblical lunar calendar as well. The model given for the cycle is merely seven days, six for work and the seventh as the Sabbath. The Biblical lunar weeks start fresh every single month with the insertion of the New Moon day, according to the Creator's ordained lunar design. The term "successive weeks" here defines all the cycles of seven days to follow thereafter, to the close of time. But no reference is made as to how they were to cycle.

Everyone has made the assumption, that the week is to cycle without end, and the calendar used is the Roman Gregorian. This comes from our preconditioning that all weeks follow in line, one after the other, as we have been groomed to believe, this is the case with the Roman Gregorian Calendar But this week cycle is only one calendar system's model of cycling weeks. This is not the case of the "weeks" found in the Biblical calendation system. What system does the Bible promote and what does it look like?

Scripture promotes only one calendation model for years, months, weeks and days. This calendation model was strictly lunisolar.

Ezekiel 46:1

Thus saith the Lord God;

The gate of the inner court that looketh toward the east shall be shut the six  working days; but on the Sabbath it shall be opened, and in the day of the new moon it shall be opened.

According to this scripture "thus saith the Lord," there are three kinds of days that never overlap that are beaconed by the New Moon (see explanation below).

• New Moon days
• Seventh-day Sabbaths
• Six working days

All of its units of time are beaconed only by the orchestration of the sun, moon and stars as defined in Genesis 1:14-18, including the cycle of weeks. Any calendar system that promotes a continuous-weekly-cycle is not in harmony with the Bible and the astronomical bodies divinely appointed for holy days of worship by our Creator of heaven and earth (Psalms 19:1-2). Check this out for yourself.

The proof lies in a quick look at your Roman wall calendar, which illustrates the New Moon falling on different days of the week each and every Gregorian month. According to Ezekiel, New Moon day will never fall on a work day or a seventh-day Sabbath. Yet, with the Roman calendar it will show in April, May and June of 2011, the New Moon falls on a week day. Then in July, New Moon day falls on a Saturday. It is an impossibility for the New Moon day, which is the first day of the lunar month, to also fall on a seventh-day Sabbath or a mere week day. Therefore, any calendar that utilizes an unbroken-cycle-of-weeks will cause the New Moon day to appear to float through the week and fall on both week days and Saturdays on occasions. This is profound proof that the modern Roman calendar is not in harmony with the Creator's ordained lunisolar time-keeping system. There is only one calendar model in harmony with the Ezekiel 46:1 criteria. You be the judge.

The lunisolar time system was re-established with Moses prior to the Sanctuary system being established. So it was that the Sanctuary was based upon the preestablished lunisolar time system and not the other way around, as many claim. All the holy appointed feast days, including the seventh-day Sabbath were founded upon lunisolar units of time as beaconed by the New Moon (Leviticus 23:2-4).

 Its years begin in Spring on New Moon day. Each month begins on New Moon day and is always 29 or 30 days in length. Each week is defined by six literal work days and followed by a seventh-day Sabbath as established by the creation model. There are four weeks in each and every lunar month. The lunar week does not cycle without end, as the New Moon Day was divinely ordained to refresh or restart the cycle of weeks each and every month. Therefore, the cycle of weeks is broken each and every month on the first day of the month. Is it any wonder that there has been an agenda to eliminate the holy appointed Feast days in Scripture along with the entire Sanctuary service model, as these testify to our Creator's lunisolar time-keeping system.