The Omer Count to Pentecost Page 9

Christian Churches of God

No. 173

The Omer Count to Pentecost

(Edition 3.0 19960803-20031006-20090117)

In the twentieth century, the Churches of God went awry in their determination of Pentecost from the wrongful implementation of the Hillel Calendar and through Judaisers in the Churches of God. This text explains the errors and the process that was followed originally. It replaces the paper Pentecost: Comparing Leviticus 23:11-22 in the Septuagint (No. 173).

Christian Churches of God

PO Box 369, WODEN ACT 2606, AUSTRALIA

Email:

(Copyright ã 1996, 2003, 2009 Wade Cox)

This paper may be freely copied and distributed provided it is copied in total with no alterations or deletions. The publisher’s name and address and the copyright notice must be included. No charge may be levied on recipients of distributed copies. Brief quotations may be embodied in critical articles and reviews without breaching copyright.

This paper is available from the World Wide Web page:
http://www.logon.org and http://www.ccg.org


The Omer Count to Pentecost

The Omer Count to Pentecost Page 9

Introduction

There has been confusion in the Churches of God in the twentieth century over the determination of Pentecost. The problem came into being due to the failure of the Hillel Calendar. This calendar, introduced in 358 CE, determines the New Moons by the putative sighting of the crescent moons which were reduced to specified postponements of the New Moons according to a system of rules determined by rabbinical traditions and a fixed date for the Wave-Sheaf offering.

The obvious error with the fixed date system resulting in a Sivan 6 Pentecost, and the historical understanding of the Church as always having Pentecost on Sunday even into Catholicism, and the clear wording of the Texts, made it impossible to follow the Hillel system in this aspect.

The Churches of God, through error, commenced to adopt the Hillel system in the middle of the twentieth century. This error came in through the The Radio Church of God, later Worldwide Church of God (WCG). Their changes in 1974 resulted in a series of errors being propagated in their offshoots.

Contrary to popular belief the RCG/WCG did not introduce the Holy Days to the Churches of God in the 20th century. That was done by the Caldwell Conference of the Church of God (Seventh Day). They kept the Calendar and all the Feasts according to the Conjunction and they had the correct nature of God doctrines, which is the reason they were allowed to keep the correct calendar. CCG has in effect taken over from them.

There are two definitive errors being followed by the Churches of God, and three if the Samaritan system is accepted as being followed by some isolated individuals, rather than any serious church system.

The three erroneous systems used to determine Pentecost are:

(1) Nisan 16, as a fixed date, which is supported by most modern Jews (the rabbinical successors to the Pharisees), and certain Judaisers coming from the Churches of God.

(2) The Sunday after the Sabbath that falls during the Feast of Unleavened Bread. This is the pre-1974 Worldwide Church of God teaching. It is supported today by some Messianic groups who keep a Sunday, or a Monday Pentecost.

(3) The Samaritan count from the New Moon following the Equinox and commencing from the Sunday within the Feast of Unleavened Bread even though it is kept in what is correctly the Second month.

The Sunday during the Feast of Unleavened Bread is now supported as the correct historical Wave Sheaf by the Worldwide Church of God since 1974, and several of its major breakaway groups, even though they do not observe the Wave Sheaf as required by Leviticus 23. They are nevertheless in error, often because of the postponements, as are all the alternatives above, including the Samaritans who have effected the postponement of the entire month in approximately fifty percent of cases. The errors all centre on the Hillel system introduced from 358 CE or the Samaritan error concerning the post-equinox New Year.

The WCG now keeps the Easter dates and no longer keeps the Feasts, which includes the correct Pentecost sometimes being out by a week.

The Historical Positions

The Churches of God, historically, at least until the errors of WCG, firstly in trying to keep a Sivan 6 and then a Monday Pentecost prior to 1974, have always kept Pentecost on a Sunday and the Temple system always kept Pentecost on a Sunday. Even when the Roman Church split with the Churches of God over the Quartodeciman disputes in 192 CE they saw no reason to alter the way of determining Pentecost. The problem they faced was simply that it had changed by the determination of Easter alone (see the paper The Quartodeciman Disputes (No. 277)).

The historical positions are also examined in the paper The Role of the Fourth Commandment in the Historical Sabbath-keeping Churches of God (No. 170).

The Sadducees ran the Temple during the period of its operation and they always kept Pentecost on a Sunday.

The Temple in Egypt followed that system also as we see from the text of the Septuagint (LXX) which was the official Greek translation of the OT, and which had been commissioned and translated in Egypt for the Egyptian diaspora by the Pharaoh there.

The same situation also ran for the Samaritans. Their Pentecost was on a Sunday but differed only in the fact that they had introduced a post-equinox commencement for the New Year, always following the New Moon after the Equinox and not nearest to it, as was the case with the Temple system. In this way at least half the time they were a month late with the Passover, often keeping the second Passover as the first. Thus their intercalation was out of sequence also with the Jewish system. They thus kept the feast in the eighth month which was the mistake made by Jeroboam for which he was condemned by God through the prophets (see the paper Jeroboam and the Hillel Calendar (No. 191)).

The Temple System

The Temple system was correct and followed the written law as we see carried out by the Sadducees. The Temple system has been examined in the paper God’s Calendar (No. 156).

There were no postponements operating in the Temple period. That is clear from the compilation of the Mishnah ca. 200 on which the Talmud was later compiled as commentary. There seems to be some quite spurious claims by pseudo-scholars of some Churches of God that seek to claim that postponements were operational in the Temple period according to the Talmud. However, that is a blatant false statement contradicted by the evidence of history and the Mishnah itself.

The Jewish authority (Judaeus) Philo, writing in Alexandria, shows that the entire Temple system and the diaspora had the one calendar, free of postponements, with the exception of the Qumran Community called Essene by some. Philo says quite clearly that the New Moons were determined by the conjunctions, which were calculated in the astronomical schools. The month was from one conjunction to the next conjunction. There were no postponements and there never had been any postponements ever recorded in the Temple period. This has been examined in the paper Commentary on UCG Doctrinal Paper: Should Christians Observe New Moons (No. 124).

Philo says:

"This is the New Moon, or beginning of the lunar month, namely the period between one conjunction and the next, the length of which has been accurately calculated in the astronomical schools." (Judaeus, Philo, The Special Laws, II, XXVI, 140, Treatise by F.H. Colson, Harvard University Press: Cambridge, MA, 1937).

That is the known historical position and is the known correct position of the Temple system. There is no other evidence to suggest they even contemplated postponements until after the fall of the Temple, as we see from the Talmud, as the postponements did not come into effect until after the compilation of the Mishnah ca. 200 CE.

The incidence of the postponements has been examined in the paper The Calendar and the Moon: Postponements or Festivals? (No. 195) and also in the various FAQs on the subject.

The Temple system as portrayed in the Septuagint (LXX)

The text concerning the Omer Count in the LXX was examined in the paper Pentecost comparing Leviticus 23:11-22 in the Septuagint, which this paper now replaces.

The Septuagint or the Seventy (LXX) translation is a translation of the Hebrew text into Greek completed in Alexandria. It should, therefore, follow the Hebrew text. Differences should highlight theological viewpoints in contention in later rabbinical thought. The translation of the LXX used here is that by Sir Lancelot C. L. Brenton (London, 1851, Hendrickson, reprint 1992). The Greek text is Romanised for the purposes of this paper.

Leviticus 23:15-17 And ye shall number to yourselves from the day after the sabbath, from the day on which ye shall offer the sheaf of the heave offering; seven full weeks: 16 until the morrow after the last week ye shall number fifty days, and shall bring a new meat-offering to the LORD. 17 Ye shall bring from your dwelling, as a heave-offering, two loaves: they shall be of two tenth portions of fine flour; they shall be baken with leaven of the firstfruits to the LORD (LXX) [The KJV translates the last phrase as they are the firstfruits unto the Lord].

Kai arithmesete umin apo tes epaurion tõn sabbatõn, apo tes emeras es an prosenegkete to dragma tou epithematos, epta ebdomadas oloklerous, eõs tes epaurion tes eschates ebdomados arithmesete pentekonta emeras, kai prosoisete thusian nean tõ Kuriõ.

The KJV is essentially the same as the LXX in the remaining text and is quoted for comparison.

Leviticus 23:18-22 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 [whole, LXX] 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 [they shall belong to the priest that brings them, LXX]. 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 [fully reap, LXX] 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. (KJV)

It is evident from the text of the LXX and Brenton’s translation that the text commences numbering the day after the Sabbath, seven full weeks.

There is no question that this count involves the First Holy Day of the Feast except where it falls on the weekly Sabbath.

The word in the Greek is Sabbatõn and this word translates the Hebrew Shabbath. It cannot be that the Feast Holy Day is meant, as the text in the Hebrew makes it quite clear in Leviticus 23 that there are three types of Sabbath days being referred to in the text. The three types are the Shabbath (SHD 7676) or weekly Sabbath, the Shabbathown (SHD 7677) or Holy Sabbatised day, and the Shabbath Shabbathown in the case of the Day of Atonement, which is a Sabbatised Sabbath or a most holy Sabbath. Atonement is clearly placed above all other days and identified under the term Sabbath.

Counting Pentecost and the Three Types of Sabbaths

Leviticus 23 is quite clear from its use of the terms in Hebrew that the method of counting Pentecost (lit. counting fifty) concerns seven perfect or complete Sabbaths. Leviticus 23 is most precise in the Hebrew text concerning the use of the terms for Shabbath, Shabbathown and Shabbath Shabbathown. The term Shabbathown occurs from Leviticus 23:24,39. Until that section of the text, the Sabbath is used specifically, referring only to the weekly Sabbath as distinct from the Holy Days, which are named holy gatherings (qodesh miqra’ SHD 6944, 4744). The Feast of Trumpets is a Shabbathown and identified as a qodesh miqra’ (pron. chodesh mikraw). The holy convocations of the Feast of Tabernacles and Last Great Day are also the Shabbathown. There is thus a clear distinction between the Shabbath and the Shabbathown of the Feasts and also of the Shabbath Shabbathown of Atonement, which is the most holy of Sabbaths. Shabbath Shabbathown is thus used of the Sabbath and Atonement only (Lev. 23:3,32).

The LXX preserves the distinction between the Shabbath and the Shabbathown by using the Hellenised term sabbaton for Shabbath and the term anapausis or rest for Shabbathown where it is used in Leviticus 23 (i.e. vv. 24 and 39). The sense is to give rest (from SGD 373 anapauo, see Thayers, p. 40). The LXX thus preserves the distinction between the Sabbath and the Holy Days by using the terms sabbaton and anapausis both terms for rest for Shabbath and Shabbathown. This use shows clearly and deliberately that the terms used for the counting in relation to Pentecost concern the weekly Sabbath only and not the Holy Days. This is clear proof that at the time of the compilation of the LXX, 6Sivan was not contemplated in the calculation of Pentecost and that it was understood as being from the weekly Sabbath.