The biblical feasts

Dates for the year ahead

Every biblical day begins at sundown, so each feast begins on the evening before its first full day. The dates below are as kept outside Israel, where Passover, Shavuot and Shemini Atzeret each last one day longer than in Israel.

Dates from Hebcal.com, CC-BY. Purim falls in Adar II in a Hebrew leap year. Firstfruits is shown on 16 Nisan, as Jewish tradition counts it.

The appointed times

The Hebrew word for these days is moadim, appointed times. Leviticus 23 lists them together, and it begins with the Sabbath.

These are the appointed feasts of the Lord that you shall proclaim as holy convocations; they are my appointed feasts.

Leviticus 23:2

The next verse names the weekly Sabbath, “a Sabbath of solemn rest, a holy convocation” (Leviticus 23:3), as the first appointed time. Every other feast in the chapter is kept once a year. Shabbat comes every seventh day, and our guide to what Shabbat is covers it in full.

The feasts follow the harvests of the land of Israel. The spring feasts mark the barley and wheat harvests, and Sukkot marks the final ingathering of the year. Three of them, Unleavened Bread, Weeks and Booths, were pilgrimage feasts, when Israel went up to Jerusalem to appear before the Lord (Deuteronomy 16:16). Yeshua and his family made that journey too (Luke 2:41; John 7:10).

The spring feasts

Passover פֶּסַח (Pesach)

Passover falls on 14 Nisan, in March or April, “at twilight” (Leviticus 23:5). It remembers the night God brought Israel out of Egypt, when the blood of a lamb on the doorposts kept the firstborn of Israel safe (Exodus 12). Families gather on the evening that begins 15 Nisan for the seder, a meal that retells the story with matzah, bitter herbs, four cups of wine and the questions children ask.

Yeshua’s last supper with his disciples was a Passover meal, and he died at Passover. Paul writes, “Christ, our Passover lamb, has been sacrificed” (1 Corinthians 5:7). At a Messianic seder the matzah and the third cup, the cup of redemption, are remembered as the bread and cup Yeshua shared.

Unleavened Bread חַג הַמַּצּוֹת (Chag HaMatzot)

The seven days from 15 Nisan are the Feast of Unleavened Bread (Leviticus 23:6–8). Today the whole week is usually called Passover. Homes are cleared of leaven, and matzah is eaten in memory of the bread Israel baked in haste.

Paul draws on this week when he calls believers to “celebrate the festival” with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth (1 Corinthians 5:8). Messianic Jews see in the sinless Messiah the bread without leaven.

Firstfruits רֵאשִׁית (Reishit)

During Unleavened Bread, Israel waved the first sheaf of the barley harvest before the Lord, “on the day after the Sabbath” (Leviticus 23:11). Jewish tradition reads that Sabbath as the first day of Passover, so the sheaf, or omer, was offered on 16 Nisan. Some Messianic congregations read it as the weekly Sabbath and keep Firstfruits on the Sunday of Passover week. The day begins the counting of the omer, fifty days to Shavuot.

Yeshua rose on the first day of the week during the feast. “Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep” (1 Corinthians 15:20). His resurrection is the first sheaf of a harvest still to come.

Feast of Weeks שָׁבוּעוֹת (Shavuot)

Seven weeks after Firstfruits comes Shavuot, on 6 Sivan in May or June (Leviticus 23:15–21). It brought the first loaves of the wheat harvest to the Lord. Jewish tradition also remembers it as the day the Torah was given at Sinai. Synagogues read the book of Ruth, many stay up through the night studying Torah, and dairy foods are a custom of the day.

The Greek name is Pentecost, from the word for fiftieth. On this feast, with Jerusalem full of pilgrims, the Holy Spirit was poured out on Yeshua’s disciples (Acts 2). Messianic Jews see the two gifts together. At Sinai God wrote his Torah on stone, and at Shavuot he began to write it on hearts, as Jeremiah promised (Jeremiah 31:33).

The fall feasts

Feast of Trumpets יוֹם תְּרוּעָה (Yom Teruah)

On 1 Tishrei, in September or October, Leviticus calls for “a day of solemn rest, a memorial proclaimed with blast of trumpets” (Leviticus 23:24). Today it is better known as Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year. The shofar, a ram’s horn, is blown in the synagogue, and apples dipped in honey wish everyone a sweet year. It begins the ten Days of Awe, a season of repentance that leads to Yom Kippur.

The New Testament links a trumpet to the Messiah’s return. Paul writes that the Lord will descend “with the sound of the trumpet of God” (1 Thessalonians 4:16). Many Messianic teachers see the fall feasts as pointing ahead to what Yeshua has yet to complete, as the spring feasts point back to his first coming.

Day of Atonement יוֹם כִּפּוּר (Yom Kippur)

Yom Kippur falls on 10 Tishrei. It is the holiest day of the Jewish year, a day of fasting, confession and prayer (Leviticus 16; 23:26–32). In the Temple it was the one day the high priest entered the Most Holy Place to make atonement for the people. Today synagogues hold services from the evening of Kol Nidre to the closing prayer, Ne’ilah, the next evening.

The letter to the Hebrews presents Yeshua as the high priest who entered the holy places “by means of his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption” (Hebrews 9:12). Many Messianic Jews fast on Yom Kippur with the rest of the Jewish people. They give thanks for atonement in Messiah and pray for the day when all Israel will be saved (Romans 11:26).

Feast of Tabernacles סֻכּוֹת (Sukkot)

Five days later, on 15 Tishrei, comes Sukkot, the Feast of Booths or Tabernacles. For seven days Israel lives in a sukkah, a temporary shelter, in memory of the years in the wilderness (Leviticus 23:39–43). It is the feast of the final harvest, and the Torah commands joy (Deuteronomy 16:14–15). Families eat in the sukkah and wave the lulav and etrog, palm, myrtle, willow and citron, before the Lord (Leviticus 23:40). The day after the seven days is Shemini Atzeret, and Simchat Torah follows, when the yearly Torah reading ends and begins again.

John writes that the Word “became flesh and dwelt among us” (John 1:14), using a Greek word related to a tent. On the last great day of Sukkot, Yeshua stood in the Temple and called, “If anyone thirsts, let him come to me and drink” (John 7:37). The prophets saw the nations going up to Jerusalem to keep this feast (Zechariah 14:16), and Messianic Jews keep it with that hope in view.

Hanukkah and Purim

Hanukkah חֲנֻכָּה (Chanukah)

Hanukkah begins on 25 Kislev, usually in December, and lasts eight days. It remembers the rededication of the Temple in 164 BC, after the Maccabees drove out the Seleucid army that had defiled it (1 Maccabees 4). Families light a nine-branched menorah, one more candle each night, and eat foods fried in oil.

John records that Yeshua was in the Temple at “the Feast of Dedication,” which is Hanukkah (John 10:22–23). Messianic Jews give thanks that God preserved the Temple and the Jewish people, and they remember the one who called himself the light of the world (John 8:12).

Purim פּוּרִים

Purim falls on 14 Adar, in February or March. It celebrates the rescue of the Jewish people in Persia, told in the book of Esther. The scroll of Esther is read aloud, the congregation drowns out Haman’s name with noise, and people send gifts of food to friends and gifts to the poor (Esther 9:22).

God’s name never appears in Esther, yet his hand is everywhere in it. Messianic Jews keep Purim as a celebration of the God who keeps his promises to Israel, whose “gifts and the calling” are irrevocable (Romans 11:29), and who preserved the people from whom the Messiah would come.

Yeshua in the feasts

Messianic Jews often speak of Yeshua fulfilling the feasts. Fulfillment, in that sense, fills a feast with more meaning. Passover still remembers the exodus from Egypt, and it also remembers the Lamb. Yeshua said he came to fulfill the Law and the Prophets and not to abolish them (Matthew 5:17), and his first followers went on keeping the feasts. Paul hurried to reach Jerusalem in time for Shavuot (Acts 20:16).

For Messianic Jews the feasts are part of Jewish life and of God’s covenant with Israel, which he has never revoked. Keeping them is an act of faithfulness and joy. It earns no one their salvation, which comes by grace through Yeshua. Gentile believers are welcome at every seder and in every sukkah, and congregations differ on what they ask of them. Some invite Gentiles to keep the feasts as fully as Jewish members do. Others see them as guests who are glad to share in Israel’s celebrations.

The best way to learn the feasts is to keep one with a congregation. Most Messianic congregations hold a community seder at Passover and build a sukkah in the autumn. Find a congregation near you, or read about the Jewish life Yeshua lived, feasts included.

Common questions