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Chapter One

The Scriptural Count to Pentecost

The Scriptural instructions for counting to the day of Pentecost, or the Feast of Firstfruits, are recorded in Leviticus 23:

 "Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When you be come into the land which I give unto you, and shall reap the harvest thereof, then you shall bring a sheaf of the firstfruits of your harvest unto the priest: 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....And you shall count unto you from the morrow after the Sabbath, from the day that you brought the sheaf of the wave offering; seven Sabbaths shall be complete: even unto the morrow after the seventh Sabbath shall you number fifty days....And you shall proclaim on the selfsame day, that it may be an holy convocation unto you"  (verses 10-21, KJV).

           God's instructions in Leviticus 23 make it clear that the weeks of counting must be seven full weeks, each ending with a weekly Sabbath day.  The seventh weekly Sabbath will always be the forty-ninth day in the count.  No other method of counting can fit the Scriptural command to count exactly fifty days from the morrow after the first Sabbath to the morrow after the seventh Sabbath: "Even unto the morrow after the seventh Sabbath shall you number fifty days."  This command shows that the count is not only seven complete weeks--49 days--but includes one additional day, making a total of fifty days.  The fiftieth day is to be proclaimed as a holy day.  In Old Testament times, this annual holy day was called the Feast of Weeks, or the Feast of Firstfruits.  In New Testament times, the name was changed to the day of Pentecost.  The English word Pentecost is  transliterated from the Greek word penteekostee, which means "the fiftieth."

           The commands in Leviticus 23 show that the count to Pentecost, or the Feast of Firstfruits, begins with the Wave Sheaf Day.  On this day, the wave sheaf was reaped and offered to God as the first of the firstfruits, marking the beginning of the spring barley harvest.  Deuteronomy 16 confirms that the beginning of the harvest was also the beginning of the seven-week count to Pentecost:

 "Seven weeks shall you number unto yourselves: begin to number seven weeks from such time as you are beginning to put the sickle to the grain.  And you shall keep the feast of weeks unto the Lord your God..." (Deut. 16:9-10, AT).

           The Wave Sheaf Day is clearly defined in Leviticus 23 as "the morrow after the Sabbath," showing that it is always the first day of the week.  God commands us to count "from the morrow after the Sabbath," which specifically means in the Hebrew, "beginning with the morrow after the Sabbath."  (See A True Understanding of Acts 2:1 by Fred R. Coulter).  The count does not include this weekly Sabbath.  The first day in the count to Pentecost is not a weekly Sabbath.  Rather, the "morrow after the Sabbath," the first day of the week, is always the first day in the count.  The weekly Sabbath is the day before "the morrow after the Sabbath."  If a number were to be assigned to the weekly Sabbath, it would have to be numbered as day zero.  As soon as this weekly Sabbath ends at sunset, the first day of the week begins, and that whole day is counted.  The first day of the week, the Wave Sheaf Day, is the first day in the fifty-day count to Pentecost.

          The commands in Leviticus 23 concerning the offering of the wave sheaf, and the Scriptural record of the original fulfillment of these commands in Joshua 5, make it clear that the Wave Sheaf Day is always the first day of the week during the seven days of the Feast of Unleavened Bread.  (See Understanding God's Command for the Wave Sheaf by Dwight Blevins.)  Remember that the wave sheaf was the first of the firstfruits of the spring barley harvest. It was so important that this first sheaf of the firstfruits harvest be offered during the Feast of Unleavened Bread, that at times the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread were postponed one full month so that the barley harvest would be ripe.  This extra month is called Adar II.  Miamonides explains this required practice:

           "And why is just this month added?  Because of the season of the barley harvest--that is, in order that Passover be celebrated in that season.  For it is said: 'Heed the month of ripening ears [Abib] (Deut. 16:1),' which means give heed that this month [also called] (of Nisan) fall in the season of ripening ears.  Without the addition of this month (of Adar [II]), however, Passover [Miamonides uses the term "Passover" in reference to the entire Feast of Unleavened Bread] would fall sometimes in the summer and sometimes in the winter.... Similarly, if the court [calendar court of 2nd Temple era in Jerusalem] found that the barley crop was not yet ripe, being retarded, and that such tree fruits as usually sprout during the Passover season had not yet produced buds, it took these two conditions as a criterion and preceded to intercalate the year [by adding the month Adar II]....in order that the barley crop might be available for the offering of the Sheaf of Waving on the 16th of Nisan [the Pharisaic Jews waved the sheaf on the morrow after the high Sabbath of Nisan 15], and in order that the fruits might sprout as usual during the season of barley harvest" (Sanctification of the New Moon, pp. 16-17).

           These words of Miamonides show how the intercalary month of Adar II serves to fulfill God's command that His feast days be observed each year "in their seasons" (Lev. 23:4).  In order to obey this command of God, it is absolutely necessary to adjust the Hebrew calendar in some years by adding an additional month.  The addition of this intercalary month keeps the feasts of God in their appointed seasons, as God has commanded.  Postponing the annual feasts of God in order to observe them in their proper seasons is a wholly Scriptural principle.  It is based on the direct command of God and should not be condemned as an unscriptural tradition of Pharisaic Judaism.

           While the Pharisaic Jews understood the necessity to observe God's feasts in their appointed seasons, they were not faithful to all of God's instructions for His feast days.  Their failure is most evident in their departure from the Scriptural commands to keep the Passover at the beginning of Nisan 14, and their adoption of the Seder meal at the beginning of Nisan 15 as the traditional Jewish Passover.  Based on this Pharisaic tradition, the Jews observe only the seven-day Feast of Unleavened Bread, which they have renamed Passover.  They have rejected God's original command for the observance of Nisan 14 as the Passover day--an additional feast day at the beginning of the spring festival season.  In Leviticus 23, the Scriptures clearly reveal that the Passover is one day, not seven days.  It is the 14th day of the first month, called Abib, or Nisan  (verse 5).  The one-day Passover observance is followed by the seven-day Feast of Unleavened Bread, which begins on the 15th day of the first month and continues until the end of the 21st day (verses 6-8).  The entire observance of the two feasts lasts a total of eight days--not seven, as practiced by Judaism today (Lev. 23:5-8, Ex. 12:18-20).

           Although the entire spring festival originally lasted a total of eight days,   the Jews reduced their observance of the combined feasts to only seven days by shifting the Passover to the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread.  Their deviation from God's commands for the Passover led to even further error.  As a result of shortening the spring festival observance, they found themselves in a quandary over determining the Wave Sheaf Day.  They chose to resolve their problem by reinterpreting God's command for the wave sheaf offering.  This second deviation from the commands of God resulted in a change in the Jews' observance of Pentecost, as we will see.

 The Pharisaic Method of Counting to Pentecost

           When the Pharisaic Jews reinterpreted God's commands for the wave sheaf offering, they began counting to Pentecost from the morrow after the annual Sabbath of Nisan 15, which may fall on any day of the week, instead of counting from the first day of the week--the morrow after the weekly Sabbath--during the Feast of Unleavened Bread.  This change was apparently made to solve the problem caused by the elimination of Nisan 14 as the Passover day.  Since the Pharisaic Jews had ceased to observe Nisan 14 as part of the spring festival season, they could not use it in determining the correct day for the wave sheaf offering.  Thus when Nisan 14 fell on a weekly Sabbath, the only weekly Sabbath they could use was the following weekly Sabbath, which fell on Nisan 21, the annual holy day which ends the Feast of Unleavened Bread.  But if the wave sheaf were offered "on the morrow after" the last day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the Wave Sheaf Day would fall on the first day of the week outside the Feast of Unleavened Bread.  The Wave Sheaf Day must always fall within the seven days of the Feast of Unleavened Bread.  It is contrary to Scripture to place the Wave Sheaf Day outside the Feast of Unleavened Bread.

           To solve this problem, the Pharisaic Jews decided to reinterpret the meaning of "the morrow after the Sabbath."  They chose not to begin their fifty-day count to Pentecost with the first day of the week during the Feast of Unleavened Bread, as the Scriptures instruct.  Instead, they transferred the meaning of the word ha Shabbat--"the Sabbath" in Leviticus 23:11--from the weekly Sabbath to the first holy day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, Nisan 15.  According to this interpretation, Nisan 16 is "the morrow after the Sabbath."  As a result, the Pharisaic Jews always begin their count to Pentecost with Nisan 16--regardless of the day of the week on which it may fall. 

           This Pharisaic practice is contrary to God's instructions in Leviticus 23, which reveal that the offering of the first of the firstfruits was to be waved on the morrow after the weekly Sabbath.  The command to count "seven Sabbaths" beginning with "the morrow after the Sabbath" clearly shows that all of these Sabbaths are weekly Sabbath days.  Only the weekly Sabbath can fit God's command to count seven Sabbaths within a period of fifty days.  As "the morrow after the seventh Sabbath" will always be the first day of the week, so "the morrow after the Sabbath"--the Wave Sheaf Day--can only be the first day of the week.  Any who doubt this fact need only to count fifty days backward on the calendar, beginning with the first day of the week. 

          Those who follow Pharisaic Judaism no longer count to Pentecost as God originally instructed.  Instead, they begin their count with Nisan 16.  Since Nisan 16 is a fixed date, their Pentecost always falls on the sixth day of the third month--Sivan 6--regardless of the day of the week upon which it might happen to fall.  While professing to follow the Scriptural instructions in Leviticus 23, the Pharisaic Jews have in reality deviated from God's clear commands.  Their first error was to proclaim that the Passover begins on the 15th day of the first month and continues for seven days.  This in turn led to a reinterpretation of the holy day of Nisan 15 as the Sabbath from which "the morrow after the Sabbath" should be calculated.  Adopting Nisan 16 as the Wave Sheaf Day led in turn to their third error--setting their fixed date of Sivan 6 for Pentecost.  In the end, the commands of God to count fifty days beginning with the first day of the week during the Feast of Unleavened Bread were completely circumvented.

          With this brief summary, we can understand the errors of the Pharisaic Jews in counting to Pentecost.  Because their count is based on the annual holy day of Nisan 15, the Pharisaic method of counting is correct only when this first holy day falls on the weekly Sabbath.  When Nisan 15, the first day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, falls on a weekly Sabbath, then Nisan 16 is in fact the Wave Sheaf Day.  But only in those years when Nisan 15 is a weekly Sabbath is Nisan 16 truly "the morrow after the Sabbath” and the correct Wave Sheaf Day.  This occurs approximately three times in every decade.

          In ancient times, not all Jews followed the Pharisaical method of counting to Pentecost.  The Jewish sects known as the Essenes and the Sadducees used different methods.  The Essenes were an ascetic sect that combined Judaism with pagan sun worship and lived in monastic religious communities.  Because of this strange mixture of sun worship and Torah law, they always counted Pentecost improperly.  They reckoned the last holy day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread, Nisan 21, as the Sabbath for beginning the count.  As a result, the first day of their count was always Nisan 22--the morrow after the last day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread.  Because they began their count on Nisan 22, their Pentecost always fell on the fixed date of Sivan 13.

          While the Pharisees and the Essenes based their counts on the holy days, which were annual Sabbaths, the Sadducees followed the Scriptural injunction to begin counting to Pentecost from the morrow after the weekly Sabbath.  The priests and the high priests who were in charge of the temple during Jesus' physical life were Sadducees.   They did not set a fixed date for Pentecost because they based their count on the weekly cycle, as God had commanded.  When a weekly Sabbath fell on any of the first six days of Unleavened Bread, they began counting to Pentecost from the first day of the week during the Feast of Unleavened Bread, according to the Scriptural injunctions.    But a problem arose in years when the weekly Sabbath fell on the last day of Unleavened Bread.  In the following chapter, we will examine this problem and we will learn why "the morrow after the Sabbath" is always the first day of the week during the Feast of Unleavened Bread.

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