WHEN YOUR FRIEND PROMISES to âcheck the calendar,â she will likely consult an app on her smartphone or a printed calendar on her desk. But to âcheck the calendarâ in ancient Israel would require looking to the skies. Israelâs calendar was not on paper or scrolls. Like other ancient nations, Israel observed the calendar revealed in the movements of the sun, moon, and stars (Gen 1:14).
The ancient Hebrews also had different reasons for consulting the cosmic calendar than we have for checking calendars today. Nowadays we use calendars to coordinate plans between peopleâto âget on the same pageâ with friends, coworkers, and other organizations regarding work schedules, meetings, birthdays, and so forth. In the ancient world, the cosmic calendar was âreadâ to coordinate oneâs activities with the nationâs deity.1 The movements of the sun, moon, and stars were regarded as signs from the divine realm, provided for humans to follow to ensure heavenâs blessings on their plantings and harvests. Therefore, to âcheck the calendarâ was a religious duty2âand the fruitfulness of society depended on it.
Ancient peoples developed worship festivals to mark the various seasonal harvests. Those festivals typically had religious stories attached to them. Festival stories provided an âinterpretationâ of the festivals and the deity whose blessings were critical to the landâs fruitfulness. All nations looked to the same sun, moon, and stars as their âclock,â but different nations developed different understandings of the divine order revealed by that heavenly clock. But one theme is found repeatedly in calendrical observances throughout the ancient world.
In the ancient Near East, the seasons cycle between periods of death and dryness, on the one hand, and rainfall bringing new life, on the other. This âdeath and new lifeâ principle is woven into calendrical festivals throughout the ancient world. Farmers across cultures recognized the life-giving character of the Creator instilled in the seasonal cycles, and through their disparate national festivals they sought to participate in that divine gift of life to produce a fruitful crop and thriving societies. Ancient peoples adopted festival observances that timed their rituals of humility and their festivals of praise with the various cadences of âdyingâ and ânew lifeâ that governed the seasons revealed from heavenâs calendar.
Israelâs Calendar Among the Nations
Many societies of the ancient world recognized this life-giving principle inscribed into nature.3 The ancient Canaanite kingdom of Ugarit, for example, adopted a mythical narrative for its seasonal festivals known to scholars as the Baal Epic.
In the Baal Epic, these Canaanite worshipers reviewed the myth of the Canaanite storm god Baal, who desired to build a palace for himself. Baalâs enemy was Mot, the god of death. Mot initially defeated Baal and confined him to the underworld. During the storm godâs confinement, the land went without rain and thus shared in Baalâs death. But then Baal defeated Mot and escaped. He restored rain to the land and finally built his desired palace, the temple where he was to be worshiped.4 The Baal Epic provided a narrative framework for the seasonal changes and harvests of Baal worshipers. âIn reality,â Theodor Herzl Gaster explains, â[the Baal Epic] is a nature myth and its theme is the alternation of the seasons.â5
A similar pattern can be found in other ancient calendars.6 The Sumerian festivals were set within a story of the dying and rising of the god Dumuzi.7 Urâs calendar identified the changing seasons with a mythical contest between Utu, the sun deity, and Nanna, the moon deity.8 In Babylonia, yet another instance of this pattern is found, ritually guiding the Mesopotamian peoples through their seasonal changes.9 Egyptian festivals annually rehearsed the mythical death of Osiris, slain by Set and then restored to life as Horus. The rites of the Osiris myth were observed in cadence with the flooding of the Nile River, which brought fertility back to the Egyptian farmland each summer. âThe Egyptian myth-makers . . . relied on observation of the natural world. The continuance of life through procreation provided a natural symbol for the order of the universe, and . . . [reveals] that beyond the natural world there is a divine mind. In this divine mind the Egyptians saw the ultimate reason for the ongoing cycle of the natural world.â10
In the New Testament, the apostle Paul referred to such Gentile myths as âseek[ing] Godâ (see Acts 17:27; cf. Acts 14:17). According to Paul, the world itself reveals the âinvisible attributesâ of God, ânamely, his eternal power and divine natureâ (Rom 1:20). Even the religious festivals of Gentile nations showed that âthe work of the law is written on their heartsâ (Rom 2:15). All nations recognized the life-giving character and power of the Creator, and through their festival calendars they sought after him.
Israel also had an annual series of festivals coordinated with the harvests of the land as well as a narrative that provided a theological interpretation of the âdeath to lifeâ pattern manifest in the seasons. However, Israel did not resort to myth for its redemption narrative. A myth is a story that explains present, this-worldly realities through a description of primeval, other-worldly causes such as battles between the gods. Israel had a historical experience of the Creatorâs redemptive goodness. They had experienced the life-renewing redemption of God in their deliverance from slavery and his carrying them into a âland of milk and honey.â The people could hope in Godâs goodness toward their labors in the land because he had shown such mercy and grace to bring them out of Egypt and into the land in the first place. The events of the exodus were therefore attached to Israelâs festival calendar, providing a historical (rather than mythical) redemption narrative for the nationâs worship and labor through their seasonal harvests.
The Hebrew festival calendar, therefore, was like those of other nations in that it was shaped around the seasonal cadences governed by the heavenly lights, but it was unlike those of other nations in that its framing narrative was historical rather than using the form of a myth.11 Later in this book (chapter four), we will look more closely at Israelâs festival narratives in the Pentateuch. In the remainder of this chapter and in the next, I want to provide a more detailed exploration of the natural (that is, nature-based) shape of Israelâs cosmic calendar.
The âClockâ Behind Israelâs Calendar
In Genesis 1:14-15, God appointed the heavenly lights to serve as Israelâs calendar. âAnd God said, âLet there be lights in the span of the heavens to separate between the day [yĂŽm] and the night [laylĂą], and let them be for signs [ÊŸĆtĆt], and for festivals [mĂŽÊżÄdĂźm] and for days [yÄmĂźm] and years [ĆĄÄnĂźm]. And let them be for lights in the span of the heavens for the light upon the earth.â And it was soâ (a.t.).
This passage is structured around three âlet there beâ/âlet them beâ statements.12 In the first, the lights are appointed âto separate between the day [yĂŽm] and the night [laylĂą].â The first purpose assigned to the heavenly lights is to provide each individual day with its cadence. The second âlet them beâ statement introduces a broader, calendar-keeping role of the heavenly lights. âLet them be for signs [ÊŸĆtĆt], and for festivals [mĂŽÊżÄdĂźm] and for days [yÄmĂźm] and years [ĆĄÄnĂźm].â The Hebrew construction of the phrase foregrounds the term signs (ÊŸĆtĆt),13 which includes regular cosmic events like equinoxes and solstices that govern the changes in earthâs seasons, as well as irregular cosmic events like eclipses and comets. Some nations used the sighting of irregular signs in the heavens for fortunetelling, a practice the Hebrews were exhorted to repudiate (Deut 18:9-14; Jer 10:2). Certain irregular signs have occasionally been used by God to mark special works of heaven in the world, like the rainbow (called a âsignâ in Gen 9:12) and the star of Bethlehem (Mt 2:2).14 But the primary signs indicated by this usage are the regular movements of the sun, moon, and stars that indicate the changing seasons. These signs were appointed, Genesis 1:14 states, for marking âfestivals [mĂŽÊżÄdĂźm]â and for marking âdays [yÄmĂźm] and years [ĆĄÄnĂźm].â
The term mĂŽÊżÄdĂźm (âfestivalsâ) is commonly translated âseasonsâ in English Bibles.15 However, as Walter Vogels asserts, âthe word moÊżed in the Torah never means the seasons of the year such as winter, spring, summer and fall . . . The word means âfixed timesâ for festivals.â16 Leviticus 23:1-44 provides a typical list of such âappointed festivals [mĂŽÊżÄdĂźm] of the LORDâ (Lev 23:2, a.t.), listing the weekly sabbath, and the annual festivals of Passover, the Feast of Unleavened Bread, the Feast of Firstfruits, the Feast of Weeks, the Feast of Trumpets, the Day of Atonement, and the Feast of Booths. The role of the heavenly signs to indicate festivals is paired with their role to govern the overarching calendar indicated by the merism âand for days [yÄmĂźm] and years [ĆĄÄnĂźm].â A merism is a phrase that describes a spectrum of items by naming the two ends of the spectrum. In this case, days and years indicate the full scope of the calendar: particularly days, months, and years.17 Indeed, it is the tracking of days, months, and years that enables the scheduling of the aforementioned festivals. The days (and months) and years are the divisions of time directly regulated by the heavenly lights, while the festivals are indirectly governed by the heavenly lights, being based on the days, months, and years. Thus, the heavenly lights in their movements were, quite literally, the clock and calendar of Israel. âThe calendrical purpose of the luminaries,â says Guillaume, âcan hardly be more clearly stated.â18
The final âlet them beâ statement in this verse introduces a third role appointed for the lightsânamely, to provide âthe light upon the earth.â Modern societies regulate working hours by artificial lighting, but our ancestors were dependent on the luminaries in the heavens. Those âlet there beâ/âlet them beâ statements indicate the three purposes assigned to the heavenly li...