Christmas – A festival of Jewish Origin? by the Rev Dr. Alfred Edersheim

Originally published in The Leisure Hour, London, England, No. 1147, December 20, 1873, pp. 810-812. CHRISTMAS–A FESTIVAL OF JEWISH ORIGIN? WHY DO WE KEEP IT ON THE 25TH DECEMBER, AND WHAT IS THE MEANING OF ITS OBSERVANCE? Of the various questions debated in church history, scarcely one has been discussed with more partisan keenness, or […]

The Passover – no foreigner may eat of it

The LORD said to Moses and Aaron in Egypt, “This month is to be for you the first month, the first month of your year.  Tell the whole community of Israel that on the tenth day of this month each man is to take a lamb for his family, one for each household. If any […]

The Jewish Festive Calendar

What does the worker gain from his toil? I have seen the burden God has laid on men. He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the hearts of men; yet they cannot fathom what God has done from beginning to end (Eccles. 3:9-11). The story of Israel’s redemption is represented […]

Pentecost – the gift of the Holy Spirit achieved the goal of the Torah

“You have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles’ wings, and brought you unto Myself. Now therefore, if you will obey my voice indeed, and keep my covenant, then you shall be a peculiar treasure to me above all people …”(Exodus 19:4-5) God redeemed the children of Israel […]

Passover – seeing the unseen

Passover celebrates the deliverance of Israel from slavery in Egypt by the mighty hand of God. However, Passover can only really be understood and celebrated in the light of the Messiah because the exodus from Egypt and the entry into the Promised Land were merely shadows and illustrations of the ultimate deliverance from the devil’s control over mankind through sin and […]

Purim – a parody in misplaced confidence

“And the king said to him, ‘What shall be done to the man whom the king delights to honour?’ And Haman thought in his heart, ‘To whom would the king delight to do honour more than to myself?’ And Haman answered the king, ‘For the man whom the king delights to honour, let the royal […]

Where is the Lamb?

  “And ‘ה spoke to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, 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 a house … And they shall take of the blood and strike it on […]

Let My People Go!

“Afterward Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh and said, This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: ‘Let my people go, so that they may hold a festival to me in the desert.’ Pharaoh said, ‘Who is the LORD, that I should obey him and let Israel go? I do not know the LORD […]

PURIM – a lesson in misplaced confidence

Mordecai recorded these events, and he sent letters to all the Jews throughout the provinces of King Xerxes, near and far, to have them celebrate annually the fourteenth and fifteenth days of the month of Adar as the time when the Jews got relief from their enemies, and as the month when their sorrow was […]

The Feast of Tabernacles – it’s origins and prophetic significance

    ‘Nations will come to your light’ (Isaiah 60:3) Israel had always to look back on its history in order to understand its future. It’s annual feasts especially were both a remembrance of its past as well as an anticipation of things to come. The feasts are described as ‘signs’ and ‘appointed times’ (Exodus […]