Leviticus 23:15

"And ye shall count unto you from the morrow after the sabbath, from the day that ye brought the sheaf of the wave-offering; seven sabbaths shall there be complete: even unto the morrow after the seventh sabbath shall ye number fifty days; and ye shall offer a new meal-offering unto Jehovah. Ye shall bring out of your habitations two wave-loaves of two tenth parts of an ephah: they shall be of fine flour, they shall be baken with leaven, for first-fruits unto Jehovah. And ye shall present with the bread seven lambs without blemish a year old, and one young bullock, and two rams: they shall be a burnt-offering unto Jehovah, with their meal-offering, and their drink-offerings, even an offering made by fire, of a sweet savor unto Jehovah. And ye shall offer one he-goat for a sin-offering, and two he-lambs a year old for a sacrifice of peace-offerings. And the priest shall wave them with the bread of the first-fruits for a wave-offering before Jehovah, with the two lambs: they shall be holy to Jehovah for the priest. And ye shall make proclamation on the selfsame day; there shall be a holy convocation unto you; ye shall do no servile work: it is a statute forever in of all your dwellings throughout your generations."

"A new meal-offering ..." This was to be new in several ways:

(1) It would be from a new crop.

(2) It would be of a new kind of grain (wheat), barley being used for the first-fruits (Leviticus 23:13). "The Talmudic tradition is that this offering was wheat, whereas the first-fruits was of barley."[19]

(3) The loaves would be baked with leaven (Leviticus 23:17), contrasting with the bread of the feast of unleavened bread.

(4) This "newness" prefigured the coming of the Gentiles (a new kind of people) into God's church, which began on Pentecost, with the significant fact (typified by the leaven) that there would continue an element of evil within the holy church itself. This latter fact received emphasis from Jesus Christ in the great parables of the kingdom which represented the "tares" growing in the wheat, and the "good and bad fishes alike" being encompassed within the visible structure of it (See Matthew 13).

(5) The use of leavened bread on this occasion may also have indicated that, "complete and final redemption was not yet attained by the church,[20] but that her probation had begun.

PENTECOST. The great festival proclaimed here was that of the fiftieth day, or Pentecost, as reckoned from the day after the morrow of the first day of unleavened bread. (See Leviticus 23:11.) This was the first day of the week, Sunday, the day of the week on which Jesus rose from the dead, the church was begun, and that of successive appearances of Jesus Christ to his disciples assembled for Lord's Day worship. (See the extended comment on "Pentecost" in my commentary on Acts 2:1.)

"Ye shall offer a new meal-offering ..." (Leviticus 23:16). Orlinsky gave the meaning here as, "An offering of new grain,"[21] but, as indicated by subsequent Jewish practice, it might also have included the meaning of "a new kind of grain." (Wheat instead of barley).

"Two wave-loaves ... baken with leaven ..." (Leviticus 23:17). Why two loaves? Unger was of the opinion that, "This anticipated the N.T. Pentecost when, under the administration of the Holy Spirit, both Jews and Gentiles were baptized into union with the glorified Christ."[22]