Leviticus 23:24

THE FEAST OF TRUMPETS, Leviticus 23:23-25.

24. Seventh month The beginning of this month must be signalized in order to accord with that symbolism of number which distinguishes the seventh day and the seventh year. Hence we have a sabbatical month as well as a sabbatical year. The seventh month closed the cycle of the annual festivals. It also contained the most important day of the year the day of atonement in which all the sins and uncleanness of the people were typically wiped away in the access of the high priest to the mercyseat with the blood of atonement. This month also contained the feast of tabernacles, which commenced five days afterwards, affording an antepast of the blessedness of communion with Christ and his saints.

The first day… a sabbath This was a day of rest, a holy convocation, as also was the tenth. Neither was necessarily a decalogue sabbath, and one of them could not be, since they were ten days apart.

A memorial of blowing of trumpets Literally, a memorial of shouts of joy. According to Numbers 10:10, the straight trumpet was to be sounded in the day of gladness; but tradition says that the shophar, cornet, or crooked trumpet, was also used. See wood-cut Joshua 6:4. The latter produced a dull, far-reaching tone. There are various opinions respecting the significance of this trumpet-blast as that it was designed to be an alarm-signal to call the people to prepare for the coming day of atonement, as we have intimation in Joel 2:15; or to emphasize the coming in of the sabbatical month; or to commemorate the giving of the law; or to re-echo the shout of the sons of God over the newborn world; or, as is the common opinion of Jews and Christians, to hail the beginning of the civil year, the feast of Tisri. In the year of jubilee it was the prelude to that glad sound which, on the day of atonement of the fiftieth year, announced the advent of “that great year of grace under the old covenant.” The rabbies fancied that on this new year’s day all men passed before God in judgment, as a flock of sheep pass, one by one, before their shepherd.