Feasts Open to the Nations

Suppose you were invited to a wedding. You were not born into either family, and you share neither their surname nor their history. But the invitation came from the father of the bride, written in his own hand, and it bears your name. No one in that position would stand outside the hall and say, “This is their celebration, not mine.”

Yet many believers say something very like that about the feasts of the Bible. The claim has a verse behind it. Leviticus 23, the great chapter of the feasts, begins, “Speak to the sons of Israel.” The feasts, it is said, were therefore given to Israel, believers from the nations have nothing to do with them, and there is no problem if they do not keep them.

That sounds careful and modest, but the verse must be read to its end.

My Appointed Times

Leviticus 23:1-2 And the LORD spoke to Moses, saying: Speak to the sons of Israel, and say to them: The appointed times (moadim מוֹעֵד mo-ade') of the LORD, which you shall proclaim them holy convocations (miqra-qodesh מִקְרָא־קֹדֶשׁ mik-raw'), these are My appointed times (moadim).

“Speak to the sons of Israel” tells us who heard the message first. It does not tell us whose feasts these are. The verse answers that question itself, and it answers twice: “The appointed times (moadim) of the LORD,” and again, “these are My appointed times (moadim).”

The word is moed מוֹעֵד mo-ade', and its plural is moadim. It means an appointed time, a set meeting, an appointment God has written into the calendar, and these appointments are His. In Leviticus 23 they are not called Israel’s feasts or the Jewish holidays. They are the LORD’s appointments, which Israel was told to proclaim.

The invitation, then, is in the Father’s handwriting. Whom did He invite?

The Sojourner at the Table

The Torah answers plainly. It names the sojourner at the feasts more than once, and for Passover it says:

Exodus 12:49 One Torah shall be for the native and for the sojourner who sojourns among you."

Numbers 9:14 And if a sojourner sojourns with you and will make a Passover to the LORD, according to the statute (chuqqah חֻקָּה khook-kaw') of the Passover and according to its judgment (mishpat מִשׁפָּט mish-pawt'), so shall he do; one statute (chuqqah) shall be for you, both for the sojourner and for the native of the land."

The Torah says “One Torah” and “one statute,” and the sojourner who keeps the Passover keeps it by the same rule as the native-born.

For the Day of Atonement the Torah says:

Leviticus 16:29 And it shall be to you an everlasting statute (chuqqah): in the seventh month, on the tenth of the month, you shall afflict your souls (nephesh נֶפֶשׁ neh'-fesh), and do no work, the native and the sojourner who sojourns in your midst.

The day belongs to “the native and the sojourner who sojourns in your midst.”

For the Feast of Booths it says:

Deuteronomy 16:14 And you shall rejoice in your feast (chag חַג khag), you, and your son, and your daughter, and your manservant, and your maidservant, and the Levite, and the sojourner, and the orphan, and the widow who are within your gates.

“And the sojourner” is named among those who rejoice, between the Levite and the orphan.

The Torah never confined the feasts to those of Israelite blood, and the prophets opened the door wider still. Isaiah describes foreigners who join themselves to the LORD:

Isaiah 56:6-7 And the sons of the foreigner who join themselves to the LORD, to minister to him and to love the name of the LORD, to be his servants, every one who keeps the Shabbat from profaning it, and holds fast my covenant (berit בְּרִית ber-eeth')— I will bring them to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer; their burnt offerings and their sacrifices shall be acceptable upon my altar; for my house shall be called a house of prayer for all the peoples.

Of “every one who keeps the Shabbat from profaning it, and holds fast my covenant,” God says that He will bring them to His holy mountain and make them joyful in His house. Isaiah does not picture the nations waiting at the gate while Israel goes in. He pictures them inside, keeping God’s times and gladly received.

What the Council Did Not Write

Someone may object that Acts 15 does not mention the feasts. That is true. The letter to the Gentile believers named four things to avoid, and the feasts were not among them.

But follow that reasoning one step further. Murder is not in the letter either, and neither is theft or lying under oath, yet no one concludes that Gentile believers have nothing to do with those commandments. The letter was never meant to be the full list. As we saw in Chapter 14, James gave the reason in the same breath: Moses “is read in the synagogues every sabbaton σάββατον sab'-bat-on” (Acts 15:21). The four things were to be put away at once, and the rest would be learned week by week as they heard Moses read. Leviticus 23 was part of what they heard.

What the Gentile Churches Did

What the churches actually did confirms it. We read the key verse in Chapter 7, but it is worth reading again with one question in mind: who received this letter? Paul wrote to Corinth, a church made up mostly of people from the nations, “Therefore let us celebrate the feast” (1 Corinthians 5:8). The verb is heortazo ἑορτάζω heh-or-tad'-zo, to keep a feast day. He writes to Greeks as to people who know well what leaven and unleavened bread mean at that season. If the feasts had nothing to do with Gentiles, he could not have written that sentence to them.

Luke’s record shows Paul himself keeping the calendar of Leviticus 23. Luke dates one of his journeys “after the days of Unleavened Bread” and tells us that Paul was hurrying to reach Jerusalem for Pentecost (Acts 20:6, 16; Chapters 16 and 33). Earlier, as he left Ephesus, Paul had said as much himself:

Acts 18:21 But taking his leave of them and saying, "I must by all means keep the coming heorte ἑορτή heh-or-tay'(festival) in Jerusalem; but I will return to you again if God wills," he set sail from Ephesus.

“I must by all means keep the coming heorte(festival) in Jerusalem.” Paul did not plan his travels around a feast he believed was over.

In Colossians 2:16 Paul tells a largely Gentile church that “no one is to krino κρίνω kree'-no(judge) you … in respect to heortes(festival) or new moon or sabbatons(referring to every Moed of Leviticus 23).” No one is judged over a feast he does not keep. The Colossians were keeping the feasts and being criticized for it. Romans 14:5 does not contain the word “feast” at all, as we saw in Chapter 32. And in Galatians 4:10 the verb is paratereo παρατηρέω par-at-ay-reh'-o(observe with hostile intent). There Paul rebukes people who were treating God’s appointed times with hostility while turning back to their former idols, not people who kept the Torah’s feasts.

The Future the Prophets Saw

The last answer to the claim that there is no problem in leaving the feasts unkept comes from the end of the story, not from its beginning:

Zechariah 14:16-19 And it shall come to pass, that everyone who is left of all the nations that came against Jerusalem shall go up year by year to bow down to the King, the LORD of hosts (tzevaot צָבָא tsaw-baw'), and to celebrate the feast (chag) of Booths. And it shall come to pass, whoever does not go up from the families of the earth to Jerusalem to bow down to the King, the LORD of hosts (tzevaot), upon them there shall be no rain. And if the family of Egypt does not go up and does not come, then upon them there shall be no [rain]; there shall be the plague with which the LORD strikes the nations that do not go up to celebrate the feast (chag) of Booths. This shall be the sin of Egypt, and the sin of all the nations that do not go up to celebrate the feast (chag) of Booths.

The nations, all of them, “shall go up year by year … to celebrate the feast (chag) of Booths.” For any family of the earth that will not go up, “upon them there shall be no rain.” Zechariah gives that refusal a name: “the sin of all the nations that do not go up.”

Nothing can be both “no problem” and a sin. In the age Zechariah foresaw, staying away from the Feast of Booths will not be a neutral preference. It will be a sin, and drought will be its consequence.

Isaiah closes his book on the same note:

Isaiah 66:23 And it shall come to pass, from new moon to new moon, and from Shabbat to Shabbat, all flesh (basar בָּשָׂר baw-sawr') shall come to worship before me, says the LORD.

“From new moon to new moon, and from Shabbat to Shabbat, all flesh (basar) shall come to worship.” It is all flesh that comes, and not Israel only.

So we return to the wedding hall. The feasts of the LORD belong to the LORD, and His invitation goes to everyone who has joined himself to Him.

But what exactly is on the calendar? Which days are they, what kind of rest belongs to each, and what may or may not be done on them? Leviticus 23 sets it out with great precision, and it rewards a slow reading.