Hillel, Why Did He Do It?

Joseph F. Dumond

Isa 6:9-12 And He said, Go, and tell this people, You hear indeed, but do not understand; and seeing you see, but do not know. Make the heart of this people fat, and make their ears heavy, and shut their eyes; lest they see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their hearts, and turn back, and be healed. Then I said, Lord, how long? And He answered, Until the cities are wasted without inhabitant, and the houses without man, and the land laid waste, a desolation, and until Jehovah has moved men far away, and the desolation in the midst of the land is great.
Published: Oct 19, 2020

News Letter 5856-034
The 4th Year of the 4th Sabbatical Cycle
The 25th year of the 120th Jubilee Cycle
The 29th day of the 8th month 5856 years after the creation of Adam
The 4th Sabbatical Cycle after the 119th Jubilee Cycle
The Middle of the 70th Jubilee Since Yehovah told Moses To go Get His People
The Sabbatical Cycle of Sword, Famines, and Pestilence

October 17, 2020

Shabbat Shalom to the Royal Family of Yehovah,


Shabbat Zoom Meeting

 Sabbath Oct 17, 2020, will be a 1 PM Eastern.

Joseph Dumond is inviting you to a scheduled Zoom meeting.

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Silence is Deadly

The Feast of Sukkot using the Hebrew Calendar is now over. And while many of you kept the Feast in October this year, you all know that I kept it with others in September, one month earlier. We have to talk about this. And I have waited until you are all home from your Sukkot in October to once again talk to you about this very important subject.

We are told some very troubling news if we see our brethren sin and do not say anything.

1Jn 5:16  If anyone sees his brother sin a sin not to death, he shall ask, and He shall give him life for those that do not sin to death. There is a sin to death, I do not say that he shall pray for it.

1Jn 5:17  All unrighteousness is sin, and there is a sin not to death.

Is this a sin unto death?

1Jn 3:15  Everyone hating his brother is a murderer. And you know that no murderer has everlasting life abiding in him.

Yehshua was talking about this very thing in Matthew.

Matt 5:21  You have heard that it was said to the ancients, “You shall not kill” —and, “Whoever shall kill shall be liable to the judgment.”

Matt 5:22  But I say to you that whoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be liable to the judgment. And whoever shall say to his brother, Raca, shall be liable to the sanhedrin; but whoever shall say, Fool! shall be liable to be thrown into the fire of hell.

Each of the above verses is referring to the command in Lev 19.

Lev 19:16  You shall not go as a slanderer among your people; you shall not stand against the blood of your neighbor. I am Jehovah.

Lev 19:17  You shall not hate your brother in your heart. You shall always rebuke your neighbor, and not allow sin on him.

Lev 19:18  You shall not avenge, nor bear any grudge against the sons of your people; but you shall love your neighbor as yourself. I am Jehovah.

If you have any love for your brethren you will not stand idly by and watch them sin and not say anything. If their sin is a sin unto death and you say nothing, you are the same as one who hates his brethren and a murderer. When you break the Sabbath it is punishable by death. When you keep the Holy Days at the wrong time and not the appointed time Yehovah set, you are sinning and it is punishable by death.

Exo 31:14  You shall keep the Sabbath therefore, for it is holy to you. Everyone that defiles it shall surely be put to death. For whoever does any work in it, that soul shall be cut off from among his people.

So when you see your brethren not keeping the Sabbath and you say nothing, they will be found guilty of breaking the Sabbath and you who kept the Sabbath will be found guilty of murder for remaining silent.

BOOM!!!

So are you now motivated to speak up and warn your brethren?

If it is OK for them to keep the Holy Days at the wrong time then it is also OK for Christians to worship God on Sundays instead of the weekly Saturday Sabbath. If on the other hand you are convicted that the Sabbath needs to be kept Holy, then you have implicated yourself by your silence in not warning Christians about keeping the Sabbath and also you are guilty in not warning them to keep the Holy Days. And if you did not warn your brethren about keeping the Holy Days a month early this year then you are guilty of murdering them for your silence.

You now have 5 months until the month of Aviv comes around again. Will you now make a point of learning the details of how to determine the start of the month so you can be an expert about when the Holy Days come? You cannot afford to be a wallflower and sit there and let everyone else figure it out and you do nothing. You will be tried for murder if you do.

During these next 5 months, you can go to our archives organized by Jan Sytsma; The Article Archives and begin your study into this subject in depth. We have two sections there for you to study in. The  Appointed times and Proving the Calendar. You can copy the whole articles or parts of them to share and tell others. But it is entirely up to you. You are possibly on trial for murder. So what should you be posting on your social platforms? Yes, people will get upset and mad at you. So know your stuff and explain it so they have a chance to understand.

If you keep the weekly Sabbath on any other day other than from Sunset Friday to Sunset Saturday you are sinning. Keeping only the day portion of the Sabbath as the Sabbath is also sinning.

If you keep the Holy Days at any other time except the times Yehovah has told us to keep them, then you are sinning. It is no different than keeping the Sabbath on Sunday or Wednesday.

If you choose not to keep the Sabbatical year from the 1st of Aviv to the following Aviv, then you are sinning. If you keep it in another year or you let only part of your land rest one year and the other part the next year, you are sinning.

Then when Yehovah causes or allows some of you to die in your youth, you cry and pray for life, but do not look to your sins as the cause of your being cut off from life. You say the same things they do  in Malachi

Mal 2:14  Yet you say, Why?

Mal 2:17  You have wearied Jehovah with your words. Yet you say, In what have we wearied Him? When you say, Every evildoer is good in the eyes of Jehovah, and He delights in them; or, Where is the God of justice?

Mal 3:8  Will a man rob God? Yet you have robbed Me. But you say, In what have we robbed You? In the tithe and the offering!

How are we sinning by keeping the Holy Day? So what if we are wrong by a month. When Yehshua comes then He can tell us the truth and then we will know.

There is a reason Amos says Yehovah hates your feast days.

Amo 5:21  I hate, I despise your feast days, and I will not delight in your solemn assemblies.

Amo 5:22  Though you offer Me burnt offerings and your food offerings, I will not be pleased. Nor will I regard the peace offerings of your fat animals.

Amo 5:23  Take the noise of your songs away from Me; for I will not hear the melody of your stringed instruments.

Amo 5:24  But let judgment roll down like waters, and righteousness like a mighty stream.

So which feasts does Yehovah hate? Are they the ones I kept earlier than most? Is it the ones you just kept? Or is the ones Christians will be keeping? Halloween, Christmas and Easter? If we keep reading it states it is the ones Christians keep.

Amo 5:26  But you have carried the booth of your king and Kiyyun, your images, the star of your gods which you made for yourselves.

Amo 5:27  So I will cause you to go into exile beyond Damascus, says Jehovah, the God of Hosts is His name.

We are told that Yehovah understands our mistakes and knows we are trying, but at some point, the judgment comes and the time for trying is over. Either you get it right or you do not.

Act 17:30  And the times of this ignorance God winked at; but now commands all men every where to repent:

You are commanded to repent because we are at the end of this age. You know it. You have done the math and looked at the Jubilee cycles. You know just how little time is left. Knowing this then you know that judgment is also coming.

Yehshua refers to “the end of the age” a couple of times in Matthew 13, as He explains the meaning of some parables. In the parable of the wheat and the tares, Yehshua warns of a judgment to come in which “the weeds are pulled up and burned in the fire” (Matthew 13:40). This will happen, Yehshua says, “at the end of the age” (verses 39–40). Later, Yehshua likens the kingdom of heaven to a dragnet that brings up all sorts of fish. Then the sorting comes: “They sat down and collected the good fish in baskets, but threw the bad away. This is how it will be at the end of the age” (verses 48–49). In both parables, the end of the age is associated with a separation, a sorting, and a burning fire (verses 40 and 50). Yehshua used the phrase the end of the age to refer to that time in the future when the kingdom of Yehovah is established, true justice reigns, and the wicked are judged.

That time is now. We can no longer continue to have these splits amongst us over which moon is to be used. We must stop the malicious and divisive debates over how to determine the barley. We need a legal authority set up. But before we can do that we need people who understand and who can be those in authority to judge. To continue to do things because of traditions or because the Jews do it this way is not good enough. We must want to do things with our whole heart according to Yehovah and create traditions by obeying His law, His Torah.

If the JEws are so righteous in the keeping of the appointed times then why were 6 million of them killed in the Holocaust? Why have they suffered pogrom after pogrom these past 2000 years? I am telling you it is because they did not keep the Holy Days at the appointed times. The only one they kept at the right time was the weekly Sabbath.

I want you to read each of the following scriptures and think about them from this point forward.

Joh 9:31  But we know that God does not hear sinners, but if anyone is God-fearing and does His will, He hears him.

Job 27:8  For what is the hope of the ungodly when He cuts off, when God takes away his soul?

Job 27:9  Will God hear his cry when trouble comes on him?

Job 35:12  There they cry, but He gives no answer, because of the pride of evildoers.

Psalms 18:41  They cried, but there was none to save; even to Jehovah, but He did not answer them.

Proverbs 1:28  Then they shall call upon me, and I will not answer; they shall seek me early, but they shall not find me;

Proverbs 1:229  instead they hated knowledge and did not choose the fear of Jehovah.

Isaiah 1:15  And when you spread out your hands, I will hide My eyes from you; yea, when you make many prayers, I will not hear; your hands are full of blood.

Jeremiah 11:11  So Jehovah says this: Behold, I will bring evil on them, which they shall not be able to escape; and though they shall cry to Me, I will not listen to them.

Jeremiah 14:12  When they fast, I will not hear their cry; and when they offer burnt offering and a grain offering, I will not accept them. But I will consume them by the sword, and by the famine, and by the plague.

Ezekiel 8:18  And I will also deal with fury; My eye shall not spare, nor will I have pity. And though they cry in My ears with a loud voice, I will not hear them.

Micah 3:4  Then they shall cry to Jehovah, but He will not answer them. He will even hide His face from them at that time, as they have done evil in their doings.

Zechariah 7:13  And it will be, as He called, and they did not listen, so they called, and I did not listen, says Jehovah of Hosts.

But who does Yehovah hear and whom does He help?

Psalms 34:15  The eyes of Jehovah are on the righteous, and His ears are open to their cry.

Psalms 66:18  If I regard iniquity in my heart, Jehovah will not hear;

Psalms 66:19  Surely God has heard; He has attended to the voice of my prayer.

Psalms 66:20  Blessed is God, who has not turned away my prayer, nor His mercy from me.

Isaiah 58:9  Then you shall call, and Jehovah shall answer; you shall cry, and He shall say, Here I am. If you take the yoke away from among you, the pointing of the finger, and speaking vanity;

He is almost here and He is going to judge you for murder because you did not and would not speak up. He is also going to judge those who do not repent and do not keep His appointed times when He said to keep them. Not when you want to keep them, but when He said to keep them.

The five foolish virgins will be going out to learn about these things when there is no time left to do so. Will you be one of them?

Hos 4:6  My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge. Because you have rejected knowledge, I will also reject you from being priest to Me. Since you have forgotten the Law of your God, I will also forget your sons, even I.

6 million Jews died in the Holocaust in WW II. 500 Million Israelites from all 12 tribes are about to die in the next 6 years. They have forgotten the Torah, they have forgotten the Holy Days and when to keep them. They have forgotten the Sabbatical Years and when they are to be kept. Now Yehovah is going to forget their sons and their daughters. Is He going to forget your family because you are sinning also?

 


 

The New Moon in the Hebrew Bible

 

The Biblical month begins with the crescent New Moon, also called First Visible Sliver. The Hebrew word for month (Hodesh) literally means New Moon and only by extension the period between one New Moon and the next.
The Rabbanite Midrash relates that when God said to Moses “This month (HODESH) shall be for you the beginning of months” (Ex 12,2) the Almighty pointed up into the heavens at the crescent New Moon and said “When you see like this, sanctify! [=declare New Moon day]”. This Rabbinic fairy-tale highlights an important point, namely that the Bible never comes out and says we should determine the beginning of months based on the New Moon. The reason for this is that the term for “Month” (Hodesh) itself implies that the month begins with the crescent New Moon. As will be seen, this would have been obvious to any ancient Israelite present when Moses recited the prophecies of Yehovah to the Children of Israel and therefore there was no need to elucidate this concept any more than such terms as “light” or “dark”. However, due to the long exile, we have lost the use of Biblical Hebrew in day to day speech. Therefore, we will have to reconstruct the meaning of Hodesh from the usage of the word in the Biblical text using sound linguistic principles.

He Created the Moon for Holidays

There can be no doubt that the biblical Holidays are dependent on the moon. The strongest proof of this is the passage in Ps 104,19 which declares:

“He created the moon for Mo’adim [appointed times]”

The Hebrew term Mo’adim [appointed times] is the same word used to describe the Biblical Holidays. Leviticus 23, which contains a catalogue of the Biblical Holidays opens with the statement: “These are the Mo’adim [appointed times] of Yehovah, holy convocations which you shall proclaim in their appointed times [Mo’adam].”. So when the Psalmist tells us that God created the moon for Mo’adim [appointed times] he means that the moon was created to determine the time of the Mo’adim of Yehovah, that is, the Biblical Holidays.

“Hodesh” Is Related To the Moon

The above verse clearly teaches us that the holidays are related to the moon. But when the Torah was given Ps 104 had not yet been written by the Levitical prophets, and the question still remains of how the ancient Israelites could have known this. The answer is that the Hebrew word for month (Hodesh) itself indicates a connection to the moon. We can see this connection in a number of instances in which Hodesh (month) is used interchangeably with the word “Yerah”, the common Biblical Hebrew word for moon, which by extension also means “month”. For example:

“…in the month (Yerah) of Bul,
which is the Eighth month (Hodesh)…” (1 Kings 6:38)

“…in the month (Yerah) of Ethanim… which is the Seventh month (Hodesh)…” (1 Kings 8:2)

Another proof that Hodesh is related to the moon (Yerah) is the phrase “A Hodesh (month) of days” (Gen 29:14; Nu 11:20-21) [meaning a period of 29 or 30 days] which is equivalent to the phrase “A Yerah (month/ moon) of days” (Dt 21:13; 2 Ki 15:13). Clearly then Hodesh is related to “Yerah”, which itself literally means “moon”.

“Hodesh” Means New Moon (Day)

The primary meaning of Hodesh (month) is actually “New Moon” or “New Moon Day” and it is only by extension that it came to mean “month”, that is, the period between one New Moon and the next. This primary meaning is preserved in a number of passages such as 1Sam 20:5 in which Jonathan says to David “Tomorrow is the New Moon (Hodesh)”. Clearly, in this verse Hodesh is used to refer to the specific day on which the month begins and not the entire month. Another passage which uses Hodesh in its primary sense is Ez 46:1 which talks about “The Day (Yom) of the New Moon (Ha-Hodesh)”. Clearly in this verse Hodesh (New Moon) is a specific event and the beginning of the month is the day on which this event (New Moon) occurs.

The Biblical New Moon is the “First Crescent”

“Hodesh” (New Moon), is derived from the root H.D.SH.   meaning “new” or “to make new/ renew”. The Crescent New Moon is called Hodesh because it is the first time the moon is seen anew after being concealed for several days at the end of the lunar cycle. At the end of the lunar month the moon is close to the sun 1 and eventually reaches the point of “conjunction” when it passes between the Sun and the Earth.2 As a result, around the time of conjunction very little of the moon’s illuminated surface faces the Earth and it is not visible through the infinitely brighter glare of the sun. After the moon moves past the sun it continues towards the opposite side of the Earth. As it gets farther away from the sun the percentage of its illuminated surface facing the Earth increases and one evening shortly after sunset the moon is seen anew after being invisible for 1.5-3.5 days. Because the moon is seen anew after a period of invisibility the ancients called it a “New Moon” or “Hodesh” (from Hadash meaning “new”).

Crescent New Moon vs. Astronomical New Moon

Many people have been led astray by the inaccurate use in modern languages of the term “New Moon”. Modern astronomers adopted this otherwise unused term, which had always referred to the first visible sliver, and used it to refer to conjunction (when the Moon passes between the Earth and the Sun, at which time it is not visible). The astronomers soon realized that the inaccurate use of “New Moon” to refer to conjunction would lead to confusion so to be more accurate scientists now distinguish between “Astronomical New Moon” and “Crescent New Moon”. “Astronomical New Moon” means New Moon as the term is used by astronomers, i.e. conjunction. In contrast, “Crescent New Moon” uses the term in the original meaning of the first visible sliver. A good English dictionary should reflect both meanings. For example, the Random House Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged Edition defines New Moon as: “The moon either when in conjunction with the sun or soon after being either invisible [Astronomical New Moon] or visible [Crescent New Moon] only as a slender crescent.” (square brackets added by NG).

The Supposed Evidence For “Concealed Moon”

Having been confused by the use of the term New Moon in modern astronomy some people have sought Biblical support for this incorrect meaning of the term. Ps 81:3 [Heb. 81:4] is usually cited which says:

“Blow on a horn for the Hodesh (New Moon)
On the Keseh (Full Moon) for the Day of our Hag (Feast).”

According to the “Concealed Moon Theory”, the term “Keseh” is derived from the root K.S.Y. meaning “to cover” and thus means “covered moon” or “concealed moon”. According to this interpretation, when the verse says to blow on a horn on the day of Keseh it actually means “[blow on a horn] on the day of Concealed Moon”. However, the language does not support this argument for the second half of the verse also refers to the day of Keseh as “the day of our Feast (Hag)”. In the Bible, Feast (Hag) is a technical term which always refers to the three annual pilgrimage-feasts (Matzot, Shavuot, Sukkot; see Ex 23; Ex 34).3 New Moon Day (Hodesh) is never classified as a “Pilgrimage-Feast” so Keseh/ Hag can not possibly be synonymous with New Moon Day (Hodesh). It has further been suggested that Keseh refers to the Biblical holiday of Yom Teruah (Day of Shouting), which always falls out on New Moon Day. However, the Bible describes Yom Teruah as a Moed (appointed time) and never as a Hag (Pilgrimage-Feast) so Keseh/ Hag can not refer to Yom Teruah either.

What Does Keseh Really Mean?

It is likely that Keseh is related to the Aramaic word “Kista” and the Assyrian word “Kuseu” which mean “full moon” (see Brown-Driver-Briggs page 490b) [Hebrew, Aramaic, and Assyrian are all Semitic languages and often share common roots]. This fits in perfectly with the description of Keseh as the day of the Hag since two of the three Pilgrimage-Feasts (Hag HaMatzot and Hag HaSukkot) are on the 15th of the month, which is about the time of the Full Moon!

More on “Concealed Moon”

Another point to consider is that there is no actual “day” of concealed moon. In fact the moon stays concealed anywhere from 1.5 to 3.5 days in the Middle East. It has been proposed that the “day” of concealed moon is actually the day of conjunction (when the moon passes between the Earth and Sun). However, it was only 1000 years after Moses that the Babylonian astronomers discovered how to calculate the moment of conjunction. Therefore, the ancient Israelites would have had no way of knowing when the moment of conjunction takes place and would not have known on which day to observe “Concealed Moon Day”.

It has been suggested that the ancient Israelites could have looked at the “Old Moon” and determined the Day of Conjunction by when the Old Moon was no longer visible in the morning sky. However, such a method would not work in the Middle East where the so-called “concealed moon” can remain concealed for as many as 3.5 days! It is in fact common for the moon to stay concealed for 2.5 days and in such instances how would the ancient Israelites have known which day was the Day of Conjunction?

In contrast, the ancient Israelites would have been well aware of the Crescent New Moon. In ancient societies people worked from dawn to dusk and they would have noticed the Old Moon getting smaller and smaller in the morning sky. When the morning moon had disappeared the ancient Israelites would have anxiously awaited its reappearance 1.5-3.5 days later in the evening sky. Having disappeared for several days and then appearing anew in the early evening sky they would have called it the “New Moon” or “Hodesh” (from Hadash meaning “New”).

 


 

In our book which you can order through amazon, we walk you through many of our News Letters explaining this ancient “Riddle” to the reader. In 2005 no one could tell me using the scriptures which moon to use to begin my months. It was only after I discovered this simple and yet profound truth that I knew absolutely which moon to use. And it is for this same reason that we named our website after. Sightedmoon.com. I do not want to repeat everything in the book here, but I cannot encourage you enough to get it and to then share it with your friends.

The reason Yehshua said no one can know the day or the hour of His coming was because He was coming on the Feast of Trumpets. The Feast of Trumpets is known in Judaism as the Feast no one knows and is the reason they keep this Feast on two days just in case it is the other day and not the first one.  Yes, the Feast about when the Messiah is to come which is on a day and at an hour that no one knows.

It is because you need two witnesses to site the moon before they know if the month and this Feast day have begun. There is only one Feast day which begins with the New Moon. The Feast of Trumpets.

The reason no one knows when this feast day is, is because it must be sighted. A conjunction moon is always calculated. And therefore it is always known days, weeks, months and years in advance. But the Crescent sighted moon, may not be seen because it is too low on the horizon with the glare of the sun, or due to haze or fog and rain. Hence it begins at a day hour no one knows.

How do you go about proving such a claim? It makes sense, but how do we prove it?

Again in the book, we walk you through the 6 days before Passover spoken of by John. We show you that the 6th day ends on the Wednesday. We then show you that Yehshua was in the grave for 3 days and 3 nights and came out at the end of the Sabbath. By doing this we prove that again He was killed on a Wednesday. We then must prove that this Wednesday in 31 AD was in fact the 14th day of the first month. When we do that you learn that there are only two dates that fit this qualification. 28 CE and 31 CE. We then show you that in 28 CE when He read the Isaiah scroll that the acceptable year was a Sabbatical year. Thus the only year that is 3 1/2 years after He read the Torah scroll and had a Wednesday for the 14th of Nisan was 31 CE.

It is a little involved but it goes to prove many things that people misunderstand, and that the year Yehshua was killed was begun with the sighting of the moon to begin the month.

Again we urge you to get the book and study it with your group or family. You should know these things and they should be as common knowledge.

 


 Rambam is My Witness

I want to get into another aspect this week. I want you all to pause and think for just a moment. Two weeks ago we talked to you about Where is Elijah? He is one of the Two witnesses that has to come before Yehshua comes. And he is going to restore all things.

Where does the Bible get this notion about two witnesses?

Is going with one witness biblical? I am of course talking about sighting the moon. The current Hebrew calendar or Hillel calendar does not need to have any witnesses because they go by the conjunction of the moon. Again we are trying to understand which calendar we are to be using.

How do we resolve this?

Where in scripture does it say we need two witnesses? This was the question I asked you all.

Deu 19:15 One witness shall not rise up against a man for any iniquity, or for any sin, in any sin that he sins. At the mouth of two witnesses, or at the mouth of three witnesses, shall the matter be made sure.

Deu 17:6 At the mouth of two witnesses or three witnesses shall he that is worthy of death be put to death. At the mouth of one witness he shall not be put to death.

If you are breaking the Sabbath then you are to be stoned to death. So it is of necessity to have two witnesses sight the moon. Especially if you will die as a result of keeping the Holy Days at the wrong time.

Psalm 89:37 It shall be established forever like the moon, and like a faithful witness in the heavens.

Stop and think about this one scripture for just a moment before you move on. Do not read over it and not get what it is saying.

Can you see a conjunction moon? No, you can not. For 1.5 and up to 3.5 days, you cannot see the conjunction moon. It is not visible and because you cannot see it it is not a witness. The moon can only be a witness when it is seen.

A waning moon is a witness.

A waxing moon is a witness

A full moon and a blood moon is a witness.

But a conjunction moon is nothing. It is not witnessing anything. You cannot see it. It does not reflect light towards the earth.

We also have two witnesses in Daniel 8 and in Revelation 11.

Dan 8:13  Then I heard a certain holy one speaking, and another holy one said to that one who spoke, Until when shall the vision last, concerning the daily sacrifice and the transgression that astounds, to give both the sanctuary and the host to be trampled?

Rev 11:3  And I will give power to My two witnesses, and they will prophesy a thousand, two hundred and sixty days, clothed in sackcloth. 4  These are the two olive trees and the two lamp stands standing before the God of the earth.

When Yehshua was at the temple they used two witnesses to sight the moon then. I have the following statement that says before that time the witness of one respected Jew was testimony enough. This comes from the writings of Rambam on the crescent moon.

Accordingly, in the early generations, testimony regarding [the sighting of] the new [moon] was accepted from any Jew [without further enquiry], for any Jew can be presumed to be an acceptable witness unless one knows with certainty that he is unacceptable. When the followers of Baithos 8 began conducting themselves in a debased manner and would hire people 9 to testify that they had seen the moon when in fact they had not, the court decreed that it would accept testimony regarding [the sighting of] the new [moon] only from witnesses whom the court knew to be acceptable. Moreover, they would examine and question their testimony. It was the de facto system used in Second Temple times by both the Pharisees and the Temple Priesthood.

This is Neusner’s translation:

RoshHa. 1:7 A. A father and his son who saw the new moon should go [to give testimony]. B. It is not that they join together with one another [to provide adequate testimony], C. but so that, if one of them should turn out to be invalid [as a witness], the other may join with someone else [to make up the requisite number of witnesses]. D. R. Simeon says, “A father and his son, and all relatives, are valid to give testimony about the new moon.” E. Said R. Yose, “M‘SH B: Tobiah, the physician, saw the new moon in Jerusalem-he, his son, and his freed slave. F. “And the priests accepted him and his son [as witnesses to the new moon], but they invalidated the testimony of his slave. G. “But when they came before the court, they accepted his [testimony] and that of his slave, but they invalidated that of his son.”

It shows there were two rival courts and both required 2 witnesses, although they had different standards as to who was acceptable as a witness. Now, this isn’t definitive proof of what the Torah requires, and of what was understood in the 1st century. That you needed two witnesses to sight the moon because one group was bribing people to lie. Why would you need any witnesses if you went by the calculated conjunction moon which is what the Hebrew or Hillel Calendars now do?

The fact that the Temple Priests and Pharisees agreed on the basic principle while disagreeing on some of the specifics, has tremendous weight for me.

It means they were using the crescent moon to begin the month. They had witnesses coming forward each month to testify and they had a court to examine the testimony to make sure they were accurate. This is what Rambam is telling us by his writings.

Rambam also says the following things;

7. 7What is the process through which the testimony regarding the sighting of the moon is accepted? Anyone who saw the moon and is fit to testify20 should come to the court. The [judges] should bring them all to a single place,21 and should make a large feast for them, so that people will come regularly. The pair [of witnesses] who arrive first are examined first according to the questions mentioned previously.22 The one of greater stature is invited [into a private chamber] first and asked these questions. If his testimony is accurate according to [the data that the court arrives at through] calculations, they invite his colleague in. If their statements are comparable,23 their testimony is substantiated.

[Afterwards,] the remaining pairs are asked questions of a broader nature. [In truth,] their testimony is not required at all, [and they are being asked] only so they will not depart disheartened, so that they will come frequently [in the future].24

Once the court sanctifies the new month, it remains sanctified regardless of whether they erred unwittingly, they were led astray [by false witnesses], or they were forced [to sanctify it].35 We are required to calculate [the dates of] the festivals based on the day that they sanctified [as the beginning of the new month].

Even if [a person] knows that [the court] erred, he is obligated to rely on them,36 for the matter is entrusted to them alone. The One who commanded us to observe the festivals is the One who commanded [us] to rely on them, as [implied by Leviticus 23:2]: “Which you will pronounce as days of holy convocation.”37

Rosh HaShanah 2:10 relates that once Rabbi Yehoshua differed with Rabban Gamliel concerning the acceptance of the testimony of witnesses with regard to Rosh HaShanah. Since Rabban Gamliel was the head of the High Court, his opinion was accepted. To emphasize the importance of following the necessity for uniform adherence to the decisions of the court, Rabban Gamliel ordered Rabbi Yehoshua to appear before him carrying his staff and his wallet on the day that Rabbi Yehoshua thought should be considered as Yom Kippur.

After consulting with his colleagues, Rabbi Yehoshua obeyed Rabban Gamliel’s instructions. Afterwards, Rabban Gamliel honored Rabbi Yehoshua for his humility and deference to the court’s authority.

As it stands now we have a number of people in Israel sighting the moon and they have become good and trusted at it. All of them report their findings online and this information is then shared to the rest of us in the world.

Lev 23:2  Speak to the sons of Israel and say to them, The feasts of Jehovah, which you shall proclaim, holy convocations, even these are My appointed feasts.

We, the people, must proclaim Yehovah’s feasts. He will make the moon visible to us or hide it from us. But when we see it then the Holy Days are to be proclaimed.

Are we who were once alienated to Yehovah and have now come back to obey Him, are you able to declare when the Moon is seen and be a witness to this great event each month. Once you can do this then you will be able to correctly determine when the Feasts are? ‘

 


 

Questions ??

The Jewish calendar that is used today, which follows a 19-year cycle, realigning the lunar and solar calendars was established by Hillel II, the Nasi (Prince) of the ancient Jewish Sanhedrin during his leadership between AD 320 and 385. This system of calculation was not uniformly used across all Jewish communities until it was legislated by Rambam in the 12th century.

Between AD 320 and 385, Hillel II, the Nasi (Prince) of the ancient Jewish Sanhedrin, established the calendar that is used today, which follows a 19-year cycle, realigning the lunar and solar calendars.

In this system the extra month is added on the 3rd, 6th, 8th, 11th, 14th, 17th and 19th years of the cycle. The current cycle began at the start of the Jewish year 5758, which occurred on October 2, 1997.

The Gregorian calendar, however, was created in 1582 by Pope Gregory XIII and proclaimed the official civil calendar of Britain and the British colonies of America in 1752.

This information begs the question. What did they use before Hillel in 320 CE.? And why did Hillel do this in the first place?

 


 

WHY HEBREW CALENDAR IS WRONG AND HOW SANHEDRIN COULD FIX IT WITH ANCIENT MITZVAH

BY ADAM ELIYAHU BERKOWITZ | MAR 29, 2017

On Wednesday evening, one of the most important Torah commandments is not going to take place, and as a result, in two weeks, the world’s Jews will celebrate Passover on the wrong night. The nascent Sanhedrin is attempting to begin fixing this problem.

The Sanhedrin will meet on the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem on Wednesday as the sun sets to observe the new moon. This event is meant as a small first step towards reinstating the important mitzvah (Torah commandment) of establishing the calendar via witnesses reporting to a Sanhedrin.

“The beginning of our redemption from Egypt began with this,” Rabbi Hillel Weiss, spokesman for the Sanhedrin, told Breaking Israel News. “Reinstating the new month and witnesses appearing before the Sanhedrin will be the true beginning of this redemption. The new moon is God sending us a sign of new beginnings, and for us to establish Pesach (Passover) in its time.”

In Temple times, the new month was a festival, marked by the blowing of the shofar and special sacrifices. Messengers were sent out and a series of mountaintop pyres lit to spread the word to outlying communities.

The Temple festivities were part of the observance, but declaring the new month had practical implications for setting the calendar. The Jewish calendar is based on the lunar cycle and by setting it according to eyewitness observance of the new moon, the Biblical Sanhedrin ensured that Jews observed the holidays in their proper time.

Today’s problem, Rabbi Weiss explained, is that the true date of the appearance of the moon no longer synchronizes with the beginning of the month as it appears on the calendar. He pointed to the current month of Nisan as an example. According to the Jewish calendar, the month began on Monday evening. But the first sliver of the new moon which should appear on Rosh Chodesh (the first day of the new month) will not actually be visible until Wednesday evening.

“It is a national imperative to re-establish this mitzvah,” Rabbi Weiss said. “All of the mitzvot pertaining to the holidays emanate from this one act.”

The discrepancy occurs regularly because the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE led to the dissolution of the Sanhedrin. Without the Sanhedrin to hear testimonies, it was no longer possible to determine the new month by witnessing.

The modern Jewish calendar was set according to a 19-year cycle with an additional month added seven times during that cycle. Even with this correction, the Hebrew calendar falls behind the actual lunar cycle at the rate of one day every 216 years. As a result, the established calendar is now out of sync with the lunar cycles.

Witnessing the new month is an important mitzvah and establishing correct times for the holidays is of utmost importance. But it is especially auspicious to witness the month now, as the Bible counts Nisan as the first month.

This month shall be unto you the beginning of months; it shall be the first month of the year to you. Exodus 12:2

“Israel is a nation, and this mitzvah is what made us a nation,” Rabbi Weiss told Breaking Israel News, noting that the word ‘you’ in the verse is plural. “Today, every Jew looks at the calendar on his wall and his entire framework of time is a personal issue. Time, the calendar, is the most important element that brings us together as the Jewish nation.”

“The Nation of Israel needs to re-establish this mitzvah in its completeness,” the rabbi asserted. “But this can only happen when the people acknowledge a Sanhedrin to accept the witnesses’ account of the new moon. When this happens, when there is a Sanhedrin sitting in Jerusalem, the impact will be perceived by a global increase in serving God.”

The rabbi quoted the Prophet Isaiah as an explanation.

And many peoples shall go and say: ‘Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of Hashem, to the house of the God of Yaakov; and He will teach us of His ways, and we will walk in His paths.’ For out of Tzion shall go forth the law, and the word of Hashem from Yerushalayim. Isaiah 2:3

However, Rabbi Weiss made one important disclaimer.

“Even though the calendar needs to be adjusted, unity is of the utmost importance,” the rabbi said. “Jews are required to adhere to the calendar accepted by the entire nation.

“Until a formal Sanhedrin is accepted by the nation, Jews must use the established calendar and observe the holidays on the days mandated by rabbinic authorities,” he concluded.

There you have an actual testimony from Rabbi Weis, spokesman for the Sanhedrin. They prefer unity over doing what Yehovah has commanded them to do. Not only that they know they are to use the crescent moon and two witnesses to begin the month. And they also know that by not doing so they are not keeping the Holy Days at the proper time. They admit it outright.

Are you going to follow the traditions of men or are you going to follow Yehovah?

The article I quoted was from 2017. But the following video is from 2013. They know and have known all this time that they are keeping the Holy Days at the wrong time.

 


 

Why Did Hillel do it?

Dan 7:25 And he shall speak great words against the most High,

and shall wear out the saints of the most High,

and think to change times and laws:

and they shall be given into his hand until a time and times and the dividing of time.

Last week we wrote to you about the Saints as they fled and were driven out of Jerusalem and the land of Israel. We showed you how they ended up in England and began teaching the Gospel in all the Universities and then to all of the world. We went from 31 AD and the death of Yehshua up until about the year 100 AD.

After the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE, the Sanhedrin was re-established in Yavneh with reduced authority. The seat of the Patriarchate moved to Usha under the presidency of Gamaliel II in 80 CE. In 116 it moved back to Yavneh, and then again back to Usha.

In the 49 and 50th year Jubilee of 133 and 134 CE respectively, there arose a Messiah by the name of Simon bar Kochbah who was promoted by Rabbi Akiva as the Messiah. It was at this time that Rabbi Yose under Rabbi Akiva’s direction who wrote the Seder Olam which used the Daniel 9 prophecy and connected them to the destruction of the Temple in 586 BC and again with the most recent one in 70 CE. But in order to do this Rabbi Akiva had to change the years so that they lined up with the Bar Kochbah revolt. He drastically shortened the period of the Persian Kings. After Simon was killed and the revolt defeated by the Romans, Rabbi Yose’s history remained as a Jewish source of reference. It is this history that has led to the Sabbatical Years being changed by Judah to 1 1/2 years before they actually are. Even Rambam confirmed this.

Hadrian came to power in 117 CE, a few decades after the Romans had destroyed the Temple in Jerusalem. He decided to convert the destroyed Jerusalem into Aelia Capitolina, a city dedicated to Jupiter, a decision that greatly angered the Jews.

The Bar Kokhba revolt was a major turning point in Jewish history. It was the final crisis that scattered the people of Israel into a diaspora that would last nearly 2,000 years. Yes, the famous destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 CE, which left the Second Temple in ruins, also sent people fleeing to the diaspora, but the brief attempt to throw off Roman rule in 130 CE was the last straw. Enormous numbers of Jews, both soldiers and civilians, were slaughtered. Many of the survivors were sold into slavery. Others fled a nation that had been decimated by war. It was a loss that completely severed people from its roots. Jews were banned from entering Jerusalem.

Hadrian changed the name of the province from Judea to Palaestina in an attempt to erase its Jewish past and the threat it posed to his hold on power. The Romans never changed the names of provinces, this was a really big deal and Hadrian chose to name it after the Philistines from the Bible, who are portrayed as the enemies of the Jews.

The 2nd-century Roman historian Cassius Dio wrote that the Jews revolted when Hadrian visited Jerusalem in 130 CE and renamed the city Aelia Capitolina after himself. This led to a Jewish uprising called the Bar Kochbah Revolt.

But the Christian historian Eusebius, a bishop of Caesarea, wrote that Hadrian only changed the name of Jerusalem to Aelia Capitolina after Roman troops suppressed the revolt, as a punishment for the Jewish uprising. Hadrian banned Jews from the city and attempted to erase their connection to it by changing its name. “It was colonized by a different race,” Eusebius wrote.

Rabbinic texts indicate that following the Bar Kokhba revolt, southern Galilee became the seat of rabbinic learning in the Land of Israel. This region was the location of the court of the Patriarch which was situated first at Usha, then at Bet Shearim, later at Sepphoris and finally at Tiberias.[5]

The Great Sanhedrin moved in 140 to Shefaram under the presidency of Shimon ben Gamliel II, and to Beit Shearim and Sepphoris in 163, under the presidency of Judah I. Finally, it moved to Tiberias in 193, under the presidency of Gamaliel III (193–230) ben Judah haNasi, where it became more of a consistory, but still retained, under the presidency of Judah II (230–270), the power of excommunication.

During the presidency of Gamaliel IV (270–290), due to Roman persecution, it dropped the name Sanhedrin; and its authoritative decisions were subsequently issued under the name of Beth HaMidrash.[citation needed]

In the year 363, the emperor Julian (r. 355–363 CE), an apostate from Christianity, ordered the Temple rebuilt.[6] The project’s failure has been ascribed to the Galilee earthquake of 363, and to the Jews’ ambivalence about the project. Sabotage is a possibility, as is an accidental fire. Divine intervention was the common view among Christian historians of the time.[7] As a reaction against Julian’s pro-Jewish stance, the later emperor Theodosius I (r. 379–392 CE) forbade the Sanhedrin to assemble and declared ordination illegal. Capital punishment was prescribed for any Rabbi who received ordination, as well as complete destruction of the town where the ordination occurred.[8]

However, since the Hebrew calendar was based on witnesses’ testimony, which had become far too dangerous to collect, rabbi Hillel II recommended changes to a mathematically based calendar that was adopted at a clandestine, and maybe final, meeting in 358 CE. This marked the last universal decision made by the Great Sanhedrin.

Gamaliel VI (400–425) was the Sanhedrin’s last president. With his death in 425, Theodosius II outlawed the title of Nasi, the last remains of the ancient Sanhedrin. An imperial decree of 426 diverted the patriarchs’ tax (post excessum patriarchorum) into the imperial treasury.[8] The exact reason for the abrogation of the patriarchate is not clear,[9] though Gamaliel VI, the last holder of the office who had been for a time elevated by the emperor to the rank of prefect,[10] may have fallen out with the imperial authorities.[9] Thereafter, Jews were gradually excluded from holding public office.[11]

Wikipedia has this to say about Hillel II.

He is traditionally regarded as the creator of the modern fixed Jewish calendar. This tradition first appears in a responsum of R. Hai Gaon (written in 992[3]) cited by R. Abraham bar Hiyya in his Sefer Ha’ibbur (written in 1123).[4] The citation explicitly refers to the year that this event happened, 670 of the Seleucid era, which corresponds to 358/9 CE.

However, a number of documents have been found that indicate the calendar was not fully fixed in Hillel’s time; most famously a letter found in Cairo Geniza (from the year 835/6) indicates that the holidays were observed on different dates from those predicted by the current calendar.[3][5] The calendar did not reach its exact modern form until at least the years 922-924.[6] According to modern scholar Sacha Stern, Hai Gaon only attributed the establishment of a 19-year cycle, and not other details of the calendar, to Hillel.[3]

The fixed calendar was of great benefit to Jews of his and subsequent generations. The Jewish calendar is lunisolar. That is, its months are synchronized with the phases of the moon, but its average year length approximates the mean length of a solar year. The Sanhedrin declared new months based on observations of the new moon, and added a 13th lunar month to certain years to ensure that holidays would continue to fall in the same seasons of the solar year. But Constantius II, following the precedents of Hadrian, prohibited the holding of such meetings as well as the vending of articles for distinctly Jewish purposes. The worldwide Jewish community depended on the calendar sanctioned by the Judean Sanhedrin to observe Jewish holidays on the correct dates. However, danger threatened the participants in that sanction and the messengers who communicated their decisions to distant congregations. Temporarily, to relieve the foreign congregations, Huna ben Abin once advised Rava not to wait for the official intercalation: When you are convinced that the winter quarter will extend beyond the sixteenth day of Nisan declare the year a leap year, and do not hesitate.[7] But as the religious persecutions continued, Hillel decided to provide an authorized calendar for all time to come, though by doing so he severed the ties which united the Jews of the diaspora to their mother country and to the patriarchate.

Hillel II  (Hillel the Nasi), also known simply as Hillel, was an amora of the fifth generation in the Land of Israel. He held the office of Nasi of the Sanhedrin between 320 and 385 CE.

First Sunday Law enacted by Emperor Constantine – March, 321 A.D.
“On the venerable Day of the Sun let the magistrates and people residing in cities rest, and let all workshops be closed. In the country, however, persons engaged in agriculture may freely and lawfully continue their pursuits; because it often happens that another day is not so suitable for grain-sowing or for vine-planting; lest by neglecting the proper moment for such operations the bounty of heaven should be lost. (Given the 7th day of March, Crispus and Constantine being consuls each of them for the second time [A.D. 321].)” Source: Codex Justinianus, lib. 3, tit. 12, 3; trans. in Philip Schaff, History of the Christian Church, Vol.3 (5th ed.; New York: Scribner, 1902), p.380, note 1.

Again, Constantine’s promotion of Sunday observance was part of his definite strategy to combine paganism with Christianity: “The retention of the old pagan name of dies Solis, or ‘Sunday,’ for the weekly Christian festival, is in great measure owing to the union of pagan and Christian sentiment with which the first day of the week was recommended by Constantine to his subjects, pagan and Christian alike, as the ‘venerable day of the Sun.’” – Stanley’s History of the Eastern Church, p. 184.

In spite of the rising popularity of Sunday sacredness, Church historian Socrates Scholasticus (5th century) wrote: “For although almost all churches throughout the world celebrate the sacred mysteries [of the Lord’s Supper] on the Sabbath of every week, yet the Christians of Alexandria and at Rome, on account of some ancient tradition, have ceased to do this.” – Socrates Scholasticus, Ecclesiastical History, Book 5, ch. 22.

Another historian also confirmed this by stating, “The people of Constantinople, and almost everywhere, assemble together on the Sabbath, as well as on the first day of the week, which custom is never observed at Rome or at Alexandria.” – Sozomen, Ecclesiastical History, Book 7, ch. 19. Thus even in the 5th century, Sabbath keeping was universally prevalent (except in Rome and Alexandria) along with Sunday keeping. Many Christians kept both days, but as the centuries wore on, Sunday keeping grew in prominence and especially within Roman Catholic territories.

In 330 A.D., Constantine moved his capital from Rome to Constantinople (modern Istanbul), thus preparing the way for the Roman Catholic Popes to reign in Rome as the successors of Constantine. As the Papal Church grew in power, it opposed Sabbath observance in favour of Sunday sacredness and made the day change official in the Council of Laodicea (A.D. 363-364). Constantine’s law had now been fully integrated into the Papal Church and the final step of the Sabbath to Sunday change was complete.

So around the year A.D. 364, the Catholic Church outlawed Sabbath keeping in the Council of Laodicea when they decreed 59 Canon laws. The following is the relevant Canon law: Canon XXIX: “Christians must not judaize by resting on the Sabbath, but must work on that day, rather honouring the Lord’s Day; and, if they can, resting then as Christians. But if any shall be found to be judaizers, let them be anathema from Christ.” (Percival Translation).

Four hundred years after the death of Christ and one hundred years after Constantine’s linking of Church and State by his Sunday law edict, Rome and Alexandria were the only places in the world where many of the Christians kept only Sunday and not the true Sabbath. Why was it that Rome and Alexandria were also the first locations that Sunday worship began? Because this is where the pagan practices of Babylon eventually landed after it was conquered. And what was the dominant pagan practice that the Babylonian priests brought with them? Sun worship which was done on Sun-day! See the history of Sunday worship for more detail.

But even before Constantine came on the scene and changed things there was a controversy going on. Constantine settled it. Let’s look at the controversy and understand where it led.

Passover Started to Differ

After all the apostles died, the Early Church divided into the Eastern Church and the Western Church. The Patriarch of Constantinople in Asia Minor governed the Eastern Church, and the Pope from Rome ruled over the Western Church1).

At that time, both churches kept the bread and wine communion on different dates.

1) Eastern Church: Kept the Communion on Passover

The Eastern Church held the Passover Communion on the 14th day of the first month of the sacred calendar. Indeed, this was in accordance with the teachings of the Bible. Other than the Passover, they also celebrated the Day of Resurrection on the first Sunday after the Feast of Unleavened Bread (the 15th day of the first month of the sacred calendar).

2) Western Church: Kept the Communion on Resurrection Day

On the other hand, the Western Church did not have the Holy Supper on Passover. Instead, they held it on Sunday (Resurrection Day) after the Passover. Thus, they mixed the two feasts together.

In the Bible, however, we can see that these two feasts are in fact completely distinct. The Passover is to commemorate Christ’s death (1 Corinthians 11:26), and the Resurrection Day, His resurrection.

This non-uniformity among the two churches caused much confusion among the Christians travelling between the east and west since they saw the two churches having differing practices.

The New Covenant Passover Under Debate

1) The First Passover Controversy

Around A.D. 155, Polycarp, Bishop of the Church of Smyrna (Eastern), and Pope Anicetus, Bishop of the Church of Rome (Western), disputed over the Passover. Polycarp emphasized that the Passover was a traditional custom handed down from Jesus, saying that he had been celebrating the Passover every year, together with John—one of Jesus’ disciples—and many other apostles. In this dispute, however, they failed to persuade each other.

2) The Second Passover Controversy

Subsequently, around A.D. 197, Victor the Bishop of Rome insisted that the churches should adopt the Roman practice of celebrating the Holy Supper on the Resurrection Day instead of the Passover. Accordingly, he called it the Dominical Rule (Lord’s Rule) and compelled all the churches to accept it. This led to the second controversy. The churches in the West agreed to follow the rule, but the churches in the East greatly opposed it. Especially, Polycrates, Bishop of the Church of Ephesus, sent a letter to Victor, in which he strongly emphasized that the Passover should be celebrated.

When Victor received this letter, he planned to excommunicate all the churches in Asia by accusing them of being “non-Orthodox”. However, he could not achieve his plan because of objections from many churches around him.

Passover Abolished

1) The Council of Nicaea
The controversy arose again in the 4th century and this time, the Council of Nicaea finally abolished the Passover in A.D. 325. The Council, convened by the Roman emperor Constantine, decided in favour of the church of Rome. The Passover would be abolished and the Holy Supper be kept on Resurrection Day.

With the Passover (including the Feast of Unleavened Bread) abolished, there was no Biblical standard to determine the date of the Resurrection Day. The Council subsequently also decided in favour of celebrating the resurrection on the first Sunday that comes after the full moon of the vernal equinox. This decision was made with the excuse that it was difficult to calculate the date of the feast according to the movements of the moon.

*Note they were using the crescent moon to begin the month of Aviv. It was this method that determined when Passover would be. With the abolition of Passover and all things Jewish, the Council had no means to determine when resurrection Sunday would be. In 325, Constantine convened the Council of Nicaea, which formally disengaged the Church from the Hebrew calendar and separated the Easter holiday from Passover. “It appeared an unworthy thing,

” Constantine declared in a letter to the churches summarizing the Council, “”It was, in the first place, declared improper to follow the custom of the Jews in the celebration of this holy festival, because, their hands having been stained with crime, the minds of these wretched men are necessarily blinded. … Let us, then, have nothing in common with the Jews, who are our adversaries. … Let us … studiously avoiding all contact with that evil way. … For how can they entertain right views on any point who, after having compassed the death of the Lord, being out of their minds, are guided not by sound reason, but by an unrestrained passion, wherever their innate madness carries them. … lest your pure minds should appear to share in the customs of a people so utterly depraved. … Therefore, this irregularity must be corrected, in order that we may no more have any thing in common with those parricides and the murderers of our Lord. … no single point in common with the perjury of the Jews.”

Later Church councils would prohibit Christians from celebrating Passover with Jews and from receiving holiday gifts from them. Overall under Constantine’s successors, including Constantius II (337-361), Theodosius II (408-450), and Justinian I (527-565), Jews would steadily become second-class citizens of the Empire.

In addition, the Church of Rome, which had been associated with polytheistic traditions and ideas for a long time, introduced Easter to commemorate the resurrection. Easter was originally a festival in honour of Eostre the goddess of spring. It was celebrated at the vernal equinox in Northern Europe10)

2) Passover disappears from History

The decision made by the council had a significant impact on Christianity. The churches which kept the Passover on the 14th day of the first month, not yielding to the authority of the church of Rome, were persecuted and called heretics. Consequently, this forced many saints to move into deserts and caves.

The Western Church had not kept the Passover until then, but it continued to celebrate the resurrection on the Sunday after the Passover. In other words, both churches had used the Passover in determining the date of resurrection. However, as the Council of Nicaea established the date of resurrection based on the vernal equinox, the meaning of the Passover completely disappeared.

Constantine II (Latin: Flavius Claudius Constantinus; February 316 – 340) was Roman emperor from 337 to 340. Son of Constantine the Great and co-emperor alongside his brothers. Following him was Constantius II, who was the Roman emperor from 337 to 361. Judaism faced some severe restrictions under Constantius, who seems to have followed an anti-Jewish policy in line with that of his father.

It was during this time that Hillel and the Sanhedrin came up with the calculated calendar. It was done of necessity. The messengers and those reporting on the state of the barley and the moon were being killed. Those sent to the diaspora were also being killed. By devising this calculated calendar, everyone in each area could know when the Holy Days were. It helped to solve the problems put on them by their persecutors.

Declaring the new month by observation of the new moon, and the new year by the arrival of spring can only be done by the Sanhedrin. In the time of Hillel II, the last President of the Sanhedrin, the Romans prohibited this practice. Hillel II was therefore forced to institute his fixed calendar, thus in effect giving the Sanhedrin’s advance approval to the calendars of all future years.

Prior to the destruction of Jerusalem, the High Priest had been in charge of the calendar. “While the Sanhedrin (Rabbinical Supreme Court) presided in Jerusalem, there was no calculated calendar. They would evaluate every year to determine whether it should be declared a leap year by examining the barley. This task fell to the president of the Sanhedrin when the priesthood was no more. “Under the reign of Constantius (337-362) the persecutions of the Jews reached such a height that . . . the computation of the calendar was forbidden under pain of severe punishment.” It was as a reaction to this situation that Hillel II, President of the Sanhedrin, took the extraordinary step in 359 C.E. of modifying the ancient Biblical calendar to allow the Jews to more easily coexist with the Christians.

Distant communities would no longer have to wait for messengers from the President of the Sanhedrin to reach them to know when a new month had started. Each community would henceforth be able to determine for themselves when a new month began and when a 13th month was to be added.

Now take notice that after Hillel’s time, more changes were added over the year. The Metonic cycle was incorporated and then later the postponement rules were added.

The “Fixed” Calendar

So when did these man-made rules come into place?  Did Hillel II institute them in 358/359 C.E. when he published the, up til then, “secret” astronomical information which had been used by the Sanhedrin to determine if the witnesses who came to testify of their sighting of the fresh crescent were lying or not?

“The plain fact is that, as seen by recent scholars, the system of the fixed calendar was not developed until fully three or four centuries after the close of the Talmudic period, about A.D. 485. [therefore, around the eighth or ninth century C.E.]…Nor can anything be found in the Talmud about the weighty calendaric matters as the regulated succession of full and defective months within the year, the four postponements of New Year’s Day, the 19-year cycle, or the number and succession of intercalated years in this or any cycle.” (The Code of Maimonides, Book Three Treatise Eight SANCTIFICATION OF THE MOON, translated from the Hebrew by Solomon Ganz; Introduction by Julian Obermann, Astronomical Commentary by Otto Neugebauer, New Haven: Yale University Press, 1956, p xli-xlii)

“There is…unimpeachable evidence from the works of writers with expert knowledge of the calendar that the present ordo intercalationis [sequence of intercalations–the 19 year cycle] and epochal molad were not intrinsic parts of the calendar of Hillel II, these being seen still side by side with other styles of the ordo intercalations and the molad as late as the 11th century. Also the four dehiyyot [postponement rules]developed gradually. …By the tenth century the Jewish calendar was exactly the same as today.” (Cecil Roth, editor, Encyclopedia Judaica, Vol. 5, p.50, article: Calendar)

While we cannot be positively sure as to when the postponement rules were added alongside the other man-made rules of the then-developing calculated rabbinical calendar, we know with complete confidence that these rules were not in use, nor even conceived of and known, during Jesus’ day. There are some indications that the initial elements of these postponements began to creep in near the end of the Talmudic period, but as theEncyclopaedia Judiaca quote states above, these rules developed gradually, along with the rest of the rabbinic calendar rules, over the course of many years.

The Postponement Rules

This again is from our article on our web site. I want you to notice rule (b) is explained with Dehiyah (b). In other words, this 2nd rule is created so that the crescent moon will not be seen in another part of the world before it would be seen in Israel. I just have to point this one glaring fact out. Even in the use of the postponement rules they still were created with the crescent moon in mind. This means the Crescent moon was the method in use before these rules were developed over the centuries.

The following quote divulges the workings of postponements. It may take a few readings to grasp some understanding of it.

“The dehiyyot [postponements] are as follows:

(a) If the Tishri molad falls on day 1, 4, or 6, then Tishri 1 is postponed one day. [This postponement is often referred to as ADU, which is an acronym formed from the Hebrew letters alef (1 for Sunday), daled (4 for Wednedsday), &vov (6 for Friday)]

(b) If the Tishri molad occurs at or after 18 hours (i.e., noon), then Tishri 1 is postponed one day. If this causes Tishri 1 to fall on day 1, 4, or 6, then Tishri 1 is postponed an additional day to satisfy dehiyyah(a).

(c) If the Tishri molad of an ordinary year (i.e., of twelve months) falls on day 3 at or after 9 hours, 204 halakim, then Tishri 1 is postponed two days to day 5, thereby satisfying dehiyyah (a).

(d) If the first molad following a leap year falls on day 2 at or after 15 hours, 589 halakim, then Tishri 1 is postponed one day to day 3.

3.1.2 Reasons for the Dehiyyot

Dehiyyah (a) prevents Hoshana Rabba (Tishri 21) from occurring on the Sabbath and prevents Yom Kippur (Tishri 10) from occurring on the day before or after the Sabbath.

Dehiyyah (b) is an artifact of the ancient practice of beginning each month with the sighting of the lunar crescent. It is assumed that if the molad (i.e., the mean conjunction) occurs after noon, the lunar crescent cannot be sighted until after 6 P.M., which will then be on the following day.

Dehiyyah (c) prevents an ordinary year from exceeding 355 days. If the Tishri molad of an ordinary year occurs on Tuesday at or after 3:11:20 A.M., the next Tishri molad will occur at or after noon on Saturday. According to dehiyyah (b), Tishri 1 of the next year must be postponed to Sunday, which by dehiyyah (a) occasions a further postponement to Monday. This results in an ordinary year of 356 days. Postponing Tishri 1 from Tuesday to Thursday produces a year of 354 days.

Dehiyyah (d) prevents a leap year from falling short of 383 days. If the Tishri molad following a leap year is on Monday, at or after 9:32:43 1/3 A.M., the previous Tishri molad (thirteen months earlier) occurred on Tuesday at or after noon. Therefore, by dehiyyot (b) and (a), Tishri 1 beginning the leap year was postponed to Thursday. To prevent a leap year of 382 days, dehiyyah (d) postpones by one day the beginning of the ordinary year.” (Explanatory Supplement to the Astronomical Almanac, P. Kenneth Seidelmann, editor; document online at:  http://astro.nmsu.edu/~lhuber/leaphist.html)

The Metonic Cycles

For astronomy and calendar studies, the Metonic cycle or Enneadecaeteris (from Ancient Greek: ??????????????????, “nineteen years”) is a period of very close to 19 years that is remarkable for being nearly a common multiple of the solar year and the synodic (lunar) month. The Greek astronomer Meton of Athens (fifth century BC) observed that a period of 19 years is almost exactly equal to 235 synodic months and, rounded to full days, counts 6,940 days. The difference between the two periods (of 19 years and 235 synodic months) is only a few hours, depending on the definition of the year.
Considering a year to be 1?19 of this 6,940-day cycle gives a year length of 365 + 1?4 + 1?76 days (the unrounded cycle is much more accurate), which is slightly more than 12 synodic months. To keep a 12-month lunar year in pace with the solar year, an intercalary 13th month would have to be added on seven occasions during the nineteen-year period (235 = 19 × 12 + 7). When Meton introduced the cycle around 432 BC, it was already known by Babylonian astronomers.

A mechanical computation of the cycle is built into the Antikythera mechanism. (The Antikythera mechanism is an ancient analog computer designed to predict astronomical positions and eclipses for calendrical and astrological purposes, as well as the Olympiads, the cycles of the ancient Olympic Games.)

The cycle was used in the Babylonian calendar, ancient Chinese calendar systems (the ‘Rule Cycle’) and the medieval computus (i.e. the calculation of the date of Easter). It regulates the 19-year cycle of intercalary months of the Hebrew calendar.

At the time of Meton, axial precession had not yet been discovered, and he could not distinguish between sidereal years (currently: 365.256363 days) and tropical years (currently: 365.242190 days). Most calendars, like the commonly used Gregorian calendar, are based on the tropical year and maintain the seasons at the same calendar times each year. Nineteen tropical years are about two hours shorter than 235 synodic months. The Metonic cycle’s error is, therefore, one full day every 219 years, or 12.4 parts per million.

The Metonic cycle has an error in it? Would Yehovah’s system have such an error?

Roy Hoffman of the New Moon Society, which is now sighting the moon and gathering information for the Sanhedrin for the day they once again revert back to the sighting of the moon, states that;

For over a thousand years, the Hebrew calendar has been fixed by calculation. Today, the Hebrew calendar does not match that fixed by observing the Moon. Even thought the gap between the two calendars continues to increase, we do not have the authority to alter the calendar until a new Sanhedrin (religious high court) is re-established and is widely recognized.
Back to the Metonic article;

Traditionally, for the Babylonians and Hebrew lunisolar calendars, the years 3, 6, 8, 11, 14, 17, and 19 are the long (13-month) years of the Metonic cycle. This cycle, which can be used to predict eclipses, forms the basis of the Greek and Hebrew calendars, and is used for the computation of the date of Easter year.

The Babylonians applied the 19-year cycle since the late sixth century BC. As they measured the moon’s motion against the stars, the 235:19 relationship may originally have referred to sidereal years, instead of tropical years as it has been used for various calendars.
Now let me quote to you how Judaism justifies this metonic cycle and at the same time show you where we are in that metonic cycle.

The lunar month on the Jewish calendar begins when the first sliver of moon becomes visible after the dark of the moon. In ancient times, the new months used to be determined by observation. When people observed the new moon, they would notify the Sanhedrin. When the Sanhedrin heard testimony from two independent, reliable eyewitnesses that the new moon occurred on a certain date, they would declare the rosh chodesh (first of the month) and send out messengers to tell people when the month began.

The problem with strictly lunar calendars is that there are approximately 12.4 lunar months in every solar year, so a 12-month lunar calendar is about 11 days shorter than a solar year and a 13-month lunar is about 19 longer than a solar year. The months drift around the seasons on such a calendar: on a 12-month lunar calendar, the month of Nissan, which is supposed to occur in the Spring, would occur 11 days earlier in the season each year, eventually occurring in the Winter, the Fall, the Summer, and then the Spring again. On a 13-month lunar calendar, the same thing would happen in the other direction, and faster.

To compensate for this drift, the Jewish calendar uses a 12-month lunar calendar with an extra month occasionally added. The month of Nissan occurs 11 days earlier each year for two or three years, and then jumps forward 30 days, balancing out the drift. In ancient times, this month was added by observation: the Sanhedrin observed the conditions of the weather, the crops and the livestock, and if these were not sufficiently advanced to be considered “spring,” then the Sanhedrin inserted an additional month into the calendar to make sure that Pesach (Passover) would occur in the spring (it is, after all, referred to in the Torah as Chag he-Aviv, the Festival of Spring!).

A year with 13 months is referred to in Hebrew as Shanah Me’uberet (pronounced shah-NAH meh-oo-BEH-reht), literally: a pregnant year. In English, we commonly call it a leap year. The additional month is known as Adar I, Adar Rishon (first Adar) or Adar Alef (the Hebrew letter Alef being the numeral “1” in Hebrew). The extra month is inserted before the regular month of Adar (known in such years as Adar II, Adar Sheini or Adar Beit).

In the fourth century, Hillel II established a fixed calendar based on mathematical and astronomical calculations. This calendar, still in use, standardized the length of months and the addition of months over the course of a 19 year cycle, so that the lunar calendar realigns with the solar years. Adar I is added in the 3rd, 6th, 8th, 11th, 14th, 17th and 19th years of the cycle. The current cycle began in Jewish year 5758 (the year that began October 2, 1997).
1997 was 5758 according to Judaism and this Metonic cycle began that year. The leap years or the extra month, Adar Bet is added just before Aviv the following year of 1998.

Now get out your charts that we have provided in the Prophecies of Abraham and begin to count the 19 year cycles. Aviv 1998 being year 1. When you do this 2016 is year 19 in the metonic cycle and it is a leap year. An extra month will be added just before Aviv 2016. you can also go to this link to see that yes indeed an extra month is added in March 2016.

We have been telling you for some time now that in 2016 The Hebrew Calendar and the Sighted Moon Calendar will be 30 days apart due to the fact the Barley will be ripe and Passover 2016 will be about March 24th.

There will also be a dark moon at this time and again in the fall at Sukkot. A dark moon warns us of famine coming.

We have also been telling you that the time when this calendar issue will be finally fixed is in 2030 when the two witnesses bring back the 13 tribes of Israel from their imminently impending captivity to keep Passover in Jerusalem.

But there is going to still be those who want to use the Hebrew Calendar and not the sighted moon calendar.

During WW II 6 Million Jews were slaughtered. WHY? They all used the Hebrew Calendar. They all went by the conjunction of the moon and they all went by the postponement rules. They all were keeping the Holy Days at the wrong time. It was the same as if they were keeping the Saturday Sabbath on Sunday. It is the wrong day to what Yehovah commanded them to keep.

And on top of this none of them were keeping the Sabbatical years.

So Judaism was not keeping the 4th commandment and for not doing so they were punished and the price for breaking the 4th commandment is death.

Exo 31:14  You shall keep the Sabbath therefore, for it is holy to you. Everyone that defiles it shall surely be put to death. For whoever does any work in it, that soul shall be cut off from among his people. 15  Six days may work be done, but on the seventh is the sabbath of rest, holy to Jehovah. Whoever does any work in the Sabbath day, he shall surely be put to death. 16  Therefore the sons of Israel shall keep the Sabbath, to observe the Sabbath throughout their generations, for an everlasting covenant. 17  It is a sign between Me and the sons of Israel forever. For in six days Jehovah made the heavens and the earth, and on the seventh day He rested, and was refreshed.
They had broken the sign that identified them as Yehovah’s. Yes, they kept the weekly Sabbath, but not the Holy Days and not the Sabbatical years.

Now let us look at what we are told in Revelation.

Rev 12:13  And when the dragon saw that he was cast to the earth, he persecuted the woman who bore the man child . 14  And two wings of a great eagle were given to the woman, so that she might fly into the wilderness, into her place, where she is nourished for a time and times and half a time, from the serpent’s face. 15  And the serpent cast out of his mouth water like a flood after the woman, so that he might cause her to be carried away by the river. 16  And the earth helped the woman. And the earth opened its mouth and swallowed up the river which the dragon cast out of his mouth. 17  And the dragon was enraged over the woman, and went to make war with the rest of her seed, who keep the commandments of God and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.
Here then is my question to you.

When the women flees into the wilderness where she is protected for 3 1/2 years from Satan, who are these other people that Satan now makes war with who keep the commandments and the testimony of Yehshua?

Why did they not flee with the rest of the woman into the wilderness?

I say to you that they do not go because they are following the Jewish Hebrew Calendar with the postponement rules and the Metonic cycles of added leap years without regard to the barley being aviv.

When you count out the Metonic cycle as we have now shown to you, year 2017 is year one in the metonic cycle. 2030 would then be the 14th year of this cycle and it is a forced leap year.

Passover 2030 will be about March 19 according to the Sighted moon calendar. Or at least it has the potential at this date. We will not know for sure until that very year. But becuase of the Metonic cycle 2030 is the 14th year and a leap year, making Passover come on April 18 of 2030.

We are given a very specific command about Passover. We are to be ready to flee and at this time Yehovah will judge.

Exo 12:11  And you shall eat of it this way, with your loins girded, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand. And you shall eat it in a hurry. It is Jehovah’s passover. 12  For I will pass through the land of Egypt this night, and will smite all the first-born in the land of Egypt, both man and beast. And I will execute judgments against all the gods of Egypt. I am Jehovah.
When one group eats Passover in 2030, they will then flee to the wilderness and they will be pursued by the army of the beast. When that army is swallowed by the earth, the beast then turns to make war on those gathering in Jerusalem for the Passover on April 18.

The two witnesses are killed during this time. They have caused the world touble for the past 3 1/2 years. It is because of this trouble that Israel is brought back to the land from captivity. But just like Jacob, it is a deception to slaughter them all once again. This is why the woman flees when she see the armies surrounding Jerusalem. But those coming late or those who do not see the armies and are going to keep the Passover according to the Hebrew calendar will be slaughtered as Revelation warns you.

After this there will be no more calendar confusion. It will be the original sighted moon calendar based on the barley being aviv. And those in the wilderness with the Messiah at Bozrah will be keeping the Holy Days at the right time and the Sabbath and the Sabbatical years.

 

Are You Going to Follow Man’s Rules or Yehovah’s Commandments? The Choice is Yours? Remember though, you must pay the price if you are wrong.

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