Numbers29chapter 29

Numbers 29:7-11

On the day of atonement "you shall humble yourselves" marks the one fast the law commands, and Numbers gives the burnt offering beside the rite of Leviticus 16. Verse 11 still asks for "one male goat for a sin offering" on the day the nation's sin is put away. Hebrews 10:1-4 takes up that repetition: "it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins."

John Gill notes that the tenth day repeats the burnt offering of the first. He records the view of Aben Ezra that this ram differs from the ram of Leviticus 16:3. Matthew Henry reads a burnt offering on a day of repentance as honour given to God. Sorrow and praise share the altar.

The grain for the tenth day follows the same rates as the first. John Gill notes the same quantity of flour and oil for each animal. The rate holds on a fast day. John Wesley describes the people afflicting themselves by fasting and abstinence, while the altar still received its fine flour mixed with oil.

The measure for the lambs closes the grain offering of the day of atonement. Jamieson, Fausset & Brown call these prescriptions supplementary to the account of the day in Leviticus. Matthew Henry makes a rule of such passages. A reader must lay them side by side, since later light supplies what earlier passages left out.

John Calvin ties the added sin offering to the fast. Confessing guilt, he says, would torment the conscience without the hope of reconciliation. Matthew Henry gives another reason, that even repentance has faults needing atonement. In his words, we must repent that we have not repented better.

Numbers 29:12-16

on the fifteenth day of the seventh month: The Feast of Tabernacles runs seven days, and its first offering of thirteen young bulls is the largest in the calendar. The month's first day and the day of atonement take a single bull each. The bulls then fall by one each day to seven, while the rams hold at two and the lambs at fourteen, and Numbers gives no reason for the descent.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown give two reasons for the size of this offering. The feast fell at the year's end and might supply past deficiencies, and it followed the ingathering of the fruits and called for liberal thanks. John Calvin calls it the chief festival. It recalled the forty years in the desert.

Thirteen bulls at three-tenths each need thirty-nine tenths of an ephah of flour, and the two rams add four more. John Calvin says Moses spells out such figures so that nothing would be done except at God's command. The cost was fixed from above. Calvin adds that the detail kept the people from resenting so great an expense.

The fourteen lambs bring the first day's grain to fifty-seven tenths of an ephah, against twelve on the first of the month. Jamieson, Fausset & Brown say these details are given with a minuteness suited to the infant state of the church. Nothing on this day is left to judgment.

The regular burnt offering stands beside the great burnt offering of the feast every day. Matthew Henry says it was offered first in the morning and last in the evening, whatever else the day held. In his words, no extraordinary services should jostle out our stated devotions. The feast rests on the daily round.

Numbers 29:17-22

From the second day the grain and drink offerings are given as a rule, "according to the number prescribed", which reaches back to the rate fixed at Numbers 15:4-12. Numbers 7 wrote twelve identical offerings out in full, and this chapter abbreviates because the count of animals changes daily while the rate per animal does not. The sin offering stays at one male goat every day.

The number prescribed refers to rates already fixed. Jamieson, Fausset & Brown explain the phrase as the ritual order set by divine authority, taking the grain rates from Numbers 29:3-10. With twelve bulls on the second day, the grain comes to fifty-four tenths of an ephah.

The second day's sin offering matches the first. Matthew Henry notes that a sin offering was presented every day of this feast, as at the other feasts. He reads it as a sign that offerings of praise are accepted only through the sacrifice Christ made for sin. Joy at the harvest still began with atonement.

By the third day the feast has used thirty-six bulls. John Wesley says the feast was kept for seven days by offering extraordinary sacrifices each day. The days between were marked at the altar. Eleven bulls stand here, two fewer than on the first day.

The third day's bulls drop to eleven, and the grain with them to fifty-one tenths of an ephah. Jamieson, Fausset & Brown find the rule for the drink offerings at Numbers 28:7 and 28:14. The measures travel with each animal. When a bull is dropped, its flour and its drink offering go with it.

John Calvin observes that Israel never came into God's presence without asking for pardon. The daily goat of this feast fits that pattern. Calvin says this of the day of atonement, and the feast keeps the same order in its joy. Thanks and pardon are sought together.

Numbers 29:23-28

Leviticus 23:39-43 says what the seven days are for: Israel lives in booths to remember the booths of the exodus. Numbers 29 carries none of that and gives the animals, the flour and the oil. This calendar is written for the altar and Leviticus 23 for the household, so the booths, the branches and the rejoicing sit there and the count of bulls sits here.

The fourth day's grain comes to forty-eight tenths of an ephah. Matthew Henry says the grain and drink offerings went with every sacrifice by rule. He warns that doing much in worship counts for little unless it is done well and in the way God appointed.

The fourth day's sin offering falls while the people are living in booths. John Wesley says that all the days of their dwelling in booths they had to offer sacrifices. He applies it to life in this world. An unsettled outward state, he says, excuses no neglect of worship.

Nine bulls on the fifth day bring the feast's total so far to fifty-five. Albert Barnes calls this a feast of thankfulness for the fruits of the earth. Its offerings, he says, were the largest of all. John Calvin likewise ties it to the ingathering of the harvest.

The fifth day's grain comes to forty-five tenths of an ephah. Matthew Henry reports one reason given for the daily decrease. God, some suggest, spared the weakness of people inclined to grudge the cost of worship. Henry points to Isaiah 43:23 for the complaint of being burdened with offerings.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown count fifteen goats and twenty-one kids in the yearly offerings made at public cost. The feast of tabernacles and its eighth day supply eight of them, one a day. This is the fifth. Each came at the nation's expense.

Numbers 29:29-34

The week comes to seventy bulls, fourteen rams, ninety-eight lambs and seven goats. Adam Clarke counts the seventy and remarks on what the week cost a nation that paid no other tax. The Babylonian Talmud at Sukkah 55b reads the seventy bulls as offered for the seventy nations of Genesis 10, a reading of Jewish tradition stated nowhere in Scripture.

The sixth day's grain is forty-two tenths of an ephah. Matthew Henry offers a second reading of the shrinking count. The falling numbers, he suggests, may hint that the order of the law would grow old and pass away. In his words, the multitude of their sacrifices should end in one great sacrifice.

Matthew Henry notes that the days of rejoicing at this feast were also days of sacrifice. On the sixth day the sin offering still stands beside the joy of harvest. Henry holds that gladness does no harm when it enlarges the heart for worship. Here the two share one day.

The seventh day brings the bulls down to seven. Albert Barnes sees design in this, since seven is the holy covenant number. He holds that the daily decrease was arranged to reach seven bulls on the seventh day. In his reading the mercies of the harvest are tied to God's covenant.

On the seventh day the grain falls to thirty-nine tenths of an ephah. Over the seven days the grain offerings total 336 tenths, more than thirty-three ephahs of fine flour mixed with oil. Jamieson, Fausset & Brown call the pattern a progressive ratio of decrease. The week ends at its lowest measure.

Matthew Henry answers the charge that seven near identical days make a vain repetition. God wrote each day out, he says, to teach exactness and to keep faith fixed on the command in every day's work. The seventh day's goat closes that series. Seven goats have now been offered.

Numbers 29:35-38

The eighth day stands outside the seven as "a solemn assembly", and its offering falls back to the one bull, one ram, and seven male lambs of the month's first day. Albert Barnes reads the month as one arc closing where it began. John 7:37 places Jesus' cry "On the last and greatest day of the feast", and readers divide over whether that is the seventh day or this eighth.

Matthew Henry notes that the last day received one bull, one ram and seven lambs, half the rams and lambs of each day before it. Adam Clarke says the Jews still counted it the chief day of the feast. He thinks the people closed the feast with a greater measure of spiritual devotion. The smallest offering fell on the highest day.

With one bull, one ram and seven lambs, the eighth day's grain returns to twelve tenths of an ephah. John Gill notes that the day's grain and drink offerings match those of the first and tenth days. That is under a third of the seventh day's thirty-nine.

The eighth day keeps its goat while every other offering shrinks. John Gill notes that the goat came besides the daily sacrifice and its grain and drink. Jamieson, Fausset & Brown add that the crowds gathered that day brought many gifts of their own, from vows and free will. The law set the minimum and the people added to it.

Numbers 29:39-40

Verse 39 sets the fixed calendar "in addition to your vow and freewill offerings", a floor with voluntary worship standing on it. Verse 40 is the calendar's only line of narrative, closing the speech begun at Numbers 28:1. Its hearers are the second generation, numbered in chapter 26 after every man of the first had fallen, receiving feasts for a land none of them has entered.

John Gill says Moses repeated these laws to the people with their additions and explanations, as a faithful servant in all God's house. Jamieson, Fausset & Brown total the yearly public offerings of these two chapters at 1,241 animals. That count leaves out vows and freewill gifts. It also leaves out the Passover lambs.