Leviticus 23:25

Ye shall do no servile work therein: but ye shall offer an offering made by fire unto the LORD.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(25) Ye shall do no servile work.—With the exception of what was absolutely necessary, all handicraft and trade were stopped. (See Leviticus 23:7.)

But ye shall offer.—As the festival is also the new moon, a threefold sacrifice was offered on it, (1) viz. the ordinary daily sacrifice which was offered first; (2) the appointed new moon sacrifice (Numbers 28:11-15); and (3) the sacrifice for this festival, which consisted of a young bullock, a ram, and seven lambs of the first year, with the usual meat offerings, and a kid for a sin offering (Numbers 29:1-6). With the exception, therefore, of there being one bullock instead of two, this sacrifice was simply a repetition of the monthly offering by which it was preceded in the service. During the offering of the drink offering and the burnt offering the Levites engaged in vocal and instrumental music, singing the eighty-first and other psalms, whilst the priests at stated intervals broke forth with awful blasts of the trumpets. After the offering up of the sacrifices, the service was concluded by the priests, who pronounced the benediction (Numbers 6:23-27), which the people received in a prostrate position before the Lord. Having prostrated themselves a second time in the court, the congregation resorted to the adjoining synagogue, where the appointed lessons from the Law and the Prophets were read, consisting of Genesis 21:1-34; Numbers 29:1-6; 1Samuel 1:1 to 1Samuel 2:10; Genesis 22:1-24; Jeremiah 31:2-20. Psalms were recited and the festival prayers were offered, beseeching the Lord to pardon the sins of the past year, and to grant the people a happy new year. This concluded the morning service, after which the families resorted to their respective homes, partook of the social and joyous repast, and in the evening went again into the Temple to witness the offering of the evening sacrifices, and to see the candlestick lighted with which the festival concluded, all wishing each other, “May you be written down for a happy new year; may the Creator decree for you a happy new year.” To which was responded, “And you likewise.” With the exception of the sacrifices, the Jews keep this festival to the present day. The trumpet which they use on this occasion consists of the curved horn of a ram, in remembrance of the ram which Abraham sacrificed instead of Isaac. This event, as we have seen, is also commemorated in the lesson of the day.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

23:23-32 the blowing of trumpets represented the preaching of the gospel, by which men are called to repent of sin, and to accept the salvation of Christ, which was signified by the day of atonement. Also it invited to rejoice in God, and become strangers and pilgrims on earth, which was denoted by the feast of Tabernacles, observed in the same month. At the beginning of the year, they were called by this sound of trumpet to shake off spiritual drowsiness, to search and try their ways, and to amend them. The day of atonement was the ninth day after this; thus they were awakened to prepare for that day, by sincere and serious repentance, that it might indeed be to them a day of atonement. The humbling of our souls for sin, and the making our peace with God, is work that requires the whole man, and the closest application of mind. On that day God spake peace to his people, and to his saints; therefore they must lay aside all their wordly business, that they might the more clearly hear that voice of joy and gladness.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

A sabbath - Here and in Leviticus 23:39 a word which should rather be rendered a sabbatical rest.

Blowing of trumpets - Here and in Numbers 29:1, literally "shouting". There is no mention of trumpets in the Hebrew text of the Law in connection with the day. However, there is no reason to doubt the tradition that the day was distinguished by a general blowing of trumpets throughout the land, and that the kind of trumpet generally used for the purpose was the curved horn of an animal or a cornet of metal, such as was used at Sinai Exodus 19:16, and on the Day of Jubilee Leviticus 25:9. It must have differed in this respect from the ordinary festival of the New moon when the long straight trumpet of the temple alone was blown (Numbers 10:2; Exodus 25:23; see cut).

Seventh month - Called by the Jews in later times it was called Tisri, but in the Old Testament Ethanim, 1 Kings 8:2. According to the uniform voice of tradition "the first day" of this month was the first day of the Civil year in use before the Exodus, and was observed as the festival of the New year. Some have viewed it as a commemoration of the Creation of the world Job 38:7 : others, as the anniversary of the giving of the Law.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

24. In the seventh month, in the first day of the month, shall ye have a sabbath—That was the first day of the ancient civil year.

a memorial of blowing of trumpets—Jewish writers say that the trumpets were sounded thirty successive times, and the reason for the institution was for the double purpose of announcing the commencement of the new year, which was (Le 23:25) to be religiously observed (see Nu 29:3), and of preparing the people for the approaching solemn feast.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

No text from Poole on this verse.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Ye shall do no servile work therein,.... Only such as was necessary for dressing food, but not any manual work, such as servants were employed in on other days, as agriculture or any mechanic business:

but ye shall offer an offering made by fire unto the Lord; a burnt offering, and what that was may be seen in Numbers 29:1.

Geneva Study Bible

Ye shall do no servile work therein: but ye shall offer an offering made by fire unto the LORD.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Leviticus 23:25

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

On the first day of the seventh month there was to be shabbathon, rest, i.e., a day of rest (see Exodus 16:23), a memorial of blowing of trumpets, a holy convocation, the suspension of laborious work, and the offering of a firing for Jehovah, which are still more minutely described in the calendar of festal sacrifices in Numbers 29:2-6. תּרוּעה, a joyful noise, from רוּע to make a noise, is used in Leviticus 23:24 for שׁופר תּרוּעה, a blast of trumpets. On this day the shophar was to be blown, a blast of trumpets to be appointed for a memorial before Jehovah (Numbers 10:10), i.e., to call the congregation into remembrance before Jehovah, that He might turn towards it His favour and grace (see at Exodus 28:12, Exodus 28:29; Exodus 30:16); and from this the feast-day is called the day of the trumpet-blast (Numbers 19:1). Shophar, a trumpet, was a large horn which produced a dull, far-reaching tone. Buccina pastoralis est et cornu recurvo efficitur, unde et proprie hebraice sophar, graece κερατίνη appellatur (Jerome on Hos. Lev 5:8).

(Note: The word תּרוּעה is also used in Numbers 10:5-6 to denote the blowing with the silver trumpets; but there seems to be no ground for supposing these trumpets to be intended here, not only because of the analogy between the seventh day of the new moon as a jubilee day and the jubilee year (Leviticus 25:9-10), but also because the silver trumpets are assigned to a different purpose in Numbers 10:2-10, and their use is restricted to the blowing at the offering of the burnt-offerings on the feast-days and new moons. To this we have to add the Jewish tradition, which favours with perfect unanimity the practice of blowing with horns (the horns of animals).)

The seventh month of the year, like the seventh day of the week, was consecrated as a Sabbath or sabbatical month, by a holy convocation and the suspension of labour, which were to distinguish the first day of the seventh month from the beginning of the other months or the other new moon days throughout the year. For the whole month was sanctified in the first day, as the beginning or head of the month; and by the sabbatical observance of the commencement, the whole course of the month was raised to a Sabbath. This was enjoined, not merely because it was the seventh month, but because the seventh month was to secure to the congregation the complete atonement for all its sins, and the wiping away of all the uncleannesses which separated it from its God, viz., on the day of atonement, which fell within this month, and to bring it a foretaste of the blessedness of life in fellowship with the Lord, viz., in the feast of Tabernacles, which commenced five days afterwards. This significant character of the seventh month was indicated by the trumpet-blast, by which the congregation presented the memorial of itself loudly and strongly before Jehovah on the first day of the month, that He might bestow upon them the promised blessings of His grace, for the realization of His covenant. The trumpet-blast on this day was a prelude of the trumpet-blast with which the commencement of the year of jubilee was proclaimed to the whole nation, on the day of atonement of every seventh sabbatical year, that great year of grace under the old covenant (Leviticus 25:9); just as the seventh month in general formed the link between the weekly Sabbath and the sabbatical and jubilee years, and corresponded as a Sabbath month to the year of jubilee rather than the sabbatical year, which had its prelude in the weekly Sabbath-day.