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Hope of Israel Mail Bag

Here is a quote from the Apocrypha: This cannot be understood any other way than
I Maccabees 1:54 -- Now the fifteenth day of that there are six working days between Sab-
the month Casleu, in the hundred forty and fifth baths and that there are equally six working
year, they set up the abomination of desolation days between certain Sabbaths and a New
upon the altar, and builded idol altars through- Moon. It is also very logical that the prophets
out the cities of Juda on every side; and burnt (including Moses) thought it crucial to distin-
incense at the doors of their houses, and in the guish Sabbath from New Moon -- after all, a
streets. new moon may not be a single "day" as such,
yet it is a single period to be followed, once
What better day for the Hellenists to thumb again, by six working days. The wording here
their nose at the Jews than by desecrating the is emphatic that it is to be "SHUT on the six
Sanctuary on the Sabbath Day? It is not called working days" -- the same six working days
the Sabbath in this verse, but if the Sabbath defined in Moses' creation story -- yet it is
Days are days 1, 8, 15, 22 and 29 according to made equally clear that it is to be opened on
the concept of the lunar Sabbath, this indeed the "Sabbath day and on the day of the New
would be a Sabbath Day and setting up the Moon." The language used here, as in most of
abomination of desolation on that day would the Bible texts, also seems to indicate that the
certainly add insult to injury. moon was acknowledged by the Israelites to be
a complete "annuary" in and of itself -- like the
-- E-mail posting by R.H. Sarrett month is to the year as the day is to the week
and the year is to the Jubilee -- much like most
Just wanted to let you kmow that we've given ancient cultures, particularly middle eastern
the lunar cycle connection with all Sabbaths a and Chaldean ones had done.
lot of thought and study and we're definite now
that you are right. What I am curious about is this:
What makes you, Mr. Dankenbring and the
God is not the author of confusion and man, are Jews so certain that the month begins on the
there a lot of scriptures that are "inconvenient dark day or, as the modern Moslems put it, the
to Jews, Christians AND Moslems too. Ezekiel "birth of the moon"? I have my own reasons for
has troubled me for a long time and now I'm personally agreeing with you (unless, or until I
able to be in perfect harmony with God's get conflicting information) but I am curious as
words through him: -- where he writes: to your reasoning (and/or God's, as the case
may be).
"This is what the Sovereign LORD says: The
gate of the inner court facing east is to be shut -- Dave Hinkley
on the six working days, but on the Sabbath day
and on the day of the New Moon it is to be Very recently, I have come upon what I con-
opened. On the Sabbaths and New Moons the sider to be significant information concerning
people of the land are to worship in the pres- the definition of the biblical Sabbath.
ence of the LORD at the entrance to that gate-
way." Ezek. 46:1, 3.

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