John 7:2

John 7:2. And the feast of the Jews, the feast of was at hand. This annual festival, the last of the three at which the men of Israel were required to present themselves before the Lord in Jerusalem, began on the 15 th of Tizri, that is, either late in September or early in October. It had a twofold significance, being at once a harvest festival and a historical memorial of the earliest days of the nation. At the ‘feast of Ingathering' (Exodus 23:16) the people gave thanks for the harvest, now safely gathered in: the ‘feast of Tabernacles,' during the seven days of which they dwelt in booths or huts, recalled the years which their fathers spent in the desert (Leviticus 23:39-43). The mode in which the feast was celebrated must be noticed in connection with later verses (see note on John 7:38): here we need only add that this festival, spoken of by Josephus as ‘the holiest and greatest' of all, was a season of the most lively rejoicing (see Nehemiah 8:16-18), and was associated at once with the most precious recollections of the past and the most sacred hopes for the future of the nation. In particular, as we shall see more fully hereafter, the feast had come to be regarded as the type and emblem of the glory of the latter day, when the Spirit of God should be poured out like floods upon the ground (Isaiah 35). On the expression ‘feast of the Jews,' see the notes on chap. John 2:13; John 6:4. To what extent the joyous and holy feast of the Lord could be perverted by the malice and hatred of ‘the Jews' this chapter will clearly show.