Some people have concluded that Judaism has gotten the calendar all wrong, not because they have, but because what the Torah says about it is something critics of Judaism have not examined as closely as Jews have for thousands of years.
While most MEN count their eyars from the 1st month to the last of the year, the Bible tells us the first month is in the Spring .... but to COUNT OUR YEARS FROM THE 7th MONTH to the NEXT SEVENTH MONTH!!!!! God does not do things the same way as men, but this is what the Scriptures tell us to do.
Lev/Vay 25:9 says...
Now that tells us clear as day that the Jubilee year is counted when?.....Tishri to Tishri. Now read all of Vayikra 25, and you will see it clearly teaches us that ALL counting of Shmitta (7th year or Sabbatical year), harvest, etc., must be in line with Jubilee. Note in verse 8, where it tells us that the counting of Shmitta years must align with Jubilee. So obviously, the 7th month is the start of the year of Jubilee, Shmitta, harvest, buying property, etc.
Some people see this as being in conflict with Exodus/Shemot 12:2, but it is not.
The first month symbolizes creation , redemption, and Passover. But the 7th month symbolizes His return to earth. God has us counting so that we look forward, not backwards!
When we count years as 5760...5761...5762...5763...etc...we are COMMANDED in scripture to count them from the 7th month to the 7th month. Note that Lev 25:8 says
So we're suppose to count the years, and we are suppose to mark that count from the 7th month, until the 7th month, as is clearly explained in the rest of Vayikra 25. (You'll have to read on to see where it says this starts in the 7th month, but I just quoted the most important verse from here earlier in this post.) So Rabbinical Judaism is counting years just like Elohim told them to do it. No where does it say to count year 1, year 2, year 3, .... year 576x... from the first month. It says to count the MONTHS from the Spring, but does NOT say to count years that way.
Scripture says to count your months 1,2,3,4,....12, (sometimes 13) from Nisan to Nisan, and count your years 1,2,3,...5762, 5763, 5764....etc.... from Tishri/Ethanim to Tishri/Ethanim. And that is exactly what Judaism is doing - counting their months and years exactly where Elohim said to start and stop. this is why the FALL is called the "turn of the year" in Exodus/Shemot 34:22, because its when the year "turns" or its count is incremented. Note how it says this....
"Celebrate
- the Feast of Weeks with the firstfruits of the wheat harvest and
- the Feast of Ingathering at the TURN OF THE YEAR" (Exod 34:22)
Is this confusing? Maybe a bit so to newcomers of Torah since no other society counts their years from anything other than the 1st month. But we can't let the traditions of men influence how we interpret scripture. Just because human traditions call month 1 the month a year starts in does not mean Elohim will do the same. But its important to understand the Jewish point of view before arguing its wrong. Many people, both in the Church as well as in Messianic movements of some sort, can be eager to say that Judaism has messed everything up, but they are in fact, following these instructions exactly as they are laid out, even if it is not how men would have numbered things.
Jewish tradition teaches that there are 4 "heads" to 4 different types of years. In the Mishnah, Rosh HaShanah 1:1 says:
"There are four new years:
- B. (1) The first day of Nisan is the new year for kings and festivals.
- C. (2) The first day of Elul is the new year for tithing cattle.
- D. ___R. Eleazar and R. Simeon say, "It is on the first day of Tishre".
- E. (3) The first day of Tishri is the new year for the counting of years, for Sabbatical years, and for Jubiliees
- F. ___for planting and vegitation
- G. (4) the first day of Shebat is the new year for trees, in accord with the opinion of the House of Shammai.
- H. ___the House of Hillel say, "On the 15th day of that month" "
And biblically one could say there used to be at least one more fifth "head of the year". The phrase, "Rosh HaShanah" or "Head of the Year" appears only once in Scripture, in Ezekiel 40:1 it says,
"In the five and twentieth year of our captivity, in the beginning of the year [Rosh HaShanah], in the tenth day of the month, in the fourteenth year after that the city was smitten, in the selfsame day...." (Ezek 40:1, KJV [with annotation])
When he uses the phrase "head of the year", this is referring to the head of the "years of exile", measured as how long since Israel was in exile, not the year as Israel came out of Egypt (which is measured from the 1st month), or Jubilee years (measured from the 7th month), or the year for tithing cattle (measured from the 6th month), etc. This is not talking about the 7th month or the first , but the month of Av, for it says "in the tenth day of the month, in the fourteenth year after that the city was smitten, in the selfsame day". There is no history of any attack on Israel starting or ending on the 10th day of either Aviv/Nisan or Ethanim / Tishri. But the temple was set afire on the 9th of Av and it took 2 days for it to burn, so the buring of the temple was completed on the 10th of Av. Ezek 40:1 was the exact 25th anniversary of that destruction of the temple. And when we read on in Ezekiel 40, what does G-d choose to reveal to Ezekiel on the 25th anniversary of the destruction of the temple? ..... He reveals what the NEW TEMPLE will look like!!!!! How poetic. The date Ezekiel is giving here is the 10th of Av, on the 25th anniversary of Israel's exile, measured from the day the temple finished burning to the ground. Now this "year" that Ezekiel is referring to, the years of exile, no longer existed when the Mishnah was written, so it was not worth mentioning at that point. But it was mentioned by Ezekiel.
So while there is some minor disagreement in Jewish tradition on this topic, we still see in RH 1:1E that Jewish tradition correctly determnied that Tishri to Tishri is when years are COUNTED, just as Lev 25:9 describes. But it also recognizes another type of "year" that begins on the "Head of the months" of Aviv/Nisan for kings and for setting the calendar.
Now note that for the 2 "years" that are described in scripture, Jewish tradition contains no debate on. But for the other 2 "years", we see some disagreement on how to reckon those.
Now why does the Scirptures tell us to count the year from one seventh month to another? Keep in mind several things: A word for "year" really doesn't exist in Hebrew the same as in English - that is - a word used EXCLUSIVELY to refer to a measure of time. The Hebrew word for "year" (shanah) also can mean "change", "repeat", "study", and perhaps G-d wants us to see all these concepts in this time of year. And there are several instances in which the 7th measure of something creates or precedes a great change in Scripture.
- It was on the 7th day that G-d "rested" from creation. The Sabbath rest means we change things every day EXCEPT the 7th day of the week. We work and create assets on every other day, but on the 7th day we rest and make no changes to our wealth.
- In Lev 13 are regulations concerning a leprous man who is isolated, and on the 7th day is when the priest (kohen) investigates the man to determine is anything has changed about his status of leprousy.
- The 7th year is the YEAR OF RELEASE, and it is in this year that several changes happen; debts are released, slaves are set free, etc.
- In Egypt, there were 7 years of plenty followed by another change; 7 years of famine.
- In Joshua 6, Israel marched around Jericho for 7 days before a great change happened; the walls fell down.
Also, we know that Rosh HaShanah (The "Head of the Year" or the "Head of the Change") symbolically represents the second coming of the Messiah, which is when the biggest change the world will ever see will happen. And setting this in the 7th month could be a hint as to how this event will happen in the 7th Millenium of mankind.
So whatever God's reasons where for having us "see" a "year" or a "change" in the 7th measure of something, this is the association He made and there must have been something symbolically important in the 7th measure of something in which he wanted us to see a change.
shalom, joe