Tabernacle
TABERNACOLO - T. murale (14th cent.) with two censing angels - Comelico, parish church of St. Nicholas (Cadore).
Closure of the annual cycle of feasts: on the 15th and 22nd servile work was forbidden, as on the Sabbath (Lev. 23, 35-36). The notice of the transfer of this feast to the northern kingdom in the following month, mentioned in 1 Kings 12, 32-33, is perhaps due to a gloss.
The feast of Tabernacles fundamentally had the character of thanksgiving to God at the end of the grape harvest and, in general, of the fruits of the countryside, whence the name “feast of the harvest” (Ex. 23, 16), and thus a feast closing the agricultural year (cf. “at the end of the year” ibid. 23, 16). The interpretation that sees in it an original New Year’s feast, corresponding to a Canaanite custom (not proven and unlikely) of beginning the year at the “autumn feast,” is unfounded. The time when it took place explains the exceptional abundance of the offerings made then, especially the rich animal sacrifices (Num. 29, 12-38), amid the rejoicing of the people, who took part in the rites with branches in hand, to be waved according to certain rules at the salient moments of the ceremony (Lev. 23, 40: from an interpretation of this text came the custom of holding in the left hand a citron branch with its fruits [Heb. postbiblical 'ethrôgh], and in the right a bundle of palm and myrtle branches, called the lulab, or, according to G. Dalman, the 'álabh). Moreover, the feast had a commemorative character with reference to Israelite origins: it was to recall the time of wandering in the desert, when Israel dwelt in tents. Hence its characteristic: during the eight days of the solemnity people dwelt in booths, which were built outdoors with leafy branches (the prescription regarding this is found only in Neh. 8, 15). To this peculiarity refers the name “Scenopegia” (σκηνοπηγία) given to the feast in the Hellenistic period (1 Macc. 10, 21; John 7, 2).
The judicial usages relating to the feast are described in a special tractate of the Mishnah (II, 6: Sukka). Among other things, mention is made there of a solemn libation, perhaps alluding to the miracle of the rock in the desert (Ex. 17, 1-7), of which there are only probably later references in the Old Testament (1 Sam. 7, 6 etc.): during the ceremony the text of Isaiah on the “waters of salvation” (Isa. 12, 3) was sung. To this rite allude the words of Christ spoken “on the last day of the Scenopegia”: “If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink” (John 7, 37).