Bird's-eye view
This passage in Numbers 29 lays out the specific, additional sacrifices required for the Feast of Trumpets, which falls on the first day of the seventh month. This is not just another festival; it marks the beginning of a climactic series of fall feasts, culminating in the Day of Atonement and the Feast of Tabernacles. The sound of the trumpets is a summons, a divine call to attention. It is a wake-up call for Israel to prepare for the most solemn day of their year, the Day of Atonement. The offerings prescribed here, the burnt offering for complete consecration, the grain offering as a tribute, and the sin offering for atonement, are layered on top of the regular daily and monthly sacrifices. This piling up of sacrifices underscores the gravity of the season and the pervasive reality of sin. God is holy, and approaching Him requires blood. The entire chapter is a detailed liturgical calendar, a divine script for worship, reminding Israel that their relationship with Yahweh is not a casual affair but a structured, covenantal reality governed by His gracious commands. The sound of the trumpet and the smoke of the altar together declare that judgment is real, but atonement is provided.
The central theme is holy convocation and atoning sacrifice. The people are called together by a blast of sound, not to a party, but to a solemn assembly where God provides a way to deal with their sin. The aroma of the sacrifices is "soothing" to Yahweh, not because He is literally placated by the smell of burning meat, but because these sacrifices point forward to the one final sacrifice of Christ, which truly and finally satisfies divine justice. This feast is a declaration of war on sin and a celebration of the God who provides the victory. It is a day of remembrance, a call to repentance, and a foreshadowing of the great and final trumpet blast that will announce the return of the King.
Outline
- 1. The Solemn Summons (Num 29:1-6)
- a. The Appointed Day: A Holy Gathering (Num 29:1)
- b. The Prescribed Offerings: A Soothing Aroma (Num 29:2-5)
- i. The Burnt Offering: Total Consecration (Num 29:2)
- ii. The Grain Offering: A Grateful Tribute (Num 29:3-4)
- iii. The Sin Offering: A Necessary Atonement (Num 29:5)
- c. The Accumulated Sacrifices: A Layered Worship (Num 29:6)
Context In Numbers
The book of Numbers chronicles Israel's journey from Sinai to the plains of Moab, on the cusp of entering the Promised Land. It is a book about ordering the covenant community for worship and for war. Chapters 28 and 29 form a distinct unit, a comprehensive list of all the public sacrifices to be offered at the sanctuary throughout the year. This section functions as a liturgical constitution for the nation. It follows narratives of Israel's failure, rebellion, and judgment, such as the incident with Baal Peor in chapter 25. The detailed instructions for worship in chapters 28-29 serve as a divine reset, reminding the new generation that their national life, their calendar, and their very existence are to be centered around the presence of God and the sacrificial system He has ordained. This specific passage on the Feast of Trumpets is part of that larger calendar, setting the stage for the Day of Atonement (Num 29:7-11) and the Feast of Tabernacles (Num 29:12-40), which are the liturgical high point of Israel's year.
Key Issues
- The Meaning of the Seventh Month
- The Typology of the Trumpet
- The Nature of a "Holy Convocation"
- The Distinction Between Burnt, Grain, and Sin Offerings
- The Concept of a "Soothing Aroma"
- The Layering of Sacrifices
- The Fulfillment of the Feasts in Christ
A Joyful Noise of Atonement
We live in an age that despises liturgy and calendars. We prize spontaneity and "authenticity," which usually means doing whatever we feel like doing whenever we feel like doing it. But God is a God of order. The universe He created runs on a calendar of seasons, and the covenant life He established for Israel was likewise structured by a calendar of feasts. These were not arbitrary holidays. They were divinely appointed times, rehearsals for redemption, that told the story of the gospel year after year.
The Feast of Trumpets, or Yom Teruah, the day of blowing, was a summons. The trumpet in Scripture is used to call an assembly, to sound an alarm, to announce a king, and to signal for battle. This feast did all of those things. It called the people together. It warned them to prepare for the great Day of Atonement just ten days later. It announced the sovereignty of Yahweh. And it declared war on the sin that separated the people from their God. The sound was to be a joyful noise, a shout of acclamation, but it was a joy grounded in the sober reality of sacrifice. The blast of the shofar was immediately followed by the smoke of the altar. This is the pattern of the gospel: the King is announced, and His throne is established on the basis of a substitutionary death.
Verse by Verse Commentary
1 ‘Now in the seventh month, on the first day of the month, you shall also have a holy convocation; you shall do no laborious work. It will be to you a day for blowing trumpets.
The seventh month, Tishri, was the sabbatical month, the culmination of the religious year. That this feast falls on the first day of this significant month highlights its importance. It is a holy convocation, a sacred assembly. God commands His people to gather. Worship is not a private, individualistic affair; it is corporate. The people are to cease their ordinary, laborious work. This is a Sabbath principle, setting the day apart as holy to the Lord. It forces them to stop their own striving and focus on God's provision. The central activity of the day is the blowing of trumpets. This is not just background music; it is a declaration. It is a wake-up call from God, a piercing sound meant to get the attention of a people prone to spiritual slumber. It announces that something of great import is at hand.
2 And you shall offer a burnt offering as a soothing aroma to Yahweh: one bull from the herd, one ram, and seven male lambs one year old without blemish;
The response to the trumpet call is sacrifice. First and foremost is the burnt offering, or the ascension offering. This was the sacrifice that was wholly consumed on the altar. Nothing was kept by the priests or the worshiper. It represented total consecration, the complete surrender of the worshiper to God. The animals specified, a bull, a ram, seven lambs, are significant. A bull represents strength and service, a ram represents leadership and substitution, and the seven lambs represent a perfect, complete offering on behalf of the people. They must all be without blemish, pointing to the perfect, spotless sacrifice that would one day be offered in Jesus Christ. The purpose is to create a soothing aroma to Yahweh. This is anthropomorphic language, of course. God doesn't have a nose. It means that the offering, when done in faith, is acceptable and pleasing to Him because it is an act of obedience that anticipates the perfect obedience of His Son.
3-4 also their grain offering, fine flour mixed with oil: three-tenths of an ephah for the bull, two-tenths for the ram, and one-tenth for each of the seven lambs.
Every burnt offering was accompanied by a grain offering and a drink offering. The grain offering, made of fine flour and oil, was a tribute, a gift acknowledging God as the provider of all sustenance. It represents the dedication of one's labor and the fruit of the land to God. Notice the prescribed amounts are precise. God cares about the details of worship. It is not up to us to decide how we will approach Him. The amounts are proportional to the animal offered: the larger the animal, the larger the tribute. This teaches that our response to God should be proportional to the grace He has shown us. The flour is "fine," the best, and it is mixed with oil, a symbol of the Holy Spirit's presence and blessing.
5 And offer one male goat for a sin offering, to make atonement for you,
After the offering of total consecration (the burnt offering) and the offering of tribute (the grain offering), there is the sin offering. This is crucial. Before a consecrated people can truly worship, their specific sins must be dealt with. The goat is the animal here, the quintessential sin-bearer. This sacrifice was not about dedicating your life in general; it was about confessing your failures and acknowledging your guilt. Its purpose is explicit: to make atonement for you. The Hebrew word for atonement, kippur, has the sense of covering or purging. The blood of the goat symbolically covered the sin of the people, cleansing the sanctuary and allowing them to remain in the presence of a holy God. It was a stark reminder that even on a day of celebration, sin is a constant reality that must be confronted and covered by a substitutionary death.
6 besides the burnt offering of the new moon and its grain offering, and the continual burnt offering and its grain offering, and their drink offerings, according to their legal judgment, for a soothing aroma, an offering by fire to Yahweh.
This verse shows the cumulative nature of the sacrificial system. The special offerings for the Feast of Trumpets did not replace the other required sacrifices. They were added on top of the daily burnt offering (the tamid) and the monthly burnt offering for the new moon. Imagine an Israelite standing at the tabernacle on this day. He would see the regular morning sacrifice, the special new moon sacrifice, and then these additional, robust sacrifices for the feast. The smoke would be ascending all day. The point is unmissable: access to God is costly, and sin is pervasive. A constant stream of blood and smoke was necessary to maintain fellowship. This layering of sacrifices was a heavy burden, designed to make the people long for the day when one sacrifice would be sufficient, once for all. The whole system was designed to be a tutor, pointing them to Christ, whose one offering accomplishes what this mountain of animal sacrifices could only foreshadow.
Application
We do not blow a shofar on the first day of the seventh month, and we do not offer bulls and goats. The trumpet has sounded definitively in the gospel. The King has come. The final battle against sin and death was won at the cross. And the one, perfect, unblemished Lamb has been sacrificed, once for all. The entire sacrificial system, with its layered offerings and constant smoke, has been fulfilled and rendered obsolete.
But the principles of this feast remain. First, God still calls us to holy convocation. The Lord's Day is our summons, our trumpet blast, calling us away from our laborious work to assemble as the people of God. To neglect the gathering of the saints is to ignore the trumpet. Second, our worship must be grounded in atonement. We do not come to God on the basis of our own consecration or good works. We come only because the sin offering, Jesus Christ, has made atonement for us. Our praise is only a "soothing aroma" to God when it comes through Christ. Third, our whole lives are to be a burnt offering. In response to the great salvation we have received, we are to present our bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is our spiritual worship (Rom 12:1). We are to offer up the "grain offering" of our daily work and the "drink offering" of our joy, doing all of it to the glory of God. The Feast of Trumpets reminds us that the Christian life is a life of joyful alarm, a constant awareness of the King's victory and a sober readiness for His return, when the last trumpet will sound.