The Day of Pentecost circa 30 A.D.
Clifton H. Payne, Jr.Pentecost is the second of the three major pilgrim festivals in the Bible. It is called Pentecost because it comes 50 days after Passover and this is the term used for the festival in the Septuagint. In Hebrew it is called Hag ha-Shavuot (festival of weeks) and it is also known in Rabbinic sources as Atzeret (implying that it is the conclusion of the Passover and a day to abstain from labor). This was the day on which the Rabbi’s calculated that the Torah was given on Mount Sinai. It is also known as Yom ha-Bikkurim (day of first fruits) and Hag ha-Katsir (festival of reaping). In the New Testament it is known as the day that the Holy Spirit was poured out upon the disciples.
In Christian tradition the day of Pentecost occurred in an upper room. This tradition comes from a combined reading of Acts 1:12-14 and Acts 2:1-4. In Acts, chapter one, the apostles return from the ascension of Jesus on the mount called Olivet and entered into the upper room where the disciples were staying along with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus and His brothers. In Acts, chapter two, they were all in one place when the sound of a rushing mighty wind filled the whole house where they were sitting. So if they are in an upper room in chapter one it would seem that they must be in the same upper room in chapter two. This reading seems clear and logical and has been the prevailing understanding for the past two thousand years. However, an aspect of the story has been missed. What has been overlooked for the past two millennia is the cultural setting of the story and some linguistic details in the text that give a different and even more logical reading of the texts.
According to Deuteronomy 16:16 every Jewish man is to appear before God in the place of God’s choosing which eventually became Jerusalem and the Temple Mount.Three times a year all your males shall appear
before the LORD your God in the place which He
chooses: at the Feast of Unleavened Bread, at the
Feast of Weeks, and at the Feast of Tabernacles;
and they shall not appear before the LORD empty-handed.
Women were exempt from requirements that were time and space specific. Therefore, women could not be priests or be expected to appear before God at an exact time due to the fact that women have children and childbirth takes priority. Women could attend festivals and bring offerings but attendance was not required as it was for men. So, by Biblical command the male apostles and disciples should have been on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem bringing offerings on the morning of the Day of Pentecost.
It has been taught in some quarters of Christianity that the disciples abandoned their Jewish traditions and the Law after the resurrection of Jesus. However, when Paul went to see James and the elders in Jerusalem, he was reminded of how zealous the believers were for the Law.
On the following day Paul went in with us to James,
and all the elders were present. When he had greeted
them, he told in detail those things which God had done
among the Gentiles through his ministry. And when they heard it,
they glorified the LORD. And said to him. You see, brother, how many myriads of Jews there are who have believed, and they are
all zealous for the law; but they have been informed
about you that you teach all the Jews who are among
the Gentiles to forsake Moses, saying that they ought
not to circumcise their children nor to walk according
to the customs. What then? The assembly must
certainly meet, for they will hear that you have come.
Therefore, do what we tell you. We have four men who
have taken a vow. Take them and be purified with
them, and pay their expenses so that they may shave
their heads, and that all may know that those
things of which they were informed concerning
you are nothing, but that you yourself also walk
orderly and keep the law. (Acts 21:18-25)
The elders of the early believers also saw the need to reassure the people that Paul himself still kept the law. In Acts chapter 16 we also see Paul circumcising Timothy because his mother was Jewish and his Greek father had never circumcised him. Paul saw the need for Timothy to be circumcised because his mother was Jewish and that made Timothy Jewish. Far from abandoning the Law and commandments the Jewish believers were all the more scrupulous about keeping them. Peter also in Acts 10:9-20 says, “Not so Lord! For I have never eaten anything common or unclean” meaning he lived a kosher lifestyle. None of the Jewish believers held the understanding that the laws and customs of the scriptures no longer held meaning or obligation to them. This being so, it seems most likely that the apostles and disciples would have been on the Temple Mount on the Day of Pentecost as scripture commands them.
On close examination of the text of Acts chapter two it can be demonstrated that this is indeed what Luke meant when he wrote:When the Day of Pentecost had fully come, they were
all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there
came a sound from heaven, as of a rushing mighty
wind, and it filled the whole house where they were sitting.
The word “house” is a commonly used word for the Temple in Jerusalem. In the Hebrew Scriptures “beit or beth” is used most frequently for the Holy Temple. In Ezekiel 47:1 “house” is translated in many editions as “temple.” Luke uses the same Greek word (oikos) in Acts 7:47 where he speaks of Solomon building a “house” for God. Even in modern English it is common to hear someone say, “isn’t it good to be in the House of the LORD.” Oikos is used frequently in the New Testament to refer to the Temple such as when Jesus says, “My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations.”
A second element in the text of Acts chapter two is the sudden appearance of a large crowd, which could not possibly have been within the upper room. Many sermons have been written to get the disciples out of the upper room and into the streets but there is nothing in the text to indicate that the disciples left where they were when the Holy Spirit was poured out upon them. The text indicates that the crowd came around the disciples. If the disciples were on the Temple Mount with all the other Jewish pilgrims for the Day of Pentecost, then the whole setting makes much more sense. Also, where does it seem most appropriate for God to send the Spirit, in an isolated upper room or the Temple that represented His Presence in the world?
Another linguistic clue is in verse one where the KJV and NKJV translate “when the Day of Pentecost had fully come.” Many modern translations leave out the phrase “fully come.” The Greek word here has the meaning to fill completely or to complete entirely. This aligns with the Rabbinic name for the day as Atzeret because it completes Passover and is the culmination of Passover. In Jewish tradition one counts the days between Passover and Pentecost. It is called counting the Omer.
From the second day of the Passover Sabbath. forty-nine days are counted up to the fiftieth day, which is Pentecost. It is written in Leviticus 23:15-17:And you shall count for yourselves from the day after
the Sabbath, from the day that you brought the sheaf
of the wave offering: seven Sabbaths shall be
completed. Count fifty days to the day after the
seventh Sabbath; then you shall offer a new grain
offering to the LORD. You shall bring from your
dwellings two wave loaves of two-tenths of an ephah.
They shall be of fine flour; they shall be baked with
Leaven. They are the first-fruits to the LORD.
So, the days are counted from Passover to Pentecost, which makes a connection between the two. The Sages understood that the reason for the redemption of Passover was to receive the Torah. While the exact date of the giving of the Torah is not clearly expressed in the Torah it has been associated with the Feast of Shavuot for a long time. In Exodus 23:14-17 it is written:
Three times you shall keep a feast to Me in the year.
You shall keep the Feast of Unleavened Bread (you
Shall eat unleavened bread seven days, as I
commanded you, at the time appointed in the month
of Abib, for in it you came out of Egypt; none shall
appear before Me empty); and the Feast of Harvest,
[Hag ha-Kitser] the firstfruits of your labors which
you have sown in the field; and the Feast of
Ingathering at the end of the year, when you have
gathered the fruit of your labors from the field.
Here the feast is called the Feast of Harvest referring to the early harvest of grain. This feast is also known as the Day of Firstfruits and Shavuot in Numbers 28:26 and Shavuot and Firstfruits of the Harvest in Exodus 34:22. Just as Passover and Pentecost are connected in the Bible and the redemption from Egypt and receiving the Torah are connected in Rabbinic literature, it makes sense that the redemption from sins in Christ and receiving the Spirit of God should be connected and seen as a harvest of the firstfruits of God’s plan of redemption in the earth.
Another close tie with the receiving of the Torah on Shavuot occurs in Acts chapter one where it is written, “they were all with one accord in one place.” While not all translations include this phrase “with one accord” I believe it is a very important phrase and ties in directly to the story in Exodus chapter 19 when the children of Israel came to Mount Sinai. Exodus 19:2 states:For they had departed from Rephidim, had come to
the Wilderness of Sinai, and camped in the wilderness
So Israel camped there before the mountain.
In this text the word camped seems the same in English but in the Hebrew the first occurrence is in the plural and the second is in the singular. The Sages noted the repetition and the change from plural to singular and commented on this anomaly. They say as the children of Israel traveled and camped in the wilderness they camped as twelve tribes of individual people but when they came to Mt. Sinai they camped as one people with one heart, in one accord. The understanding was that when the people were in one accord then God came down and gave them the Torah. This is a very interesting correlation to Acts 2:1, for when the disciples were of one heart, God came down to give the Holy Spirit just as on the day that God gave the Torah at Mount Sinai.
Another correlation with Scripture can be seen in Ezekiel chapter 47. In this chapter Ezekiel is seeing a vision of water flowing from under the threshold of the temple (house) toward the east…the water was flowing from the right side of the temple (house) south of the altar. This is a metaphor/allegory for the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. South of the altar in the Second Temple was a large area that could literally accommodate tens of thousands of people and in the time of Jesus Jews came from all over the world by the hundreds of thousands to celebrate the three pilgrim feasts in Jerusalem. In the vision of Ezekiel, the water begins as a small flow but deepens and widens and brings life as it goes down to the Dead Sea. There are fishermen on the banks and trees whose leaves are for healing. This reminds us of the Scriptures, “I will make you fishers of men,” and “all the trees of the field shall clap their hands” and ”they will lay hands on the sick and they will recover.” “And it shall be that every living thing that moves, wherever the rivers go, will live. There will be a very great multitude of fish, because these waters go there; for they will be healed, and everything will live wherever the river goes.” This is a beautiful poetic picture of the Day of Pentecost and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. These words in Ezekiel seem to parallel what occurred on the Day of Pentecost.
The last bit of evidence to claim that the disciples were at the Temple, as Scripture commands, on the Day of Pentecost rather than being in an obscure upper room is to be found in Luke chapter 24. Interestingly, Luke is the author both of the gospel of Luke and the Acts of the Apostles. Luke gives essentially the same story in Acts 1:4-5 and Luke 24:49-53 that the disciples were to remain in Jerusalem until they were endued with power from on high. Luke gives one detail in his gospel that he omits from the account in Acts. Luke 24:50-53 says:And He led them out as far as Bethany, and He lifted
up His hands and blessed them. Now it came to pass,
while He blessed them, that He was parted from them and carried up into heaven. And they worshipped Him,
and returned to Jerusalem with great joy, and were
continually in the temple praising and blessing God. Amen.
Here Luke adds an important detail that we don’t see in Acts. Luke says that they were worshipping at the Temple daily (continually). How much more should they have been at the Temple on the Day of Pentecost, which was a command of God for every Jewish male. It is also interesting to note that here Luke chooses to use a word for Temple that cannot be confused with a personal dwelling called a house or a family or dynasty called a house. Here Luke uses the Greek word “hieron” which is used only of temples whether pagan or of the Temple in Jerusalem. It is clear from Luke’s account that the disciples were at the Temple every day from the time that Jesus ascended until the day that the Holy Spirit was given on the Day of Pentecost. Reading the Bible outside of its original cultural and linguistic context has resulted in an incorrect reading of the text. The fact that the disciples were at the Temple on the Day of Pentecost shows the continuity of God and His plan and His archetypes within Scripture from the beginning and fits within the context of the culture that God created for the Jews and makes better sense of our received texts.