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Regarding those four key words in Genesis 1:14 -- signs, seasons, days and years -- we
can be sure that the sun generally marks days. After 12 moon cycles have passed, the earth has
gone through nearly four seasons of weather changes making up a year, marked by the sun with four
clearly defined earth tilts called equinoxes and solstices. These in turn are determined by the angle
of the sun throughout which the sunlight hours grow longer to a threshold at which they then begin
growing shorter again. The underlying Hebrew word is accurately translated by the word signs --
implying astronomical events such as eclipses, and others we observe with our eyes in the sun,
moon and stars. This reminds us of God's promise in Jeremiah 31:35-36: "Thus says the Lord, who
gives the sun for a light by day, and the ordinances of the moon and the stars for a light by night...If
those ordinances depart from before Me, says the Lord, then the seed of Israel shall also cease
from being a nation before Me forever."
Finally, at first glance, the word seasons appears to represent the four radical weather
shifts we experience each year -- winter, summer, spring and autumn or fall. However, the Hebrew
word that has been translated "seasons" implies NO SUCH THING! This word -- "MOWADAH"
(Strong's #4150) -- literally means "AN APPOINTMENT, i.e., a fixed time or season---by impli-
cation, an assembly (as convened for a definite purpose); technically the congregation; by exten-
sion, the place of meeting..." etc. Clearly, using the English word "seasons" to translate a word that
literally means "an appointment" is, at the very best, misleading. In fact, it is the sun (equinoxes
and solstices) that marks the four seasonal changes that make up the actual year. So, to interpret the
Hebrew word "mowadah" to mean those seasons is duplicitous to say the least!
Psalm 104 reveals the answer to the riddle of this apparently deliberate mistranslation.
There, in verse 19, we find the same word -- mowadah -- used SPECIFICALLY IN RELATION
TO THE MOON --
He appointed the moon for seasons [mowadah]...
In this verse the English word "appointed" actually means "made" -- see Strong's #6213.
Better translated, this verse should read: "He MADE the moon for APPOINTMENTS"! Now, just
what are His, or God's, appointments? The answer to this is found in Leviticus 23 --
Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them: "The FEASTS of the Lord, which you
shall proclaim to be holy convocations, these are My FEASTS.
Six days shall work be done, but the seventh day is a Sabbath of solemn rest, a holy
convocation. You shall do no work on it; it is a Sabbath of the Lord in all your dwellings"
(verses 2-3, NKJ).
Interestingly, the word "feasts" in verse 2 above is, in fact, the word "MOWADAH" -- ex-
actly the same as "SEASONS" in Genesis 1:14 and Psalms 104:19. So these verses in Leviticus 23
should read as follows: "Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them: 'The APPOINTMENTS
of the Lord, which you shall proclaim to be holy convocations, these are My APPOINTMENTS."
The grave error in translating "mowadah" as "feasts" becomes apparent when you realize
that in verse 3 the SOLE SUBJECT is the seventh-day Sabbath! Generally we don't think of the
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