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4) Finally, the word seasons appears at first glance to be the four radical weather shifts each year
-- winter, summer, spring and fall or autumn. However, although the English word certainly im-
plies such, the underlying Hebrew word "mowadah" (Strong's #4150), literally means "an ap-
pointment, that is, a fixed time...by implication, an assembly (as convened for a definite purpose);
technically the congregation; by extension, the place of meeting..."etc.
To use the English word "seasons" to translate a word that literally means an appointment
is, at the very least, a grave error. Besides, we have just seen that the sun (equinoxes and solstices)
marks the four seasonal changes which constitute an actual year. To interpret the Hebrew word
mowadah to mean those seasons is duplicitous at best.
In the Book of Psalms we find the answer to the enigma of the apparent deliberate mis-
translation. There the same word -- mowadah -- is used specifically in relation to the moon:
He appointed the MOON for SEASONS [mowadah]...(Psalms 104:19).
According to Strong's Concordance, the English word appointed in this passage actually
means "made" (#6213). In other words, God made the moon for appointments! What are His ap-
pointments? Notice Leviticus 23:
Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, Concerning the FEASTS of the
LORD, which ye shall proclaim to be holy convocations, even these are my FEASTS.
Six days shall work be done: the seventh day is the sabbath of rest, an holy convocation;
ye shall do no work therein; it is the sabbath of the LORD in all your dwellings. -- Verses
2 and 3.
The word "feasts" found in verse 2 above is, in fact, the word mowadah -- the same as
"seasons" in Genesis 1:14 and Psalm 104:19. Following the Sabbath mowadah in Leviticus 23 is
the list of what we commonly call "feasts," including Passover/Unleavened Bread, Pentecost,
Trumpets, Day of Atonement and Tabernacles. ALL ARE "MOWADAH." The mistake in translat-
ing mowadah strictly as "feasts" becomes very obvious when in verse 3 the sole subject is the
seventh-day Sabbath. Most people generally don't consider the Sabbath as being a "feast" per se,
but it leads the list of "feasts" in Leviticus 23.
With this in mind -- the actual planetary moon being established for mowadah or God's ap-
pointments as shown in Psalm 104 -- the passage in Leviticus confirms the fact that this is the sole
means by which the seventh day Sabbath was calculated. The Sabbath is a mowadah -- the moon
was made for mowadah. Nothing in the Bible specifies this term for the sun.
Another witness to this understanding is found in the Book of Ecclesiasticus:
And then the moon, ever punctual to mark the times, an everlasting sign:
It is the moon that signals the feasts, a luminary that wanes after being full.
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