WEEKS, FEAST OF (Gr. Pentecoste = fiftieth, Heb. Shabuoth, also called feast of harvest, day of the first-fruits, etc.), the second of the three great regalim or pilgrim feasts of the Old Testament, was celebrated seven weeks, or forty-nine days, after the passover. As the latter was the feast of the barley harvest, so the former was that of the wheat-harvest. The first two loaves of the new crop were offered up on the day of the festival—leavened, and containing about 31 quarts each (the Mishnah speaks of their being 7 in. by 3), together with a peace-offering of two lambs. Besides this, a great burnt and sin offering—the former consisting of seven lambs, a bullock, two rams, to gether with the appropriate meat and drink offerings; the latter of one kid—were added, according to Leviticus (xxiii. 18); while Numbers (xxviii. 27) increases the num ber of the bullocks to two, and only mentions one ram—a number more in accordance with the regulations for the other festive sacrifices. The Jewish tradition, however, considers the animals mentioned in the later passage as an additional sacrifice; and .Josephus has indeed added both up, except in as far as the rams are concerned, of which he only gives two. Tradition has given to this feast, which originally was only intend ed to represent the solemn closing of the harvest, a new significance by making it the anniversary of the Sinaitic legislation, which indeed must have taken place in the first Clays of the third month. But the pentecost, which is always fixed in the Jewish cal
endar on the 6th of Sivan, could not, before the establishment of astronomical compu tation, fall always on the same day, but must needs have fallen between the 5th and 7th of that month. Moses himself nowhere fixes the date of this festival as he does with the others. The Karaites, instead of referring the "morning of [after] the Sabbath" of Lev. (xxiii. 15) to the 16th of Nisan, take it literally, and celebrate the festival always on a Sabbath. The uncertainty of the lunar calculation and observation among, the Jews of the dispersion, caused them also to add one day to this festival—a usage still retained at present. There seems to have been more of the character of a harvest-home inherent in this festival than in the Passover, which partook particularly of the character of a large and solemn family-gathering. For the Christian adoption of this festival, see PENTE COST.