III.I.2.  “Abel was a shepherd and Cain was a husbandman.  And in process of time it came to pass that Cain brought of the fruit of the ground an offering unto the Lord; and Abel also brought an offering of the firstlings of his sheep.”  It is out of the simplest, most natural, and most wide-spread offerings, those of the first-fruits of the flock, herd, and field, the occasions for which recur regularly with the seasons of the year, that the annual festivals took their rise.  The passover corresponds with the firstlings of Abel the shepherd, the other three with the fruits presented by Cain the husbandman; apart from this difference, in essence and foundation they are all precisely alike.  Their connection with the aparchai of the

[first-fruits; firstlings for sacrifice or offering]

yearly seasons is indeed assumed rather than expressly stated in the Jehovistic and Deuteronomistic legislation.  Yet in Exodus xxiii. 17-19, xxxiv. 23-26 we read:  “Three times in the year shall all thy men appear before the Lord Jehovah; thou shalt not mingle the blood of my sacrifice with leaven, neither shall the fat of my sacrifice remain until the morning.  The best of the first-fruits of thy land shalt thou bring into the house of Jehovah thy God; thou shalt not seethe the kid in the milk of its mother.”  It is forbidden to appear before Jehovah empty, hence the connection between the first general sentence and the details which follow it.  Of these, the first seems to relate to the passover; doubtless indeed it holds good of all animal sacrifices, but in point of fact these are offered in preponderating numbers at the great festival after the herds and flocks have produced their young.  The remaining sentences relate to the feasts of harvest and ingathering, whose connection with the fruits of the field is otherwise clear.  As for Deuteronomy, there also it is required on the one hand that the dues from the flock and herd and field shall be personally offered at Jerusalem, and made the occasion of joyous sacrificial feasts; on the other hand, that three appearances in the year shall be made at Jerusalem, at Easter, at Pentecost, and at the feast of tabernacles, and not with empty hands.  These requirements can only be explained on the assumption that the material of the feasts was that furnished by the dues.  Clearly in Deuteronomy all three coincide; sacrifices, dues, feasts; other sacrifices than those occasioned by the dues can hardly be thought of for the purpose of holding a joyous festival before Jehovah; the dues are, properly speaking, simply those sacrifices prescribed by popular custom, and therefore fixed and festal, of which alone the law has occasion to treat. 1

***************************************** 1.  Deuteronomy xii. 6 seq., 11 seq., xiv. 23-26, xvi. 7, 11, 14.  In the section xiv. 22-xvi. 17, dues and feasts are taken together.  In the first half (xiv. 22-xv. 18) there is a progression from those acts which are repeated within the course of a year to those which occur every three years, and finally to those which occur every seven; in the second half (xv. 19-xvi. 17) recurrence is again made to the principal, that is, the seasonal dues, first to the firstlings and the passover feast, and afterwards to the two others, in connection with which the tithes of the fruits are offered. ****************************************