Parashat Chol Hamoed – Pesach

Saturday 15 April 2017         Nisan  19  5777

Parashat Chol Hamoed – Pesach
Exodus 33:12 - 34:26 Ezekiel 37:1-14; John 1:29-31, 10:14-18
Passover and Sukkoth (Tabernacles) are celebrated for 8 days and therefore, a weekly Sabbath falls within the observance of these festivals. The first day and the last day of the festival is treated likely a weekly Shabbat. No normative work is permitted

Lev 23: 4 – 8
"These are the appointed feasts of Adonai, holy convocations which you are to proclaim in their appointed season. During the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month in the evening, is Adonai's Passover. On the fifteenth day of the same month is the Feast of Matzot to Adonai. For seven days you are to eat matzah. On the first day you are to have a holy convocation and you should do no regular work. Instead you are to present an offering made by fire to Adonai for seven days. On the seventh day is a holy convocation, when you are to do no regular work."

But, the intermediate days of the festival, the halacha is less stringent and work is permitted. These intermediate days are called ‘chol hamoed’ or half holidays and the Sabbath that falls in this period is called Chol HaMoed -Pesach.

In the portion for this Shabbat Chol HaMoed – Pesach, we read that Moshe ascended before HaShem with the replacement two tablets of stone.
Ex 34:1-4
1 And the LORD said to Moses, "Cut two tablets of stone like the first ones, and I will write on these tablets the words that were on the first tablets which you broke.
2  So be ready in the morning, and come up in the morning to Mount Sinai, and present yourself to Me there on the top of the mountain.
3 And no man shall come up with you, and let no man be seen throughout all the mountain; let neither flocks nor herds feed before that mountain."
4 So he cut two tablets of stone like the first ones. Then Moses rose early in the morning and went up Mount Sinai, as the LORD had commanded him; and he took in his hand the two tablets of stone.

And then we read:

Exo 34:5 - 7
Then Adonai passed before him, and proclaimed, "Adonai, Adonai, the compassionate and gracious God, slow to anger, and abundant in lovingkindness and truth, showing mercy to a thousand generations, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, yet by no means leaving the guilty unpunished, but bringing the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children's children, to the third and fourth generation." Then Moses quickly bowed his head down to the earth and worshipped.

In Judaism, this is known as the Thirteen Attributes of Mercy or in Hebrew, Shelosh-'Esreh Middot. These are the attributes with which, according to Jewish tradition, God governs the world. According to the explanation of Maimonides these attributes must not be regarded as qualities inherent in God, but merely as the method of His activity, by which the divine governance appears to the human observer to be controlled. In the Sifre, however, these attributes are not called "middot," which may mean "quality" (as well as "rule" and "measure"), but "derakim" (ways), since they are the ways of God which Moses prayed to know and which God revealed to him.
The goal is for a person to become so familiar with the 13 Attributes’ meanings and applications that they can be consciously and regularly applied in one’s life. These thirteen attributes are also found in Micah 7:18-20:

18 Who is a God like You, pardoning iniquity and passing over the transgression of the remnant of His heritage? He does not retain His  anger forever, because He delights in mercy.
19 He will again have compassion on us, and will subdue our iniquities. You  will cast all our sins into the depths of the sea.
20 You will give truth to Jacob and mercy to Abraham, which You have  sworn to our fathers from days of old.

The attributes are contained in the verses as follows:
1.       Adonai                                 — compassion before a person sins;
2.       Adonai                                 — compassion after a person has sinned;
3.       El                                          — mighty in compassion to give all creatures according to their need;
4.       Rachum                               — merciful, that humankind may not be distressed;
5.       Chanun                                — gracious if humankind is already in distress;
6.       Erech appayim                    — slow to anger;
7.       Rav chesed                         — plenteous in mercy;
8.       Emet                                     — full of truth;
9.       Notzer chesed laalafim      — keeping mercy unto thousands;
10.     Noseh avon                        — forgiving iniquity;
11.     Noseh peshah                    — forgiving transgression;
12.     Noseh chatah                     — forgiving sin;
13.     Venakeh                              — and pardoning.

All of these ‘ways’ (’derachim’) are revealed in Yeshua the Messiah!

Col 2:9
For all the fullness of Deity lives bodily in Him, and in Him you have been filled to fullness. He is the head over every ruler and authority.

Yeshua said to His disciple Phillip:
John 14:9
9  Yeshua answered: "Don't you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father .

May our eyes be increasingly opened to the revelation of Messiah!