The Appointed Times of YHVH—the Shabbat and the Messiah
Shabbat was the first appointed time set by YHVH from the very beginning of His creation. Here we will discuss the Shabbat and the Messiah, or how Yeshua the Messiah fulfills the Shabbat day and the role He plays in the Redemption Plan of YHVH. We will also discuss what the Rabbinical literature says about the Messiah, and also how the Messiah’s mission has been encoded in the names of the first ten generation in the Book of Genesis.
Shabbat: the first appointed time of the Creator
The Creator made the whole universe and everything in it in six days and in the seventh day He rested. We read regarding the creation of the Shabbat day:
And in the seventh day Elohim completed His work which He had done, and He rested on the seventh day from all His work which He had made. (Gen 2:2)
These words of Gen 2:2 define the completion of the work of creation that on the seventh day the Creator ended the work which He had made by ceasing to create. The completion of the work of creation on the seventh day not on the sixth contains the actual completion because the seventh day of rest and rest itself needed to be created. We keep on reading:
And Elohim blessed the seventh day and set it apart, because on it He rested from all His work which Elohim in creating had made. (Gen 2:3)
The blessing and setting apart the seventh day for rest has regarded the Shabbat to literally mean “cessation.” The Shabbat day and rest were instituted right then. And the Creator ended His work by blessing and setting apart the Shabbat day when the whole creation was complete. The account of the seventh day is not summed up, like the others, with the formula “evening was and morning was” therefore the Shabbat day was set as a unique day in the creation.
The Shabbat and the Messiah in the Rabbinical literature
There is a common understanding of the sages, found in Sanhedrin 97a, who reason about the Shabbat and the Messiah, the coming of the Messiah and how His coming refers to the reckoning of time. R. Kattina said:
Six thousand years shall the world exist, and one [thousand, the seventh], it shall be desolate, as it is written, and the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day [footnote: Isa. II, 11]. Abaye said: it will be desolate two [thousand], as it is said, after two days will he revive us: in the third day, he will raise us up, and we shall live in his sight. [Footnote: Isa. II, 11] It has been taught in accordance with R. Kattina: Just as the seventh year is one year of release in seven, so is the world: one thousand years out of seven shall be fallow, as it is written, And the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day,’ and it is further said, A Psalm and song for the Sabbath day [footnote: Ps. XCII, 1], meaning the day that is altogether Sabbath [footnote: I.e., the period of complete desolation] and it is also said, For a thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday when it is past [footnote: Ps. XC, 4; thus ‘day’ in the preceding verses means a thousand years].
The Tanna debe Eliyyahu teaches likewise about the Shabbat and the Messiah:
The world is to exist six thousand years. In the first two thousand there was desolation [footnote: I.e., no Torah. It is a tradition that Avraham was fifty-two years old when he began to convert men to the worship of the true God; from Adam until then, two thousand years elapsed]; two thousand years the Torah flourished [footnote: I.e., from Avraham’s fifty-second year until one hundred and seventy-two years after the destruction of the second Temple. This does not mean that the Torah should cease thereafter, but is mentioned merely to distinguish it from the next era]; and the next two thousand years is the Messianic era [footnote: I.e., Messiah will come within that period], but through our many iniquities all these years have been lost [footnote: He should have come at the beginning of the last two thousand years; the delay is due to our sins].
The sages describe the whole human history as a seven-millennium week, after the pattern of the seven-day week, consisting of 6,000 years of human labor in developing the Creator’s world and a seventh millennium that is “wholly Shabbat and rest, for life everlasting” that is the Era of the Messiah. Hence, we may find the Creation pattern: 6 days x 1,000 years = 6,000 years: six days we labor and do our business, but the seventh day, the Shabbat, we set apart to honor Him and have a rest. So is the six-millennial labor of mankind, and the seventh millennium is the Messianic Era of rest and peace. In other words, the Shabbat represents the rest in the coming Messianic Kingdom for the Psalmist writes (Psa 90:4):
For a thousand years in Your eyes Are like yesterday that has past, Or like a watch in the night.
Therefore, the Creator’s clock is based on the six days of creation, with each day corresponding to 1,000 years, and the seventh day is the Shabbat of the Messiah.
The Word of YHVH begins with the creation of the first week in whose pattern we see a shadow picture of how the world will exist in the next 7,000 years. Much can be said about the hidden meaning of YHVH’s first week in which He has given us the model to follow: six days work is to be done and the seventh day, Shabbat, is a rest for YHVH. Based on the days of creation, the sixth day of the week, Friday (the day man was created on), is entirely given over to preparations for the Shabbat, thus the time leading up to the seventh millennium will be for preparing for the coming of the Messiah.
Messiah in the Redemption Plan of YHVH
There are strong considerations, that the Creator’s 6,000-year countdown might have not started from Day One of Creation, but from the year when YHVH’s redemption plan commenced, namely, when Adam fell from grace seven years after he was created (read Jubilees 3:17-32). Adam was created on the sixth day, on the eve of the first Shabbat, and the Creator declared that everything He made was good. Adam was blessed with everything paradise can provide. The creation of Elohim was perfect as it was made and Adam was sinless and created to live forever, thus there was no reason for existing of a reckoning of time and much less time itself. Time as we know it today was not in existence, because there was no need for it. The need for time came when Adam became mortal, because of his sin before the Creator. Thus the need for time came into being, because the Creator has set six thousand years for man to labor, after which everything will be restored. Therefore, the Creator started reckoning of time since that point only for the sake of man. This reckoning was also for the sake of the redemption of the sinful man. The hypothesis of this author is that the Redemption of YHVH’s creation might have begun from year eight from the creation and as we advance in this study it will be proven to be true. But first, let us start again from the year of the fall.
After the adversary deceived the woman, Elohim made this prophetic statement that commenced the Redemption Plan in year eight of the Creation:
And I put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed. He shall crush your head, and you shall crush His heel. (Gen 3:15)
This declaration of Elohim was not addressed to Adam and Havah but to satan (Heb. adversary) that Elohim would do away with sin in a very particular way. At that moment by His omniscience, the Creator of the universe already devised the plan for the redemption of His creation. Therefore, after the fall of mankind, there was a need for redemption not only for man but also for the creation itself until man will return to what he was before the sin. The fall of Adam occurred in the seventh year after the creation, which was the first sabbatical year. Therefore, the 6,000 years of allotted time for restoration of all things could have commenced right then, in the eighth year of the creation. The Creator of the universe devised a plan for the redemption of His creation and this plan includes the work of a special man, whom the Creator called the Seed of a woman. This man was anointed (Heb. mashiach) not only to crush the adversary’s head, but to redeem the mankind and the entire creation by his work. We see this man in an encoded message in the Scripture.
The Messiah encoded in the Bible from the very beginning
In the first book of the Scripture, Genesis, we find the first ten generations from Adam to Noach. When the names of the first righteous men after Adam are read with their meanings in Hebrew, a prophetic picture of the Redemption Plan of YHVH and that of the Messiah comes into light:
Adam Human
Sheth Appointed/Substituted
Enosh Mortal man
Qeynan Possession
Mahalalel Praise of Elohim
Yered Shall Descend
Hanok Dedicated
Methushelah His Death Sends
Lemek Powerful
Noach Rest
Or, after the decoding of this hidden message we read:
A human being appointed/substituted for a mortal man, a praise of Elohim, shall descend dedicated and His death shall send a powerful rest.
Another powerful encrypted message we find this time in the last book of the Scripture, The Revelation. If we rearrange the names of Ya’akov’s sons as they appear in Rev 7:4-8 with the full description of their meanings given by their mothers, before us is revealed another prophetic picture of the Messiah. We read:
Gen 29:35 Yehudah, Yehovah praised, “Now I praise YHVH.”
Gen 29:32 Re’uvein, Behold a son; “For YHVH has looked on my affliction.”
Gen_30:11 Gad, Fortune; “With Fortune
Gen_30:13 Asher, Happy; I am blessed.”
Gen_30:8 Naphtali, My Wrestling, “With great wrestling I have wrestled and I have overcome.”
Gen_41:51 Menashsheh, Causing to overlook “For Elohim has made me forget all my toil
Gen 29:33 Shimon, Heard, Because YHVH has heard that I am unloved, He gave me this son too.”
Gen 29:34 Leivi, Joined, “Now this time my husband will be joined to me,
Gen 30:18 Issaschar, He will bring a reward, “Elohim has given me my wage,
Gen 30:20 Zevulun, Habitation, “Elohim has presented me with a good gift. Now my husband will dwell with me.”
Gen 30:24 Yoseph, YHVH has added, “YHVH will add to me another son:
Gen 35:18 Binyamin, Son of the right hand, Son of my sorrow (Ben-Oni) and Son of my right hand (Binyamin)” [the suffering Messiah and the conquering Messiah]
But who could that son (called a praise of Elohim and Son of the right hand) be but Yeshua the Messiah, the Anointed One of YHVH? There is a remarkable passage in a very old book titled Pesikta, cited in the treatise Abkath Rokhel, and reprinted in Hulsii Theologia Judaica, p. 309, in which the Sages express their faith in the redemption work of the Messiah. We read:
When Elohim created the world, He stretched out His hand under the throne of His kavod, and brought forth the being of the Messiah. He said to him: ‘Will you heal and redeem My sons after 6000 years?’ He answered him, ‘I will.’ Then Elohim said to him: ‘Will you then also bear the punishment in order to blot out their sins, as it is written, “But he bore our diseases” (Isa 53:4). And the Messiah answered Him; ‘I will joyfully bear them’ (cf. Zohar, 2:212a).
It appears from this quote from Abkath Rokhel that the sages understand that the coming of the Messiah will be after 6,000 years since the sin entered this world in the seventh year of Creation, hence our talking point: the Shabbat and the Messiah. For more on the redemption work of the Messiah, read Chapter The Redemption Plan of YHVH from the present author’s book Reckoning of Time.
After the six-thousand years, on the eve of the seventh thousand, the Shabbat, the Messiah of YHVH will come to bring peace in the world and redeem man to YHVH. The long-waited Messiah of Israel will come on the eve of the Shabbat to bring rest to His brothers.
This article is a part of series of articles dedicated to the Appointed Times of YHVH and how His Messiah Yeshua has fulfilled them. For the rest of the set-apart days of the Creator, please, visit The Appointed Times of YHVH.
Navah
May we merit seeing the coming of our Mashiach speedily in our days.