ys, solemnly ended by the Sabbath. Thus Judaism raised
the Sabbath above all dependence on nature and into the realm of holiness.
The Jewish Sabbath became the witness to God, the Creator ruling above
nature in absolute freedom.(1476)

Still the ancient festival of the new moon was preserved as an observance
in the Temple, and it afterward survived only in the liturgy of the
Synagogue. While ancient Israel had observed the New Moon as a day of rest
even more sacred than the Sabbath,(1477) the Priestly Code placed it among
the festivals only as a day of sacrifice, but as neither a day of rest nor
of popular celebration.(1478) Beside the recital of the _Hallel_ Psalms
and the _Mussaf_ ("additional") prayer in the Synagogue no religious
significance was attached to it in the daily life of the people. Still the
fact that the Jewish calendar was regulated by the moon, while that of
other nations depended on the solar year, led the rabbis to compare the
unique history of Israel to the course of the moon. As the moon changes
continually, waxing and waning but ever renewing itself after each
decline, so Israel renews itself after every fall; while the proud nations
of the world, which count their year by the course of the sun, rise and
set, as it does, with no hope of renewal.(1479) At the same time,
assurance was found in the prophetic words that "the light of the moon
shall be as the light of the sun and the light of the sun shall be
sevenfold as the light of the seven days" and "thy (Israel's) sun shall no
more go down, neither shall thy moon withdraw itself, for the Lord shall
be thine everlasting light."(1480)

9. The various Jewish festivals, like the Sabbath, were detached from
their original relation to nature and turned into historical memorials,
eloquent testimonies to the great works of God and of Israel's power of
rejuvenation. The Passover was originally the spring festival of the
shepherds when they hallowed the thresholds,(1481) but was later
identified with the agricultural Feast of Unleavened Bread in Palestine,
and at an early period was further transformed into a festival of
redemption. The former rites of consecration of tent and herd were taken
as symbols of the wondrous deliverance of the Hebrews from the Egyptian
yoke. The sacrifice of the "passing over the threshold," with the
sprinkling of the blood on the doorposts and lintels of each house,
observed each spring exactly as is still done among the semi-