ression used in Scripture means the return of the year, as applied to
the close of one and the opening of another year. This is the expression
employed in the Second Book of Samuel, and of the First Book of
Chronicles, where it is said "after the year was expired, at the time
when kings go forth to battle," implying that in the time of David the
year began in the spring. The same expression, no doubt in reference to
the same time of the year, is also used in connection with the warlike
expeditions of Benhadad, king of Syria, and of Nebuchadnezzar, king of
Babylon.

It is admitted that the Feast of Tabernacles was held in the autumn, and
in the seventh month. The difficulty lies in the question of how it
could be said to be "in the end of the year," "at the year's end,"
although it is clear from the cases just cited that these and similar
expressions are merely of a general character, as we ourselves might
say, "when the year came round," and do not indicate any rigid
connection with a specific date of the calendar.

We ourselves use several years and calendars, without any confusion. The
civil year begins, at midnight, on January 1; the financial year on
April 1; the ecclesiastical year with Advent, about December 1; the
scholastic year about the middle of September, and so on. As the word
"year" expresses with ourselves many different usages, there is no
reason to attribute to the Jews the extreme pedantry of invariably using
nothing but precise definitions drawn from their ecclesiastical
calendar.

The services of the Tabernacle and the Temple were--with the exception
of the slaying of the Paschal lambs--all comprised within the hours of
daylight; there was no offering before the morning sacrifice, none after
the evening sacrifice. So, too, the Mosaic law directed all the great
feasts to be held in the summer half of the year, the light half; none
in the winter. The Paschal full moon was just after the spring equinox;
the harvest moon of the Feast of Tabernacles as near as possible to the
autumn equinox. Until the introduction, after the Captivity, of the
Feast of Purim in the twelfth month, the month Adar, the ecclesiastical
year might be said to end with those seven days of joyous "camping-out"
in the booths built of the green boughs; just as all the great days of
the Christian year lie between Advent and the octave of Pentecost,
whilst the "Sundays after Trinity" stretch their length through six
whole months. Th