The Significance of Yom Teruah - A Day For Resurrection

Article Index


XIV. A Day for Resurrection

There are two resurrections and two judgments. The resurrection of the righteous occurs a thousand years before the resurrection of the wicked.

Revelation 20:4-5 I saw thrones on which were seated those who had been given authority to judge. And I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded because of their testimony for Yeshua and because of the word of God. They had not worshipped the beast or his image and had not received his mark on their foreheads or their hands. They came to life and reigned with Mashiach a thousand years. (The rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were ended.) This is the first resurrection.

II Luqas (Acts) 1:4-11 On one occasion, while he was eating with them, he gave them this command: "Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my Father promised, which you have heard me speak about. For John baptized with water, but in a few days you will be baptized with the Holy Spirit." So when they met together, they asked him, "Lord, are you at this time going to restore the kingdom to Israel?" He said to them: "It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." After he said this, he was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud hid him from their sight. They were looking intently up into the sky as he was going, when suddenly two men dressed in white stood beside them. "Men of Galilee," they said, "why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Yeshua, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven."


Notice that the Lord will return with the sound of the shofar. And when He return, the righteous will get the first invisible transport to Israel, as it says in Yehezekel (Ezekiel) 37:13-14.

I Thessalonians 4:14-18 We believe that Yeshua died and rose again and so we believe that God will bring with Yeshua those who have fallen asleep in him. According to the Lord's own word, we tell you that we who are still alive, who are left till the coming of the Lord, will certainly not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord himself will come down from heaven, with a loud command, with the voice of the archangel and with the shofar call of God, and the dead in Mashiach will rise first. After that, we who are still alive and are left will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore encourage each other with these words.

If we are standing on the earth, watching the Lord return in the clouds, then the Lord will be returning in the same way that He left!

Matityahu (Matthew) 24:29-31 "Immediately after the distress of those days 'the sun will be darkened, and the moon will not give its light; the stars will fall from the sky, and the heavenly bodies will be shaken.' "At that time the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky, and all the nations of the earth will mourn. They will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky, with power and great glory. And he will send his angels with a loud shofar call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of the heavens to the other.


Since Yom Teruah is on Rosh Chodesh, and since, the sun will be darkened, this implies a solar eclipse as the moon is always between the sun and the moon at Rosh Chodesh. This leaves a situation where the moon will not give it's light, and the sun will be darkened. The sign of the Son of Man is probably Rosh Chodesh with a solar eclipse, during the day! This would account for the world gazing intently at the sky when Yeshua returns. The clouds could also represent, in addition to clouds, Israel as we meet the Lord in the air!

Yeshayahu (Isaiah) 30:25-33 In the day of great slaughter, when the towers fall, streams of water will flow on every high mountain and every lofty hill. The moon will shine like the sun, and the sunlight will be seven times brighter, like the light of seven full days, when HaShem binds up the bruises of his people and heals the wounds he inflicted. See, the Name of HaShem comes from afar, with burning anger and dense clouds of smoke; his lips are full of wrath, and his tongue is a consuming fire. His breath is like a rushing torrent, rising up to the neck. He shakes the nations in the sieve of destruction; he places in the jaws of the peoples a bit that leads them astray. And you will sing as on the night you celebrate a holy festival; your hearts will rejoice as when people go up with flutes to the mountain of HaShem, to the Rock of Israel. HaShem will cause men to hear his majestic voice and will make them see his arm coming down with raging anger and consuming fire, with cloudburst, thunderstorm and hail. The voice of HaShem will shatter Assyria; with his scepter he will strike them down. Every stroke HaShem lays on them with his punishing rod will be to the music of tambourines and harps, as he fights them in battle with the blows of his arm. Topheth has long been prepared; it has been made ready for the king. Its fire pit has been made deep and wide, with an abundance of fire and wood; the breath of HaShem, like a stream of burning sulfur, sets it ablaze.

This is the day for breathing. It is the day for blowing the shofar. It is the day that we get our spirit back!

It is customary, on the day preceding Yom Teruah, to visit the cemetery after the morning service, to prostrate oneself on the graves of the righteous and to give alms to the poor.

The sages say that we should remember the 'fathers' on Yom Teruah because on this day Abraham and Jacob were born.

Revelation 21:10-14 And he carried me away in the Spirit to a mountain great and high, and showed me the Holy City, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God. It shone with the glory of God, and its brilliance was like that of a very precious jewel, like a jasper, clear as crystal. It had a great, high wall with twelve gates, and with twelve angels at the gates. On the gates were written the names of the twelve tribes of Israel. There were three gates on the east, three on the north, three on the south and three on the west. The wall of the city had twelve foundations, and on them were the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.

* Here we are "remembering" the fathers.
* Fourteen men were called "apostles". One fell
Judas. One was chosen extra: Mathias.
* Paul was also was called an apostle, but, he was never numbered with the twelve.