The Day and hour that NO man knows! or The day and hour that only the Father knows!

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If you are a believer in Jesus Christ (Yeshua), then you are probably well aware of the above statement. Chances are you have been told that it means that No man can know the day or hour of His second coming. But there is more! Did you also know that Jesus was Jewish and that He was speaking to His Jewish disciples, using a common term only understood in that culture. Was Jesus telling them the time frame as to when He would be returning? I believe He was and I believe that ALL of His disciples understood that this was what He was telling them! That's because it was a very common, yearly feast that ALL Jews knew about and who obedient Jews observed every fall season. 

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In simplest terms, the above statement is called an "idiom". Each culture uses idioms in their common language. An idiom is a phrase or expression whose meaning can not be understood from the ordinary meaning of the words spoken. An example in our culture and time would be "Get off my back" meaning "stop bothering me" or "its raining cats and dogs" meaning "it is raining very hard". If you spoke this second phrase around people from another country and culture, they would likely be confused, because they would surely know it does not actually rain animals out of the sky!

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When Jesus spoke these words, He was referring to a very well known feast day (or Holy day, festival, celebration) on God's calendar known as the Feast of Trumpets, which is described in the 23nd chapter in the book of Leviticus. This feast day was commonly known as "The day and hour that no man knows" and also called "The day that only the Father knows" because this particular feast began at sundown with the sighting of the new moon, signaling the start of the seventh month. It was impossible to know the very day or hour that the festival would begin because you had to be outdoors watching and waiting for the sliver of the 7th new moon to know it was starting. However we can know when a new moon is approaching.

 

The new sliver moon of the 7th month can usually be seen in the month of Sept or Oct. Every month the moon starts as a sliver and then "waxes" fuller until it becomes a full moon two weeks later. Then is "wanes" or becomes smaller as it goes back to a sliver and then disappears (or looks like it disappears) for a day or two. Then the cycle repeats all over again.