The Feast of Huts (aka Tabernacles) celebrates a major chapter in Israel’s formation–the time\u00a0when\u00a0the exodus generation\u00a0lived in portable, temporary shelters.\u00a0The nation remembered (by\u00a0re-enacting a part of) the\u00a0journey from Egypt to the Promised Land.<\/p>\n
The Gospel of John specifies that Jesus attended the Feast of Huts…in secret at first (John 7:10). None of the Gospel accounts mention the palm-branch huts specifically, so did Jesus\u00a0participate in the re-enactment? Did he live\u00a0in a hut?<\/p>\n
Moses’ Law records the instruction from God for people attending the Feast.\u00a0First, every able-bodied man in the nation must participate. Then,\u00a0“Live in the huts for seven days” as a national remembrance of Israel’s history. (Leviticus 23:42)<\/p>\n
Josephus reiterates the command, “Upon the fifteenth day of the same month, when the season of the year is changing for winter, the law enjoins us to pitch tabernacles [huts] in every one of our houses, so that we preserve ourselves from the cold of that time of the year” (Josephus, Antiquities<\/em> 3.10.4\u00a0 244).<\/p>\n The Mishnah states that “All seven days [of the feast] a person treats his sukkah [hut] as his regular dwelling and his house as his sometimes dwelling” (Sukkah<\/em> 2.9).<\/p>\n Did Jesus have a feast hut? Yes, naturally … if Jesus was an able-bodied male who followed God’s law recorded by Moses<\/em>.<\/p>\n On a very earthy level, it seems that he would have been more conspicuous if Jesus did not have a hut.<\/p>\n