Matthew 16.1-4:
Then the Pharisees and Sadducees came and testing him asked that He would show them a Sign from Heaven. He answered and said to them, “When it is evening you say, fair weather, for the sky is red; and in the morning, foul weather today, for the sky is red and threatening.” Hypocrites! You know how to understand the face of the sky, but you cannot the Signs of the Times.
What did Yeshua mean with the statement, “But you cannot understand the Signs of the Times”? Here is the apparent answer from the Qumran texts of the Dead Sea Scrolls:
Qumran 4Q271 Fragment 4, Column II, Line 5: English translation – Israel in all these matters, behold, [it is defi]ned in «The book [of the Divisions of The Times according to their Jubilees and their Weeks».]
The words appearing in the Hebrew text are “sefer machlakot haetim” – scroll of the divisions of the times. This points us to the Book of Jubilees retelling of the Day 4 Genesis creation story. Therefore, to learn Yeshua’s lesson on the Signs of the Times OR the Divisions of the Times, our best understanding comes from Day 4 of the creation narrative in Genesis 1:14-19. This is a biblical metaphor about the purpose of the Sun and the Moon.
1) The Greater Luminary – the Sun – is a parable and metaphor of Messiah’s Sons of Light. The Sons of Light live IN the world but are not OF the world.
2) The Lesser luminary – the Moon – is a parable and metaphor of Messiah’s Light in the darkness. We are like the light of the Moon testifying of his festival truths in a world of spiritual darkness and night.
