1762 June [1761 November 26], Voltaire [pseudonym: Rabbin Akib], “Sermon in the Character of a Jew”, in The Gentleman's Magazine[1], translation of original in Hebrew, page 255, column 1:
WE have juſt received the news of the ſacrifice of two and forty human victims, which the Savages of Liſbon publickly made in the month Etanim *, in the year 1691, ſince the ruin of Jeruſalem. Thoſe Savages call ſuch executions Acts of Faith. My brethren, they are not acts of charity. Let us lift up our hearts to the Eternal †.
* The month of Auguſt of the Hebrews.
1932, Adolphe Lods, “Effect of the Political, Economic and Social Changes on the Religion of Israel”, in S. H. Hooke, transl., Israel, from its Beginnings to the Middle of the Eighth Century[2], London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd., →OCLC, pages 416–417:
As for the date of the feast, that is to say, the great feast of Jahweh in the autumn, the northern tribes, when they kept it in the eighth month, followed the ancient custom which was still observed in Judah in the time of Solomon[.] Indeed, we learn from an early text that the temple was finished in the month Bul, the month which was later on called the eighth month of the year (1 Kings vi. 38) ; another text adds that “ the feast ” was held immediately after the dedication of the temple (1 Kings viii. 65). Since it is extremely probable that the dedication took place as soon as the temple was completed, and not eleven months later, it would follow that the dedication and the feast of Ingathering took place in the eighth month, and not in the seventh (Etanim), as another passage has it, which has apparently been corrected according to later usage (1 Kings viii. 2).
According to Calendar I the Asif festival was celebrated upon the last seven days of the year, the last seven days of the month, Etanim, The New Year’s Day, following immediately upon the conclusion of the Asif festival proper, the first day in the new year, was celebrated upon the 1st of the month, Bul. Obviously therefore the entire festal period of eight days began in one month and was concluded in the next month, upon the first day thereof. In equating the months of Calendar I, bearing their old, West-Semitic names, with the months of Calendar II, designated by number alone, Deuteronomic writers regularly equated Etanim with the seventh month and Bul with the eighth month.⁵²
⁵² Cf. 1 Ki. 6.38; 8.2 and “The Three Calendars of Ancient Israel,” 67-71. Actually this is only a rough and inexact equation. We know that under the conditions of Calendar II the New Year’s Day fell upon VII/10. Accordingly VII/10 of Calendar II must have been equivalent to the 1st of Bul of Calendar I. Actually therefore, speaking roughly, the month, Etanim, of Calendar I was equivalent to the last two thirds of the sixth month and the first third of the seventh month of Calendar II, while the month, Bul, of Calendar I was equivalent to the last two thirds of the seventh month and the first third of the eighth month of Calendar II. However, the equation of Etanim with the seventh month and of Bul with the eighth month of Calendar II was sufficiently exact to be used by late Deuteronomic editors with convenience at least.
1972, Johannes C. de Moor, “New Year with the Israelites”, in New Year with Canaanites and Israelites[4], →ISBN, →OCLC, page 18, column 1:
In 1 Ki. 8:2 the New Year is simply called hęḥāg ‘the festival’ which indicates its dominating place in the then existing cultic calendar[242]. It took place in the month of Etanim which is a late Canaanite name[243] of the month corresponding to Ugaritic riš yn (§ 2.11) and to Babylonian Tashritu which became Tishri in later Hebrew sources[244]. Moreover, a relatively modest reconstruction of the original text of 1 Ki. 8:65-66 leads to the conclusion that the festival still began on the first day of the month and lasted seven days[245], as it did with the Canaanites[246] and with Saul[247].
Now, as stated before, Jeroboam aimed at dissolving the ties binding Ephraim to Judah by emphazising exclusive Ephraimite traditions. One may therefore be justified in assuming that in deferring the Feast of Tabernacles by one month he reverted to an established northern calendar ²). This calendar is obviously alluded to in 1 Kings vi 38 where we are told that Solomon’s temple was completed in the month of Bul, the eighth month ³). In viii, 2 on the other hand, it is reported that the dedication took place in the month of Etanim, the seventh month, during "the Feast", i.e. during Tabernacles. The most plausible explanation for these contradictory statements is to be found in the assumption that the two dates given are based on two different calendars.
³) The remark was significantly dropped from the parallel version in 2 Chr. v, while the date “in the seventh month” is retained (v 3) though without mentioning “the month of Etanim”. This can hardly be explained as a mere omission of ancient names which were of no significance to the contemporaries of the Chronicler (BRUNET, RB LXI, 1954. p. 363). The disconcerting date “in the month of Bul which is the eighth month (1 Kings vi 38) has been scrapped altogether in Chr.
