23:16,17
The other two are the Festival of Harvest. More details of these will be given in Leviticus (Lev 23:9-22). The first fruits were to be given to the Lord, and the bringing in of the crops was to be celebrated. The spirit behind all this is to remind them that it is the Lord who provides. So in all this we have a reminder of (i) our utter dependence upon the Lord; and (ii) the complete reliability of the Lord. We were saved by the Lord alone, and He will continue to provide for us. We need to remember these two facts at all times. Hence the three festivals, and they were to be communal affairs.
23:18,19
We then get some rules on sacrifices, specifically what was not to be included. Yeast must not contaminate any of the sacrifices. This bit on not cooking a goat in its mothers milk may well relate to Canaanite religious practices, which they were not to seek to emulate in any way. Indeed, quite a lot of the rules which may seem somewhat arbitrary to us, are, or may be, related to religious practices of surrounding peoples.
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