DEVARIM

Words [of Moses]

2 That thou shalt take of the first of all the fruit [reshit kol pri] of the earth [ha'adamah], which thou shalt bring of thy land that Yahweh thy Elohim giveth thee, and shalt put it in a basket, and shalt go unto the place which Yahweh thy Elohim shall choose to place his name [Shmo] there.

'...the feast of the firstfruits was not to be confined to an acknowledgment of the goodness of God in nature: it was to be associated also with the history of their divine origin as a nation in the wonders of the exodus from Egypt. They were formally to bring that history into view in their observance of the feast.

Law of Moses Ch 21

11 And thou shalt rejoice in every good thing which Yahweh thy elohim hath given unto thee, and unto thine house, thou, and the Levite, and the stranger that is among you.

'... the modern mood of mind rebuked that would class the Egyptian deliverance among myths and legends. Natural men can see a mild beauty in making the yearly harvest an occasion of thanksgiving: but to mix up with it an explicit acknowledgment of the Mosaic miracles is nauseous to their superior wisdom. There is no true wisdom at the bottom of their intellectual aversions.

Harvests are lovely, but if we had only harvests to trust to for hope as to futurity, we should be in darkness. It is the open participation of divine power in human affairs, as authenticated in Israel's history, that gives us that "strong consolation" of which Paul speaks, and therefore furnishes a reasonable ingredient in the festal celebrations of Israel--from none of which, indeed, was it ever absent.

Law of Moses Ch 21.