High Sabbaths

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High Sabbaths refer to the annual festivals recorded in the books of Exodus and Deuteronomy. Rather than the weekly seventh day Sabbath, these days of the Festivals of Unleavened Bread or Passover (Pesach), Pentecost (Shavuot), Atonement (Yom Kippur), Trumpets (Rosh Hashanah), and Tabernacles (Sukkoth) may fall on various other days of the week.

In the Gospel of John, of the night immediately following Christ's burial, it is written "for great was the day of that Sabbath" (John 19:31), which was the First Day of Unleavened Bread, an annual 'Sabbath' day. In the King James version the same phrase was translated, "for that sabbath day was an high day," which may be the origin of naming the yearly rest days 'High Sabbaths'.

This phrase "high Sabbath" has been identified by Dr. Dani ben Gigi of Hebrewworld.com, former professor of Hebrew Language at Arizona State University, as meaning specifically "Shabbat haGadol", that is, the weekly Sabbath that comes before Passover each year. There is no reference in the Torah of the Jews, the first five books of Moses, or the Old Testament that calls the Feast Days as "high holy days". This is a modern practice that follows the example of Roman Catholicism which calls^{[citation needed]} their special days, High Days.

The ten day period between the High Sabbaths of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur are commonly referred to as the High Holy Days, or High Holidays.