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Feasts and festivals
Passover and Unleavened Bread
Hebrew pesach, matsot · Greek pascha · 14–21 Nisan, March or April
Passover began at twilight on the 14th day of the first month, called Abib and later Nisan, in March or April (Leviticus 23:5). Each household took an unblemished year-old male lamb or young goat and slaughtered it at twilight. The meat was roasted over the fire and eaten that night with unleavened bread and bitter herbs, and nothing was left until morning. The texts tie the meal to the night of the departure from Egypt: it was eaten in haste, by people dressed for travel, “with your sandals on your feet and your staff in your hand” (Exodus 12:11).
For the next seven days, the Feast of Unleavened Bread, leaven was cleared out of the houses and only flat unleavened bread was eaten. The first and seventh days were sacred assemblies without regular work, and a priest waved a sheaf of the first barley before the Lord. Passover was one of three feasts at which the men were to appear at the sanctuary (Deuteronomy 16:16), and kings Hezekiah and Josiah held great Passovers in Jerusalem. In the 1st century crowds of pilgrims filled the city; Jesus’ parents went every year (Luke 2:41).
Key verses
You must keep it until the fourteenth day of the month, when the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel will slaughter the animals at twilight. They are to take some of the blood and put it on the sides and tops of the doorframes of the houses where they eat the lambs. They are to eat the meat that night, roasted over the fire, along with unleavened bread and bitter herbs.This is how you are to eat it: You must be fully dressed for travel, with your sandals on your feet and your staff in your hand. You are to eat in haste; it is the LORD’s Passover.For seven days you must eat unleavened bread. On the first day you are to remove the leaven from your houses. Whoever eats anything leavened from the first day through the seventh must be cut off from Israel.The Passover to the LORD begins at twilight on the fourteenth day of the first month. On the fifteenth day of the same month begins the Feast of Unleavened Bread to the LORD. For seven days you must eat unleavened bread.The king commanded all the people, “Keep the Passover of the LORD your God, as it is written in this Book of the Covenant.” No such Passover had been observed from the days of the judges who had governed Israel through all the days of the kings of Israel and Judah. But in the eighteenth year of Josiah’s reign, this Passover was observed to the LORD in Jerusalem.Every year His parents went to Jerusalem for the Feast of the Passover.Sources
Adapted and shortened from the Tyndale Open Bible Dictionary · CC BY-SA 4.0
Tyndale Open Bible Dictionary © 2023 Tyndale House Publishers · CC BY-SA 4.0 — Feasts and Festivals of Israel: Seasonal Festivals; Calendars, Ancient and Modern: Jewish Festivals; Passover
Adapted from Tyndale Open Bible Dictionary: articles chosen, shortened and retold in our own words (history, nature and daily life only) and, in languages other than English, machine-translated. The original work by Tyndale House Publishers is available for free at tyndaleopenresources.com.
