CHRONOLOGY OF THE ISRAELITE EXODUS
(Exodus 12 to 16)
by
Keith Hunt
I have seen over the last number of decades a few pretty
fancy charts and outlines, from people trying to put together a
day by day CHRONOLOGY of the Israelites coming out of Egypt -
chapters of Exodus 12 through to 16.
Such "chronologists" have spent HOURS and hours figuring it
all out. Most of them have been from the Churches that DO observe
the Festivals of Leviticus 23. They somehow want to "fit" the
Passover and Feast of Unleavened Bread, and some even Pentecost,
into this nice neat framework of dates and days, to give I guess,
more credence to those Festivals of the Lord.
It has been a complete WASTE of time for them. They would
have been better to have spent their time on other studies, than
this chronology stuff about the chapters of Exodus 12 to 16. They
have been day dreaming, and doing back flips and juggling tricks,
to make those events of Exodus 12 to 16 "fit in" with their
ideas, that to them will add weight to the observance of the
Festivals of God.
The FESTIVALS of the Lord DO NOT NEED SUCH jig-saw puzzles
of chronology to establish them as God's Festivals that should be
observed by His people today!!
Such chronologers have MISSED the simple points of Exodus 12
to 16.
Now, dear reader, you take out your Bible and read from
Exodus 12 through to 16:1.
Have you seen it? It is pretty simple!
Exodus 12 is the Passover ON the 14th of the month, the
first month. The Israelites reach the wilderness of Sin, ON the
15TH DAY of the SECOND MONTH!
WITHIN FOUR CHAPTERS we have covered ONE MONTH AND ONE DAY!!
Now, go back and read through once more, very carefully,
noting the places the Israelites pitched their tents, to stay a
while.
Exodus 12:37 - They left Rameses and pitched at Succoth,
which is just a Hebrew word for "booth" or "tent."
The next we are told is in chapter 13 and verse 20. They
moved from Succoth to Etham, by the edge of the wilderness.
Then it's chapter 14 and verse one. They are to encamp
before Pihahiroth, over against Baalzephon; by it they were to
camp over against the sea.
Pharaoh and his army are coming after them, is the rest of
chapter 14. The children of Israel do go through the Red sea by
NIGHT and in the morning watch, and when the morning is appearing
the Egyptians try to flee but are drowned in the Red sea.
We are at chapter 15. We have singing and praises for God
and His mighty power. Moses brings the Israelites through and out
of the Red sea, and to the wilderness of Shur - verse 22. They go
THREE DAYS JOURNEY in the wilderness - verse 22. They get to
Marah, verse 23. They had no water. They come to Elim and there
is water, and they camp, verse 27.
They pick up and come to "the wilderness of sin" which is
between Elim and Sinai - ON THE 15TH DAY OF THE **SECOND**
MONTH!!
It should be pretty easy and plain to see that FROM THE 14TH
OF THE FIRST MONTH (PASSOVER DAY) - CHAPTER 12; RIGHT TO CHAPTER
16:1 IS ONE WHOLE MONTH PLUS ONE DAY!
Now, it has to be either they stopped in those places way
MORE than ONE day, or there were OTHER places they pitched their
tents that we are NOT TOLD ABOUT. Then I suppose it could be
possible it was BOTH!
FURTHER PROOF
You want a little more to back up what we have just read?
Turn to Numbers 33 and you will find it.
Look at verse 3. Ah, it tells us clearly the Israelites
DEPARTED FROM RAMESES on the 15TH OF THE FIRST MONTH!
They moved from Rameses and pitch at Succoth - verse 5.
They departed from Succoth and pitched at Etham, on the edge
of the wilderness - verse 6.
They removed from Etham, and turned to Pihahiroth, and they
pitched at Migdol - verse 7.
They departed from Pihahiroth, and PASSED THROUGH THE MIDST
OF THE SEA INTO THE WILDERNESS, AND WENT THREE DAYS JOURNEY IN
THE WILDERNESS OF ETHAM AND PITCH AT MIRAH - verse 8.
They left Mirah and CAME UNTO ELIM, where there was water -
verse 9!
They moved from Elim and encamped by the Red sea - verse 10.
They removed from the Red sea and encamped in the wilderness
of Sin - verse 11.
NOW THAT HAS BROUGHT US BACK AGAIN TO EXODUS 16:1.
HOW SIMPLE IT IS! FROM THE PASSOVER ON THE 14TH DAY OF THE
FIRST MONTH, TO THE DAY THEY ARRIVE IN THE WILDERNESS OF SIN,
TOOK ONE WHOLE MONTH AND ONE DAY! They got to the wilderness of
Sin, on the 15th day of the SECOND month - Exodus 16:1.
We are told SO LITTLE, just about NOTHING, of the
"chronological" day times of this period of time - one month and
one day. We are told the Passover was on the 14th day of the
first month. We are told they left Rameses on the 15th day of the
first month. We are told they crossed the Red sea by night. We
are told they did a three day journey into the wilderness.
AND THAT IS IT FRIENDS!!
It is NOT POSSIBLE - it was NEVER INTENDED by the Lord - for
us to KNOW THE EXACT DAYS OF LENGTH THEY PITCHED THEIR TENTS AT
ANY ONE OF THE LOCATIONS MENTIONED.
If you want to say they only pitched at each location
mentioned to us, for only one night. Then ACCORDING TO NUMBERS
33, you get a total of SEVEN or EIGHT DAYS, to reaching the
wilderness of Sin! And that has to include a three days journey
into the wilderness mentioned to us. So you could extend it all
to 10 or 11 days, to reach the wilderness of Sin.
BUT IT'S NOT POSSIBLE to figure it that way, as we see
CLEARLY from Exodus 16:1 that it took the Israelites ONE MONTH
AND ONE DAY (from the 14th of the first month to the 15th of the
second month) to reach the wilderness of Sin!
THROW THE CHARTS AWAY, THROW THE DIAGRAMS AWAY FOLKS! It is
just not possible to figure the chronology of Exodus 12 through
to chapter 16:1.
AND FURTHER - IT DOES NOT MATTER - THE FESTIVALS OF THE LORD
ARE NOT ESTABLISHED UPON CHRONOLOGY!
...................
Written December 2007
The NIGHT to be much Observed?A Re-Look at the Scriptures A RE-LOOK AT "THE NIGHT TO BE MUCH OBSERVED"
EXODUS 12:42
by
Keith Hunt
(December 2007)
In the "old" Worldwide Church of God, under Herbert
Armstrong, we observed "the night to be much observed" at the
BEGINNING or evening of the 15th day of the first month - Abib or
Nisan.
It was the "tradition" to first meet as a local congregation
and have an very fine evening meal and fellowship. It was done
that way in the 1960s. Later it was "groups" of brethren getting
together in different home, varying from year to year.
Now, the evening of the 15th, is the start of the FIRST holy
day of the SEVEN days of Unleavened Bread Feast. The reader is
asked to study all my studies on the nitty-gritty of the Passover
and Feast of Unleavened Bread. A long study, which should take a
fair good time, if you are reading all the Scriptures and
meditating on them all. But worth the while if you still have
questions about "days" "evenings" "14th" "15" "7" or "8" days for
Unleavened Bread, and many more questions.
In all those studies, I do not remember if I gave much
inquiry into the "night to be much observed." I guess it was not
an issue at the time with most people, so I gave little or no
time re-looking at it per se. I guess you could say I went along
with the "traditional" keeping of it from way way back as taught
in the old WCG.
A recent gentleman emailed be about it and has indeed got me
to re-investigate the matter.
I must say I was some surprised at what I've found, trying
to revisit this passage without any pre-conceived ideas. It has
been truly said that, most wrong theological ideas come from a
wrong premise or pre-conceived ideas.
We must always be willing to look at sections of Scripture
with a new and open mind, but as someone said, not so open that
your brains fall out.
So with this study I've endeavored to do just that, with
also the CONTEXT in mind.
Certainly the beginning chapters of Exodus 12 is the
Passover. The lamb kept until the 10th day. Then on the 14th day
they killed it in the evening. The Israelites were commanded to
do certain things with its blood, and how to eat the lamb. The
Lord was going to PASS OVER THEIR HOUSES THAT NIGHT of the 14th!
(verses 6-13).
It was to be a MEMORIAL day - a Feast day (verse 14). It did
in Jewish history take a somewhat elaborate number of hours,
lasting until the morning hours. I have elaborated on that in
some of my studies. It was in Israel quite a full evening as at
it was practiced by Jesus and His disciples, and other Jewish
families also (celebrated with a few other families in small
groups in homes).
Exodus 12:15 starts a brief explanation of the 7 day feast
of Unleavened Bread, through to verse 20.
We are then taken back to the main topic of this section,
the Passover in verse 21 and forward. They were to remember to
teach their children the wonderful meaning of the Passover
(verses 26-27).
At MIDNIGHT the Lord smote all the first-born in the land of
Egypt. Pharaoh rose up in the NIGHT. He called for Moses by NIGHT
told Moses that he and the children of Israel should RISE UP AND
BE GONE! The Egyptians wanted them out mighty fast! So the people
got going as fast as they could go with live stock, donkeys,
sheep and goats, and don't forget small children. Yes, they took
much "spoils" from the Egyptians also, I guess you could say
"back pay" for hard work, very hard work, over generations of
time (verses 31-36).
I believe the verses 37-41 are INSET VERSES. Verses you can
put in brackets as in fact and thought put within an overall
basic context - the CONTEXT OF THE PASSOVER ON THE NIGHT OF THE
14TH OF THE FIRST MONTH.
THEN YOU PICK UP THE CONTEXT AGAIN IN VERSE 42!
IT IS A NIGHT TO BE MUCH OBSERVED UNTO THE LORD IN BRINGING
THEM OUT FROM THE LAND OF EGYPT. THIS IS THE NIGHT TO BE OBSERVED
OF ALL THE CHILDREN OF ISRAEL.
WHAT NIGHT HAS BEEN THE CONTEXT NIGHT? WHY IT'S BEEN THE
NIGHT OF THE 14TH - THE NIGHT WHEN THE LORD PASSED-OVER THE
HOUSES - THOSE WITH THE BLOOD OF THE LAMB ON THE DOOR FRAME, WERE
SAVED BY THE BLOOD OF THE LAMB!
PHARAOH RISES UP IN THE NIGHT AND TELLS MOSES AND AARON TO
"GET OUT OF HERE - BE GONE - TAKE OFF" AND DO IT FAST!
AND ISRAEL DID EXACTLY THAT - THEY GOT MOVING TO RAMESES.
AFTER VERSE 42, WHAT DO WE IMMEDIATELY FIND? GOD STARTS
TALKING ABOUT A CERTAIN IMPORTANT POINT OF HOW TO OBSERVE THE
PASSOVER - ALL THE WAY DOWN TO VERSE 49!
THERE WAS ONE SPECIAL DAY - THE 14TH DAY - THE PASSOVER
EVENING/NIGHT OF THE 14TH AND THERE WAS A SPECIAL DAY OF THE
15TH, WHEN ISRAEL LEFT RAMESES UNDER FULL AND COMPLETE FREEDOM,
FREEDOM FROM THE MIDNIGHT OF THE 14 ACTUALLY, WHEN PHARAOH GOT
UP IN THE NIGHT AND TOLD THEM TO "MOVE OUT, AND DO IT QUICKLY."
THE "NIGHT TO BE MUCH OBSERVED" OR AS THE MARGIN SAYS "A NIGHT OF
OBSERVATION" FROM THE **CONTEXT** IS THE NIGHT OF THE **14** -
NOT THE NIGHT OF THE 15TH!!
In chapter 15 the day to REMEMBER in which God did a further
"bringing them out of Egypt" with a STRONG HAND was the 15th day,
when they LEFT RAMESES, AS they DID LEAVE Rameses on the 15th day
of the first month - see plainly what Numbers 33:3 says. Yes of
course they went out on that day from Rameses with a high hand in
the SIGHT of the Egyptians!
Hence that beginning of the Feast of Unleavened Bread was a
mighty walk out from Rameses. There could have well been 6
million, including children. Add to all that their cattle and
herds - it must have been some awesome sight in front of the
Egyptians, as they hopelessly beheld the departure of their once
slaved Israelites.
So sure the beginning of chapter 13 pays attention to the
importance of the Feast of Unleavened Bread as Israel started to
march out of Rameses on the 15th. And in that context there is
NOTHING about leaving Rameses at NIGHT! If they depart on the
MORROW after the Passover, as they did, see Number 33:3; then
"morrow" after the Passover could have been after sunset, the
beginning of the 15th, a cool night travel for 3 or 4 hours. OR,
it could have been an early morning start on the 15th. Either
would be a moving out of Rameses on the 15th, the day AFTER the
Passover!
ONE MORE PASSAGE
Turn to Deuteronomy 16:1. "Observe the month of Abib, and
KEEP the PASSOVER....FOR IN THE MONTH OF ABIB THE LORD THY GOD
BROUGHT THEE FORTH OUT OF EGYPT BY NIGHT!"
THE NEXT VERSE IMMEDIATELY TALKS ABOUT SACRIFICING THE
PASSOVER!
WE AGAIN HAVE "NIGHT" CONNECTED WITH PASSOVER AND ISRAEL
COMING OUT OF EGYPT!
IT SEEMS TO BE ADDING UP - AND TO MY THINKING THE WEIGHT OF
EVIDENCE IS IN FAVOUR OF THE PASSOVER NIGHT, THE BEGINNING OF THE
14TH OF ABIB, AS THAT VERY SPECIAL NIGHT TO BE OBSERVED!! AND NOT
THE 15TH PER SE. THE 15th IS IMPORTANT FOR IT IS A HOLY DAY.
BUT LET'S FACE IT WHAT NIGHT AND DAY CAN COMPARE TO THE 14TH
OF NISAN? IT WAS THE NIGHT JESUS SPENT THE LAST PASSOVER ON EARTH
WITH HIS 12 DISCIPLES, AND INSTITUTED THE NEW TESTAMENT PASSOVER
ORDINANCES.
NOW THIS IS REALLY A NIGHT TO BE OBSERVED. THIS IS A
MEMORIAL LIKE NO OTHER IN HISTORY - JESUS - GOD IN THE FLESH,
WILL DIE FOR THE SINS OF THE WORLD ON THIS VERY 14TH DAY, WHICH
STARTS WITH THE MEMORIAL PASSOVER EVENING!
SURE THE DAY OF THE 15TH AND THEIR TRAVELS DURING THE FEAST
OF UNLEAVENED BREAD, TO MAKE THEIR WAY OUT OF THE PHYSICAL LAND
IS IMPORTANT, AND SO WE HAVE THE FEAST OF UNLEAVENED BREAD TO
COMMEMORATE THAT MARCH OUT OF SIN TO A NEW LIFE WITH GOD!
What about "this night being the night of bringing them out
from the land of the Egyptians" (chap.12:42) - the Passover
night; And "Remember this day in which you came out of Egypt"
(chap.13:3) - the 15th day as they departed from Rameses.
God often speaks at times AS IF it is a done deal. When He
decides to do a certain thing - IT WILL BE DONE, so He speaks
accordingly. When God had decided the time HAD COME for Israel to
leave Egypt, then when that death angel passed over at midnight
of the 14th, and Pharaoh made that call, and told Moses and
Israel to LEAVE, ALTHOUGH PHYSICALLY they were still, at that
point, IN THE LAND of Egypt, they had for all purposes and intent
LEFT EGYPT. GOD HAD FREED THEN FROM EGYPT! THEY TRULY WERE OUT OF
EGYPT, EVEN IF THEIR LEGS AND CATTLE HAD YET TO CROSS EGYPT'S
BOARDER LINE.
IT WOULD SEEM FROM THE LITTLE EVIDENCE GIVEN US THAT THE
NIGHT TO BE MUCH OBSERVED IS **NOT** THE BEGINNING OF THE 15TH
DAY OF ABIB, BUT THE VERY NIGHT OF THE 14TH - PASSOVER NIGHT!
We certainly do not want to take anything away from the 15th
Holy Day of Abib - the first of the 7 complete days where only
un-leavened bread is to be eaten, but the night of the 14th is
the memorial of our Lord's sinless sacrifice for you and for me.
SURELY INDEED THAT EVENING AND NIGHT IS TO BE MUCH OBSERVED!
........................
Written December 2007
ADDED February 2010
First, the WCG and others were and are wrong in teaching the "night
to be much ovserved" was the evening of the 15th.
Now, specifically "even the self same day" - this phrase is
connected to the previous one "And it came to pass at the end of
the four hundred and thirty years...."
It is not written in the Bible per se (no chapter and verse)
about 430 years ealier of Israel "dwelling in Egypt" but from this
statement we know GOD KNEW to the very day when the tribes of Israel
CAME INTO Egypt, and 430 years later, to the exact day - the 14th
of Nisan, Israel or "all the host of the Lord went out from the land
of Egypt" - same verse. God inspired Moses to so record that God knew
the day Israel arrived in Egypt, and it was the same calendar day
that He was going to bring them freedom from Egypt, 430 years later
to the very same calendar day - context obviously is the 14th day.
Now, "going out from Egypt" WITHIN the CONTEXT is simply meaning
that that night of the 14th, when Pharaoh said "get out" - Israel
had been set free, they had "gone out of Egypt" but not yet
crossed the border line, but in true mental state they had left
Egypt, they were free people, no longer in Egypt as under their
domain, they were no longer slaves to the Egyptians.
This has to be the way to understand this "being free that night"
because EITHER WAY of the night of the 14th, OR the night of the
15th when they left Rameses (as we know other verses clearly tell
us they left Rameses on the 15th), they only marched on the 15th
to Succoth, which was not a town, but the word means "tent" or
"booths" - they moved for a while and then pitched their tens for
the night. So during the 14th day light they gathered at Rameses, and
did not leaves Rameses until the 15th. Either way then THEY STILL
HAD NOT left the physical land, had NOT crossed the border line
of Egypt, on the 14th OR 15th.
The phrase "went out from the land of Egypt" (which ever day, YOU
WANT TO PICK - 14th or 15th) MUST MEAN "they were free, no longer
slaves, no longer under the thumb or rulership of any Egypt
master, not even Pharaoh."
The phrase cannot be taken literally, as meaning they crossed the
border line of Egypt into another country on that day, for the
facts of the following chapters make it clear they DID NOT cross
the border line of Egypt either on the 14th or 15th day.
They did not leave the physical land of Egypt until they crossed
the Red Sea, and that was NOT done on EITHER the 14th or 15th day.
Hence there can be only one way to understand "went out from the
land of Egypt" and that is they were free, and they STARTED to
head for the border line. It is one of those phrases that must be
understood WITHIN the context it is written in. The context is
being slaves, under chains so to speak, of rulers, and then being
SET FREE! I think the slaves of the United States of America
could have used the very same phrase "I came out of the land
of the United States the day I was freed from slavery." Some did
literally leave, came to Canada, BUT NOT ON THAT DAY when they were
given their freedom, and many stayed, but they had in 'spirit' been
set free, had come out of the USA. Yet of course in this case the
many who stayed willfully became part of the USA.
In Israel's case they all left (with others also going with them,
as it is written) Egypt.
And the context shows, they were set free the night of the 14th.
God had told them to prepare to be set free with the Passover
meal, and then God set them free from Egypt through the death of the
firstborn in Egypt, and the command from Pharaoh to "get out of
here - be gone."
NOTE:
Some have tried to chronologize the events of Israel leaving
Egypt to have them going through the Red Sea on the last holy day
of the Feast of Unleavened Bread. It is simply NOT possible to so
figure! It is true the Israelites moved through the Red Sea at
night - see Exodus 14:20-31.
But if you take Numbers 33:1-10, noting especially verses 3-8 and
the places they pitched their tents before moving through the
midst of the sea into the wilderness, you cannot know for certain
what day they passed through the sea. If you only give one day
for each place mentioned, then it surely was NOT the last day of
the Feast of UB when they passed through the sea.
We are not told HOW LONG they stayed at the places mentioned.
Giving each one day is human SPECULATION only.
It is NOT POSSIBLE to figure the daily chronology from Exodus 12
to 16:1. We are told the Passover was on the 14th day of the
first month and that getting to the wilderness of Sin, was on the
15th day of the second month. Anything else is PURELY up for
grabs. You could have a thousand chronologies from a thousand
different individuals and we still would not know which is the
right one. And it is not important to know, unless you have some
"pet" teaching you want to promulgate.
Entered on this Website December 2007
Numbers 28: 16,17How do we understand its language? by
Keith Hunt
The debate in many of the Sabbath/Feast observing groups as
to WHEN the original Passover took place has been L O N G
and vigorously defended or proclaimed as in the evening of the
14th of Nisan by the one side and in the evening of the 15th of
Nisan by the other side. Then there are those who also claim it
took place in the afternoon of the 14th on into the night of the
15th, and they so hold the NT Passover service (or as it is
popularly called "The Lord's Supper") at about 3 p.m. in the
afternoon of the 14th (the time when they suppose Jesus died on
the cross).
I have spent MUCH time and much writing on the Passover
issue, for those who want to get into the nitty-gritty of it all,
as you can see from the list of Passover studies on this Website.
But there are TWO verses in the Old Testament, in the book of
Numbers that I believe make this issue very SIMPLE to understand
and clear as to the truth of the matter when the original
Passover took place and was taught by God to be observed in
ancient Israel, IF we let language be what it is and say what it
says, without configuring the language in a way that would
distort language from its natural teaching and context.
Those TWO verses are found in NUMBERS 28: 16, 17.
It reads in the KJV translation as:
"And in the fourteenth day of the first month is the
passover of the Lord. And in the fifteenth day of this month is
the feast: seven days shall unleavened bread be eaten."
The verses that follow show the first and seventh days of
this seven day feast to be holy convocation....holy gathering, in
which no regular servile work was to be done. Those first and
seventh days of that seven day feast were holy Sabbath days, as
also Leviticus 23 clearly teaches.
I have looked at the Hebrew in Green's Hebrew/English
Interlinear and how he translated the Hebrew for those two verses
of 16 and 17. You may want to consult a reader of Hebrew, such as
a Jewish rabbi.
You will find that there is NO DIFFERENCE in the meaning of
the Hebrew but in the one verse for "fourteenth day" and in the
other verses for "fifteenth day." The numerics being the only
difference. Obviously one verse is talking about the 14th day and
the other verse about the 15th day, both in the first month,
which in the Hebrew calendar is called Nisan or Abib.
Now, letting language take its natural course, if in verse
16, it is meaning the end of the 14th (as some teach) for the
Passover service, then natural language would have verse 17
saying and meaning the feast of seven days is at the end of the
15th day, not at its beginning.
If verse 16 is meaning the Passover is at the middle of the
afternoon of the 14th, then in the same way verse 17 must be
teaching that the seven day feast begins in the middle of the
afternoon of the 15th.
This would be the way to understand these two verses within
the flow of natural language.
As just about no one that I know of believes that the
Sabbath of the 15th day of the first month begins in the middle
of the afternoon of the 15th, or at the end of the 15th.
As just about all the people I know of that observe the seven day
feast of Unleavened Bread, agree that the first day of that
feast, the holy Sabbath day, does begin at the END of the 14th,
and not during the 15th or at the end of the 15th, then we are
ONLY left with ONE clear way to understand the meaning of these
two verses.
As we look at ALL the other verses in the books of Moses, we
can see that the feast of Unleavened Bread is from the 15th to
the 21st day of the first month. The feast of Unleavened Bread
STARTS when the 15th day begins, and the 15th day begins when
the 14th day ends, which is at the END of the 14th, and not
before the 14th day is finished. The 15th day and so the first
day of the seven day feast of Unleavened Bread does not BEGIN in
the middle of the 15th day or at the END of the 15th day.
Let me repeat. The 15th day starts at the END of the 14th
day and not anytime thereafter, and certainly not in the middle
or at the end of its very own 15th day.
Let me repeat. All the other verses on the subject of the
length and the numeric days of the feast of Unleavened Bread,
clearly show that feast is seven days in length, from the 15th to
the 21st INCLUSIVE counting. The feast of Unleavened Bread STARTS
with the arrival of the 15th day, which STARTS when the 14th day
has come to a close.
Now all that should be pretty simple language and
arithmetic. So Numbers 28: 16, 17, from simply letting language
be itself, we can only conclude there is but ONE way to
understand and read these verses. The Passover was at the
BEGINNING of the 14th and the first day of the feast of
Unleavened bread was at the BEGINNING of the 15th.
To try and make these verses of Numbers 28, say that the
Passover was at the END of the 14th and the first day of the
seven day feast was at the BEGINNING of the 15th, hence at the
SAME time, or that the Passover was in the MIDDLE of the
AFTERNOON of the 14th day and the first day of the feast of
Unleavened Bread just a few hours way at the BEGINNING of the
15th, makes language say WHATEVER YOU WANT IT TO SAY!
Then if language can say whatever you want it to say, then
it is more than true as some people are want to utter, "You can
make the Bible say whatever you want it to say."
If language in the Bible is not to be understood with the
other verses on the same subject, then language means nothing,
and other verses prove the first day of the seven day feast (of
Unleavened Bread) BEGINS at the BEGINNING of the 15th and not
before or after the 15th day has begun.
Now, if from the beginning the Passover and first day of the
seven day feast were started TOGETHER, at the beginning of the
15th, which started at or around sunset of the 14th day, then it
would have been very simple for Moses to have written (God
inspiring him), "Now the Passover of the Lord and seven day feast
is in the 15th day of the first month...." Or, "In the fifteenth
day of the first month is the passover of the Lord and the feast:
seven days shall unleavened bread be eaten...." Or, "Late in the
fourteenth day of the first month is the passover of the Lord,
and in the fifteen day is the feast: seven days shall unleavened
bread be eaten...."
There is a Hebrew word for "late" - it is used in Psalm
127:2. It is number 309 in Strong's Concordance of the Bible. And
Strong gives the meaning as: "...a prim. root; to loiter (i.e. be
behind); by impl. to procrastinate:- continue, defer, delay,
hinder, be late (slack), stay (there), tarry (longer)."
If we want to work backwards in these two verses of Number
28: 16 and 17, we have the eating of unleavened bread for seven
days in the feast that is in the fifteenth day of the month
spoken about in verse 16, the first month, and in the fourteenth
day is the Lord's passover.
The Hebrew words being the same but for the numerics of each
verses, and as we know the feast of Unleavened Bread began, for
seven days, on the, or at the BEGINNING of the 15th day, then as
that feast for seven days was at the start of the 15th, then the
Passover of the Lord was also at the start of the 14th day, or
the EVENING of the 14th, the BEGINNING of the 14TH.
And that is exactly what Moses wrote in Leviticus 23, "In
the fourteenth day of the first month at EVENING is the Lord's
passover. And on the fifteenth day of the same month is the feast
of unleavened bread unto the Lord: seven days you must eat
unleavened bread. In the first day you shall have a holy
convocation: you shall do no servile work therein...." (verses
5-7, KJV).
Yes, I know the Hebrew for "evening' in this verse is
"between the two evenings" but as we study the Bible's OWN
interpretation for that phrase (not what men or any sect
of Judaism say it means), we have no contradiction. See my study
on that specific term under "The Passover" heading.
All is in perfect harmony. The Passover was from the
beginning at the BEGINNING of the 14th day, and the feast of
Unleavened Bread was to start at the BEGINNING of the 15th day.
..........................
Written during the feast of Unleavened Bread, 2003
Passover/UB Questions- AnswersFive of the most often asked Questions PASSOVER AND UNLEAVENED BREAD FEAST
QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
1. One of the most frequent questions is: What leavened products
do I clean out of the house?
People can get confused and some very nit-picky. The simple
answer is; this is the Feast of unleavened BREAD, not unleavened
Wine, Grape juice, 7 Up, Potato chips, and such like. The old
English milk shakes (before the Big M came there) were puffy and
light, but it's not the days of un-Puffy English milk shakes, it's
the days putting out puffy leavened flour products. The Israelites
left Egypt without hanging around to bake bread that PUFFED UP,
from leaven agents. The symbolic type used in the New Testament
is that "leaven" typifies sin (1 Corinthians 5). Hence for this
New Testament feast of God we just remove FLOUR baked foods that
are specifically made with leaven agents of some kind to PUFF it
up.
The most popular leaven agents in the Western world are "yeast"
and "baking soda." Just put our flour products that are made to
"puff up" and buy flour products that are made without a puffing
up agent.
Some unleavened bread can be one inch, two inches etc. thick, but
they are still unleavened because no puffing up agent like yeast
was used to make that flour product.
And raw yeast and baking soda are not "puffed up" of and by
themselves. You do not have to throw them out. It is the
principle of "eggs" - they can be used to leaven, puff up, but of
themselves they are not puffed up, you do not have to throw out
your eggs. I think the egg example should clear up that uncertain
question about yeast and baking soda.
And remember the heart of doing this during this Spring Feast of
the Eternal, is the MOST IMPORTANT thing. Some can make the
"physical" side of this Feast more important than the spiritual
heart side. They get the cart before the horse. Yes we do having
certain physical rites in the Christian Church of God; water
baptism, the symbols of the bread and wine in the Passover
service, but partaking of those symbols means nothing if the
heart and mind is not in touch and in tune with the Father and
Christ.
If you are a family, especially with small children, make the
looking for and removing of leaven flour products a "fun time" -
hide and seek type fun, and maybe a reward for helping find and
clear out leaven flour products from the house. Maybe you would
want to deliberately hide some leaven flour products so you can
have the young children make a game out of it, as you of course
explain the symbolic meaning behind it all.
2. Do we throw out the bottle of wine even if we have only used a
small portion for the Passover service?
For a single person, a couple, or a family, put out your small
cups a wine/grape juice, say on the 13th, and also the unleavened
bread to be eaten in the service. Now, if you buy or bake
unleavened bread, do you throw it all out after you take a
portion to set it aside for the evening Passover service? No, we
do not! So then the same for the wine or grape juice.
In a church service setting the elders will make sure there is
usually more glasses of the fruit of the vine, and also
unleavened bread, than the people who will be attending. As that
fruit of the vine and unleavened bread has been sanctified for
the Passover service, then what is left of both should be
discarded. As the apostle Paul would say, "In my judgment, and I
do have the Spirit of the Lord."
3. How do I observe the Feast of Unleavened Bread with a husband
or wife that does not follow my faith?
Let me be very clear on this. You DO NOT try and force your
religious faith on your mate. Some unconverted or "different"
faith mates will comply with your wishes that no leaven flour
products enter the house for the 7 day Feast of UB (unleavened
bread). But if they do not, you should do nothing to "twist the
arm of" them to comply with your wishes. We are called to peace,
to be peaceable people. God looks on the heart. He can see the
situation. He understands the situation. You are called to be
peaceable. Your focus is that you do want you can, which will be
that you will eat only unleavened flour products for those 7 days
of the UB feast. You have no power (and do not try - you are
called to be peaceable) over others that do not see things in the
way God has revealed them to you.
4. What about adult children living in your house, who do not
follow your faith?
Your house is always your house. You have the right to have
household laws that reflect your faith. If you have adult
children who (for whatever reason) desire to live in your house,
you need to make it clear to them there are certain basic rules
your house lives under. Christian parents should not allow their
adult single children, living "at home" to bring their boy or
girl friend in for the night and sleep with them (which also
means having sex with them). You have the right to lay down that
rule, if they want to live in your home.
So for the UB feast, you let them (nicely of course) there will
be no UB flour products allowed in the house for those 7 days.
Then you need to relax, this feast is to be enjoyed, not held as
some kind of "witch-hunt" and "spy" time. If your adult son or
daughter sneaks a leaven flour dough-nut into your home and into
their room in a nap-sack ... well you may not know it, so don't,
don't turn this Feast of the Lord into a "spy-and-search" and
"I'm watching you, and I'll catch you" Feast. God will know your
heart and a spy attitude will obliterate your spiritual observing
of this Feast.
5. What about friends and relatives not of your faith coming to
visit during the UB Feast?
Be kind, be polite, be peaceable, as much as lies within you.
Lovingly explain to them (if they do not know) how you physically
live with flour products during this 7 day Feast of UB. You may
be surprised how many will want to know more, and be quite open
for you to explain. Nations today in the Western world are very
diverse in culture and religion, hence there is quite an open
understanding and acceptance of various religious practices and
faiths.
There are many other studies on this Website about the theology
and practice concerning the Feasts of the Lord. The above are the
most common 5 questions that I have heard and been asked over the
years, from people who have come to see the wonderful truths and
blessings in observing the Festivals of the Lord.
Keith Hunt
History - Pharaseeism - Passover #1Adaptions and Adoptions FESTIVALS OF THE JEWISH YEAR
A Modern Interpretation
by Theodor H. Gaster
(Written 1952/53)
You will see by the writing of the author he is a modern historic
secular believer. He does not believe the Bible is the "inspired"
word of God. But he does bring out some interesting facts of
history, that most may not know - Keith Hunt
PASSOVER
The Festival of Freedom
The festival of Passover is known in Jewish tradition as the
"Season of Our Freedom." Its central theme is Release. On the
seasonal plane, it marks the release of the earth from the grip
of winter. On the historical plane, it commemorates the exodus of
the Children of Israel from Egypt. On the broad human plane, it
celebrates the emergence from bondage and idolatry.
In each case, the release is accompanied by a positive
achievement; it is not simply an escape. It is also a cooperative
act between God and man. On the seasonal plane, Passover
inaugurates the reaping of the new grain; man sows the seed, but
God - or the cosmic power provides the rainfall and sunshine
which quickens it. On the historical plane, it commemorates the
birth of the Jewish nation: Israel was prepared to face the
hazards of the wilderness, so God, in His providence, brought it
to Sinai, gave it the Law, and concluded the Covenant. On the
broad human plane, it celebrates the attainment of freedom and of
the vision of God: man casts aside his idols and repudiates his
ignorance and obscurantism, and in that very act God reveals His
presence and imparts knowledge.
The three aspects of the festival run parallel to one
another: the dark and dreary winter corresponds at once to the
dark era of bondage and to the black night of ignorance, while
the burst of new life in spring corresponds, in turn, to the
flowering of Israel and the burgeoning of freedom.
Yet the freedom which is celebrated in the Passover festival
is freedom of a special kind. Our own modern concept of freedom
has developed through diverse channels and is today a fusion -
or, perhaps, a confusion - of several originally distinct
categories of thought. It is mixed up, for instance, with ideas
of sovereign independence, personal liberty and democratic
government; yet none of these ideas - however fervently Jews may
today adhere to them - enters significantly into the Passover
ideal. In Jewish tradition, freedom, in the modern sense, is
scarcely a virtue; at best, it is an opportunity. What matters is
volitional dedication, and it is this and this alone that forms
the theme of the Passover story. If Israel had gone forth out of
Egypt, but not accepted the Covenant at Sinai, it would have
achieved liberation - that is, mere release from bondage - but it
would not have achieved freedom, in the Jewish sense of the term.
For the only freedom, says Judaism, is the yoke of the Torah; the
only true independence is the apprehension of God.
The complex of ideas which today make up the Passover
festival is the result of a long process of development and, more
especially, of Judaism's inspired transformation of a primitive
seasonal ceremony.
The nature of that ceremony is described in detail in the
twelfth chapter of the Biblical Book of Exodus. At full moon in
the first month of spring, we read, it was customary for every
family to slaughter a lamb or goat at twilight and then, in the
middle of the night, to eat it in common, along with unleavened
bread and bitter herbs. The eating had to be done "in haste," and
whatever portion of the meat remained unconsumed had to be burned
ere break of dawn. Moreover, as soon as the slaughtering had been
effected, a bunch of hyssop was dipped into the victim's blood,
and a few drops were sprinkled with it on the doorposts and
lintels of each house. The ceremony was known as "pesah," and was
followed immediately by a six-day festival, called the Feast of
Un-leavened Bread, during which no fermented food was allowed to
be eaten, and the first and last days of which were regarded as
especially sacred and marked by a total abstention from work.
(The author, like many Jews, has it wrong: the Passover was one
day, the feast of Unleavened Bread was 7 days in duration - Keith
Hunt)
Shorn of its later interpretations, this ceremony falls into
a common pattern of seasonal festivals in many parts of the
world.
The essence of such festivals is to recement the bonds of
kindred and community at the beginning of a new agricultural
cycle. This is done by partaking of a meal in common--"breaking
bread together"--for thereby a common substance is absorbed. The
practice is well attested in antiquity. When, for example,
persons or tribes entered into compacts with one another, as in
the case of Abraham and Abimelech, or of Moses and Jethro, in the
Bible, the agreement was usually sealed by eating together - a
custom which underlies our own word companion (properly, "one who
eats bread with another") and which survives also in the familiar
usage of "having a drink on it."
On such occasions, however, it is not only how one eats but
also what one eats that is important, for the food consumed is
believed itself to impart new life and vigor. Accordingly,
special precautions have to be taken to ensure that it is pure
and free of putrescence, and in a Near Eastern country this means
that it has to be eaten at once and "in haste," and not lie
around in the sun. It means also that no fermented food may be
absorbed with it, since fermentation is the result of
putrefaction, and that bitter herbs must be eaten at the same
time as an effective cathartic against any impurity that may
inadvertently have been consumed.
Once the meal is finished, it becomes necessary to mark by
some outward sign those who have participated in it and thereby
entered into renewed ties with one another. The usual method of
doing this is to sprinkle some of the animal's blood on the
foreheads of all present or on the flaps of their tents or
doorposts of their houses. This, for example, is the practice
among the Amur Arabs of Palestine and at New Year ceremonies in
Madagascar. Moreover, this sprinkling of blood serves a further
purpose. In primitive societies, the family consists not only of
its human members but also of its god. He, too, therefore is
regarded as being present at the communal meal and as being bound
by the bond which it cements. Accordingly, the mark of blood on
the forehead or the doorpost affords a means whereby he may
readily recognize those individuals or households with whom he
has entered into a pact of friendship and protection. It thus
becomes, in effect, a device for averting supernatural hurt.
The Israelites took over this primitive rite and gave it a
meaning all their own, thereby relating it to their own historic
experience and justifying its continued observance.
(Do you see now how the author goes into secularism to determine
how the Israelites adopted this Spring feast - Keith Hunt)
The Exodus from Egypt, they said, had coincided with the
traditional pesah ceremony, and because their ancestors had so
meticulously carried out the prescribed regulations and dashed
the blood upon the doorposts of their houses, Jehovah had been
able instantly to recognize His own proteges when He came to
smite the firstborn in the land. All of the elements of the
traditional ceremony were then fancifully explained as memorials
of that momentous event. The unleavened bread recalled the fact
that, in their hurried departure from bondage, there had been no
time to wait for the dough to rise and the bread had therefore
been baked without yeast, while the eating "in haste"
commemorated the haste with which the departure had been made.
Indeed, the very name of the festival (the original significance
of which is obscure) was now connected ingeniously with the
Hebrew word 'pasah,' "skip," and taken to imply that, on seeing
the sign of blood, God had "skipped" or passed over the houses of
the Israelites and spared them from the plague.
Much of this explanation is, to be sure, historically frail.
Modern scholarship has made it virtually certain that the
Biblical narrative of the Exodus represents a foreshortened and
anachronistic account of what really took place. In the light of
historical and archaeological research, it has become
increasingly improbable that all of the tribes of Israel, as they
later existed, ever went down to Egypt or came out of it. It is
now generally conceded that the confederation was of later origin
and grew up gradually in the Holy Land after the Conquest, so
that the story of a common ancestor who went down to Egypt with
all his sons is as anachronistic as it would be to speak of
"Uncle Sam" and his forty-eight children at the time of the
Revolutionary War. Only a certain portion of what subsequently
became the Children of Israel--according to some scholars, only
the Joseph-tribes--ever went down to Goshen, and the conquest of
Canaan was the result not of a single coordinated invasion but of
the successive expeditions and gradual infiltration of various
Hebrew tribes, which had begun before the Exodus and continued
for some time after the arrival of the "redeemed" Holy Land.
Then, too, it must be borne in mind that the Biblical
narrative is a saga, not a factual report and therefore
embellishes the record of events with all kinds of fantastic and
legendary details drawn from the storehouse of popular lore.
Moses' staff, for example, has parallels in the magical wands and
weapons borne by heroes and deliverers in the folk tales of many
nations; the miraculous parting of the Red Sea finds counterparts
in the ancient Indian myth of Krishna's flight from the
tyrannical King Kamsa and in the statement of various Greek
writers that the Pamphylian Sea drew back and gave passage to the
troops of Alexander the Great when they were marching against the
Persian hosts of Darius III.
(Well it is now very evident the author does not believe in the
inspiration of the Holy Bible - Keith Hunt)
Nevertheless, even though the story of the Exodus cannot yet
be confirmed from any extra-Biblical source, and although we may
readily detect in it several obviously legendary traits, in broad
substance it is indeed consistent with everything that we now
know about political conditions in the Near East at the period in
question. Historical records have confirmed that there indeed
existed at that period, in virtually all parts of the Near East,
a special class of persons (not, however, an ethnic unit) known
as Hebrews, who did not enjoy full civic rights and who lived
largely as mercenaries and freebooters, and who on several
occasions made marauding raids upon Palestinian and
Syrian cities. History also confirms that the land of Goshen
(modern Wadi Tumilat), on the eastern confines of Egypt proper,
had long been recognized as a free grazing ground or reservation
for neighboring nomads, and it establishes that in the fourteenth
century B.C.E. there was indeed a change of regime in Egypt which
was unfavorable to aliens, for at that date the Hyksos, or
Foreign Princes, who had been in control of the country for some
two hundred years, were finally expelled and replaced by a native
Egyptian monarch. Furthermore, we know that the new Pharaoh's
successor, Ramses II (1298-32 B.c.E.) did indeed renovate - for
himself the abandoned Hyksos capital in the Delta and call it
after his own name, and that he also built a storecity named
Pithom, just as is described in the Bible. Lastly, an inscription
of Pharaoh Merneptah (1232-2¢ B.C.E.), discovered in his mortuary
chapel at Thebes, mentions the presence of the Israelites in the
Holy Land in 1227 B.C.E.
(Yes, the author has to admit certain truths, for extra-Biblical
writings have been found to substantiate what the Bible records
- Keith Hunt)
Against this general background, it would seem not at all
improbable that a particular group of Hebrews--what the Bible
describes as the "family of Jacob" should have migrated from the
Holy Land to Goshen, to settle under the more favorable regime of
the Hyksos; that it should at first have thrived and prospered
but subsequently, after the fall of that regime, have been viewed
with suspicion and enslaved; and that it should eventually have
sought freedom by linking up with other Hebrews in a concerted
attack on the Holy Land. And that, when the legendary trimmings
are stripped away, is substantially the story related in the
Bible. Nor, indeed, is it in any way remarkable that these events
do not find mention in Egyptian records, for it must be
remembered that to the Egyptians of the period, the Children of
Israel were in no sense a formidable or important power, but
merely a motley crowd of gypsies on a relatively distant
reservation.
In Judaism, however, the story of the Exodus has long since
been lifted out of a purely historical context. The Jewish
attitude toward it stems from the premise that events transcend
the moments of their occurrence - that anything which happens in
history happens not only at a particular point in time but also
as part of a continuous process and therefore involves as its
participants not only a single generation but also - and more
important - all who went before and all who follow after.
Take, for example, the American Civil War. What was secured
by this conflict was not simply the Union of that particular day
and age, but the Union per se, so that, in a wider perspective,
both the Founding Fathers on the one hand and we ourselves on the
other were also actively involved in it and personally shared in
the victory which ensued. In exactly the same way, the Exodus of
the Children of Israel from Egypt involved also both the
patriarchs of the past and their children's children of the
future, for it validated the mission of the former and determined
the destiny of the latter.
It is this ideal Exodus - this Exodus detached from a
mooring in time - that is really celebrated in the traditional
Seder service on the first two evenings of the Passover festival.
The Seder - the word means simply "order of service" or "formal
procedure" - is at once a substitute for the ancient paschal
sacrifice and a fulfillment of the Biblical injunction (Exod.
13:8) to retell the story of the Exodus to one's children.
The principal feature of the ritual is the eating of various
foods traditionally associated with the departure from Egypt.
These are: matzah, or unleavened bread; bitter herbs (e.g.
horse-radish), taken to commemorate the bitterness of servitude;
and haroseth, a mixture of chopped apples, nuts, raisins and
cinnamon, which symbolizes the mortar in which the Israelites
labored while they built the store-cities of Pithom and Raamses
(Exod. 1:11). Moreover, the meal is introduced by the
consumption of parsley dipped in salted water. During the course
of it, a minimum of four cups of wine must be drunk, recalling
the four expressions used in Exodus 6:6-7 to describe God's
deliverance of Israel, viz., "I will bring you out from under the
burden of the Egyptians, and I will rid you of their bondage, and
I will redeem you ... and I will take you to Me for a people."
In addition, besides the food actually consumed, the shankbone of
a lamb and a roasted egg have to be placed on the table. The
former symbolizes the paschal offering, while the latter is, in
all probability, a later importation from pagan custom and, like
the corresponding Christian Easter egg, exemplifies the beginning
of life in spring.
(Ah, we begin to see the added Pharasaical adoptions for the
"seder" - Keith Hunt)
There is a strict religious protocol about the manner in
which the ritual foods are to be eaten. The matzah, for example,
consists of three cakes placed one above the other and popularly
known as "the priest, the Levite, and the Israelite." At the
beginning of the service, the celebrant breaks the middle cake in
half and sets one of the halves aside, wrapping it in a napkin.
This, known as 'afikomin,' is subsequently distributed among the
company and constitutes the last thing eaten at the ceremony. The
bitter herbs, in addition to being eaten separately, are also
served in a "sandwich," between pieces of matzah, thereby
carrying out to the letter the Biblical commandment (Exod.12:8)
which enjoins that unleavened bread and bitter herbs be eaten
together as an accompaniment of the paschal meal. At the
conclusion of the supper, an extra cup of wine is filled for the
prophet Elijah who, it is believed, will come on Passover night
to herald the final redemption of Israel. The main door of the
house or apartment is flung open for a few moments to permit his
entrance.
Those present at the Seder ceremony are expected to adopt a
casual, reclining posture, symbolizing that of freemen at ancient
banquets. In some parts of the world, however, everyone appears
in hat and coat, with satchel on back and staff in hand, thus
re-enacting the Departure from Egypt.
The narrative portion of the ceremony is known as the
'Haggadah,' or 'Recital,' and consists in a repetition of the
Scriptural story of the Exodus, embellished by rabbinic comments
and elaborations and rounded out by the chanting of psalms, hymns
and secular songs.
The narrative is introduced by a series of questions (Mah
Nishtanah), asked by the youngest member of the company: "Why is
this night different from all other nights?" All that follows is
regarded as the answer.
High points of the Haggadah are: the "Section of the Four
Sons," the "Litany of Wonders," and the chanting of "Hallel."
The first of these is based on the fact that the Bible speaks
four times of "thy son's" inquiring about the meaning of
Passover, and each time poses his question in different terms.
Once (Deut.6:20), he is represented as asking, "What mean these
testimonies and statutes and judgments which the Lord our God
hath commanded us?" Another time (Exod.12:26), he demands
brusquely, "What means this service of yours?" A third time
(Exod.13:14), he asks simply, "What is this?" And a fourth time
(Exod.13:8), the question is not even framed, but merely implied.
This variation, said the sages, is purposeful; in each case the
form of the question typifies the character and attitude of the
inquirer, who is respectively wise, wicked, simple and too young
to ask. Each must be answered differently, in appropriate
fashion.
The "Litany of Wonders" is a cumulative poem reciting the
benefits conferred by God on Israel at the time of the Exodus.
Not only did He lead them out of Egypt, but He also punished the
Egyptians; not only did He part the Red Sea, but He caused them
to pass through it dryshod; not only did He lead them to Mount
Sinai, but He gave them the Law; not only did He give them the
Law, but He brought them to the Promised Land; not only did He
bring them to the Promised Land, but He built the temple in Zion.
As each of these benefits is recited, the company responds loudly
with the word 'Dayyenu,' "Alone 'twould have sufficed us" In all,
fifteen benefits are enumerated, alluding, so the rabbis said, to
the numerical value of the Hebrew word Yah, one of the names of
God (cf. Exod.15:2; Ps.68:4).
The Hallel ("Praise") is the group of psalms, 113-118, which
is recited at all new moons and at all festivals and which is
introduced by the word 'Hallelujah,' "Praise ye the Lord." In the
present instance, they are deemed especially appropriate, because
one of the psalms (Ps.114) in fact describes events connected
with the Exodus. (These psalms, it may be added, were very
probably the hymns intoned by Jesus and his disciples at the Last
Supper.) 1
(There is no such proof of that statement in the NT - Keith Hunt)
Properly understood, the Seder ceremony is no mere act of
pious recollection, but a unique and inspired device for blending
the past, the present and the future into a single comprehensive
and transcendental experience. The actors in the story are not
merely the particular Israelites who happen to have been led out
of bondage by Moses but all the generations of Israel throughout
all of time. In an ideal sense, all Israel went forth out of
Egypt, and all Israel stood before Sinai; and all Israel moved
through darkness to the Presence of God, in the wake of a pillar
of fire.
Whenever the trumpets sound in history, they sound for all
ages; and when the bell tolls, the echo lives on forever.
This is not a rarefied piece of modern rationalization. The
conception of the Seder as an experience rather than a recitation
runs like a silver thread through the whole of Jewish tradition
and finds expression on every page of the Haggadah. "Every man in
every generation," says a familiar passage (quoting the Mishnah),
"must look upon himself as if he personally had come forth out of
Egypt. It was not our fathers alone that the Holy One redeemed,
but ourselves also did He redeem with them." Similarly, in the
Litany of Wonders, it is not "they" but we who are said to have
wandered for forty years and to have been fed upon manna in the
wilderness, and finally to have reached the Promised Land.
Everywhere the emphasis is placed squarely on the durative
and ideal sig
......
1 'Matt. 26:30; Mark 14:26. The English Bible renders, "When they
had sung a hymn," but the Greek original would also permit the
rendering, "When they had sung hymns."
......
nificance of the Exodus rather than on its punctual and historic
reality. The Haggadah is the script of a living drama, not the
record of a dead event, and when the Jew recites it he is
performing an act not of remembrance but of personal
identification in the here and now.
The Seder ceremony, said the sages, is valid only when the
"bread of affliction" and the bitter herbs are actually before
you. In a sense larger than they intended, these words epitomize
its essential significance. Wer nie sein Brot mit Traenen ass ...
It may be said, in fact, that the central theme of the Seder
is not - as commonly supposed - the Exodus from Egypt. That is
merely its highlight. The central theme is the entire process of
which that particular event happens to have been the catalyst. In
Jewish tradition, the deliverance from Egypt is important only
because it paved the way to Sinai - that is, to Israel's
voluntary acceptance of its special and distinctive mission; and
what the Seder narrative relates is the whole story of how Israel
moved progressively from darkness to light, from the ignorance
and shame of idolatry to the consciousness and glory of its high
adventure.
All through the ages, the very structure of the narrative
has evinced its purport. In ancient times it began, on a note of
shamefaced humility, with the words, "At first our fathers were
worshipers of idols," (or, in an alternative version: "A
wandering Aramean was my father") and ended with the triumphant
chanting of the Psalms of Praise. Today, even though later
accretions have somewhat obscured this dramatic sequence, it
still opens (in most parts of the world) with a reference to the
"bread of affliction" and closes in a breathless and inspired
climax with the defeat of the Angel of Death. Moreover, the very
sentence which begins with the words, "At first our fathers were
worshipers of idols," ends significantly with the proud
affirmation: "But now the Presence of God has drawn us to His
service."
The several features of the ritual and the several elements
of the narrative in turn reinforce this sense of continuousness.
For neither ritual nor narrative is the product of a single age
or environment--a mere heirloom or museum piece passed down
intact and piously conserved. On the contrary, some parts of each
go back to the days of the Second Temple, while others are no
earlier than the fifteenth century. Ritual and narrative alike
are therefore dynamic, not static creations - virtual
kaleidoscopes of Jewish history - reflecting in their growth and
development the various phases of Israel's career.
(Yes, over time things were added and adopted to make up the
present "seder" service for the religious Jews - Keith Hunt)
The form of the meal, for example, with the reclining on
cushions, the preliminary dipping of parsley in salted water, and
the customary consumption of eggs as an 'hors d'oeuvre,'
reproduces the typical pattern of a Roman banquet, and one may
even suppose that the recital of the narrative and the conclusion
of the repast with the chanting of psalms may have been modeled
after the Roman practice of having literary works read aloud at
meals and regaling oneself afterward with choral entertainment.
Indeed, it is not at all impossible that the initial invitation
to the hungry and needy, and the prescription that at least four
(originally, three) cups of wine must be drunk, are likewise of
Roman origin. For the fact is that it was common Roman practice
for "clients" to wait upon their patrons during the day in order
to pay their respects to them; and for this attention they were
often rewarded by a formal invitation to join the company at
supper (coena recta). Similarly, 'pace' the traditional
explanations of the three or four glasses of wine, it is not
without interest that a normal Roman dinner actually entailed a
minimum of three cups--one for the preliminary libation to the
gods, a second for the mutual toasting of the guests, and a third
in honor of the hosts or, under the Caesars, of the emperor. (To
be sure, this minimum was usually exceeded; but so, too, are the
minimum three or four cups of the Seder!).
On the other hand, the 'afikomin' is distinctly Greek,
although the term now bears a meaning quite different from that
which attached to it in Hellenic speech. The Talmud says that
"men must not leave the paschal meal epikomin." This last word
was really the Greek 'epi komon,' a popular expression for
"gadding around on revels" - the common nightly pastime of the
"gay blades" of Hellas.
The term, however, was subsequently misunderstood, and the
sentence wrongly rendered: "Men must not leave out the afikomin
after the paschal meal." The curious, unintelligible expression
was then taken to refer to some special condiment or "dessert"
which had to be served at the conclusion of the repast, and
thence arose the custom of distributing small pieces of
unleavened bread and calling them 'afikomin!'
Similarly, when the door is opened "for Elijah," we are
plunged at once into the Middle Ages, for the real purpose of
this act seems to have been to provide an effective rebuttal of
the terrible 'Blood Libel' which asserted that Jews employ the
blood of Christian children in the preparation of 'matzah.' The
door was flung open so that all might have a chance of beholding
the complete innocence of the proceedings.
Lastly, the secular songs and ditties with which the service
now concludes and which constitute its most recent - though most
familiar - feature take us straight into Renaissance Europe. One
of these songs, the famous 'Shad mi yodea' ("Who knows one?"),
for example, has been traced by students of comparative
literature to a popular and widespread "counting-out rhyme," the
earliest specimen of which appears in Germany in the fifteenth
century. (In that earlier version, incidentally, the successive
numbers refer to God, Moses, and Aaron, the three Patriarchs, the
four Evangelists, and the five wounds of Jesus!) Similarly, the
'Had Gadya' ("Only One Kid") finds its earliest prototype in a
fifteenth-century German folk song, 'Der Herr der schickt das
Jockli hinaus,' though here again, the wide popularity of the
song is shown by the fact that early versions of it have turned
up in most European countries.
It should be observed also that, in Oriental lands, quite a
different set of popular chants is appended to the 'Haggadah.'
The 'Sephardim,' for instance, have many such chants written in
the Ladino, or Judeo-Spanish, dialect current especially in the
Levant, while elsewhere, Judeo-Arabic and Judeo-Persian songs are
in use. The inclusion in it of those "native" compositions
likewise bespeaks the true character of the Seder as an
expression of the total, continuous experience of the Jewish
people.
(It adopted and adapted what it needed to do in various parts of
the world, and with some outlandish albeit 're-made' sections for
a tradition less vulgar and distasteful - Keith Hunt)
Even the illustrations which adorn the older editions of the
Haggadah conspire to create a picture of the entire stretch of
Jewish history. The "wicked son" (who balances on one leg from
one Seder to the next) is simply a Roman centurion; the one who
is "too young to ask," and who holds up his hands like a
questioning child, is taken directly from an earlier print of a
slave in supplication before Hannibal; while the store-cities of
Pithom and Raamses, which the Israelites were compelled to build
for Pharaoh, are the walled towns of fifteenth-century Europe!
All the centuries seem, as it were to blend and blur.
(Yes, false Christianity of Rome, that adopted and adapted, the
customs and ideas of paganism, baptizing them with so-called holy
water, making them supposedly clean and pure before God, has also
been done by the Pharasaical Rabbis of Judaism through the
centuries - even at the time of Christ it was so in Judah, hence
the words of Christ in Mark 7, denouncing them for following
traditions that made void the commandments of God - Keith Hunt)
.......................
To be continued
History - Phariseeism - Passover #2As Catholicism so JudaismPASSOVER IN HISTORY #2
From the book "Festivals of the Jewish Year" by Gaster (1952)
Continued from previous page:
Nor is it only in the accidental development of its form, or
in the externals of the traditional "book of words," that the
"continuous" character of the ceremony is evinced. Several of the
poems which have been added to the narrative portion of the
Haggadah revolve around the theme that Passover was the occasion
not only of the deliverance from Egypt but also of all the main
deliverances - and, indeed, of all the main events - in Jewish
history. This, of course, is pious fiction, but the fact that it
was invented shows that in the minds of successive generations of
Jews the Seder has always exemplified a continuous and durative
experience. Moreover, that experience is projected into the
future as well as retrojected into the past. Every detail of the
Exodus, it is maintained, foreshadows an element of Israel's
ultimate redemption. In the words of a medieval hymn: 2
They went from Egypt in the dead of night,
Yet was the glow of life their guiding light
That glow which yet shall pierce the darkest skies
When God cries out, "Thy dawn is come! Arise!" 3
When that He did the sea from them divide
The waters were a wall on either side, 4
So, when the new day breaks, the Lord shall keep His word,
and by still waters lead His sheep. 5
On the final night of deliverance - the "night of vigil," as
the Bible calls it (Exod.12:42)--God will come to Israel as a
lover serenading his beloved and eventually winning her as his
own:
......
2 From the poem, "Pesah usheru be-or ha-hayyin le-or," by
Jekuthiel bar Joseph, chanted in some synagogues on the eve of
the eighth day of Passover.
3 Isa. 60:1.
4 Exod. 14:22.
5 Isa. 40:10-11, 49:10.
......
O night of vigil and O witching hour,
When God rode forth from Egypt in His power!
The night shall come when He shall ride once more
As once he rode in those far days of yore.
But we with song shall fill that eventide;
To us He comes a lover to his bride.
O night of vigil and O witching hour!
Tho' God with darkness all the world o'erpower,
Lo, in His hand is day as well as night,
And over us shall break His morning light;
For ne'er that other night shall be forgot
When Abraham led his men to rescue Lot. 6
O night of vigil and O witching hour!
As once when steers would His poor sheep devour,
The Shepherd fought with them and lay them low,
So, as He rescued us so long ago,
He yet shall come, and this long night be done.
Deliverance cometh with the rising sun.
O night of vigil and O witching hour!
Tho' dark the earth and tho' the heavens lower,
This is the hour when God His tryst shall keep
With His beloved, rouse her from her sleep,
And, like a bridegroom leading home his bride,
Lead her in peace to Zion at His side. 7
In another sense, too, the Passover story is a continuous
experience. For if it is true that the punctual event which it
celebrates possesses also a durative character, involving the
children of all generations, it is equally true that the
particular historical occasion of the Exodus represents a
situation which is in itself seemingly
......
6 Cf. Gen. 14:10-16.
7 From the poem "Lel shimmurim '6M6 El hatsah," chanted in some
synagogues on the first evening of Passover.
......
perpetual and which is by no means confined to a single moment of
time. In a larger sense, the villain of the piece is not a
particular Egyptian Pharaoh - Seti I or Ramses II - but all the
tyrants who have ever opposed Israel at any time; the Sea of
Reeds is not the particular Lake Timsah (or any other similar
expanse of water) which the Israelites had to cross on their way
to Sinai, but all the obstacles which Israel has ever encountered
throughout its career and which have yielded when the emblem of
God was lifted above them; the manna is not the peculiar gum of
'Tamarix gallica manni f era,' as learned botanists assure us,
but that divine sustenance on which Israel has been fed
continually while it has been roaming the world's desert to the
place of Revelation - that "bread of angels" which has to be
gathered afresh every morning and which (as the sages acutely
observed) tastes different to every man. And the journey through
the wilderness, in the wake of a cloud by day and a pillar of
fire by night, is the eternal progress of Israel toward the
Kingdom of God.
Nor is it only on the historical plane that this continuous
significance of the festival is brought home. On the seasonal
plane, Passover marks the time when, in Palestine, the heavy
rains of winter give place to the light showers, or "dews," of
spring; and for this reason special prayers for "dew" are
included in the morning service of the first day. But this dew is
not merely a blessing of nature; it is also a symbol of God's
beneficence toward Israel both in the past and in the future. It
is the dew which was mentioned in Isaac's blessing upon Jacob
(Gen. 27,28); to which Moses compared his final discourse (Deut.
32:2); which fell upon Gideon's fleece as a sign that Israel
would be saved from the Midianites (Judg. 6:37-38). It is also
the dew of rejuvenation and resurrection - the "dew of youth"
with which God annoints His Messiah (Ps.110:3), and the "dew of
lights" which, as the prophet says, will eventually fall on the
"land of the shades" (Is.26:19):
Behold, there is a word of God which saith.
"My dew shall fall upon the land of Death," 8
And they that slumber now the long night through
Shall yet awaken with the morning dew....
Lily and rose shall blossom, 9 and the corn
Gleam in the valleys with the dew of morn....
Lo, angels shall unlock the treasuries
Of hea'n and pour the dewdrops from the skies;
And pilgrims wending to the festival
Shall see My dew upon Mount Hermon fall; 10
And all the scattered shall come home again
Unto a land of corn and wine, where rain
Drops gently down from heaven, 11 and the Lord
No longer passes with a flaming sword. 12
The Passover festival then has two basic messages for modern
man. The first is that deliverance from the scourge of bondage
and the night of ignorance lies just as much in his own hands as
in God's. If it is true that God delivered Israel from Egypt "not
by the hand of an angel, nor by the hand of a seraph, nor by the
hand of any one man sent, but by His own glory and His own self,"
it is equally true that in the world of men it
......
8 Isa. 26:19.
9 Cf. Hos. 14:5.
10 Cf. Ps. 133:2.
11 Deut. 33:28.
12 From the poem, "Tahath elath "opher," by Eleazar Kalir (IX
cent.), recited in some synagogues as part of the Prayer for Dew.
......
is by the hands of men that His glory and His being can alone be
revealed.
The second message of Passover is that deliverance is
continual. "The festival is celebrated," says the Haggadah, in
its answer to the "wise son," "because of that which the Lord did
for me, when I came forth out of Egypt." And the wise son
understands.
OMER DAYS
The seven weeks between Passover and Pentecost are known as
the Days of the 'Omer.' Omer is a Hebrew word meaning "sheaf,"
and the name derives from the Biblical commandment (Lev.23:I5)
that from the day when the first sheaf of barley was offered to
God in the sanctuary seven full weeks are to be counted until the
final celebration of the harvest-home and the presentation to Him
of the two loaves of new bread.
The counting, which cornmences on the second night of
Passover,
(That was the Pharisee practice and teaching. It was INCORRECT -
in this case it was the Sadducees that had the correct counting;
they cut the sheaf shortly after sundown on the weekly Sabbath
during the Unleavened Bread feast, and started to count to
Pentecost from the first day of the week after the weekly Sabbath
that fell during the UB feast. See all of my in-depth studies
under "Pentecost" on this Website - Keith Hunt)
is performed in ceremonial fashion every evening at sunset. It is
prefaced by a blessing recalling the Biblical ordinance, and is
followed by the recitation of the Sixty-seventh Psalm ("The earth
hath yielded her produce; God, our own God, is blessing us."). A
prayer is also offered for the rebuilding of the Temple and the
restoration of its ancient services.
The Omer Days are observed as a kind of Lent. At least
during the earlier portion of them, it is not permitted to
solemnize marriages, cut the hair, wear new clothes, listen to
music or attend any form of public entertainment.
The traditional reason for the austerity is that it is a
sign of mourning, commemorating the fact that during this period
of the year many of the disciples of Rabbi Akiba, the illustrious
teacher of the first century C.E., were wiped out by the plague.
This, however, is simply a historical rationalization of a far
more ancient and primitive usage. The true explanation is to be
found in the universal custom of regarding the days or weeks
preceding the harvest and the opening of the agricultural year as
a time when the corporate life of the community is, so to speak,
in eclipse, one lease of it now drawing to a close and the next
being not yet assured. This state of suspended animation is
expressed by fasts and austerities and by a curtailment of all
normal activities. 13
(Once more this is adoptions from the pagan nations around the
world; hence the Jews have their "lent" to correspond with the
Roman Catholic "lent" - Keith Hunt)
Especially interesting in this connection is the ban on
marriages - originally a method of showing that, at the time when
the annual lease of life is running out, human increase also is
arrested. Among the ancient Romans, marriages during May were
considered unlucky. The poet Ovid declares flatly that such
marriages will not last, and adds: 14 "If proverbs mean a thing
to you, men say 'A wicked baggage is a bride in May.'" Moreover,
this belief survives to the present day in many European
countries. In Italy, for instance, it is regarded as inauspicious
to marry in May because that month is "dedicated to the Virgin";
while a North Country rhyme current in Britain asserts that "If
you marry in Lent,/You will live to repent." or, according to
another version, "Marry in May - rue for aye." Similarly, in
several parts of Germany, marriages in May are discountenanced,
and a work on Kentucky superstitions, published as late as
......
13 See below, pp. 53 ff.
14 Fasti, V, 487.
......
1920, bears evidence that the notion has percolated also to the
New World.
On the thirty-third day of the 'omer, known by the Hebrew
name of 'Lag b'Omer,' 15 the lenten restrictions are suddenly
relaxed, according to some authorities, for twenty-four hours
only; according to others, right up to the advent of Pentecost.
Lag b'Omer--which falls on the eighteenth of Iyaris not regarded
as a sacred occasion and is not distinguished by any special
service in the synagogue; it is simply a folk festival. Various
explanations of it are offered in Jewish tradition. It is said,
for instance, that it commemorates the date when the plague which
had been ravaging the disciples of Akiba suddenly ceased. This,
however, rests on nothing more substantial than a misreading and
misinterpretation of a passage in the Talmud. Alternatively, it
is claimed that it marks the day when the manna first began to
fall in the wilderness. But this flies in the face of Scripture
itself, for, according to Exodus 16:13, that event occurred on
the sixteenth, not the eighteenth of the month!
The true explanation, it may be suggested, is that Lag
b'Omer had originally nothing whatsoever to do with the Omer
period as a whole, but was simply a rustic festival which
happened to fall within it. It is the equivalent of the European
May Day.
This conclusion is borne out not only by the close
correspondence of dates but also by the virtual identity of
ceremonies.
......
15 'Lag' is an artificial word made up of the Hebrew letters L-G
which have the numerical value of 33.
......
It was customary on Lag b'Omer for children to go out into
the woods and shoot with bows and arrows. Although this usage has
fallen into desuetude in Western countries, it is still
maintained in the Land of Israel. A popular ditty sung on the
occasion runs as follows:
Up, and to the greenwood,
With arrow and with bow;
There the world is blossoming,
There the flowers blow.
There, on every branch and bough,
The little birds are seen;
And there, as far as eye can reach,
All things are bright and green.
Tradition gives various reasons for this custom. It is said,
for instance, that it symbolizes the readiness of the Jews to
take up arms against those who destroyed the Temple, or - even
more fancifully - that it symbolizes the fact that the great
second-century teacher, Rabbi Simeon ben Yohai, who died on the
day, was so pious and virtuous that throughout his lifetime no
rainbow ever appeared in the sky to portend disaster on earth!
The true explanation lies, however, in the common practice
of shooting arrows at demons and evil spirits on days when they
are believed to be especially rampant. May Day is preeminently
one of these occasions, for, according to popular tradition, the
preceding night - the socalled Walpurgis Nightie 16 is the time
of the witches' sabbath.
In Germany, it is common usage for country folk to go out
into the woods on May Morn and shoot arrows; any-
......
16 The name derives from Walpurgia, an English nun of the eighth
century, who founded religious houses in Germany, and to whom the
Church dedicated the day.
......
one who hears the noise from a distance is expected to cry out:
"Shoot my witch away!" The most interesting example of the custom
obtains, however, in the rural areas of England, where it takes
the form of contests in archery in imitation of the exploits of
Robin Hood. A fascinating description of these ceremonies as
observed in the time of Henry the Eighth, is furnished by John
Stow in his famous "Survey of London" (1603):
"In the month of May, namely on May-day in the morning, every
man, except impediment, would walk in the sweet meadows and green
woods, there to rejoice their spirits with the beauty and savour
of sweet flowers and with the harmony of birds praising God in
their kind; and for example hereof, Edward Hall hath noted that
King Henry the Eighth .... in the seventh year of his reign, with
Queen Catherine [of Aragon] his wife, accompanied with many lords
and ladies, rode a-maying from Greenwich to the high ground of
Shooters Hill, where, as they passed by the way, they espied a
company of tall yeomen clothed all in green, with green hoods,
and with bows and arrows, to the number of two hundred. One,
being the chieftain, was called Robin Hood, who required the king
and his company to stay and see his men shoot, whereunto the king
granting, Robin Hood whistled, and all the two hundred archers
shot off, loosing all at once; and when he whistled again, they
likewise shot again, their arrows whistled by craft of the head,
so that the noise was strange and loud, which greatly delighted
the king, queen and their company. Moreover, this Robin Hood
desired the king and queen, with their retinue, to enter the
greenwood, where, in arbors made of boughs and decked with
flowers, they were seated and served plentyfully with venison and
wine ... and had other pageants and pastimes."
Scholars have long pointed out that the familiar figure of
Robin Hood is simply a transmogrified form of "Robin o' the
Wood," chief of the hobgoblins and mischievous sprites. The
seasonal ceremonies associated with his name are therefore
nothing but distorted portrayals of the antics of these creatures
and of the measures used to drive them away, at the beginning of
spring.
In this connection, the use of the bow and arrow is of
particular interest, for it is motivated by the idea that evil
spirits should be given a taste of their own medicine, requited
with their own weapons, it being a fairly universal belief that
their principal means of attacking mortals is by hurling darts at
them. In the Ninety-first Psalm, for instance, the pious
Israelite expresses his confidence that Jehovah will deliver him
"from the arrow which flieth by day, the pestilence that stalketh
in darkness, the destruction that ravageth at noon" - all three
of them well-known demons of Semitic folklore. Similarly, the
anguished job complains (6:4) that "the arrows of the Almighty
are within me, the poison whereof my spirit drinketh up"; while
in the Iliad of Homer (I, 43-49), Apollo sends plague upon the
Achaeans by shooting his arrows at them. In the same way, too, a
man who was suffering from aches and pains was said in old
English to be "elf-shot," and to this day the Germans call a
"stitch" in the side a Hexenschuss, or "witches' shot."
Moreover, the method of forefending these demons with their
own weapons has several interesting parallels. At ancient Indian
weddings, for example, arrows were shot to protect the bridal
couple; and among the Bechuanas, the bridegroom discharges an
arrow into the bride's hut when she leaves it on marriage. 17
Of interest also is the fact that in the Lag b'Omer
ceremonies, the children go with their bows and arrows not only
to the greenwood but also to the cemetery. Here we have another
link with May Day customs, for the
......
17 A familiar equivalent is the custom of having bride and groom
walk under an archway of crossed swords at military weddings.
......
fact is that dances and convocations in cemeteries were a common
feature of the celebrations on that occasion. It is recorded, for
example, in a medieval Scottish chronicle that in 1282 the priest
of Inverkeithing himself "led the ring" in the village
churchyard, the dancers being his own parishioners; and John
Aubrey, the seventeenth-century English antiquary, informs us
that, in his day, village lads and lasses used to dance in the
churchyards not only on May Day, but also on all holy days and
eves of holy days. 18 This curious practice goes back, of
course, to the common primitive custom of communing with or
propitiating the dead at major seasonal festivals.
In Palestine, Lag b'Omer is distinguished also by another
celebration. On this day, it is said, Rabbi Simeon ben Yohai, the
father of Jewish mysticism, passed from the world, after first
revealing to his disciples the secrets of his mystic visions. In
tribute to his memory, a pilgrimage is made, on the previous
evening, to the traditional site of his grave in the village of
Meron, near Safed. Since, however, the illustrious teacher
departed this life in joy rather than in sadness, the anniversary
of his death is celebrated as a festival, not as a day of
mourning. Accordingly, the pilgrimage is followed immediately by
the kindling of bonfires and by all-night singing and dancing.
This latter celebration is known as "the 'hillula' of Rabbi
Simeon ben Yohai." 'Hilluld' is an Aramaic word (akin to the more
familiar 'hallelujah'), meaning "frolic" or "revel"; but, since
it is also the technical term for wedding festivities, it is
popularly interpreted, in this context, as referring to the
mystic "wedding," or union, of all planes of existence which
......
18 See Margaret Murray, "The God of the Witches" (New York,
1952), p.107.
......
took place when the soul of the sage ascended to heaven. Here
again, what we really have, under the guise of memorial exercise,
is the last lingering survival of a typical May Day ceremony. For
the fact is that it is custo mary in many parts of the world to
kindle bonfires at the end of April or the beginning of May as a
means of forefending demons and witches at the moment when the
cattle are first let out of the barn. In ancient Rome, for
example, such fires were lit at the rustic festival of the
Parilia, on the twenty-first of April; and in England, they are
kindled at crossroads on St.George's Day (April 23) 19
Similarly, the Celtic festival of Beltane, on May 1, was
marked by the kindling of fires, a custom still maintained in the
Scottish and Irish Highlands; in Bohemia and Moravia, it is
common practice, on the same day, to "burn out witches"; and in
Sweden, "huge bonfires are built in every hamlet, around which
the young people dance."
It is not, of course, to be assumed that the Jewish festival
was actually borrowed from Europe. We are dealing solely with
parallel phenomena. But the parallelism shows clearly that here
too, as in the case of so many other festivals, Judaism has
molded ancient clay into new shapes.
......
19 Shakespeare alludes to this in a memorable passage of "King
Henry VI" (I, I, i, 153-154), where the Duke of Bedford, resolved
to go to France and fight the Dauphin, exclaims: "Bonfires in
France forthwith I am to make,/To keep our great Saint George's
feast withal."
......
......................
Note:
As the author said, "Judaism has molded ancient clay into new
shapes" - they, like the Roman Catholic church, took old pagan
ceremonies and customs, and figured if they sprinkle them with
holy water, they would be clean, and God would accept such in
worshipping Him. Nothing could be further from the truth, as
fully expounded on this Website.
Keith Hunt
2ND PASSOVER? I HAVE A STUDY ON MY WEBSITE CALLED "DO WE LOOK TO THE JEWS FOR INTERPRETING THE BIBLE" READ THE FOLLOWING AND I WILL ANSWER - Keith Hunt
Parashas Beha'aloscha The Torah discusses the laws of a person who could not bring the Pascal offering because he was either ritually impure or because he was at a distance from the Mishkan (or in later generations from the Temple.). He is to offer his Passover sacrifice a month later, on the 14th of Iyar. Numbers 9:10 "Speak to the Children of Israel saying: Any man of you or of your generations who will be impure or is on a distant way nevertheless, he shall bring the Passover sacrifice to Hashem."
RASHI Or on a distant way: Rashi: There is a dot on the letter "heh" ( in the word "Rechoka' ("distant") which means that the letter is then regarded as non-existent) and this tells us that the Torah means that the way need not really be a distant one but merely outside the threshold of the forecourt during the time of the sacrificing of the Passover offering. WHAT IS RASHI SAYING? Rashi explains the meaning of the dot on top of the letter 'heh' in the word "rechoka" which we find in the Torah scroll. Whenever a word has one or more dots on the top it the Talmudic Sages interpret the significance of this strange phenomenon. The rule is that when the majority of the letters of a word have dots above them, then the meaning of just these letters is interpreted. When a minority of the letters of a word have the dots, then only the undotted letters are interpreted. So in our case, only one letter is dotted, so it is dropped and the word is read without the letter. The word that remains is "Rachok" which also means "distant" but is the masculine form of the word. Rashi tells us the significance of this. It teaches us that the words "a distant way" refer to a subjective distance and not an objective one. So the person need not actually be distant from the Temple to be excused from bringing the Pascal offering, as long as he is merely outside the entrance of the Temple he is excused, since that "distance" was far enough for him to be delayed in making the sacrifice. The journey itself was not distant; the man was. UNDERSTANDING RASHI The meaning of this interpretation is based on the fact that the Hebrew word "way " ("derech") is feminine while the word "Ish" ("man") is masculine. Therefore once the letter "heh" is dropped, the word "distant" becomes a masculine adjective and refers back to "man" and not to " way." Considering the rules of dots on top of letters in the Torah this is a reasonable interpretation. But for a deeper understanding let us look at the Midrashic source of Rashi's comment.
THE MIDRASHIC SOURCE In the Tractate Pesachim (93a) we find a dispute between Rabbi Akiva and Rabbi Eliezer on this issue. Rabbi Akiva says that the distance is as far as the town "Modiin." Which is about 15 miles from Jerusalem. While Rabbi Eliezer says (based on the dot interpretation) that the distance here is only beyond the threshold of the Temple entrance. The problem is that Rashi has chosen Rabbi Eliezer's interpretation which is nether the law nor the closest to the simple meaning (p'shat) of the verse. Why would Rashi do that? Can you think of an answer? Your Answer:
A DEEPER UNDERSTANDING OF RASHI An Answer: It would seem that Rabbi Akiva's simple interpretation of the word "rechoka" as objectively distant (until Modiim) would be the one that Rashi should have chosen for his commentary, sine Rashi prefers p'shat interpretations. But he does not choose Rabbi Akiva's interpretation because Rashi characteristically sees p'shat in a unique way. He sees p'shat through the eyes of the Sages. And since the Sages have a rule about interpreting words that have dots on top of them, then Rashi too bases his interpretation on this principle. So Rashi is left with the word "rachok" (without the letter "heh" at the end) which must refer to a masculine noun - that is to "man" and not to "way." This interpretation also finds some support in the Torah text itself. See verse 13 where it refers to way but does not mention the word "distant." This would support Rabbi Eliezer's view that the journey need not actually be "distant.". So Rashi has chosen the p'shat interpretation considering the Sages' principle about interpreting the dots on top of letters in the Torah.
ANOTHER ANSWER My Daughter, Elisheva, has suggested another answer to the question: Why did Rashi not choose rabbi Akiva's interpretation (distance means "until Modiim") since it seems closest to p'shat and since the hahlacha is like Rabbi Akiva. Her answer is that the verse (9:10) says :" Any man of you or of your generations" ( see the complete verse above) . Now the distance of Modiim is about 15 miles from Jerusalem while the complete Camp of Israel in the wilderness was only 12 miles square (see Rashi in the book of Joshua). So the verse cannot possibly mean "until the distance of Modiim" as Rabbi Akiva said because Moses was speaking to "YOU" (meaning this GENERATION in the wilderness) and future generations." So this generation had no Jews living at that distance (15 miles) from the Mishkan! So even according to p'shat Rabbi Eliezer (who says beyond the entrance of the Mishkan) would seem to fit the verse better than Rabbi Akiva. I think that's a brilliant answer, even I do say so myself! Shabbat Shalom Avigdor Bonchek "What's Bothering Rashi?" is produced by the Institute for the Study of Rashi and Early Commentaries. The five volume set of "What's Bothering Rashi?" is available at Judaica bookstores. ...................
HIS DAUGHTER WAS ON THE RIGHT PATH.
IT IS A JOKE EVEN AMONG JEWS: ASK 3 JEWS A QUESTION AND YOU'LL GET 3 DIFFERENT ANSWERS.
THE IDEA OF "INTERPRETING" DOTS, DASHES, SQUIGGLES, AND WHATEVER IN HEBREW LETTERS IS STRANGE TO PUT IT MILDLY, AND TO PUT IT BLUNTLY: CRAZY, NUTTY, ABSURD, FANATICAL, RIDICULOUS, AND JUST BIZARRE.
WHY?
WELL IT WOULD MEAN YOU'D HAVE TO KNOW HEBREW FOR STARTERS; SECOND, DIFFERENT IDEAS COULD COME FROM DIFFERENT PEOPLE AS TO WHAT THIS DOT MEANS, OR WHAT TWO DOTS MEAN, OR THIS SLIGHT SQUIGGLE [BACK TO 3 JEWS WITH 3 ANSWERS TO ONE QUESTION]. THIRD, IT WOULD MEAN GOD HAS HIDDEN THE SECRETS OF UNDERSTANDING THE BIBLE IN A KIND OF "CODE" FORM, AND ONLY THE "LEARNED" OF THIS CODE COULD UNDERSTAND THE OLD TESTAMENT.
SUCH A THEOLOGY IS IN THE FANATIC RANGE OF IDEAS.
GOD HAS NOT WRITTEN THE BIBLE IN A WAY ONLY "SCHOLARS" OF A CERTAIN CODE THEOLOGY CAN UNDERSTAND IT.
GOD DID INSPIRE THE BIBLE TO BE WRITTEN IN HEBREW AND GREEK, BUT IT WAS THE COMMON HEBREW AND GREEK OF THE TIMES; NOT SOME "HIGHER LEARNING" HEBREW AND GREEK. THEN GOD IN THESE LAST "EX" HUNDREDS OF YEARS IN THE LATTER END, INSPIRED THE BIBLE TO BE SENT AROUND THE EARTH IN THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE. HE HAD DOZENS OF SCHOLARS IN HEBREW AND GREEK, IN THE TIME OF KING JAMES, TRANSLATE THE BIBLE INTO THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE. THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE HAS BECOME THE UNIVERSAL LANGUAGE OF THIS ENTIRE EARTH.
THE KJV TRANSLATORS HAVE GIVEN THE HEBREW AND GREEK ABOUT 99 PERCENT CORRECTLY INTO ENGLISH. THE 1 % IS EASY TO PROVE WRONG [SUCH AS "EASTER" GIVEN INSTEAD OF "PASSOVER" IN ACTS 12; THE GREEK READS "PASCHA" - OTHER ERRORS ARE TO DO WITH PUNCTUATION - THERE WAS NO PUNCTUATION AT ALL IN THE HEBREW AND GREEK MSS OF THE BIBLE].
JESUS SAID, UNLESS YOU BECOME AS LITTLE CHILDREN YOU CANNOT ENTER THE KINGDOM OF GOD; THE MAIN POINTS OF SALVATION AND THE KINGDOM OF GOD CAN BE UNDERSTOOD BY CHILDREN OF 9, 10, 11 ETC. THEN TO PASS THE MILK STAGE INTO THE MEAT, YOU "SEARCH THE SCRIPTURES" AS JESUS SAID TO DO; YOU FIND ALL THE VERSES ON ANY GIVEN SUBJECT FOR THE FULL TRUTH OF THAT SUBJECT.
YOU DO NOT NEED A PhD IN THEOLOGY TO UNDERSTAND THE BIBLE. YOU DO NOT NEED TO FIGURE HIDDEN CODES ARE IN THE BIBLE, AND ONLY CERTAIN ONES CAN INTERPRET THE BIBLE CORRECTLY.
THIS "JEWISH" CODE UNDERSTANDING IS IN THE SAME BOAT WITH THE GUY IN CHURCH HISTORY CALLED ORIGEN [185-254 A.D.] WHO "ALLEGORIZED" JUST ABOUT EVERYTHING IN THE BIBLE. SO THINGS DID NOT MEAN WHAT THEY SAID. WITH SUCH THEOLOGY IT IS TRUE WHAT SKEPTICS OF THE BIBLE SAY, "YOU CAN PROVE ANYTHING YOU LIKE BY THE BIBLE."
NOW WHAT ABOUT NUMBERS 9:9-11 ?
IT IS THE VERSES ABOUT OBSERVING THE PASSOVER IN THE SECOND MONTH ON THE 14TH. IT WAS GIVEN BY GOD BECAUSE OF THE PHYSICAL WORLD OF MAN, WHERE THINGS CAN HAPPEN TO PREVENT A ONE ONLY DATE OBSERVANCE. SO GOD GAVE THE PASSOVER ANOTHER TIME TO BE OBSERVED, IF THE FIRST DATE COULD NOT BE OBSERVED.
IF WE WERE TO PUT THESE VERSES INTO MODERN PHRASING, WITH THE BASIC UNDERSTANDING THAT GOD KNEW SOME WOULD NOT BE ABLE TO OBSERVE THE PASSOVER IN THE FIRST MONTH ON THE 14TH; WE COULD WRITE IT: "AND THE LORD SPAKE UNTO MOSES, SAYING. SPEAK UNTO THE CHILDREN OF ISRAEL, SAYING, IF ANY PERSON OF YOU OR YOUR GROUP SHALL NOT BE ABLE TO KEEP THE PASSOVER IN THE FIRST MONTH [for reasons such as being unclean through the unclean laws I have given you, or in a journey too far away], THEN THEY SHALL KEEP THE PASSOVER IN THE SECOND MONTH AT EVENING SHALL THEY OBSERVE IT......"
THE WHOLE CONTEXT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH ANY PHYSICAL TOWN OR CITY. READING INTO IT THAT IT DOES MEANS YOU HAVE TO COME UP WITH SOME BIZARRE "CODE" UNDERSTANDING THAT GOD NEVER INTENDED.
WHAT THE ETERNAL IS INTENDING IS AS SIMPLE AS IT READS: THERE MAY BE [TWO ARE GIVEN AS EXAMPLES] TIMES WHEN PEOPLE CAN NOT OBSERVE THE PASSOVER IN THE FIRST MONTH. ANOTHER EXAMPLE WOULD BE "GIVING BIRTH" - A WOMAN MAY GO INTO BIRTHING ON THE VERY EVENING OF THE 14TH OF THE FIRST MONTH. ANOTHER EXAMPLE WOULD BE SEVERE SICKNESS WHERE YOU CAN NOT GET OUT OF BED, OR YOU HAVE COME DOWN WITH A SICKNESS THAT NEEDS YOU TO BE QUARANTINED - SEPARATED FROM OTHERS FOR A TIME.
TO PUT THESE VERSES INTO A MODERN CONTEXT I AM SURE YOU CAN THINK OF OTHER SITUATIONS, THAT MAKE IT IMPOSSIBLE FOR SOMEONE TO OBSERVE THE PASSOVER ON THE 14TH OF THE FIRST MONTH.
SO GOD GAVE ANOTHER TIME YOU COULD OBSERVE THE PASSOVER - THE 14TH OF THE SECOND MONTH.
OKAY, THE QUESTION ARISES; WHAT IT YOU CAN NOT OBSERVE IT THEN EITHER? ANSWER: THEN FOR THAT YEAR YOU CAN NOT OBSERVE THE PASSOVER; GOD ONLY GAVE TWO DATES FOR PASSOVER OBSERVANCE. HE FULLY UNDERSTANDS YOUR HEART, IF FOR SOME ODD REASON YOU CANNOT OBSERVE THE PASSOVER ON THE TWO DATES HE GAVE. THERE IS ANOTHER YEAR, NEXT YEAR...... IF YOU DON'T LIVE TILL NEXT YEAR..... AGAIN GOD UNDERSTANDS YOUR HEART..... NO PROBLEM WITH HIM.
SO DO YOU NOW SEE THE SIMPLICITY OF ALL THIS IN NUMBERS 9 AND THE SECOND PASSOVER DATE?
AH, PUT ALL THIS TO A CHILD OF SAY 9 OR 10 AND THEY WILL UNDERSTAND IT; THE PRINCIPLE BEHIND GOD GIVING A SECOND DATE FOR PASSOVER OBSERVANCE IS SIMPLE; FOR SOME REASON YOU CAN'T OBSERVE IT IN THE FIRST MONTH, YOU CAN OBSERVE IT IN THE SECOND MONTH ON THE EVENING OF THE 14TH.
Keith Hunt
Passover - A Jewish Seder?A look at both gives the answer The following article appeared in
BIBLE REVIEW
Summer 1987
Called "Was the Last Supper a Passover Jewish Sedar?"
by Baruch M. Bokser - With some additional comments and all capital words
by
Keith Hunt
To this day, Jews throughout the world observe the Passover
festival with a highly ritualized meal called a SEDER. The word
means "order" and refers to the order of the SERVICE at the meal,
including prayers, psalms, other readings, the retelling of the
story of the Exodus from Egypt and the eating of special foods
that have symbolic significance.
It is commonly SUPPOSED that the Last Supper, the meal Jesus
ate with his disciples the night before his crucifixion, was a
SEDER.
But was the Last Supper a Passover seder?
The question itself assumes that the Last Supper occurred on
the eve of Passover ... The Synoptic Gospels (Matthew, Mark and
Luke) clearly indicate that the Last Supper was the Passover
meal:
"And on the first day of Unleavened Bread, when they
sacrificed the Passover lamb, his disciples said to him,
'Where will you have us go and prepare for you to eat the
Passover?'" (Mark 14:12; see also the parallel passages in
Matthew 26:17 and Luke 22:7-9).
The disciples then "prepared the Passover" (Mark 14:16;
Matthew 26:19; Luke 22:13). "When it was evening, he sat at the
table with the twelve disciples" (Matthew 26:20 and, with slight
variations, Mark 14:17 and Luke 22:14). This is the account in
the Synoptic Gospels.
According to the Gospel of John ... referring to the same
meal, at which Judas betrayed Jesus, John tells us that it
occurred "before the feast of Passover John 13:1, see also John
19:42). Moreover, after the Last Supper, between the second and
third time Peter denied he was a disciple of Jesus, when Jesus
was taken to Pilate - we are told that the Jews had not yet eaten
the Passover (John 18:28). Finally, John is careful to point out
that Jesus' crucifixion occurred on "the day of Preparation for
the Passover" John 19:14).
Scholars have provided a variety of responses to this
apparent discrepancy. Some say John is correct and the synoptics
are incorrect (Of course both are correct for all four were
inspired by God to write what they wrote - Keith Hunt). Others
say the synoptics are correct and John is incorrect (No, all are
correct, for ALL Scripture is given by the inspiration of God -
2 Tim.3:16 - Keith Hunt).
Still others attempt to harmonize the two accounts by
suggesting that they are referring to different calendars (The
answer simply lies in the fact that the true Old Testament
Passover was at the beginning of the 14th day, when Jesus then
observed it with his disciples, and what John relates is the
Pharisees Passover at the middle and end of the 14th going on
into the 15th. It was called also in every-day language "the
Passover" - John simply does not stop to take the time to
explain, he just uses the language and phrase "the Passover" for
indeed the Pharisees Passover meal had not yet begun when he was
relating the events prior to it. The synoptic Gospels are all
very clear that what Jesus observed with His disciples was "the
Passover" - the reader should then know that Jesus observed the
true Passover of the Old Testament, at the correct time of the
beginning of the 14th. I cover all this in great detail in all of
my Passover studies on this Website - Keith Hunt).
Putting chronology aside for the moment, I would like to
focus on the NATURE of the Last Supper. Was it a SEDER meal as we
have come to know it, assuming that it occurred on the eve of
Passover?
The answer, I believe, is NO!
The seder meal as we know it did not DEVELOP until AFTER 70
AD., in RESPONSE to the Roman destruction of the Temple that
ended the First Jewish Revolt.
The description of the Passover festival in the Hebrew Bible
seems to combine two originally independent festivals (No, the
Bible does not combine them at all, it is the Pharisees Jews that
combined them - Keith Hunt). The FIRST was an ancient
agricultural festival known as the Festival of Unleavened Bread
(an alternative name for Passover, both in the New Testament and
among Jews even today). Unleavened bread (matzah), without yeast,
was baked at the time of the first harvest, in early spring. The
Bible assumes that this festival commemorates the Exodus from
Egypt and that the unleavened bread symbolizes that experience,
in particular, the haste with which the Israelites fled (Exodus
12:17-20,29). The SECOND festival was the Festival of the
Passover Offering, commemorating the historic deliverance of the
Jews when God slew the Egyptian firstborn, but passed over the
houses of Jews whose doorposts were swabbed with the blood of a
sacrificial lamb (Exodus 12:13,23-27). It was at this point that
Pharaoh allowed the enslaved Israelites to leave Egypt.
The fullest biblical account of the evening Passover
observance is found in Exodus 12, which sets out what should be
done on the first Passover night and how it should be remembered
in subsequent years.
The Israelites are instructed to prepare a Passover
offering, and eat it with bitter herbs and unleavened bread, and
to put some of the sacrificial animal's blood on the doorposts so
as to provide a sign that the Destroyer or angel of death should
"pass over" the Israelite homes and afflict only the Egyptian
firstborn.
To ensure that the story is retold in subsequent years, the
Bible uses a pedagogic device: "And when your children ask you,
'What do you mean by this rite?' you shall say, 'It is the
Passover sacrifice to the Lord, because He passed over the houses
of the Israelites in Egypt when He smote the Egyptians, but saved
our houses"' (Exodus 12:26-27). The sacrifice and placing of the
blood on the doorposts are assumed to elicit this question from
the child.
Here and in all other biblical references to the evening
rite the text assumes the CENTRALITY of the sacrifice; the
SACRIFICE is the HEART of the rite. Thus, Numbers 9:1-15
considers the need for a "second Passover" for those who cannot
observe the first because they were in a state of impurity or on
a journey, they must bring a paschal offering one month later and
eat it with unleavened bread and bitter herbs. The implication is
that the holiday cannot be celebrated WITHOUT this sacrificial
lamb.
After the establishment of the monarchy and construction of
Solomon's Temple, the nature of the Passover observance changed.
According to the Bible, before this time it had been a
DOMESTIC observance. The biblical text, even before Solomon's
time, nevertheless looks forward to the place that "God will
choose" for his sanctuary (Deuteronomy 16:2); that is, Jerusalem.
When, in the time of the monarchy, God had in fact chosen
Jerusalem and his sanctuary was built there, the nature of the
Passover observance changed. The Passover sacrifice was still
central, but instead of a domestic observance, it became a
national pilgrim festival, with the sacrifice offered at God's
sanctuary in Jerusalem - though families might celebrate the
festival in that central location.
Passover, at this point associated with joyous festivity,
took on the dimensions of a national holiday. A communal or
family meal still took place after the sacrifice, but the
SACRIFICE remained the critical feature and the eating of the
sacrificial animal was the ESSENTIAL CENTRAL element of the meal.
As in earlier times, the unleavened bread and bitter herbs were
eaten with the animal.
Except for the change from a domestic observance wherever
Israelites assembled, to a national pilgrim festival in
Jerusalem, the same basic pattern of observance is found in
Joshua 5:10-11; 2 Kings 23:21-24; Ezekiel 45:21; Ezra 6:19-22 and
2 Chronicles 30:1-27; 35:1-19. The last two chapters of
Chronicles, describing the Jerusalem observance, emphasize the
great rejoicing, as well as the role of the Levites and other
experts in singing praises to God; Chronicles also states that
the eating of the Passover sacrifice took place in kinship groups
(The writer forgets that before Jerusalem was the place where God
placed His name, it was Shiloh - hence before Solomon and David
his father, God had a place of "festival observance" and so
"pilgrim" feasts - Keith Hunt).
Early post-biblical sources maintain the centrality of the
communal sacrificial meal, even when they supplement the biblical
heritage. For example, Jubilees, a post-biblical text from the
second century B.C., speaks of observing the rite of the Passover
offering at the central sanctuary in Jerusalem and EMPHASIZES the
slaughter of the sacrifice and the people's joy as they eat the
sacrifice, drink wine and praise God (Jubilees 49). (For the
first time, the drinking of wine is required. Reference to bitter
herbs is omitted, and unleavened bread is mentioned only as part
of the Festival of Unleavened Bread.) Other sources - the epic
Greek Jewish poet Ezekiel (second century B.C.), Samaritan
traditions, the Temple Scroll and other Dead Sea Scrolls - all
refer to an evening celebration CENTERING around the SACRIFICE.
Even the Jewish philosopher Philo (c.30 B.C. - 45 AD.), who
adopts an allegorical reading of the Bible, assumes the
centrality of the Passover offering and meal, which he
spiritualizes. To the biblical record, he adds only the singing
of prayers and hymns. He is clear, however, regarding the
celebratory nature of the festival: the practice of "the whole
people" offering the sacrifices, a people "raised for that day to
the dignity of the priesthood ... was sanctioned by the law once
in every year to remind them of their duty of thanksgiving."
(Philo, Special Laws, 2:145-146,148)
(Yes, as Philo well knew, no Levitical Priesthood was needed to
kill the Passover lambs. The Passover lambs were to be killed in
the place where God had placed His name, Jerusalem in king
David's day, and after, but the Passover lambs did not have to be
killed in the Temple by the Priesthood - the people were the
priests on that day for that sacrifice, as Philo relates - Keith
Hunt).
The first-century Jewish historian Josephus, though
frequently mentioning Passover as a thanksgiving for the
deliverance from Egypt, describes the eating of the sacrifice in
fraternities, among the multitude of participants who came on
pilgrimage to Jerusalem. He refers to the great number of
sacrifices and the singing of the Levites accompanied by musical
instruments (Josephus, Wars, 6:423-424).
These post-biblical texts DO note some CHANGES in observance
- prayers, wine, omission of bitter herbs, Levites singing, etc,
- but they consistently center on the SACRIFICE, a distinct
holiday of the Passover Offering. Preparing and bringing that
offering led up to the experience of the sacrifice, which
culminated in the sacrificial meal.
Jews outside of Jerusalem who did not participate in the
sacrifice could still observe the seven-day Festival of
Unleavened Bread by avoiding leaven (This may even be attested in
the Elephantine sources; see Bokser, Origins, pp.20-21).
They might, on their own, gather to usher in the holiday
with a special meal, instruct a child on the meaning of the
event, offer praises to God and drink wine.
But especially those who had once gone on pilgrimage to
Jerusalem would have realized that they were missing the national
celebration. WITHOUT the SACRIFICE, they could not fully share in
the experience of the observance in Jerusalem. Philo insightfully
grasped this dynamic:
"Countless multitudes from countless cities come, some over
land, others over sea, from east and west and north and
south at every feast. They take the temple for their port as
a general haven and safe refuge from the bustle and great
turmoil of life, and there they seek to find calm weather,
and, released from the cares whose yoke has been heavy upon
them from their earliest years, to enjoy a brief
breathing-space in scenes of genial cheerfulness.
Thus filled with comfortable hopes they devote the leisure,
as is their bounded duty, to holiness and honouring of God.
Friendships are formed between those who hitherto knew not
each other, and the sacrifices and libations are the
occasion of reciprocity of feeling and constitute the surest
pledge that all are of one mind" (Philo, Special Laws, Book
I, 69-70).
Anthropologists like Victor Turner, have illuminated how the
heightened experience of departing from home and normal social
structures and going on pilgrimage amidst the throngs of pilgrims
would cause people to abandon their usual approach to the world
and open themselves to new experiences. Furthermore, people
gathering in one location reawaken, reinforce or create a sense
of being part of a larger group. In sharing something that was
offered to God, one not only sensed the divine presence, but
solidified one's bonds with those who shared in the meal.
After the Roman destruction of the Temple in 70 A.D., all
this was no longer possible.
A new challenge faced the Jewish community. How should it
observe a festival that had been tied so closely to the
SACRIFICIAL cult? Some circles of Jews were apparently so caught
up in their grief over the loss of the Temple that they could not
react. Others, however, most notably the nascent rabbinic
movement, found means to continue Jewish life. They DREW ON and
ELEVATED the importance of those biblical rites which did not
require sacrifices and tried to make other religious rituals
independent of the Temple cult and its sacrificial rites. This
was a SLOW process, and all the stages are not clear, especially
because the earliest rabbinic sources were edited considerably
after the events. The MOST important and EARLIEST of these
rabbinic texts is the MISHNAH, edited in about 200 A.D, after the
failure of the Second Jewish Revolt against Rome in 135 AD.
The failure of the Second Jewish Revolt dashed any remaining
hope of rebuilding the Temple or re-instituting its cultic forms.
By 200 AD., the necessity of the rabbinic approach for Jews
was confirmed. Since the Mishnah was not compiled until about
200, it is difficult to be sure what was originally proposed as a
temporary solution and what was suggested (whether after the
Temple's destruction in 70 or whether after the failure of the
Second Jewish Revolt) for the long term (See M.J.Cook, "Judaism,
Early Rabbinic," in Interpreter's Dictionary of the Bible,
Abingdon, 1976, pp.499-504).
(I ASK THE READ TO NOTE AGAIN THE LAST PARAGRAPHS ABOVE - Keith
Hunt)
Several scholars, have noted teachings in the Mishnah that
explicitly free ritual acts from the Temple cult, but they also
note Mishnaic texts that make a CHANGE without explicitly
acknowledging it. Indeed, most of the Mishnah is written as if
religious life in general underwent no changes. Based on this
phenomenon, Jacob Neusner attributes to the Mishnah an a
historical and timeless view of reality (Jacob Neusner, Judaism:
The Evidence of the Mishnah, Chicago University Press, 1981).
A CLOSE STUDY, however, reveals that the laws of the Mishnah
INTRODUCED fundamental CHANGES. In the case of the Passover
ritual, the Mishnah reworks the domestic version of the Passover
observance, as described in Exodus 12 (before the establishment
of the Temple in Jerusalem). It TRANSFORMS what the BIBLE
describes as a DOMESTIC, sacrificial meal into a NON-sacrificial
SEDER. It does this EXTREMELY SUBTLY.
For example, it equates eating unleavened bread and bitter
herbs with the sacrifice, teaching that the unleavened bread and
bitter herbs comprise the festival's three essentials. Because
these two remain viable irrespective of the existence of a Temple
cult, the biblical rite can become independent of the sacrifice
(Alon, The Jews in Their Land, pp.261-265).
(AH, PLEASE NOTE what is beginning to take place here by the laws
of the Mishnah - Keith Hunt)
Moreover, by SUGGESTING that Jews outside the Temple in the
pre-70 period had a meal WITHOUT the Passover offering, it
creates a pre-70 precedent for the NEW protocol WITHOUT the
sacrifice. The Mishnah therefore writes as if the NEW rituals
were the STANDARD pre-70 practice - anachronistically reading
back into history rituals that had NOT YET been adopted. To
appreciate how this is done requires a close critical reading of
the texts.
But it is CLEAR that this in fact occurred. This REWORKING
of history, as it were, was undoubtedly intended to convince Jews
that they should believe or feel that what they were doing
pursuant to Mishnaic rules was religiously viable.
The Mishnah also introduced a change in the thrust of the
Exodus story. This is reflected in the Mishnah's instruction that
one "starts with the disgrace [section of the Bible, which, e.g.,
narrates Israel's slavery] and ends with the glory, and expounds
[the biblical section] from 'A Wandering Aramean was my father'
(Deuteronomy 26:5), until he finishes the entire portion."
The best part of the requirement entails reviewing the
essential message of Passover - the freeing of the Israelites
from Egyptian slavery. The participants are to narrate Israel's
history from its "ignominious" origins to its praiseworthy state.
Such a retelling would not be unusual even in a pre-70
sacrificial rite. But the latter part of the quoted passage
prescribes a novel feature, the exposition of the classic
biblical text of Israel's early history. That text in effect
asserts that Israel continues to experience the divine bounty and
redemption.
This activity will enable the participants to derive new
meaning from the biblical account of redemption from slavery.
Leading people to focus on the ongoing promise of redemption was
made especially prominent by the rabbis after the tragedy of 70
AD.
While the Mishnah speaks of eating the Passover offering,
the unleavened bread and bitter herbs, the latter two, as we have
noted, are equated with the sacrifice. Overcoming the sense of
the physical loss of the Passover offering is further developed
in the Mishnah's symbolic explanation for each of the foods:
As the Mishnah explains, the Passover offering is made
because the Lord passed over the houses of the Israelites, the
bitter herbs are eaten because the Egyptians embittered their
lives and the unleavened bread is eaten because the Lord redeemed
his people. NOTE the unleavened bread has REPLACED the Passover
sacrifice in conveying the notion of REDEMPTION. The text
continues: (on the post-Mishniac glosses to this passage and the
change in the sequence of C.1-3, see Bokser, Origins).
"Therefore we are obligated to give thanks, to prise, to
glorify, to crown, to exalt, to elevate the One who did for
us all these miracles and took us out of slavery to freedom,
and let us say before Him Hallelujah."
After the Roman destruction of the Temple, the Mishnah
restructured the biblical observance of Passover.
The symbolic interpretation of the three foods, giving
significance to what they represent rather than to the literal
act of eating, provides a means of relating to them without their
physical presence being consequential. The symbolic meaning of
the unleavened bread, redemption, leads to the religious
consequence of recognizing redemption: One must give thanks to
God by singing the appropriate biblical psalms and by reciting a
blessing formula. This reminds the people of past bounty so as to
make them realize that they continue to experience it in the
present.
This, in effect, RESTRUCTURES the biblical practice. Instead
of Levites or other experts singing during the slaughtering of
the paschal lamb, ordinary people - without experts - are to
offer thanksgiving even without the sacrifice. Since God
continues to redeem Israel, Israel still experiences the divine
presence.
In still another passage, the sages, Rabbi Tarfon - and
Rabbi Aqiva, differ over the proper blessing to close these
thanksgiving praises to God:
"And [one] seals with [the term for] redemption. Rabbi
Tarfon says, '... Who has redeemed us and redeemed our
ancestors from Egypt and brought us to this night - and
[one] does not seal [with a concluding formula].'" "R.Aqiva
says, [One adds to the blessing:] 'Thus 0 Lord, our God and
God of our ancestors, bring us in peace to the approaching
festivals which are coming to meet us, happy in the building
of your city, [so as] to eat from the Passover and festive
offerings whose blood will reach the wall of your altar with
favor, and let us thank You for our redemption. Praised art
thou, 0 Lord, who redeems [or redeemed] Israel'"
(Mishnah, Pesahim 10:6).
Taron and especially Aqiva refer not simply to a past
redemption but to an ongoing redemption. In the mention of a hope
for the "building of Your city," the Jews in the post-70 period
were provided with a firm foundation of hope for future
redemption. In the post-Mishmic period this thought was
considerably expanded on; in contrast, at this point the message
speaks of the future in terms of the continued presence of God
who redeems and only in passing alludes to the loss of the
Temple. But the hope for the future is clear, and this
RESTRUCTURING reflects a transformation caused by the reality of
life (without the Temple), which contradicts the meaning of the
rite as a pilgrimage festival celebrating national redemption.
The holiday has taken on a NEW dimension, reaching back to
the pre-Temple perspective of Exodus 12, EMPHASIZING the MEAL as
a family gathering independent of any national cult. But the NEW
rite also deals with the hope of future redemption by channelling
it into the experience of the SEDER.
This pattern accords with a feature of rituals in general.
As historians of religion have noted, rituals are often designed
to respond to and overcome the contradictions of life. On the one
hand, the anxiety and disappointment caused by unachievable
ideals are temporarily eased by the experience of the ritual,
where one feels integrated with ones fellow celebrants and in
effect - at that moment - redeemed; on the other hand, a person
there receives a taste of the ideal so that he or she may try to
achieve it in daily life.
By this process and in this way the Mishnah has REWORKED the
DOMESTIC observance described in Exodus 12 into something QUITE
DIFFERENT, making a sacrificial meal INTO a SEDER. This was done
in response to the religious crisis presented by the Temple's
destruction.
The Mishnah characteristically focuses not on the trauma but
on what was necessary in order to deal with that trauma, in
effect working through the religious and psychological problem.
This is in accord with the outlook of the Mishnah as a
whole, as suggested by Jacob Neusner (Neusner, Judaism, The
Evidence).
While the Mishnah nowhere CLAIMS it is TRANSFORMING the
earlier heritage, a CAREFUL reading of the text indicates that,
in FACT, it is. Emotionally it may have been too difficult openly
to acknowledge this change; memories of the Temple were still too
vivid to state cavalierly that it and its sacrificial system were
being replaced. Moreover, the rabbis were trying to convince
others and themselves that the new procedures were religiously
viable and desired by God.
Anachronism provided them, as it has other religious
thinkers through the centuries, with a creative and positive
means to move forward. As Alan Mina aptly put it:
"Alarmed at the effect the loss would have on the people,
the rabbis made believe that there had been no rupture, and
that the institutions they created or adapted had always
existed .... It is a fascinating idea, and one that goes
some way toward accounting for how traditions originate in
untraditional practices and why fictions are sometimes
necessary to give these new traditions power and secure
their acceptance" (Alan Mintz, review of Baruch M.Bosker,
Origins of the Seder, in The New Republic, April 22, 1985,
p.42).
Let us return now m the Last Supper. The meal that Jesus and
his disciples would have eaten on the eve of Passover was the
SACRIFICIAL meal ... NOT a seder as we know it. It would have
FOCUSED on the sacrifice and celebrated the Exodus. It would NOT,
however, have looked to a future redemption, as the post-70 seder
did.
In all four gospels, Jesus and his disciples go to Jerusalem
for the Passover observance, standard practice of all good Jews
who were able to make the journey. In a city crowded with
pilgrims, it was doubtless difficult to find a place where Jesus
and his disciples could gather to eat the sacrificial meal. Jesus
instructs his disciples, as recorded in the Gospel of Mark:
"'Where will you have us go and prepare for you to eat the
Passover?' And he sent two of his disciples, and said to
them, 'Go into the city, and a man carrying a jar of water
will meet you; follow him, and wherever he enters, say to
the householder, The Teacher says, Where is my guest room,
where I am to eat the Passover with my disciples? And he
will show you a large upper room furnished and ready, there
prepare for us.' And the disciples set out and went to the
city, and found it as he had told them; and they prepared
the Passover" (Mark 14:12-16).
During the Last Supper, food is "dipped" and wine is drunk,
but this does not tell us much in terms of Passover observance.
True, at a SEDER wine is drunk and food is dipped in other
food, but this was true at other banquets and, for some, even at
ordinary meals. Moreover, the special dipping at the SEDER
originally involved the bitter herbs, which were dipped into a
special concoction called haroset (Haroset is still served at
Passover seders. Recipes any in different parts of the world, but
they always include chopped fruit and nuts, often bound together
with wine and seasoned with spices).
Thus, there is nothing in the gospel description that
indicates that the Last Supper was a rabbinic SEDER, rather than
the TRADITIONAL SACRIFICIAL meal held at the time....
The rabbis did their RESTRUCTURING in a manner that FIT
their NEED to demonstrate that Judaism could continue after the
destruction of the Temple, to show that the God of Israel still
related to Israel, and that Israel could still experience God and
find favor in God's eyes....
.................
Sorry, the article I have does not have the author's name on it.
If anyone can give me this information, I will be pleased to add
it to the head of the article - Keith Hunt.
Thanks to a gentleman in Michigan by the name of Mike Phillips,
you now have the name of the author of this study. Thank you
Mike, from the Church of God Sabbatarian, greatly appreciated.
As the author has said, there is nothing in the Bible to indicate
the Passover meal or supper of the Old Testament was anything
close to the SEDER meal of the Mishnah and that observed by the
Jews of today. As shown, the CENTRAL eliment of the Old Testament
Passover was the killing and eating of the lamb. As to all the
other things done, in their order, and whatever words spoken for
each, at the Jewish SEDER meal, there is no evidence of any of
this for that which was observed in the true Old Testament
Passover meal, as observed by God's true children from Moses to
the time of Christ.
And under the inspiration of the apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians
11, God's children under the New Covenant gather together NOT to
observe the Lord's supper, but to do as Paul was instructed by
the Lord Himself, and observe the remembrance of Jesus' death on
the NIGHT He was betrayed, the beginning of the 14th of Nisan,
with bread and the fruit of the vine.
Jesus is our PASSOVER (1 Cor.5). He is the LAMB of God that takes
away the sins of the world. The New Testament Passover is NOT the
Lord's supper, but is still the Passover. Jesus through His
sacrifice, shed blood and broken body on the cross, covers,
PASSES OVER, our sins. It is the blood of the true Passover Lamb,
that makes it possible that death shall not come nigh to us -
Keith Hunt
1 CORINTHIANS 11:20.....LORD'S SUPPER
THE GREEK WORD IS DEIPNON
The Strongest Strong's Concordance says... "...banquet, supper, evening meal.."
Thayer's Lexicon says basically the same thing; "....1. supper, esp. a formal meal usually held at evening.....used of the Messiah's feast, symbolizing salvation in the Kingdom of heaven; Rev. 19: 9, 17..... 2. univ. food taken at evening 1 Cor. 11:21
The Englishman's Greek Concordance gives every place it is used, which are:
Mat. 23:6 love the uttermost rooms at feasts Mar. 6:21 made a supper to his lords, high captains 12:39 the uppermost rooms at feasts Lk. 14:12 When you make a dinner or supper 16 And a certain man made a great supper 17 sent his servants at supper time 24 were bidden shall taste of my supper 20:46 the chief rooms at feasts Jon. 12:2 There they made him a supper 13:2 supper being ended, the devil having 4 He arose from supper, and laid arside 1 Cor. 11:20 (this) is not to eat the Lord's supper 21 one takes before (other) his own supper Rev. 19:9 unto the marriage supper of the Lamb 17 unto the supper of the great God
So a meal, a banquet, a feast, an evening meal or supper. The Greek word can be used in all those contexts.
The Passover was an evening meal, the Old Testament Passover with a Lamb eaten, and with un-leavended bread and bitter herbs, as directed by the OT law of God (Ex. 12:5-8 etc.). Wine or fruit of the vine was part of this Passover evening meal by the time of Christ.
1 Corinthians 11:17-34.
We see Paul had taught them how to observe the memorial of the Lord's death (v. 23).
Now there was division.
We see some were continuing to make a meal of it, and a selfish and un-righteous manner in doing so; some were left out, some got drunk (v. 21).
Verse 20, as in the margin reference. "When you come together therefore into one place, YOU CANNOT EAT THE LORD'S SUPPER."
Paul goes on to tell them not only can they not eat the Lord's evening meal [as He did with his disciples at the Passover; which was the Lord's Passover meal] as a New Testament memorial, but many were even trying to do it, and with selfishness [not sharing] and drunkenness [some getting drunk].
All of this was a double whammy; a triple whammy - a meal when it was no longer to be a meal, and doing this meal in a way that Paul says he certainly could not praise. "What! Have you not houses to eat and drink in? Or despise you the Church of God, and shame them who have not. What shall I say to you? Shall I praise you in this? I praise you not!" (v. 22).
THEN PAUL TELLS THEM WHAT HE HAD ALREADY TAUGHT THEM:
"For I have received of the Lord that which also I DELIVERED UNTO YOU......"
Paul tells them again Jesus took bread and the cup and blessed both and told them what they represented for the New Testament Passover (vs. 23-26).
IT IS CLEAR WHAT JESUS INSTITUTED THAT LAST PASSOVER NIGHT TO BE THE NEW TESTAMENT PASSOVER.
IT IS CLEAR PAUL WAS INSTRUCTED TO TELL THE CORINTHIANS AND EVERYONE, THE NEW TESTAMENT PASSOVER WAS NOT TO BE A "LORD'S SUPPER" MEAL.....THEY WERE TO EAT AN EVENING MEAL IN THEIR HOUSES.
THE NEW TESTAMENT PASSOVER EVENING WAS TO BE UN-LEAVENED BREAD AND THE FRUIT OF THE VINE. AND IN THE GOSPEL OF JOHN THE FOOT WASHING SERVICE.
THERE IS ALSO THE RECORD OF HISTORY - CALLED IN CHURCH HISTORY "THE QUARTODECIMIN CONTROVERSY" - THE 14TH OF THE MONTH [of Nisan or Abib - first month in God's canendar].
THE ROMAN CHURCH WENT WITH THE ADOPTION OF "EASTER" SUNDAY MASS SERVICE, AS IT CAME INTO THEIR TRADITIONS. BUT SOME STAYED WITH THE PASSOVER OBSERVANCE ON THE EVENING OF THE 14TH. THE ROMAN CHURCH EVENTUALLY CALLED THEM "HERETICS" AND CONDEMNED THE PRACTICE. ALL THIS I HAVE FULLY EXPLAINED IN OTHER STUDIES.
THERE IS NO RECORD AT ALL OF THESE 14TH OBSERVERS, KEEPING AN EVENING MEAL AS WAS DONE FOR THE OLD TESTAMENT OBSERVANCE OF THE PASSOVER.
AS PAUL SAID, ".....YOU CANNOT NOT EAT THE LORD'S MEAL [SUPPER]" IT WAS NO LONGER TO BE A LORD'S PASSOVER EVENING MEAL.
FOR AT LEAST 500 YEARS THESE 14TH OBSERVERS AND THE "EASTER SUNDAY" ROMAN CATHOLIC OBSERVERS CLASH HORNS ON WHEN AND HOW TO REMEMBER THE LORD'S DEATH.
THE TRUE 14TH CHRISTIANS NEVER OBSERVED IT AS AN EVENING MEAL. THEY FOLLOWED THE INSTRUCTIONS OF PAUL TO THE CORINTHIANS. ..........
SPRING FEAST OF PASSOVER/UNLEAVENED BREAD IS IT 7 OR 8 DAYS?
EXODUS 12:18
DOES THE PASSOVER AND 7 DAYS OF
UNLEAVENED BREAD ALL BEGIN AT THE SAME
TIME, AND SO WE THEN HAVE ONE SPRING FEAST FOR 7 DAYS?
If from Ex.12:18 we are to understand the Feast of
Unleavened Bread beginning at the beginning of the 14th of the
first month, and if verse six is telling us that the Passover was
to be slain and eaten at the beginning of the 14th of the first
month, that together with verse 16, would be stating a number of
things we have not understood before, namely: 1) The Spring
Feast is 7 days long and not 8. 2) The 14th day is a Sabbath
day. 3) The Passover day is the first Sabbath day of the feast
of Unleavened Bread.
Understanding these verses this way, may seem correct within
Exodus chapter 12. But, the Bible contains other verses on the
same subject matter. These also we must take into account. We are
not to read the Bible with horse blinkers over our eyes, or just
ignoring other verses that shed light on the same subject. When
we look at all the other sections of Scripture in the Old
Testament(OT) concerning the Passover day and feast of Unleavened
Bread, there are some large errors in believing the Passover day
and feast of Unleavened Bread(FoUB) are all one, both beginning
at the same time, at the beginning of the 14th.
There are some sections of Scripture that are hard to
understand, at first glance. Peter was inspired to say that some
of the things Paul wrote were hard to understand, by the
unlearned that is, as he went on to say (2 Peter 3:15 and
context). Sometimes we have to search the Scriptures (Acts 17),
study to show ourselves approved, rightly dividing(putting
together verse with verse) the word of truth (2 Tim.2:15), to
come to the truth of the matter on a specific subject.
The above are a few keys to correctly understand the Bible.
I have covered in other Passover studies, many other truths
concerning this Spring Feast. I have proved in earlier studies
that "between the two evenings" - the phrase used in Exodus 12:6
as to when the Passover lamb was to be killed and then eaten,
MEANS, from letting just the Bible interpret itself, at DUSK, or
TWILIGHT - the BEGINNING OF THE 14TH DAY.
All of this I have covered fully before. Hence we clearly
and plainly see from Exodus 12:6 that the Passover lamb was slain
as the 14th day began, and the Passover meal was eaten as that
14th night moved on.
That was the FIRST Passover celebration, starting at DUSK,
at the beginning of the 14th day of the first month. Then if we
turn to Lev.23:5 we find this truth once more reiterated. And
again the phrase "between the two evenings" is used. The
Passover, which was the killing of the lamb to spread it's blood
upon the door posts (in Ex.12) so when God passed over THAT NIGHT
(Ex.12:12) those under the blood of the lamb would be saved from
death, that Passover is IN the 14th day, and at TWILIGHT of the
14th day.
The Passover lamb has to do WITH THE 14TH DAY, and I have
proved in other studies on how God used NUMBERS in the Bible,
that the number 14 is the number for SALVATION - BEING SAVED! It
is two times 7, the number used by God for PERFECTION or
COMPLETENESS (the Eternal completed His work and rested the 7th
day - Gen.2). The number 14 is DOUBLE perfection, as if saying
completely perfect, or perfectly and completely saved - God
making sure it is double "perfect" if He saves anyone.
Now, notice Lev.23:6,7.
"And ON the fifteenth day of the same month is the FEAST of
UNLEAVENED BREAD unto the Lord: seven days you must eat
unleavened bread. In the first day you shall have a holy
convocation: you shall do no servile work therein."
Within THREE verses next to each other are TWO days
mentioned - the 14th and the 15th. The Passover on one and the
feast of Unleavened Bread starts on the other. I submit this is
prettysimple to understand.
I submit to you that a grade school child could easily
figure this one out. Something called the Passover is IN the
14th day, not before and not after, but IN the 14th day. Argue
all you like about WHEN in the 14th day, but the words clearly
say it is IN the 14th day. Then ON the 15th day, not before, is
the feast called Unleavened Bread. Then the thought continues
with verse seven, that the FIRST day of this feast is a Sabbath
of rest from servile work.
The 15th comes AFTER the 14th. On the 15th and for SEVEN
days is the feast of Unleavened Bread in which unleavened bread
is to be eaten. Now ask your grade schooler to start counting
SEVEN DAYS, with the first day being the 15th. Ask them to
stop when they come to the seventh day count. They will stop
counting ON and including the 21st day.
As the 15th day starts at the end of the 14th, when the 14th
finishes, which according to the beginning, from the beginning as
Christ often said ("....but from the beginning it was not so"
Mat.19 for one example) was the "evening" (days beginning and
ending in the evening, Genesis chapter one), was at dusk or
twilight, the 15th was from dusk, evening to evening. So the
21st day was not over until the END of that day at dusk
or evening.
I submit, these verses in Leviticus, are simple to follow.
In the first month there is the Passover day, being the 14th,
followed by, starting with the 15th day, the feast of Unleavened
Bread, continuing for seven day, until the end of the 21st day.
This makes a TOTAL of EIGHT DAYS, not seven!
One of the keys to understanding the Bible and all its
doctrines, is to let the simple easy to understand verses tell
you what they are telling you, in a logical way, without any
fancy foot interpretation.
Let's look at one more simple logical couple of verses
concerning the Passover and feast of Unleavened Bread. Turn to
Numbers 28, and just read verses 16 to 18.
Again, it is IN the 14th day that the Passover is. And it is
IN the 15th day is the feast, the feast of seven days of
unleavened bread, and IN the first day (of this feast, the
logical continuation of the thought) is an holy convocation with
no servile work to be done.
Now, with simple logic, if as some argue the Passover is at
the END of the 14th day, and if we go along with their argument
for verse 16, then the same logic and context of words for verse
15, means the feast is at the END of the 15th. Yet, no one that
I know about who observe the feast of Unleavened Bread, start it
at the END of the 15th day.
Once more in pretty clear language, the Passover is not
before or after the 14th but IN the 14th day, and the seven days
of Unleavened Bread feast, is not before the 14th but starts with
and in the 15th day.
The word "passover" is found 48 times in the OT. Only in
the two sections of Scripture we have looked at - Lev.23 and
Num.28 do we find the word used with fourteen and the feast on
the fifteenth. In other words only in these two places do we have
the simple and logical truth clearly laid out for us that the
Passover is IN the 14th day and the feast of Unleavened Bread is
IN the 15th day, and continues for seven days, the 15th day being
a Sabbath of rest from servile work. In Exodus 12 and Lev.23 we
are also told that the seventh day of this feast is also a
Sabbath of no servile work.
All of what I have just taken you through is very important
to our understanding of Exodus 12:18. It is first of all a
letting of the easy Scriptures tell us in plain language
what they say, meaning what they say and saying what they mean.
When we have that as our foundation and rock to stand on, then we
may proceed to untangle the few harder verses that seem to say
something different.
Now, as we read the Bible from cover to cover, there will be
some other things we will pick up on such as a BASIC NORM on
certain words and then now and again EXCEPTIONS to that norm. We
need to remember that exceptions are just that - exceptions, to
the normal. They are not the norm or normal, but exceptions,
otherwise the exceptions would be the norm and the norm would be
the exceptions.
We may ask: How or WHEN does God start the 24 hour day? Is
it at noon? Is it at sunrise? It is at 12 midnight? Is it at 3
p.m. in the afternoon? Going to the BEGINNING - the book of
Genesis and chapter one, we learn right off the bat, from the
beginning, that God STARTED days in the evening. Now that is the
NORM! You can even look up the word "evening" in the Hebrew
lexicons, especially the larger and more detailed ones such as
"The Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament" and see that
from the Hebrew language, the norm is that days began in the
evening, at dusk or twilight.
So, in the norm, a 24 hour day has only ONE evening, at the
very beginning of that 24 hour day.
Hence, when God was telling Israel about the day of
Atonement feast in Lev.23, He told them that they should
celebrate their Sabbath from EVEN(ing) to EVEN(ing). And
that Sabbath day of Atonement was the 10th day of the seventh
month. The norm in God's mind is that days begin from evening
and last (the 24 hour day we are talking about, not the day light
part of a day) until the next evening, when a new day then
begins. The celebrating of Atonement feast was IN or ON the 10th
day, from evening to evening.
The word "even" or "evening" is used dozens of times
throughout the Bible. In most cases it is just a part of speech,
such as saying, "and the evening had come." Sometimes it is used
in conjunction with a number, like: "during the evening of the
third day" and no more is said. In all such places it takes the
NORM, as first given to us in the beginning, the evening of the
day being the beginning of the day.
That is letting the basic simple, first and MAIN meaning and
understanding of how the Bible uses "evening" interpret for us,
as we find this word in dozens of places.
But, and here come the "but" with capital letters, BUT, from
time to time there are EXCEPTIONS, with capital letters for
emphasis, so you will remember this point.
And as we are talking about the feast of Atonement in Lev.23
we shall stay there and see our first exception example.
Lev.23:26 tells us in clear language that it is the 10TH day
of the seventh month that is the day of Atonement. Verse 32 says
it is a Sabbath of rest, then the last half of that verses says
we shall celebrate it FROM "even" to "even." The NORM is that God starts days from evening to evening as we
see in Genesis chapter one. But there are times when God inspires
writers to use what to us has come to be known as the Roman way
to start and end days, from midnight to midnight.
When we understand this then all what might seem to be
contradictory is cleared up.
The evening of the 9th day, in this case, is indeed the evening that follows the
day light portion of the 9th day. And can so be called, in the
Roman way of counting days, the evening of the 9th day. At the
same time, in the norm of how God counts days, from evening to
evening, it is the start of the 10th day in this 7th month.
Within a relatively short passage of Scripture, God uses BOTH
ways to count days. He uses His way, hence the 10th day, and He
uses the Roman way, hence the feast of Atonement begins on the
evening of the 9th day, which is also the start of the 10th day
as we view it from the counting of days as found in Genesis
chapter one.
The evening following the day light part of the 9th day is called
here still the evening of the 9th day. It is the way we think of it
in our Roman way of counting days, from midnight to midnight. It is
the evening of the 9th day, but in the norm of God's recognizing it
is the start of the 10th day. So God uses both ways of recognizing in
one sentence. It is the evening of the 9th in Roman counting of days,
but it is also the start of the 10th in the norm of Genesis chapter
one.
There are NORMS in the Bible for MANY things, but there are
also EXCEPTIONS to the norm at times. Generally and normally,
the Spirit of God is given to a person under the New Covenant, at
BAPTISM, see Acts 2:38, BUT we find in the book of Acts
some EXCEPTIONS to that norm, the Spirit was given BEFORE
baptism! See Acts 10:44-48.
We find in the New Testament, concerning "evening" an
EXCEPTION to the norm. Turn to the gospel of John, chapter 20.
The context is clearly the FIRST DAY of the week. Also proved by
the rest of the gospel writers - Matthew, Mark and Luke as they
write concerning the same happenings.
Notice, verse 19. Mark it well. "Then the SAME DAY, at
EVENING, being the FIRST DAY of the week......"
Here John, under inspiration by the Spirit, does the same as
the Eternal did in Lev.23:32. He puts the evening that would
normally start the new day, or in this case, would have started
the SECOND day, as PART OF the same day of the context - the
FIRST day.
Yes, there are now and then exceptions to the rule or the
norm.
Now, with all the above firmly and clearly understood.
Knowing from the easy to understand verses we looked at in Lev.23
and Numbers 28 concerning the Passover in the 14th day and the
feast of Unleavened Bread in the 15th day, starting and
continuing for seven days, to the end of the 21st day. Knowing
there are EIGHT days altogether from the 14th to the 21st - eight
days not seven. Knowing that the rule and norm for the evening of
a day to be the beginning of the day, but knowing the Bible does
use exceptions to that rule once in while. Knowing we must take
the easy to understand verses on a subject, first, and let them
say what they say, and then in their light tackle the harder and
at first what may seem like contradictory verses.
With all the above we are now ready to understand Exodus
12:18-20.
Previous studies have proved from the Bible interpreting
itself, that "between the two evenings" and "even" of the 14th
day when the lambs were to be killed and the Passover eaten, was
the BEGINNING of the 14th, at DUSK or twilight. Hence verse 6 of
chapter 12, was at dusk, the beginning of the 14th day. The
CONTEXT, right up to the end of verse 14 (interesting, verse 14
the context goes to) NEVER CHANGES. The Lord's Passover (verse
11) is IN the 14th day, not after it. The Lord PASSED OVER
(Passover) "this night" (context is still 14th day) of the 14th
day (verses 12-13). This SAME DAY - the 14th - is a MEMORIAL (see
also 1 Cor.11 and the Greek for "in remembrance of me" - verse
24,25. It is "in THE remembrance/memorial of me." And Paul was
talking about the SAME NIGHT in which Jesus was betrayed, verse
23).
Verse 14 of Exodus 12, calls the Passover a MEMORIAL and a
FEAST.
God has SEVEN feasts and the Passover is ONE of those
feasts.
Verse 15 of Exodus 12, STARTS a NEW thought and a set of new
commands and instructions. From verses 15 to 20 the context is
the Feast of Unleavened Bread.
It is the same as Lev.23 and Numbers 28 we looked at, with a
few differences. It is SEVEN days in duration, the first of those
seven days is a holy convocation, a Sabbath of rest, no work
except that which may be for eating food. Exodus 12 tells us the
7th day of this FoUB is also an holy convocation, a Sabbath day.
We now come to verse 18. The only way to understand this
verse, in the light of the plain simple verses on the subject of
starting and finishing this seven day feast, as given to us in
Lev.23 and Numbers 28, is that here we have an EXCEPTION to the
norm or rule, of the use of evening. An exception such as found
in Lev.23:32 and John chapter 20.
The evening here in verse 18 would normally be the START of
the 15th day, but God chose to change the fast ball to a curve
ball for this pitch to home plate. He can do this you know, as
He is God, He is the pitcher, the one delivering the goods, and
He can deliver as He chooses. God here chose to deliver with an
exception to the norm of speech that uses the word "even" or
"evening." Here God chose to put the evening of the 15th AS PART
OF THE EVENING OF THE 14TH, THE EVENING HERE IS THE END OF THE
14TH, STARTING INTO THE 15TH DAY, GOING TO THE END OF OR
THE EVENING OF THE 21ST DAY, WHICH IS THE START OF THE 22ND DAY,
BUT PUT HERE AS STILL BELONGING TO THE 21ST DAY. The same
principle as John saying Jesus came to them in the evening, being
the first day of the week. John putting the evening of the second
day (normally speaking as from the beginning - Gen.1) not with
the second day, but as part of the first day. The same principle
as God putting the day of Atonement in Lev.23:32 as from the
evening of the ninth day to the evening of the tenth day. An
exception to the norm, which usually as the rule of thumb, puts
the evening of a day at the beginning of the day, the start of a
new day, as from the beginning in Genesis chapter one.
So, Exodus 12:18 DOES NOT CONTRADICT Lev.23:5-7 and Numbers
28:16-18, or the rest of the Scriptures proving the Passover was
at the beginning of the 14th, and the feast of Unleavened Bread
beginning on the 15th at dusk or evening, being a Sabbath day,
the first day of the seven day FoUB, lasting to the end of the
21st day, which was the last day, and a Sabbath day, to end this
Spring feast season, which consisted of TWO feast to the Lord,
the Passover memorial feast and the feast of seven days called
Unleavened Bread.
All is in complete and perfect HARMONY when you believe the
simple and easy to understand verses FIRST, willing to search for
all verses on a subject, and then realize there may be an
EXCEPTION to the norm which then seems to be harder to understand
and even contradictory, but it is not, when you understand the
use of exceptions to the normal.
..............................
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