The Passover #34

The Passover is both the night in Egypt when God struck down the firstborn while sparing the Israelites, and the yearly feast that Israel keeps in memory of it. The instructions are given in Exodus 12. It is the final of the ten plagues, the event that led Pharaoh to release Israel, and one of the most important background themes for understanding the New Testament.

Biblical Account

God told Moses and Aaron that the month of the exodus would be the first month of the year (Exodus 12:1-2). On the tenth day, each household was to choose a lamb, a year-old male without blemish, and keep it until the fourteenth day, when the whole assembly would slaughter it at twilight (Exodus 12:3-6). They were to put some of the blood on the two doorposts and the lintel of the houses where they ate, and eat the roasted meat with unleavened bread and bitter herbs, dressed to travel, with belts fastened, sandals on, and staffs in hand, and “in haste” (Exodus 12:7-11).

God said that on that night he would pass through Egypt and strike down every firstborn, both man and beast, and execute judgment on the gods of Egypt: “The blood shall be to you for a token upon the houses where ye are… and when I see the blood, I will pass over you” (Exodus 12:12-13). The day was to be kept as a memorial throughout their generations, along with a seven-day feast of unleavened bread (Exodus 12:14-20).

Moses passed the instructions to the elders, telling them that when their children asked what the rite meant, they should answer, “It is the sacrifice of the LORD’s passover, who passed over the houses of the children of Israel in Egypt” (Exodus 12:21-27). At midnight the LORD struck down all the firstborn in Egypt, from Pharaoh’s son to the prisoner’s, and there was a great cry, for there was not a house without someone dead (Exodus 12:29-30).

Theological Significance

Passover teaches that deliverance comes through a substitute and through obedience to God’s word. The lamb’s blood marks the household, and the Israelites are saved by trust in the instruction and not by their own merit. The feast later became one of the three annual pilgrimage festivals, described in Leviticus 23:4-8 and Deuteronomy 16:1-8, and it remains central to Jewish life today, with the Seder as its home ritual.

The New Testament draws heavily on this pattern. Paul writes, “Christ our passover is sacrificed for us” (1 Corinthians 5:7), and John the Baptist calls Jesus “the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). The Gospels connect Jesus’ final meal with his disciples to Passover, and he gave the bread and cup new meaning there (Luke 22:7-20). The Gospel of John places the crucifixion at the time the Passover lambs were being slaughtered, and scholars discuss how John’s timeline relates to that of the other Gospels.

The Hebrew word pesach is traditionally understood as “pass over,” though some scholars propose other senses, such as “protect.”