Passover

The institution of the Passover

The Hebrew term “Passover” derives from a verb meaning “to pass over” with the sense of “to spare”.

Celebrating the Passover

Instructions concerning its observance

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Combined with the Feast of Unleavened Bread

Exodus 34:25 KJV 1900

Thou shalt not offer the blood of my sacrifice with leaven; neither shall the sacrifice of the feast of the passover be left unto the morning.

The need for ritual cleansing

John 11:55 KJV 1900

And the Jews’ passover was nigh at hand: and many went out of the country up to Jerusalem before the passover, to purify themselves.

Provision for ritual uncleanness

Numbers 9:6–13 KJV 1900

And there were certain men, who were defiled by the dead body of a man, that they could not keep the passover on that day: and they came before Moses and before Aaron on that day: And those men said unto him, We are defiled by the dead body of a man: wherefore are we kept back, that we may not offer an offering of the Lord in his appointed season among the children of Israel? And Moses said unto them, Stand still, and I will hear what the Lord will command concerning you. And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, If any man of you or of your posterity shall be unclean by reason of a dead body, or be in a journey afar off, yet he shall keep the passover unto the Lord. The fourteenth day of the second month at even they shall keep it, and eat it with unleavened bread and bitter herbs. They shall leave none of it unto the morning, nor break any bone of it: according to all the ordinances of the passover they shall keep it. But the man that is clean, and is not in a journey, and forbeareth to keep the passover, even the same soul shall be cut off from among his people: because he brought not the offering of the Lord in his appointed season, that man shall bear his sin.

Provision for non-Jews

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Its observance in the OT

These occasions are times of spiritual renewal, when the nation remembered how the Lord had saved them:

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Ezekiel’s vision of the future observance of the Passover

Ezekiel 45:21–24 KJV 1900

In the first month, in the fourteenth day of the month, ye shall have the passover, a feast of seven days; unleavened bread shall be eaten. And upon that day shall the prince prepare for himself and for all the people of the land a bullock for a sin offering. And seven days of the feast he shall prepare a burnt offering to the Lord, seven bullocks and seven rams without blemish daily the seven days; and a kid of the goats daily for a sin offering. And he shall prepare a meat offering of an ephah for a bullock, and an ephah for a ram, and an hin of oil for an ephah.

The Passover in the NT

Its observance

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It was celebrated by Jesus Christ

At Passover time Jesus Christ himself was sacrificed and he inaugurated the Lord’s Supper.

See also ; Jesus Christ observed the Passover like other Jews.

Jesus Christ identified with the Passover lamb

1 Corinthians 5:7 KJV 1900

Purge out therefore the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened. For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us:

See also ; ; This may refer to the Passover victim; ;