Exodus 12:1-20

B. The divine ordinance of the passover

Exodus 12:1-20

1, 2And Jehovah spake unto Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, saying, This month shall be unto you the beginning of months; it shall be the first month of the year to you. 3Speak ye unto all the congregation of Israel, saying, In [On] the tenth day of this month they shall take to them every man a lamb, according to the house of their fathers [according to households], a lamb for a house: 4And if the household be too little for the [a] lamb, let him and his neighbor next unto his house take it according to the number of the souls; every man according to his eating, shall [shall ye] make your count for the lamb. 5Your lamb shall be [ye shall have a lamb] without blemish, a male of the first year [one year old]: ye shall take it out [take it] from the sheep, or from the goats. 6And ye shall keep it up [keep it] until the fourteenth day of the same [this] month: and the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening. 7And they shall take of the blood, and strike [put] it on the two side-posts and on the upper door-post 8[the lintel] of the houses wherein they shall eat it. And they shall eat the flesh in that night roast [roasted] with fire, and unleavened bread; and [bread]: with 9bitter herbs they shall eat it. Eat not [nothing] of it raw, nor sodden at all [boiled] with water, but roast [roasted] with fire; his [its] head with his [its] legs, and with the purtenance [inwards] thereof. 10And ye shall let nothing of it remain until the morning; and that which remaineth of it until the morning ye shall burn with fire. 11And thus shall ye eat it: with your loins girded, your shoes on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and ye shall eat it in haste: it is the Lord’s 12passover [a passover unto Jehovah]. For [And] I will pass through the land of Egypt this night, and will smite all the first-born in the land of Egypt, both man and beast; and against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgment: I am Jehovah. 13And the blood shall be to you for a token [sign] upon the houses where ye are: and when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you [there shall be no destroying plague upon you], when I smite the land of Egypt. 14And this day shall be unto you for a memorial; and ye shall keep [celebrate] it a feast to Jehovah; throughout your generations ye shall keep it a feast by an ordinance forever [celebrate it as a perpetual ordinance]. 15Seven days shall ye eat unleavened bread; even [yea, on] the first day ye shall put away leaven out of your houses; for whosoever eateth leavened bread from the first day until the seventh day, that soul shall be cut off from Israel. 16And in the first day there shall be a holy convocation, and in the seventh day there shall be a holy convocation to you [on the first day ye shall have a holy convocation, and on the seventh day a holy convocation]; no manner of work [no work] shall be done in them; save [only] that which every man must eat [is eaten by every man], that only may be done of you. 17And ye shall observe the feast of unleavened bread; for in [on] this self-same day have I brought your armies [hosts] out of the land of Egypt; therefore shall ye [and ye shall] observe this day in [throughout] your generations by [as] an ordinance foreExo Exodus 12:18 In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month at even, ye shall eat unleavened bread, until the one and twentieth day of the month at even. 19Seven days shall there be no leaven found in your houses: for whosoever eateth that which is leavened, even [leavened], that soul shall be cut off from the congregation of Israel, whether he be a stranger [sojourner] or born in the land. 20Ye shall eat nothing leavened; in all your habitations shall ye eat unleavened bread.

TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL

[Exodus 12:11. בְּחִפָּזוֹן. Lange translates: in Flucht-bereitschaft, “in readiness for flight,” condemning De Wette’s rendering, Eilfertigkeit, “haste,” “precipitation.” But in the only other two passages where the word occurs, Lange’s translation is hardly admissible. Deuteronomy 16:3, “Thou camest forth out of the land of Egypt in haste, בְּחִפָּזוֹן.” It could not be said, “Thou camest forth in readiness for flight.” So Isaiah 52:12, “Ye shall not go out with haste (בְּחִפָּזוֹן), nor go by flight.” Here the word also denotes anxious haste. The verb חָפַז likewise everywhere conveys the notion of hurriedness, or anxiety connected with haste. Tr.].

EXEGETICAL AND CRITICAL

Exodus 12:1 sqq. Institution of the Passover. As Christendom reckons its years according to the salvation in Christ, so the Israelites were to reckon the months of the year from the first month of their redemption. The first month, in which the redemption took place, Abib (month of green ears) or Nisan, was to become the first month of their year. Hereby likewise the feast of the Passover was to be made the foundation of all the Jewish feasts, and the Passover sacrifice the foundation of all the various kinds of offering. The feast, however, becomes a double one. The Passover, as the feast of redemption, lasts, together with the day of preparation, only one night; the least of unleavened bread (including the Passover) seven days. Since the feast of the great day of atonement also coalesces with the feast of tabernacles which follows close upon it, it would seem that the feast of Pentecost also, as the feast of ingathering, requires to be coupled with something. The institution of the feast of the Passover, connected with the announcement of the destruction of the first-born of Egypt, is narrated in Exodus 12:1-14; in 15–20 the institution of the feast of unleavened bread. The two feasts, however, are so thoroughly blended into one, that the whole feast may be called either the Passover, or the feast of unleavened bread. The festival as a whole signifies separation from the corruption of Egypt, this being a symbol of the corruption of the world. The foundation of the whole consists in the divine act of redemption celebrated by the Passover. The result consists in the act of the Israelites, the removal of the leaven, which denotes community with Egyptian principles (Vid. Comm. on Matthew, pp. 245, 289). We have here, therefore, a typical purification based on a typical redemption.

Exodus 12:1-2. In the land of Egypt.—It is a mark of the dominion of Jehovah in the midst of His enemies, that He established the Jewish community in the land of Egypt, as also the Christian community in the midst of Judaism, and the Evangelical community under the dominion of the Papacy. To the triumphant assurance in regard to the place corresponds the triumphant assurance in regard to the time: the Passover, as a typical festival of redemption, was celebrated before the typical redemption itself; the Lord’s Supper before the real redemption; and in the constant repetition of its celebration it points forward to the final redemption which is to take place when the Lord comes. Keil calls attention to this legislation in the land of Egypt, as the first, in distinction from the legislation on Mt. Sinai and the fields of Moab. The beginning of months. It does not definitely follow from this ordinance that the Jews before had a different beginning of the year; but this is probable, inasmuch as the Egyptians had a different one. Vid. Keil, Vol. 11., p. 10. Nisan nearly corresponds to our April.

Exodus 12:3. Unto all the congregation of Israel.—As heretofore, through the elders. A lamb.—A lamb or kid. According to households.—The companies were not to be formed arbitrarily, but were to be formed according to families. Vid. Exodus 12:21. On the tenth day of this month.— Vid. Exodus 12:6.

Exodus 12:4. Of course more than two families might unite, if some of them were childless. Also perhaps the gaps in smaller families might be filled by members from excessively large ones. Later tradition fixed upon ten as the normal number of participants.

Exodus 12:5. Quality of the lamb: without blemish, male, one year old. For divergent opinions, see Keil, Vol. II., p. 11. That the lamb, as free from blemish, was designed to represent the moral integrity of the offerer (Keil), is a very doubtful proposition, since moral integrity needs no expiatory blood; it might, with more propriety, be taken to represent theocratic integrity. Also the requirement that the lamb be a male can hardly [as Keil assumes] have exclusive reference to the first-born sons [for whom the lambs were substituted]. The requirement of one year as the age probably is connected with the necessity that the lamb be weaned; furthermore, it was for a meal which was to suffice for an ordinary family. The first-born of beasts which were sacrificed on other occasions than at the Passover needed only to be eight days old. As the lamb was of more value than the kid, it is natural that for this occasion it became more and more predominantly used.

Exodus 12:6. Ye shall keep it.—Does this mean simply: ye shall keep it in store? Probably it is intimated that the lamb was designed either to represent the persons, or to be held in custody for them. Why did this keeping of the animal last from the 10th to the 14th of Nisan? “Which regulation, however, Jonathan and Raschi regarded as applicable only to the passover slain in Egypt” (Keil). According to Hofmann, the four days refer to the four generations spent by the Israelites in Egypt. In that case the whole analogy would lie in the number four. If the 10th day of Nisan was near the day of the command, and Moses foresaw that the last plague would not come till after four days, it was natural for him not to leave so important a preparation to the last day; the four days, moreover, were by the ordinance itself devoted entirely to wholesome suspense and preparation; in another form Fagius refers to this when he says: “ ut occasionem haberent inter se colloquendi et disputandi,” etc. Vid. Keil. The whole assembly of the congregation of Israel.—Although every head of a family killed his lamb, yet the individual acts were a common act of the people in the view of the author of the rite. Israel was the household enlarged; the separate household was the community in miniature. Hence later the lambs were slain in the court. In the evening (literally “between the two evenings”). This regulation, which distinguishes two evenings in one day, is explained in three ways: (1) between sunset and dark (Aben-Ezra, the Karaites and Samaritans, Keil and others); (2) just before and just after sunset (Kimchi, Raschi, Hitzig); (3) between the decline of the day and sunset (Josephus, the Mishna, and the practice of the Jews). Without doubt this is the correct explanation; in favor of it may be adduced Exodus 16:12; Deuteronomy 16:6; John 13:2. According to this passage, preparation for the Passover was begun before the sun was fully set. Considerable time was needed for the removal of the leaven and the killing of the lamb. According to the Jewish conception of the day as reckoned from 6 A. M. to 6 P. M., there was in fact a double evening: first, the decline of the day of twelve hours; secondly, the night-time, beginning at 6 P. M., which, according to Genesis 1:5 and Matthew 28:1, was always evening in the wider sense—the evening of the day of twenty-four hours—which preceded the morning, the day in the narrower sense.

Exodus 12:7. Take of the blood.—The two door-posts, as well as the lintel of the door, denote the whole door; the threshold is excepted because the atoning blood should not be trodden under foot. “The door,” says Keil, “through which one goes into the house, stands for the house itself; as is shown by the frequent expression: ‘in thy gates,’ for ‘in thy cities,’ Exodus 20:10, etc.” It is here assumed that every house or tent had a door properly so called. “Expiation was made for the house, and it was consecrated as an altar” (Keil). This is a confused conception. It was the household that was atoned for; the building did thus indeed become a sort of sanctuary; but in what sense was it to be an altar? For here all kinds of offerings were united in one central offering: the חֶרֶם, or the slaughter of the Egyptian firstborn; the expiatory offering, or the blood sprinkled by the hyssop-branch on the door-posts (Leviticus 14:49; Numbers 19:18), which, therefore, as such represent the several parts of the altar; the thank-offering, or the Passover-meal; the burnt-offering, or the burning of the parts left over. Because the door-posts themselves stand for the altar, the smearing of them was afterwards given up, and, instead, the lamb was killed in the court; and this change must have been made as soon as there was a court.

Exodus 12:8. On that night.—The one following the 14th of Nisan. Why only on the same night? Otherwise it would not have been a festive meal. Why roasted? The fire (itself symbolically significant) concentrates the strength of the meat; by boiling a part of it passes into the water. The unleavened bread has a two-fold significance. When eaten at the Passover, it denotes separation from the leaven of Egypt (Matthew 16:6; Matthew 16:12; 2 Corinthians 5:8); as a feast by itself, the feast of unleavened bread, called bread of affliction, denotes remembrance of the afflictions which were connected with the flight from Egypt (Deuteronomy 16:3). This is overlooked, when it is inferred from Exodus 12:17 that the ordinance of the feast of unleavened bread was made at a later time (as Keil does, II., p. 20). With bitter herbs.—מְרֹרִים, πικρίδες (LXX.), lactucæ agrestes (Vulg.), the wild lettuce, the endive, etc. Vid. Keil II., p. 15, Knobel, p. 99. “According to Russell,” says Knobel, “there are endives in Syria from the beginning of the winter months to the end of March; then comes lettuce in April and May.” According to Keil, “the bitter herbs are not called accompaniments of the meal, but are represented as the principal part of the meal, here and in Numbers 9:11.” For עַל, he says, does not mean along with, together with, but retains its fundamental meaning, upon, over. In this way the following strange symbolic meaning is deduced: “The bitter herbs are to call to mind the bitterness of life experienced by Israel in Egypt, and this bitterness is to be overcome by the sweet flesh of the lamb.” If only the bitter herbs did not taste pleasant! If only the lamb did not form a meal of thank-offering, and in this meal were not the chief thing! May not the lamb, according to the usual custom, have lain upon a setting of bitter herbs? In the passage before us only the unleavened bread is said to be put upon the bitter herbs. The modification of the arrangement in Numbers 9:11 is unimportant. It is a strange notion that the bitter herbs and the sweet bread formed “the basis of the Passover-meal” (Keil). In that case the “sweet” bread ought to have made the “sweet” flesh of the lamb superfluous. Moreover, the opposite of sweet is not bitter, but sour. According to Knobel, the bitter herbs correspond to the frankincense which used to accompany many offerings of grain, inasmuch as they had, for the most part, a pleasant odor. But frankincense has a special reference to prayer. If the bitter herbs are to be interpreted as symbolic, we may understand that they supplement the negative significance of the unleavened bread by something positive, as being health-giving, vitalizing, consecratory herbs.

Exodus 12:9. Its head with its legs. [“From the head to the thighs,” is Lange’s translation.] “ I.e., as Raschi correctly explains, whole, not cut in pieces, so that the head and legs are not separated from the animal, no bone of him is broken (Exodus 12:46), and the inward parts together with the (nobler?) entrails, these of course first cleansed, are roasted in and with the body.” The unity of the lamb was to remain intact; on which point comp. Bähr, Symbolik des Mosaischen Cultus II., p. 635, Keil, and others. The symbolic significance of the lamb thus tended towards the notion of personality and inviolability, that on which rested also the fact and continuance of the unity of the family which partook of it.

Exodus 12:10. Let nothing of it remain. “But what nevertheless does remain till morning is to be burnt with fire” (Keil). But was any of it allowed to remain till morning? Vid. my hypothesis, Life of Christ, Vol. IV., p. 262.

Exodus 12:11. And thus. The preparation for the journey is here at once real and symbolic. The readiness to start is expressed by three marks: the loins girded (tucked up); the travelling shoes on the feet; the walking-stick in the hand. That even the O. T. ritual was no rigid ordinance is proved by the remarkable fact that at the time of Christ they ate the passover lying on couches. In haste. [“In readiness for flight,” Lange.] A meal could hardly have been taken in “anxious flight” (Keil), or in “anxious haste” (Knobel).—It is Jehovah’s Passover. Not the Passover unto Jehovah, as Keil takes it, referring to Exodus 20:10, Exodus 32:5. For the Passover designates Jehovah’s own going through, going by, passing over (sparing), as symbolically represented and appropriated by the Passover festival. The feast, it is true, is celebrated to Jehovah; but it celebrates Jehovah’s act, and in the place where the rite is first instituted, it cannot appear as already instituted. The LXX say: πάσχα ἐστὶ κυρίῳ. The Vulg. “ est enim Phase (id est transitus) domini. On the meaning of פָסַח vid. the lexicons, and Keil II., p. 17. The pesach is primarily the divine act of “passing over;” next the lamb with the killing of which this exemption is connected; finally, the whole eight days’ festival, including that of unleavened bread (Deuteronomy 16:1-6), as, on the other hand, the latter feast also included that of the Passover. That this first Passover was really a sacrificial feast, Keil proves, in opposition to Hofmann, II., p. 17. Comp. Hofmann’s Schriftbeweis II., p. 271.

Exodus 12:12-13. Explanation of the Passover. And I. The counterpart and prototype of the Passover festival are historic facts. First, Jehovah, as judge, passes through all Egypt. Secondly, He visits upon the young life in the land a plague whose miraculousness consists especially in the fact that the first-born fall, the infliction beginning with the house of Pharaoh. The result is that all the gods of Egypt are judged by Jehovah. What does that mean? Keil says: the gods of Egypt were spiritual powers, δαιμόνια. Pseudo-Jonathan: idols. Knobel compares Numbers 33:4, and says: “We are to think especially of the death of the first-born beasts, since the Egyptians worshipped beasts as gods,” (!) etc. The essential thing in the subjective notion of gods are the religious conceptions and traditions of the heathen, in so far as they, as real powers, inhere in national ideals and sympathies. Legends in point, vid. in Knobel, p. 100. Thirdly, Jehovah spares the first-born of the Israelites. The blood shall be to you for a sign. The expression is of psychological importance, even for the notion of atonement. It does not read: it shall be to me for a sign. The Israelites were to have in the blood the sacramental sign that by the offering of blood the guilt of Israel in connection with Egypt was expiated, in that Jehovah had seen the same blood. This looking on the blood which warded off the pestilence reminds us of the looking up to the brazen serpent, and of the believer’s contemplation of the perfect atonement on the cross. Keil says, “In the meal the sacrificium becomes a sacramentum.”

Exodus 12:14. The solemn sanction of the Passover. As an ordinance for ever. The institution of the Passover continues still in its completed form in the new institution of the Lord’s Supper.

Exodus 12:15. The solemn institution of the seven days’ feast of unleavened bread. It was contemporaneous with the Passover; not afterwards appended to it, for this is not implied by Exodus 12:17. (See above on Exodus 12:8). The real motive was the uniform removal of the Egyptian leaven, a symbol of entire separation from everything Egyptian. Hence the clearing away of the leaven had to be done on the first day, even before the incoming of the 15th of Nisan, on the evening of the 14th. Vid. Exodus 12:18. Hence also every one who during this time ate anything leavened was to be punished with death. He showed symbolically that he wished to side with Egypt, not with Israel. The explanation, “The unleavened bread is the symbol of the new life, cleansed from the leaven of sin,” (Keil), is founded on the fundamentally false assumption, revived again especially by Hengstenberg, that the leaven is in itself a symbol of the sinful life. If this were the case, the Israelites would have had to eat unleavened bread all the time, and certainly would not have been commanded on the day of Pentecost to put leavened bread on the altar (Leviticus 23:17). The leaven is symbol only of transmission and fellowship, hence, in some cases, of the old or of the corrupt life. “Leaven of the Egyptian character,” says Keil himself, II., p. 21.

Exodus 12:16. On the first day. This is the day following the holy night, the second half of the 15th of Nisan. Like the seventh day it is appointed a festival, but to be observed less rigidly than the Sabbath. According to Leviticus 23:7, the only employments forbidden are the regular labors of one’s vocation or service, and food may be prepared according to the necessities of the day; this was not allowed on the Sabbath.

Exodus 12:17. For on this self-same day. Strictly speaking then, the days of unleavened bread began with the beginning of the 15th of Nisan, and in commemoration of the exodus itself, whereas the Passover was devoted to the commemoration of the preceding dreadful night of judgment and deliverance, the real adoption or birth of God’s people Israel.

Exodus 12:18. On the fourteenth day of the month. This is the feast of unleavened bread in the wider sense, including the Passover. The Passover, according to the very idea of it, could not be celebrated with leavened bread, i.e., in connection with any thing Egyptian, for it represented a separation, in principle, from what was Egyptian.

Exodus 12:19. Also the foreigner, who wishes to live among the Israelites, must submit to this ordinance, even though he has continued to be a foreigner, i.e., has not been circumcised. The one born in the land is the Israelite himself, so called either in anticipation of his destined place of settlement, or in the wider sense of nationality. Keil approves Leclerc’s interpretation: quia oriundi erant ex Isaaco et Jacobo, [“because they were to take their origin from Isaac and Jacob.”]

Exodus 12:20. Eat nothing leavened. Again and again is this most sacred symbolic ceremony enjoined, for it symbolizes the consecration of God’s people, a consecration based on their redemption.

Footnotes:

[3][Exodus 12:11. בְּחִפָּזוֹן. Lange translates: in Flucht-bereitschaft, “in readiness for flight,” condemning De Wette’s rendering, Eilfertigkeit, “haste,” “precipitation.” But in the only other two passages where the word occurs, Lange’s translation is hardly admissible. Deuteronomy 16:3, “Thou camest forth out of the land of Egypt in haste, בְּחִפָּזוֹן.” It could not be said, “Thou camest forth in readiness for flight.” So Isaiah 52:12, “Ye shall not go out with haste (בְּחִפָּזוֹן), nor go by flight.” Here the word also denotes anxious haste. The verb חָפַז likewise everywhere conveys the notion of hurriedness, or anxiety connected with haste. Tr.].

[4][The age of the lamb is expressed in Hebrew by the phrase: “son of a year.” The Rabbinical interpretation is that this means a year old or less, and in practice it has been applied to lambs from the age of eight days to that of one year. Apparently our translators had that interpretation in mind in rendering: “of the first year.” But notwithstanding the wide currency of this view (adopted even by Rosenmüller, Baumgarten, Murphy and other modern commeutators), it seems to be almost stupidly incorrect, as Knobel very clearly shows. Murphy says: “The phrase ‘son of a year’ means of any age from a month to a full year,” and refers to Genesis 7:6; Genesis 7:11. But why “from a month?” Why not “eight days” as well? Why not one day, or one second, from the time of birth? Isaac, we are told in Genesis 21:4, was circumcised when he was the “son of eight days.” How old was he? In Leviticus 27:6 we read: “If it be from the son of a month unto the son of five years,” where the A. V. reads correctly “a month old,” and “five years old.” It would be a singular way of fixing two limits, if both expressions are so indeterminate as the Rabbinical interpretation would make them. If the “son of a year” may be as young as eight days, and the “son of a month” may be twenty-nine days old, what is the use of the phrase “son of a month” at all? Or what is the sense of using the latter phrase as the early limit? Why not say simply: “If it be the son of five years?” which, according to the Rabbinical interpretation, ought to cover the whole period. Tr.]

[5][Ginsburg in Alexander’s Kitto’s Cyclopædia, Art. Passover, has shown that the second of the three views about “the two evenings” was not held by Kimchi and Raschi (otherwise called Jarchi), but that they agreed with the great mass of Jewish commentators in adopting the third view. The phrase itself is so vague that from it alone the meaning cannot with certainty be gathered. Most modern Christian commentators, it should be said, adopt the first view. Deuteronomy 16:6, where the time for sacrificing the Passover is fixed “at the going down of the sun,” is quoted as favoring that view, while Lange quotes it on the other side. Whatever may have been the exact meaning of the phrase originally, it is probable that the very early Jewish practice corresponded with the Rabbinical interpretation. The transactions recorded in 1 Kings 11:18 indicate this. There we read (Exodus 12:26) that the prophets of Baal called on Baal from morning till noon, and afterwards (Exodus 12:29) from mid-day “until the time of the offering of the evening sacrifice” (more exactly, “until towards the time”). According to Exodus 29:39 the evening sacrifice also was offered “between the two evenings.” If the meaning were “from mid-day till sunset,” there would seem to be no reason why it should not have been so expressed. Besides, it is intrinsically improbable that the howlings of the false prophets continued through the whole day. Especially is it difficult, if not impossible, to find time enough in the evening of that day for the events which are narrated to have followed, viz. Elijah’s prayer, the consumption of the burnt-offering, the slaying of the false prophets, the return from the Kishon, the prayer for rain, the servant’s going seven times to look, Elijah’s going to Jezreel. Tr.]

[6][This sentence is marked as a quotation by Lange, but the source, as very often in the German original, is not indicated; and in this case I have not been able to trace it out. Tr.].

[7][Bähr, l. c. says on this point: “This had no other object than that all who received a part of that one intact Iamb, i.e., who ate of it, should regard themselves as a unit and a whole, as a community, just like those who eat the New Testament Passover, the body of Christ (1 Corinthians 5:7), of which the Apostle, in 1 Corinthians 10:17, says, ‘For we being many are one bread and one body; for we are all partakers of that one bread.’ ”—Tr.].

[8][The hypothesis is that the remains of the paschal lamb, if there were any, were burnt up the same night, and therefore were not allowed to remain till the next day. But this seems to conflict with the plain language of the verse. Tr.].

[9][Why not in “anxious haste?” A man can surely eat in haste as well as do anything else in haste. That there was to be a “readiness for flight” is sufficiently indicated by the precept concerning the girdles, sandals, and staves. Vid. under “Textual and Grammatical.”—Tr.].

[10][We have let the A. V. reading stand: nevertheless it is by no means so clear that Keil is not right. He certainly is supported not only by many of the best versions and commentators, but by the Hebrew, which literally rendered can read only, “It is a Passover to Jehovah,” or “It is a Passover of Jehovah.” The latter differs from Lange’s translation as making “Passover” indefinite, whereas “Jehovah’s Passover” is equivalent to “ the Passover of Jehovah.” Furthermore, the subject of the sentence naturally, if not necessarily, refers to the lamb; but the lamb cannot be called Jehovah’s passing over. The last point made in opposition to Keil is not just, inasmuch as Keil does not render (as Lange makes him) “ the Passover unto Jehovah,” but distinctly leaves the noun indefinite, so that there is no implication that it was an already existent institution. Tr.].

[11][Hofmann takes זֶבַה in Exodus 12:27 in the general sense of slaughter, instead of the ceremonial sense of sacrifice, and argues that, as the lamb was killed in order to be eaten, it was in no proper sense an offering to Jehovah, although the killing and eating of it was divinely commanded. He distinguishes also between the original ordinance and the later celebration of it. Keil, on the contrary, lays stress on the fact that זָבַה and זֶבַה everywhere, except Proverbs 17:1, and 1 Samuel 28:24, denote sacrifice in the narrow ceremonial sense, and that the Passover in Numbers 9:7 is called קָרְבָּן‍, offering. Knobel likewise says, “Without doubt the Passover was a sort of offering.” But he contends that it was not (as Keil and others hold) a sin-offering, for the reasons: (1) that the O. T. gives no indication of such a character; (2) that the mode of observing the rite differed from that belonging to the sin-offering, particularly in that the lamb was eaten, whereas none of the animal constituting the sin-offering was eaten; and (3) that it was a joyous festival, whereas everything connected with the sin-offering was solemn. He classes it, therefore, rather with the burnt-offering. But the latter was not eaten, and had (though not exclusively, yet partially) an explatory character. Vid. Leviticus 1:4. Tr.].