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11.1–10 The tenth plague has been adumbrated since 4.22–23. In light of 13.1–2, another purpose to slaying both human and animal (v.5) firstborns is suggested: the Lord exercises his right to collect, as it were, all firstborn males.
11.1 The Hebrew term translated plague is from the root “touch” and connotes disease; it is different from the word also translated plagues in 9.14 and strike in 12.23. “Touch” figured in 4.25, just after the firstborn plague was first revealed. Upon, against. Afterwards, as predicted in 3.20. Drive you away. The Hebrew adds “completely” others interpret “as he would divorce a bride.”
11.2 Predicted in 3.22 (see note there). Tell, lit. “say now in the ears of.” Objects…gold. 3.22; 12.35 also mention clothing, which term is also found here in some versions.
11.3 That the people found favor is predicted in 3.21. Man…importance, ironic (see 10.28–29). Again (see 10.7) Pharaoh’s underlings arrive at the truth before he does.
11.4 It is surprising, in view of 10.28–29 and the omission of any reference to Pharaoh here, that this speech is addressed to Pharaoh in person (see v. 8). Midnight, an hour associated with death (Job 34.20; cf. Gen 32.23–25; Ex 4.24). Go out, the verb denoting “exodus” (see note on 3.10).
11.5 Firstborn, i.e., “firstborn male” see note on 13.1–2. Female slave. Egypt had other than Hebrew slaves. Handmill, a stationary horizontal round stone with a mobile upper grinding stone; using it was the most menial chore (Isa 47.1–2). The livestock were all said to have perished (see note on 9.6).
11.6 Cry, poetic justice; see note on 3.7. Never been. See note on 7.14–12.32. Will…again echoes never…again in 10.28–29.
11.7 Growl, lit. “chop with the tongue,” hence “bark” cf. Josh 10.21. While Egypt is beset by unprecedented screams, Israel will not be disturbed by so much as a barking dog. Distinction. Cf. distinction in 9.4, set apart in 8.22; see note on 8.22.
11.8 Officials, lit. “servants,” who will now “serve” the Lord. In Hebrew “these” and “to me” sound alike, reinforcing the sense that Pharaoh’s courtiers will render homage to God. Left Pharaoh. See note on 11.4.
11.9 The plagues narrative pauses, echoing the story’s beginning (7.3–4).
11.10 Hardened. See note on 4.21.
EXODUS 12
The First Passover Instituted
1The LORD said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt: 2This month shall mark for you the beginning of months; it shall be the first month of the year for you. 3Tell the whole congregation of Israel that on the tenth of this month they are to take a lamb for each family, a lamb for each household. 4If a household is too small for a whole lamb, it shall join its closest neighbor in obtaining one; the lamb shall be divided in proportion to the number of people who eat of it. 5Your lamb shall be without blemish, a year-old male; you may take it from the sheep or from the goats. 6You shall keep it until the fourteenth day of this month; then the whole assembled congregation of Israel shall slaughter it at twilight. 7They shall take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts and the lintel of the houses in which they eat it. 8They shall eat the lamb that same night; they shall eat it roasted over the fire with unleavened bread and bitter herbs. 9Do not eat any of it raw or boiled in water, but roasted over the fire, with its head, legs, and inner organs. 10You shall let none of it remain until the morning; anything that remains until the morning you shall burn. 11This is how you shall eat it: your loins girded, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and you shall eat it hurriedly. It is the passover of the LORD. 12For I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and I will strike down every firstborn in the land of Egypt, both human beings and animals; on all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments: I am the LORD. 13The blood shall be a sign for you on the houses where you live: when I see the blood, I will pass over you, and no plague shall destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt.
14This day shall be a day of remembrance for you. You shall celebrate it as a festival to the LORD; throughout your generations you shall observe it as a perpetual ordinance. 15Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread; on the first day you shall remove leaven from your houses, for whoever eats leavened bread from the first day until the seventh day shall be cut off from Israel. 16On the first day you shall hold a solemn assembly, and on the seventh day a solemn assembly; no work shall be done on those days; only what everyone must eat, that alone may be prepared by you. 17You shall observe the festival of unleavened bread, for on this very day I brought your companies out of the land of Egypt: you shall observe this day throughout your generations as a perpetual ordinance. 18In the first month, from the evening of the fourteenth day until the evening of the twenty-first day, you shall eat unleavened bread. 19For seven days no leaven shall be found in your houses; for whoever eats what is leavened shall be cut off from the congregation of Israel, whether an alien or a native of the land. 20You shall eat nothing leavened; in all your settlements you shall eat unleavened bread.
21Then Moses called all the elders of Israel and said to them, “Go, select lambs for your families, and slaughter the passover lamb. 22Take a bunch of hyssop, dip it in the blood that is in the basin, and touch the lintel and the two doorposts with the blood in the basin. None of you shall go outside the door of your house until morning. 23For the LORD will pass through to strike down the Egyptians; when he sees the blood on the lintel and on the two doorposts, the LORD will pass over that door and will not allow the destroyer to enter your houses to strike you down. 24You shall observe this rite as a perpetual ordinance for you and your children. 25When you come to the land that the LORD will give you, as he has promised, you shall keep this observance. 26And when your children ask you, ‘What do you mean by this observance?’ 27you shall say, ‘It is the passover sacrifice to the LORD, for he passed over the houses of the Israelites in Egypt, when he struck down the Egyptians but spared our houses.’” And the people bowed down and worshiped.
28The Israelites went and did just as the LORD had commanded Moses and Aaron.
The Tenth Plague: Death of the Firstborn
29At midnight the LORD struck down all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sat on his throne to the firstborn of the prisoner who was in the dungeon, and all the firstborn of the livestock. 30Pharaoh arose in the night, he and all his officials and all the Egyptians; and there was a loud cry in Egypt, for there was not a house without someone dead. 31Then he summoned Moses and Aaron in the night, and said, “Rise up, go away from my people, both you and the Israelites! Go, worship the LORD, as you said. 32Take your flocks and your herds, as you said, and be gone. And bring a blessing on me too!”
The Exodus: From Rameses to Succoth
33The Egyptians urged the people to hasten their departure from the land, for they said, “We shall all be dead.” 34So the people took their dough before it was leavened, with their kneading bowls wrapped up in their cloaks on their shoulders. 35The Israelites had done as Moses told them; they had asked the Egyptians for jewelry of silver and gold, and for clothing, 36and the LORD had given the people favor in the sight of the Egyptians, so that they let them have what they asked. And so they plundered the Egyptians.
37The Israelites journeyed from Rameses to Succoth, about six hundred thousand men on foot, besides children. 38A mixed crowd also went up with them, and livestock in great numbers, both flocks and herds. 39They baked unleavened cakes of the dough that they had brought out of Egypt; it was not leavened, because they were driven out of Egypt and could not wait, nor had they prepared any provisions for themselves.
40The time that the Israelites had lived in Egypt was four hundred thirty years. 41At the end of four hundred thirty years, on that very day, all the companies of the LORD went out from the land of Egypt. 42That was for the LORD a night of vigil, to bring them out of the land of Egypt. That same night is a vigil to be kept for the LORD by all the Israelites throughout their gene
rations.
Directions for the Passover
43The LORD said to Moses and Aaron: This is the ordinance for the passover: no foreigner shall eat of it, 44but any slave who has been purchased may eat of it after he has been circumcised; 45no bound or hired servant may eat of it. 46It shall be eaten in one house; you shall not take any of the animal outside the house, and you shall not break any of its bones. 47The whole congregation of Israel shall celebrate it. 48If an alien who resides with you wants to celebrate the passover to the LORD, all his males shall be circumcised; then he may draw near to celebrate it; he shall be regarded as a native of the land. But no uncircumcised person shall eat of it; 49there shall be one law for the native and for the alien who resides among you.
50All the Israelites did just as the LORD had commanded Moses and Aaron. 51That very day the LORD brought the Israelites out of the land of Egypt, company by company.
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12.1–28 Although the Passover ceremony may have its origins in a spring fertility rite, it serves two functions here: the immediate one of warding off the plague (vv. 7, 13, 22–23) and the perennial one of commemorating the exodus redemption (vv. 14, 24–27). The weeklong Festival of Unleavened Bread (vv. 14–20), which immediately follows (Lev 23.5–6; Num 28.16–17) and coalesces with Passover (Deut 16.1–8; but see Ex 23.15; 34.18), is not celebrated before leaving Egypt, but is ordained here, as it too comes to commemorate the exodus (vv. 15–20; 13.3–10).
12.1 Egypt. The Egyptian Passover is distinguished from the perennial one (vv. 17, 20). Deut 16.1–8 centralizes the rite at a single shrine (cf. 2 Kings 23.21–23).
12.2 The Bible’s cultic calendar begins with the exodus season. The Priestly term first month (Lev 23.5; Num 28.16) is Abib (Hebrew “new ear of grain”) elsewhere in the Pentateuch (Ex 13.4; 23.15; 34.18; Deut 16.1) and Nisan (from Babylonian) in postexilic books (Neh 2.1; Esth 3.7). The agricultural calendar begins with the seventh month; see 23.17 and the tenth-century BCE Gezer inscription, which lists agricultural tasks by month. Mark, lit. “be.” Beginning, lit. “head,” cognate to first.
12.3 Israel has not expressly heard from Moses and Aaron since 6.12; its cooperation now reflects the impact of the Lord’s wonders. The tenth day of the seventh month is the Day of Atonement (Lev 23.27). Family, lit. “house of fathers,” a tribal division (see note on 6.14).
12.4 It shall join…in obtaining, lit. “he and his neighbor closest to his house will take.” The lamb…eat of it, “according to the number of persons, each by how much he eats, you shall divide the lamb.”
12.5 Without blemish, a stipulation for all sacrificial offerings (e.g., Lev 1.3, 10). A year-old male, a typical sacrificial offering (e.g., Num 28.3; 29.2).
12.6 The fourteenth, the full moon, a propitious time when the night is brightest; see also Lev 23.34. The whole assembled congregation, or “the entire assembly,” which does not imply that everyone performed the rite together. Twilight, lit. “between the two settings,” apparently between sunset and the last of the residual light in the sky.
12.7 See note on 4.25. By performing this apotropaic ritual Israel is again “set apart” from Egypt (11.7). They eat, lit. “they shall eat.”
12.8 Same night. See Num 9.12; Deut 16.4. The sacred meal may also serve to protect the household. Roasted. See note on 12.9. Unleavened bread, minimally cooked, biscuitlike “matsah” bread used generally in ritual offerings (e.g., Lev 2.4–5; 6.9); leavening further removes the flour from its natural, created state. See the symbolic interpretation in vv. 33–34. Bitter herbs. The species is uncertain, but see 1.14. The three components of the offering signify a complete meal.
12.9 The prohibition against eating the offering raw or boiled means that it must be roasted, which ensures that the blood, the protective element, is removed. Blood, the symbol of life (Gen 9.4; Lev 17.11, 14), is divine property and must be returned to the deity whenever meat is eaten (Lev 17.3–6; Deut 12.16); cf. Deut 16.7, which is harmonized in 2 Chr 35.13. With its…organs, in contradistinction to the wholly burnt offering (Lev 1.8–9).
12.10 Let none of it remain, lest it be profaned; cf. 23.18; Lev 7.15; see notes on 12.8; 10.19.
12.11 Passover. The name of the offering and its festival are related to the cognate verb pass over in vv. 13, 23, 27. Alternatively, the verb may mean “to protect.”
12.12 Pass through, not pass over (see note on 12.11). Strike. See note on 2.11. Firstborn. See note on 13.1–2. Gods. See Num 33.4. By causing so severe a catastrophe in Egypt, the Lord, who has sought acknowledgment among the Egyptians (see 9.14; cf. note on 5.2), defeats Egypt’s gods, who, like Pharaoh’s magicians (see notes on 7.12; 9.11), prove powerless. Deities other than the Lord are assumed to exist, even if they are ineffectual; cf. 15.11.
12.13 No plague shall destroy, rather “no plague will be a destroyer,” the demonic agent that brings death (“ravager” in Isa 54.16), distinguished from the deity in v. 23.
12.14 Celebrate…festival. See note on 5.1. Perpetual. See note on 12.1; cf. v. 17.
12.15 See note on 12.1–28. Remove, lit. “cause to stop”(see note on 5.5). Cut off, a punishment imposed in the Priestly Torah literature primarily for serious ritual infractions (e.g., Lev 17.4); because it contrasts with capital punishment (31.14), it may entail divine retribution for transgressions that escape human detection.
12.16 See Lev 23.7–8; Num 28.18, 25. Assembly, or “convocation.” The preparation of food for immediate consumption is permitted during the festival but prohibited on the sabbath (16.23; 35.3).
12.17 I brought. The Passover in Egypt is seen as past. Companies. See note on 6.26.
12.18 Until, up to the eve of the twenty-first if the festivals of Passover and Unleavened Bread have coalesced (see note on 12.1–28), up through the eve of the twenty-first if the festivals are discrete.
12.19 Cf. v. 15. Alien. Aliens who reside among the Israelites by dint of marriage or another circumstance and are circumcised (v. 48) are enjoined to observe most laws (so v. 49) and are protected from abuse (e.g., 22.20–22).
12.20 Settlements refers to Israel’s future circumstances, as in v. 17.
12.21–28 An elaboration of the laws in vv. 1–13. The Festival of Unleavened Bread, which does not take place the night of the plague, is omitted.
12.21 Moses. Cf. v. 28, which includes Aaron. Lambs, rather “small cattle,” sheep or goats; see v. 5. Families, not the term used in v. 3. Select lambs. The instruction presupposes that the ritual is already familiar; the term passover is introduced in v. 11 only after the offering has been described.
12.22 Hyssop, a brushlike plant of uncertain identity, used also in purification rites (e.g., Lev 14.4, 6; Num 19.6). Basin, to collect the blood of the Passover animal. Touch. Cf. 4.25. None…go outside. The phrasing, absent from the foregoing instructions, suggests the protective function of the ritual; see notes on 12.8; 12.42; see also v. 46.
12.23 Pass through. See note on 12.12. Strike down, or “afflict with plague” (twice), cognate to plague (v. 13). The destroyer. See note on 12.13.
12.24 Rite, lit. “word,” command.
12.25 Cf., e.g., 3.8, 17; 6.8–9. The topic of rites to be observed once Israel is settled in Canaan is resumed in 13.5.
12.26 See note on 9.16.
12.27 Struck down. See note on 12.23. Worshiped. See note on 4.31.
12.28 Aaron. See note on 12.21.
12.29–30 The fulfillment of 11.4–6, with some variations; cf. note on 11.1–10.
12.29 Prisoner, more severe than the image in 11.5. Dungeon, lit. “pit,” alluding perhaps to Gen 41.14.
12.30 Arose, aroused by the outcry.
12.31 Summoned. See note on 10.29. Pharaoh’s implicit surrender to the Lord is a reversal (see 5.2).
12.32 Pharaoh reverses his refusal in 10.24. Bring a blessing on me too, “bless me too” when you worship the Lord.
12.33 Egyptians. Cf. 10.7. Urged, ironically another rendering of the Hebrew verb used o
f “stiffening” Pharaoh’s heart in 14.4, 8 (“hardened” see note on 4.21). Hasten. See note on 10.16. All. They fear the tenth plague is not the last.
12.34 Leavened, a symbolic interpretation of v. 8 (cf. v. 11) and of the Festival of Unleavened Bread; see v. 39. Kneading bowls, an echo of 8.3 (7.28 in Hebrew).
12.35 Told them. It has not been reported that Moses gave the instruction to ask for jewelry and clothing, although he was so ordered (3.21–22; 11.2–3). Clothing, the cloaks of v. 34. Plundered. See note on 3.22.
12.37 Rameses. See 1.11. Succoth, hebraization (“Booths”) of an Egyptian site (Thk-w) in the area of Wadi Tumilat, east of Pithom (see 1.11). Num 33.4 adds a macabre detail. Six hundred thousand. 603, 550 in Num 1.46, excluding 8, 580 Levite men (Num 4.48). Counting women, children, and the elderly, the total would well exceed 2 million; a large army comprised perhaps 20, 000 soldiers.
12.38 Mixed, intermarried (Neh 13.3); see Num 11.4; cf. Lev 24.10. The Hebrew term recalls the fourth plague’s flies. Great numbers, “very heavy” (see note on 4.10).
12.39 See note on 12.34.
12.40 Four hundred thirty. It is 400 years in Gen 15.13. Gen 15.16 predicts four generations (160 years), a count that conforms to 6.16–20, in which Moses is the fourth generation in Egypt.
12.41 Companies. See note on 6.26.
12.42 If the vigil is Israel’s and not the Lord’s (the Hebrew is ambiguous), a protective function for the Passover rite is again suggested (see notes on 12.8; 12.22; see also v. 46).
12.43–49 A resumption of the instructions for the Passover night ritual (vv. 1–13, 21–27); cf. v. 19. Since vv. 14, 28 seem to close the preceding units, the present passage appears to be a codicil. See also Num 9.1–14.
12.43 Foreigner, not alien (vv. 19, 48–49).
12.44 Purchased. The Hebrew adds “for silver” (cf. Gen 37.28).
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