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Exodus 12 :: New International Version (NIV)

The Passover and the Festival of Unleavened Bread

Exo 12:1The LORD said to Moses and Aaron in Egypt,
Exo 12:2“This month is to be for you the first month, the first month of your year.
Exo 12:3Tell the whole community of Israel that on the tenth day of this month each man is to take a lamb[fn] for his family, one for each household.
Exo 12:4If any household is too small for a whole lamb, they must share one with their nearest neighbor, having taken into account the number of people there are. You are to determine the amount of lamb needed in accordance with what each person will eat.
Exo 12:5The animals you choose must be year-old males without defect, and you may take them from the sheep or the goats.
Exo 12:6Take care of them until the fourteenth day of the month, when all the members of the community of Israel must slaughter them at twilight.
Exo 12:7Then they are to take some of the blood and put it on the sides and tops of the doorframes of the houses where they eat the lambs.
Exo 12:8That same night they are to eat the meat roasted over the fire, along with bitter herbs, and bread made without yeast.
Exo 12:9Do not eat the meat raw or boiled in water, but roast it over a fire—with the head, legs and internal organs.
Exo 12:10Do not leave any of it till morning; if some is left till morning, you must burn it.
Exo 12:11This is how you are to eat it: with your cloak tucked into your belt, your sandals on your feet and your staff in your hand. Eat it in haste; it is the LORD’s Passover.
Exo 12:12“On that same night I will pass through Egypt and strike down every firstborn of both people and animals, and I will bring judgment on all the gods of Egypt. I am the LORD.
Exo 12:13The blood will be a sign for you on the houses where you are, and when I see the blood, I will pass over you. No destructive plague will touch you when I strike Egypt.
Exo 12:14“This is a day you are to commemorate; for the generations to come you shall celebrate it as a festival to the LORD—a lasting ordinance.
Exo 12:15For seven days you are to eat bread made without yeast. On the first day remove the yeast from your houses, for whoever eats anything with yeast in it from the first day through the seventh must be cut off from Israel.
Exo 12:16On the first day hold a sacred assembly, and another one on the seventh day. Do no work at all on these days, except to prepare food for everyone to eat; that is all you may do.
Exo 12:17“Celebrate the Festival of Unleavened Bread, because it was on this very day that I brought your divisions out of Egypt. Celebrate this day as a lasting ordinance for the generations to come.
Exo 12:18In the first month you are to eat bread made without yeast, from the evening of the fourteenth day until the evening of the twenty-first day.
Exo 12:19For seven days no yeast is to be found in your houses. And anyone, whether foreigner or native-born, who eats anything with yeast in it must be cut off from the community of Israel.
Exo 12:20Eat nothing made with yeast. Wherever you live, you must eat unleavened bread.”
Exo 12:21Then Moses summoned all the elders of Israel and said to them, “Go at once and select the animals for your families and slaughter the Passover lamb.
Exo 12:22Take a bunch of hyssop, dip it into the blood in the basin and put some of the blood on the top and on both sides of the doorframe. None of you shall go out of the door of your house until morning.
Exo 12:23When the LORD goes through the land to strike down the Egyptians, he will see the blood on the top and sides of the doorframe and will pass over that doorway, and he will not permit the destroyer to enter your houses and strike you down.
Exo 12:24“Obey these instructions as a lasting ordinance for you and your descendants.
Exo 12:25When you enter the land that the LORD will give you as he promised, observe this ceremony.
Exo 12:26And when your children ask you, ‘What does this ceremony mean to you?’
Exo 12:27then tell them, ‘It is the Passover sacrifice to the LORD, who passed over the houses of the Israelites in Egypt and spared our homes when he struck down the Egyptians.’ ” Then the people bowed down and worshiped.
Exo 12:28The Israelites did just what the LORD commanded Moses and Aaron.
Exo 12:29At midnight the LORD struck down all the firstborn in Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh, who sat on the throne, to the firstborn of the prisoner, who was in the dungeon, and the firstborn of all the livestock as well.
Exo 12:30Pharaoh and all his officials and all the Egyptians got up during the night, and there was loud wailing in Egypt, for there was not a house without someone dead.

The Exodus

Exo 12:31During the night Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron and said, “Up! Leave my people, you and the Israelites! Go, worship the LORD as you have requested.
Exo 12:32Take your flocks and herds, as you have said, and go. And also bless me.”
Exo 12:33The Egyptians urged the people to hurry and leave the country. “For otherwise,” they said, “we will all die!”
Exo 12:34So the people took their dough before the yeast was added, and carried it on their shoulders in kneading troughs wrapped in clothing.
Exo 12:35The Israelites did as Moses instructed and asked the Egyptians for articles of silver and gold and for clothing.
Exo 12:36The LORD had made the Egyptians favorably disposed toward the people, and they gave them what they asked for; so they plundered the Egyptians.
Exo 12:37The Israelites journeyed from Rameses to Sukkoth. There were about six hundred thousand men on foot, besides women and children.
Exo 12:38Many other people went up with them, and also large droves of livestock, both flocks and herds.
Exo 12:39With the dough the Israelites had brought from Egypt, they baked loaves of unleavened bread. The dough was without yeast because they had been driven out of Egypt and did not have time to prepare food for themselves.
Exo 12:40Now the length of time the Israelite people lived in Egypt[fn] was 430 years.
Exo 12:41At the end of the 430 years, to the very day, all the LORD’s divisions left Egypt.
Exo 12:42Because the LORD kept vigil that night to bring them out of Egypt, on this night all the Israelites are to keep vigil to honor the LORD for the generations to come.

Passover Restrictions

Exo 12:43The LORD said to Moses and Aaron, “These are the regulations for the Passover meal: “No foreigner may eat it.
Exo 12:44Any slave you have bought may eat it after you have circumcised him,
Exo 12:45but a temporary resident or a hired worker may not eat it.
Exo 12:46“It must be eaten inside the house; take none of the meat outside the house. Do not break any of the bones.
Exo 12:47The whole community of Israel must celebrate it.
Exo 12:48“A foreigner residing among you who wants to celebrate the LORD’s Passover must have all the males in his household circumcised; then he may take part like one born in the land. No uncircumcised male may eat it.
Exo 12:49The same law applies both to the native-born and to the foreigner residing among you.”
Exo 12:50All the Israelites did just what the LORD had commanded Moses and Aaron.
Exo 12:51And on that very day the LORD brought the Israelites out of Egypt by their divisions.
NIV Footnotes
The Hebrew word can mean lamb or kid; also in verse 4.
Masoretic Text; Samaritan Pentateuch and Septuagint Egypt and Canaan
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