Messianic Judaism - The Torah and the Testimony Revealed

Why Passover is not eaten on the 15th of the Moon

Among the Messianic movement there are many circles following the pattern of Temple Judaism where the Pesach Lamb , though sacrificed on the 14th as required by Torah, is roasted and eaten on the 15th day of the Moon, on the 1st Day of haMatzot (of Unleavened Bread); contrary to Torah.

So to clear up the confusion over this matter, and to show how this is not written Torah that is being followed, but Oral Torah that goes contrary not only to how Pesach was ordained to be kept, but contrary also to how Yeshua Himself kept it, I am presenting a basic outline here of the key verses establishing the proper time for Pesach to be kept as a lead-in to our e-Booklet entitled, "On Pesach and the Resurrection".

To begin, remember the first Moon of the harvest/festival year is the Moon of Aviv; Shemot (Exodus) 12:2; 13:4. It is called the "Aviv" meaning green/ready to ripen, because this is the Moon that the Barley harvest becomes ripe; Shemot (Exodus) 9:31, the Bikurim (the First Fruits) of which are offered during haMatzot (Unleavened Bread) on the day of First Fruits; V’yikra (Leviticus) 23:4:14.

Pesach begins at dusk on the 14th of the Aviv Moon (N-ssan); V’yikra (Leviticus) 23:4,5, and is slaughtered at "at sun down", between the two dusks (two evenings) [bayn ha-erevim]; Shemot (Exodus) 12:6; and D’varim Deuteronomy) 16:6.

Remember, in Hebrew, the day always begins at sundown. So if something says at dusk of the 14th, that means at the beginning of the 14th, not at the end of it.

Likewise, the Pesach is kept in the home; Shemot (Exodus) 12:3, not as a public assembly, the assembly of which occurs only on the 1st and 7th days of haMatzot (Unleavened Bread); V’yikra (Leviticus) 23:6-8, which occur respectively, on the 15th and 21st days of the Moon.

This is what we see in Shemot (Exodus) 12:16,17, where it states that there will be a public assembly on the first day and on the seventh. Then it states that they are to observe this first day, which lands on the 15th of the Moon, BECAUSE it is the day that Yahuweh will have brought them out of Egypt.

In B’midbar (Numbers) 33:3 it states that they left Egypt on the 15th day of the Moon, on the day after the Pesach.

So each head of a household slaughtered his own lamb after sun of the 13th had gone down and the evening of the 14th had begun.

They then roasted their respective lambs, ate their lambs, and had the blood on their doorposts and lentils by midnight when the Angel of death came through to kill the first born of every household that did not have blood on the doorposts and lentil by the time of his visitation at midnight; Shemot (Exodus) 12:21-24,29.

The Scriptures also state that no one could leave their homes until morning, that none of the Lamb could be left until morning, and that whatever was left in the morning had to be burned up; Shemot (Exodus) 12:8-10.

That day they woke up to the mourning of Egypt, had to burn up all the leftover lamb flesh, plundered the Egyptians, gathered their people and their flocks, and had less than 24 hours to leave the borders of Egypt by foot, the feat of which took until the 15th to accomplish; Shemot (Exodus) 12:16,17.

This is further confirmed in B’midbar (Numbers) 33:3, which states that it is on the 15th day (the 1st day of haMatzot [Unleavened Bread] Shemot (Exodus) 12:17), the day after the Passover, that they left Egypt.

Additionally, in Shemot (Exodus) 12:8 it states that the Pesach shall be eaten with unleavened bread. In Shemot (Exodus) 12:15 it states that unleavened bread shall also be eaten for the full 7 days of the feast of Unleavened Bread. This is a total of 8 days that unleavened bread is to be eaten.

In Shemot (Exodus) 12:18 it states that no leaven shall be eaten from the evening of the 14th through the 21st. Again, this is a total of 8 days. The 14th is day 1, the 15th day 2, the 16th day 3, the 17th day 4, the 18th day 5, the 19th day 6, the 20th day 7, and the 21st day 8.

The difference concerning the leaven between Pesach and unleavened bread is that on Pesach leaven cannot be eaten, but can still be in the house; but during Unleavened Bread, leaven can be neither eaten, nor be in the house; Shemot (Exodus) 12:15.

In time, the priests began requiring the lambs to be slaughtered at the Temple, though Yahuweh commanded each household to slaughter its own lamb before there ever was a Temple or Mishkan.

The humungous task of this required a considerable amount of time, and so the slaughter of the lambs eventually spilled over into the day time, and ultimately began to be roasted a day later on the 1st day of Unleavened Bread. This is not Scriptural. Yeshua and His disciples slaughtered and ate theirs on the 14th as the Torah requires.

You will have to read the study "On Pesach and the Resurrection" for explanation of the New Testament Scriptures, and of how they describe nothing other than what I have already described here. The key to understanding this is that in the first century whenever one said "Passover" they almost always meant the combined events Pesach and Unleavened Bread, and when one said "Unleavened Bread" they almost always meant the combined events of Pesach and Unleavened Bread.

Two other key points are when they say the "days of unleavened bread when the Pesach lambs would be killed", this meant the actual day of Passover, or the 14th day of the Moon; and when they say "for that Sabbath was a High Day" it meant the 1st day of Unleavened Bread, or 15th day of the New Moon.

Copyright 4-10-09 by the Torah and Testimony Revealed Ministry.

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