Exodus 12:14-28

Common English Bible

¹⁴ “This day will be a day of remembering for you. You will observe it as a festival to the Lord. You will observe it in every generation as a regulation for all time. ¹⁵ You will eat unleavened bread for seven days. On the first day you must remove yeast from your houses because anyone who eats leavened bread anytime during those seven days will be cut off from Israel. ¹⁶ The first day and the seventh day will be a holy occasion for you. No work at all should be done on those days, except for preparing the food that everyone is going to eat. That is the only work you may do. ¹⁷ You should observe the Festival of Unleavened Bread, because on this precise day I brought you out of the land of Egypt in military formation. You should observe this day in every generation as a regulation for all time. ¹⁸ In the first month, from the evening of the fourteenth day until the evening of the twenty-first day, you should eat unleavened bread. ¹⁹ For seven days no yeast should be found in your houses because whoever eats leavened bread will be cut off from the Israelite community, whether the person is an immigrant or a native of the land. ²⁰ You should not eat anything made with yeast in all your settlements. You should eat only unleavened bread.”

²¹ Then Moses called together all of Israel’s elders and said to them, “Go pick out one of the flock for your families, and slaughter the Passover lamb. ²² Take a bunch of hyssop, dip it into the blood that is in the bowl, and touch the beam above the door and the two doorposts with the blood in the bowl. None of you should go out the door of your house until morning. ²³ When the Lord comes by to strike down the Egyptians and sees the blood on the beam above the door and on the two doorposts, the Lord will pass over that door. He won’t let the destroyer enter your houses to strike you down. ²⁴ You should observe this ritual as a regulation for all time for you and your children. ²⁵ When you enter the land that the Lord has promised to give you, be sure that you observe this ritual. ²⁶ And when your children ask you, ‘What does this ritual mean to you?’ ²⁷ you will say, ‘It is the Passover sacrifice to the Lord, for the Lord passed over the houses of the Israelites in Egypt. When he struck down the Egyptians, he spared our houses.’” The people then bowed down and worshipped. ²⁸ The Israelites went and did exactly what the Lord had commanded Moses and Aaron to do.