Exodus 12
1NOW the Lord had spoken to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt saying,
2This month shall be to you the beginning of months. It is the first for you among the months of the year.
3Speak to all the congregation of the children of Israel and say, On the tenth of this month let them take everyone a sheep according to the houses of patriarchal families, everyone a sheep for a family;
4and if there be too few in the family to be sufficient for one sheep, let him associate with him his next neighbour. With regard to the number of souls, everyone shall collect to him a number sufficient for a sheep.
5Your sheep shall be without blemish, a male and in its first year. You may take either from the lambs or the kids.
6And it shall be kept up by you until the fourteenth day of this month. Then the whole multitude of the congregation of the children of Israel shall kill it in the evening.
7And they shall take some of the blood and put it on the two sideposts and on the lintel of the door of the house in which they are to eat it.
8And that night they shall eat the flesh roasted with fire. They shall also eat unleavened bread with bitter herbs.
9You shall not eat any of it raw or boiled in water, but only roasted with fire, head and feet and carcass together.
10Nothing of it shall be left till the morning. And you shall not break a bone of it. And what is left of it till the morning you shall burn with fire.
11And in this manner you shall eat it. Your loins shall be girded. Your sandals shall be on your feet, and your staves in your hands. And you shall eat it in haste. It is a Passover to the Lord.
12For in that night I will pass through the land of Egypt, and smite all the first-born in the land of Egypt, both of man and beast. And upon all the gods of the Egyptians I will execute vengeance. I am the Lord.
13But the blood shall be to you for a sign on the houses in which you are. And when I see the blood, I will protect you and there shall be no destroying plague among you, when I smite in the land of Egypt.
14And that day shall be to you for a memorial. And you shall celebrate it as a festival to the Lord throughout all your generations. As an everlasting ordinance you shall celebrate it.
15Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread. And from the first day you shall remove all leaven out of your houses. Whoever shall eat leaven from the first to the seventh day, that soul shall be cut off from among Israel.
16And with regard to the first day, it shall be proclaimed holy; and the seventh day shall be holy to you. In them you shall not do any kind of sacrificial service, save that which must be done for every soul.
17This alone shall be done for you and you shall keep this commandment. For on that day I will lead out your host from the land of Egypt; therefore you shall make the observance of that day an everlasting rite to your generations.
18Beginning at evening with the fourteenth day of the first month, you shall eat unleavened bread until the evening of the twenty-first day.
19For seven days there must be no leaven found in your houses. Whoever shall eat leavened bread, that soul shall be cut off from among the congregation of Israel; whether he be a stranger or born in the land.
20You shall eat nothing that is leavened. But in all your habitations you must eat unleavened bread.
21Moses therefore convened the whole senate of the children of Israel and said to them, Go take for yourselves the sheep according to your families and kill the passover;
22and ye shall take a bunch of hyssop and having dipped it in the blood by the door you shall smear the lintel and the two sideposts with some of the blood which is at the door; and none of you shall go out of the door of his house until the morning.
23For the Lord will pass by to smite the Egyptians; and when he shall see the blood on the lintel and on the two side posts, the Lord will pass over that door and will not suffer the destroyer to enter into your houses to smite.
24And this ordinance you shall keep as a rite established for thee and thy children for ever.
25And when you come to the land which the Lord will give you as he hath spoken, you must keep up this religious service.
26And if your children say to you, What is the meaning of this religious service?
27then you shall say to them, It is the sacrifice of the Passover of the Lord; because he passed over the houses of the Israelites in Egypt when he smote the Egyptians, and delivered our houses. Upon which the people bowed down and worshipped;
28and the Israelites went and did as the Lord commanded Moses and Aaron.
29And when they had so done, it came to pass that at midnight the Lord smote all the first-born in the land of Egypt, from the first-born of Pharao, who sat on the throne to the first-born of the captive in the dungeon, and even the first-born of all the cattle.
30Whereupon Pharao arose by night he and all his attendants and all the Egyptians; and there was a great cry in all the land of Egypt; for there was not a family in which there was not one dead.
31And Pharao called for Moses and Aaron by night and said to them, Arise and depart from among my people, both you and the Israelites. Go and serve the Lord your God as you say.
32Take your flocks and your herds and go away, and bless me, I beseech you.
33And the Egyptians pressed the people with great earnestness to hurry them away out of the country; for they said, We shall all die.
34So the people took up, upon their shoulders, their dough which had not yet been leavened—the masses of mixed meal, bound up in their mantles—
35(now the Israelites had done as Moses commanded them; they had asked of the Egyptians gold and silver vessels and raiment;
36and the Lord had given his people favour in the sight of the Egyptians and they had supplied them, so they spoiled the Egyptians);
37and the Israelites to the number of six hundred thousand men on foot besides women and children began their march from Ramesses to Succoth.
38And there went up with them a mixed multitude with flocks and herds and cattle in great abundance.
39And of the dough which they brought out of Egypt they baked unleavened cakes, for it had not been leavened: for the Egyptians hurried them away and they could not wait, and they had not dressed any provisions for themselves for the journey.
40Now the sojourning of the Israelites which they and their fathers had sojourned in the land of Egypt and in the land of Chanaan was four hundred and thirty years.
41And at the end of four hundred and thirty years all the host of the Lord came out of the land of Egypt.
42At night there was a watch for the Lord. This watch of the Lord was instituted that very night to bring them out of the land of Egypt. That it might be kept by all the children of Israel throughout their generations,
43the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, This is the law of the Passover:—No stranger shall eat of it;
44but every servant born at home or bought with money thou shalt circumcise and then he may eat of it.
45A sojourner of an hireling shall not eat of it.
46In one family it shall be eaten, and you must not carry any of the flesh abroad out of the house; nor shall you break a bone thereof.
47All the congregation of the children of Israel shall keep this festival.
48And if any proselyte come to you to keep the passover to the Lord, thou shalt circumcise all his males and then he may come and keep it, and he shall be as a native of the land. No uncircumcised person shall eat of it.
49There shall be one law for the home born and for the proselyte who shall come among you.
50Now the children of Israel had done as the Lord commanded Moses and Aaron; and when they had done so, on that very day
51the Lord led the Israelites out of the land of Egypt with their host.