16,951
edits
Changes
m
link
The great springtime of Israel occurred when God liberated His people from the Egyptian yoke by a series of providential interventions, the most striking of which is expressed in the tenth plague: the killing of the first-born of the Egyptians.<ref>Exodus 11:5; 12:12,29 ff.</ref> To this event, tradition later joined the offering of the first-born of the flock and the redeeming of the first-born Israelite.<ref>13:1f.,11-15; Numbers 3:13; 8:17.</ref> But this parallel comparison remains secondary. What matters is that the Passover coincides with the deliverance of the Israelites: it became the memorial of the Exodus, the greatest event of their history. It recalled that [[God]] had struck Egypt and spared His faithful.<ref>12:26f.; 13:8 ff.</ref> From now on such will be the meaning of the Passover and the new meaning of its name.
''Pasch'' is the equivalent of the Greek ''[[Pascha]]'', derived from the [[Aramaic ]] ''Pasha'' and the Hebrew ''Pesah''. The origin of this name is disputed. Some give it a foreign etymology, Assyrian (''pasahu'', to appease) or Egyptian (''pa-sh'', the remembrance; ''pe-sah'', the blow); but none of these hypotheses is compelling. The Bible associates ''pesah'' with the verb ''pasah,'' which mean either to limp, or perform a ritual dance around a sacrifice,<ref>1 Kings 18:21,26.</ref> or figuratively, "to jump", "to pass", "to spare". The Passover is the ''Passage'' of Yahweh who ''passed over'' the Israelite houses while He struck those of the Egyptians.<ref>Exodus 12:13,23,27; Isaiah 31:5.</ref>
===Passover and Unleavened Bread===