Exodus 12:4

_AND IF THE HOUSEHOLD BE TOO LITTLE FOR THE LAMB, LET HIM AND HIS NEIGHBOUR NEXT UNTO HIS HOUSE TAKE IT ACCORDING TO THE NUMBER OF THE SOULS; EVERY MAN ACCORDING TO HIS EATING SHALL MAKE YOUR COUNT FOR THE LAMB._ If the household be too little ... Since it was imperative that none of the paschal lamb should be left (Exodus 12:10), care was to be taken, by associating neighbouring families, that the party should be sufficiently large to ensure the entire consumption. Josephus states that, in later times, the normal rule required at least ten persons to constitute a proper paschal communion. But it is obvious, from the deflation given above of 'father's house, that it might comprise thirty or forty persons, for children of all ages were admissible as guests. Moreover, while the lambs in Egypt were (and are) large, it must be borne in mind that "a male of the first year...

1-20 The Lord makes all things new to those whom he delivers from the bondage of Satan, and takes to himself to be his people. The time when he does this is to them the beginning of a new life. God appointed that, on the night wherein they were to go out of Egypt, each family should kill a lamb, or that two or three families, if small, should kill one lamb. This lamb was to be eaten in the manner here directed, and the blood to be sprinkled on the door-posts, to mark the houses of the Israelites from those of the Egyptians. The angel of the Lord, when destroying the first-born of the Egyptians, would pass over the houses marked by the blood of the lamb: hence the name of this holy feast or ordinance. The passover was to be kept every year, both as a remembrance of Israel's preservation and deliverance out of Egypt, and as a remarkable type of Christ. Their safety and deliverance were no...

Verse Exodus 12:4. _IF THE HOUSEHOLD BE TOO LITTLE_] That is, if there be not persons enough in one family to eat a whole lamb, then two families must join together. The rabbins allow that there should be at least _ten_ persons to one paschal lamb, and not more than _twenty_. _TAKE_ IT, _ACCORDING TO THE NUMBER OF THE SOULS_] The persons who were to eat of it were to be first ascertained, and then the lamb was to be slain and dressed for _that number_....

Tradition specifies ten as the least number; but the matter was probably left altogether to the discretion of the heads of families. The last clause should be rendered: “each man, according to his eating, ye shall count for the lamb.”...

FIRST INSTITUTION OF THE PASSOVER. EXPOSITION THE INSTITUTION OF THE PASSOVER AND THE REASONS FOR IT.—In the interval allowed by God, according to the precedent of former announced plagues, between the warning concerning the first-born and the execution, Moses received instructions for the institution of a new religious rite,_ _founded possibly upon some previous national usage, but so re-shaped, re-cast, and remodelled as to have an entirely new and fresh character. In all Eastern nations, the coming in of spring was observed as a jocund and festive time, with offerings, processions, and songs of rejoicings. When the date of the vernal equinox was known, it was naturally made the starting-point f

AND IF THE HOUSEHOLD BE TOO LITTLE FOR THE LAMB,.... That they cannot eat it up at once; LET HIM AND HIS NEIGHBOUR NEXT UNTO HIS HOUSE TAKE IT ACCORDING TO THE NUMBER OF THE SOULS; which Josephus e says were never fewer than ten, and were often twenty, but no man might feast alone; with which agrees the Jewish canon f, "they do not kill the passover lamb for a single person, nor even for a society consisting of one hundred, that cannot eat the quantity of an olive:'' EVERY MAN ACCORDING TO HIS EATING SHALL MAKE YOUR COUNT FOR THE LAMB: that is, a man must reckon up how many he has in his own house to eat of the lamb, and what their appetites be, by which he will he able to judge whether he can dispense with a lamb himself, or whether he must take in some of his neighbours, and how many, so as to eat up the whole lamb, for, for such persons the lamb was to be slain. The rule is, "if a...

Exodus 12:1. _And the Lord spake unto Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, saying, This month shall be unto you the beginning of months: it shall be the first month of the year to you._ And for this reason that, now, as a nation, they were to begin their separate history, separate in existence from all the rest of mankind. Exodus 12:3. _Speak ye unto all the congregation of Israel, saying, In the tenth day of this month they shall take to them every man a lamb, according to the house of their fathers, a lamb for a house: and if the household be too little for the lamb, let him and his neighbour next unto his house take it according to the number of the souls; every man according to his eating shall make your count for the lamb._ The separation of the lamb was to take p

5. REDEMPTION BY BLOOD, THE PASSOVER AND THE LAW OF THE FIRSTBORN CHAPTER 12 The Passover Instituted and Kept, the Death of the Firstborn and the Exodus _ 1. The Passover instituted and the feast of unleavened bread (Exodus 12:1)_ 2. The command given to the people and obeyed (Exodus 12:21) 3. The death of the firstborn in Egypt (Exodus 12:29) 4. The departure of the children of Israel (Exodus 12:31) 5. From Rameses to Succoth (Exodus 12:37) 6. The fulfillment of the 430 years ...

EXODUS 12:1 P. RULES FOR THE PASSOVER (first set). On the history of the Passover, see pp. 102f. Most ceremonial rules are dated from Sinai or the land of Moab: so these that follow are noted in Exodus 12:1 as given in Egypt. The first month (Exodus 12:2) is in J, E, and D Abib, and later (Nehemiah 2:1) Nisan. As the Quakers dropped the names of the days of the week on account of their pagan origin, so P avoids the Canaanitish or Phœ nician names, using numbers only, as in the later Biblical books. The critical months in autumn and spring, which closed or began the harvest, were natural starting points for the year among an agricultural people. Befo

IF THE HOUSEHOLD BE TOO LITTLE FOR THE LAMB. No mention is made here of the number of persons necessary to. Paschal company, but. Jewish tradition fixed ten as the least number, and including children it averaged about twenty. An individual might not eat the Passover alone....