Chapter 12
1
And the LORD said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, saying:
2
This month is the beginning of months for you; it is the first of the months of the year for you.
3
Speak to all the congregation of Israel, saying: On the tenth of this month they shall take for themselves a lamb for the house of fathers, a lamb for the house.
4
And if the house is too few for a Passover lamb, then he shall take—he and his neighbor nearest to his house—according to the count of souls per man according to his eating; you shall cover over the lamb.
5
It shall be for you a sheep, unblemished, male, a son of a year; you shall take it from the sheep and from the goats.
6
And it shall be for you for observance until the fourteenth day of this month, and they shall slaughter it, all the assembly of the congregation of Israel, between the evenings.
7
And they shall take some of the blood and put it on the two doorposts and on the lintel, on the houses in which they shall eat it.
8
And they shall eat the flesh that night, roasted over fire, and unleavened bread with bitter herbs—they shall eat it.
9
Do not eat it raw or cooked in water, but roasted over fire—its head with its legs and its innards.
10
Do not leave any of it until morning; you shall burn with fire what remains of it until morning.
11
And in this way you shall eat it: your loins girded, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and you shall eat it in haste. It is Passover to the LORD.
12
I will pass through the land of Egypt on this night, and I will strike every firstborn in the land of Egypt, from humanity to beast. And I will execute judgments against all the gods of Egypt. I am the LORD.
13
And the blood will be a sign for you on the houses where you are, and I will see the blood and pass over you, and there will not be a plague to destroy you when I strike the land of Egypt.
14
And this day shall be a memorial for you, and you shall celebrate it as a festival to the LORD for your generations, an eternal statute; you shall celebrate it.
15
Seven days you shall eat unleavened bread; only on the first day you shall remove leaven from your houses, for anyone eating leaven—that vital life force shall be cut off from Israel from the first day until the seventh day.
16
And on the first day there shall be a sacred convocation, and on the seventh day a sacred convocation; no work shall be done on them, except what must be eaten by every person—that alone may be done by you.
17
And you shall keep the unleavened breads, for on this very day I brought your heavenly hosts out from the land of Egypt; and you shall keep this day for your generations—a statute everlasting.
18
At the beginning, on the fifteenth day of the new moon, in the evening you shall eat unleavened bread until the twenty-first day of the new moon, in the evening.
19
Seven days leaven shall not be found in your houses, for any eater of leavened bread—that soul shall be cut off from the congregation of Israel, whether in the stranger or in the citizen of the earth.
20
You shall not eat any leaven in all your dwelling places; you shall eat unleavened bread.
21
Moses called to all the elders of Israel and said to them, "Draw and take sheep for yourselves for your clans and slaughter the Passover."
22
You shall take a bundle of hyssop, and you shall dip it in the blood that is in the basin, and you shall touch the lintel and the two doorposts with the blood that is in the basin. And none of you shall go out from the entrance of his house until morning.
23
And the LORD will pass over to strike Egypt, and he will see the blood on the lintel and on the two doorposts, and the LORD will pass over the door, and he will not allow the destroyer to come into your houses to strike.
24
You shall keep this word as a statute for yourself and for your sons forever.
25
And it will be that when you come to the land that the LORD will give you just as he spoke, and you will keep this service.
26
And it will be that when your sons say to you, "What is this service to you?"
27
And you shall say, "It is a Passover sacrifice to the LORD, who passed over the houses of the sons of Israel in Egypt when he struck Egypt, but he delivered our houses." And the people bowed and prostrated themselves.
28
And the sons of Israel went and did just as the LORD had commanded Moses and Aaron; so they did.
29
And it was at midnight, and the LORD struck every firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh who was sitting on his throne to the firstborn of the captive who was in the dungeon, and every firstborn of livestock.
30
Pharaoh rose up that night, he and all his servants and all Egypt, and there was a great cry in Egypt, for there was no house where someone had not died.