2,435 related texts · 25 related myths · Page 2 of 51
The Torah commands: "The entire congregation of Israel shall offer it" (Exodus 12:47). The Mekhilta asks why this verse is necessary at all, given that the Torah already instructed...
(Exodus 13:8) commands, "And you shall tell your son on that day." But when exactly is "that day"? The verse sits within a passage about the month of Nisan, so one might think the ...
(Ibid. 16) "And it shall be as a sign upon your hand, etc.": In four places, the mitzvah of tefillin (leather phylacteries worn during prayer) is mentioned: (Exodus 13:1-10) "Sanct...
The law of chametz turns on timing. Sifrei Devarim asks exactly when eating leaven must stop before Pesach. Our source for this particular detail is Sifrei Devarim, a collection of...
(Exodus 13:3) records Moses telling the people, "This day you go out, in the month of Aviv." The Hebrew word Aviv means spring. But the verse seems redundant, everyone present alre...
The familiar reading treats these epic stories in the Torah and just accept that things happened at the right moment. But what if there's a hidden layer of incredible detail beneat...
Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Exodus 12:29) opens up a corner of the Exodus story that few readers notice. The verse says the firstborn of Egypt died, from Pharaoh's heir down to the ...
Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Exodus 12:30) describes Pharaoh rising in the night, and with him every one of his servants and every surviving Mizraee. The great cry goes up. And then ...
Of all the animals in the ancient Israelite household, the donkey occupied a strange, liminal place. It was not kosher, yet it was precious. It carried burdens, plowed fields, and ...
(Exodus 12:6) "And it shall be to you for a keeping": Why does the taking of the Pesach (Passover) precede its slaughtering by four days? R. Matia b. Charash says: It is written (E...
The Torah commands in (Exodus 12:17), "And you shall watch over the matzot." The Mekhilta takes this verse as the foundation for one of the most detailed areas of Passover law: the...
"This day you go out in the month of Aviv" (Exodus 13:3), a verse that seems to state the obvious. Of course Israel left in the month of Aviv (spring). The Torah already told us th...
God uses the east wind as an instrument of judgment, and the pattern repeats across the Hebrew Bible with striking consistency. In Egypt, it was the east wind that brought the plag...
The Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Exodus 13:21) watches a miracle change its posture. By day the "glory of the Shekinah of the Lord" went before Israel in a column of cloud to lead th...
The Book of Jubilees, sometimes called Lesser Genesis, is an ancient Jewish religious work of 50 chapters, considered canonical by the Ethiopian Orthodox Church as well as Beta Isr...
The Mekhilta, the tannaitic midrash on Exodus, turns its attention to a small but revealing detail about the night of the Exodus. The Torah states that the Israelites carried "thei...
Rabbi Shimon ben Yochai tackled a puzzle in the laws of the Passover sacrifice. The Torah states: "In one house shall it be eaten" (Exodus 12:46). Does this mean literally one phys...
The Torah issues a distinctive command about the Passover sacrifice: "And a bone shall you not break in it" (Exodus 12:46). The Mekhilta asks a deceptively simple question, does th...
"One Torah shall there be for the citizen and for the stranger" (Exodus 12:49). This verse, one of the most sweeping declarations of equality in the Torah, might seem redundant. Af...
Sifrei Devarim turns to Six Days or Seven Days of Matzah at Passover. The question? How long exactly are we supposed to eat matzah during Passover? It But here’s the thing: one ver...
Some of the most famous images of Passover, the belted tunic, the shoes on the feet, the staff in the hand, were never meant to continue. Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Exodus 12:11) s...
The first matzah was not baked in an oven. Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Exodus 12:39) says that Israel divided the unleavened dough they had brought out of Mizraim, the same dough th...
It all revolves around Pesach (Passover), Passover, the holiday celebrating our liberation from slavery in Egypt. The Midrash (rabbinic interpretive commentary), in Midrash Rabbah,...
(Exodus 13:5) states, "And it shall be, when the Lord brings you to the land of the Canaanite, the Hittite, the Amorite, the Hivvite, and the Jebusite." That is five nations. But J...
Rabbi José, in Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer, paints a vivid picture – a stark contrast, really – of that momentous night. On one side, you have the Israelites. Picture them: finally free...
The Torah introduces a practical problem in the laws of the Passover sacrifice. What happens when a household is too small to consume an entire lamb? (Exodus 12:4) addresses this d...
The Mekhilta asks a practical question about Passover night in Egypt that reveals something extraordinary about how communal sacrifice works. The Torah commands, "The entire assemb...
On the night that would change everything, God told the Israelites to paint blood on their doorframes. But where exactly? On the inside of the doorposts and lintel, or on the outsi...
The Torah gives strict instructions about Passover leftovers: "You shall not leave over anything of it until the morning, and what is left over of it until the morning, in fire sha...
When God announces the final plague, He uses a word that looks simple at first, but carries layers of meaning: "And I shall pass through the land of Egypt" (Exodus 12:12). The Hebr...
The Torah declares in (Exodus 12:16), "On the first day, a calling of holiness." The Mekhilta asks what it actually means to "call" a day holy. And the answer is surprisingly concr...
(Exodus 12:19) "Seven days se'or (leavening) shall not be found in your houses": This tells me only (that the transgression) against finding (it). Whence do I derive (the same for)...
The Torah states in (Exodus 12:20), "All leavening you shall not eat." The Mekhilta asks why this verse is needed at all, since the Torah has already forbidden chametz in an earlie...
The Torah instructs in (Exodus 12:22), "And you shall take a bunch of hyssop," referring to the bundle of hyssop used to apply the blood of the Paschal lamb to the doorposts in Egy...
R. Nehorai says; Upon my oath, not one in five hundred went out. For it is written (Ezekiel 16:7) "Numerous as the spouts of the field did I make you" (in Egypt), and (Exodus 1:7) ...
The Torah is specific about how to redeem the firstborn of a donkey: "And every firstling of an ass shall you redeem with a lamb" (Exodus 13:13). The Mekhilta takes this precision ...
The Torah mentions redeeming "the first-born of the unclean beast" in (Numbers 18:15), which could suggest that every unclean animal's firstborn must be redeemed. Camels, horses, d...
(Exodus 13:15) records a foundational obligation: "and every firstling of my sons I shall redeem." The redemption of the firstborn, known as pidyon haben, is one of the Torah's mos...
R. Nehorai says: I swear: Not one in five hundred went up. For it is written (Ezekiel 16:7) "(In Egypt) I made you as numerous as the plants of the field," and (Exodus 1:7) "And th...
The Mekhilta completes its trilogy of faith-based miracles with the blood of the Passover lamb. God told the Israelites to slaughter a lamb and place its blood on their doorposts, ...
The Seder Olam reveals a pattern hidden in the calendar of sacred history: the most important events in Israel's story all cluster around one date, the fifteenth of Nisan. It began...
How will God judge the dead? The body will claim innocence, it is just dirt without a soul. The soul will claim innocence, it is pure spirit without a body. Neither sinned alone. A...
"The locust came up over all the land of Mizraim, and settled in all the limits of Mizraim exceedingly strong. Before him there had been no locust so hard, nor will there be like h...
After three days of darkness, Pharaoh calls Moses back. "Go, worship before the Lord; only your sheep and your oxen shall abide with me: your children also may go with you" (Targum...
There is a grief so total it sets a boundary in time. Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Exodus 11:6) frames the final plague not only as a wound inflicted but as an unrepeatable event. Mi...
The original Passover meal was not symbolic. The bitter herbs on the first seder plate were real bitter herbs, eaten in a real hurry on a real night. Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Exo...
Scale matters in apocalyptic theology. Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Exodus 12:12) opens the heavens over Mizraim and reveals something the plain verse leaves hidden: the Lord descend...
The laws of Passover refuse the distinction between insider and outsider. Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Exodus 12:19) says that whoever eats leaven during the seven days will perish f...
