as a permanent statute for the generations to come. 15 For seven days you must eat unleavened bread. On the first day you are to remove the leaven from your houses. Whoever eats anything leavened from the first day through the seventh must be cut off from Israel.
16 On the first day you are to hold a sacred assembly, and another on the seventh day. You must not do any work on those days, except to prepare the meals—that is all you may do.
17 So you are to keep the Feast of Unleavened Bread,[1] for on this very day I brought your divisions out of the land of Egypt. You must keep this day as a permanent statute for the generations to come. 18 In the first month you are to eat unleavened bread, from the evening of the fourteenth day until the evening of the twenty-first day. 19 For seven days there must be no leaven found in your houses. If anyone eats something leavened, that person, whether a foreigner or native of the land, must be cut off from the congregation of Israel. 20 You are not to eat anything leavened; eat unleavened bread in all your homes.”
21 Then Moses summoned all the elders of Israel and told them, “Go at once and select for yourselves a lamb for each family, and slaughter the Passover lamb. 22 Take a cluster of hyssop, dip it into the blood in the basin, and brush the blood on the top and sides of the doorframe. None of you shall go out the door of his house until morning.
23 When the LORD passes through to strike down the Egyptians, He will see the blood on the top and sides of the doorframe and will pass over that doorway; so He will not allow the destroyer to enter your houses and strike you down.
24 And you are to keep this command as a permanent statute for you and your descendants. 25 When you enter the land that the LORD will give you as He promised, you are to keep this service.
26 When your children ask you, ‘What does this service mean to you?’ 27 you are to reply, ‘It is the Passover sacrifice to the LORD, who passed over the houses of the Israelites in Egypt when He struck down the Egyptians and spared our homes.’”
Then the people bowed down and worshiped. 28 And the Israelites went and did just what the LORD had commanded Moses and Aaron.
The Tenth Plague: Death of the Firstborn
29 Now at midnight the LORD struck down every firstborn male in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh, who sat on his throne, to the firstborn of the prisoner in the dungeon, as well as all the firstborn among the livestock.
30 During the night Pharaoh got up—he and all his officials and all the Egyptians—and there was loud wailing in Egypt; for there was no house without someone dead.
The Exodus Begins
31 Then Pharaoh summoned Moses and Aaron by night and said, “Get up, leave my people, both you and the Israelites! Go, worship the LORD as you have requested. 32 Take your flocks and herds as well, just as you have said, and depart! And bless me also.”
33 And in order to send them out of the land quickly, the Egyptians urged the people on. “For otherwise,” they said, “we are all going to die!” 34 So the people took their dough before it was leavened, carrying it on their shoulders in kneading bowls wrapped in clothing.
35 Furthermore, the Israelites acted on Moses’ word and asked the Egyptians for articles of
- ↑ 17 That is, the seven-day period after the Passover during which no leaven may be eaten
