The Last Night

“Christ our passover is sacrificed for us” (1 Corinthians 5:7).

A fundamental question about the Passover revolves around five scriptures and three resulting assumptions: “Ye shall keep [the Passover lamb] until the fourteenth day of the same month; and the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it between the two evenings … And they shall eat the flesh in that night” (Exodus 12:6-8).

“And thus shall ye eat it: with your loins girded, your shoes on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and ye shall eat it in haste: it is Jehovah’s Passover” (Exodus 12:11). “Kill the Passover … and none of you shall go out of the door of his house until the morning” (Exodus 12:21, 22).

“The Egyptians were urgent upon the people, to send them out … of the land in haste; for they said, We shall all be dead men” (Exodus 12:33).

“And they journeyed from Rameses in the first month, on the fifteenth day of the first month; on the morrow after the Passover the children of Israel went out with a high hand in the sight of all the Egyptians, while the Egyptians were burying all their firstborn … And the children of Israel journeyed from Rameses, and encamped in Sukkoth” (Numbers 33:3-5).

If the day were to begin at sunset, the Passover lamb be slain after sunset, and the Israelites must leave hastily after sunrise, then how can departure be reckoned a day later than the slaying of the Passover lamb?

Reckoning the Day

The reckoning of the beginning of the day has changed from time to time and place to place throughout ancient history. By the first century AD, which is New Testament times, Pliny says, “The Babylonians count the period between two sunrises, the Athenians that between two sunsets, the Umbrians [central Italy] from midday to midday, the common people every where from dawn to dark, the Roman priests and the authorities who fixed the official day, and also the Egyptians and Hipparchus, the period from midnight to midnight.” In more ancient times it had been the Babylonians who reckoned by sunset and the Egyptians by sunrise.

If Genesis 1 was interpreted in terms of a 24-hour day, it would begin at noon. Verse 5 says, “the evening and the morning were the first day.” In contrast, Genesis 19:34 shows daylight to be “the morrow” after the night — a sunrise reckoning. “The next day” after the night in Numbers 11:32 and 33:3 also implies the day was then reckoned as beginning at sunrise. The only New Testament text unmistakably defining the beginning of the day is Matthew 28:1, “Now late on the sabbath day, as it began to dawn toward the first day of the week,” which surprisingly is consistent only with a sunrise reckoning.

If at the time of the exodus the day was still reckoned as beginning at sunrise, which was apparently the Egyptian practice then, it would be unnecessary to propose an extra day’s delay in the Israelites’ departure. Such reckoning would equally accommodate the slaying of the Passover lamb in the afternoon or the evening, as both would be on the same calendar day.

Resolution of this latter issue depends solely on the meaning of the phrase “between the two evenings.”

“Between the Two Evenings”

The Hebrew expression beyn ha gharbayim is neither singular nor plural, but dual (for things which come in pairs) and hence means “between the two evenings.” The expression is used eleven times: Exodus 12:6, 16:12, 29:39, 41, 30:8, Leviticus 23:5, Numbers 9:3, 5, 11, 28:4, 8. In Exodus 29:39-41 and Numbers 28:4-8 the continual offering of two lambs is one in the morning and the other between the two evenings; this distinction contrasts the two times of day, such that “between the two evenings” cannot simply be between one sunset and the next sunset. Similarly in Exodus 30:7, 8, the high priest Aaron was to dress the lamps in the morning and light the lamps between the two evenings (presumably because sunlight was either dimming or gone).

This expression is further refined in Exodus 16:12-13, “Between the two evenings ye shall eat flesh, and in the morning ye shall be filled with bread; and ye shall know that I am Jehovah … it came to pass at even, that the quails came up, and covered the camp.” In the Spring the migratory kind of quail would be flying north in great numbers and would be rising up in altitude to reach the wilderness of Sin, where the Israelites were; migratory birds settle towards sunset, or twilight (after which both flying and settling would be more dangerous). Therefore, these two verses require that “between the two evenings” means a limited period after sunset.

In contrast to the Pharisees’ thought of 3:00 PM, Jack Finegan says, “The Sadducees and the Samaritans, however, held that the slaughtering of the lamb itself was to take place between sunset and darkness. The Book of Jubilees seems to agree with this when it says about the Passover lamb: ‘It is not permissible to slay it during any period of the light, but during the period bordering on the evening, and let them eat it at the time of the evening until the third part of the night’ (49:12). The Targum of Onkelos also rendered ‘between the two evenings’ in Exodus 12:6 as ‘between the two suns,’ and this was then explained as meaning the time between sunset and the coming out of the stars.”

Thus, the appropriate synonym is “twilight” (from the Anglo-Saxon word “two + lÂoht” for “two lights”). Jewish Publication Society (1917) and David H. Stern (a Hebrew Christian) both call it “dusk.” The feast in Egypt is delineated in Exodus 12:18, which literally says, “In the first [month] in [the] fourteenth day of the month in the evening you must eat unleavened breads until the twenty-first [day] of the month in the evening.” (This wording is somewhat parallel to that of Leviticus 23:32.) They ate unleavened bread on the 14th. Because the day then was reckoned from sunrise, events of both afternoon and evening were reckoned on the 14th. Change to sunset reckoning would later cause the evening events to be reckoned on the 15th.

In Haste

Israel was to eat the Passover in haste — fully dressed, with staff in hand and shoes on their feet — ready to go at the crack of dawn. But does not the Scripture say, “in the month of Abib Jehovah thy God brought thee forth out of Egypt by night” (Deuteronomy 16:1)? Does this suggest that Israel left before sunrise? No. It describes God’s part, not man’s part. “It came to pass at midnight, that Jehovah smote all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh that sat on his throne unto the firstborn of the captive that was in the dungeon; and all the firstborn of cattle” (Exodus 12:29). Only Moses and Aaron left their houses at night (Exodus 12:31), and that by Pharaoh’s command. Man’s part began at sunrise — the actual departure — rendered un-miraculous by the Passover miracle that preceded it.

But would it not have taken a day to get all the people together at Rameses (Hatwaret, Avaris) before the departure from Egypt? No. It is not said that they encamped at Rameses, but that they left from Rameses for the first encampment at Sukkoth (Exodus 12:37). The Egyptians were deathly afraid to let any Israelites stay behind, or even delay: “And the Egyptians were urgent upon the people, to send them out of the land in haste … they asked of the Egyptians jewels of silver, and jewels of gold, and raiment: and Jehovah gave the people favor in the sight of the Egyptians, so that they let them have what they asked. And they despoiled the Egyptians” (Exodus 12:33-36). So any delay was unlikely. Moreover, the departure occurred on the day the Egyptians were burying their dead — just six to eighteen hours after their firstborn died — a public-health expedient (Numbers 33:4, NASB).

Israel left from the city of Hatwaret (Greek, Avaris, later called Rameses, near modern Faqus) in the land of Goshen on Nisan 15 “on the morrow after the Passover” (Numbers 33:3). Thus, it would appear that the Passover meal must have been eaten on Nisan 14 (according to the reckoning of the day at the time of the exodus), for the morrow afterwards to be Nisan 15. Then “thou camest forth out of the land of Egypt in haste” (Deuteronomy 16:3).

They first made camp at Sukkoth, after the first day of the seven-day Feast of Passover. The second encampment at Etham, near modern Ismailia (at the Suez Canal), was a mere thirty miles east-south east of Hatwaret, the capital of Goshen; the caravan likely began by mid-morning and moved at least two miles per hour, requiring perhaps seventeen hours travel time split between the two days. The third day apparently went eighteen miles to the north, to another Red Sea residue, nearly to the Philistine road that they had earlier been commanded not to use, which would represent about another ten hours of travel. The Red Sea crossing might have consumed up to five hours, followed by a thanksgiving song of deliverance, comprising the fourth day. The remaining three days of the Feast of Passover constitute the three days’ journey into the wilderness, to which they had been called from the beginning (Exodus 3:18).

For the Christian, the period of the plagues typifies the present evil world (the world during which evil predominates), while the death of Egyptian firstborn symbolizes Armageddon, during which the world self-destructs (Mutual Assured Destruction, or MAD). The sacrifice of the Passover lamb just before the last plague reminds us that Christ’s sacrifice is prerequisite to deliverance of the whole world from sin, sickness, sorrow, and death. The first three days of the feast, when Israel is out from under the influence of Pharaoh, depicts the thousand-year kingdom of Christ, when Satan is bound, and people learn righteousness. The Lord’s people crossing the sea and seeing Pharaoh and his hosts drown shows the little season in which Satan will be loosed and then destroyed. Feast days five to seven foreshadow the ages of eternity, for mankind will have been perfected. The holy convocation of the first day doubtless signifies rejoicing at the resurrection of the world’s dead, and that of the last day the perfected world when “everlasting joy shall be upon their heads” (Isaiah 35:10, see also “Studies in the Scriptures,” Volume 6, pages 457-459).

Changes After the Exodus

For Passover observances after the Exodus, two notable changes were instituted, one by commandment and the other for practical reasons. In the fortieth year after the Exodus Moses commanded: “Thou mayest not sacrifice the Passover within any of thy gates, which Jehovah thy God giveth thee; but at the place which Jehovah thy God shall choose, to cause his name to dwell in, there thou shalt sacrifice the Passover at even, at the going down of the sun, at the season that thou camest forth out of Egypt” (Deuteronomy 16:5, 6). When once they entered into the Promised Land, all Israel was to journey to the Tabernacle, or later to the Temple in Jerusalem, for the Passover observance; household celebrations were no longer to be allowed.

The Passover influx of travelers to the Tabernacle created a logistics problem: How do people come to the Tabernacle “between the two evenings” and afterwards get to lodging for the night, especially those families with small children? Apparently it was resolved by advancing the slaying of the lambs by a few hours. (With a sunrise day, the sacrifice would still be reckoned on Nisan 14.) In that way it was later to synchronize the sacrifice of the typical lamb with the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ, of which the former was a type: “For our Passover also hath been sacrificed, even Christ”(1 Corinthians 5:7).

Schematic of the Exodus

To see the consequences of the days of the Exodus beginning at sunrise, the representation below is suggested.

If in later times the beginning of the day was changed to a sunset reckoning, such a change evidently opened the way later for lambs to have been slain at the same time Jesus Christ died.

If a change in reckoning of the beginning of the day seems a difficult concept, consider that the calendar was changed by the Lord to make the seventh month become the first month (Exodus 12:1, 2), so that even today the Jewish New Year begins with the seventh month. Likewise, Christ’s return to raise the sleeping saints begins the new “day” in the heavenly phase of the kingdom long before the “day” of the reign of Christ begins in the earthly phase of the kingdom.

Uncertainties of the calendar even today cause the Jews in Dispersion to observe two Passover Seders, on each of the first two days of the Feast of Passover. (That timing is most appropriate at Babylon and other lands east of Israel ever since the Hillel II calendar began in the fourth century.)

Changing to a Sunset Day

To see the effect of a change of reckoning the day according to sunset, the diagram below is suggested for the year of Christ’s sacrifice (AD 33 April 3). The Passover meal, which in Egypt had been associated with the night of Nisan 14, was now associated with Nisan 15. To maintain the sacrificing of the Passover lamb on Nisan 14, it was delayed until mid-afternoon, near the closing of the 14th, just a few hours before the main Passover meal. In this way, Christ could institute his Memorial at the same time of the 14th that the Passover lambs in Egypt had been slain and eaten. And in this way, Christ could sacrificially die at the same time Israel was currently sacrificing the typical Passover lambs.