Passover–How to Prepare
by Avram Yehoshua
Preparations for Passover are both physical and spiritual. May His Spirit lead you as you prepare to honor the Lamb of God:
1. Physical: you’ll want to do some spring cleaning and make sure there aren’t any crumbs of bread or pieces of candy containing leaven (yeast) behind the couch or in the bedrooms, etc. You’ll also have to go through all the things in the refrigerator and cupboards as well. You’ll be delightfully shocked at some of the things you’ll find that have yeast in them that you’ll either have to eat before Passover, or give it to a poor and needy person who isn’t celebrating Passover (a day before the Passover), or throw it out.Reading these chapters and articles will give you a greater appreciation of what our God has done and also heighten your desire to want to do the Passover as unto our Lord. God takes Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread seriously (Ex. 12:15, 19; Num. 9:13) and so should we.
a. Anything with yeast si’or–שְׂאֹר (yeast), which is a specific way of saying anything leavened with yeast (hamaytz–חָמֵץ ; leavened products), cannot be eaten during Passover and can’t be found in your home. You must eat it before Passover, give it to the poor, burn it or throw it out.2. Spiritual: seek the Lord Yeshua in prayer and ask Him to lead you into a deeper understanding of Passover. Read Ex. 1–16; Is. 52:13–53:12; Mt. 26-28 and Rev. 1. These articles on the website will also prepare you for Passover (or ask me for their PDFs):
b. The reason for this is that yeast causes bread ‘to puff up’ and is a perfect picture of what pride does to a man (1st Cor. 5:6-8). Yahveh forbids these foods during Passover week because He has given us His Lamb and His blood to remove pride from us. Yeshua was humble (Mt. 11:28-30) and sinless and is represented as the Bread from Heaven—bread without yeast (unleavened bread—Hebrew; matza).
c. Ancient man used yeast in the air to make sourdough bread. That same yeast starts to break down the human body when one is dying and ‘feeds’ upon a corpse, and so, it’s related to death, something that is opposite of what God is and has done for us.
d. Yeshua was and is humble, not proud. We want to get rid of all the symbols of pride because Yeshua is not like that and He came to make us like Himself.
e. As you go through your cupboards and refrigerator looking for leaven products you’ll note that our soul is like our home—it can be filled with things that aren’t good for us. Ask Yeshua to cleanse you of all sin and unrighteousness. That’s what Passover is about and why you’re searching for those things in your home: to remind us that there are sinful things in our soul that need to be searched out and gotten rid of.a. Passover and Jesus
b. Passover
c. The Passover Ceremony
d. The Feast of Unleavened Bread
e. First Sheaf
Store-bought matza gives Passover a bad name. It tastes like the cardboard box it comes in. Ruti makes our matza, and believe me, the difference between them is like night and day. It’s kind of like eating an apple and eating a picture of an apple : ) If you must, the store-bought matza tastes great with lots of butter. At the end of this guideline is Ruti’s recipe for making real matza, the kind Yeshua would have eaten with His friends.
For seven days we must eat unleavened bread–matza.1 If you buy the store-bought matza don’t be concerned if the box states ‘not kosher for Passover’ as this is just a rabbinic injunction.2 You may eat any matza as long as it doesn’t contain yeast. As ridiculous as this may sound, there is matza (unleavened bread) with leaven in it! It’s made by Manischewitz and they call this brand, American. How appropriate! Remember to buy enough matza for the entire week of Passover. Usually, one to one and a half boxes per person is enough for the week.
We use grape juice and wine for the Passover. Whatever anyone’s preference is. Ruti likes to mix about one-third wine and two-thirds grape juice for her glasses. I usually do about 50-50 for the first two glasses and then straight wine for the third cup, which pictures the blood of Yeshua. Also, even though traditionally each of the wine glasses for the Passover ceremonial meal should be full, you don’t have to drink the entire contents of each glass after the blessing is said for it. You may drink from the same glass until the next glass with wine is offered up with thanksgiving to the Lord.
Any sweet, red wine will do. Most sweet wines are Jewish, like Mogan David or Manischewitz. Concorde grape is great and very sweet. You don’t have to buy the ones that specifically say ‘kosher for Passover’ as the ones that don’t say it are just as biblically kosher for Passover as the others are. It’s just that the ‘kosher for Passover’ ones have been watched over and scrutinized especially for Passover by the Rabbis, but it’s the same wine without the label.
Traditionally, the wine should be sweet, red wine, red to picture the blood sacrifice the Rabbis say, and I go along with that. This is important for the 3rd Cup, which Yeshua lifted up and proclaimed was His blood shed for the forgiveness of sins. Whether you want sweet, semi-dry or dry red wine is up to you.
Nothing that has any yeast (leaven) in it should be eaten or found in your home for the week of Matza (the Feast of Unleavened Bread). These include, but are not limited to:1. breadIt’s a great idea to read all the labels you have on your canned goods, etc., because they need to be thrown out or eaten before Passover if they have yeast in them, not stored or hidden in a closet or cupboard. For those of you who soak your beans, if you put some salt in the water, it’ll stop the fermenting process.
2. cake
3. cookies
4. spaghetti (unless the package doesn’t list any yeast or leavening agents)
5. crackers (unless the package doesn’t list any yeast or leavening agents)
6. most cold cereal’s contain leaven (read the ingredients)
7. anything that has malt in it, like beer and ‘root-beer’ soda
Last, but certainly not least, toasters. Either clean them out thoroughly or throw them out and buy a new one after Passover.
Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread
The first and seventh days of the Feast of Unleavened Bread are holy Sabbaths. We need to keep them as such in spite of what the world is doing. You can prepare food on these annual Sabbaths3 (unless it coincides with the weekly 7th day Sabbath). Of course, this means no buying or selling on the annual Sabbaths and that we are to set ourselves apart to worship and to be with Yeshua and His Family.
The commandment to not have or to eat anything with leaven in it also speaks of eating unleavened bread every day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread (Hag Matzot). In other words, we can’t substitute potatoes or rice, etc., for or in place of the unleavened bread on any day of the Feast. If we want potatoes or rice, that’s alright to eat, but we must have unleavened bread every day of the Feast.
We must not do as the Pharisaical Rabbis do, who allow their people to symbolically sell all their leaven products to someone who is not keeping the Feast (here in Israel it’s usually to an Arab for one shekel) and then, after the Feast, buy it back for a shekel, but this is a perversion of God’s Word. We are also not to cover our leaven or store it away in a cupboard or in the garage or at a neighbor’s house who isn’t keep the Feast. This, too, is a great perversion of God’s Word to us. This is also done in Israel (covering it and storing it ‘out of sight’).
We must eat matza (unleavened bread) every day of the Feast. Leaven products are not to be seen in our dwelling because God has sent His Son to take all our sin nature and sins away, which leaven symbolizes. If we store them we’re saying that God hasn’t taken our sin away by the sacrifice of His Son Yeshua. This is the reason for making sure we don’t eat them or have them in our possession and making sure that we do eat the Bread of Life, Yeshua, symbolized in the matza (unleavened bread).
Matza is the bread of humility—the bread of affliction. When someone is afflicted he is ‘brought low.’ When God afflicts us it is because He loves us and wants to mold us and make us like His Son, who, although being God the Son was severely afflicted in our place. No greater love is there then that a man lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends, Yeshua said, if you do what I command you (Jn. 15:13-14), and the Passover celebration is an intricate part of walking in His ways.John 15:13–14: “Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends. You are My friends if you do whatever I command you.”Matza is a perfect picture of Yeshua, humble and obedient to everything His Father commanded Him, even to death, and not just any death that was instant and without pain, but a death that was incredibly torturous and prolonged: He was spit upon and struck by some in the Sanhedrin; He was brutalized by the Romans who ripped out his back and some of His beard:Isaiah 50:6: ‘I gave My back to those who struck Me and My cheeks to those who plucked out the beard. I did not hide My face from shame and spitting.’They placed a crown of long, piercing thorns upon His head, slashed His back open with the Roman lashes of sharpened implements attached to the lashes to literally rip the back open, the lashes also had lead balls on them to pummel the life out of Him, and then He was pierced with nails to a wooden pole to be displayed as an object of contempt and ridicule, totally naked and fully humiliated for you and me. He suffered greatly and we know that He is able to comfort all of us who suffer in this life, because He knows what it is to suffer.
He also did it so that we could ‘taste and see’ that Yahveh is good, full of love, compassion, mercy and truth. Psalm 34:8 says ‘Taste and see that Yahveh is good! Blessed is the man who trusts in Him!’Exodus 34:5–8: “Now Yahveh descended in the Cloud (the Glory Cloud) and stood with him there and proclaimed the name of Yahveh and Yahveh passed before him and proclaimed, ‘Yahveh, Yahveh God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering and abounding in goodness and truth, keeping forgiving-lovingkindness for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the sons and the son’s sons to the third and the fourth generation.’ So Moses…bowed his head toward the ground and worshiped.”With belief in Yeshua there comes the Holy Spirit to dwell within us so that we, too, can taste and see the love of God our Creator-Redeemer. This way we can become like Him and pass that love unto others. We can only give, pass on to others, what we ourselves possess. That’s why we need to be loved by God, so that we can love Him back with His love and love others with that love that passes all understanding. It is life itself because as John says, God is love. It’s not the love of the world, which is sensual and lustful, but the love that lays down its life for another.
God commands us that we eat unleavened bread every day of the Feast of Unleavened Bread and that no leaven is eaten by us or even seen in our places:Exodus 12:15: ‘Seven days you must eat unleavened bread. On the first day you shall remove leaven from your houses. For whoever eats leavened bread from the first day until the seventh day, that person shall be cut off from Israel.’May we come to know the One who gave so much for us because when we do, following His commandments are not grievous, but filled with Joy:
Exodus 12:17–18: ‘So you must observe the Feast of Unleavened Bread, for on this same day I will have brought your armies out of the land of Egypt. Therefore, you must observe this day throughout your generations as an everlasting ordinance. In the first month, on the fourteenth day of the month at evening, you must eat unleavened bread, until the twenty-first day of the month at evening.’
Exodus 13:6–7: ‘Seven days you must eat unleavened bread and on the seventh day there shall be a feast to Yahveh. Matza must be eaten seven days and no leavened bread shall be seen among you, nor shall leaven be seen among you in all your quarters.”4
Exodus 34:18: ‘The Feast of Unleavened Bread you must keep. Seven days you must eat unleavened bread, as I commanded you, in the appointed time of the month of Aviv, for in the month of Aviv you came out from Egypt.’
Leviticus 23:6: ‘And on the fifteenth day of the same month is the Feast of Unleavened Bread to the Lord. Seven days you must eat unleavened bread.’
Deuteronomy 16:3: ‘You must eat no leavened bread with it. Seven days you must eat unleavened bread with it, that is, the bread of affliction (for you came out of the land of Egypt in haste), that you may remember all the days of your life the day in which you came out of the land of Egypt.’1st John 2:3: ‘Now by this we know that we know Him, if we keep His command-ments.’What is a definition of humility? To follow His commandments in this world of darkness. This brings us face to face with how others, even other believers, perceive us (different!) and how we perceive ourselves (we’re the only ones doing this!). Will we give way to the pressures of darkness or will we follow the One who was very different and was ‘the only one doing it,’ picking up our wooden pole of crucifixion and entering into His Kingdom of Life? Come, let us go outside the Camp, which speaks of humiliation5 and walking with Yeshua, for He is there waiting for us:
1st John 5:2–3: ‘By this we know that we love the Sons of God, when we love God and keep His commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments and His commandments are not burdensome.’Hebrews 13:13: ‘Therefore let us go forth to Him, outside the camp, bearing His reproach.’In this we are truly like Fathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, David, the Prophets, and also, Yeshua.May your Passover be filled with His Presence! All our love!
Avram & Ruti Yehoshua
Ramat Gan, IsraelP.S. What about non-believers? Can they celebrate Passover with us? Absolutely not. It’s not a Passover demonstration, but a real, live Passover unto our God. We partake of Yeshua’s flesh and blood, and so, what non-believer would want to do that? Even if they wanted to, if they weren’t a believer it would be sin for us to give it to them and sin for them to have it. It’s only for His Body. It’s holy food that must not be profaned and treated as ‘common.’ Also, the spiritual condition of a non-believer is not conducive to our celebration of Passover. Passover is not a time for teaching non-believers, but for entering into fellowship with our God through the body and blood of His Lamb.
What of grown children that don’t believe, but who live in the home of their parents who are believers? Children fall under the spiritual authority of their parents. It’s up to the father6 to determine if they are open to participating in the Passover or not, but obviously, they shouldn’t drink the Third Cup nor eat the matza at that time unless they have just given their lives to Yeshua during the Passover ceremony.
What of young adults who believe and want to celebrate the Passover, but their parents don’t? Of course, it would be good to celebrate it at another’s home or congregation. If not, and it’s alright with your parents, you can celebrate by yourself in your room. Make sure that your room is leaven free and you’ll be able to keep the Passover as unto the Lord. We are called to do what we can do.
What of young children? Should they be forbidden to eat of His body and blood because they might not understand it properly?Matthew 19:14: “But Yeshua said, ‘Let the little children come to Me and do not forbid them for of such is the Kingdom of Heaven.’”Children are sanctified by believing parents (1st Cor. 7:14) and should be given the body and the blood because they are‘one’ with their parents.
Ruti’s Barley Matza Grind whole grain barley (not pearled barley) into fine flour. Or buy barley flour at a health food store.
This is cooked one piece of matza at a time, hence, ‘for 1 serving.’ I sometimes double the recipe and use two ‘same size pans’ and make it at the same time. Of course, if you have three pans you can do three pieces of matza at a time, etc.
When you finish making the matza in the pan, let the pan cool down before you put the next batter in. If you put the batter into a hot pan it’ll begin to cook the batter before you have time to spread it out.
For 1 serving:Place the batter in a 21 centimeter (8 inch) heavy Teflon pan with the bottom of it about 15 centimeters (6 inch), or place on a griddle or other pan and just spread out. With a circular bottom you can fit the dough around the pan so it makes a round piece of matza. This is the shape it would have been in the days of Yeshua.• One third cup of barley flour
• Two tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
• Add water gradually and mix in until it looks like Gerber’s Baby Cereal
• Herbamare vegetable salt (or regular salt)
Spread it out evenly with a spoon. Sprinkle the top lightly with salt or herbal salt (Herbamare is the best and doesn’t have any yeast in it).
Sesame seeds can be added, but not for the Passover matza. The sesame seeds give it an additional taste, but were most likely not used for the Passover meal. You can use it for the other days, though.
Now comes the tricky part. Everyone has different burners, gas or electric, and so:
Gas Stove• On a gas stove use the smallest burner at the highest flame for five to six minutes. When the bread begins to bubble, poke some holes in the bread with a plastic utensil (like a spatula, so you don’t ruin the pan). In the ancient days they would put holes in the matza so the dough wouldn’t ‘bubble up.’Electric stove
• You’ll want to cook it until it has light-brown spots; these are the bruises. Flip it and turn the heat down to low for about three minutes.
• Turn the heat up to a high flame for two minutes more.
• Place on a slatted bread board and eat when cooled off. Without the sesame seeds, this matza is like the matza that Yeshua and His Apostles ate for their Passover meal.• On an electric stove like ours that has 1-6 possible heating increments, I start it on six until the burner is hot and let it start to cook, but just barely.You might want to experiment and make a few practice pieces before Passover so you’ll get the hang of it.
• Then I make the piercings in it and turn it down to four for a few minutes; checking it every so often to see if it has brown spots on it (bruises) and when it does, I flip it over.
• Then I turn the heat down to three and I leave it there for a minute and then I turn it down to either two or one and let it cook the rest of the way.
Ruti’s Hazeret–Maror (Bitter Herbs) Horseradish is a root, kind of whitish-pale-light brown. Just call around until you find a supermarket that has ‘horseradish root.’
Then find a place, maybe a health food store in their Middle Eastern section, that has a jar of unhulled tehina paste (sesame paste). It’s like peanut butter, but smoother and made from sesame seeds.• Take a quarter to a third of a cup of the tehina paste, put it in a semi deep mixing bowl and add the juice of one lemon and stir. (If serving more than 4-6 people, use more tehina; a little goes a long way.)You can add crushed garlic and/or finely chopped parsley or coriander if you like. You might want to try one plain batch first. This is Avram’s favorite—Industrial Strength! : )
• Mix it with a fork until it’s mixed and then start adding water to it until you get a creamy consistency (not super thick, but a medium-thick paste). As you use it, you’ll have to add more water anyway.
• Peel the horseradish root, the outer-light brownish part, using a paring knife. Then grate the horseradish root CAREFULLY. You must be very careful with it in terms of breathing in the freshly grated horseradish. It can cause choking and unconsciousness. It’s powerful.
• Add the grated horseradish (a lot of it) to the tehina and mix it in. Add to taste (until your eyes tear). Make it at least one day before Passover because it needs to meld with the tehina. It makes an excellent maror. Seal it and let it stay over-night in the refrigerator. It should be good for the entire Feast, if it lasts that long and you don’t have to make some more.
You can place some in extra virgin olive oil if you can’t find tehina. The reason we place it in the tehina is because of oxidation, and also, it dilutes it so one can eat it. In the tehina one can still draw tears to the eyes when placed on matza. It’s also great with the lamb or salad.
Ruti’s Haroset Recipe Haroset is a traditional Jewish dish for Passover. It’s optional, but very tasty. You’ll need:
• 8 small green applesGrate the apples. Grind the walnuts relatively fine (or break them up with a hammer, using something over the hammer’s head so as not to dirty the nuts with it). Mix with the apples and add the rest of the ingredients and mix. Place in refrigerator one day before Passover so it can meld together.
• 5 handfuls of finely crushed walnuts
• cut-up pieces of golden raisins (to taste)
• 5 tablespoons of date honey (or regular honey or sorghum molasses or pure maple syrup)
• cinnamon
• 1 small lemon (juice)
• light sprinkle of cloves
• golden raisins and/or a cup of dates
• 1/3 to 1/4 sweet red wine (grape juice optional or one can make it without either)
It should serve about six to eight people and it’ll look like the mortar our Fathers made in Egypt for Pharaoh and his building projects.
What to buy for Passover Here’s a general list of things you might want to consider having at your Passover table, along with the necessary foods (items 1-3 in bold), and also, food for the early morning hours:
1. Lamb: about half a kilo to three-quarters of a kilo (one to one and a half pounds) for each person (if you’re not roasting a whole lamb). By the time the bone and the fat are taken into consideration, and shrinkage when cooked, it won’t be too much.a. If you cook it over a spit or grill it, you don’t have to be concerned about the fat or the blood as they will fall into the fire, but if you cook it in the oven you’ll want to trim the fat off before and not put anything (e.g. potatoes) in with the lamb as it’ll soak up the blood and some of the left-over fat.2. Bitter thing:7 (maror מָרוֹר)1. If you cook a leg or some ribs over a grill or on a spit, you’ll also want to take most of the fat off because it might catch on fire and burn the meat.b. Put olive oil on the lamb after you’ve taken the fat off and it’ll tenderize it, along with cooking it in olive oil (in the oven). Ruti uses extra virgin olive oil and puts garlic under and on top of it.
c. Also realize that the Lord commanded Israel to burn all the left-over lamb by dawn (Ex. 12:10; Dt. 16:4). You may not be roasting a whole lamb, but we should follow all the commandments that we can follow, and so, whatever is left of the lamb should either be burned or thrown out by dawn. Of course, God commands this because the lamb is a picture of the one-time sacrifice of Yeshua (Hebrews 7:27; 9:12; 10:10).
a. Hazeret is the term used in Israel today for horseradish root. This is the traditional ‘bitter’ thing at Passover (maror being written on many Passover plates and found in Ex. 12:8) and it’s wonderful with the meal. Be careful, though, if you buy this root fresh and grate it because it’s potent. The fumes will burn the lining of the lungs and irritate the eyes, so don’t breathe it deeply when grating it. This only happens during the grating process when the gases are released. Do it in a well ventilated room.3. Matza: if you’re making your own, make it fresh every day. You can grind a lot of grain the day before Passover and store it in the fridge, using it daily or buy flour. Matza is like Manna, it’s only good for one day. Of course, making it on the 7th day Sabbath is prohibited (Ex. 16:4-5, 22-26), so, like Manna, you’ll need to make a double portion on Friday. Ruti puts our Sabbath matza in our electric oven at 350º for 15-20 minutes to ‘toast it’ lightly, which freshens it up a bit, making it more cracker-like, but better than eating the day old matza without toasting it. (It should be an electric oven and not a gas oven because fire is prohibited on the 7th day Sabbath; Ex. 35:1-3).1. Ruti puts the hazeret (ground horseradish) in some tehina paste and it makes a wonderful paste to eat with the lamb and on the matza (see her recipe above).b. You could also use parsley for the ‘bitter thing’ and/or
2. Horseradish that is already prepared can be bought in a grocery store.
c. Watercress and/or
d. Baby Greens and/or
e. Coriander and/or
f. Radish (you don’t have to have all of these, but you do need to have at least one).a. You can make it out of any grain (or flour) and more than one grain if you like:4. Wine: about half a bottle on average for each person. Manischewitz Concorde Grape is tasty. Some like Mogen David’s Concorde Grape. Any sweet, red wine will do, but you can also have a dry or semi-dry red wine if you like.1. Barley grain/flour and/or2. Whole wheat grain/flour and/or
3. Spelt grain/floura. No grain has any leaven in it, but if you buy it as flour there is some, like pancake flour, that may have leaven in it. Read the labels on everything that you buy, including any flour.b. Or, you can buy the already made matza in the box. Just make sure it doesn’t have any leaven in it and don’t confuse the matza with the picture of the matza on the box, even though the two might taste the same.a. Alfred Edersheim states that wines were always mixed with water, especially at Passover. Usually, it was one part wine and two parts water (Nidd. 2.7), but at Passover it was one part wine to three parts water (Pesach 108b) because of the number of ceremonial glasses for the meal.85. Grape Juice: about half a bottle on average for each person.
b. A full cup of wine symbolizes fullness of joy, but one doesn’t have to drink all the wine that is in the cup every time a blessing is said. Passover is not a time to get drunk—it’s a time to get high on the Lord!
c. The New International Encyclopedia of Bible Words says that yayin or wine in Scripture is, ‘fermented wine, which in Bible times contained about seven to ten percent alcohol.’9 Mixing it with water would lessen the alcoholic content by 75% for Passover (i.e. the water wine mixture would contain about 2% alcohol).
6. Water/and or any other beverage for the meal (if one doesn’t want to have only wine and/or grape juice.
7. Vegetablesa. Avocado8. Potatoes and/or
b. Carrots
c. Cucumbers
d. Lettuce
e. Peppers: Red & Yellow
f. Etc.a. Beans and/or9. Butter: which goes well with the potatoes and matza
b. Rice and/or
c. Sweet Potatoes
10. Humus: which goes well with the potatoes, matza and veggies
11. Olive oil (extra virgin) for dipping the matza into or pouring on potatoes and lamb
12. Tehina (to put the freshly grated horseradish in)
13. Lentil Soup (or any other soup, just make sure if you make it from a mix or packet that it doesn’t have leaven in it)
14. Nutsa. Almonds15. Dates (hadrawi are the best!)
b. Cashews
c. Pistachios
d. Pecans
e. Etc.a. Medjool are also very good16. Figs
17. Raisins
18. Bananas
19. Apples
20. Etc.
ENDNOTES:
1. Ex. 12:15, 18, 20; 13:6; 34:18.
2. Some matza is made with eggs and this wouldn’t be acceptable for the matza of Passover night when we eat the matza that speaks of Yeshua’s body. The matza for Passover night should be simple.
If the store-bought matza doesn’t have salt on it, take some olive oil and rub it on the matza and then lightly sprinkle salt on it because salt was always part of matza, as well as olive oil3. “On the first day there shall be a holy convocation and on the seventh day there shall be a holy convocation for you. No manner of work shall be done on them, but that which everyone must eat—that only may be prepared by you” (Exodus 12:16).
4. In English the word leaven (or yeast) appears twice, but in Hebrew they are two different words meaning the same thing–no leavened products especially bread. In Ex. 13:7 it’s written: ‘Unleavened bread must be eaten seven days and nothing with leaven (hamaytz–leavened products) shall be seen among you, nor shall leaven (si’or–yeast) be seen among you in all your quarters.’
5. To go ‘outside the Camp’ spoke of those who were banished from Israeli society because they were unclean (e.g. lepers, etc; Lev. 13:46; Num. 5:1-3; 31:19). The writer of Hebrews speaks of Yeshua being crucified outside Jerusalem to emphasize that Yeshua was totally humiliated (as one might expect a leper to feel), and so, we shouldn’t be afraid of being humiliated, either.
6. The father is the God ordained authority in the family (Gen. 18:12; 1st Cor. 11:3, 8-9; 16).
7. In the only two places where bitter herbs are mentioned in English (Ex. 12:8; Num. 9:11) the Hebrew word speaks only of ‘bitter’ (in the plural). Traditionally, ‘herbs’ has been added to the translation, but the ‘bitter thing’ need not scripturally be an herb like parsley. It can be a vegetable like celery or lettuce, etc., or a root like horse radish.
8. Alfred Edersheim, The Life and Times of Jesus The Messiah (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 2000), p. 619.
9. New International Encyclopedia of Bible Words, ‘Wine’ (Accordance electronic ed. Altamonte Springs: OakTree Software, 2006), n.p.