Exodus 12:21

Earlier in the chapter the LORD gave Moses and Aaron the full instructions for the Passover (Exodus 12:1–20): a lamb chosen on the tenth day of the month and killed on the fourteenth, its blood put on the doorposts, and its flesh roasted and eaten. Now Moses takes that word to the people, and he begins with the elders. The word for elder, zâqên, is used of old men and of the elders of a people, here in the plural, zēqēnîm. These were the experienced and respected heads of Israel’s families and tribes, who led them in judgment, in daily affairs and in the things of God.

Moses calls the elders because they are the people’s recognised leaders. Through them God’s word could reach every household in time, and they would see that it was carried out. The whole nation keeps this Passover together, and each home receives the command through its own leaders.

Verse 22 tells each household what to do with the blood. It has been caught in a basin (the KJV’s “bason”), and they are to dip a bunch of hyssop in it and put it on the lintel, the beam above the door, and on the two side posts. The phrase “the blood that is in the bason” stands twice in the verse, keeping the reader’s eye on the one thing that matters at the door.

Hyssop, ʼêzôwb, was a common plant, probably a kind of marjoram, whose small leafy branches made a good brush for sprinkling a liquid. Israel later used it in rites of cleansing, as for a healed leper (Leviticus 14:4), and David asks God to purge him with hyssop and make him clean (Psalm 51:7). Its place in the first Passover links the blood on the door with cleansing and with being set apart for God.

The verb for “strike”, nâgaʻ, means to touch, reach or strike, and here it is the touch of the hyssop bringing the blood to the wood. The lintel and the two posts frame the whole doorway, so the way into the house was marked above and on both sides, a sign that every person inside was under the blood.

Blood, dâm, stands for life throughout Scripture: “For the life of the flesh is in the blood: and I have given it to you upon the altar to make an atonement for your souls: for it is the blood that maketh an atonement for the soul” (Leviticus 17:11). The blood on the door showed that a life had been given for that house, the lamb’s life in place of the firstborn’s.

“None of you shall go out at the door of his house until the morning.” Safety that night lay inside the marked door. Anyone who stepped out would leave the place God had appointed and walk into the judgment passing through Egypt, so the protection held for those who stayed where God had put them.

Verse 23 gives the reason for everything in verse 22. Yᵉhôvâh, the LORD, is God’s covenant name, the personal name of the God who keeps his promises to Israel, and he acts on both sides of this night. He passes through the land to strike the Egyptians, and he passes over the doors marked with blood. The judgment is his, and the mercy is his too.

The verb pâçach, “pass over”, is the root of the feast’s name, and it means to pass over or spare. People ask whether this means God simply overlooked the Israelite houses. The LORD is present at each door that night, he sees the blood, and he deliberately spares that house while he judges Egypt. The same night he executes judgment against all the gods of Egypt (Exodus 12:12), in a land that honoured Pharaoh as a divine king and worshipped many gods, and the plagues showed that the LORD alone rules over them.

“And ye shall observe this thing for an ordinance to thee and to thy sons for ever.” The night in Egypt happens once, and the LORD makes it a feast for every generation after, as he had already said (Exodus 12:14). To observe, shâmar, is to guard, watch over and keep with care, so Israel was to look after this feast and keep it whole. “This thing”, dâbâr, means a word, and also a matter or thing, and here it is the whole Passover with all its commands. An ordinance, chôq, is something prescribed, a statute or decree given by God. The lasting force of the command comes from the words that follow, “for ever”, ʻôwlâm, a time that reaches on into the future. “To thee and to thy sons” carries it from the people standing in Egypt to all who would come after them.

God builds a question into the feast: “And it shall come to pass, when your children shall say unto you, What mean ye by this service?” The word for children, bên, means son, and here it stands for the next generation. They will say (ʼâmar, to say or tell) what they want to know. “This service” is the same word, ʻăbôdâh, as in verse 25, and it covers the whole observance: the sacrifice, the meal, the unleavened bread and the bitter herbs.

A child at the table sees something unusual and asks about it, and the parents have their answer ready. God knows that a ritual left unexplained grows hollow, so he gives the explanation along with the rite. The father, as head of the household, carried the main duty of teaching, and the child’s question is welcomed as part of God’s design. The question asks for the meaning, and that shows what the rite is for: the outward act carries an understanding of what God has done, and it leads to trust in him.

The same pattern runs through the Law and beyond. Israel is told to teach God’s words diligently to their children, at home and on the road, when they lie down and when they rise up (Deuteronomy 6:4–9). Moses gives a son’s question and a father’s answer about the LORD who brought them out of Egypt (Deuteronomy 6:20–25). Joshua sets up stones from the Jordan so that when children ask what they mean, their parents can tell how the waters were cut off before the ark of the covenant (Joshua 4:6–7). A psalm tells the LORD’s works to the generation to come, so that children yet unborn might set their hope in God (Psalm 78:1–7).

The answer God gives is short and complete: “It is the sacrifice of the LORD’S passover, who passed over the houses of the children of Israel in Egypt, when he smote the Egyptians, and delivered our houses.” A sacrifice, zebach, is an animal slaughtered and offered, and the word can mean the victim itself. The Passover is a sacrifice because the lamb died so that judgment would pass over the household, its life given in place of the firstborn. It is the LORD’s Passover, peçach, because he appointed it and he did the passing over.

The answer names two acts of God on the same night. He passed over, and he smote. “Smote” is nâgaph, to strike, smite or defeat, a heavy blow struck on purpose. The word “houses” stands twice in the verse, and both times it means Israel’s homes, translating bayith: “the houses of the children of Israel” and “our houses”. The parents say “our houses”, so every generation tells the deliverance as its own family’s story.

“And the children of Israel went away, and did as the LORD had commanded Moses and Aaron, so did they.” They went home at once to prepare, and they did what they were told. “Commanded” is tsâvâh, to give a command or charge, and the command came from the LORD through the leaders he had appointed. “Did” is ʻâsâh, to do or make. The word “did” stands twice in the verse, and the repetition makes the point that everything was done as God had said. Their firstborn and their freedom depended on it, and their obedience was the form their faith took that day. Then at midnight the LORD struck Egypt’s firstborn, and Israel left Egypt (Exodus 12:29–42).

The pattern of God’s word followed by obedience runs through Scripture. Abram went as the LORD had spoken to him (Genesis 12:1–4). At Sinai God gave Israel his law (Exodus 19), and the Passover deliverance was the reason Israel’s firstborn were set apart to the LORD (Exodus 13:1–16). Jesus says, “If ye love me, keep my commandments” (John 14:15).

People ask whether God still asks for obedience this specific. The ritual commands of the Law, such as animal sacrifice and blood on the doorposts, are fulfilled in Christ, and God still calls his people to obey his revealed will. Jesus sums it up as love for God and love for our neighbour (Matthew 22:37–40), and Paul says the righteousness the law asks for is fulfilled in those who walk after the Spirit (Romans 8:4). Under the new covenant that obedience comes from a heart devoted to Christ, and it is as real as Israel’s was that night.

The New Testament reads this night in the light of Jesus. Paul writes, “For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us” (1 Corinthians 5:7), and John the Baptist pointed to him as “the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world” (John 1:29). The Passover lamb had to be without blemish, and Jesus is the sinless Son of God. Peter tells believers that they were “not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold... But with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot” (1 Peter 1:18–19).

Jesus died at Passover time, and his blood does for his people what the lamb’s blood pictured. We are justified by his blood and saved from wrath through him (Romans 5:8–9). By his own blood he obtained eternal redemption (Hebrews 9:12), and “there is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1). The blood on the doors kept Israel’s firstborn alive through one night of one plague. Christ’s blood saves from sin and from eternal death, reconciles us to God, and brings us into his family as sons (Galatians 4:4–7).

Each household put the blood on its own door, and each believer receives Christ’s work by faith, believing in the heart and confessing with the mouth that Jesus is Lord (Romans 10:9–10). Israel stayed inside the marked door until morning, and Jesus calls his disciples to abide in him (John 15:4). Israel obeyed fully that night, while Jesus obeyed his Father perfectly all his life, becoming obedient unto death (Philippians 2:8), and by his obedience many are made righteous (Romans 5:19). The land promised in verse 25 points ahead to an inheritance kept in heaven for God’s people (1 Peter 1:4) and to the new heaven and new earth where God dwells with them (Revelation 21:1–4). In heaven the Lamb that was slain is worshipped as worthy (Revelation 5:6–10), and the people who bowed their heads in Egypt are joined by a great company redeemed by his blood.

These eight verses show the LORD as the God who judges and spares on the same night, and who keeps his promises. He judges with perfect justice, and he gives his people a way of escape that he himself provides and they receive by trusting his word. He thinks ahead to children not yet born and builds their questions into the worship he gives. He promises a land to slaves and speaks of it as already theirs.

The children’s question still comes to every believer, “What mean ye by this service?” Peter tells us to be ready to give a reason for the hope that is in us (1 Peter 3:15), and Jesus sent his disciples to teach all nations (Matthew 28:19). The answer has the same shape as Israel’s: the Lamb has been slain, the judgment has passed over all who are in him, and God has delivered our houses. Like Israel that night, his people answer with worship and with obedience.