11 In the second month, on the fourteenth day, in the evening, they are to keep it, taking it with unleavened bread and bitter-tasting plants;
For the king, after discussion with his chiefs and all the body of the people in Jerusalem, had made a decision to keep the Passover in the second month. It was not possible to keep it at that time, because not enough priests had made themselves holy, and the people had not come together in Jerusalem. And the thing was right in the eyes of the king and all the people. So it was ordered that word was to be sent out through all Israel, from Beer-sheba to Dan, that they were to come to keep the Passover to the Lord, the God of Israel, at Jerusalem: because they had not kept it in great numbers in agreement with the law. So runners went with letters from the king and his chiefs through all Israel and Judah, by the order of the king, saying, O children of Israel, come back again to the Lord, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, so that he may come again to that small band of you which has been kept safe out of the hands of the kings of Assyria. Do not be like your fathers and your brothers, who were sinners against the Lord, the God of their fathers, so that he made them a cause of fear, as you see. Now do not be hard-hearted, as your fathers were; but give yourselves to the Lord, and come into his holy place, which he has made his for ever, and be the servants of the Lord your God, so that the heat of his wrath may be turned away from you. For if you come back to the Lord, those who took away your brothers and your children will have pity on them, and let them come back to this land: for the Lord your God is full of grace and mercy, and his face will not be turned away from you if you come back to him. So the runners went from town to town through all the country of Ephraim and Manasseh as far as Zebulun: but they were laughed at and made sport of. However, some of Asher and Manasseh and Zebulun put away their pride and came to Jerusalem. And in Judah the power of God gave them one heart to do the orders of the king and the captains, which were taken as the word of the Lord. So a very great number of people came together at Jerusalem to keep the feast of unleavened bread in the second month. And they got to work and took away all the altars in Jerusalem, and they put all the vessels for burning perfumes into the stream Kidron. Then on the fourteenth day of the second month they put the Passover lambs to death: and the priests and the Levites were shamed, and made themselves holy and took burned offerings into the house of the Lord.
Let this month be to you the first of months, the first month of the year. Say to all the children of Israel when they are come together, In the tenth day of this month every man is to take a lamb, by the number of their fathers' families, a lamb for every family: And if the lamb is more than enough for the family, let that family and its nearest neighbour have a lamb between them, taking into account the number of persons and how much food is needed for every man. Let your lamb be without a mark, a male in its first year: you may take it from among the sheep or the goats: Keep it till the fourteenth day of the same month, when everyone who is of the children of Israel is to put it to death between sundown and dark. Then take some of the blood and put it on the two sides of the door and over the door of the house where the meal is to be taken. And let your food that night be the flesh of the lamb, cooked with fire in the oven, together with unleavened bread and bitter-tasting plants. Do not take it uncooked or cooked with boiling water, but let it be cooked in the oven; its head with its legs and its inside parts. Do not keep any of it till the morning; anything which is not used is to be burned with fire. And take your meal dressed as if for a journey, with your shoes on your feet and your sticks in your hands: take it quickly: it is the Lord's Passover. For on that night I will go through the land of Egypt, sending death on every first male child, of man and of beast, and judging all the gods of Egypt: I am the Lord. And the blood will be a sign on the houses where you are: when I see the blood I will go over you, and no evil will come on you for your destruction, when my hand is on the land of Egypt. And this day is to be kept in your memories: you are to keep it as a feast to the Lord through all your generations, as an order for ever.
And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron, This is the law of the Passover: no man who is not an Israelite is to take of it: But every man's servant, whom he has got for money, may take of it, when he has had circumcision. A man from a strange country living among you, and a servant working for payment, may not take part in it. It is to be taken in one house; not a bit of the flesh is to be taken out of the house, and no bone of it may be broken. All Israel is to keep the feast. And if a man from another country is living with you, and has a desire to keep the Passover to the Lord, let all the males of his family undergo circumcision, and then let him come near and keep it; for he will then be as one of your people; but no one without circumcision may keep it. The law is the same for him who is an Israelite by birth and for the man from a strange country who is living with you.
In the fourteenth day of this month, at evening, you are to keep it at the regular time, and in the way ordered in the law.
Take no leavened bread with it; for seven days let your food be unleavened bread, that is, the bread of sorrow; for you came out of the land of Egypt quickly: so the memory of that day, when you came out of the land of Egypt, will be with you all your life.
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Commentary on Numbers 9 Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
CHAPTER 9
Nu 9:1-5. The Passover Enjoined.
2-5. Let the children of Israel also keep the passover at his appointed season, &c.—The date of this command to keep the passover in the wilderness was given shortly after the erection and consecration of the tabernacle and preceded the numbering of the people by a month. (Compare Nu 9:1 with Nu 1:1, 2). But it is narrated after that transaction in order to introduce the notice of a particular case, for which a law was provided to meet the occasion. This was the first observance of the passover since the exodus; and without a positive injunction, the Israelites were under no obligation to keep it till their settlement in the land of Canaan (Ex 12:25). The anniversary was kept on the exact day of the year on which they, twelve months before, had departed from Egypt; and it was marked by all the peculiar rites—the he lamb and the unleavened bread. The materials would be easily procured—the lambs from their numerous flocks and the meal for the unleavened bread, by the aid of Jethro, from the land of Midian, which was adjoining their camp (Ex 3:1). But their girded loins, their sandaled feet, and their staff in their hand, being mere circumstances attending a hurried departure and not essential to the rite, were not repeated. It is supposed to have been the only observance of the feast during their forty years' wandering; and Jewish writers say that, as none could eat the passover except they were circumcised (Ex 12:43, 44, 48), and circumcision was not practised in the wilderness [Jos 5:4-7], there could be no renewal of the paschal solemnity.
Nu 9:6-14. A Second Passover Allowed.
6, 7. there were certain men, who were defiled by the dead body of a man—To discharge the last offices to the remains of deceased relatives was imperative; and yet attendance on a funeral entailed ceremonial defilement, which led to exclusion from all society and from the camp for seven days. Some persons who were in this situation at the arrival of the first paschal anniversary, being painfully perplexed about the course of duty because they were temporarily disqualified at the proper season, and having no opportunity of supplying their want were liable to a total privation of all their privileges, laid their case before Moses. Jewish writers assert that these men were the persons who had carried out the dead bodies of Nadab and Abihu [Le 10:4, 5].
8-14. Moses said unto them, Stand still, and I will hear what the Lord will command concerning you—A solution of the difficulty was soon obtained, it being enacted, by divine authority, that to those who might be disqualified by the occurrence of a death in their family circle or unable by distance to keep the passover on the anniversary day, a special license was granted of observing it by themselves on the same day and hour of the following month, under a due attendance to all the solemn formalities. (See on 2Ch 30:2). But the observance was imperative on all who did not labor under these impediments.
14. if a stranger shall sojourn among you, and will keep the passover—Gentile converts, or proselytes, as they were afterwards called, were admitted, if circumcised, to the same privileges as native Israelites, and were liable to excommunication if they neglected the passover. But circumcision was an indispensable condition; and whoever did not submit to that rite, was prohibited, under the sternest penalties, from eating the passover.
Nu 9:15-23. A Cloud Guides the Israelites.
15. the cloud covered the tabernacle—The inspired historian here enters on an entirely new subject, which might properly have formed a separate chapter, beginning at this verse and ending at Nu 10:29 [Calmet]. The cloud was a visible token of God's special presence and guardian care of the Israelites (Ex 14:20; Ps 105:39). It was easily distinguishable from all other clouds by its peculiar form and its fixed position; for from the day of the completion of the tabernacle it rested by day as a dark, by night as a fiery, column on that part of the sanctuary which contained the ark of the testimony (Le 16:2).
17. when the cloud was taken up—that is, rose to a higher elevation, so as to be conspicuous at the remotest extremities of the camp. That was a signal for removal; and, accordingly, it is properly called (Nu 9:18) "the commandment of the Lord." It was a visible token of the presence of God; and from it, as a glorious throne, He gave the order. So that its motion regulated the commencement and termination of all the journeys of the Israelites. (See on Ex 14:19).
19. when the cloud tarried long upon the tabernacle, … then Israel kept the charge of the Lord, and journeyed not—A desert life has its attractions, and constant movements create a passionate love of change. Many incidents show that the Israelites had strongly imbibed this nomad habit and were desirous of hastening to Canaan. But still the phases of the cloud indicated the command of God: and whatsoever irksomeness they might have felt in remaining long stationary in camp, "when the cloud tarried upon the tabernacle many days, they kept the charge of the Lord, and journeyed not." Happy for them had they always exhibited this spirit of obedience! and happy for all if, through the wilderness of this world, we implicitly follow the leadings of God's Providence and the directions of God's Word!