14t12 of Arisan. —On this day, which, as we have seen, was till the evening called the preparation for the Passover (non 7rapacrxevil rob and which was also called the first day of Passover or of unleavened bread (Lev. xxiii. 5, 6 ; Num. ix. 3 ; xxviii. 16 ; Josh. v. to ; Ezek. xlv. 21 ; 2 Chron. xxx. 55 ; xxxv. 1 ; Joseph. yezoish Wars, v. 3. 1), or the reason stated under the 13th of Nisan, handi craftsmen, with the exception of tailors, barbers, and laundresses, were obliged to relinquish the work either from morning or from noon, accord ing to the custom of the different places in Pales tine (Mishna, Pesachim, iv. 1-8). Leaven was only allowed to he eaten till mid-day, when all leaven collected on the previous evening and dis covered on this day had to be burned. The time for desisting from eating and burning the leaven was thus indicated :—` Two desecrated cakes of thanksgiving-offering were placed on a bench in the Temple ; as long as they were thus exposed all the people ate leaven, when one of them was removed they abstained from eating but did not burn it, and when the other was removed all the people began burning the leaven' (ibid., i. 5). It was on this day that every Israelite who was not infirm, ceremonially impure, uncircumcised, or who was on this day fifteen miles without the walls of Jerusalem Volizlzna, Pesachim, ix. 2 ; Maimonides, Hilchoth Korban Pesach., v. 89), appeared before the Lord in Jerusalem with an offering in propor tion to his means (Exod. xxiii. 15 ; Deut. xvi. 16, 17). Though women were not legally obliged to appear in the sanctuary, yet they were not excluded from it (I Sam. i. 7 ; Luke ii. 41, 42). The Israelites who came from the country to Jerusalem to celebrate the Passover were gratuitously accom modated by the inhabitants with the necessary apartments (Luke xxii. 10-12 ; Matt. xxvi. 18) ; and the guests left in return to their hosts the skins of the paschal lambs, and the vessels which they had used in their religious ceremonies (7oma, 12 a). It was, however, impossible to house all the pil grims in Jerusalem itself, since the circumference of the city was little more than one league, and the number of the visitors was exceedingly great. Josephus tells us that there were 3,000,000 of Jews at the Passover A.D. 65 (de Bell. yucl. ii. 3), and that at the Passover in the reign of Nei o there were 2,700,000, when 256,50o lambs were slain (i bid , vi. 9. 3),* and most of them must therefore have encamped in tents without the walls of the town, as the Mohammedan pilgrims now do at Mecca. It is therefore not surprising that seditions broke out on these occasions, and that the Romans, fearing lest these myriads of pilgrims should create a disturbance, and try to shake off the foreign yoke when thus massed together, took all the precau tionary measures of both force and conciliation during the festival (Joseph. Antiq. xvii. 9. 3 ; de Bell. yted. i. 3, etc. ; Matt. xxvi. 5 ; Luke xiii. I).
The Offering of the Paschal Lamb. —Having selected the lamb, which was neither to be one day above a year nor less than eight days old (Maimon ides, Hilchoth Korban, i. 12, 13)—being an exten sion of the law about firstlings and burnt-offerings (Exod. xxii. 30 ; Lev. xxii. 27)—and agreed as to the exact number of those who were to join for one lamb, the representatives of each company went to the temple. The daily evening sacrifice (Exod. xxix. 38, 39), which was usually killed at the eighth hour and a half (= 2.30 Kw.), and offered up at the ninth hour and a half (= 3.3o P.M), was on this day killed at 1.3o, and offered at 2.30 P.M., an hour earlier ; and if the 14th of Nisan hap pened on a Friday, it was killed at 12.30, and of
fered at 1.30 P.M., two hours earlier than usual (Mishna, Pesachi in, v. i ; Maimonides, Hilchoth Korban Pesach., i. 4). All the representatives of the respective companies were divided into three bands or divisions. 'The first division then entered with the paschal sacrifices, until the court of the temple was filled, when the doors of the court were closed, and the trumpets were sounded three times, differing in the notes (lr-inl wpn wpm). The priests immediately placed themselves in two rows, holding bowls of silver and gold in their hands, i.e., one row holding silver bowls and the other gold ones. These bowls were not mixed up, nor had they stands underneath, in order that they might not be put down and the blood become coagulated. The Israelites themselves killed their own paschal sacrifices, the nearest priest caught the blood, handed it to his fellow-priest, and he again passed it on to his fellow-priest, each receiving a full bowl and returning an empty one, whilst the priest nearest to the altar sprinkled it in one jet towards the base of the altar. Whereupon the first divi sion went out, and the second division entered ; and when the second again went out, the third entered ; the second and third divisions acting in exactly the same way as the first. The Hallel was recited [HALLEL] the whole time, and if it was finished before all the paschal animals were slain, it might be repeated a second, and even a third time. . . . The paschal sacrifice was then sus pended on iron hooks, whch were affixed to the walls and pillars, and its skin taken off. Those who could not find a place for suspending and skinning it, had pieces of wood provided for them which they put on their own shoulders, and on the shoulders of their neighbour, and on which they suspended the paschal sacrifice, and thus took off its skin. When the 14th of Nisan hap pened on a Sabbath, on which it was not lawful to use these sticks, one of the offerers put his left hand on the right shoulder of his fellow-offerer, whilst the latter put his right hand on the shoulder of the former, whereon they suspended the paschal sacrifice, and took off its skin. As soon as it was opened, and the entrails to be sacrificed on the altar were removed (comp. Lev. i. 9 ; 3-5), they were placed on a dish, and offered with in cense on the altar. On the Sabbath, the first di vision, after leaving the court, remained on the Temple Mountain, the second between the ram parts (i.e., the open space between the walls of the court of the women and the trellis-work in the temple, comp. Mishna, Mia'a'oth, ii. 3), whilst the third remained in its place. When it became dark, they all went out to roast their paschal sacrifices' Pesachim, v. 5-to). A spit, made of the wood of the pomegranate-tree, was put in at the mouth of the paschal lamb, and brought out again at its vent ; it was then carefully placed in the oven so as not to touch its sides, lest the cooking should be affected (comp. Exod. xii. 9 ; 2 Chron. xxxv. 13), and if any part of it happened to touch the earthenware oven, it had to be pared off; or if the fat which dripped from it had fallen on the oven and then again fallen back on the lamb, the part so touched had also to be cut out (Pesachim, vii. 1, 2). If any one broke a bone of the paschal lamb, so as to infringe the command in Exod. xii. 46, he incurred the penalty of forty stripes (Pesachim, vii. it). The bone, however, for the breaking of which the offender is to receive the stripes, must either have some flesh on it or some marrow in it, and he Llicurs the penalty even if some one has broken the same bone before him (Maimonides, Hilchoth Kor ban Pesach., x. I, 3).