Children of Abraham

Richard L. Shafer[1]

 

April this year brings important holidays for all those of the Abrahamic faiths.  On April 11, Muslims will celebrate the birth of Prophet Muhammad in about 570 A.D., with readings from his teachings. 

 

Jews celebrate Passover (Pesach), one of the most widely observed Jewish holidays, during April 13 - 20.  Passover commemorates the occasion when YHWH killed the first-born sons of all Egyptians, including first-born males of Egyptian-owned livestock, but allowed the first-born of Israel to live.  This was the 10th and most awful plague brought upon Egypt because the Pharaoh would not allow the Israelites to leave. 

 

We read in Exodus 12 that Moses warned Pharaoh of the coming disaster, then proceeded to give instructions to the Israelites to choose a lamb to eat – if too much for the immediate family, then it must be shared with the neighbors.  The lamb (or young goat) was to be sacrificed on the 14th day of the month, near twilight, and some of its blood put on the two doorposts and above the door of the house where the animal was to be roasted and eaten.  Those eating the Passover meal were to wear “traveling clothes.”  What was not eaten was to be burned the next day. 

 

During the night, God passed throughout Egypt and all the first-born males died, except those of the Israelites.  God had passed over those houses which had the blood of the sacrificed lambs on the doorposts and lintels.  It was that very night that Pharaoh ordered Moses and the Israelites to leave Egypt[2].  And they left.  You can read the entire story in Exodus, beginning at Chapter 1.

 

In Deuteronomy, Moses instructs the Israelites to explain about the Passover celebration:

 

When your child asks you on the morrow, saying:  What (mean) the precepts, the laws, and the regulations that YHWH our God has commanded you?  Then you are to say to your child:  Serfs were we to Pharaoh in Egypt, and YHWH took us out of Egypt with a strong hand; YHWH placed signs and portents, great and evil-ones, on Egypt, on Pharaoh and all his house, before our eyes.  And us he took out of there in order to bring us, to give us the land that he swore to our fathers…[3]

 

Easter (April 16, or April 23 for Orthodox Christians) is the culmination of high holy days as Christians celebrate the resurrection of Jesus.  Jesus was crucified on Good Friday, the day on which the celebration of Passover that year would start at sundown.”[4]. 

 

In Luke 23:44, we read that it was around noon that the sky darkened “and stayed that way until the middle of the afternoon.  The sun stopped shining, and the curtain in the temple split down the middle.”  Some say the timing of Jesus’ death on the cross coincides with the instructions from YHWH about sacrificing the lamb:  “…on the 14th day of the month, near twilight…”  The connection is thus made between the sacrifice at Passover and the sacrifice of Jesus.

 

This year, as we give thanks at Easter for the resurrection of Jesus, we can also give thanks for YHWH’s deliverance of the Israelites from Egypt.  Happy Passover!  Happy Easter! 

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Copyright Richard L. Shafer, 2006


[1] This is one of a series of occasional columns in which the author, raised in the Christian tradition, searches for common ground and common history among the teachings, beliefs and practices of adherents of the Abrahamic faiths --  Islam, Christianity and Judaism

[2] Exodus 12:31

[3] Deuteronomy 6:20-23, from THE SCHOCKEN BIBLE:  VOLUME I.  Schocken Books, New York, 1983

[4] HOLY BIBLE, Contemporary English Version, p. 1128.  American Bible Society, New York.  1995