Exodus 12:20

20 Eat nothing made with yeast. Wherever you live, you must eat [only] unleavened bread."

Exodus 12:20 Meaning and Commentary

Exodus 12:20

Ye shall eat nothing leavened
Bread or anything else that had any leaven in it: in all your habitations shall ye eat unleavened bread,
that is, if they eat any bread at all, it must be such; otherwise they might eat cakes of almonds or of eggs mixed with sugar, provided there was no leaven used, and this the Jews call the rich unleavened bread ^F16: this is repeated over and over, that they might be the more careful of observing this precept; but as this was limited for a certain time, it plainly appears to be a mistake of Tacitus ^F17 the Roman historian, who represents unleavened bread as the bread the Jews eat of in common.

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FOOTNOTES:

F16 See Leo Modena's History of the Rites of the Jews, par. 3. c. 3. sect. 5.
F17 Hist. l. 5. c. 4.

Exodus 12:20 In-Context

18 From the evening of the fourteenth day of the first month until the evening of the twenty-first day you must eat unleavened bread.

19 There should be no yeast in your houses for seven days. Whoever eats anything with yeast in it must be excluded from the community of Israel, whether he is an Israelite or not.

20 Eat nothing made with yeast. Wherever you live, you must eat [only] unleavened bread."

21 Then Moses called for all the leaders of Israel. He said to them, "Pick out a lamb or a young goat for your families, and kill the Passover animal.

22 Take the branch of a hyssop plant, dip it in the blood which is in a bowl, and put some of the blood on the top and sides of the doorframes [of your houses]. No one may leave the house until morning.