The combined feasts of Passover and Unleavened Bread are the most important

of all the annual Jewish feasts. They commemorate God’s rescue of the

Hebrews from the “plague of the firstborn” during the time of Moses, where

God’s people were spared death by applying the blood of lambs upon the

doorframes of their homes. The feasts also remember the hasty release and

exodus of the Hebrews from their cruel treatment and enslavement by

Pharaoh, king of Egypt.

So that they would always remember his saving acts, God told the Jews to

commemorate this “divine rescue” from death and bondage through these two

feasts, which were to be celebrated every year—at the same time and in the

same way—without fail.

Jesus and his disciples had travelled to Jerusalem to commemorate Passover

before, but the one we read about in Mark 14:12-26 would be entirely

different. As Jesus told his disciples during this particular Seder meal,

it would become the occasion of his death by crucifixion, and the timing

was no mere coincidence.

By Keith Beebe