SPIRITUAL MEANING
OF PASSOVER
This is a supplement to
This stuff relates the Eucharist to the Feast.
1
Cor 5:5. Do you not realize
that only a little yeast leavens the whole batch of dough? 7. Throw out the old yeast so that you can be the
fresh dough, unleavened as you are. For our Passover has been sacrificed, that
is, Christ; 8. let us keep
the feast, then, with none of the old
yeast and no leavening of evil and wickedness, but only the unleavened bread of
sincerity and truth. (all NJB)
Rabbi Shaul (Paul) is here speaking about the Passover and Feast of Unleavened Bread which follows. This is an eight day festival that begins the second week of April this year.
COMMUNION / EUCHARIST and PASSOVER / UNLEAVENED BREAD
In
the Anglican / Episcopal Church, the Eucharist (Communion) celebrated at each
service is an extension of both the Passover and the feast of Unleavened
Bread. In these congregations, do you
remember what the People say after the Priest breaks the bread and proclaims,
“Chr-st, our Passover Lamb is Sacrificed”?
(The answer is that the people proclaim, “Therefore, let us keep the feast!” The older version then has the people saying,
“HalleluYah!”) The Priest and People are quoting 1
Corinthians 5:7, in which Shaul is speaking of the Feast of Unleavened
Bread. So there is a close connection
between the (Anglo-Orthodox) Christian Eucharist (or Communion) and Israelite
(and Jewish) Passover and Feast of Unleavened Bread.
Before we get to the Scripture about this, can you answer the following?
(1) Who instituted
the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread? __________________
(2) When are these observed and for how long?_________________________________
(3) Who instituted the Eucharist and Supper? ______________________
(4) When are these to be observed? _________________________________________
Answers: (1) Yahweh Elohim, (2) the 14th day of Ab and the next seven days, (3) Yahshua the Anointed (aka Jesus Christ) (4) as often as possible (1 Corinthians 11:26).
Shaul connects the Feast of Unleavened Bread with the Eucharist in 1 Corinthians 11, saying, “I received this tradition from the L-rd….”
Note this statement of faith:
We hold to the Real Presence of Yahshua in the elements of the Communion (i.e. the properly consecrated and administered unleavened bread and wine) as plainly set forth in Yahshua's own words (John 6:55), which we affirm to be genuine. The Communion is an extension of the Feast of Unleavened Bread and may be celebrated as often as we will. (http://yahpop.org/arc/Misc/Beliefs.htm)
YEAST / LEAVEN
Yeast (Leaven) is the symbol for sin. Sin, we remember, is breaking the commandments of Yahweh (1 John 3:4). What causes yeast to spread itself, or rise? (It proliferates in the medium causing fermentation, then dies in its own excrement.)
Why
do you suppose we never are to use a loaf of yeast bread or a hotdog bun for Eucharist /
Communion? We use only unleavened bread,
preferably the “wafer” as a communion element.
The “wafer” is real bread, made of nothing but wheat flour and water
under the supervision of set-apart ministers.
How would you un-yeast dough? How can one un-leaven him/herself?
Lev 17:1. Yahweh spoke to Moses and said: 5. The Israelites should bring their sacrifices to Yahweh at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting, to the priest, and offer them as communion sacrifices to Yahweh; … 7. This is a perpetual law for them and for their descendants.
POLARIZING EVERYONE
This Bible version uses the word communion to describe animal sacrifices. In the olden days, butchering wasn’t to be done outside of bringing the offering of it into the meeting place. One reason for this is that these Israelites (who didn’t have supermarkets), by “sacrificing” outside the “communion,” might be doing so unto a pagan god. How long was such sacrifice to continue? Who are “their descendants”? We are their descendants.
John
6:51. Yahshua speaking: …the
bread that I shall give is my flesh, for the life of the world. 52. Then the Jews started arguing among themselves, How can this man give us his flesh to
eat? 53. Yahshua replied to them: In all truth I tell you, if you do not eat
the meat of the Son of man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. 54. Anyone who does eat my meat and drink my
blood has eternal life, and I shall raise that person up on the last day. 55. For my meat is real food and my
blood is real drink.
Of course, this series of sayings polarized Yahshua’s followers and scandalized the rest. It still is a cause of division in the Christian Church.
Here’s a turn-about for you: the more liberal churches take Yahshua’s words literally – they really eat his meat and drink his blood. The Anglican / Episcopal Church, for instance, believes this way and therefore commemorates the Eucharist every time they meet. On the other hand, the conservative / fundamentalist churches do not take these words literally and therefore but seldom offer “The Lord’s Supper” because to them it’s only a memorial service.
Messianics also believe (for the most part) that Yahshua was not instituting anything new here – that he was only observing the Passover. Therefore Messianics only do Passover on Passover, and Feast of Unleavened Bread on Feast days.
In the passage, Yahshua is making direct reference to the Exodus, the Passover and the Feast of Unleavened Bread.
SACRIFICES
Romans
3:25. Yahweh appointed
Yahshua as a sacrifice for
reconciliation, through faith, by the shedding of his blood, and so showed his
justness; first for the past, when
sins went unpunished because he held his hand; 26. and now again for the present age, to show
how he is just and justifies (prejudges) everyone who has faith in Yahshua.
Have the animal sacrifices of the Torah passed away out of
the law of Yahweh because the man Yahshua was the last sacrifice? No,
they haven’t. There can be no
justification without the shedding of blood, and there can be no shedding of
blood unless there is the
This is why some believers – Roman Catholics, Orthodox and some Anglicans say, “Our Passover lamb is sacrificed!” when they snap the crunchy circle of unleavened bread. They understand that Yahshua sacrifices himself every time we break the bread and do the supper as he commanded.
Other Anglicans and “Evangelical Christianity” think that idea of eternal sacrifice is kind of nutty, especially since Hebrew 7:27 says, He (Yahshua) has no need to offer sacrifices every day, as the high priests do , … this he did once and for all by offering himself.
TWO HOUSE
Now we wonder if we too are polarized and scandalized at
such teaching. Do we not understand Christians
to be