Thou shalt keep the feast of unleavened bread: (thou shalt eat unleavened bread seven days, as I commanded thee, in the time appointed of the month Abib; for in it thou camest out from Egypt: and none shall appear before me empty:)
Thou shalt keep the feast of unleavened bread, х ha-Matsowt (H4682)] - or Passover (see the command as given, Exodus 12:3-20; Exodus 13:3; Exodus 13:10). It was instituted as an anniversary memorial of the inauguration of their national existence; and on every return of the sacred season they celebrated the old covenant.
None shall appear before me empty - i:e., without sacrificial offerings (Numbers 28:1-31; Numbers 29:1-40; Deuteronomy 16:16-17), which were requisite at all the yearly feasts, though mentioned only in connection with the first. 'So close and decided was the relation which this and the other great communion feasts had to the national tenure of Canaan, that the people in repairing to them were always accompanied by gifts of the seasonable produce of it-a kind of fee paid to the feudal lord under whom the possession was held' ('Israel after the Flesh,' p. 51).
The following is the account of the actual observance of this feast, given by Josephus ('Antiquities,' b. 3, ch.
x., sec. 5): 'On the fourteenth day of the month Abib (in later times Nisan, Nehemiah 2:1; Esther 3:7), which is the beginning of our year, the law ordained that we should every year slay that sacrifice which was called the Passover. The feast of unleavened bread succeeds that of the Passover, and falls on the fifteenth day of the month, continuing seven days, on which they feed on unleavened bread. On the second day of unleavened bread which is the 16th day of the month, they first partake of the fruits of the earth; for before that day they do not touch them' (see further the notes at Leviticus 23:9-14).