Then God said to Moses: Today, this very night, Pharaoh will
let you go. Make yourselves ready to set out. Each family must slaughter a
lamb. You must smear a sign on the doorposts with its blood. Put on sandals.
Take a staff in your hand. Eat hastily and leave nothing over. This night all
the first-born sons of the Egyptians will die. But the Angel of Death will
pass over your houses, which have been marked by the blood of lamb.
Everything happened just as God had said.
The first-born sons of the Egyptians died. The son of the poorest man and also
the Pharaoh’s son. That night the Egyptians wept for their sons. Then the
Pharaoh had Moses and Aaron brought to him and ordered them: Go away,
quickly! Take everything that belongs with you. The Israelites gathered
together and set off out of Egypt.
The people of Israel never forgot this first
Passover night. The mothers and fathers did not forget how God had spared
their own first-born sons. Since then they have always brought God an
offering after the birth of their first-son. Each year they celebrate the
Passover, the feast of the Exodus and they explain it to their children like
this: With a mighty hand God liberated us from bondage in Egypt.
