Exodus 13:6-8

13:6 For seven days ¹  you must eat ²  bread made without yeast, and on the seventh day there is to be ³  a festival to the Lord. 13:7 Bread made without yeast must be eaten ⁴  for seven days; ⁵  no bread made with yeast shall be seen ⁶  among you, and you must have no yeast among you within any of your borders.

13:8 You are to tell your son ⁷  on that day, ⁸  ‘It is ⁹  because of what ¹⁰  the Lord did for me when I came out of Egypt.’

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¹ tn Heb “Seven days.”

² tn The imperfect tense functions with the nuance of instruction or injunction. It could also be given an obligatory nuance: “you must eat” or “you are to eat.” Some versions have simply made it an imperative.

³ tn The phrase “there is to be” has been supplied.

⁴ tn The imperfect has the nuance of instruction or injunction again, but it could also be given an obligatory nuance.

⁵ tn The construction is an adverbial accusative of time, answering how long the routine should be followed (see GKC 374 §118.k).

⁶ tn Or “visible to you” (B. Jacob, Exodus, 366).

⁷ tn The form is the Hiphil perfect with the vav (ו) consecutive, carrying the sequence forward: “and you will declare to your son.”

sn A very important part of the teaching here is the manner in which the memory of the deliverance will be retained in Israel – they were to teach their children the reasons for the feast, as a binding law forever. This will remind the nation of its duties to Yahweh in gratitude for the great deliverance.

⁸ tn Heb “day, saying.” “Tell…saying” is redundant, so “saying” has not been included in the translation here.

⁹ tn “it is” has been supplied.

¹⁰ tn The text uses זֶה (zeh), which Gesenius classifies as the use of the pronoun to introduce a relative clause after the preposition (GKC 447 §138.h) – but he thinks the form is corrupt. B. S. Childs, however, sees no reason to posit a corruption in this form (Exodus [OTL], 184).