Someone might at once say [that] “to make the pascha” is nothing else than to keep the festal day of the Passover. But properly and primarily [it] is to sacrifice and eat the paschal lamb. For — not now to touch the question whether the 14th day of the moon was festal — when the time is treated [of], both Latins and Greeks rather say “to keep” [agere], ἄγειν [agein], than “to make” [facere], ποιεῖν [poiein] — as in Plutarch (On Isis, and in the Roman Questions) — except perhaps rarely, as [in] 3 Kings [1 Kgs] 8 v. 55 in the Hebrew [and] Greek, and 2 Paralipom. [Chr.] 35 v. 15. And yet these latter are [found] in this chapter of Joshua, and Matt. 26:18; Heb. 11:28. Then the disciples “prepared the pascha itself” (Matt. 26:19; Mark 14:16; Luke 22:8 & 13). But they did not prepare the day itself, but the lamb; and therefore [it] is called “pascha,” which they prepared; [and] the Lord is said to have eaten [it] with them, in the same chapters. Thirdly, [it] is said [thus]: for [in Num.] 9, twice, [it is] not simply “to make the pascha,” but “to make [it] to the Lord”; and 2 Paralipom. [Chr.] 30 v. 5; ch. 35 v. 1. Fourthly, in the same ch. (v. 6 & 11), for “to make” is put the verb of slaughtering, שחט [shachat]; and likewise ch. 30 (v. 15 & 17) — just as [in] Exod. 12 v. 6, Deut. 16 v. 1, “to make”; but [at] v. 2, 6, זבח [zavach, “to sacrifice”]. Fifthly, [it] is very usual among the Latins, Greeks, and Hebrews, that the verb “to make” means “to sacrifice.” Cicero (for Murena): “Juno,” he says, “the hostess, to whom [it] is necessary [for] all guests ‘to make’ [sacrifice].” [Cicero] to Atticus (bk. 1): “which was ‘made’ for the people.” The old Poet: “I vow more — if, I say, he returns — that [I] will ‘make’ [sacrifice] with a two-year-old [victim], a boar.” Juvenal (satire 9): “‘making’ for the people.” Virgil: “when I ‘make’ [sacrifice] with a heifer, for the crops, do thou thyself come” — as Macrobius reads (Saturnalia bk. 3 ch. 2), or, as Nonius, “when I make a heifer”; just as also Plautus (Aulularia): “O Faith, I will ‘make’ [offer] thee a full gallon-jar of honeyed [wine].” And to this [some] not ineptly recall that Varronian [saying] (bk. 2 On agriculture): “The gods, being ‘made’ [sacrificed to], help.” And that [of] Luke 2:27: “that they might ‘do’ according to the custom of the law for him” — that is, “offer, or sacrifice,” says Suárez (disput. 83, sect. 2, tom. 3), although about this I less assent, since [it] seems only to be signified [that] they did that which the custom of the law willed to be done — as often elsewhere, in the laws and other precepts where [there] is no mention of sacrifices, [it] is said [so]. Thus ῥέζον [rhezon] (Iliad, bk. 2): “…of a lamb; and to another of the ever-living gods he sacrificed…; there the Achaeans were sacrificing to Zeus of all oracles” [Il. 2.400–401]. And with the accusative, the same Poet (Iliad bk. 1): “to make [offer] to Phoebus a holy hecatomb on behalf of the Danaans” [Il. 1.443–444]. And in the Anthology: “having sacrificed a heifer to Cypris.” Similarly, another verb of making, δρᾶν ἀντὶ τῷ θύειν [dran anti tou thyein, “to do” instead of “to sacrifice”], was employed — as Athenaeus (bk. 14) is [the] author, from Clitodemus, and, from both, the most learned Budaeus (fol. 342). Of the verb ποιεῖν [poiein] examples likewise are adduced, together with the Hebrew. For [in] Lev. 15 v. 15, when Moses prescribed, for the purgation of one with a flux, two turtledoves or pigeons to be sacrificed, he says, word-for-word in Hebrew: “And the Priest shall make these — one [for] sin, the other [for] a holocaust” — that is, he shall immolate one for sin, the other for a holocaust. In Greek, καὶ ποιήσει αὐτὰ ὁ ἱερεὺς, μίαν περὶ ἁμαρτίας, καὶ μίαν εἰς ὁλοκαύτωμα [kai poiēsei auta ho hiereus, mian peri hamartias, kai mian eis holokautōma]. And in the same manner, when [the discourse is] about the sacrifice of the Nazarite,—
(col. 538 — right column; printed “545”)
—[it] is treated [in] Num. 6 v. 11, both in Hebrew and Greek. And 3 Kings [1 Kgs] 8 v. 64; in the same book, ch. 18 v. 23, where Elijah, contending against the sacrificers of empty gods, demands two oxen, which they should sacrifice without fire: “And I,” he says, אעשה [eʿeseh] “will make [sacrifice] one ox,” ἐγὼ ποιήσω τὸν βοῦν τὸν ἄλλον [egō poiēsō ton boun ton allon]. Hosea (2:8): “I multiplied silver to her, and gold, which” עשו [ʿasu] “they made [for] Baal,” ἀργυρᾶ καὶ χρυσᾶ ἐποίησε τῇ Βάαλ [argyra kai chrysa epoiēse tē Baal]. More of that kind [it] is [possible] to find, but these [are] enough — from which, however, [it] is understood how unlearnedly Calvin wrote (in the Antidote to the Articles of the Parisians): [that] the verb “to make,” even if in Latin [it] be taken for “to sacrifice,” yet [does] not [so] in Hebrew or Syriac. See Bellarmine (bk. On the Mass, ch. 12). But that that Pascha was a sacrifice is plain [from] Exod. 23 v. 18; Deut. 16; Num. 9 v. 7 & 13, where [it] is always called קרבן [qorban, “an offering”]; and Num. 9, when [it] is said: “You shall not immolate upon leaven.” Josephus (bk. 3 ch. 11): [he] sacrifices “the sacrifice called pascha” — or, slaughters the sacrifice called pascha. And therefore, in the Hebrews’ little book Tseror ha-Mor (fol. 70), [it] is written [that] the pascha ought to be roasted, [so] that [it] be a sacrifice. And Josephus (bk. 3 Antiquities ch. 10), “the sacrifice called pascha,” says [it] must be sacrificed every year. And Abulensis teaches [this] (Exod. 23:27); Bellarmine (bk. On the Mass ch. 7, with added places, from Mark ch. 14; 1 Cor. 5). And Calvin confesses [it] (1 Cor. 5), and Junius (in [his] annotations on Num. 9, note 3), saying: “The paschal lamb is a Eucharistic sacrifice, or [a sacrifice] of the peace-offerings [pacifica].” And nearly the same [says] Scaliger (bk. 6, On emendation, fol. 535). But because the consumption of the same [victim] looks to a certain perfection and integrity of the sacrifice, therefore sometimes he who eats the pascha is also said “to make” it (Num. 9 v. 13), as is understood from v. 12. See below, quaest. 21 & 24.