The manner can be considered [as] twofold. One, as regards the very beast to be eaten; the other, as regards the eaters. And as regards that [beast], again twofold: for either the preparation of it for eating, or its integrity, is considered. The preparation is placed in these [points]:
First: the lamb was chosen on the tenth day of the first month, and was fed at home until the evening of the 14th day, and kept prepared for slaughter (Exod. 12 v. 3 & 6). But that this ceremony was to be observed only at that time of the Egyptian departure, and not every year afterward, Abulensis handed down (in the same place, after quaestion 4; and Joshua ch. 4 q. 21), and others following him, as Ribera (bk. 5 ch. 3, On the temple). For, first, here [in] ch. 23 below, [in] ch. 16 of Deut., [and] elsewhere, as often as the Passover is treated, [there is] never any repetition of this precept. Then, four causes are adduced why this had to be done at that first time. The first: lest, on account of the various cares and occupations of the departure, the Israelites should forget this lamb. The second: that [there] might be more leisure for examining whether the lamb were such as [it] ought to be, [as] was said above (q. 19). The third: that, by the continual sight and bleating of that lamb, the same Israelites might be admonished of the imminent liberation. The fourth: that they might consider for certain [that] God was bringing help, since they saw — in the very eyes of the Egyptians, and now with impunity — those [animals] which were august deities to them [the Egyptians] being seized [as] living [creatures] and given over to slaughter (Exod. 8). But these reasons do not agree with the following times [i.e. do not apply to the yearly Passover]. But by these [reasons] I am indeed not much moved. For, first, [there] are also other ceremonies here, referring to the following times, which nevertheless are mentioned only here. For example, when—
(col. 553 — left column; printed “560”)
—[the lamb] to be devoured with head, feet, and entrails, with the girding of the loins, the shoeing of the feet, [and] the carrying of a staff. [It] is enough [that] afterward [it] is said, generally, [that] all the paschal rites are to be observed (Num. 9 v. 3, 12, 14). Then, those [four] causes are either less apt, or agree even with the following times. The first indeed seems less apt. For how could they forget the lamb, on whose blood [their] life and the safety of all depended? How [could they] not have its immolation among [their] first and most ancient cares? They ought, in like manner, [to have anticipated] whatever they did not wish [to be] given to oblivion then, by two, three, or four days. The second and third causes are indeed suitable, but they fall out excellently for any year. For it likewise behooved [their] posterity to explore, for four days, the goodness and purity of the fire, which was to be used only for the sacrifice; and to be frequently admonished, by the meeting, sight, and bleating of the tender little lamb, of the past liberation from Egypt. The fourth is inept, since darkness most densely oppressed [for] a triduum that [time] in which the lamb, here destined for immolation, was kept at home — so that the Egyptians could see nothing of what was done by the Jews, as [was] said in [the treatment of] the Egyptian plagues (Exod. 11). Yet be it [so]: [suppose] [there] were not then darkness — [were] not all these [things] done in the houses of the Israelites? Did [the Egyptians] always search their inmost recesses with their [own] eyes? And how would [the Egyptians] now be the more offended [by things] which — as often as at other [times] — they [the Israelites] slaughtered lambs and kids for [their] daily food? For what was said above (q. 20) about these gods pertained to the Hebrews themselves. The Jews today are wont — as will be said below — to spend almost the whole week before the Passover in the preparation of the flour for the unleavened [bread], in the purging of the house and furniture, and in other like [things]: why not also, of old, [did they] yearly prepare lambs? Why would they — that they might approach to the likeness of the first Passover, and the more propitiously renew the old memory — not gladly give four days to that lamb (namely, to choosing [it] from the flock, feeding [it] at home, and proving [it]), when in their own land [it] was now permitted? And indeed [that] this rite was perpetual [yearly], Rupert hands down (bk. 10 on John, on ch. 10 & 11; bk. 2 on Exod. ch. 6; bk. 5, On the divine offices, ch. 7), St. Chrysostom (in St. Thomas’s Catena on John 12), the Venerable Bede (homily on Palm Sunday, and on Matt. 2), St. Anselm, Lyra, [and] Sagneius on John ch. 12 — teaching how, for this reason, the Lord (namely, the true Passover, and the true lamb) willed to enter Jerusalem, and to be received, as [it were], by the whole city five days before his Passion. But some are in doubt why Josephus (bk. 2 Antiquities, near the end) said [that] this lamb had to be prepared on the 13th day. But he does not say [so]. For in the Greek he only says (ch. 5) [that] the Israelites themselves had to be, on the 11th day, [already] prepared and ready for emigrating on the 14th. But in Rufinus’s version (ch. 14) thus: “The Lord ordered Moses to command the people to have the sacrifice prepared; and [he] asserted [that] the Hebrews would be arrayed on the 10th day of the month Xanthicus, and would go out, and would carry off all [things].”
Secondly: the lamb was slaughtered, and its blood was received [caught]; and, in the first Passover indeed, [it] was placed upon both doorposts of the door, and upon the lintel of the house in which it was to be eaten (Exod. 12 v. 7). But whether that ceremony was propagated into all the years afterward, Abulensis answers (q. 10) [that it] was not. First, on account of the reason by which also—
(col. 554 — right column; printed “561”)
—he used above [argued earlier]: [namely] that this ceremony is narrated only in Exod. ch. 12. Secondly: because it was done [so] that the striking Angel, seeing the blood, might leave the houses marked with that blood free from the slaughter. Thirdly: he adds a reason (Exod. 25, q. 27): the warm blood had to be sprinkled on the doors of the houses; but because afterward the immolation of the paschal [victims] was done in the Temple, the warm blood could not be brought home to the house. Thus Junius and Tremellius also assert [that] this was a singular [one-time] mandate. But the first reason [is] already overthrown; the second does not bring [it] about that the same ceremony should not be repeated in memory of that immunity and safety which was then done. For the unleavened [breads] too were then truly eaten on account of the present necessity, and the lack of other bread; yet the memorial of them was thereafter carried down into all posterity by a similar eating. The third reason assumes something that would [itself] have to be proved — namely, that the blood always had to be sprinkled warm on the doors. And yet, if the vessels had first been warmed, [it] could still, by a certain industry, come to pass that the warm blood be brought from the Temple to the house. Lactantius (bk. 4 ch. 26), when he said [that] by the blood of this lamb [it was] pre-signified [that] the world would receive the greatest and sublime sign of the cross on its foreheads, adds: “The figure of which thing the Jews even now exhibit, when they mark their thresholds with the gore of the lamb.” And although this [the Jews] either did — the Jerusalemite Jews (if [there] shall be any) only after the Temple was destroyed — or indeed all [did it], but only in some imitation of the true Passover: [it] is nevertheless understood [that], while [it] was still lawful to make the true Passover, that rite was still wont to be employed; or at least [that] Lactantius reckoned so. Yet we read [that] the priests received the blood of the paschal [victims] from the immolating Levites, and sprinkled [it] (2 Paral. [Chr.] 30 v. 16; ch. 35 v. 11) — namely, that they might touch the horns of the altar (Exod. 23; and Abulensis notes [on] Deut. 16); and then [there] is proved [that] which I was saying above about the immolation in the Temple (q. 21). For thus (ch. 1, corban of the Passover), Rambam says: “The blood of the Passover had to be poured out beside the base of the altar.” And he again advises [that], ordinarily, after the blood of the continual [daily] sacrifice was poured out, the blood of the paschal [victims] had to be poured out — whether the pascha had been slaughtered before this [daily] sacrifice (yet after midday) or not. Now this blood (Exod. 12 v. 22) is said to be “in the threshold” [limen], and into it a bunch of hyssop [is] to be dipped — each of which [phrases] has [its] difficulty. For, 1., for “threshold” [limen], some render “in a basin” [in pelvi] — namely, because the Hebrew Saph [סַף] signifies both “a vessel” and “a threshold”; and the Chaldaean Paraphrase took [it] for “a vessel.” But our [translator] follows the Seventy themselves, who translated [it] παρὰ τὴν θύραν [para tēn thyran, “beside the door”] twice. Then, for “hyssop,” the same [translators], according to the opinion of the Rabbis, wished [it to be] origanum [marjoram], or that which the Arabs call Tzatar [za’atar]. But [it] must be known, 1., [that] the Hebrew ezob [אֵזוֹב] and the Arabic tzatar [are] of a broad signification, primarily and of themselves. For each embraces both hyssop, and all the kinds of origanum, and thymbra, and thyme, and savory — as [it were] joined by affinity. 2., [that it] is rightly rendered here — and almost always elsewhere — “hyssop”: (1) because St. Paul so renders [it] (Heb. 9 v. 19); (2) because here, and [in] Num. 19, Ps. 50 [51], and elsewhere, the Seventy [do]. 3., the very etymology indicates [that] ezob avails against fluxes, cough, indurations, abscesses, and running ulcers. And therefore, [that] which has the greatest power of effecting these [cures] is deservedly called, before the others, “hyssop.” But Tzator [means], properly — as is also indicated by the etymology — that which—
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—[the Arabic tzatar] signifies, of that same kind [savory], the least [i.e. savory in particular]; and therefore [savory] itself too is generally understood [by it] (3 Kings [1 Kgs] 4:32). But the fat [it] was lawful to burn the whole night until the dawn of the next day; to defer [it] further, [was] unlawful — as Rambam teaches there.
Thirdly: the slaughtered lamb was flayed, split open, thoroughly cleaned, and washed. All these [things], however, the use and necessity of the victims taught. But (q. 11) Abulensis thinks the intestines [were] drawn out and washed; Cajetan, however, [that] only the plucked-out gall, and the viscera which contain filth, [were] cast out. No cutting-off of any limbs was otherwise done — not of the legs, not of the head; nor [was there] any dissection into pieces piecemeal: but all was left wholly entire (Exod. 12 v. 46; Num. 9:12; John 19:36). Briefly, in the place cited before, Rambam [says]: “After,” he says, “they poured out the blood of the Passover, they flay [it], and cut open the belly, and draw out the intestines; and [each] scrapes off the fat of his sacrifice separately; and the master of the sacrifice takes his pascha with its skin, and carries [it] home, to Jerusalem.”
Fourthly: the same thoroughly-cleaned and washed lamb was roasted (Exod. 12 v. 9): “You shall not eat of it anything raw, nor boiled with water, but only roasted with fire.” Where [it] is to be observed, first, [that] “raw” is here called not [that] which [was] plainly raw and uncooked, but [that] which [was] less well cooked, or even half-cooked. For, first, the Israelites were not so barbarous and wild that — unless prohibited — they either could or would feed on raw flesh. On the contrary, even among tame and civilized peoples [there] are found not rarely some gluttons, greedy [ones], and impatient of all delay in preparing food, who snatch and devour half-raw and almost still-bloody flesh. Secondly: [there] are, in Aristotle (bk. 4 Meteorology ch. 2 & 3), two artificial species of cooking (of [that] which is done only externally): boiling [elixatio] and roasting [assatio]; and to these two others are opposed, [two] species of rawness or imperfect cooking — to the former [boiling], μόλυνσις [molynsis]; to the latter [roasting], στάπτησις [staptēsis]. God, therefore, wills the lamb to be cooked not by the former species of cooking, but by the latter [roasting], and this not imperfect and στάπτησις, but perfect: so that here the Lord forbids two [things] which are repugnant to roasting — all boiling, and στάπτησις. And those two species of cooking Scripture describes in this place by fire and water, as [it were] by efficient causes, saying in the Hebrew: “You shall not eat of it (the lamb) raw, and [as] a cooking cooked in water; but roasted with fire” — not because that cooking in water is done without fire, but [because it is] done by fire as [it were] the remoter cause, and by water as [it were] the nearer cause. But roasting sometimes has also fire [as] remoter, and air [as] nearer; yet [it] is always a fiery dryness by which that cooking is done, but in boiling a warm moisture acts. Whence also, in Athenaeus (bk. 14), roasted flesh is called by a certain one of the ancients φλογίδες [phlogides, “flame-meats”]. And (2 Paralip. [Chr.] ch. 35) roasting indeed is also called “cooking in fire”; but boiling [is] described by the instruments or vessels in which that moisture is contained, when [it] is said: “The peace-victims, or the holy [things], they cooked in cauldrons, and pans, and pots” — as also 1 Kings [Sam] ch. 2 v. 14. Thirdly: for “raw” in the Hebrew is na [נָא]. Which little word, since elsewhere [it] signifies “now,” or “I pray [you],” Oleaster wonders how, in this one place only, [it] is taken for “raw.” “To me,” he says, “this signification was always suspect.” And—
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—I think the root of this name is [a verb] which is “to break” or “to cut in pieces,” so that here the sense is: “You shall not eat of it broken or cut in pieces” — so that [God] does not wish [it] to be divided into pieces for cooking it in water, but [wills it] to be roasted and eaten whole. But [it] seems to me a great rashness to invent other significations of words than those which the most ancient Rabbis of the Hebrews — the Seventy Translators, I mean, or other Greeks and Latins — have handed down. But in all those [versions], that word is rendered ὠμὸν [ōmon, “raw”]; and in these [Latins], crudum [raw]. If we should interpret it, with Oleaster, “broken” or “cut,” could not another have that interpretation suspect by a like reasoning — because, namely, in this place [only] it is found so? [There] is added [the point] that in this matter the more recent [ones] — even the Rabbis of the Jews — do not at all dissent from the Christian Greeks and Latins. Nay, Rashi says the word [is] Arabic, which signifies “something less than [what] is necessary [for it] to be eaten” — [i.e.] “well cooked.” Hence, perhaps, [comes] our German rho, or rhaw, “raw” — as, from the Hebrew [na], the German gartt [garden] seems [derived], [and] the Latin hortus, the French jardin. For among both Greeks and Latins the change of n into r [is] usual.
But [there] are causes why the Lord preferred this lamb to be roasted rather than boiled. The first: that the speed and readiness of the emigration from Egypt might be signified. For flesh is roasted more quickly than [it] is boiled; so that, for that [reason] (Gen. 18 v. 7), when, to three guests turning aside to him, the most hospitable Abraham hastened a luncheon, [he] is understood to have ordered the roasting of the calf to [his] servant, when [it] is said: “He himself ran to the herd, and took thence a most tender and best calf, and gave [it] to the boy, who hastened and cooked it.” For so also, in Homer (Odyssey 14), Eumaeus, to Ulysses arriving, with the greatest speed slew two little pigs καὶ ἀμφ᾽ ὀβελοῖσιν ἔπειρ᾽ ὀπτήσας [kai amph’ obeloisin epeir’ optēsas, “and, having roasted [them], pierced [them] around on spits”]. Where Eustathius [says]: “Observe [that] Eumaeus sets roasted meats before his master on account of the haste employed.” Yet [there] are today cooks who have, if not greater, at least equal speed in boiling. The second cause: that [it] might be a sacrifice, says the Tseror Hammor. For although — as [was] said above — certain victims were also boiled in cauldrons and pots, yet generally either those victims whole, or that part of them which was more proper to God, was roasted, and at last burned up. And among the Athenians — as Philochorus says, in Athenaeus (bk. 14) — only to the Horae [Seasons] or weather-powers were boiled sacrifices offered. The third cause: because the simplest manner of cooking and seasoning flesh is roasting. Hence, indeed, some think [it] is called by the Latins assum [roast]. For when the ancients said assum [meaning] “that which is alone [plain]” (whence also the word assa [voice], which is poured forth by the mouth alone, without any admixture of musical instruments) — “roast flesh” [assa caro] was [so] called, [flesh] which was brought in among the dishes alone, that is, without any coloring of foreign flavor. The fourth cause: because the same manner [roasting] is also the most ancient of all among mortals — as Varro teaches, and Homer too, by his fables, when to the heroes never boiled, but only roasted, flesh and fish are set — as Athenaeus noted (bk. 1), Eustathius (on Iliad μ [12]), and Servius (on Aeneid 1): “In the heroic times,” he says, “they did not feed on boiled flesh.” Which, however, [they] teach [to be] true only of the very first times of the different regions, [from the fact] that [there] are also things scattered [in the sources] about boiling among the ancients. For (Metamorphoses bk. 1) Ovid [says]: “And—
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“And so [she], half-alive [still living], partly softens the limbs in seething waters, partly the putting-under scorched [them] with fire.” [Ovid, Met. 6]
And the same [poet], of Itylus:
“Part thence leaps in the hollow cauldrons, part hisses on the spits.”
Bk. 8, Valerius Flaccus:
“Part [is] on the spits, part foams up in the surging cauldron.”
Seneca, Thyestes:
“These entrails cling on the spits; and, given to slow furnaces, they drip; those the boiling water tosses, the cauldron complaining.”
Juvenal, Satire 15:
“Nor did [he] boil [it] down in a burning cauldron, nor on spits.”
Claudian, In Eutropium:
“Which parts he will fix on the spits; which he will hand to the vainly-warm[ing] water [i.e. boil].”
And what [need] of many [words]? We see, in this chapter of Exodus and in the others cited above, [that] cooking in water, or in cauldrons and pots, is expressly named, before those heroic times almost were. You will see — if these dainty [tidbits] delight you — Josephus Casaubon in [his] Various Readings, and Corradus. The fifth cause: to men [who are] at leisure, or occupied with the exercise of the mind, boiled [meats] are indeed more useful and healthful, as Eustathius (cited, on Odyssey 14) shows, [and] Albertus (on the Meteora, bk. 14); [but] Athenaeus [shows that] roasted [meats are] more conducive to the more robust, and [those] laboring in body. But the Israelites now had to set out on a journey on foot. The sixth cause is [that] of CHRIST the Lord — the figure of the true lamb — as St. Justin hands down (against Trypho). But of that afterward, in its [own] place.
But if the viscera had been drawn out of the lamb, [then], that they might be roasted, they were put back into their [own] place, and stuffed in again. This roasting was wont to be done in furnaces, as Rambam indicates, and from him Scaliger (bk. 2, On the emendation of times, p. 102).
V. The roasted lamb was eaten (in the same ch. of Exod., v. 8). Where, because [it] is [written], “They shall eat the flesh,” some of the Jews (in Abulensis, quaest. 10) thought [that] neither the sinews nor the cartilages [were] to be eaten. But [in fact], when the eating of flesh is treated of, that word is never wont to be taken so narrowly. Then [it] appears [that] here mention of “flesh” only [was] made for this [reason]: that [it] might be opposed to the bones, which — lest the marrow be sought in the eating — [it] was forbidden to break. But now — in a ceremony in which [there] are continual, as [it were], symbols of haste — who would believe [that] a laborious separation of the sinews and cartilages from the flesh and bones — [a separation] which could be done only slowly — [was] prescribed? Since, besides, cartilages are either joined to some bone, or solitary: was [it] permitted [to eat] none, or only some? If none, then he could eat neither the larynx, nor the epiglottis, nor the [outer] ears, nor the many others which gird and fortify especially the extremities of the false ribs and bones. How, then, [at] v. 9, was [it] commanded [that] the head be devoured with the feet and the intestines? But if [it] was permitted to eat some, which [ones], and why those rather than others? A like question could be [asked] about the sinews, since they are sometimes taken for ligaments and tendons, and for the other part of the muscles, as Fernelius shows (Anatomy ch. 5 & 10), Vesalius (bk. 2 & 4) — sometimes for long and rounded vessels—
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—through which the spirits called “animal” are carried down from the brain. And because this looks to the integrity of the beast to be eaten, [there] are to be subjoined [the things] which look to the same, at v. 9 & 10: “You shall devour the head with its feet and the intestines. Nor shall anything of it remain until morning. If anything be left over, you shall burn [it] with fire.” Where the Translator put the verb “to devour” [vorare] for the verb “to eat,” to express the haste the more. Otherwise the Hebrew uses the verb “to eat” [only] once, and that [only] at the beginning of the period. And “the feet” ought to be taken a little more broadly, so that the legs too be signified. For these [words] are in the Hebrew; and indeed in such a way that from that word the Latin crura [legs] seems [to be] born. But lest anything could be left over, the Lord had provided (v. 4) by granting [only] such a number of banqueters as would be enough for eating the whole lamb. But [there] are here four little questions.
The first: why did the Lord will [that] nothing of the lamb be left over until the morning time? The general answer is [that] he did not wish those [things] which had been sacrificed to him to come into profane — much less abject and sordid — use. And that could happen, if the eating of them were extended into more days. For the flesh taken [as sacrificed] to God — [could], like any other profane [flesh], be brought moderately to the daily table by any head of household, and so the family be sustained; [it] could also be corrupted by excessive heat or moisture, stink and rot, and so become food for dogs or cats. But each [is] alien to the dignity of the sacrifice. For this cause, the Lord guarded [against] this in every kind of sacrifices (Lev. 7); but in such a way that [he] granted sometimes only one day, sometimes two, for consuming the victims, never a third (in the same place, v. 15, 19; and in Josephus, 3 Antiquities ch. 10, in Greek). Because, therefore, the lamb was a sacrifice, for that [reason] he prescribed a fixed time for eating it. But why did he give only one day — nay, [one] night? That the memory of the haste undertaken in eating the first lamb might be the more vigorous [and] perpetual. For, since [they] had to depart on the very next day, if they had left the lambs half-eaten, these [remains], on the morrow, would have been either a new burden to [them] departing, or a spat-upon mockery to the Egyptians, [their] enemies.
The second: why [was] such express mention made of the foot and of the intestines? First, because someone could have suspected [that] these [were] to be omitted, [on the ground] that all boiling of the lamb was rejected, and these are not wont to be roasted. For the feet, since [they are] both dry and very sinewy, would easily be burned up; the intestines, on account of the viscous and tenacious humor, would be roasted with difficulty; or, on account of the tenderness and softness of the fibers, would easily be either scorched or shriveled. Then, because the custom of certain nations does not eat either those [feet] or these [intestines], or at least scarcely [does].
The third: what is understood by those words, “if anything be left over”? Some understand [the] bones. But the particle “if” would not have been [needed]; for [it] would be established [that] those [bones] remain. Tremellius, in [his] annotations, includes also the hide. But neither would “if” have had to be said [for that]. For [what] nations [are] so wild and monstrous as to devour the wool and hide of the lamb? Not even in the holocausts were the skins of the animals burned; but they fell into the possession of the sacrificing priest (Lev. 7 v. 8). And what occupation, [and] who—
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—[what occupation, and who] would there be [a] stench in the whole city, if so many hides and bones had to be burned in so many houses in almost the same hour? [It] is treated, I think, of those remains of the lamb alone which could come into food, and which were said above [to be] comprehended under the one word “flesh.” For the fat of the lamb was owed to the Lord, and was burned on his altar the same day (Exod. 12), just as [with] all the other victims (Lev. 1, 3, 4, 5).
The fourth [little question]: why did the Lord will [that] the residue be burned with fire? This the Lord sanctioned in other sacrifices too (Lev. 7 v. 17, 19); and that because fire is the purest among these impure elements, most efficacious for acting, [and] most swift for consuming; and truly because fire is wont to add a certain sacrificial perfection to the already-slaughtered victim, when [it] either roasts it, or cooks [it] in pots, or devours [it] on the altars, or, finally, works [it up] in the stomachs and livers of men. [It is] fitting, therefore, that if anything be at any time left over, even from the eating of men, the fire should have and feed upon this whole. Which is done today too, if [it] ever happens [that] the Eucharistic species, by too great age, or from any other cause, become worm-eaten, rot, turn sour, [or] be corrupted. But to the same integrity and manner seems to look [that] which is handed down (v. 46): [that] no little particle of the lamb itself be carried out of the house in which the banquet is, and that no one go out (v. 22). But of this afterward. Now [let us treat] of the manner as regards those [things] which ought to be eaten with [the lamb].
VI. With the lamb ought to be eaten unleavened breads and wild lettuce (v. 8; Num. 9 v. 11). But [it is] to be observed, first, [that] there, in the Hebrew, the breads are said [to be] eaten [in one clause], but in another member of the sentence, and afterward, [it] is subjoined: “with bitter [things] they shall eat [it]” — namely, the lamb. In the Numbers place [it] is, “with unleavened and bitter [things] they shall eat it.” And of the unleavened [breads] [more] in another place below; but the “bitter” [things] — which agree almost by the very word with the Hebrew merorim — in the Chaldaean Paraphrast, the Talmudists, Lyra, Pagninus, Tremellius, [and] Scaliger are expounded in Greek [as] ἄγρια λάχανα [agria lachana], that is, “any bitter herb.” But our Translator put a certain species of them; and rightly. For, first, the Seventy also did the same, when they translate ἐπὶ πικρίδων [epi pikridōn]. But this Greek name — although St. Cyprian retains [it] — signifies not any bitter herb whatever, but a certain single kind, in Aristotle (bk. 9 On the history of animals, ch. 6), where Gaza [renders it], conveniently to our text, thus: “The Dragon [serpent], when [it] is troubled with nausea from eating apples, sucks up the juice of wild lettuce.” Elsewhere [Aristotle] calls [it] amaraginē [bitter-herb]. 2. The most renowned expositor of the Jews himself, Rashi, similarly interprets [it] “wild lettuces.” 3. Since the Hebrew name [merorim] universally denotes anything bitter (as [in] Lamentations 3; Job 9), whence do those Translators [get] that “herbs” rather than other bitter things [are] to be taken? For many [things] of bitter flavor are found in fruits and juices and other things, besides herbs; and do not even now, today, the Jews bring salt water and vinegar to that table? But why would someone not contend [that] the lamb is commanded to be eaten so entirely that not even the gall is to be rejected? They will answer [that], from the very usage of the Jews, [it] is known [that] bitter herbs are signified, since they employ these there.
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But I likewise say [that] the Seventy saw pikrides [πικρίδας] employed, [and] our Translator “wild lettuces”; and therefore [each] expressed the genus by a species which was indeed known and usual — both he [the Vulgate] and those [the LXX]. But [that there] are some [kinds] of lettuces [that are] more bitter, Athenaeus (bk. 2) and Pliny (bk. 19 ch. 8) teach, where, when [Pliny] had enumerated the lettuces — purple, curly, Cappadocian, and other Greek [ones] — he added, accommodately to our Greek and Latin text: “but the worst kind, with a reproach of [its] bitterness, they called picris.” In Germany the Jews use, at this time, in their Passover, larger radishes, which [they] call Meerrettich [horseradish], as [it were] “sea-[radishes],” or “bitter [ones]” — of which, in these regions, [there] is great use among all, with boiled hens and other flesh. If, therefore, someone should express or render those “bitter [things]” by the names of these, [as] “with larger, sea-, or bitter radishes,” [he] would not badly derive the word from the very usage.
So in the Halachoth Seder of the book Pesach (fol. 118), various species are recounted. Fifthly: in the Talmud (ch. On the paschal [lamb], [on] the evening) [it] is commanded [that] there be set out azymus [unleavened bread] and charoseth. But what [is] that? In the Treasury of the Syrians (fol. 19), Moses Mardenus says [that] charusa is a sharp taste. For St. Ephrem too, in [his] little book On the composition of man, joins [it] with τῷ chamutso [χαμουτσω], that is, “sour,” from vinegar. And in the same little book [Ephrem] several times uses the word charuso for those roughnesses which are in the “rough artery” [windpipe], as [they] call [it], and for the villi of the stomach. And therefore charoseth seems to be any edible, or any sauce [embamma], of a bitter and, as [it were], sourish taste. Of which kind [it] can be made from the darker lettuces, and endives, radishes, and other like vegetables of a sharper juice; and [it] is made by the Jews today to that thickness with which mustard [sinapi] among us is wont to be set on the table in little dishes — [called] by the Italians, as [it were], mostacea, by the French moutarde, as Scaliger notes (bk. 5, On emendation, fol. 536). [It] can therefore be generally taken [that] the Paschal lamb [is] to be eaten with certain bitter [things]; or, if one please to speak specifically, that kind can be expressed out of the bitter [things] which the usage of the Jews and of the region brings. But two [things] can still be asked.
The one: whether this eating of bitter [things] had to be done with the lamb — so that, at the same time as its flesh was eaten, those [bitter things] too were eaten — or [rather] separately, and indeed after those [the meat]? Scaliger (in the cited place, p. 535) asserts, after. And his reason [is] twofold. The former: because the greatest solemnities of the Jews — such as the Passover, Pentecost, [and] Scenopegia [Tabernacles] — while their wealth flourished and the Temple stood, were always transacted with the eating of two suppers [courses]. In the former, they fed on the immolated victims; in the other, certain “propitiatory and thanksgiving [things]” [ἐξιλαστικὰ καὶ εὐχαριστικά] were sung; and those “second tables” [second courses] were furnished with various desserts [bellaria] — except in the Paschal [supper], in which, into the place of the desserts, was brought, in a dish [tryblion], a salad [acetarium] of endives and wild lettuces; whose juice, because [it is] sharp and bitter, therefore a sauce was made of vinegar and other [things] I know not what, into which they dipped the unleavened [breads] and those bitter vegetables. For in their rituals [there] is a canon by which [they] are forbidden, after the eating of the Passover, to employ the ephicomen [afikoman]. For thus, half-Greek, [they] call τὸ ἐπίκωμον [to epikōmon], that is, those desserts, which by the ancestral name were called kinnuah. The latter reason is from another canon, which orders “a second washing when the bitter [things] are to be taken”: δεῖ δευτέρα βαπτισμὰ ἐπὶ τῶν ἀγριολαχάνων [dei deutera baptisma epi tōn agriolachanōn, “there must be a second dipping upon the wild herbs”]. But if we consult the text, from it we [can] only with difficulty carve out that custom. For—
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For in the same manner and time, in that Paschal supper, both the bitter [things] and the unleavened [breads] are commanded to be eaten. But [were] not these eaten with the very flesh of the lamb? Or [were] these — [a thing] which is wont to be corrected in children — taken without any admixture of bread, and entirely alone? Therefore [it] behooved [them] to eat those bitter [things] with them [the lamb & bread]. And so much the more fittingly, [in] as much as we see [it is] more usual that to roasted flesh sauces of that kind are joined; so that, if others be lacking, [they] are made even from the first fresh crop, from sorrel [oxalis], and other juicy and pounded [things]. Then, the Hebrew particle bal [עַל, al], which hitherto we have rendered “with,” indicates rather a connection of this kind — that the lamb be eaten upon these bitter [herbs]. But this in no way signifies “after the lamb,” but either “in and with the bitter [things],” or at least “after the bitter [things]”; so that if the lamb had to be eaten alone, and the bitter [things] alone, these [bitter things] would rather have to be taken before it [the lamb]. I would think, therefore, [that] the bitter [things] were taken in both manners and times; but together with the very flesh of the lamb, from the first institution and the text. For (Deut. 16 v. 3) by the same particle the lamb is forbidden to be eaten upon leaven for seven days, but [it] is commanded to be eaten “upon the unleavened [breads]” — that is, not with leaven, but with the unleavened. But after those flesh[-portions] were eaten, from a certain custom and discipline — from which the prescription too of several suppers [courses], and of washings, and of like [things arose] — these more-bitter [things] were still eaten [afterward].
But the latter [thing] which can be asked is: what was the cause of those bitter [things] to the Lord? All answer [that] it was done, that the Israelites might preserve, by that annual bitterness, the memory of the harshness which they endured in the Egyptian servitude. But perhaps [there] was also something of superstition, among the Egyptians, in the eating of the lettuces which our Translator put. For, in the cited place, Pliny — when he relates [that] Augustus [was] cured by Musa the physician [with] lettuce — adds [that] the earlier [ancients] had not dared this, because [they] were prohibited by religion. And Athenaeus (bk. 2) shows [that there] were many who detested lettuces, either because Adonis was fancied to have hidden in them, or because they blunted and restrained the lust of the flesh. Hence, indeed, this kind of vegetable was called by some ἄσωτος [asōtos], by others εὐνούχειος [eunoucheios, “eunuch-plant”], and by a certain one also “the food of the dead” — [so called], by the same witnesses, and by Rhodiginus (bk. 27, last ch.). But, oh the madmen — who, that they might more licentiously drink poison, detested the antidotes!
VII. But as regards the very [persons] eating the lamb, a fourfold manner is required in them (v. 11). First: that [they] be girded at the loins. Secondly: that [they be] shod. Thirdly: that [they be] carrying a staff in [their] hands. Fourthly: that [they be] hastening. And the first indeed [is] sought from the custom of the ancient Orientals especially (among whom [there] is this custom even now), who mostly use togas [long robes] and ankle-length [garments]. And therefore, when a journey [is] to be made, they gather up the garment, and gird themselves (4 Kings [2 Kgs] 4; Tob. 5 v. 5). Whence also those [phrases], “to be in readiness [in procinctu],” “to gird oneself for the journey,” and the like. See [on] Ephesians; St. Jerome; St. Ambrose (bk. 2 On penance ch. 3; bk. 7 on Luke). But he seems (bk. 1 On Cain ch. 8) to signify [that] they put off [their] shoes — which, however, is repugnant to the text. The third [mode] is wholly [that] of the travelers of that time. For they were wont to carry not spears and swords, but only staffs. For hence, only for the sake of sacrifice, Abraham carries a sword — not at [his] side, or over [his] shoulder, but in [his] hands (Gen. 22 v. 6); Jacob crosses the Jordan on his staff (Gen. 32:10); Judah goes to Thamnas [Timnah] with a staff in [his] hand (Gen. 38 v. 18 & 25); Balaam, angry at his ass, cries on the way (Num. 22 v. 29): “Would that I had a sword, that I might strike thee!”; Samson goes to his marriage at Thamnatha into the land of the Philis-—
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—tines, and had nothing of arms in [his] hand when the Lion met [him] (Judges 14 v. 6). David comes into Nobe [Nob]; and, because he said [that] the King’s word was urgent, he took no sword with him — in the manner not of a courtier or a military man, but of a common traveler (1 Kings [Sam] 21 v. 8). And St. Chrysostom (hom. 13 on Ephesians) counts this same [carrying a staff] among the marks of τῶν ὁδοιπορούντων [tōn hodoiporountōn, “of travelers”]. And this too was familiar, as today, to shepherds. And all the Israelites professed themselves [to be] of this kind (Gen. 46:34). For hence too [is] Moses’s rod (Exod. 4). And that [saying] of the Poet:
“As the shepherd leaned on his staff, and sat down on a rock.”
The fourth [mode] was commanded because the departure was imminent; and therefore nothing was to be lingered-over at table — [which] the ancients called tuburcinari [to gorge hastily]. But [there are] here two questions.
The one: whether they had to eat standing? The other: whether those rites were perpetual and annual, or [were] to be used only in the first Passover? To the former question Philo answers [yes] (in the book On the sacrifice of Abel and Cain); and Scaliger embraces that (bk. 6, fol. 534), and everywhere the Painters [so depict it]. But in the text [it] is nowhere commanded; and the contrary [was] observed, both today and of old. For they adorn [their] couches with coverlet-cloths as rich and precious as they can, and recline on them. And in the Talmud (ch. Kiddush ha-pesach): “On other nights we, while we eat or drink, partly sit, partly recline; but on this Paschal [night], kullanu mesubbin — that is, we all recline.” And [did] not CHRIST the Lord recline with the Apostles in a great furnished dining-room [triclinium], and eat the Passover? (Luke 22:12; Matt. 26:19 & 20). But although the posture is not here expressly set down, yet I think [it] sufficiently indicated. For [those] who had to be girded at the loins, and ready for the journey, and who [had to be] furnished with shoes and leaning on staffs — could they lie on a couch? And I see [that] Maldonatus—
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—our Maldonatus (on Matt. 26 v. 20) agrees. The [things] which are objected concerning the later times will be understood from the other question already posited. To that, then, Scaliger (in the cited book, fol. 534), Tremellius, and Junius answer, [that] those rites were to be employed only in that first Passover.
For to what [end] otherwise? “The readiness [procinctus],” says Scaliger, “signified the necessity of hastening, and the danger of the imminent enemy. But afterward, no enemy being imminent, they were secure; and therefore they ate the Passover not standing, but sitting, or rather reclining. Then, nowhere else are those same rites repeated.” But this [was] already removed above. And in the Passovers of the later times, not any necessity which [existed] then, but only the memory of that [necessity] which [had existed] of old, could demand those rites. And [it] plainly appears — from the beginning of that chapter (Exod. 12), and from v. 24 & 15 — [that] not the ceremony of one day only, but of all the following times, is sanctioned. St. Chrysostom indeed, in that homily 23, about to expound those rites allegorically, first treats of the history, and says: “The Jews were forgetful of God’s benefits. God, therefore, did not bind his own benefits to time only, but also to the posture or habit of those eating. For therefore [they] now feed girded and shod, that, being asked, they may say: because we were ready to make the journey, and because we were ready to go out of Egypt now into the land of promise. This indeed the type wills. But the truth itself is [that] by which we too eat the Passover — CHRIST. ‘For our Passover,’ he says, ‘is CHRIST.’ What, then? We too ought to eat shod, and we [too] girded. Wherefore? That we too may be ready for the going-out, and for the pilgrimage from this world.” But I see [that they] describe [what] the Talmudists and the other Rabbis of the Jews sanctioned after they ceased to inhabit Jerusalem and to offer the true sacrifice. For then, that they might seem to preserve a certain majesty of the ancient ceremony, they instituted various [things] which [were] not before, and changed [things] which were [before] — the Passover itself, that is, or the victim, being now immolated and taken away [i.e. no longer possible]: so that that “NOW” of St. Chrysostom is referred not to the time in which he was speaking, but [to that] in which the lamb was eaten, after that first precept of the Lord. Only those words of the Evangelists — ἀνακεῖσθαι [anakeisthai, “to recline”] into ἀναπεσεῖν [anapesein, “to lie down”], and likewise ὁ ἀνάγαιον [ho anagaion, “the upper room”], ἐστρωμένον [estrōmenon, “furnished”] — seem to obstruct this exposition. For plainly [it] seems to certain [scholars] [that], in the time of CHRIST the Lord, these reclinings, and these spread foods, were in use — as [to] Ciaconus, Baronius, Lipsius. And then, what is said, except [that] the Lord reclined not at [over] the lamb, but at the Eucharist — as [it] seemed to Euthymius; or at least [that] those rites [were] indeed prescribed, and thereafter kept for a long time, but, by the very usage of the meal gradually changing, [were] wholly overwhelmed, and — without the fault of anyone good — omitted. But that [former view] Maldonatus refutes in the same place; [and] the latter we can scarcely defend. For the laws of men can be antiquated by other laws of men, or by customs; but what could contravene the laws of God? What [could] a human [thing] weaken—
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—their authority? Are those words, then, used catachrestically [by a misapplication]? For today too, since all use of dining-couches has ceased, we nevertheless say “to recline [accumbere] at table” for “to sit,” and “triclinium” for the place of food. Thus Maldonatus, in the cited place, has not yet resolved that [difficulty].
VII. [continued] I will set down some more little questions.
The first: whether the lamb had to be eaten by messes [companies]? Scaliger asserts [it] (in the cited place), saying [that] by Josephus [they] are called φρατρίας [phratrias, “brotherhoods”], which in St. Mark (ch. 6) are συμπόσια [sympōsia, “companies”] and πρασιαί [prasiai, “ranks”]. But that [was] touched above, quaest. 15.
The second: how many could feast at once for eating the lamb? In Scripture the number is not defined, but (Exod. 12 v. 4) so great [a number] is prescribed as would be enough for eating it up entirely. And it can indeed be as great as you please, but not as small as you please. And therefore Josephus (bk. 6 of the War, ch. 45) says [that] at least ten men had to be present, as [was] noted [in] quaest. 21. And (part 2, ch. 13) Rambam, discussing how many Jews had to be in some city or village that they might have a Synagogue, holds the same reckoning of numbering: “Wherever,” he says, “[there] are ten sons of Israel, they have need of a beth ha-keneseth, that is, a house of assembly, or Synagogue.” And this the Jews say they gather from Num. 14 v. [27], “How long” — where, by the Hebrew עדה [ʿedah], the ten spies are signified; and so [that there] cannot be an ʿedah, or Church [assembly], unless ten come together.
The third: whether [there was] any precept about drink in that same paschal banquet? In Scripture, nothing at all — so that even in that way [it] might already then appear [that] the cup is not so greatly to be demanded by the Laity, as will perhaps be said below. But among the Rabbis, [there are] a good many [things] about it, in which [these] three [are] chief. First: that each one drink at least four cups of wine. For thus the great book of precepts, in Halachoth Seder [le-]Leil Pesach (fol. 118, first column), prescribes: “Every person — whether they be men or women — is bound this night to drink four cups of wine, nor to detract anything from these.” And of these [is] Halachoth Arbaʿ [kosoth] Pesachim, on which there exists a singular commentary of R. Elias Mizrachi. Second: that this wine be red. For in the same place [it] is added: “And adom wine — that is, red — is commanded.” Whence also, of the present-day ceremonies of the Jews, Pfefferkorn narrates this: “Of those supping and reclining, each man or woman has his own cup, into which is poured red wine of some [kind]. For in that supper they do not drink wine of another color.” Third: that certain prayers or blessings be joined to each of the four cups. Whence also the fourth [cup] is called cos hillel — that is, “the cup of the hymn,” or of praise. But of these [more] again below, quaest. 34 & 39.