Exodus 12:21-41

New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition

²¹ Then Moses called all the elders of Israel and said to them, “Go, select lambs for your families, and slaughter the Passover lamb.^{(A) 22} Take a bunch of hyssop, dip it in the blood that is in the basin, and touch the lintel and the two doorposts with the blood in the basin. None of you shall go outside the door of your house until morning.^{(B) 23} For the Lord will pass through to strike down the Egyptians; when he sees the blood on the lintel and on the two doorposts, the Lord will pass over that door and will not allow the destroyer to enter your houses to strike you down.^{(C) 24} You shall observe this as a perpetual ordinance for you and your children.^{(D) 25} When you come to the land that the Lord will give you, as he has promised, you shall keep this observance. ²⁶ And when your children ask you, ‘What does this observance mean to you?’^{(E) 27} you shall say, ‘It is the Passover sacrifice to the Lord, for he passed over the houses of the Israelites in Egypt when he struck down the Egyptians but spared our houses.’ ” And the people bowed down and worshiped.^(F)

²⁸ The Israelites went and did just as the Lord had commanded Moses and Aaron; so they did.

The Tenth Plague: Death of the Firstborn

²⁹ At midnight the Lord struck down all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sat on his throne to the firstborn of the prisoner who was in the dungeon and all the firstborn of the livestock.^{(G) 30} Pharaoh arose in the night, he and all his officials and all the Egyptians, and there was a loud cry in Egypt, for there was not a house without someone dead.^{(H) 31} Then he summoned Moses and Aaron in the night and said, “Rise up, go away from my people, both you and the Israelites! Go, serve the Lord, as you said.^{(I) 32} Take your flocks and your herds, as you said, and be gone. And ask a blessing for me, too!”^(J)

The Exodus: From Rameses to Succoth

³³ The Egyptians urged the people to hasten their departure from the land, for they said, “We shall all be dead.”^{(K) 34} So the people took their dough before it was leavened, with their kneading bowls wrapped up in their cloaks on their shoulders. ³⁵ The Israelites had acted according to the word of Moses; they had asked the Egyptians for jewelry of silver and gold and for clothing,^{(L) 36} and the Lord had given the people favor in the sight of the Egyptians, so that they let them have what they asked. And so they plundered the Egyptians.^(M)

³⁷ The Israelites journeyed from Rameses to Succoth, about six hundred thousand men on foot, besides little ones.^{(N) 38} A mixed crowd also went up with them and livestock in great numbers, both flocks and herds.^{(O) 39} They baked unleavened cakes of the dough that they had brought out of Egypt; it was not leavened, because they were driven out of Egypt and could not wait, nor had they prepared any provisions for themselves.^(P)

⁴⁰ The time that the Israelites had lived in Egypt was four hundred thirty years.^{(Q) 41} At the end of four hundred thirty years, on that very day, all the companies of the Lord went out from the land of Egypt.^(R)